Policies&Procedures

The University’s policies and procedures were developed and are implemented to advance the overall mission and core values of the institution. Policies seek to ensure compliance with state and federal statutes, other regulatory practices, and to protect and serve the institution and its employees. The institution strives to ensure that its procedures represent sound and efficient business practices.

The spirit and practice of shared governance plays an important role in policy development. Thus, policies are developed and revised with input from key constituent groups including Faculty Senate, Professional and Scientific Council, Government of the Student Body, and Graduate and Professional Student Senate.

Historically, Iowa State University has embraced a decentralized operational philosophy and policy development has often taken place within divisions under the management of vice presidents. Since policies were maintained in separate handbooks and manuals, and more recently, on separate web sites, duplication and inconsistency became a concern.

Recognizing the need to improve policy management, the administration in 2003 established a centralized online policy library. The Policy Library contains university−wide policies, and links to guides and handbooks that contain policies. Procedures for developing or updating, as well as guidelines for formatting and archiving policies, are now readily accessible online.

Development of the Policy Library continues with the goals of ensuring that: 1) all policies are current and accessible through the Internet; 2) University policies are presented consistently; and 3) users can simultaneously reference/search policies. The organization of policies onto a single web source will improve their consistency, clarity and accuracy. To promote and maintain this effort a Policy Administrator position was created and filled.

The creation of this position ensures that the University’s policies will continue to be consistently documented and organized, and that they will be current and appropriately archived. The Policy Administrator serves as a resource person for questions regarding policy library organization, policy revision and implementation, and archiving for storage and search purposes. The employee is guided by the “Policy Administrator Responsibilities” and will work closely with staff in the administrative offices responsible for respective policies.

The University Administration expects that an additional benefit of the Policy Library will be a gradual change in culture where staff will readily access policy as needed. This should result in improved training opportunities for faculty and staff and greater compliance on the part of all university personnel.