Inside Iowa State

Jan. 12, 2007

Council elects two presidents-elect

by Anne Krapfl

The Professional and Scientific Council reset its leadership slate for the next few years during its Jan. 10 meeting. In a special election, council member Dan Woodin was elected to fill the president-elect spot vacated in November by Teresa Peterson. Woodin will become president of the council in June. Woodin, a team leader in IT Services, also served as council president in 2005-06 and back-to-back terms from 1992 to 1994.

In the council's regular January election of its next president-elect, they selected Lynne Mumm, a commercialization associate with IPRT Company Assistance. Mumm begins serving as president-elect in June and council president in June 2008.

In other business, the council approved a final report and recommendations on the proposed budget model. The council endorsed "with reservation" the proposed Resource Management Model. Key reservations are that the model be implemented only if the university receives the flexibility to carry over funds, called "strategic reserve funds" in the proposed model, and that, if implemented, the focus remain on the primary, original purpose for investigating a change -- to provide incentives for student recruitment and retention and external funding.

Among the council's other recommendations:

• Implement the model with the least amount of complexity possible. Add layers and levels as deemed necessary. Driving the model down too far into smaller units stifles creativity and likely would cost more to administer.
• Advisory committees, as proposed, are too large and the guidelines for their membership too complex. Give deans and administrators more flexibility in this area.
• Monitor salary equity issues to ensure that new or different revenue streams do not exacerbate current issues regarding salary competitiveness among units.
• Give the proposed model and its formulas a chance to work. The first evaluation should be done no sooner than year three of implementation.
• Add instructions to the implementation plan that require vice presidents and major units to communicate new policies and procedures with the sub-units that report to them.
• Fund the implementation costs of the new budget model from the Institutional Excellence Fund; protect the academic core from unintended consequences.

Guaranteed use of carry over funds, size of advisory committees and implementation costs are among the items presented in a P&S Council response to the proposed Resource Management Model.