[Plsfaculty] Graduate Funding Plan and more info

Sat Apr 20 19:29:04 MST 2024

Dear Faculty,

Attached please find a user-friendly form (much better than the previous, pls revert to this form for our use).  Please fill out the form for each of your students and return to Leslie Monday or Tuesday, end of day.  Send directly to Leslie please.
-If you have already provided the older form to Leslie, no need to re-do for graduate summer supplemental pay.

-Please use the attached form from now on.
-Fill out one per student, updating each fiscal year and/or when you wish to change the grant number(s).

Per Faculty Meeting discussion, we want graduate students to be paid on time and to operate with secure financial plans for each student.
For MS students: Please complete at least 2 full academic years.
For PhD students: Please complete at least 3 full academic years.

Summer supplemental for graduate students
If you are covering  = indicate for how many hours and grant #
If you are not covering = indicate none.

TAships
Indicate first and second preferred semester (TAship #1 or TAship#2) for one TA-ship per student.
note: Given the substantial reduction in number of CALES allocated GA/TAships (Mark’s report Friday), we must aim for providing one experience per Ph.D. student during their program.
-There are courses offered by other departments for which our students have historically been considered for TAships, and we hope these opportunities will continue to come our way.

-Please do not count on TA/GA support on a regular basis for grad students.
-Please accept the value of saving endowment/scholarship funds for emergencies (per Matt Jenks, Faculty meeting), not routinely spending to zero each year. Maintaining a savings account is prudent, and particularly, right now.

What else i can tell you:
-The TAship plan proposed by the Grad Committee cannot be considered yet, for all the same reasons.
-The endowment/scholarship funds and allocations will be reviewed by the Business Office (and me), when the information is available, together with next year’s budget, when the information is received.
-The status of CALES and our 2024-2025 budgets can be followed at the Compass website.
-The good news is that summer supplemental-grad students can be put into place by mid-week, with your quick response to this email.  Heartfelt thanks to everyone for expediting.

Summer teaching
-Attached is the memo from David Galbraith circulated for winter courses in Dec 2023, that also applies to summer teaching.
Please note standard compensation rate will not be given for undergrad classes with fewer than 12 students and Grad classes w fewer than 5 students.
request: If a Guiding principles doc on this topic exists among your SPLS documents, please email the original to Leslie and me and archive in the BOX folder if possible. Thanks.
-If you are teaching this summer, please make sure your course is listed and advertised – undergrads/contact Finn; - graduate courses, contact Keenia for immediate circulation to the other units and relevant colleges.

In summary, truly wish things were different - the pay-back leaves us no latitude and once we get through it, and receive our budget/new model, etc. the situation will improve.  Crossing fingers, office staff can be hired soon too. In the meantime, please consider creative approaches available to you, and as much hope and fortitude you can muster to get through this and realistically, part of the next year (the Dean projected 18-months from March).  Also, a request- please avoid discussing your concerns with Lizeth – she’s feeling upset about the pressure to do payroll, plus the changes associated with HR centralization, so further distractions aren’t beneficial. Please be patient with Leslie and all the CALES folks helping us out.

Lastly, Tuesday (4/23): 1:00 pm CALES Graduate Dean, Jia Hu will present wisdom on the Graduate Funding Plan and entertain comments and questions from faculty. I’ll send a zoom link for everyone to join – please consider her advice and benefits of establishing an effective long-term protection plan to assure stability in SLPS graduate student support.  Other CALES units have adopted a Graduate Funding Plan and guiding principles and SPLS can follow suit - establishing a five year  ‘protection plan’ just makes good sense.

Best,

Judy

Judith K. Brown
Regents Professor & Interim Director
School of Plant Sciences
The University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721 USA
Office: 520-621-1402
Cell: 520-490-2109
Email: jkbrown at arizona.edu<mailto:jkbrown at arizona.edu>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://list.cals.arizona.edu/pipermail/plsfaculty/attachments/20240421/606fb814/attachment-0001.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Graduate Student Funding Plan_2024-2025.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 270274 bytes
Desc: Graduate Student Funding Plan_2024-2025.pdf
URL: <https://list.cals.arizona.edu/pipermail/plsfaculty/attachments/20240421/606fb814/attachment-0002.pdf>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Supp comp for non-traditional teaching 2023-24[1][3].pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 220850 bytes
Desc: Supp comp for non-traditional teaching 2023-24[1][3].pdf
URL: <https://list.cals.arizona.edu/pipermail/plsfaculty/attachments/20240421/606fb814/attachment-0003.pdf>