3-1-2006

Staff Assembly Executive Council Meeting Minutes

March 1, 2006

Members present:  Shelly Daugherty, Rick Smith, Connie Hickman, Marcia Bertholf, Krystal Burns, Kelly Earnest, Karen Franks-Harding, Brady Nielsen, Crystal Roberg

Agenda Discussions:

  1. The date of March 29 has been set for HEADS UP GONZAGA. This is a day that works for both Fr. Lee and Fr. Ganz. Marcia will contact Sodexho and work on the specifics for food and settings. Shelly will schedule a meeting with Fr. Ganz, Fr. Lee, Jason Swain, herself, and at least one other Staff Assembly member. Angela has agreed to help with marketing the event. Karen Franks-Harding scheduled a meeting for March 2 to discuss the details. 
  2. SWOT Analysis – Some staff have not had an opportunity to attend a SWOT meeting.  Additional open meetings have been scheduled for March 3, March 7 and March 8.  It might be good for SA members to attend other meetings to help get a feel for how different groups seem to have different priorities or bring a different perspective to the discussion.  It was noted that in the different meetings some staff felt as though the exercise was wasted effort while others were hopeful and eager to see real results.
  3. Sharon Prendergast Retirement – At 46 years Sharon is the longest employed staff member at Gonzaga.  A special reception has been planned in her honor Friday, March 3 in the Rare Book room at Foley.  Marcia pointed out that Sharon is responsible for bringing the TIAA-CREF benefit to staff.  Marcia also talked about establishing a perpetual gift in her name.  Staff Assembly is honoring her with a plaque and gardening gift basket.  This discussion also generated thoughts on an annual staff award (similar to annual faculty awards) and/or community service awards for staff. 
  4. Nominations and Committee Descriptions – Krystal Burns is ready to put out a call for nominations for Staff Assembly 2006-2007 members by the end of this week.  There are several positions that will be open including:

- Vice President,

- Secretary,

- Treasurer,

- Exec Council - 4 positions 2006-08

- Budget Comm - 1 position 2006-08

- Community Service - 1 position 2006-08

- Compensation Committee - 2 positions 2006-09

- Safety & Health - 1 position 2006-08

- Security Advisor - 1 position 2006-08

- Space Comm - 1 position 2006-08

- Board of Regents - 1 position Jan 2006-Dec 08

The process for obtaining nominations is:

-          Krystal sends out a call via email for nominations

-          Nominations will be accepted until March 17 (approximately 10 days) at which time Krystal will call those nominated to make sure they want to be on the ballot and to get a short statement about why they would like to serve on SA.

-          Ballots will be sent out First week of April

(This process does not include the Board of Regents representative which is a special process.)  We are hopeful for a good response. 

Further discussion revolved around the fact that the SAEC has lost contact with SA Committees.  In an effort to strengthen communication with Committee members it was suggested that we revisit committee descriptions and make sure that we as SAEC have clearly communicated to committees regarding purpose and responsibilities including the need to attend at least a few SAEC meetings during the year.  Since we don’t have a consensus on job descriptions for committees it is hard to hold them accountable.  We started to examine/edit those descriptions last fall but got “side-tracked.”  It was agreed that we should take the task up again and get it done.  In the meantime Krystal asked us to look at the descriptions she sends out with the call for nominations and make any necessary changes.  For instance the secretary position says they “maintain the staff assembly website.”  In reality this is not what we do.  We had talked about the possibility of getting the Vice President involved in posting minutes to the website.  We need to decide and make this a part of the description.

  1. Meeting with Thayne McCulloh – On Tuesday, February 21 several SAEC members met with Thayne McCulloh to discuss the context in which comments in SA meeting minutes for January 25.  Thayne was eager to make sure that SA know he truly wants us to succeed. His earlier comments were specifically related to his role as SA liaison.  Since he also acts as supervisor to other departments on campus he is not sure he is the person best suited to act as SA liaison.  This dual role may create a conflict of interest for him.  He wants our best interests to be served.
  2. SA will meet on a weekly basis from now until the first of May for Strategic planning purposes.  There was also discussion about a SA Day retreat for new members in the fall.