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Administered by the Blog Committee, Policy Matters posts are written by members on a variety of topics. From think pieces to how-to's, editorials to news round-ups, there is something for every policy administrator. Interested in contributing a post? Let us know by emailing admin@acupa.org.

 

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We need a policy, STAT!

Posted By Alison Whiting, Mount Royal University, Tuesday, October 21, 2025
Updated: Friday, October 17, 2025

Implementing an Expedited Policy Approval Process

The Policy Ask

In June of 2025, the Alberta Government introduced a new Fairness and Safety in Sport Act ( (hereafter referred to as the "Act”) and accompanying regulation.

Google Gemini (an AI tool) summarizes the legislation in the following paragraph:

"Fairness and Safety in Sport policies are regulations, particularly in Alberta, Canada, designed to ensure integrity, equity, and safety in sports, especially for female athletes. These policies, such as Alberta's Fairness and Safety in Sport Act and its accompanying Regulation, require sports organizations to implement rules and procedures for athlete eligibility and participation. The Alberta Act specifically mandates policies that limit eligibility for female-only divisions to biologically female athletes, aiming to protect the integrity of women's sports while also seeking to provide avenues for transgender athletes' meaningful participation."

The government made it clear that Post-Secondary Institutions fall under the Act and regulation, and that we had to have a Board-approved policy in place by September 1, 2025.

Now, I’m sure most of you can immediately spot the challenge of being told in June that you need a Board-approved policy in place by September 1. Our Board of Governors meetings follow the academic calendar and we do not have any regularly scheduled meetings between June and September. Our standard policy approval process includes a 30-day community consultation period and we try our best to ensure that consultation happens during the academic year when faculty and students are on campus.

The Challenges

So, what did we do? We first turned to our trusty Policy on University Policies and Procedures, which did already include a process for expedited policy approvals. Our Policy on Policies currently states:

EXPEDITED POLICIES

1.1 In extraordinary circumstances calling for urgent action, such as a change in federal or provincial law, a significant and immediate financial opportunity, or a major institutional risk, the President may revise or put into effect a Policy without prior presentation to or consultation with the University’s Board of Governors which would otherwise be required.

1.2 If a Policy is revised or put into effect by the President in extraordinary circumstances, the University Secretariat will notify Employees in a timely manner.

1.3 Any Academic or Management Policy put into, or taken out of, effect in such a manner must immediately enter a normal development process in accordance with the Policy Framework.

However, this still left us with some issues. This expedited process provides approval authority to the President, but the Act and legislation required a Board-approved policy. We were also concerned about our ability to truly follow a normal development process after the fact when the Act and legislation had clear requirements about the policy content.

The Solution

Knowing we didn’t have a lot of time, the Associated General Counsel and I quickly took action, working closely with the executive who oversees our athletics department, to draft a policy and procedure that complied with the Act while minimizing administrative burden and protecting athlete privacy and confidentiality.

We also engaged in conversations with our President and University Secretary to consider ways to bring this policy forward for approval given the challenges outlined above. In the end, we decided a special meeting of the Board’s Governance and Nominating Committee in August would be the best approach, followed by community engagement activities in September.

The Board’s Governance and Nominating Committee Terms of Reference permit them to “act on behalf of, and with the full authority of the Board on matters that arise between regularly scheduled Board meetings.” We held a special meeting of the Governance and Nominating Committee at the end of August, at which time they approved the Fairness and Safety in Sport Policy and Procedure on behalf of our university’s Board of Governors. This allowed us to meet the Act and legislation requirement to have a Board-approved policy in place by September 1st.

Now, we were left with the challenge of how to address community engagement without the ability to conduct a formal consultation process. Again, through conversations with our University Secretary and the executive who oversees our athletics department we decided we would bring the new Fairness and Safety in Sport Policy and Procedure to various formal governing bodies of our institution for information and discussion [which includes Deans Council and General Faculties Council (our version of an academic Senate)], invite our campus community to share feedback with us about the anticipated impacts of the policy, and then share all the feedback collected with our Board of Governors.

Next Steps

This was the first time we had to use our Expedited Policy process in this way. As a result, we are now reassessing the language we have in our Policy on University Policies and Procedures to allow for greater flexibility should we find ourselves in this situation again in the future. We will propose changes to the language to allow the Board or President to approve new policies without following the Policy Framework and create a mechanism for receiving community feedback on policies approved through this expedited process. With these proposed changes, we can be allowing us to be nimble and flexible in the future and still ensure transparency with our university community.

Tags:  comment period  exceptions  policy approval  policy process  regulations  transparency 

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Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen?

Posted By Alison Whiting, Mount Royal University, Tuesday, May 20, 2025
Updated: Monday, May 19, 2025

The benefits and challenges of drafting by committee

I think it is no small secret that universities love a committee. Whether you call them committees, working groups, task forces, advisory groups, steering committees, or something else entirely, it would not surprise me to learn that your university has these in abundance. If there’s a problem, there’s probably a committee being formed to find the solution.

But I jest. Committees (advisory groups, task forces, etc.) are an integral component of collegial governance. And in many ways, there are indisputable benefits to having a cross-institutional committee weigh in on policy decisions that have broad campus impacts.

Benefits such as:

  • Breadth of expertise: Universities are awash with subject matter experts and their expertise can help ground the policy in the context of the university’s campus culture and history.
  • Cross-divisional representation: Including representation across different divisions of the university helps create well-rounded and inclusive policies and ensures relevant application in all areas.
  • Proactive stakeholder consultation: Early input from relevant stakeholders can speed up the policy approval process by identifying and addressing issues right away.
  • Improved uptake: When more people have been involved in the policy process it creates a sense of shared ownership which can lead to better buy-in and uptake during the operationalization of the policy.

However, the question at the heart of this blog post is: Is drafting by committee the most effective strategy for policy writing? And I’m not so sure that it is. While we want to ensure we are capitalizing on the wealth of expertise available on campus and gathering the relevant people in the room, we also run the risk of the proverbial “too many cooks in the kitchen.” And when we have too many cooks in the kitchen, we can end up with a policy that includes everything and the kitchen sink.

Drafting by committee can lose sight of the overall objective.

The challenge with drafting by committee is that we can quickly lose sight of the overall objective as everyone starts getting into the weeds about what the policy needs to say and how it needs to be said. People come to the table with their own personal objectives of what they believe the policy needs to cover, and if they successfully convince the rest of the committee to include each of those objectives or pieces of information, we can quickly end up with a policy draft that is unwieldy.

Drafting by committee can cause logistical challenges.

Challenges such as coordinating meetings, keeping people on task, waiting for each committee member to weigh in on decisions, coming to consensus with there are differing opinions and perspectives, time spent wordsmithing the language so that we can land on a message that's not only precisely accurate, but accurately precise while also artfully exact, with every word pulling its semantic weight. Or at least that’s what the linguists in the room tell me.

So how and when can we use committees in our policy process?

My personal preference is to capitalize on existing committees as part of an early consultation process. As we covered at the start of this blog, it is highly likely that you already have a plethora of committees at your disposal. There is likely one, if not two or three or four, committees scattered across campus that include relevant subject matter expertise and cross-institutional representation that you could utilize to help inform the policy without actually asking them to write it. Why ask people to form and join yet another committee when you can simply go to them? Instead, consider:

  • Take the existing policy (or the plan for a new policy) to the committee and ask the committee members to identify their top one to two pain points with the policy.
  • Take that information away, and use it to help inform the new draft.
  • Bring the new draft back to the committee for feedback.

The key to this process is to let the committee know they are not “the owners” of the policy, you are there seeking their feedback and expertise, but that ultimately the policy drafter is making the final decision on the scope, content and language of the policy.

This process can be repeated with however many relevant committees or groups exist on campus relative to the topic of the policy being drafted or revised. Utilizing existing committees in this way helps reap the benefits, while sidestepping the challenges.

Whether you always write policy by committee, never write policy by committee or occasionally find yourself writing policy by committee, this blog post has hopefully sparked some reflection on the value and pitfalls of drafting by committee.

Tags:  collaboration  committees  drafting policy  how-to  policy development  policy process  writing 

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Tracking and Managing Legislative Mandates that Affect Institutional Policy

Posted By Cara O'Sullivan, Utah Valley University, Tuesday, March 18, 2025
Updated: Friday, March 14, 2025
In recent years, state legislatures have increased their scrutiny of higher education, resulting in substantial legislation that impacts institutional policy. Depending on the length of the legislative session in your state and the deadlines legislators set for laws and required policies to go into effect, this can inflict quite a time crunch on staff in the Office of General Counsel and policy offices. (In Utah, the legislative session lasts 45 days, from January through early March.) In this article, I will discuss the process we set up at Utah Valley University (UVU) to track legislation that would affect policy, to organize policy revisions, and to assign appropriate changes to policy owners and attorneys who have the applicable subject matter expertise. I will also discuss a policy process we implemented four years ago called the compliance policy process, which is reserved for policy actions required by changes to state and federal law.

Policy Development Process

In Utah, the Utah System of Higher Education’s (USHE) General Counsel conducts a monthly meeting with policy office managers across our system and a separate meeting with attorneys across the USHE system. In these meetings, USHE General Counsel shares any upcoming changes to federal regulations and state code that could impact USHE and institutional policy. During the legislative season, USHE maintains a list of bills going through the state legislature and flags whether they are significant to higher ed or related to campus law enforcement and notes who the stakeholders throughout the system are.

Throughout the legislative season, our General Counsel works proactively with their counterparts across the USHE system to help institution leadership provide input into bills that will impact our institutions. In turn, our General Counsel keeps the Policy Office updated on bills making their way through the legislative process.

UVU’s General Counsel and the Policy Office then determine which bills apply to areas of our institution and which may require us to create new policies or revise existing ones. We then map the legislation to the applicable university policy and the attorney with appropriate subject matter expertise. We contact the policy owners to alert them to the upcoming policy action because they will need to approve any revisions and note the date by which policies must go into effect.

Our policy office has two full time editors and an editorial intern, who split responsibility for editing the necessary policy changes. Through our project tracking system, we document the progress of policy drafts in the review process and ensure Policy Office editors, policy owners, and assigned attorneys have all reviewed and approved the policy drafts.

We then submit the drafts through our compliance policy process to President’s Council and the Board of Trustees.

Compliance Change

Before we developed the compliance change policy process, we relied on our temporary emergency process to implement policies by the dates set by new laws. Per our Policy 101 Policy Governing Policies, we were obligated to submit the temporary emergency policy through the regular policy process and obtain university community commentary. Four years ago, when revising Policy 101, we determined that we needed a policy process to accommodate policy actions mandated by changes to state and federal law that often have tight compliance deadlines. We also reasoned that these mandated policy actions were not subject to the full notice and comment stages because we are required to comply with federal and state legislation.

In the compliance change process, the policy draft goes to President’s Council for approval and goes into effect upon that approval. The Board of Trustees may later ratify or disapprove the policy.

Even though the university community does not have a formal commentary period in this particular process, the UVU Policy Office is still tasked with making policy decisions transparent. So, with each compliance change, we work with the Office of General Counsel and the policy owners to craft an executive summary that explains the legal requirements for a compliance change. We provide this document on our news blog. This assures the university community that university leadership has adhered to our shared governance model and formal policy process.

When first implemented, our compliance change process applied only to limited scope revisions to passages of existing policy or deletions of a policy. But as legislation mandating deep changes to higher education began sweeping across the country, we realized we had to expand the compliance change process to the creation of new policies.

Getting Ahead of the Game

Proactively monitoring legislation and planning for policy changes mandated by legislation helps us avoid a huge rush that can occur at the end of a legislative session—especially when deadlines to place policies into effect can be very tight. This process helps us identify appropriate policy owners and attorneys and adjust workloads as best as possible. In the current environment in which higher education leaders and policy managers find themselves, staying organized and planning proactively can help us better deal with the changes sweeping across our industry.

Tags:  Cara O'Sullivan  federal government  legislation  mandates  policy changes  policy process  proactive  state government 

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Reigniting Professional Passions Through Policy-Related Professional Development

Posted By Sara Gigeroff, University of New Brunswick, Monday, November 13, 2023
Updated: Monday, November 13, 2023

The views and opinions expressed in this post are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the association or post-secondary institution. The author does not receive any financial incentive for purchases made through the links included in this post.

 

Seeking Specialized Skills

I often identify myself as a keen continuous learner, and when I start to feel stuck or bored, I tend to look for learning opportunities or new hobbies. When I wrote What’s in your Policy Closet earlier this year, I was at a point in my career where I wanted and needed more professionally. In December 2022, that stuck feeling led to seeking out professional development opportunities and resources that could help expand my skillset and reignite the passion I had for my job, while preparing to request a reclassification. I had previously attempted to seek out policy-specific learning opportunities, but quickly realized those types of experiences were few and far between.

Reigniting Professional Passions

In more recent searches for relevant materials and webinars, I somehow stumbled upon an international bestselling book by Perfect Policies founder Lewis S. Eisen titled Rules: A Guide to Drafting Respectful Policies and Directives. The book arrived during the first week of January, and was a good reminder that policies need to be drafted with clarity and respect, while assuming positive intent from those who fall under them, as well as the importance of avoiding the parent-child dynamic in policy writing. While reading, I thought to myself, “he gets it,” and felt reassured that I was developing policies in a good way.

Inspired by Lewis’ writing, I found myself scouring the internet for other materials, opinion pieces, articles, and learning opportunities that he offered. In an opinion piece published in 2021, he wrote “ Drafting policies and directives is not rocket science, but it does require specific knowledge and skills that must be deliberately acquired,” and that really resonated with me because it wasn’t until I discovered ACUPA that I was able to connect with other policy professionals and could tap into policy-specific learning opportunities.

Having connected with Lewis via LinkedIn, I learned that he had developed a virtual workshop on Advanced Policy Drafting Techniques, and having recently had the pleasure of attending that workshop, I wanted to share a few key takeaways from those sessions, such as values-based policy drafting, a quick way to ensure respectful wording, and the place for plain language. I have also provided other resources that I have found helpful throughout my policy career.

Virtual Learning

One of my favorite things about attending any professional development opportunity is the broad experience that participants bring to the classroom, especially in virtual settings where contributors are often distributed across the globe. Policy-specific professional development opportunities almost always have to be very deliberately sought out, which means that going into any learning opportunities, I know I am going to be surrounded by other keen policy professionals at different stages in their careers and from different employment settings. I’ve had wonderful discussions with people from the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom, just to name a few, who have held positions in academia, non-profit, government, and other employment settings. Discussions with fellow attendees and course instructors, as well as meetings with ACUPA members, always leave me feeling inspired and ready to get back to work. I would encourage anyone feeling stuck to spend some time expanding their professional community and learning from people with different perspectives and worldviews.

Values-Based Policy Drafting

Regardless of your geographic location and work environment, the establishment where you work likely has a mission statement, values, and goals. When drafting a policy, it is important to have your institution’s values in mind and be able to tie the policy to those values. Although this may seem like common sense and is something I have in the back of my mind, I realized when it was being presented by Lewis that I do not deliberately consider how a policy relates to the values of my place of employment during the proposal or drafting stages. I draft with clarity and respect, try to assume positive intent from all employees, and avoid the parent-child dynamic as best I can, but there is so much more to the policy cycle, a lot of which requires buy-in and collaboration.

Positive Positioning

When people hear policy, they usually think of rules, and immediately want to push back because they don’t want to be told what to do. As the authority drafting or revising the policy, it is important to know how that policy, or changes to it, could impact the values of an institution. Connecting a new policy, or changes to an old policy, to the company or institution’s values helps with optics, and more importantly, helps to gain buy-in from others, especially from senior leadership and potential collaborators. In being able to state, “this policy aligns or supports values X, Y, and Z, by . . .” and “this policy will achieve X, Y, and Z, by . . .” the policy itself, or revisions, become attached to goals rather than rules, and are automatically viewed in a more positive light. Illustrating how someone or something specific fits into a policy or strategic document, and how it can benefit them, is an important part of the consultation process.

Re-Introducing Respect

Lewis’ book and workshops focus on the importance of clarity, conciseness, and respectful wording, which means removing the underlying assumption of a parent-child dynamic from policies. We first learn about rules as children, and those rules are set by adults. What we took away from that experience is that all rules need to sound like that, but policies are written by adults and for adults, so they need to be written in a way that makes others want to adhere to them. This means employing an approachable tone and removing words like must, may (a blunted must unless representing a possibility), many, and should (which represents a recommendation rather than a rule) from your policy vocabulary. Simply removing these terms will change the tone of your policy from condescending to respectful, and sets rules that people are more willing to follow.

Make it a Manual

How often do you find yourself thinking or saying, “no one is reading/following this policy?” Another significant takeaway related to language and terminology from Lewis’ workshop was the idea of who needs to read and understand the policies we write. The short answer is relevant policy professionals, specialists, and those with authority over the policy. As policy professionals, many of us have adapted to using plain language, but have you ever considered that by using plain language in policy, your directive may become murky or lost completely? Policies are, after all, for use by specialists (like us), and those with authority over them. This means that policies can and should often contain jargon and technical terms because they are necessary for clarity. Non-experts, on the other hand, require good guidance documents. Lewis suggests thinking of the guidance documents as a pamphlet; an office or unit-specific manual for employees to reference that tells them everything they need to know, with hyperlinks to other relevant documents. Although these additional guidance documents take time to develop, I would argue that they are a valuable resource that could lead to increased awareness and compliance within offices.

Never Stop Networking

If you’re feeling stuck, losing your passion for policy, or are seeking more from your career, I highly recommend attending events and professional development opportunities. A great place to gain new policy knowledge is through expanding your network by connecting with ACUPA colleagues and becoming more involved with the association by joining a committee, attending the annual conference, and taking advantage of the many continuous learning opportunities available to you. 

Another way to expand your skills and participate in sessions with like-minded policy professionals is by searching regularly for experiences available through Eventbrite. This is a great way to find hidden gems! Earlier this month, I participated in an interactive session on policy change. The workshop was marketed as “a fun and quirky journey through the science of policy change - with pop culture references to really nerd out together,” and it was such a unique, fun way to learn and discuss policy concepts with individuals from across the world. It also provided me with new LinkedIn connections and relevant examples that I can use to discuss policy with my colleagues who don’t necessarily understand what I do and why policy is important.

Along with attending and participating in opportunities available via Eventbrite, I have also recently discovered a site called Apolitical that has some great resources. Though geared towards government and public servants, the policymaking learning opportunities available through Apolitical, such as free and for-fee courses, articles, and events, are valuable regardless of the setting you work in and where you are in your career as a policy professional.

Educational Opportunities Recommended by Sara:

Drafting Policies for Maximum Engagement (available for a fee, next offered in February 2024)

An Introduction to Policymaking (online, free)

Stakeholder Engagement 101 (online, free)

Silo-Busting for Public Servants (online, free)

Certificate in Policy Development and Implementation (online, available for a fee)

Eventbrite (online, free/available for a fee)

Additional Resources Suggested by Sara:

Rules: A Guide to Drafting Respectful Policies and Directives

How to Write Effective Policies and Procedures: The System that Makes the Process of Developing Policies and Procedures Easy

Become A Procedures Pro: The Admin's Guide to Developing Effective Office Systems and Procedures

Articles by Lewis S. Eisen

Ten Benefits of the Perfect Policies™ Approach

5 Obstacles to Policy Approval: How to Craft a Good, Approvable Policy

What Does Policy Actually Mean, Anyway?

Tags:  Continuous Learning  Policy  Policy Cycle  Policy Development  Policy Drafting  Policy Implementation  Policy Process  Policy Writing  Professional Development  Sara Gigeroff 

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Policy in the News

Posted By Sara Gigeroff, University of New Brunswick, Monday, April 10, 2023
Updated: Thursday, April 6, 2023

Articles on Topics that May Affect Your Policies

Due to the popularity of our previous Policy in the News post, the Blog Committee wanted to take this opportunity to share recent policy-related higher education articles ahead of the ACUPA Annual Conference.

Administration

Guidance for an Often Thankless Task: Revising the Faculty Handbook
By Laura L. Behling, Inside Higher Ed, April 4, 2023

AI in Academia

AI Tools Don’t Have to be the Enemy of Teaching and Learning
By Gavan P.L. Watson & Sarah Elaine Eaton, University Affairs, February 17, 2023

Canadian Universities Crafting ChatGPT Policies as French School Bans AI Program
By Aaron D’Andrea, Global News, February 1, 2023

Campus Safety

West Virginia Governor Signs Campus Carry Gun Bill
By John Raby, AP News, March 1, 2023

Equity, Diversity, Inclusion

Free Speech vs. Hate Speech
By Safia Abdulahi, Inside Higher Ed, April 4, 2023

Harvard Grad Union Members Mixed on New University-Wide Policies on Bullying and Discrimination
By Julia A. Maciejak, The Harvard Crimson, April 5, 2023

How EDI Policies are Failing International Students
By Karine Coen-Sanchez, University Affairs, January 24, 2023

The Ohio Education Bill that Stands Against Diversity Training—and China
By Alcino Donadel, University Business, March 15, 2023

Health and Wellness

New ‘Disconnecting from Work’ Policies Aren’t Enough to Tackle the Problem of Work-life Balance
By Michael Rancic, University Affairs, August 8, 2023

What Higher Ed's Paid Parental-Leave Policies Look Like
By Megan Zahneis, The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 28, 2023

Yale University’s New Mental Health Policy Raises Discussions Among BW Communities
By Madeline Dwyer, The Exponent, March 23, 2023

Information Technology

Education Espionage: FSA “Secret Shoppers” to Monitor Higher Ed for Unethical Practices
By Alcino Donadel, University Business, March 15, 2023

How IT Departments Can Shape Acceptable Use Policies in Higher Ed
By Alexandra Shimalla, EdTech: Focus on Higher Education, March 29, 2023

U.S. Department of Education Announces Updated Data Security Expectation for Postsecondary Institutions
By Sarah Pheasant, Jonathan Tarnow (Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP), J.D. Supra, March 31, 2023

Tenure and Recruitment

Florida University System Approves New Tenure Policy, Spurning Faculty Critics
By Jeremy Bauer-Wolf, Higher Ed Dive, March 30, 2023

Texas Senate’s Priority Bills on Higher Ed Would End Tenure, Diversity Policies
By Kate McGee, The Texas Tribune, March 10, 2023

Tags:  acceptable use  administration  AI  articles  Canada  ChatGPT  compliance  data security  diversity  EDI  equity  Florida  free speech  health  inclusion  IT  leave  news  parental leave  policy  policy administration  policy development  policy process  recruitment  Sara Gigeroff  tenure  Texas  wellness  West Virginia  work-life balance 

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Increase Awareness of and Participation in Policy Development

Posted By Deborah Bartlett, Washington State University, Monday, January 9, 2023
Updated: Friday, January 6, 2023

Implementing a "Policy on Policies"

If you've been in the policy administration business for any length of time, you've likely heard about, considered, and/or implemented a "policy on policies" at your institution. For those of you who don't already publish such a policy, I thought I'd discuss why I believe that it's a valuable tool to have in place.

Policy development is an important function, but getting administrative buy-in and notice of the importance of consistent policy development and tracking is sometimes difficult. Having a "policy on policies" provides an agreed-upon process for developing, reviewing, and approving policies, and ensures better compliance with the rules, regulations, and agreements that govern the business of higher education.

Here are some things to consider when creating or updating a policy on policies at your institution:

  • Applicability
  • Equity Review
  • Required Policy Review and Approval Steps
  • Templates or Framework

I'm also providing brief descriptions below of how we've chosen to handle these considerations here at Washington State University (WSU).

Applicability

Do you want a policy on policies that applies to all or only some policies?

At WSU, as with many public research universities, we have many types of institution-wide policy publications in place -- administrative policy manuals, academic policies and procedures, personnel manuals, research-related manuals, and our Washington Administrative Code (WAC) regulations.

When we first published an executive policy on policies, our administration decided to apply it to all policies except academic and single-unit or single-campus policies and procedures. The policy at that time outlined a draft/review/approval process that all policy publication departments were required to follow. Our policy on policies was revised recently to apply only to policies intended for publication in the four administrative policy manuals and the WAC regulations, which are managed by my office.

Equity Review

Do you want to include an equity review requirement in your policy on policies?

Our administration, including academic leadership, recently approved an equity review process, which includes an equity lens tool. My office agreed to publish the equity lens tool from our new Policy Development website, and to include discussion of the required process in the policy on policies.

Equity lens review includes review and approval both during the policy discussion phase and during the formal drafting and review phase of policy development.

And in the interest of increasing transparency and WSU community input, our Policy Development website includes descriptions of administrative policies under development and copies of drafts of the policies under review. (Copies of administrative policy drafts are available to WSU members only.) Copies of proposed WAC amendments continue to be published through the Washington State Register (WSR), and our Proposed WACs website links to the WSR proposals and public hearing information.

Required Policy Review and Approval Steps

Do you want to include specific actions for policy developers to complete when requesting new or revised policies, or removing policies? Do you want to have separate processes for major revisions and minor revisions?

In order to ensure that steps such as conducting the equity review, involving my office (for preparation and process oversight), and obtaining approvals from necessary administrators are completed, we decided to include step-by-step process instructions in our updated policy on policies. Our administration agreed to allow an abbreviated approval process for minor revisions.

Our policy on policies also includes periodic review requirements. For the most part it was decided to make the applicable administrative departments responsible for periodic review, as my office has a very limited staff (just two of us).

Template or Framework

Do you want your policy developers to use a template, or will you provide a policy framework to them for reference?

As I wrote in a previous blog a year or so back, we had for many years not required templates for policy development, but instead provided framework recommendations upon request. However, our compliance administration decided to implement a template for our executive policies and a template for our business and safety policies and procedures. (Links to these policy templates are available from our Policy Development website In the interest of moving forward with the updated policy on policies requirements as soon as possible, we have not applied the templates to our existing policies, but plan to restructure our policies as revisions occur. (Again, this is mainly due to staffing limitations and workload.)

In conclusion, if you haven't already implemented a "policy on policies," I highly recommend doing so. Having one in place greatly assists both policy developers and members of the policy administration office, by providing readily-accessible guidance and structure.

Note to ACUPA Members

Be sure to look at the ACUPA Templates and Other Tools webpage for samples to use to guide policy development, revision, review, and removal. These templates, guides, and tools have been developed from samples provided by policy administrators at multiple institutions and can be invaluable resources.

Tags:  Deborah Bartlett  equity lens  equity review  Policy Development  policy on policies  policy process  template 

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Easily Convert Web Pages to PDF Format

Posted By Evelyn Vanderburg, The University of Texas at San Antonio, Monday, May 9, 2022
Updated: Thursday, April 28, 2022

Free Tool Does the Job without Programming or Coding

Have you ever tried to figure out how to convert policy pages into a PDF file and found it to be a tedious experience? Convoluted html coding, such as </p>, <ol>, <li>, <div>, <span>, and &nbsp, confuse you?

There are several software apps and policy management developers who claim to be able to convert web pages into PDF format at minimal cost. Why spend a lot of money trying to find out what to use when you can use this guide for free, thanks to your ACUPA membership!

By following these steps, you will be able to convert HTML code to PDF in no time. The Adobe Acrobat-Create PDF extension tool lets you quickly convert HTML to PDF in your Google Chrome browser. The conversion process happens in seconds without manual deletion of the HTML and CSS codes. Here’s how.

  1. In Google Chrome, check to see if you have the extension. Choose Settings then click Extensions. If you do not see a box with the extension displayed, skip to Step 6 for instructions on downloading the extension.
  2. Enable the Adobe Acrobat-Create PDF extension, by clicking the toggle switch to the right.
  3. Navigate to the page you want to convert.
  4. Use one of the following two options:
    1. Click on the Extensions symbol, and click on Adobe Acrobat PDF edit, convert, sign tools.
    2. In the pop-up box, click on Convert Web page to Adobe PDF.

OR

  1. Right-click on the web page, choose Adobe Acrobat: PDF edit, convert, Convert Web Page to Adobe PDF.
  1. Your browser will save the file according to your browser settings. Note: Design features and images on the page may not convert depending on the page coding. However, all text should convert seamlessly.
  2. If you need to download the extension, go to the following URL in Google Chrome: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/adobe-acrobat-pdf-edit-co/efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj
  3. Click the button to Add to Chrome.
  4. In the pop-up window, click Add extension.
  5. The extension is automatically enabled, so you can go back to Step 3 to convert a page.

Tags:  Evelyn Vanderburg  PDF  policy library  policy process  tools 

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Behind the Scenes of Policy Data

Posted By Jessica Teets CCEP, Purdue University, Monday, June 21, 2021
Updated: Monday, September 27, 2021

Can a policy management system track as well as I can?

The views expressed in this post are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of ACUPA or Purdue University.

I track a fair amount of data with each of the policies in the Purdue University policy library. Currently, I use Excel to manually track all my data. Even to me, this seems a bit archaic with the variety of policy management systems out there. I have looked at a couple vendors, but have stopped short of pursuing a contract because I am afraid I won’t be able to capture all my data.

Some data are pretty standard, such as the date of issue, the responsible executive, the responsible office, and the volume and chapter (see my post from October 2020 on Organizing a Policy Catalog to learn more about the last two). It’s easy to designate a field that captures these data. It is also easy to track the date a policy was last revised. Even systems that are not designed exclusively for policy management can track version dates.

Where I run into trouble is finding a way to automatically track the last date a policy was reviewed. Policies get revised all the time. Titles, phone numbers, and email addresses change frequently, which require an update to the affected policy, and thus, a new version date. Most of the time, however, these small administrative updates do not coincide with a comprehensive review of the policy. If I were to use the version date to determine when a policy is due for review, I would likely have a lot of policies that never get reviewed because the version date never falls outside the review period (which, at Purdue, is every five years).

I also get tripped up when a policy supersedes another policy. This can happen for a number of reasons, such as the title of the policy changing, two policies being combined into one or vice versa, old memos being updated into policies, etc. With my Excel spreadsheet, I am able to track a current policy all the way back to its origin, even if that is a memo from 1952. I can tell you the name and number of the policy or memo that addressed a given subject on a given date, and I can find a copy of that document in our e-archives. I have not had to track anything back to 1952, but I have had instances when our legal counsel needed all the versions of a policy going back several years. I just don’t see how a system could track this kind of serpentine information.

Last, but not least, we allow for interim policies. This means a policy can go into effect without having gone through all the required steps. The policy owner then has six months to finish all the steps and finalize the policy, or request an extension of the interim status. I mark policies as interim and track the six-month deadline in Excel. It seems to me that I would have to continue to track this sort of thing manually even if I had a policy management system.

Maybe I am making things too complicated. Maybe I need to let something go. What do you think?

Tags:  data  Jessica Teets  policy management  policy process  policy tracking 

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Version Control, Auto Saving, and Collaborative Editing

Posted By Jennifer Gallagher, Utah Valley University, Monday, August 24, 2020
Updated: Monday, August 24, 2020

Innovations in Policy Draft Development that Saved Me Time and Tears

It was 10 p.m. on the night before the new draft of our Title IX policy was due for review by our Chief Policy Officer, the final step before it could move to President’s Council and on to Trustees for (fingers crossed) approval and adoption. It was crunch time, just a couple of weeks out from the new Title IX rule’s August 14th deadline, and I was elbows deep and hours into a heavy edit of what I was promised was the final draft from its writing committee. That’s when the emails started.

First, it was, “Just one more quick thing . . .” and “Can you change these lines, too?” then a flurry of discussions, and with it, more and more requested revisions, which I dutifully and meticulously incorporated. And then it happened. The dreaded “I made some additional changes to the draft throughout; see the attached draft.” No, no. I protested internally. That is not the Draft. I have the Draft. That is the Ghost of Drafts Past with (groan) new revisions!

If you have ever edited anything for anyone ever, you likely just visibly shuddered at the above scenario. Every editor will inevitably, at one point or—more likely—many points, experience the same sinking feeling when the sanctity of version control is casually disregarded. But with documents as important as policies (especially ones as critical and time sensitive as the one mentioned above), the balance between editorial courtesy and non-discretionary necessity becomes heavily (and rightfully) skewed toward the latter. So, what’s a policy editor to do, besides swallow her tears and play a very long, very high-stakes game of Spot the Differences? Which is, inevitably, exactly what I did for the next few hours of my evening.

The following morning, I woke from a (dismally short) sleep and decided something had to change about our editorial process. Over the past few months of remote work, our institution has embraced using Microsoft Teams to keep in touch with co-workers and collaborate on projects, but, at the time, we were still using shared Box folders to store working drafts and their numerous past versions. And while Box integrates well enough with Teams, files hosted through Box do not have the same advanced capabilities as files hosted on Microsoft’s cloud services SharePoint and OneDrive. As long as we continued to insist on keeping files scattered on Box, in emails, and on our internal drives, we truly weren’t utilizing Teams to its full potential, and we were creating a lot more unnecessary work for ourselves. Little did we realize we were needlessly complicating a system already automated and optimized through Office 365.

How it Works and How it Works for Us

Like ours, many institutions have adopted Teams for remote communication and project collaboration as we all continue to navigate the new normal of current events. But many Teams users are not aware of what happens behind the scenes of Teams. Every file (including all documents, notebooks, wikis, Planner tasks, calendar entries, and everything in between) shared or created within a Teams channel is uploaded to SharePoint (or OneDrive in the case of files shared in chats). (If you use Teams and haven’t already, I highly encourage you to take a few minutes and explore what your SharePoint site looks like. Think of it as Teams’ central repository—because it is.)

The benefits of this, besides embedded organization and easy access to needed files without leaving Teams, are the integrated collaboration and cross-app features you only get with SharePoint and OneDrive files (Microsoft hosted files play nice with Microsoft apps, go figure!). These features include automatic saving (no more losing progress), automatic version record keeping (eliminating the need for multiple version files), and, most importantly for our office, collaborative editing between multiple authors in real time (goodbye, Ghosts of Drafts Past).

By embracing and encouraging the use of Teams instead of email for sending drafts and Box for housing versions, we were able to ensure that a single working draft was always live and available for authors, editors, and reviewers. Consequently, the next round of review and revision for our Title IX policy went far more smoothly. We were able to work together, simultaneously, on a living document in real time and chat seamlessly with each other as needed, eliminating the need for tracking down relevant email chains, sending out and downloading multiple drafts, re-uploading them, and other general draft babysitting and housekeeping. The sanctity of the working draft was respected without effort. It was a game changer.

Since then, we have integrated this process into how we handle every document that comes through our office, and we continue to explore additional ways to utilize the automation, collaboration, and project management features embedded within SharePoint. It might be dramatic to say that it has revolutionized our editorial process, but it certainly has spared me a lot of extra work and frustration (not to mention, late-night tears).

For those who are interested in utilizing collaborative editing but need additional guidance, Microsoft provides tips and tutorials on their support pages, a few of which I will link below:

I hope this post finds you all well and each one of you survived Title IX season relatively unscathed. I would love to hear how your institutions handled the crunch—the challenges, the triumphs, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Let me know your experiences or if you’ve found any game changers for remote collaboration. And, as always, if you have any questions for me regarding the topics above, feel free to drop them into the comments.

Tags:  Collaboration  Jennifer Gallagher  MS Teams  policy process  Productivity 

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Do I Really Need a Policy and Procedure?

Posted By Brittani Brown, California State University San Marcos, Monday, May 11, 2020

Make sure your policy library has only what it needs

Organizations develop policies and procedures to guide operations and behavior.  Policies direct organizations on what needs to be done and how.  But how do we decide what policies are necessary?  As policy administrators, we are asked to write or implement a policy, and it is our responsibility to confirm that the policy accomplishes something, and that a policy is the best way to achieve success.  Organizations implement policies to avoid difficult conversations, to course-correct challenging groups, or to resolve an isolated incident that may never occur again. To avoid publishing an unnecessary policy, first, ask yourself if the issue is essential and if it needs clarification.

The importance is subjective.  As policy administrators, we must help our colleagues identify the need for a policy and procedure and determine how to include the important and most practical information for users.  We want to avoid issuing policies merely to replace difficult conversations.  For example, if a campus department wants to eliminate hard copy invoices, do we need a policy, or can we accomplish this goal with a conversation?

Complex issues need clarification.  Is your organization subject to new legislation?  We cannot expect every person in our organization to research and comprehend the law.  Policies are a mechanism to interpret, shorten, and add the “why” and “how” tailored to the organization.

Certain issues have a major impact on the readers and the organization. Personnel, financial, health, and safety are common policy topics and are easily identified as necessary policies.  However, the remaining potential policies should inform readers with clear communication

Creating policies for all topics results in overload, and people will ignore them.  Never write/implement a policy “just to have one” or “because it seems like a good idea.”  Align the policy with the strategic objectives of the organization.  Ensure the policy accomplishes something, and it will be read.  Keep the policy concise.

Tags:  brittani brown  policy  policy administration  policy management  policy process  procedures 

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