submitted by Earl Hawkey and Jeff Keown
In regards to the meeting only 12 of the 14 Big 10 schools were in attendance. Based on the conversation that took place it looks like Maryland and Rutgers do not have active or clearly defined retiree organizations. The major outlier in the 12 that did attend was Northwestern which appears to be a retired faculty based organization only. While officially it is described as an Emeriti Association the people from Northwestern indicated that almost all retired faculty are given the “Emeriti” title unless that have totally alienated the rest of the University community.
There are a couple of institutions that actually give direct funds to their retiree organizations and/or part time support staff, but most organizations are like us - pure volunteer groups. Some do raise funds by going out to get businesses sponsors. Of course that also involves allowing these sponsors access to the membership to sell their services or promote their products. Several institutions do not charge membership fees including Indiana, Michigan State, Northwestern and Purdue.
One topic that seemed to be of great concern was that a number of institutions do not provide any information regarding new retirees to their groups. Based on the discussion it appears to be related to either a lack of interest on the part of their HR groups or a general concern regarding the privacy of employment records. My reading on this is that it may have more to do with the interpretation of state privacy laws as it relates to changes in the employment status and/or how the retirees organizations are seen by the institution – i.e. whether the retiree groups are seen as part of the university or loosely affiliated private organizations.
The full comparative information gathered before and after the meeting are included as attachment to this report although not all institutions responded to the survey.
Presentations
The opening presentation was by Richard Alley Evan Pugh Professor of Geosciences at Penn State. It was an interesting presentation that revolved around the history of energy sources used to fuel developing and modern industrial economies and how we have changed from predominant energy sources previously when their use became unsustainable. He argued that there are other sources of renewable energy such as wind and solar that can and will eventually supplant fossil fuels. Government can help that process and thereby reduce the bad climate side effects, but the change to different energy sources is economically (if not environmentally) inevitable.
There was a presentation about what Penn State provides for retirees in terms of health care. They do offer a Medicare Advantage Plan (Part C) that they actually subsidize with state funds such that the premium is only $80 per month per person. That would be nice to have but I think it would be a non-starter in Nebraska. There was additional discussion in regards to state sponsored defined benefit plans versus defined contribution plans similar to our situation here.
The structural problem for retirees is clearest in states like Illinois that exempted their employees from Social Security coverage but now find it difficult to finance their retirement plans. While the private sector has moved predominately to the defined contribution model, this is difficult for these states to do since their retirees often do not qualify for significant Social Security benefits.
The speaker for the evening meal was Barry Lee Myers who is the Co-Founder and CEO of AccuWeather (based in State College, PA). In his presentation Mr. Myers talked about how he and his brother founded AccuWeather and how it has completely changed how weather information is generated and consumed worldwide. He also emphasized how his company recruits talent from all of our institutions.
On the final day we had a talk from Amy Lorek who is a faculty member at Penn State. She described an experimental class that she taught where she brought together undergraduate students and retired volunteers to encourage interaction and develop better generation understanding. She thought both groups gained a lot of insight and considered it very successful. She also referenced a TED talk that she thought would be of interest and can be found on YouTube and at: https://www.ted.com/talks/laura_carstensen_older_people_are_happier
Future Meetings
The 2019 meeting of the Association will be held at August 2-4, 2019 at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana at the I-Hotel and Conference Center on campus.
Locations of future meetings are as follows:
2020 – University of Iowa
2021 – Indiana University
2022 – Northwestern University
2023 – University of Wisconsin
2024 – Ohio State University
Projected future meetings not official yet:
2025 – University of Michigan
2026 – University of Minnesota
2027 – Michigan State University
2028 – University of Nebraska
2029 – Purdue University
2030 – Penn State University