Kennesaw State President Dr. Pamela Whitten announced a new webpage created to provide updates on the university’s Comprehensive Administrative Review activities and action plans.
The CAR is meant to take an in-depth look at administrative functions and gather information from all 27 USG institutions, according to the USG’s website. The USG will use information gathered from the CAR to restructure operations and realign positions as a way to be more effective with the university system’s resources.
KSU was involved of phase one of the review, which was completed over the summer. With the results of the surveys and focus groups conducted on campus, the university has begun to come up with and implement action plans to improve the university.
Whitten provided a link to the new webpage in an email to faculty and staff on Oct. 29. There are over 43 ongoing projects related to the CAR at KSU on the website. Each project also contains a link leading to more details about the status of the project.
The projects fall under several categories including academic affairs, communication, facilities and space management, fiscal affairs, human resources, UITS, procurement and travel, regulatory and compliance, senior administration and student affairs.
On Thursday, Oct. 25, Assistant Vice President of Human Resources Karen McDonnell spoke at a staff senate meeting to address staff questions about the CAR.
Many staff members brought up concerns about a lack of communication on campus and low morale among KSU staff. Many are also concerned that the results of the CAR could mean that staff members will be laid off as the university tries to reallocate its resources.
Some were also disappointed that Whitten and other members of the administration were not there to speak with staff and address their concerns.
“Why isn’t the president here? Not even here, but just meeting with all of the employees,” one staff member said during the meeting. “You feel like they don’t really appreciate the staff because they’re not even here to express something that will affect everyone’s day to day life.”
McDonnell said that she plans to put together a working group with staff, HR and “anyone who needs to be involved” to try to include representation from the staff senate and remain transparent.
Jeannine Jones, an administrative assistant within the School of Communication and Media, said that staff is usually informed on university updates through KSU Inform, but decisions brought upon by the CAR were instead verbally communicated to deans. Jones said that it was expected that deans pass the information along to departments and staff, but the message was only relayed to a small portion of staff members.
Staff members who have been working as employees at KSU for several years also brought up concerns about new staff members being hired and brought into their departments.
Jones said that recent changes to the university mean that jobs being posted may have a new title, class code or salary, meaning that new employees with the same job as employees who have worked at KSU for longer could make a higher salary.
Several members also brought up concerns that staff members have not been allowed to continue to teach as a second job at the university.
“Students are losing since specific classes aren’t offered when we don’t have anyone to teach the class,” Jones said.
McDonnell said that an increased salary may be implemented in some job descriptions because “we want top talent here to really continue to happen. There are people that are more than willing to come for a pay cut, so it is not always the case, but it is a possibility.”
University officials are still working on many of the proposed projects related to the CAR, meaning that many of the decisions and projects have not yet been finalized.
Information and all communications about the CAR can be found on KSU’s website.
