As director of talent acquisition at Kansas State University, Roberta Maldonado Franzen became a bit surprised by the kinds of employee benefit questions that job candidates were asking during interviews last year. The university is in Manhattan, Kansas, often referred to as the “Little Apple.” Of the estimated 1,500 people who apply for jobs each […]
It wasn't like we didn't get the memo about the gap in oral healthcare in America. As far back as the Surgeon General's report 15 years ago, we knew that quality, affordable, and accessible oral health is acutely disaggregated – read as, if you live in a middle class or high end suburban neighborhood, quality […]
Soon after becoming president of Georgia State University in 2009, Mark P. Becker set out to answer a question: How can you create a better university, in the heart of a large, diverse city, where many of your students are first-generation or low-income, and who face challenges not seen as commonly at a typical flagship […]
California’s colleges and universities have made strides in providing mental health care to students—when higher ed as a whole has struggled to keep up with a growing demand for services. Recent studies suggest that up to one-third of college students suffer mental health problems. California’s Mental Health Act, passed in 2004, assesses a 1 percent […]
Energy conservation at Yale now goes beyond lower utility bills. The institution broke new ground in higher ed recently with a pilot program to calculate the wider cost of carbon use at 20 of its New Haven, Connecticut, buildings, including the well-known Peabody Museum and the president’s office. The point of pollution is just one […]
As colleges and universities move into 2016, campus finance leaders may wish for a crystal ball to help with preparations in the coming year. Unfortunately, a crystal ball is not in the budget. Most colleges and universities will continue to face financial hurdles, and although there is much crossover, certain issues will be more or […]
Do today’s employee benefit packages resemble those that colleges and universities offered in the past? Hardly. Wellness benefits have transformed into all kinds of unique offerings, ranging from on-site vegetable gardens to fitness centers. Meanwhile, traditional “do-everything-for-me” benefits have disappeared. Schools now expect employees to take action, change behaviors and make decisions that positively impact […]
What's going on? Marvin Gaye's plaintive question from decades ago echoes hauntingly today. With each new incidence of brown-skinned people being brutalized, it returns more bitterly to our lips, triggered by each new image from Ferguson to Tempe, Baltimore to Cleveland, Staten Island to Charleston the list goes painfully on. The geography and frequency […]
Embezzlement originating from any corner of campus can threaten any college and university. As for the losses, they can be big. Take, for example: Emory University in Atlanta. In July, a former employee received an 18-month prison term for stealing over $300,000. As an administrative assistant in the school of nursing, she misled students into […]
Earlier this year, CUPA-HR—an HR association for higher education—conducted its 2015 Employee Healthcare Benefits in Higher Education Survey. Of the 525 public and private institutions that responded, 70 percent offer healthcare coverage to same-sex domestic partners. However, that number will likely increase after the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision in June to legalize same-sex marriage. […]
