By Ralph Derickson

New officers of the UK Staff Senate Development Task Force are, from left, Ann Livingstone, election officer; Dave Vantreese, secretary; Jeanie Caldwell, chair; Suzanne Scheff, treasurer, and Sean Scott, parliamentarian.

Feb. 7, 2002 (Lexington, Ky.) -- A University of Kentucky Staff Senate Development Task Force (SSDTF) that will be responsible for conducting the election of senators to UK's first staff senate today elected its own officers and established a "timeframe" for the staff elections.

Ninety senators elected from the university's 10,000+staff contingent will participate in the first UK staff senate meeting scheduled for 1 p.m. July 11 in the auditorium of the W.T. Young Library.

The UK Board of Trustees adopted a new governing regulation at its Jan.22 meeting establishing the university's first staff senate.

Russ Williams, the staff representative to the UK Board of Trustees who helped bring the fledgling SSDTF together, turned over the reins of the organization to its first elected officers and noted, "We've now finished the beginning."

The staff senate will serve as a liaison with the University Administration making suggestions and recommendations about myriad staff-related matters.

UK has had a Faculty Senate since the mid-1960s.

Jeanie Caldwell, a 14-year-employee of UK who is currently the program coordinator for the UKAdvance program in Human Resource Development, was elected chair of the Staff Senate Development Task Force. Caldwell has served in Human Resource Development since 1997. Prior to that she worked in the clinical laboratory. She is a native Lexingtonian who graduated from Henry Clay High School. At UK, she is the chair of the UK Women's Forum, a member of the President's Commission on Women and a member of the Governor's Task Force on the Economic Status of Women in Kentucky.

Other officers are:

-- Suzanne Scheff, director of Women in Engineering program in the College of Engineering, treasurer;

-- Dave Vantreese, director of the Instructional Technology Center in the College of Education, secretary;

-- Ann Livingstone, Office of International Affairs, election officer, and

-- Sean Scott, Employee Benefits, parliamentarian.

To achieve the election of the 90 staff senators, the SSDTF set an election "timeframe" that may be subject to some changes but generally calls for:

-- Nominations of senators to be accepted April 1-12;

-- Multiple elections of staff senators to be conducted April 29 through May 17, with final election results available May 24;

-- An orientation program for new staff senators on June 17, and

-- The first staff senate meeting, July 11.