Monday, November 21, 2022
News
A Note about SEAMS
Dear colleagues,
As part of the SEAMS Executive Committee, I want to call your attention to a few communication issues that will be important for all of us to keep in mind over this coming break from classes. Now that many of the Workday features will be going live, there will be any number of e-mail messages that go out to you as a whole and — in some cases — to a select group of folks that play specific roles on campus. Please keep an eye out for those e-mails! They will come from different senders, but they should contain the word “Workday” in the subject heading. Many of them, like the one in today’s ELT, will include links to learning opportunities about particular features of Workday that will be important to your work, so please do take advantage of these opportunities.
Also, I’d like to remind everyone at this point again that we will experience a variety of challenges as parts of Workday go live. Please be patient and kind in responses to the staff members that are working tirelessly to make this transition possible. It is the season to give thanks, and I am particularly grateful to our colleagues across the institution that have spent so much of their time helping us move to a new platform that we believe will eventually truly be much better for the ways we do our business together.
Finally, have a wonderful break from classes and enjoy time with family and friends.
Gratefully, Michelle
Workday Training
The campus community will start using Workday on January 2nd, and all of us will need to prepare by engaging in training. Training for faculty is available on the SEAMS Training page; you will have the opportunity to choose among multiple forms of training. Several modules are already available, and the site will continue to grow as we get closer to January 2, so please stay tuned for updates.
Faculty Workday Foundations Training
Your Faculty Workday Foundations training will consist of:
- Workday Navigation
- View and Manage your Employee Profile
- Report Out-of-Pocket Expenses
- Payroll Deductions and Benefits
In total, your Workday Foundations training should take less than 30 minutes to complete. Supervisor training and Money Manager training will require additional time.
Approving Timecards in December
Please note that if you supervise non-exempt employees, you should be prepared to approve non-exempt time off requests in Workday beginning on December 21st and time entry submissions on January 2nd. (Exempt staff time off requests in Workday begin on January 2nd.) See the Supervisor Training linked above for more details.
Foundations training is being offered before providing access to Workday so community members who are gone in December can get a jumpstart on their training, if they wish to do so. Full support for the training and the use of Workday will begin on December 18th. If you have questions before then, please submit them here.
A Helpful Note about Life-Long Learning from Janet Scannell
I love working in higher education, mostly because I love learning. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and grow. I was thinking recently about the ways in which introducing new technologies is a learning challenge.
Continue reading…
Teachers at every level use feedback to help their students make adjustments in their understanding and their approach to the material. Opportunities to check one’s comprehension and gain feedback and guidance is a core part of learning theory.
Those same steps are an important part of learning how to use technology, although we don’t often apply the same consciousness and appreciation for that learning. Giving and receiving feedback will be essential for us to survive and thrive through the move to Workday.
As we prepare for the move to Workday, this is another opportunity to think about our learning process. I’d like to encourage two things: 1) that all of us give ourselves room to recognize that our learning won’t be a straight line and that it takes time and feedback to learn new practices, and 2) that you offer feedback to the functional and technical leaders about how to improve the process.
The SEAMS team has put a lot of resources together to help all of us learn how to do HR and Finance functions in Workday. Those are available on the project website. Guided sessions will be great opportunities to learn and practice, while gaining real-time feedback.
As you use the new environment, please feel free to submit feedback on the SEAMS website or send feedback to: seams-planning-group@carleton.edu.
As much as I love learning, it’s also true that I wouldn’t choose to have to learn new ways to manage the ITS budget, hiring, etc. Please know that our nearly 30-year-old software (Colleague / HUB) has significant challenges for functional departments (like HR), and that Workday will offer much better tools, including a mobile app.
According to our peer schools, we can expect to be uncomfortable with, and adapting to, our environment for the next few years. Your feedback and patience will be very helpful as we move through the next phase of this journey.
Click here to read Janet’s full article, including lessons learned from feedback about the cybersecurity training.
Winter Weather Disruptions
As we look ahead to the upcoming winter term, we must also look ahead to the potential for more disruptive inclement weather. (The last week has provided a reminder that inclement weather does not always respect the bounds of our academic calendar.) As a residential campus, Carleton very rarely closes or cancels classes completely because of weather. But, even if the college is open, winter weather can still make staff and faculty travel to campus challenging, particularly for those who live farther from Northfield.
If severe weather impacts employees’ ability to safely travel to campus, there are Weather Days and FlexWork policies that may apply, depending on circumstances. Faculty unable to travel safely to campus on a weather-impacted class day will need to teach in ways other than the usual. (We’d all hope that these disruptions won’t occur frequently, but circumstances are different, and the individual decision about when it’s appropriate to stay off the roads is left to the best judgement of individual faculty.) Many instructors will be able to use hard-earned experience of the last several years to substitute remote instruction during their normal class meeting time. For some types of courses, though, remote instruction may not be possible or appropriate; these instructors can arrange for a colleague to cover their class, make their own arrangements for make-up class sessions after the weather improves, or offer alternative asynchronous instructional activities. In any case, the amount of work asked of students in these alternatives should be similar to that of the original class session. (The LTC’s information on resilient pedagogy is particularly helpful in planning.)
Syllabus Collection Reminder
You should have received an email on November 9th that asked you to submit your syllabi from Fall 2022 courses to our syllabus archive. If you haven’t submitted yours yet, please do! If you have questions, please get in touch with David Liben-Nowell in the Provost’s Office.
Thanks for Hosting Prospective Students for Class Visits
The Admissions office would like to thank the faculty for hosting over 200 prospective students in classes this fall! There will not be class visits through Admissions during winter term but Admissions looks forward to collaborating with you all again as we welcome *admitted* students to campus come spring term for traditional visits and large-scale programming on April 14 and 21.
Advising
Advising Quick Links
- Advising Handbook
- Forms and Decision Trees
- Advising Contacts
- Graduation & Major Requirements
- Academic Rules and Regulations
- Off-Campus Study Programs
- Career Center Resources for Faculty & Advisers
- Office of Student Fellowships ‘For Advisors’ Page
Grants and Fellowships
Workshops
LTC 2022 Winter Break Conference
Registration is still open for the Winter Break Conference! All members of the Carleton community are welcome and you may sign up for as few or as many sessions as you wish. Please register at the conference website.
Everyone’s voice counts in these important conversations!