CENTER FOR RETIREES AT UH (CRUH)

The University Needs it more than the Retirees Do

By Fred W. Riggs

[preliminary draft -- suggestions for revision are invited]

[A possible alternative design would be an INTERGENERATIONAL CENTER]

Despite its name, the proposed Center for Retirees is needed by UH far more than it is needed by UH retirees: for the most part, our retirees have already established a life-style that meets their needs without any help from the University – of course they appreciate the financial, medical, and legal services UH offers them, but they see no links between them and their continuing professional and social life. The reason why the University needs CRUH will become apparent to anyone viewing the Retirees Registry which provides information about the post-retirement activities and achievements of UH retirees. For the most part, these efforts support programs and projects outside UH – if we had a Center for retirees, it could attract many retirees to volunteer their services and offer gifts in ways that benefit UH. A tiny investment in support of CRUH will repay itself many times over by benefits that accrue to the University.

However, reciprocity is necessary: retirees must benefit also if they are to do more for the University. Shelley Glazer, Executive Director of the UC Berkeley Retirement Center, has written a Survey of University Retiree Centres. She stresses that their mission is a dual one: ... to serve the campus while serving retirees.. Key objectives are: To create an overall umbrella organization serving all retired faculty, staff, and surviving beneficiaries through which retirees may directly communicate and interact; to develop programs, services, and functions that serve retired individuals so as to maintain an enduring connection with the university and... to maintain the center’s original purpose of providing administrative support to the emeriti and retiree associations... For a good example of the many services a retirement center can offer members see the USC Center's Retiree Benefits page. Once established, CRUH will also strive to enhance benefits for retirees. However, to gain the support needed to get started, we need the backing of our UH administration. Consequently the main emphasis in this memo is on the benefits CRUH can secure for the University. The text is organized under the following headings, linked so that readers can jump first to any segment most likely to interest them. Readers in a rush may find it useful to go first to #6. Projects to see what kinds of activities are proposed for CRUH.

• 1. Experience at other Universities

• 2. Association for Retirement Organizations in Higher Education (AROHE)

• 3. Organizational Design

• 4. Groundwork already Accomplished

• 5. Funding Ideas

• 6. Promising Projects

• 7. Conclusion

• 8. Links

I. EXPERIENCE AT OTHER UNIVERSITIES

Skeptics may doubt the validity of the argument that the University has more to gain than retirees from the establishment of a Center for Retirees, but experience at other Universities provides convincing evidence. Links to websites for selected universities having Centers and Associations can be found at Retirement Organizations Experience elsewhere shows that investing in programs to help retirees and encourage them to support their university is truly worth while, both intellectually and financially.

The UCLA Emeriti/Retirees Relations Center, which was founded in 1969, claims to be a "model" for such Centers in higher education throughout the nation. About a decade later, a similar center was created at the University of Southern California by then University President John R. Hubbard. It has subsequently played a leading role in creating the national Association for Retirement Organizations in Higher Education (AROHE).

The centers for retirees at USC and UC/Berkeley were pioneers and their experience provides the basis for a comprehensive analysis of the history and values of such centers as explained by Shelley Glazer and Elizabeth Redmon in Continuing the Connection. They conclude that Increased interest in emeriti-retiree programs at colleges and universities internationally serves as evidence that retired faculty and staff seek to maintain and enhance their connections and contributions to the institution, and thereby to the community. Moreover, they are willing to put their time and energy into the creation and continuation of programs that facilitate this connection. Proactive programmatic focus, as illustrated in these two case studies, gives evidence to the strong belief inherent in the culture of each institution that one may retire from a job, but one does not need then to sever all connections with, or retire from, the community. Among other Centers for retirees, the Henry Koerner Center for Emeritus Faculty at Yale University is notable. Readers can find data about many other retiree centers through these links.

A particularly strategic model is provided by the new Retiree Center at UC Davis because Virginia Hinshaw, the incoming Chancellor for UHM, played a decisive role in creating it.

A significant argument for supporting the Center was provided by statistical evidence published in EmeriTimes, August 2006, based on a 2003-5 survey. It showed that among the responding retirees at Davis, Twenty-eight percent published a total of 37 books, 55% published a total of 136 articles, 20% authored 48 book chapters, 5% wrote 18 abstracts, 7% wrote 10 professional reports, 14% wrote 70 consulting reports, and 10% wrote 28 book reviews. Three emeriti created artworks, four had exhibitions and one had a theater performance. In total there were 358 publications and creative works. Future productivity is promising as 27% of the respondents reported 48 scholarly works in progress. Thirty percent of the responding emeriti are still teaching, a majority on the UC Davis campus. The emeriti were also active in university service. Seven percent served on eight Academic Senate committees, 18% served on 34 doctoral committees, 11% on 19 departmental committees and 6% on administrative committees.The responding emeriti contributed to their professions by serving on committees of their respective professional societies(21%), 9% held offices, 18% have editorial appointments, 30% reviewed a total of 104 articles, and 9% provided other services to their profession. Eighteen percent of the respondents received honors from their profession.

Comparable data from retirees at UH may become available through the newly created SURGE program which supports bio-data for anyone at the University who records their personal information. Meanwhile, anecdotal reports on the post-retirement activitiesof UH retirees can be found on the FRAUHM REGISTRY.

Emory University has expanded the idea of a center into a more elaborate academic institution described at: Emeritus College. An explanation of the rationale and goals of the new institution are explained in the original Proposal to establish the college. It explains these goals as to:

“enhance the relationship between the university and its emeritus faculty for the benefit of Emory's educational mission as well as for the greater welfare of its emeriti and of the wider community." A prospectus describing how the institution should work contains this language: An Emeritus College would likely increase the amount, and enhance the quality, of the scholarly research and writing and consulting done in their maturity by emeritus professors within its precincts, thus benefitting the general reputation of the University. Such faculty would still be directly identified with the University, their work seen as proceeding from within the University's research community, rather than from private individuals in distant and scattered venues…

Finally, and of no small importance, are some financial considerations. The existence of a highly visible and active Emeritus College would likely provide an incentive to more than a few regular faculty to retire earlier than they might otherwise, thus relieving the University of a portion of its heavy financial obligation to senior faculty in terms of both salary and fringe benefits, and allowing it to open up new lines for entry-level positions. Furthermore, Emory's providing for an Emeritus College would build the kind of good will among retired faculty that might well inspire reciprocal generosity in the form of gifts and bequests.

Interestingly, the leader of Emeritus College at Emory, Eugene Bianchi, has become president of AROHE about which we may now add some thoughts.

II. AROHE: ASSOCIATION OF RETIREMENT ORGANIZATIONS IN HIGHER EDUCATION.

Several "tips" on the AROHE Site provide good clues to its goals and methods:

Tip #1. Join AROHE! This organization is a vital source of information and contacts with persons and schools that can provide advice and useful models to fit any school considering a retirement organization.

Tip #2. Seek support of top administrative leaders and other campus constituents (faculty and staff) early in the process of starting an organization. In this connection, be aware of the campus political culture, and keep everyone informed and, ideally, involved with the initial exploration and later development of the retirement organization.

Tip #6. Recognize basic needs such as organizational and institutional legitimacy, budget and space. At a minimum, a successful retirement organization must be recognized as part of the institutional framework both in terms of acceptance of how it contributes to the overall mission of the university and of making clear the lines of administrative reporting. If this first condition is met, then budgetary support and space allocation may be somewhat easier to secure to facilitate the activities and programs of the retirement organization.

For UH to benefit from AROHE it needs to enroll one or more retirement organizations as regular Members – individuals and institutions can also sign up as Associate Members. Here’s the basic rule: Membership in AROHE is open to forming or existing retirement organizations in higher education. Membership is conferred to a single organization rather than to an individual or institution, though individuals or institutions may join as Associate Members. For further details see Membership. Information about other universities and their Centers and Associations for retirees can be found by clicking on sites listed here.

Two kinds of retirement organizations are recognized: “Associations” like FRAUHM, which link retirees through membership and shared activities; and “Centers” which are sponsored by University administrations to promote reciprocal benefits for retirees and the sponsoring university. UH has an Association and FRAUHM our "Faculty Retirees Association at UHM", will join AROHE and pay its membership dues. The ByLaws of the Association include the goal of working (2) to offer support and service to the University of Hawaii wherever possible. Regrettably, no Association can really do this, only an officially sponsored "Center" has the capability, but UH still lacks such a Center. Fortunately, however, this gap can readily be filled by an administrative decision to create an official “Center for Retirees at UH “ (CRUH). A first step, already launched, is for UHM to pay the modest dues required to enroll our "FORMING CENTER" as a member of AROHE. The start-up costs are trivial but, once started, it should be possible to raise money to cover a growing budget as determined by its governing board. This leads us to think about the design of an organizational structure for CRUH. These ideas have evolved in the context of work with CLUH, our retirees Committee on Liaison with UH.

III. ORGANIZATIONAL DESIGN

The By-Laws for FRAUHM stipulate that its goals, in Article (2), includes: to offer support and service to the University of Hawaii wherever possible. Sadly a lack of resources and reciprocity has restricted FRAUHM's work to its first goal, serving its mmbers. That's quite understandable and the only effective way to develop mutually beneficial relations between retirees and the University is to establish an officially recognized and funded Center.

At its most basic level, the effective operation of any university center requires an energetic director. A model at UH can be seen in our Office of International Education, directed by Jenny Samaan. This Office which reports directly to the President of the UH System, coordinates a wide range of international partnerships and activities that involve all 10 campuses and, potentially, every college and department. A wide network of informal relationships provide support and guidance but the core of this activity is in the hands of a director with a small staff and office. Although it has many links across the 12-campus system, it lacks a governing board or list of associates. No doubt this is why it's called an "office" rather than a "center". Substantively, however, it performs the functions of a university "center." Moreover, and this is a major point, the location of the OIE in the President's Senior Management Team facilitates coordination of effort across the whole spectrum of campuses, colleges and departments of the University. Since retirees have links to all parts of the University System, this is both the logical location for CRUH and it will also facilitate utilization of retiree services wherever they are needed, anywhere in the sytem.

It may be much easier, however, to launch a Center for Retirees at the UH Manoa level. A prototype for such a center can be found in the complex set of linked international functions coordinated by an officially-sponsored Manoa International Education Committee (MIEC) led by Edward Shultz. It's 27 members link a wide assortment of internationally-oriented programs at UH. The challenge facing any Center for Retirees will be equally complex and multi-faceted.

Another UHM model that may be instructive for the internal design of CRUH can be found in the Public Policy Center, directed by Susan Chandler. She is also a faculty member in the School of Social Work. Policies are set by a 4-person steering-committee composed of full-time faculty members who volunteer their services. Moreover, an extended list of faculty associates provide resources for projects sponsored by the Center. It also has a impressive set of committees chaired by associates. CRUH might well be organized on the PPC model. Organizationally, CRUH could be located at the UH System level, following the OIE model, or at the UHM level, as illustrated by the PPC and MIEC.

With such models in mind, here are a few names of experts who can be asked for advice. My experience developing the UH Web Site for Retirees has put me in contact with individuals from around the campus who are well qualified to serve as personal advisers or associates. They are listed below. Some of them might also be willing to serve as members of a Board or Steering Committee for CRUH. I’d be glad to chair the group but it would be expedient to invite a current faculty member or UH administrator to serve as director. Deciding whom to invite to serve CRUH, in what capacities, will be a major challenge for the future after consultation with all these advisers:

• Harvey Gochros is president of FRAUHM (2006-7). He or some other officers serving on their Board could be tapped.

• Rebecca Goodman, is director of OLLI the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. In this capacity she works with many retirees who volunteer to teach courses, or enroll in them. Her role also puts her in touch with other potential volunteers for service with CRUH.

• Lee Putnam directs the SCVP Senior Citizen’s Visitor Program which offers retirees free instruction as auditors in virtually any course offered at UHM.

• Kathryn Braun directs the Center on Aging which is now being transferred from the Medical School to the School of Social Work where it will take on an expanded role as proposed in a detailed report on plans for the Center for Aging Research and Education (CARE). Anthony Lenzer, the former director of COA, has aleady offered sage advice. The dean of SSW, Jon K Matsuoka, is also planning an expanded certificate in Gerontology, and related activites for elders. He and colleagues in the School, especially Colette Browne and Pamela Arnsburger, may be tapped to help us.. The extended scope of COA can be gleaned from its home page which includes an impressive list of Affiliated Faculty. A notable event was the international conference on Active Aging which COA organized in February 2006. Information about participants can be found at Presenters. Some of them may also be willing to advise CRUH.

• James Pietsch is the director of the Elder Law Program based in our School of Law. Some details about this multi-faceted program dealing with the legal problems confronting senior citizens can be found at UHELP.

• Kevin Takamori, Associate Vice President of the UH Foundation, heads its Office of Alumni Relations . Structurally, his Office serves as an administative center for work with a widely-scattered host of Alumni Association chapters. Althouh Kevin's work focuses on alumni, he has also taken an interest in retirees and his advice and support will be valuable. Some alumni are, of course, also retired faculty members and their personal networks include many of their former students.

• Some faculty members who have a special interest in the elderly might be recruited as associates for the proposed CRUH. A good example is Eldon Wegner who specializes on the Sociology of Aging. No doubt other interested faculty can be found if we canvas the deans and departments looking for those who have studied the elderly.

• LINKAGES. To faciliate coordination between CRUH and other campus structures, we need to discuss plans for CRUH with people in the President's office, the UHM Chancellor, the ACCFSC and UHM Senate. To illustrate, consider Article I of the ACCFSC Charter. It begins: The purpose of the University of Hawai'i All Campus Council of Faculty Senate Chairs is to provide a formal, independent voice and organization through which the faculty of the University of Hawai'i System can participate in the development and interpretation of system-wide policy, and to promote and improve coordination, communication, and understanding among the faculty, students, community, administration, and Board of Regents. It would be wonderful if all "emeritus professors" could be viewed as "faculty" members and utilized as resource people who are recognized as active partners in the University community.

Project Committees: To launch and develop programs sponsored by CRUH, we should create special committees, inviting qualified individuals to chair them and select their members. The examples that follow are illustative -- more can be added, and these can be revised.

1. Centennial Celebration. UH is planning a set of activities to commemorate its Centennial in 2007. Phil Kinnicutt is in charge for the UH System, and Joanne Clark is managing the UHM events. We are in touch with both of them, and George Simson will take responsibility for coordinating the compilation of data from retirees for the centennial. This will be a natural function of the ABCD (Archives, Biography, Computing and Documenttion) project which he directs under CLUH sponsorship.

2. University Club. Raymond Yeh is leading a project to develop plans for a University Club. James McCutcheon has accepted responsibility for CLUH to work with him and engage retirees as active partners in this effort. An important activity for CRUH will be promoting projects and activities that contribute toward developing a support base for establishing the University Club and Jim will be our leader in this effort.

3. Gray Intersect Networks (GIN). With our established mailing list for retirees it is already feasible to reach a substantial number of retirees to inform them about events and opportunities. Using this resource, we could recruit groups of retirees interested in discourse and action on selected topics or problems of our community and university. Some ideas about this possibility are explained at: "GIN". Such networks need not be limited to retirees, of course. Indeed, they should be open to participation by interested faculty, community members, or anyone else sharing an interest in the group’s theme questions.

4. Mentoring. Many opportunities exist for retirees to help students, younger faculty, and anyone seeking assistance. We have already done some work to create a framework for recruiting retirees as mentors. One example involves raising money from extra-mural sources. Retirees who have had experience in fundraising can be recruited to help individuals develop viable project proposals. See: Mentoring. We anticipate that a task force of experienced fund raisers among retirees could be mobilitzed to help CRUH raise money for its activities. Perhaps they would also be willing to consult with the various UH groups interested in the elderly to help them raise money for their programs..

Other possibilities are suggested in the CLUH agenda – these examples are offered to illustrate some directions that CRUH committees might pursue.

IV. GROUNDWORK ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED

A number of steps have already been taken that pave the way for creating CRUH. Most notably we have a RETIREES WEB site, launched in response to a request from Denise Konan, and posted at: UH PAGE FOR RETIREES. In addition to the substantive information included on this site, it offers an extended list of links to relevant web pages for retirees, both at UH and elsewhere.

Moreover, under CLUH sponsorship, we have created several resources that can be made available to CRUH – preferably transferred to it as start-up capabilities. These include:

1. MASTER LIST of retirees. Starting with the comprehensive List of Emeriti posted in the UH Catalog, we have created a more comprehensive listing that includes FRAUHM members and those on our Mailing List. This data enables us to reach out to retirees both to inform them of opportunities and to recruit volunteers for specific projects.

2. REGISTRY. All UH retirees are invited to contribute entries describing their post-retirement plans and achievements, with links to any web sites that provide information about their pre-retirement careers. This information provides a preliminary basis for recruiting individuals qualified to contribute in various ways to CRUH projects as they evolve. The Registry is still growing as more people submit entries for inclusion – although incomplete, it already provides a good starting point.

3. NECROLOGY for UH faculty provides information about the deceased, often with obituaries that celebrate their achievements. This list also provides information about surviving relatives, and helps us up-date lists of those who remain alive and healthy.

4. ,MAILING LIST. This resources has already been mentioned above – it provides an easy way to reach a substantial number of retirees and recruit individuals for selected purposes. Although quite incomplete, it’s growing and we are urgently working on ways to expand its coverage.

V. FUNDING IDEAS

It would be naive to expect the BOR to approve substantial funding for CRUH from general funds, but to assure minimal stability, at least some secretarial support and a part-time post for director might be expected. Predictable financial returns for UH are substantial, and so a minimal investment to lay the foundation is a reasonable request.

Many retirees have had experience raising money for research and other projects with which they were associated during their careers at UH. We may call on them to join a Finance Committee that would be asked to help raise money for CRUH. Moreover, if the UHF is actively involved in developing CRUH, in parallel with the existing Office for Alumni Relations, we may well expect help to come from this source. Finally, if retirees become convinced that UH is really interested in working with them, it's reasonable to expect that some of them will make personal gifts and even offer legacies to help support the retiree Center. Meanwhile, to prime the pump, a Fund for Active Retirees has been launched under the aegis of the UH Foundation. It provides a mechanism for interested retirees to provide financial support for interim projects that can be managed by FRAUHM through its Liaison Committee. By this means some activities proposed for CRUH can actually be started before the Center is actually created.

Each of the gerontological and lifelong learning programs mentioned above in #III above has its own financial problems and money-raising projects. We may hope that the CRUH finance committee would work closely with them to push for mutual support. While learning from their eperience, it could also help mount drives to raise money for these cooperating centers. Each will benefit from the work of the others if they are linked by effective communication and cooperation.

VI. PROMISING PROJECTS

Article 2 of FRAUHM's By-laws specify that: The purposes of this association are (1) to organize and offer social, professional, and intellectual programs and activities of special interest to its members, and (2) to offer support and service to the University of Hawaii wherever possible.

As it evolved, however, the Association has been unable to do much beyond sponsorship of monthly luncheons at which guest speakers discuss a range of timely topics. Most conspicuously, it has not been able to do much to "offer support and service to UH." It's history is almost exclusively a record of luncheon speakers and Board decisions covering narrowly restricted topics. During its second year, on April 27, 1988, a Breakfast Meeting was held at College Hill. Interested members and President Simone discussed:. "What retirees can do for the University and vice versa." Sadly, there appears to have been no follow-up activity -- at least none reported in these minutes.

The Strategic Plan for USC's retirement community outlines a sharply different perspective. It reads, in part:

This strategic plan is being developed by a joint committee of the USC Retiree Community... In the fall of 2004 the following blueprint has been developed... the Retiree Community seeks to support the role and vision of USC, and to further the themes of interdisciplinary lifelong learning, strengthening our Pacific Rim connections, technology transfer, and collaboration with other institutions... in the context of the celebration of the University’s 125 th anniversary, in which all of us are encouraged to think about how we can honor the past in ways that help and inspire the future.. this USC Retiree Community strategic plan is organized into three sections. First, it focuses on honoring the past by reviewing what retirees have done... Then it turns to exploring what might be worth inventing in the future. It concludes with steps that might be taken to implement this enlarged picture of the future.

The rest of the document spells out in some detail a wide range of activities undertaken by USC retirees. Here's a sample paragraph:

A substantial resource of unpaid service, retirees constitute a pool of experts who remain on or return to campus to serve in innumerable capacities: from time to time they help out in emergency situations and cover staff and faculty shortages; help orient and consult with new staff and faculty, providing advice and counsel when it is sought; they teach courses, lead freshman seminars, guest lecture; they maintain contact with alumni and provide expertise on alumni tours. They are productively engaged in research, publication, and mentoring students, not infrequently employing undergraduates to assist with research projects, thereby helping to mold some of USC’s finest students; they are involved in project development, strategic planning, accreditations preparation, doctoral supervision, and numerous other committees. Retirees identify and develop outside resources for USC and encourage donor gifts

The USC experience could well provide a role model for emulation at UH. The director who organized much of this activity was Elizabeth Redmon, now herself retired. She's willing to visit UH and discuss their experiences with us -- it would be a most helpful exercise.

Another model for emulation can be found at Emory University in the form of an Emeritus College. Its director, Eugene Bianchi, is now President of AROHE. A list of projects sponsored by EC that serve both the retirees and the University are posted under the heading of: Projects . Again, many of these project ideas could well be emulated at UH. To be more specific, here are a few concrete suggestions: