Updated: Monday, Sept. 9, 2024 at 5:21 p.m.
After a nine-year push from staff for a governing body, Staff Council members said they collected census information on the workers they serve and relayed concerns to administrators in the body’s first year.
Members of the Staff Council said they spent last year collaborating with administrators to advocate for a more equitable pay structure for all staff, which resulted in a 1 percent increase in the merit pool, and an expanded telework policy. These milestones come after two unsuccessful attempts to form a University-wide staff governing body in 2014 and 2020, which staff said was due to a lack of approval from the administrations of former University presidents Steven Knapp and Thomas LeBlanc.
Staff Council President Bridget Schwartz said former interim University President Mark Wrighton was the first GW president to support staff’s interest in forming a governing body.
She said during the council’s inaugural year, members advocated for staff by launching initiatives like staff spotlights and Community Connections, which highlight the work of different departments. She said the council also released short surveys throughout the year to collect information on staff experiences, which she said helped the council understand employees’ biggest concerns.
“One of the big things we needed to do as a council was to really get to know staff because our role is to advocate on their behalf,” Schwartz said. “We know what our experiences are and what we hear in passing by our colleagues, but what is the staff really facing?”
Schwartz said the council passed resolutions to increase benefits for staff, including one passed in February that supported the permanent adoption of the remote and hybrid policy — which allows some staff to work virtually. She said one of the council’s first resolutions was proposed by Staff Experience Committee Chair Nicole Mintz and passed in February to provide work flexibility for staff, cut transportation costs and minimize long commutes.
Schwartz said the council is anticipating officials’ release of a website that will display publicly available financial documents, which University President Ellen Granberg announced plans in May to develop over the summer. She said the council hopes the website will promote more “transparency” with GW leadership after observing an “increased need for communication” between officials and community members during the pro-Palestinian encampment in University Yard last spring.
She said the council cannot predict changes to labor laws, administrative strategic plans or campus tensions, but the council will remain a support system for staff.
“We’ll just stay flexible and amenable to those types of changes and what’s needed from the council. But I think at the core, what the council will always be, is a voice for GW staff and to lift each other up,” Schwartz said.
Council Vice President Kim Fulmer, who will take over as president in January at the end of Schwartz’s 18-month term, said the council has formed a “strong” sense of community because of staff members’ participation in the four standing committees. With 35 representatives housed in divisions like Information Technology and the Division of Student Affairs, the Staff Council operates the four committees: the Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee, the Service Committee, the Staff Development and Recognition Committee and the Staff Experience Committee.
The Staff Council’s bylaws state that the vice president takes the helm of the council as president after serving in the position for one year.
She said the council has allowed the staff to form a “unified voice” when raising issues relevant to them to the administration, including requests for wages that support the rising cost of living in D.C.
“Opportunities for committee work and group training faded away in recent years, so I am glad we have this renewed opportunity to feel connected,” Fulmer said in an email.
As the council enters its second year, Fulmer said she hopes the body will continue to collaborate with the Student Government Association and Alumni Association. She said the effort started when SGA President Ethan Fitzgerald attended a meeting in April to discuss staff’s needs and his mission to increase students’ access to mental health resources on campus.
Mintz, the Staff Experience Committee chair, said the committee created multiple subcommittees to tackle various topics that concern staff, like compensation, staff resources, career advancement and merit performance. She said the resolution to support wage adjustments for staff, proposed by Compensation Subcommittee Chair Emily Lewis and passed in April, was the council’s response to feedback from staff on the Staff Council survey published earlier that month.
The resolution requested all staff receive a one-time salary increase of 5 percent in FY 2025 and then annual wage increases between 3 and 5 percent that are not associated with performance ratings. The resolution was spurred by a discussion on GW’s merit pay compensation model, which annually awards bonuses to staff who go beyond the duties outlined in their job descriptions, Lewis said.
GW pays both salary and hourly wages to staff, depending on the position. The University compensates full-time service and support positions hourly, and positions in the manager stream are compensated on a salary basis.
Mintz said the resolution contributed to the merit pool, or employees considered to receive the merit increases, increasing by 1 percent this year. Staff members previously reported that high-performing staff receive limited rewards through the merit pay system due to a small merit pool, which some experts said was because the system was flawed due to its subjectivity.
“Staff look at that as a morale booster, being recognized for the work that is being done and working toward retention, knowing that employees may go to a different university or the private sector and really wanting to show that the university values staff,” Mintz said.
The survey results in April revealed that the majority of staff want GW to discontinue annual merit increases, or pay raises that reflect employee performance. The survey found most staff would prefer a system in which the University distributes an annual standard cost of living adjustment for all staff members, which in practice is an increase in employee benefits or pay to offset inflation because of the high cost of living in the District.
The April resolution states that more than 60 percent of staff have reported taking on second jobs to “break even” because GW’s wages are too low to keep up with D.C.’s cost of living.
Since the Staff Council first convened in August 2023, the body has passed three resolutions, addressing GW’s remote and hybrid work policies for staff, Staff Council bylaws and wage adjustments. Schwartz said more results from the April survey will be published on the Staff Council website before the next Board of Trustees meeting Sept. 27.
Mintz said the council advocated for more merit increases to alleviate staff burnout, a result of staffing remaining below pre-pandemic levels. She said because the council’s rate of formally proposing solutions to staff issues outpaces GW’s rate of implementation, the council has felt pressured by time.
“There are so many priorities and strategies, so we keep our staff engaged and remind everyone ‘we hear you, and this is going to take longer than we’d like it to because that’s how the academic cycle works,’” Mintz said.
Mintz said their annual election will result in a new Staff Council executive team in December. Nominations for executive staff council members and representatives from GW schools and divisions ended Sept. 6. Both part-time and full-time employees are eligible to join the council.
“We really look out for all staff, shift staff and custodial staff. They’re so behind the scenes and equally as important as senior leadership,” Mintz said. “We are all in a continuum where there has to be cohesion and recognition and appreciation for what everybody is doing in their own role in support of our students.”
Hannah Marr contributed reporting.
This post has been updated to reflect the following:
This post has been updated to clarify that the April resolution to support wage adjustments for staff contributed to the merit pool increasing by 1 percent, but did not alone cause the uptick. Other efforts and factors also contributed to the increase.
