USAC Sub-Committees

The Governance Subcommittee has these primary responsibilities:

• Partner with the Office of Human Resources to facilitate the Staff Career Development Grant process.
• Elect Staff Senators to serve on the University Senate.
• Appoint staff members to serve on various senate and university-wide committees.
• Review and update USAC’s Bylaws and Procedures and Operations Manual on a regular basis, finding ways to make USAC operate more effectively and inclusively.
• Coordinate special projects that ensure staff are well represented in decision making bodies at Ohio State.

The Inclusive Excellence (IE) Subcommittee’s internal focus is ensuring inclusive practices within USAC to promote our committee's commitment for diversity, equity and social justice. Externally, the committee establishes and maintains collaborative relationships with university stakeholders to enhance the staff experience by advocating for fairness, inclusivity, and equality.

In recent years, IE has focused on initiatives such as USAC membership demographics and recruitment strategies to help diversify our ranks and benchmark to that of the OSU staff community, City of Columbus, and Franklin County and contributing to the larger conversation around staff pay equity at The Ohio State University. IE routinely works with our other subcommittees to bring inclusive excellence into all that we do, ensure equity and representation in our programming, and ensure that our work aligns closely with the Shared Values Initiative.

The Outreach and Engagement subcommittee proudly hosted the All-Staff Wellness Event to begin President Johnson’s Investiture Week and to welcome and celebrate her as our new leader. This created a forum for staff to directly engage with President Johnson while demonstrating our shared value of Care and Compassion by taking time to support each other’s physical and mental health. We honored our value of Inclusion and Equity by making this a hybrid event also available via virtual live stream for those unable to participate in person. O&E later hosted two town halls to help provide information and answer questions for staff about the ongoing implementation of the Career Roadmap project. We are pleased to have set a USAC record with over 2,000 staff members engaging with us live during these events, and many more who watched the recordings posted to our website.

The Staff Affairs subcommittee had a landmark year due to the support from President Johnson of the Winter Recess initiative. The University invoked the Short-Term Closure policy to support the health, safety, and wellbeing of the University’s workforce and closed all campuses on December 27-29, 2021. This pilot was a remarkable success, and we are currently working with the administration to make Winter Recess a permanent addition to the University calendar. USAC is proud to continue its work recognizing staff who do excellent work in their units through our Staff in the Spotlight program. USAC accepts nominations for this honor each month, and recognizes 2 employees through various media channels, including the USAC newsletter and social media accounts. We are now working with Jeff Risinger to align this award more closely with the Shared Values Initiative and to attach a small financial award for the recipients. To acknowledge the stressful challenges the workface has faced throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Staff Affairs is also working closely with Human Resources to revise the Paid Leave Policy to formally recognize mental health issues such as feeling stressed and overwhelmed as an appropriate use of sick leave. We know that many employees can use their sick time for a mental health day, but others report being denied by their supervisors. We believe that officially incorporating this into the policy language aligns with our Shared Values by supporting their mental health and creating an equitable environment for all employees.