Administration

Town Hall provides update on University initiatives, chance to ask questions

Senior Vice President David Gray, left, and Provost Nick Jones hosted a Penn State Town Hall meeting for faculty and staff at the HUB-Robeson Center on Sept. 30. Credit: Patrick Mansell / Penn State. Creative Commons

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Faculty and staff had a chance to hear updates on new initiatives at Penn State, ask questions and offer feedback during the second University-wide Town Hall meeting on Sept. 30, which was led by Provost Nick Jones and Senior Vice President David Gray.

TOWN HALL SURVEY: Did you participate online or in person? Take a short survey and share your thoughts!

Jones and Gray provided faculty and staff with updates on topics such as health care and the impact of the lack of state budget and fielded questions and suggestions on a range of topics including diversity, the budget, flextime, energy efficiency and campus green space.

Sponsored by Penn State Today and held in the HUB-Robeson Center and livestreamed, the Town Hall meeting will be available for online viewing. Penn State community members who were not able to watch the Town Hall can view the video below:

 

The University’s upcoming Strategic Plan was among the topics touched on. Jones said the University plans to finalize and launch it by the new year, and before that will make it available online for review and feedback. The University’s upcoming capital campaign will be in line with the Strategic Plan.

Jones said later that many people have been engaged in the Strategic Plan process and he hopes that will continue.

“The Strategic Plan that we’re about to launch — it’s not President Barron’s strategic plan or my strategic plan or David’s strategic plan — it is our strategic plan,” Jones said. “It is the institutional strategic plan. It was built very deliberately getting as much feedback from every corner of the university that we could. This is your strategic plan. We really hope that all our constituents — faculty, staff, students and alumni — will contribute to this process.”

Jones and Gray also encouraged employees to share their ideas for addressing the issues brought up at the meeting, including ways to streamline operations.

“Nobody is better enabled to address opportunities for efficiency and effectiveness of services than the folks that are day to day working in those service units,” Gray said. “So I encourage, at every turn possible, our staff and employees to bring forward their ideas to us. They’re keen observers of how the jobs are being performed and ways in which we might be able to improve upon service efficiency while at the same time not doing any disservice to the quality or level of the service we provide.”

Other topics included:

  • Open enrollment for University health care, which will take place Nov. 2-20. Gray noted that payroll contributions will remain unchanged with the exception of collective bargaining units. There will be a reduction in deductibles and out of pocket costs, based on new regulations. The University will be offering 24 informational webinars in addition to two live meetings for Office of Physical Plant staff.
  • Streamlining University policies, including eliminating some, updating others and adding new ones, where needed. Jones said that there are currently 103 Human Resources policies, which will be reduced to about 58, with another 13 added, for an expected total of 71.

Faculty and staff who attended in person or watched online are encouraged to share their feedback by taking a short survey. The survey will be open to participation until the morning of Oct. 7.

In addition to a June 2, 2015, University-wide town hall event, Jones and Gray also held a meeting for Office of Physical Plant employees in July. Future meetings, messages and events will be announced on an ongoing basis.

Last Updated October 8, 2015