As an incoming freshman or transfer student, the new surroundings of UW-Madison and the city surrounding it can be a tad intimidating, if only because they're new. Every day you'll see a rash of names of the front page of the paper of various government officials, university administrators and other notable figures and organizations, but it takes some time to understand who they all are and what it is they do. To make things easier, The Daily Cardinal has created a cheat sheet covering most of news makers you will see throughout the pages of our paper in the coming year.
Campus Administration
The UW-Madison administration is organized into 20 schools and colleges, which are each headed by a dean.
The chancellor, currently Chancellor Carolyn ""Biddy"" Martin, oversees the entire university. She is in charge of making public remarks and facilitating reports, strategic plans and initiatives for the university.
The university's Provost, currently Paul Deluca, is chief deputy to the chancellor and the university's chief academic officer.
There are three vice chancellors. The Vice Chancellor for Administration, Darrell Bazzell, oversees administrative initiatives, the university budget and reports. The Vice Chancellor for Research and Dean of Graduate School, Martin Cadwallader, oversees the graduate school administration and research administration. The Vice Chancellor for University Relations, Vince Sweeney, oversees university communications, trademark licensing and parent/visitor programs.
The university also has several governance groups such as the Faculty Senate. The Faculty Senate acts as an advisory committee to the chancellor, deans and Provost. It is an organization of UW-Madison faculty members that meets once a month to discuss issues relevant to the university such as the graduate school restructuring and faculty rights.
—Kayla Johnson
Student Government
The Associated Students of Madison (ASM) is UW-Madison's student government. Like any government, most people either hate it or ignore it. But ASM is surprisingly powerful for a student government and gets plenty of front-page coverage in the campus newspapers. ASM offers students a voice in administration decisions and oversees $38 million of our tuition dollars.
All UW-Madison students are automatically members of ASM, like it or not. Most student involvement ends with the compulsory membership.
For students who care to get involved, spring and fall elections occur online and decide the members of Student Council. Student Council is the governing body of ASM, consisting of 33 representatives, elected from each school. The ubiquitous acronym ""ASM"" is often used interchangeably to refer to work actually done by Student Council.
ASM has several committees, including Academic Affairs, which oversees the ASM Textbook Swap, and Legislative Affairs, which lobbies government on student issues. Most notable among the committees is the Student Services Finance Committee (SSFC), which oversees $38 million in student segregated fees. Student segregated fees are collected as part of tuition, costing each student $1,020 per year. SSFC uses strict rules and guidelines to allocate student segregated fees to various campus groups, like WISPIRG, which received $126,244 from SSFC last year.
—Jamie Stark
Board of Regents
The UW System Board of Regents is composed of 18 members appointed by the governor of Wisconsin.
Regent President Charles Pruitt has served since May 2003 and will finish his term in May 2016. Sixteen regents are appointed to seven-year terms, though the two student members serve for two years at a time. Regents may remain on the board for multiple terms.
Board members' duties include setting admission standards, analyzing and approving the institutions' budgets and establishing basic regulations.
The regents select the President of the UW System, currently Kevin Reilly, who took office in 2004. They also choose the chancellors of the 13 UW universities and UW-Extension as well as both the chancellor and deans of the UW colleges. Appointees rely on the regents to determine the length of their tenures in office.
The Board has a number of goals for the upcoming year.
""We're particularly focused on pursuing and advocating for the Growth Agenda for Wisconsin, the goal being to increase the number of college graduates in the state of Wisconsin,"" Pruitt said. ""That will be an important priority.""
The regents must also submit a biennial budget request to the governor by August that, if approved by both the governor and legislature, will be in effect from 2011 through 2013, he said.
In addition, Pruitt said throughout the year the regents will focus on a variety of issues brought before the full board by the three standing committees.
—Alison Dirr
City of Madison
The Madison Common Council holds meetings in the Council Chambers to conduct Madison's legislative business. To govern the city, the Common Council adopts the city budget and passes laws and policies. The Common Council is made up of the Alders who individually represent Madison area Districts 1-19.
This past May the Madison Common Council approved the $90 million Edgewater Hotel project. The Edgewater renovations were initially proposed in June 2009. The project went through different committees including the Landmarks Commission before it was finally approved.
Mayor Dave Cieslewicz is the current mayor of the city of Madison. The Mayor's Office is located in the City-County Building near the Capitol.
Cieslewicz proposes and reviews policies that may be adopted by the City. He also evaluates existing policies and procedures, among other mayoral tasks.
Cieslewicz writes his own blog, which can be accessed at www.cityofmadison.com.
The Dane County Board of Supervisors is made up of 37 elected supervisors from each of the districts within the county.
The County Board is the policy-making body of the county government. Establishing county ordinances, passing laws concerning law enforcement and levying taxes are just some of the duties of the County Board. The Board also has Board Officers that help to direct and guide the board. The Dane County Board typically meets twice a month.
Currently the Board is dealing with various agenda items including amending an ordinance regarding fee exemptions for Municipal road maintenance projects. If approved this amendment would clarify that the permit fee exemption is intended to apply to road maintenance projects, not road construction projects.
—Maggie DeGroot
State Legislature
The Wisconsin State Legislature is the source of all laws in the state not provided by the federal government, which includes everything from maintaining key components of infrastructure, such as public schools, law enforcement agencies, and roads, to determining the terms of more controversial issues such as marriage, environmental, and abortion laws.
The Legislature consists of 132 members: 99 Representatives and 33 Senators, each representing a different district in Wisconsin distributed around the state according to population.
In its structure, the Legislature closely resembles Congress. Like Congress, it is a bicameral legislature, meaning it consists of an upper house (the Senate) and a lower house (the Assembly), and in order to become a law, a bill must pass through both before being signed by the Governor.
During the last legislative session which ended in April, the Senate and Assembly passed a ban on texting while driving, an expansion of the BadgerCare state health plan, and a bill restricting the payday loan industry.
Democrats currently hold the majority in each house and the whole executive branch, save for Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen. However, terms for legislators in both houses only last two years, which provides for frequent turnover and fluctuation in the political climate of the legislature.
In addition, Gov. Jim Doyle will not run for a third term, leaving the position of Governor wide open for the first time in eight years. While Democrats undoubtedly dominate the capitol now, there is no telling what the elections this fall could mean for Wisconsin.
—Ariel Shapiro
