Inside Iowa State

June 12, 2008

Regents approve ISU compensation plan

by Anne Krapfl and Diana Pounds

Iowa State will distribute $16.6 million in the next fiscal year for salary and benefits increases for faculty and staff. The Board of Regents, State of Iowa, approved ISU's compensation plan during a June 12 meeting in Ames.

For the second year, the plan includes salary funds targeted to departments and individuals in high-priority areas and those whose salaries are severely below market. For faculty, the pool is $2.9 million and for P&S staff, it's $600,000.

Details of the FY09 compensation plan.

The compensation plan doesn't specify an average salary increase for faculty and P&S staff. Merit increases are determined by the collective bargaining agreement between the state of Iowa and AFSCME. Under the current contract, Merit employees will receive a 3.0 percent salary increase on July 1. On an employee's review date during FY09, each will receive a 4.5 percent increase up to the maximum of his or her pay grade. Those at the maximum pay grade levels will not receive a second increase.

Community college transfer credits made easy on new Web site

Regents heard a report on the articulation Web site that will allow students enrolling in a community college courses to find out which credits are transferable to the state universities and how they would be applied. The site, called TransferInIowa.org, has been completed and will go live on July 1. The site was constructed and is being supported on an Iowa State University server.

New programs

The board approved Iowa State requests to:

• Establish a B.S. program in culinary science in the department of food science and human nutrition, which is jointly administered by the colleges of Agriculture and Life Sciences and Human Sciences. The program will prepare culinary scientists as both food scientists and chefs.
• Establish a B.S. in global resource systems, administered by the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Students in the program will develop leadership skills through an experiential learning component, foreign language study, an immersion experience abroad and senior thesis.
• Establish a B.S. in biological systems engineering, administered by the department of agricultural and biosystems engineering in the College of Engineering. The program, which integrates life sciences with engineering, will offer four options: biorenewable resources, bioenvironmental engineering, food engineering, and pre-professional/pre-graduate.
• Establish a B.A. in world languages and cultures, administered by the department of world languages and cultures in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The program reconfigures the current structure of separate majors in Spanish, French, German and Russian students into a single major. There will be no change in requirements for major concentrations.

New names

The board approved requests to:

• Change the name of the interdepartmental graduate major (M.S. and Ph.D.) in plant physiology to interdepartmental graduate major in plant biology.
• Change the name of the B.S. in entomology to B.S. in insect science.
• Change the name of the B.S. in agricultural education to B.S. in agriculture and life sciences education.

Regents initiatives

Board President David Miles said in the coming months, the regents will:

Develop a new strategic plan

Develop a communications plan to more effectively communicate the impact and value of the regents institutions to Iowans

Analyze the affordability of higher education for students and their families

Launch a collaborative effort to achieve more sustainability and conservation among regents institutions

Universities will review sexual assault policies

The regents recommended that University of Iowa officials consolidate sexual assault investigations in one office and take a number of other steps to improve handling of those investigations. In addition, the regents asked Iowa State and University of Northern Iowa leaders to review their procedures and policies in light of the recommendations. The universities will report on those reviews in September.

The recommendations were a result of a regents request to its board office to review whether University of Iowa officials followed proper procedures in investigating an alleged sexual assault that occurred at Iowa in October 2007. The board office concluded that Iowa followed established policies and practices, but that those policies needed to be tweaked and strengthened.

Compensation plan, new academic programs and name changes for degree programs were among the items approved by the Board of Regents, State of Iowa, during its June 12 meeting.