- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Are you looking for value-added news and commentary on the latest agriculture and food topics? Be sure to visit UCFoodObserver.com. This website is sponsored by the University of California's Global Food Initiative and just celebrated its one-year anniversary.
The blog is written by Rose Hayden-Smith, UC Cooperative Extension advisor in Ventura County, with assistant editor Teresa O'Connor, who is also a UC Master Gardener.
“From curated news reports to original interviews, you'll find hundreds of news items about everything from food policy and sustainable agriculture to historical perspectives and key cultural trends,” said Hayden-Smith. “You'll also find us on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram as @UCFoodObserver.”
Although UC Food Observer reaches beyond UC for content, it has featured Q & As with Pat Crawford, UC Cooperative Extension specialist with the Nutrition Policy Institute and Doug Parker, director of the California Institute for Water Resources. The blog recently included a California Agriculture article on the effects of climate change on crops in a post.
Hayden-Smith invites consumers and producers alike to take part in the conversation about how to sustainably and nutritiously feed the world.
- Author: Jodi Azulai
For more information on finding a mentor or being a mentor see these resources:
The UC Davis Mentoring Toolkit: Provides detailed information on mentor/mentee roles and responsibilities, how to choose a mentor, and a mentor assessment to find out if you might be a good mentor.
UC Merced's Career Advancement Mentorship Program: A volunteer career development program that matches experienced UC Merced staff (mentors) with staff members (mentees) seeking mentoring and professional development.
UC Berkeley's Staff Mentorship Program: A program where mentees are matched with seasoned staff mentors to formulate and start acting on a career plan.
UC Riverside's Staff Mentorship Program is in development. For more information, contact the UCR Human Resources office.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
An international group of water experts gathered in Sacramento on Feb. 2 and 3 to share their experiences with the use of market-based incentives to address water scarcity. The presentations and videos from the workshop "Water Pricing for a Dry Future: Policy Ideas from Abroad and their Relevance to California" have been posted at http://spp.ucr.edu/waterpricing under the “video” tab.
"The workshop provided an opportunity for individuals in various sectors to interact with scholars from several countries, who showed how water-pricing mechanisms have been used creatively in their countries to promote water conservation," said Ariel Dinar, UC Riverside professor of environmental economics and policy, who co-organized the workshop.
Experts from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, France, Israel, South Africa, Spain and California, presented their water-pricing cases.
The workshop was sponsored by the UC Center at Sacramento, UC Riverside School of Public Policy, UC Berkeley, UC ANR, Giannini Foundation of Agricultural Economics, Public Policy Institute of California Water Policy Center and Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
ANR is renewing the Qualtrics license for another three years. The 2015 pilot year was successful, resulting in more than 60 new accounts or accounts transferred from other university accounts, said Kit Alviz, Program Planning & Evaluation analyst. Surveys have been created for research, administrative, needs assessment and program evaluation purposes.
Unique Qualtrics features include the ability to create mailing lists and schedule individualized invitations and reminders, create display/skip logic so that questionnaires can be tailored to each participant and utilize Qualtrics' many options for response types and scales.
To register for a Qualtrics account, ANR staff and academics can complete this survey. For more information about ANR's Qualtrics account, please visit http://ucanr.edu/sites/CEprogramevaluation/Get_Qualtrics_through_ANR.
ANR has purchased the Offline Surveys feature, which will allow Qualtrics users to download surveys to smartphones and tablets for offline data collection. Learn more about the Offline Surveys feature by clicking on this link.
Technical assistance will continue to be provided by Qualtrics at (800) 340-9194 or support@qualtrics.com. Qualtrics has online trainings and tutorials that you can take at your convenience.
- Visit Qualtrics' Getting Started website to “Learn Qualtrics in 5 Steps” via five short, recorded webinars
- Their Support website lists even more training offerings, including weekly live webinars and recorded sessions.
The University of California Board of Regents today (March 24) approved a new retirement program for future UC employees proposed by President Napolitano, as part of a broader effort to maintain the university's excellence and sustain its long-term financial health.
The new retirement program will apply only to UC employees hired on or after July 1, 2016. Current employees and retirees are not affected by these changes because accrued pension benefits are protected by law and cannot be reduced or revoked.
The new program, which is consistent with the 2015 budget agreement with the state, will bolster the long-term financial stability of UC and its retirement program, while providing critical funding for many university priorities through savings generated by the plan and through additional funds UC will receive from the state.
Under the 2015 budget agreement, UC is receiving nearly $1 billion in new annual revenue and one-time funding over the several years, including $436 million to help pay down UC's unfunded pension liability. As part of the agreement, UC is implementing a cap on the pensionable earnings of future employees, mirroring the limit on pension benefits for state employees under the 2013 California Public Employees' Pension Reform Act (PEPRA). The university expects to save on average $99 million a year by implementing the pension cap, over half of which will go toward further paying down UC's unfunded liability.
“When we approved the budget agreement between the governor, the Legislature and this body, we did so committing ourselves to proactively developing a set of retirement options that are financially prudent, are oriented toward the long-term sustainability of the university and that allow us to effectively recruit and retain the very best faculty and staff,” Regent Monica Lozano said. “The [retirement] options on the table go a long way toward meeting those three very important objectives.”
Under the proposal approved by the regents, future employees will be offered a choice between two options:
- Option 1 – Pension + 401(k)-style supplemental benefit: The current UC pension benefit capped at the PEPRA salary limit (currently $117,020) plus a supplemental 401(k)-style benefit for eligible employee pay up to the Internal Revenue Service limit (currently $265,000), or
- Option 2 – New 401(k)-style benefit: A new stand-alone 401(k)-style plan with benefits-eligible employee pay up to the Internal Revenue Service limit (currently $265,000).
Maintaining a pension benefit — along with a 401(k)-style supplement (Option 1) — is important to attracting and retaining the caliber of personnel needed to maintain UC's excellence, especially faculty for whom the university often competes against elite private institutions that can often pay more than UC.
At the same time, UC's workforce is highly diverse and people have different retirement needs and goals. The new stand-alone 401(k)-style retirement benefit (Option 2) may be attractive to employees who work at UC for only a few years and want a portable retirement benefit they can take with them, and/or who prefer to personally manage their retirement savings.
The vast majority of future staff would not see any difference in their benefits compared to current employees. Based on current data, 79 percent of current employees would not be affected by the PEPRA cap.
You can read more details about the approved retirement benefits here.
Other elements of employee compensation were also discussed, including employee salaries and the university's ability to recruit and retain quality faculty and staff. President Napolitano noted for the regents that employee salaries remain an issue for certain employee groups and that she intends to propose ways to address competitive employee pay at future regents' meetings.
In addition to new retirement options for future UC employees, the president's plan will:
- Focus on overall employee compensation by (1) allowing UC to budget for regular pay increases for faculty and staff, and (2) making merit-based pay a regular component of systemwide salary programs to reward employees based on performance.
- Help preserve UC's quality by devoting resources to assist campuses in attracting and retaining faculty and key staff, and improve the student experience.
- Offer enhanced retirement counseling and education for all employees, including new hires, as part of UC's commitment to helping employees successfully plan for retirement.
Last summer after the 2015 budget agreement was finalized, President Napolitano convened a task force to recommend options for the new retirement benefits. The task force presented her with its recommendations in December 2015.
In January and February, the president solicited feedback on the recommendations from the UC community. She received comments from more than 300 faculty and staff, which she used to help inform the proposal she brought to the regents.