Wednesday Wire: August 29, 2018

Submitted by Robin Frazier, frazier.398@osu.edu

Effective immediately, ALL student employees are required to complete a student application. This includes FWS students and non-OSU student employees. An application should be completed by all returning student employees since they would not have completed one last year. This application must be submitted with the Request for Student Employment Form in order to initiate the hire process. All forms are available on the ATI Intranet. Please remember to complete termination forms for any of your students that will not be returning to work this AU semester. As a friendly reminder, below is the step-by-step process for student hires. A new Request for Student Employment Form or Job Referral Form must be submitted for all students, including those returning from last year because it's a new academic year. 1. Supervisor has the student complete a Student Application Form. 2. Supervisor completes the Request for Student Employment Form. If the student is eligible for Federal Work Study, they must print out the Job Referral Form and have the supervisor complete the form. 3. Supervisor submits forms to HR. Students are also welcome to bring the forms to HR with their identification for the I-9 form. 4. HR will coordinate with Academic Affairs to verify student’s enrollment and fee status and then HR will make any necessary updates to the position if need be (i.e. supervisor, location, time approver, wage changes, etc. ) If you plan on hiring a large number of students, I would advise reaching out to me in advance to see how many positions are available for your department in case more need to be created/updated. 5. Once the position has been approved, HR will draft a letter of offer via DocuSign. It will be sent electronically to the Department Head, Division Chair, or PI for review and signature. Once signed, it will go directly to the student to sign electronically to the OSU email provided on the request form. 6. Once HR receives a copy of the signed LOO, a background check will be initiated (if applicable) and a hire packet will be sent to the student via DocuSign for completion. Only students with access to restricted data are required to have a university background check. This must be selected on the Request for Student Employment Form. The university will send the student an email to complete an authorization form in order to initiate the check. 7. The student must complete the hire packet and setup an appointment to bring their identification in if they did not do this as part of step #3. HR will upload their documents to their hire packet and then their hire will be entered in the HR System by the Service Center so they can have access to etimesheet and Employee Self-Service. 8. It will be the student’s responsibility to print out their OPERS Exemption Form and either return it to me or mail it the OHR address on the form, within 30 days of their hire. If their form is not received within 30 days of their hire, students will pay into OPERS.

Important things to remember:
• The DocuSign process does create efficiencies, however, students will need to be reminded by their supervisors that they must check their email for their hire paperwork. The speed of this process will rely heavily on how quickly the student completes their paperwork.
• Students cannot bring in expired identification or photocopies of their identification for the I-9 form. They must be current and original.
• If you do not have a job title already in the system and on file with Academic Affairs or myself, a position will need to be created and you will need to allow at least a week to get one created and approved before we can start the hire process.
• Students cannot start work until you receive a copy of the Request for Student Employment from me.
• Please allow 2 weeks to get your students hired. It does not normally take 2 weeks to complete the hire process, however, there are several steps and approvals required to hire anyone and we need to allow ample time to complete the process. The College has only one shared Service Center that enters the hires and so they are trying to process all transactions across all department within the College.

Submitted by Jim Kinder, kinder.15@osu.edu

As a component of the fully executed MOU between Ohio State and CQUniveristy there are several ongoing and developing collaborations with Ohio State faculty members. Mark and Tieneke are two of the key individuals from CQUniversity who are engaged in these collaborations. Mark and Tieneke are scheduled to be at Ohio State from Friday 7 through Tuesday 18 September. One purpose of this message is to alert you that Mark is scheduled to make a presentation entitled GPS for cows, fit-bits for sheep, laser beams in pastures, fenceless farms: An update on some of the latest agri-tech emerging in the Australian grazing Industries. The presentation is scheduled to occur in Room 212 Animal Sciences with video linkage to 123 Gerlaugh Hall on the Wooster campus on 11:30 AM Monday 10 September 2018 in

Mark is an Associate Professor in the Precision Livestock Management Group. He is involved in a range or research and education activities with a focus on agri-tech in grazing systems. Some of the topics that Mark will address in this presentation are: 

•  An overview of Australian agriculture and agri-tech with a focus on grazing animal production, particularly sheep and beef;
• On-animal sensor technologies including GPS tracking, accelerometer, audio sensing and proximity logging and their application by Australian graziers (ranchers) to solve key production, social, welfare and environmental issues;
• GPScows School Engagement Program (www.gpscows.com) which see’s school students across Australia (and the USA) using GPS tracking technology to monitor livestock and learn about spatial science;
• Ani-sense open source research animal monitoring project - program is developing a low-cost open source multi-sensor animal monitoring system which will be made freely available to animal scientists across the globe;
• DataMuster platform (www.datamuster.net) being developed by CQUniversity to collate, analyse and present sensor information from walk-over-weigh, water monitoring and on-animal sensors enabled by the R statistical package; and
• Collaborative research opportunities to enable US students and academics to visit Australia and work with our research team as a result of a variety of opportunities from short terms stays, including the CQU Fulbright Scholarship through to longer term Post-Doctoral Fellowships through Advanced Queensland.

Mark and Tieneke are key contributors in addressing aspects of the previously described MOU between CQUniversity and Ohio State CFAES in collaborative research and teaching endeavors. CQUniversity is a public institution founded in 1967 in Rockhampton as the Queensland Institute of Technology Capricornia with the award of full university status in 1992. The main campus for CQUniversity is located in Rockhampton, a regional business center that is the self-proclaimed beef cattle capital of Australia. There are a further 15 CQUniversity campuses spread throughout Australia in all major cities and rural regions of Queensland, except Tasmania. When CSIRO (federal research entity) closed the extensive research high quality research laboratory in Rockhampton, about 10 years ago CQUniversity initiated a focus on agricultural research which has developed into one of the strongest programs in the University. Recently, there was also development of an undergraduate program focused on agricultural science. 

The overarching collaborative research endeavors between the two universities relates to food producing animal, plant and environmental interactions (particularly surface water) and relationships to sustainable agricultural systems. Mark’s research focus is on using precision technologies for gaining a greater understanding of animal (primarily beef cattle and sheep) behavior and effects on enterprise productivity. Tieneke has recently taken on a coordinator role for the agricultural sciences teaching program and has a background in plant sciences and agricultural landscape assessment using precision technologies. Mark has applied for funding from a Fulbright Scholar program which if awarded would result in him and Tieneke being in residence at Ohio State for about 4 months in 2019. Their visit to Ohio State in September, therefore, is a bit of a scouting venture to assess opportunities for them and their family if this award eventuates. Attached are their CVs.

The present and developing collaborations between Mark, and Tieneke with those at Ohio State have focused on Luis Moraes, Tony Parker, Alvaro Garcia-Guerra, all of the Department of Animal Sciences, and Jon Witter at Ohio State ATI. These collaborations are focused on research funding, joint scientific publications, joint training of graduate students, and collaborative teaching of undergraduates by faculty from both universities. There, however, has been dialogue with several other Ohio State faculty and some staff members about specific collaborations in these and other realms.

Both Mark and Tieneke are scheduled to meet with several in CFAES administration, Ohio State Animal Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Ohio State ATI and several industry stakeholders during the time they will be in Ohio. If there, however, are others that I have not specifically contacted that would like to meet with either Mark or Tieneke while they are at Ohio State, please let me know and I will ascertain if we can arrange a time for dialog with the one or both of the Trotters . 

Take care and cheers for now.

Jim

Submitted by Amy Kohmetscher, kohmetscher.1@osu.edu 

If you experience a technical issue with classroom equipment (computers, monitors, video conferencing, etc) call 614-514-4848 or 8-4-4848 if using a Wooster campus phone. During class time you can save a minute or two by pressing "1" as soon as the recording begins. This will direct you to an IT representative and help you get your class back on task sooner.