Report to the Provost on Caregiving and Employment

-Comparison to Benchmark Universities -Review of the Research -Personal Experiences -Recommendations

PACWC Subcommittee: Natalie Blais, Graduate School of Public Health

Carolyn Kaempf, Student Financial ServicesMary Elizabeth Rauktis, School of Social Work

Research on the Impactof Caregiving on Employment

• Increases the likelihood of women leaving the work force (Pavalko & Artis, 1997; Dentinger & Clarkberg, 2002).

•Expensive long term implications for both the caregiver and the University

Impact on the Caregiver

Loss of Income Reduced Social Security benefits Loss of voluntary and employer contributions to retirement

Loss of employer supported health care

• Loss of Social Capital• Repetitive, hard costs: • Recruiting• Rehiring• Retraining

Impact on the University

Comparison of Pitt to Benchmark Universities: Policies

Comparison of Pitt to Benchmark Universities: Benefits

* How much paid leave can be taken and how much accrued sick & personal time must be used before unpaid leave begins varies

by school.

Comparison of Pitt to Benchmark Universities: Services

Research on Effective Policies

Three policies with most impact on retaining caregiving women:

(1) Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) (2) Paid Time Off (sick & vacation days)(3) Flexible work hours and location

(Chesley & Moen, 2006; Kossek, 2005; Pavalko & Henderson, 2006).

Recommendations

Life Solutions

Aging Institute

Crisis/Short Term Case

ManagementInformational Seminars

Time Donation and Flex

Time Policies

Existing Resources -promote services -increase utilization

New Services & Activities

Recommendations

•Increase Visibility of existing•Life Solutions and Aging Institute

Resources:

▫Orientation/information video ▫Marketing reminders

Read Green, University Times, Twitter, Facebook▫On-campus activities

Information fairs Targeted events, brown bag series, expert

speakers

Recommendations• Expand Services and Training:

▫ Elder care short-term/crisis care case management services. Short term crisis case management could be accessed through the

EAP Life Solutions when there is an emergency in which the employee needs assistance in finding resources and navigating the complex systems of Medicare and private insurers.

▫ Develop a track of informational seminars on Aging & Elder Care, to be delivered in-person, on campus, and via webinars: Strategies for paying for long term care Estate Planning Social Security Medicare Powers of Attorney Advanced Directives Caregiver counseling and emotional support End of life care and palliative/hospice

•Improve access to resources through new benefit policies:▫Time Donation Policy

Allows staff to voluntarily assist fellow employees in critical need of paid leave after other options are exhausted.

See 2010 Staff Association Council proposal Cost neutral; potential cost savings. See

Appendix.▫Flex-time Policy

Access to counseling during the work day

Recommendations

Mentoring/Communication Subcommittee Report4/15/14

Subcommittee Members

•Leigh Cully, Staff, DRS•Janet Grady, Faculty, UPJ•Eleanora Kaloyopoulou, Undergrad

Student•Kristin Kanthak, Faculty, Political Science•Kacey Marra, Faculty, SOM and SOE•Martha Merrill, Grad Student, SOE

Approach

•The subcommittee conducted a fact-finding search to identify structured or formalized mentoring programs on all campuses

•The subcommittee also identified the communication pathway for these programs

•Each subcommittee member focused on a different subset of the University: staff, faculty, post-docs, grad students, undergrads, and regional campuses

Undergraduate MentoringWhere we are now:

• Academic Advising▫Each student has mentor

• Undergraduate Research▫Older students

Students must seek out own research advisor Independent research for class credit Brackenridge Fellowship, Arts & Sciences Research

Award▫First-year students

First Experiences in Research Program Selection process to pair faculty with students Helps students meet faculty

Graduate Student MentoringWhere we are now:

• Well-established mentoring programs help students realize their career goals and enhance their campus experience (Examples: FAST in Medicine, GWEN in Engineering)

• Graduate students without mentorship opportunities (peer-to-peer and/or advisor-to-student) are eager for programs

• Quality of opportunities depend on interest and time by all parties involved

• Official peer-to-peer mentoring available in half of the schools (Business, GSPIA, Law, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy)

Staff MentoringWhere we are now:

• Staff Association Council: Mentoring Subcommittee currently in the redevelopment phase

• Student Affairs: Peer to Peer Support program is designed to assist new staff’s transition into the division

• Office of Human Resources: “mentoring” workshops designed to promote and maximize professional growth within the University

Mentoring on Regional Campuses

Where we are now:

• Structured faculty orientation programs• Mostly informal mentoring by chairs• Staff mentoring through

departments• Lack of formal, structured programs• Doing comparatively much better for

student mentoring

Post-doctoral Fellow MentoringWhere we are now:

▫UPPDA No formal mentoring plan identified A program for post-docs to mentor high

school students Links to the Office of Academic Career

Development▫OACD

A Career Development Plan and Annual Progress Assessment Process is required for all postdoctoral trainees

▫A&S has a formal post-doctoral program, but no formal mentoring program was identified

Faculty Mentoring

Where we are now:

• A 2006 PACWC university-wide pilot program with webpage• Formal mentoring program in the Dietrich

School of Arts and Sciences• Formal mentoring program at the Institute

for Clinical Research Education• Formal mentoring in the School of

Medicine: CaMP• New informal mentoring program in the

Swanson School of Engineering

Summary: Recommendations

• Creation of a virtual mentoring hub that is university-wide

• Use the structured programs in A&S and Health Sciences as models

• Consistent topic coverage• Avoid anyone “slipping through cracks”• Comprehensive mentoring for faculty administrators• Standardized mentor training with rewards• Update the PACWC pilot program website• Improved communication about mentoring opportunities• Benchmark institutions to assess best practices in

mentoring

Promoting Successful Research Careers among Female Faculty

Jean Hale, Director of Alumni Relations and Development, GSPIA; Giuseppina Mecchia, Associate Professor of French and Italian; Laura Schaefer, Professor of Mechanical Engineering; Anna Vainchtein, Associate Professor of Mathematics.

Framing the Issue

• Pitt promotes a healthy, active, intellectual research environment

• National discussion on gender equality and research opportunities

• “Overall, these data suggest academia mirrors the rest of society; gender inequality still exists in academic settings1”

• Which strategies can help mitigate these issues at Pitt?

1. Monroe et al., 2008, "Gender Equality in Academia: Bad News from the Trenches, and Some Possible Solutions," Perspectives on Politics.

Tasks

• Mentoring can address issues specific to women among all faculty, and to faculty among all women at Pitt (such as high service loads and caregiving responsibilities)

• Sponsoring informal meetings with prominent women visitors can lead to exchange of research ideas and grant/publication strategies

• Video recording/web streaming of lectures and conferences facilitates the participation of women

• Publicizing of women faculty scholarly and teaching awards and accomplishments by the Office of Public Affairs

Implementation

• Creation of a mentoring blog• Provost's Office/PACWC provides

funding for group lunch or reception• Provost's Office tasks CIDDE with

recording and broadcasting seminars• Department chairs summarize and

provide data about research and teaching accomplishments of female faculty