BOD: Internal Policy
Nicole–
You were elected by the students because they saw a driven, competent and knowledgeable leader. Serving as the Director of Internal Policy has been a fantastic experience and one of the most meaningful challenges of my life. I hope it will be the same for you. However, as with any job where people are depending on you and watching your every move, so you must always stay accountable. Accountability can be challenging in the face of politics, and interpersonal conflicts but the Director of Internal Policy must be the most honest and accountable person in the Association. It is after all part of your job to keep others accountable to our policies and all applicable laws so you must be the example. Your challenge will be unique due to the nature of the election, but I’m confident that you’ll be able to handle yourself.
Here are a few pieces of advice I hope will help you next year:
- Don’t ever doubt that you are qualified. I don’t believe that anyone is ever really “qualified” to be on Board (I had no idea what I was doing coming in)– it just matters how quickly you can learn and adapt.
- Don’t spend too much time working out of office hours. It is going to be inevitable that you sometimes work over your 20 paid hours (this is a public service job), but if you do too much, believe me you are going to burn yourself out by the end of the year. Tell people that you’ll get back to them during office hours, they’ll understand.
- Stay humble. You are only there because of the students and their dollars– don’t forget that you are there to serve them and not yourself. And potentially even more important, keep your Board humble.
- In this role you do so much important work that holds the Association together, yet no one really knows about it because it’s all internal. Don’t let this discourage you, your predecessors and I know how much you will be doing!
- On the same note, find a way to make this role external as well. Concentrate on developing all the relationships you can since your role is so internal. Your and the Association’s relationship with GPSS is of utmost importance as you have the power to unite the forces of our organizations. GPSS and Judicial this year were my safe places. You have 100% control of how these relationships start, and you must be willing to be part of the solution in GPSS.
- Hold your Board accountable. Check them. Make sure they are transparent and following the Bylaws. It is not your job to be the Personnel Director, but it is your job to make sure the Board is following their rules and serving students.
- Don’t be afraid to admit you don’t know the answer. As the “policy expert” people often expect you to know every word of the Bylaws off the top of your head, but it’s okay to let people know that you will get back to them. This will ensure more accurate answers! DO NOT BULLSHIT.
- Take advantage of all the ways this job preps you for the real world. I think the Director of Internal Policy role is one of the most applicable jobs to real professional work outside of ASUW and for that I’ve been really grateful.
On the Google Drive, you have access to all of the past Internal Policy’s (or Operations or Policies and Procedures) transition documents and folders. Browse through them and see what you can learn. You can call me if you have questions these don’t answer (253-223-5806) and PLEASE know that you can reach out to me at any point– I’m happy to help you get started! Don’t be afraid to make this position your own. It can be hard to do with this role, but try to be as innovative as possible.
I am going to leave you with a few words that Noe left Taylor left Bo, Bo left Casey, Casey left Cooper, and Cooper left me:
“You are only bound by the Bylaws, otherwise, sky’s the limit”.
Antonio Gonzalez
[/section]
Logins/Passwords
- Request email password reset from Rene, but as of now, here is the info:
- username: asuwbdop@uw.edu
- password: Lookatmenow1
- Desktop
- username: asuwbdop
- password: Lookatmenow1 (Please change this ASAP)
- Slack
- username: asuwbdop@uw.edu
- password: This will be reset for you
Weekly Meetings
During a typical week, these are the meetings you will attend to give you an idea of how much time you spend in meetings versus office hours:
1:1 with Advisor
At the beginning of each quarter, set up weekly meeting time with your adviser, Christina Coop. I would recommend 30 minutes to an hour, but that’s just me. It’s up to you to establish the type of relationship you want with your adviser, but in my experience Coop was a fantastic person to bounce ideas and problems off of. Without her I would have not made it through the year. Coop is pretty hands off for the most part, which I tend to like, but she is a great historical resource for you when you need her. Be sure to bring her questions and issues of concern earlier than later and ask for specific feedback. Otherwise she may stop your work later until you correct an issue and it will be a much more frustrating ordeal.
EAC 2:1
I found it valuable to set up 30-60 minute weekly meetings with the EAC Chair and Vice Chair (at the same time), since this is your liaison entity that will probably need the most support from you. This is especially necessary during Fall Quarter when you are revising the EPP with the EAC and during Winter Quarter when you are planning elections events. In Spring just get out there and support them by volunteering and helping them out anywhere you can! For the EPP process it is vital to include members of the EAC with the development and planning of the EPP. Work to get the EPP ready to go for the end of Fall Quarter (like really really get it done by Fall quarter)
Senate Vice Speaker 1:1
I found it valuable to set up 30-minute weekly meetings with the Senate Vice Speaker. Just be there for them as another liaison between Senate and Board and be a diligent manager of this often fraught relationship. The Senate Vice-Speaker will be your biggest partner in representing Senate at the Board table, encourage the new person to be an active participant at Board! This was my closest relationship this year!
GPSS Exec and Senate
GPSS Exec and Senate alternate, so they are technically every other week but you will have a meeting every Wednesday at 5:30. The first meeting of the quarter will be a GPSS Exec meeting. These meetings typically last two hours each. Their meetings also start meeting once a month in the Summer so try to make it or call in if you can as these initial meetings are important to starting off the ASUW’s relationship with GPSS off right. This relationship was one of the things I focused on the most. Come to these meetings prepared to be extremely professional and build a strong relationship. When doing ASUW business be mindful to loop GPSS in on anything that could be an opportunity for partnership or is relevant to Grad students.
Board of Directors
Historically Board meetings have been on Thursdays at 4:30—we had to do 5:30 because of Board scheduling conflicts. The public expects the meeting time to stay consistent so pick a time ASAP and stick with it for the year. People need to accommodate their schedules to the meeting as unexcused absence is grounds for recall. I believe you all decided on 5:30 for next year so you should be fine here!
Judicial Committee
I held weekly one-hour meetings, beginning the third week of Fall Quarter and continuting until elections started in the Spring. Sometimes, you won’t have anything to look at, but I think it’s better to schedule a meeting each week and use the time to build up the group’s competencies and preparedness or to cancel three days in advance (OPMA requirement) if you need to. There’s essentially always something to do. Judicial meets on Monday’s at 4:30 PM — if this time does not work for your committee next year, you must cancel the already set meeting time with the OPMA office and create a special meeting! The cancelation and creation of a new meeting must be done 3 business days before the meeting occurs.
Elections Administration Committee
This committee will meet starting in Week 5 or 6 of Fall Quarter at the latest. Hold the EAC Chair and Vice-Chair accountable for getting started on time because all the time is needed to run an effective election. You are welcome to attend these meetings, but don’t have to. I would go as often as I could, but usually didn’t stay the whole time.
Senate
Every Tuesday, 5-7 PM. You need to be at all of these. It is extremely important to stay engaged in what is going on the whole time as well because you will often be looked to for Parli Pro rules or institutional questions. Hold the Director of University Affairs accountable to being there as well.
Senate Steering
Once a week, time TBD for availability for 1 hour by the Senate Speaker.
Contacts/Meetings
You can basically find any contact you will ever need in the Director of Internal Policy gmail, but here are a few to get you started:
Christina Coop (your primary advisor, especially for EAC and Judicial related affairs): cmcoop@uw.edu
Rene Singleton (your secondary advisory, especially for BOD, records, elections violations, Senate, and GPSS questions): sniglet@uw.edu
Office of Public Records (your contact for registering OPMA meetings for the year): pubrec@uw.edu
GPSS VP of Internal Affairs (your main GPSS contact for all things GPSS-ASUW): gpssvpin@uw.edu
GPSS President: gpsspres@uw.edu
UW Office of the Attorney General’s Office: mltaylor@uw.edu (Executive Assistant to AG)
Office of Student Conduct: higgie@uw.edu (Elizabeth Taylor, Director)
Antonio Gonzalez: 253-223-5806, I will also be around 😉 and check up on you during the year, YOU GOT THIS!
General Resources
Appointing Committee Members
- No matter what you are appointing volunteers or committee members to, you need to go through the Office of Outreach and Involvement (OOI) and follow the Open Selection Process (OSP). With the OSP, you must keep your applications open a minimum of two weeks and must have at least one more applicants than open slots to close. It is up to you to decide whether you want to interview applicants (I only interviewed for Judicial members).
- When you are ready to open a volunteer or committee opportunity, go to the Employee Portal at employee.asuw.org and find the “OOI (may still say OVO) Resources” tab. You will then find the information needed to open an application with OOI.
- It is important that you use the “Request for a Volunteer Application” form for all of your volunteer applications so that OOI can check them, post them on the website, and advertise them in a timely manner! If you choose to make your own form, there is a place to indicate that and OOI will simply review it, but send those through the provided Google Form. I used all the past applications that past Directors made! You can find those in the google drive as well.
- The Office of Outreach and Involvement exists to help you recruit volunteers, so ask them to help you advertise your committee appointments.
- It is also useful for you to undertake outreach of your own. Work with O-COMM to create graphics for leaflets and Facebook posts. Also emailing advisers from department you’d think would be interested is where I’ve found a good amount of success.
- Any delineated committee appointments and ASUW representatives to external committees or councils need to be passed through Board Bills—remind your Board of this!
Employee and Communications Portals
- The Employee Portal holds all the information you need to know your rights as an employee. You can find it at employee.asuw.org.
The Communications Portal (http://comm.asuw.org/) has all the information you need to create on-brand presentation and advertising materials, as well as request O-COMM services, such as posters and social media posts on the General ASUW Facebook Page.
[/accordion]
BOD: Internal Policy
EAC
General Info:
- Overall, this job gives you significant flexibility with how you do it. Don’t be afraid to jump in on something that is outside of your scope, but talk to your board first!
- I would suggest using your first 2:1 meetings each quarter with the EAC to outline their goals and how you can help them that quarter.
- Get to know the EAC interns as well—EAC typically has 3-4 and they are an integral part of the team.
- Keep Board updated on what’s going on with EAC.
- During Fall Quarter, they will need to pick their EAC Committee members through the Open Selection Process. You need to submit a Board Bill before the committee members are approved. I would recommend letting EAC choose the committee members on their own, and then just reviewing their choices to make sure you don’t see any red flags.
Revising the EPP
- Do your best to get this document PASSED BY THE END OF FALL QUARTER. Politics begin to rear their ugly head in Winter and getting it passed earlier ensures that the EAC has ample time to educate potential candidates.
- At the beginning of the year, you will meet with the EAC Chair to review and suggest revisions to the EPP. My suggestion would be to engage the entire EAC committee in figuring out the issues of this year’s elections, then working with the Co-Chairs to implement those reforms. It is important for the EAC Chairs to lead this process, since your ultimate say will come at the Board table. What worked well this year was having the EAC and Judicial engaged in the process from the start together. This cuts out some of the middleman so to speak in having to communicate EAC wants/concerns with Judicial and vice versa.
- Always keep an updated version of the EPP on your desktop, the ASUW elections website, and the Records Page. When any changes occur, be sure to hold the EAC accountable to keeping it updated in all locations as that was a bit of a struggle this year.
Judicial
General Info
- There are basically two functions of the Judicial committee: to make judgments and to make recommendations. Recommendations usually come in the form of suggested revisions to governing documents and policies that are then submitted to the Board of Directors for final approval. Judgements are decisions that the Judicial Committee makes in regards to suspected violations by the ASUW, but can essentially be overturned by the BOD. Anyone can submit a request for review of a violation or document, using the Request for Review form on the Records Page.
- The Request for Review form can be found on the records page. This document must be revised and approved each year by the Board of Directors.
- I would recommend meeting once a week for an hour until elections. (Bring some snacks, these people are volunteers, treat them right!)
- Judicial Judgments and recommendations should be submitted to Board for their review and uploaded in the Judicial Folder on the Records Page.
- Read the Judicial bylaws a few times—there’s a lot of information about this committee in the Bylaws!
- Judicial has a website (judicial.asuw.org), so you might want to check it out. I didn’t do anything with it this year because I didn’t find it necessary — its OUT DATED!! Perhaps this can be a project of your own?
- Any revisions to any governing documents need to go through Judicial before Board’s final approval and adoption—be strict about this, not all BOD’s have been and it has led to some inconsistent documents. I tried my absolute best to make sure we did the same and it worked out!!
- The process should look like as follows:
- Board bill making document changes brought to board, then after read, referred to the Judicial Committee
- Judicial will conduct a review, and produce a recommendation for changes
- You will bring the board bill back to board the next meeting after Judicial has approved the recommendation, read out the recommendation and move to adopt recommendations. You should be the supporter of Judicial’s work first and foremost.
- Continue consideration, and pass when ready, or don’t.
- The process should look like as follows:
- If you are reviewing documents, it is not Judicial’s job to change the intent of the document or revision—you are there to see if anything contradicts with any other governing documents, is illegal, etc. or if there is bad grammar or logic going on.
- Encourage Judicial members to attend one BOD meeting per quarter
- Judicial meetings are subject to OPMA—see section titled “OPMA”
- Use parli pro but don’t be too strict with it as there are only seven of you
- I would recommend letting Judicial members take the lead on conversation and mostly just provide context and monitor conversation—you don’t want to bias Judicial members with your insider knowledge and will have final say anyways at the Board table
- The Board AA will need to take minutes every meeting and upload them to the Records Page, along with any recommendations or judgments
- Meeting agendas should be posted to the Records Page 24-hours in advance
- Historically, the chair gives each Judicial member a hard copy of all of the governing documents, but this year we really just used virtual documents and Google Docs to edit—up to you!
- Remember to request your Senate liaison right away! They should already be elected once you take office actually! But if for some reason they cannot commit (summer is a long time) then you will need to request a new one from Tim and the Vice Speaker.
- Coop comes to Judicial meetings and is there as a historical resource for you, but really lets you do your own thing
- Make sure to register your volunteers with OVO when they ask
- Copies are in the google drive for the agenda I used! I did not like prior years so I made my own — make sure to look in Antonio Gonzalez’s folder!
Orientation
- Your first meeting will be your Judicial Orientation that all committee members must attend.
- You do not need to register this meeting with the Office of Public Records.
- During this meeting, you should give Judicial their binders with all of the governing documents, assign reading assignments, and go over the basics of Judicial!
- In my folder, you can find the Power Point I used for orientation!
- I would suggest starting Judicial up no later than the fourth week of Fall, so you will definitely want to open up the committee application by the first week of school.
Membership
- Membership for regular session
- Director of Internal Policy, Chair
- Vice President (Presidential Proxy)
- Four at-large members
- One Senate Representative
- Reach out to senate leadership in the first week to inform them they need to elect a liaison ASAP (hopefully this is already done by the end of Spring 2021)
- Christina Coop, SAO Advisor (non-voting)
- Liaison from Student Legal Services if necessary (non-voting)
- I didn’t find that we ever needed this rep, but they are invited if anything gets sticky — I do not think they ever came this year!
- Secretary Elections
- At the first regular meeting, you will need to elect a Secretary of Judgments and Secretary of Recommendations
- The Secretary of Recommendations cannot be the Presidential Proxy. This person is the Vice Chair for the whole year, and is basically your right-hand person with research and writing recommendations. So for the most part, they are the person who types of a little blurb about Judicial’s recommendation to the Board of Directors to go online and to Board.
- The Secretary of Judgments cannot be the Presidential Proxy either. This person chairs Judicial during elections hearings, collects elections violations, and is your right-hand person when writing Judicial judgements to be provided to Board and uploaded on the Records Page.
- Both Emily and Jessica will be coming back as at-large representatives next year, but see more about committee members in the section about appointing representatives.
Yearly Schedule
- I would suggest the following schedule:
- Fall– EPP
- Winter—Bylaws and Constitution and Entity Policies
- Spring until elections—Entity Policies
- Spring during elections
- The Secretary of Judgments will chair the elections hearing, where Rene will be the supervising SAO Advisor
- You and the Vice President will not attend the hearing
- You will have no role in Judicial during this time, other than booking the room and registering the meetings.
- All year—any Requests for Review submitted
Governing Documents
General Info
- While you are the expert on the ASUW’s governing documents, your Board members need to know the parts of documents that are relevant to them. I would encourage your Board to read their section of the bylaws before taking office and for your Board ex-officio’s to read their policies (i.e., Personnel Policy, F&B Policy, Com Policy). It is also not your job to Control-F everything for your Board—don’t let them make you answer questions they could find in three seconds just be opening up the Bylaws…lol (but this will happen too)
- Here is a Board of Directors cheat sheet that Bo made for Board at the beginning of last year to help them get used to Board meetings: BOD Cheat Sheet Final
- Hold Board and the ASUW accountable to your governing documents—I know you will!
- The Bylaws and entity policies can be amended by the BOD after going through Judicial, but the Constitution can only be amended through an approved ballot measure
- The Constitution supersedes the Bylaws if there is ever inconsistency between the two, and the Constitution and the Bylaws trump any other policies
- Keep updated versions of all governing documents on your desktop and the Records Page—I would also suggest having hard copies of each document in your filing cabinet
- Your filing cabinets are a bit messy—you legally need to keep the last seven years of records, and Rene insists on hard copies. I worked with this year’s AAs to get moving on document archiving, where you send documents older than 7 years to UW records, but there’s still a ways to go. I would suggest going through the binders in and by your desk and utilizing the AAs to help with other documents around the office.
- Don’t forget to update the year and date of last revisions on each governing document when you amend it.
- The Bylaws and every policy should be reviewed by relevant entity members, Judicial and the BOD each year by Spring Quarter. I would suggest the following schedule:
- Fall Quarter: EPP
- Winter Quarter: Bylaws and (Constitution if you need to)
- Spring: Personnel, Volunteer, F&B, and COM Policies)
- I would recommend reading the Constitution and Bylaws twice even before the beginning of the year—this really helped me be confident when asked questions. However, you definitely don’t need to know everything on the spot!
- I would suggest giving a presentation to your Board during BOD orientation on the major parts of the Bylaws that they should be aware of throughout the year (guarantee you will not get your entire Board to read the Bylaws in their entirety lol)
- Master copies of all of the policies and governing documents are on your desktop and records page.
GPSS
General Info
- You are the lead of the relationship between GPSS and ASUW. This relationship has the power to be messy or to have positive impact on students. Invest your time in this relationship and it will pay off 10 fold on its impact for students.
- Work with the GPSS President and Vice President of Internal Affairs to ensure that all GPSS spots on ASUW committee are filled—they really struggled to fill these positions this year, so work to support them in filling these spots
- List of seats:
- Student Regent Selection committee
Chaired by GPSS President Bi-annually
3 GPSS Representatives - ASUW BOD
GPSS VP Internal or other rep. - Dawg Pack Advisory Board
GPSS President or Proxy
1 GPSS Representative - ASUW Senate
2 GPSS Representatives - ASUW Legislative Steering
1 Non-voting GPSS Representative - Student Safety Advisory Board
1 Seat
- Student Regent Selection committee
- List of seats:
- You also need to be sure we fill out ASUW Senate Liaison to GPSS
- You will need to ask senate leadership to elect a liaison who will attend each GPSS senate meeting along with you
- You are at their meetings to ensure that the ASUW and GPSS are working cooperatively to have the best impact on students. Make sure that information is flowing both ways.
- Make sure that the graduate perspective is considered with ASUW programming efforts and at Board, however this is also the GPSS Secretary’s job (or the new proxy since this position is no longer)
- You and the GPSS VP of Internal Affairs are the main links between GPSS and ASUW, so inform both organization of each other’s business and activities
- Each officer on GPSS exec has their own employees they oversee and liaison to, but there office is still really small (like twenty people or so)
- Help establish a good relationship between GPSS Exec and ASUW BOD early on—I would suggest setting up quarterly meetings with both boards so that relevant elected officials can collaborate and you guys can get to know each other. Also try to get these relationships and meetings started before the year even starts.
- I would also suggest that you keep the ASUW Senate updated on what GPSS is up to
GPSS Exec
- Exec is basically their Board of Directors, but it functions a little differently. They don’t really pass Board Bills, but spend most of their time discussing the structure and agenda of their senate meeting, as their Senate plays a much larger role than the ASUW Senate.
- GPSS Exec meetings generally run about two hours long and are every other Wednesday at 5:30 in the board room
- You will often see the same public forum speakers at GPSS and ASUW BOD
- Membership of GPSS Exec
- GPSS Officers (paid employees)
- President
- Vice President of Internal Affairs
- Vice President of External Affairs
- Vice President of Equity and Accountability
- Vice President of Finance
- ASUW Director of Internal Policy
- Four Executive Senators ( paid volunteers)
- These members are four senators elected by the senate to essentially come to GPSS board meetings to act as a check on the officers and participate in GPSS affairs a little more than regular senators
- You will give an update each Exec meeting on ASUW initiatives, senate resolutions, programs, etc. that graduate students would find relevant
- You are a voting member on exec and SENATE!
- Be sure that you are given equal respect as an officer on GPSS Exec, and give Gabby (if she is the rep this year!) equal respect as an ASUW Board member. Include her in Board Bondings and events and ensure Gabby is including you.
- GPSS Officers (paid employees)
GPSS Senate
- You are a VOTING member in the Senate.
- I would see if you could give an ASUW update in Senate as well—looking back this would have been helpful to spread the word on ASUW events and initiatives that would also be relevant to grad students. Make sure people know that ASUW represents graduate students as well. We have power to work with them in GPSS to make change for grad students.
- They use Sturgis’ Rules of Order in their senate, when they follow it.
- You could definitely share more information with ASUW Senate about what is going on at GPSS Senate
- There is food every week! (not for me but maybe for you since you will be back in person!)
- Meetings last about two hours every other week.
- Senators are elected by department, so it’s not like ASUW Senate where any student can get involved.
- JOINT RESOLUTION PROCESS!!!!
OPMA & OPRA
General Info
- The Office of Public Records oversees the University’s compliance with both the OPRA and the OPMA.
- Here is a link to the OPMA for your reference: LAW
- Here is a link to the OPRA for your reference: LAW
- If you have any questions about either laws, contact: Kathleen Burns, pubrec@uw.edu
- All BOD members need to be OPMA and OPRA certified at the beginning of the year
- If Rene doesn’t before you, invite the Office of Public Records to come speak at BOD orientation. This was helpful to make sure people took these laws seriously.
- All employee emails and SLACK messages are subject to the Open Public Records Act. Even if people use personal messaging these are subject to OPRA and they will have to turn over texts, facebook messages etc. if they are requested to. Drive this fact home at orientation and get people to stick to their work messaging and emails.
- If there are more than five BOD members, it is legally considered a meeting, so you should not be discussing work-related matters. This goes for texts and Facebook messages as well—you should not be discussing business on these platforms. You can all get personally fined for doing so.
Registering delineated committee meetings
- BOD, Senate, Senate Steering, Judicial, Special Appropriations, Finance & Budget, Legislative Steering, and Personnel all must be registered with the Office of Public Records. It says in the Bylaws to register all meetings in the Constitution, which you can also choose to do.
- Check with pubrec@uw.edu to see when the deadline to register is. It’s usually in December for the coming year. There is one annual deadline that ASUW usually misses since we change our committee times dependent on student schedules. Those that have to be changed or aren’t registered will need to be registered as “special meetings”. Try to get 2022’s meetings registered in December as it’s much easier that way.
- For meetings that weren’t submitted for the entire year before the deadline, you will need to submit them as special meetings at the beginning of each quarter. If you have the times, dates, and locations for every meeting for the quarter, you can send an email to pubrec.uw.edu with all of the quarter’s meetings. You must list each of the meeting dates with individual locations and times, as well as attach the meeting agenda for each day. The email should read similarly:
- “The ASUW Judicial Committee will be holding five special meetings on:
- Tuesday, February 1st in Gowen 301 at 5 PM
- Tuesday, Febraury 8th in Gowen 301 at 5 PM
- Tuesday, February 16th in Gowen 301 at 5 PM
- “The ASUW Judicial Committee will be holding five special meetings on:
The agendas for each meeting are attached”
- When you are submitting agendas, they don’t have to have all the information on them. They can literally be the bare-bones and just say “Approval of the Minutes, Approval of the Agenda, New Business, Old Business, Adjournment”. This way you can register all meetings at the beginning of the quarter as special meetings, before all of the agendas are set. Once meetings are registered in this way, these bare bones structures cannot be changed. I choose to register all meetings individually so I could have a filled out agenda that had action items and everything we would be discussing — I found this easier than submitting a bunch of bare bones ones.
- Special meetings must be registered no sooner than three days in advance. Cancellations or reschedules must also be done three days in advance.
- Committee meeting agendas should be posted to the records page at least 24-hours in advance.
Records:
- You are responsible for ensuring that proper records are kept for registered meetings. You can see details in the sections below, but also know that my training documents and all else will be my folder in your drive. All of my training documents and everything else for DOIP from my personal computer has been uploaded within my folder under the subfolder named ASUW Director of Internal Policy.
Parliamentary Procedure
General Info
- Even though you are the Parliamentarian of the Board of Directors, I personally don’t believe you need to be an extreme effort on parli pro with this position! Know the basics obviously, but things never get that contentious with parli pro at Board since there are only 13 people talking. Teach your Board the basics at the beginning of the year!
- The space you might need to know parli pro better is at Senate as you might need to be a resource there.
- GPSS Senate uses Sturgis’ Rules of Order FYI. Historically, GPSS’s knowledge and enforcement of parli pro has been REALLY lax. They generally express interest in receiving help.
- I have left you copies of Robert’s Rules of Order and Sturgis’ Rules of Order in your desk! Make sure to sign your name in the Robert’s Book!
- Parli pro should be used in delineated committees, but in my opinion it can be fairly relaxed since all ASUW committee chairs aren’t going to be experts on parli pro. Judicial you can turn it up a notch if you want, since it is a bit more formal.
- I would encourage Senate Leadership to take the lead on Parli Pro Workshops as I feel like your time could be better spent on other projects at the beginning of the year and the Vice Chair should really be leading these.
- Here is a parli pro video the Director of Internal Policy made with Senate four years ago:
Quarterly Reports
General Info
- Each BOD member, Entity Director, and Committee chair must submit a Quarterly Report at the end of each quarter in order to let the public know what the ASUW has been up to
- Quarterly Reports must include accomplishments, concerns, future goals, and advice for the benefit of the ASUW. Winer and Spring Quarterly Reports should include a summary of the previous quarter’s goals.
- Quarterly Reports should be uploaded to the Records Page by the third week of the following quarter.
- Make sure employees know that Quarterly Reports are public and different than confidential Employee Evaluations that are collected at the same time.
- I was able to get 80% completion from employees each quarter, but to do this IT IS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY TO COMBINE THEM INTO THE SAME SURVEY AS EMPLOYEE EVALS. Touch base with the VP/Personnel Director around Week 7 of the quarter to combine it all together! That way it all gets done.
- Even with them attached to employee evals you will need to get committee quarterly reports from each of the Board members separately.
- After each quarter, I worked with OCOM to uniquely advertise the Quarterly Reports to the public. Take a look at the Association’s Facebook to see what we did for all three this year.
Example
- The following questions were asked on the Winter Quarterly Report:
- What were your major undertakings this quarter? What was your greatest accomplishment?What were your goals for this quarter and how are you measuring your success in these endeavors?What barriers and/or difficulties did you face in implementing your goals this quarter?
What are your goals for Winter Quarter? How will you measure success in these?
How did you include and/or reach out to people external to the ASUW in your work (students, businesses, community organizations, RSOs, administrators, etc.). How did you collaborate with other ASUW entities and/or employees? How did you ensure these collaborations were equitable?
The ASUW maintains a public historical record that is permanently published at wiki.asuw.org. Please write a 200-250 word blurb that encompasses your entity’s undertakings, accomplishments, and goals for inclusion in this record as you would like your history to be kept. Feel free to synthesize your other answers here.
- What were your major undertakings this quarter? What was your greatest accomplishment?What were your goals for this quarter and how are you measuring your success in these endeavors?What barriers and/or difficulties did you face in implementing your goals this quarter?
- The 250 word Blurbs are for use on the WIKI! I was unable to get those onto the WIKI for 2020-2021. Please get those out and add them to the WIKI along with the new updates you receive.
- You can find all quarterly reports on records.asuw.org under quarterly reports.
Records Management
General Information
- records.asuw.org is all yours! You are responsible for maintaining the Records Page, with the webmasters.
- Make sure to upload all documents in screen reader accessible formats and train all AA’s to do so. Here is a guide:
- You have full access to this site and can grant access to folders
- At the beginning of the year, you will need to have the webmasters add 2021-2022 folders for each section and then make sure that the correct employees have access. ( I did some but you will have to take on the rest)
- Meeting minutes need to be taken for all delineated committee meetings (Board, Senate, Judicial, Personnel, F&B, EAC, etc.)
- The Senate page is missing a lot of documents—perhaps you could make it a project to recover them! They are undergoing a huge website transformation so check in on how you can help with records!
Relationship with AA’s
- I would recommend holding a Records Page orientation with all of the AA’s at the beginning of the year. I have included the training document in my Drive Folder under ASUW Director of Internal Policy.
- AA’s should:
- Keep their corresponding minutes and agendas up to date on the page
- Upload committee agendas at least 24-hours in advance and meeting minutes no later than 8 days after the meeting takes place (enough time to have committee members initial meeting minutes at the following meeting)
- Keep comprehensive meeting minutes
- Keep hard copies of the minutes in their filing cabinets
- The Board AA should upload Board minutes, agendas, Board Bills, and Board Reports each week
Senate
General Info
- You obviously attend Senate and Senate Steering meetings each week, but it is up to you whether you want to attend Senate staff meetings as well (I did not).
- I would suggest holding 1:1s with Senate employees at the beginning of each quarter to figure out how you can help them that quarter and to set their goals.
- For the most part, I tried to let Senate do their own thing, so that they didn’t feel a huge check from the BOD
- I see my role as the BOD liaison to Senate, so I tried to be in Senate to voice BOD concerns and to hold BOD accountable to staying involved with Senate. Make sure to be deliberate about establishing a strong relationship between the two groups.
- I would encourage Senate Leadership to hold Parli Pro workshop and targeted outreach with the express goal of enhancing equity.
- Talk to Senate Leadership early on to gauge how they see your role with Senate
- Let them do their own thing—it is not your role to overstep, but to instead give guidance and support when necessary!
- I would suggest placing the responsibility of senate resolution follow up on Senate Leadership more—they have plenty of time to do this with four employees in the office; on that note, make sure Senate employees are using their time efficiently.
- Establish early what Senate expects from Board
Misc.
Nonprofit Registration
You will need to register the ASUW for nonprofit status with the state in April of 2022. Our registration expires April 30th. It’s a really simple process that Rene will walk your through and it only takes about twenty minutes. Just remind Rene around Week 4 that you need to register and you should be good! The registration takes place here: https://www.sos.wa.gov/corps. Don’t do anything without the guidance of SAO — I did not want to mess anything up so I heavily relied on Rene and their office.
Elections Violations
- The Judicial Secretary of Judgements should lead the process of enforcing fines. They should work with Rene and you can be looped in, but you shouldn’t be too involved.
- Try to collect the fines ASAP. Do it before registration begins so they will actually be binding. Talk to Rene to get the details. (We changed the EPP and bylaws so there are no fines, just community service — it is your job, as well as BOD to make sure that people actually complete their community service)
- Upload any future elections violations to the Records Page.
Wiki Page and ASUW History
- Here is the link to the ASUW Wiki Page: wiki.asuw.org
- Over the past three years or so, the Wiki Page has been let go but I revived the platform this year.
- You have access to it if you just use your username and login.
- Please update it and input the 250 word blurbs that people created in this year’s quarterly reports. These can be found in my drive folder under quarterly reports. I did not do this — so make sure that this years BOD has representation on the WIKI!
Appointments through OOI’s Open Selection Process
General Info
- For any appointments you make, you must go through the Office of Opportunities and Involvement and pass them through a Board Bill.
- See the General Resources tab for in-depth information on how to appoint committee members and ASUW representatives using the Open Selection Process.
Judicial
- There are four at-large members on Judicial, yet Judicial Committee appointments are good for two years. Therefore, you need to appoint two new members at the beginning of the year.
- Your current Judicial members are:
- Emily Glenn: emglenn@uw.edu
- Jessica Keane: jesskean@uw.edu
- You will need to find TWO MORE MEMBERS THROUGH OOI AND OPEN SELECTION PROCESS
- Along with the four at-large members, you will need to get a Senate rep (do this early) and remind the Vice President that it is their job to sit on Judicial as the President’s Proxy.
- Here is the application that I used last year for Judicial: Judicial App
- You should have enough people to start — you only need 4 people to start the meeting! (You, VP, Emily, Jessica, and the Senate Rep should be enough to start until you fill the last two open seats!)
Elections Administration Committee
When EAC appoints committee members to their committee, make sure you approve of them through a Board Bill.
Interns
You are more than welcome to have an intern, I just didn’t think it would be super useful as most of the responsibilities in your job description need to be performed by you and it takes a lot of institutional knowledge to even understand your role. However, if you do want an intern, my suggestion would be to have them help you with reviving history efforts.
Committees that you appoint ASUW Representatives to
The Bylaws state that you are responsible for appointing ASUW representatives to the following committees. All of these committee appointments need to be made through OVO and the Open Selection Process. Once ASUW representatives are appointed to external and university committees, you don’t need to do much other than make sure they are fulfilling their responsibilities and representing the ASUW’s values and beliefs well. THESE MUST BE APPOINTED TO IN FALL QUARTER
- Library Fines Appeals Committee
- This committee reviews appeals to library fines!
- Point of contact: Kirsten Spillum, Head Central Circulation & Library Account Services (kirsten@uw.edu)
- I’ve appointed the 2021-2022 representative to this committee, because they needed a representative by summer—you will need to appoint a new representative THIS SPRING.
- Advisory Committee on Student Conduct is a new committee that was created in conjunction with implementation of the new student conduct process. The committee is established by the President’s office. And, the design was to have a student representative appointed as a representative of ASUW for each campus and, also, a GPSS rep.
- Committee on Academic Conduct
- These committee are both under the Office of Student Conduct, and BOTH NEED APPOINTMENTS THIS FALL. Check in with the below points of contact:
- Point of contacts: Ellen Taylor, Associate Vice President for Student Life (ebtaylor@uw.edu) & Elizabeth Lewis, Director of Office of Student Conduct (higgie@uw.edu)