A Report by the Subcommittee on Cross-College Activity

Tino Balio
John Bollinger
Virginia Hinshaw
Howard Martin
David Trubek (chair)
Tom Yuill

March 28, 1995

On October 12, 1994, the Council of Deans met to discuss cross-college activities. It listed numerous activities that involve more that one of the UW’s schools and colleges and recognized the need for clearer policies governing cross-college cooperation. To meet that need, the Chancellor apointed a subcommittee of the Council and charged it to study the issue and report back to the Council.

The list covered everything from academic services to interdisciplinary degree programs. The subcommittee chose to focus on areas in which cross-college cooperation is necessary for academic programming and research. Other matters, while important, were not canvassed. We paid primary attention to five areas in which "horizontal" cooperation across college boundaries is clearly necessary and already underway: biological sciences, environmental studies, international education, the arts, and the "virtual department" housed in the College of Engineering. But we tried to look more generally at all areas where cross-college learning communities are necessary and colleges must cooperate in the granting of degrees, development and management of curricula, and conduct and application of research. The report sets forth recommendations for policies that could facilitate such cooperation.

The UW-Madison’s schools and colleges must cooperate to produce and disseminate knowledge. Changes in knowledge and society create the need for constant innovation and continuous improvement. Scientific and technical changes make new forms of knowledge possible and necessary. These, and changes in the social, economic, political, and cultural realms, create demands among all our constituents for new forms of learning. The university must respond. Some demands can be met by one discipline or one college. More and more, however, adequate responses must be interdisciplinary and cross-college.

To facilitate cooperation both among disciplines and between colleges, the UW-Madison has a matrix structure with two axes of organization. The first, or vertical, axis orients the university by disciplinary departments. These are grouped in schools and colleges. Departments are the primary teaching units and tenure homes. In some cases, they also serve as loci for research activities. This axis ensures that all our efforts are anchored in strong disciplines. The second, or horizontal, axis organizes the university along lines that cut across disciplinary and college boundaries and are designed to respond to the changing needs of our constituents and emerging possibilities for knowledge production and dissemination. Horizontal, interdisciplinary organization allows us to mobilize talent from all parts of the university, pool ideas, and share resources. The UW-Madison’s commitment to interdisciplinary work goes way back. To meet the needs of the future we must reaffirm that commitment and be especially sensitive to the need for interdisciplinary cooperation across the boundaries of the vertical colleges. In a time of limited resources, we must be sure that we manage our complex matrix structure efficiently.

Of course, the whole cross-college issue would go away if we could create new colleges to meet every new need. After all, the current structure of colleges is over 100 years old; why not just redesign the whole thing so that we have a college for every area of knowledge, new and old? If, for example, we find that environmental studies and the arts draw on faculty in many colleges, why not have full-scale, autonomous colleges of environmental studies and the arts?

This solution has not been adopted. We have decided to make the existing college system work for new needs. We remain committed to the disciplines as a basic building block of organization. We have found that major structural change can be avoided if we maintain an environment in which creative faculty with strong disciplinary ties can reach out and find rewarding interdisciplinary alliances. We know that moving disciplines around to bring them closer to similar units may help solve some problems but also create new ones. For example, liberal arts students need to study arts and the environment, so if all units with these knowledges were moved to separate colleges a new problem of cross-college cooperation would arise between L&S and the new units. We realize that interdisciplinary needs wax and wane and the matrix keeps commitments flexible so we do not lock resources into what may turn out to be short-term needs. Thus there has emerged an informal presumption that we will attempt, if possible, to deal with problems of cross-college horizontality through cooperation rather than whole-scale restructuring.

The UW-Madison has provided an enabling environment for interdisciplinary activities. Our matrix structure permits us to combine disciplinary rigor with interdisciplinary flexibility and evolutionary responsiveness. It needs to be preserved. But we must strengthen the horizontal axis. The basic vertical structure (departments and colleges) is more powerful than the horizontal one (largely institutes and centers). The matrix won’t work unless we can deal with two basic aspects of the imbalance:

Departments, which control most teaching resources, serve as the basic unit for allocation of the instructional budget and can rely on "hard" money; interdisciplinary units, on the other hand, tend to rely much more heavily on more volatile extra-mural sources. At the present time, faculty careers tend to be built around departments because they are the tenure home and control crucial resources such as merit pay and teaching assignments. Rewards tend to go for activities that are recognized by disciplinary peers within the department and nationally. Activity outside the discipline and department may go unnoticed or even be penalized. The tendencies, moreover, are being aggravated by down-sizing as departments feel more pressure to use resources for core disciplinary needs. Sometimes, this imbalance can be remedied at the college level when interdisciplinary activities are carried on within one college. But it is extremely difficult to maintain effective horizontal reward structures across college boundaries. To make the matrix system work, we must change the structure of rewards and the control of resources. Units in the horizontal axis must have more control over the rewards that motivate faculty. If necessary, resources for this purpose must be reallocated from the vertical axis.

Our commitment to the matrix structure, and the resumption that new needs will be met without creation of new colleges, create governance problems. The whole UW system for governance of academic activities is tied to the vertical axis and works well. It does not work as well for horizontal, cross-college interdisciplinary activities.

Effective governance of academic activities requires the integration of academic policies and academic resources. It demands coordinated input from faculty and administrators. This can be done within a college through interaction of the Dean with the APC and other faculty governance mechanisms. But when programs operate across college boundaries, there is no such structure in place. Because there may be no equivalent of a Dean or an APC for a cross-college area, there may not be any effective mechanism to set policy or manage resources to realize academic policy goals for cross-college efforts. Moreover, since all such areas will involve several Deans, APC’s and faculties, it may be hard to get agreement on needed measures. In such situations, responsibility must fall on the several Deans to work together to ensure that cross-college learning communities can function effectively. These Deans must serve as citizens of the university, not advocates for their own unit.

We are struggling with these problems in many areas, including the four major areas (or "clusters") the Committee focused on (biological science, environment, international studies and the arts) and the virtual department. All have some form of cross-college governance. But most are new and all are still evolving, so none can serve as a full-blown model. However, the committee was able to develop some recommendations for the campus as a whole by drawing on the experience to date in these clusters. These specific suggestions will require further discussion and refinement, and must be integrated with pending Faculty Senate legislation on governance. While details may change, the policies suggested reflect the approach we must adopt to realize our vision for the 21st century.

The problems of horizontal activity vary greatly from area to area. The subcommittee sought to develop recommendations and suggested policies that could be used in all areas, while recognizing that detailed solutions will require additional fine-tuning to meet special needs. We recommend that the UW-Madison:

1. Reallocate resources to support horizontal efforts

Cross-college units must have control over resources. They should be established as strategic partnerships or joint ventures between the relevant colleges. These colleges should be expected to contribute resources from their existing budgets, allowing resources to go with the faculty who join in horizontal learning communities. Horizontal units should have their own budgets: when housed within a single college they should have a line item in the college budget.

2. Create and empower matrix governance structures

Governance structures for cross-college activities must involve faculty and administrators and incorporate horizontal and vertical dimensions. Since all cross-college activities involve goals and knowledges that transcend any one discipline and college, the governance system must include faculty and administrators who represent the horizontal mission. Since, at the same time, these units are partnerships or joint ventures of several colleges, the vertical units must also have a voice in governance. The proper mix of faculty and administration, and of horizontal and vertical perspectives, will depend on the nature and scale of the activity in question. In some cases, a single Dean (or Director reporting directly to the Chancellor and Provost) with horizontal responsibilities may provide administrative leadership; in others a committee of Deans may be needed. In the former case, representatives of participating colleges should play a role in governance; in the latter, a senior administrator with horizontal duties will be needed. Faculty participation is essential in all cases.

3. Give Deans of schools and colleges campus-wide responsibilities

Except where we now have a horizontal Dean or Director, the Deans of the vertical schools and colleges should provide administrative leadership in the governance of cross-college activities. There are two ways this can be done. In some cases, one college alone may be asked to perform cross-college responsibilities for the campus, and that units’ Dean asked to manage it for the benefit of all ("trustee dean"). In others, an interdisciplinary area may involve faculty and units in several colleges and the area may require constant cooperation of several Deans. In that case, unless a horizontal Dean/Director is available, a committee of Deans should be appointed to oversee governance and the interact with faculty. One member of the committee should be designated chair and have overall responsibility for the cross-college unit ("managing Dean"), possibly on a rotating basis. All Deans with cross-college responsibilities, whether as horizontal, trustee, or managing Dean, should be given clear responsibilities for the learning community they administer and shall be accountable to the Chancellor and Provost.

4. Give departments incentives for interdisciplinary contributions

The matrix system will only work if departments foster horizontal activities. We must change departmental attitudes and modify reward systems, giving departments incentives to contribute to the horizontal axis. There should be institutional rewards for departments that contribute to cross-college goals and accommodate interdisciplinary appointments. Departments need better information on the value of interdisciplinary units to their activities and on the interdisciplinary roles played by their faculty. Interdisciplinary work should be weighed equally with departmental activity in merit and other awards. Departments should report on their interdisciplinary contributions and be rewarded when they make substantial contributions.

5. Empower horizontal units so they can reward faculty participation

The other side of the coin is to be sure that interdisciplinary units have the power to reward faculty. They too must be able to measure performance and provide recognition. These units must ensure that participating faculty get full credit for teaching, research, and outreach done outside departments either directly or through their home department. To that end, major horizontal units may need to have some department-like powers. These could include a budget and capacity to affect merit raises, set curricular requirements, and determine teaching assignments. Horizontal units should have a formal voice in departmental tenure decisions and may require partial tenure homes in some cases. One model for organization of such a unit is the "virtual department," such as the one created by the College of Engineering for Geological Engineering. (For a description of the virtual department model, see the Appendix.) To the extent that horizontal units are given some of the powers of the departments, their organization will be affected by new campus policies for the governance of departmental-like units. (see F.P.P. Ch. 5.)

6. Both vertical and horizontal axes should be simplified

The structural complexity of both axes impedes effective management of the matrix. It would be easier to align the reward systems and provide effective governance if both axes were simplified through consolidation. It would help if the vertical axis contained a smaller number of larger departments each with a clear mandate to participate in horizontal activities. Similarly, it would be useful if the horizontal axis was made up of a smaller number of units with clear missions and adequate resources. The horizontal axis includes a large number of specialized units (programs, centers, institutes), some of which are quite small and lack permanent resources. This axis has grown up over time often on an ad hoc basis and in response to changing needs. If this axis is to be strengthened, it also should be streamlined.

7. Campus-level accountability and monitoring are essential

The matrix structure allows us to meet new needs without always creating new colleges or departments. It can be refined to deal with the demands of the next century. But the roles of vertical and horizontal components, and their interaction, need to be clarified and all must be accountable for their role in managing the matrix. Each unit in the matrix should have clear objectives and each should be required to specify measures to be taken to achieve these objectives. Each major horizontal unit should be required to provide the Chancellor and Provost with an annual report in a format similar to that used currently by vertical units. Reports should be prepared by the responsible trustee, managing, or horizontal Dean and made available to all members of the horizontal learning community.

The Virtual Department is one model for cross-college units. It is an existing structural form that can be used by faculty who see a need to provide education and other services in new ways to meet new demands. A Virtual Department is an organization of faculty and academic staff who, with support of their college(s), have agreed to participate in a multi-disciplinary, interdepartmental joint venture that must involve educational programming and may also embrace research and outreach. Faculty will have appointments in the Virtual Department but their tenure homes and Faculty Senate representation will be in other, primarily disciplinary, departments. When a Virtual Department involves faculty and staff from more than one school or college, it should have the following elements:

• a trustee or managing Dean from one college who has fiscal responsibility and administers the Virtual Department on behalf of the participating colleges

• a governance structure that gives all affected colleges a voice

• an executive committee which has powers over curriculum and other academic matters similar to those of executive committees in regular departments

• a chair selected through standard procedures for departmental chairs

The Virtual Department should be an independent budget unit with its own UDDS number. Resources must come from participating schools and colleges. With consent of their home departments, faculty may transfer some or all their salary to the Virtual Department but these resources follow the faculty should they leave the Virtual Department. Other resources that are needed (e.g. staff, TA, S&E, capital, etc.) must be contributed by the Deans of participating colleges. Merit raise disputes should be resolved by the Deans. The Dean with fiscal responsibility shall ensure that interdisciplinary participation is properly measured and rewarded and that resources that may revert to participating colleges are tracked.