The University of Wisconsin Board of Regents weighed possibilities for a new waste, fraud and abuse hotline presented by the Audit Committee in a meeting this week.
UW-Madison will be the first of the UW System schools to implement this hotline in an effort to report waste, fraud and abuse by having tipsters call the hotline.
A survey involving the Big Ten and the audit group showed that most schools who responded to the survey had a hotline to detect fraud excluding all of the UW System schools.
UW was involved in an email scam this past November, the Purchasing Services website said. Emails were sent to suppliers claiming to be from UW purchasing services and asking for items to be shipped to non-UW addresses. There is no indication of who the perpetrator is at this point.
According to the meeting agenda, this hotline will be a way to help UW expose abuse of ethics and suspicious financial activity through tipsters calling in.
Anonymity, access 24 hours a day and multilingual options are all being taken into consideration for the hotline, making it accessible to anyone who wants to call in.
The agenda said this hotline will be run through third party vendors, who are the most common and inexpensive option.
The vendors will help with providing important data and communication strategies, making sure reported items are taken care of in a timely manner.
UW System President Ray Cross also presented the board with an update on his vision for a new UW System, including budget reforms and a new strategic committee to help control the spending in the system.
“This vision is about creating a new UW System that is more responsive to the needs of the state while making a UW education more affordable and more accessible,” Cross said.
Over the past six months, the board has been keeping a close eye on how UW and all other systems do business, Cross said.
“Those efforts have been noticed by both internal and external stakeholders … who said they now feel very comfortable with how [the board] has handled these issues … and addressed the concerns [the stakeholders] raised,” Cross said.
A UW System strategic planning steering committee has been appointed, and held its second meeting last month, Cross said.
The committee is joining together with Madison’s Office of Quality Improvement to help as a consultant, Cross said.
“They are devising methods for collecting input, creating a timeline and identifying areas of focus to help guide this important undertaking,” Cross said.
The three areas of reform the board needs to focus on are reforming business practices, refocusing academic priorities and redesigning the approval processes for facility requests and segregated fees, Cross said.
“This is very important work. As we strive to ensure that campus communities are safe and welcoming places to live, work and learn, [the board] will closely follow the task force work and provide updates,” Cross said.
UW-Superior Chancellor Renee Wachter also updated the board on UW-Superior’s strategic goals initiative.
The plan, entitled “Superior Visions 2020,” involves four strategic initiatives including student experiences, thriving partnerships, achieving excellence and resource management. It involves “Clear Sight Requirements” including to ensure all programs are relevant, diversifying revenue sources and strategically increasing enrollment.
“To not have vision is to be blind. It’s to operate in a world of darkness, unsure of your orientation … The 2020 part of our name is that we are seeing with clarity, that our strategy is not based on wishful thinking … It’s a sobering look at the world in which we’re operating,” Wachter said.
Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, welcomed the changes made to the UW System in a public statement.
“I appreciate that UW System President Ray Cross is being pro-active in tackling issues at the UW System with the new reform plan. The academic success of our students who attend UW System schools is pivotal to the economic future of our state,” Vos said in the statement.
