Posts Tagged: ANR Staff Assembly

UC ANR staff: Snack healthy on Aug. 29 and win a prize for your office

The UC ANR Staff Assembly's new Wellness Committee is sponsoring its first activity on Healthy Snack Day, Aug. 29. Healthy Snack Day is a statewide day of action led by the Champions for Change Program of the California Department of Public Health.

Many UC Cooperative Extension food educators are planning activities with their clientele Aug. 29 to promote the benefits of eating nutritious foods at snack time, and the Wellness Committee is bringing the celebration to UC ANR staff by sponsoring a healthy competition.

The Wellness Committee has asked UC ANR Staff Assembly Ambassadors to coordinate a breaktime healthy snack event at their local facilities. All staff can share their snacks on social media using the hashtag #SnackHealthyUCANR. To win, each ambassador can submit his or her location's best photo. The Wellness Committee will select a winner to receive a dispenser for infused water for the facility.

Find out who your staff assembly ambassador is by visiting the UC ANR Staff Assembly website.

Members of the UC ANR Staff Assembly Wellness Committee are:

• Jeannette Warnert, chair
• Austin Cantrell
• Michelle Hammer Coffer
• Kaela Plank
• Alyssa Rodriguez
• Anne Schellman
• Shawnice Sellers
• Wylie Skillman
• Leah Sourbeer
• Christopher Gomez Wong

ANR staff encouraged to support and engage with Staff Assembly

Colleagues:

Since I joined UC ANR last summer, I have come to recognize the valuable role played by the Division's staff employees. We rely on academics to lead our research and extension programs and administrators to set the course and manage our efforts, but accomplishing our goals would be impossible without the many capacities offered by a dedicated staff.

Our Academic Assembly goes back years, and all UC campuses plus the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Office of the President have staff assemblies. However, ANR lacked an organization dedicated to promoting the welfare of staff.

Last spring, the division's Work Environment Assessment workshop participants discussed the staff assembly concept and sought volunteers to help design a process and structure for establishing the UC ANR Staff Assembly. As the impressive number of volunteers illustrated, there was a palpable enthusiasm and clear willingness to engage. There were actually many more volunteers than we could accommodate on the committee, a nice “problem” to have.

In February, representatives of the new staff assembly committee presented the mission statement and bylaws they drafted for the new organization to me and other members of the UC ANR leadership team. The committee envisioned a UC ANR Staff Assembly that cultivates satisfied, dedicated and professional staff to work with the Division's leadership, academics and other members of the ANR community.

All ANR staff employees will be members of the ANR Staff Assembly, including county-paid, part-time and limited-appointment staff. The elected leaders of the group will seek input from ANR staff on policies, processes and programs and serve in an advisory capacity to ANR leadership, giving staff a collective voice on issues of concern. The assembly also will provide support for career training and professional development to staff to aid career advancement.

The ANR Staff Assembly will become a member of the Council of UC Staff Assemblies (CUCSA) and send representatives to CUCSA's quarterly meetings. CUCSA presents staff perspectives and recommendations on management initiatives to the University of California's decision makers and has weighed in on important Regents' decisions, such as budget issues and domestic partner benefits.

I would like to thank the Work Environment Assessment workshop participants and the committee of ANR volunteers who met over the last six months to develop the structure of our new UC ANR Staff Assembly. I encourage supervisors, managers, directors and administrators in ANR to provide support for ANR staff who are interested in being involved in the UC ANR Staff Assembly. You'll hear more about our Staff Assembly in the coming weeks and months, as I know the team hopes to establish a website, town hall meetings, and other venues for engagement.

Please be open, on a case-by-case basis, to allow release time for staff to participate in UC ANR Staff Assembly activities and to run for elected positions on the assembly's executive committee or as CUCSA representatives. And I would especially encourage our staff to become engaged with the UC ANR Staff Assembly as we work together to support healthy food systems, environments, people and communities in California.

Sincerely,

Glenda

 

UC ANR Staff Assembly and Principles of Community committees formed

On behalf of the Work Environment Assessment Committee, we want to thank all who volunteered to be part of statewide committees to create an ANR Staff Assembly and to develop UC ANR Principles of Community. Response throughout the six regional workshops was tremendous and we appreciate your enthusiasm.

From the list of nearly 50 volunteers, committee rosters were developed that balance people from different areas of the state and different job responsibilities in order to provide a diverse representation of UC ANR. For those not selected, we sincerely appreciate your willingness to serve and to be part of these committees. 

Here are the committee members:

UC ANR Staff Assembly	UC ANR Principles of Community
Matt Baur Andrew Besson Janelle Hansen Tammy Majcherek Lori Renstrom Nikolai Schweitzer Jeannette Warnert	Mary Blackburn Tina Jordan Emily LaRue Chris Martinez Laura Snell Katherine Soule Erin Thompson Jeff Tibayan Liz Villalobos Terri White

The Staff Assembly will be a mechanism through which non-academic staff will be able to voice their issues, concerns and suggestions. The committee will meet throughout the fall and then provide a report to UC ANR Senior Leadership in February 2016.  

The Principles of Community Committee will also work throughout the fall, taking the input from all of the Work Environment Assessment Workshops. The committee will work together to develop a draft set of Principles of Community for UC ANR by February 2016.

Both committees will reach out for feedback and will provide updates on a regular basis.  

Thank you again to our volunteers who stepped up to create the first UC ANR Staff Assembly and to develop our own UC ANR Principles of Community.

Sincerely,

Jan Corlett, chief of staff to the vice president

Linda Marie Manton, executive director for ANR Staff Personnel   

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