Graduate Awards Committee 1 (GAWC-1) Meeting Minutes

Thursday, December 10, 2020 - 2:00-3:30 p.m.

Conducted via WebEx

Attendees: J. Dufek (Co-Chair), S. Jordan (Co-Chair), H. Teng, S. Nelson, E. Regentova, R. Miller, W. Ridgway, A. Abruscato, G. Nowak, M. Roberts, T. Herold, M. Borer, M. Nicholl, S. John, S. Nelson, T. Grigsby, T. Henthorne, W. Ridgway, Y. Ban, A. Abruscato, B. Bernatis, C. Maes, C. Jensen, G. Kleiger, B. Heinle (ex-officio), Leena Lopez (ex-officio)

Excused:  K. Charron, I. Jackson, A. Belarmino

Called to order:  2:01 pm

• Dufek introduced and welcomed Co-Chair Dr. Sara Jordan; Dufek also thanked her for stepping into this role, especially at this stage in the process of the work of the committee

• Dufek reminded the committee that all correspondence goes to committee members via the google group address:  grad-awards-committee-scholarships-fellowships-group@unlv.edu

• The scholarship/fellowship Assessment Rubric was again made available. Members can find it here.

• Brianne Heinle described how recommendation letters are populated for students. Specifically, if a student is applying for more than one award, the referee is only alerted once. This letter is then mapped to each scholarship/fellowship. Thus, the recommendation letter may not be customized to a specific scholarship/fellowship. Because of this, it was agreed that the evaluative comment in the rubric that asks that letters of recommendation be customized to the award is to be disregarded during the evaluation process.

• Dufek reminded the group that we will “divide and conquer” The members who will view Fellowships are:  Dufek, Herold, Nowak. Others may be asked to join, based upon overall application numbers.

• Scholarships have been divided into six groups, roughly based upon number of applications. These groups are bulleted below. Brianne will send a definition of each award to the committee following this meeting.

• Group 1 (Sastaunik)

• Group 2 (Carns)

• Group 3 (Alumni Based)

• Group 4 (Summer & Moretti)

• Group 5 (Adams, Community Impact, Janine Lee) 

• Group 6 (SDRF)

• In response to the committee’s previous input, we will try to allow some choice in which awards you are assessing. Please enter your top three group preferences here. Committee Co-Chairs along with Graduate College members will review and make group assignments.

• Please complete your group preferences by December 15, 2020.

• Training - Procedures and Best Practices:  Brianne Heinle, Graduate College Business Manager

• The procedure for gaining access to Salesforce (username and password specific to this committee) was explained

• Please do not change the password as your doing so will change it for every member of the committee

• If you do change the password by mistake, reach out to Bri or Leena

• Brianne stepped through the evaluation process step-by-step and addressed committee member questions along the way

• A reference manual reflecting this live training is available to committee members and can be found here.

• Following the training, members had some requests for additional resources. Brianne agreed to follow up and provide:

• Quick start guide for evaluating (step 1, step 2, etc.)

• Spreadsheet template – applicant names x rubric category in one document so committee members do not have to manually type all of the applicant names

• This was requested so that committee members can create their own general overviews of the applicants prior to entering data directly into Salesforce

• Timeline

• Applications per “assignment” will be disseminated after Dec 15, 2020

• Review of applications - through January 13, 2021

• Convene subgroups to evaluate - January 14, 21 and 28, 2021

• Please have your reviews completed prior to our next meeting on January 14, 2021

• Questions

• New business - none

• Next meeting:  January 14, 2021 (2:00-3:30 pm) via WebEx

• Co-Chair Jordan will convene the meeting

Meeting adjourned at 3:02 pm