Naming proposals, insurance premium increases go to regents next week

Proposed health and dental premium increases for 2025, a new name for the College of Human Sciences and a request to name a campus building for retired senior leader Warren Madden are on the docket when the state Board of Regents meets Sept. 18-19 at the ISU Alumni Center. The meeting agenda is online, and all public portions of board activity will be livestreamed on the board's website.

Addition: Health

The proposed College of Health and Human Sciences reflects strong programs, research and outreach across multiple health dimensions in the college's current offerings. The addition of health to the college name also helps communicate its health-related focus to students, employers and stakeholders. The change also would be consistent with what's happening at other universities. Of Iowa State's 10 peer institutions, six have colleges similar to the College of Human Sciences, four of whom have the word health in their college name. The others are considering the addition of "health" to their college names.

If the board approves the name change, it would become effective immediately.

Employee insurance premiums

Iowa State leaders will ask the regents to approve health and dental premium increases (PDF) for the plan year that begins Jan. 1. Only premium increases are proposed; no changes are being made to the health care and dental plan designs.

The faculty/staff members of Iowa State's Employee Benefits Advisory Committee worked with the university's consultant, WTW, to review the ISU plans, compare them to other health plans and consider plan design, guided by the findings of the 2022 benefits survey. Their recommendation was to leave the plan design alone and increase premiums. As proposed, all plan participants would experience an increase to their monthly health care premium, between $12 and $66 for HMO participants, and between $11 and $97 for PPO participants.

The university will absorb most of the premium increases and will cover more than 87% of the total cost of the health care plans.

HMO: Proposed increases to monthly premiums

*includes university portion

PPO: Proposed increases to monthly premiums

*includes university portion

Employee monthly premiums for basic dental insurance would stay flat (employee only coverage) or go up $1 for all basic plan options except employee and family, which would go up $2/month, as proposed. Employee premiums for the comprehensive dental plan would go up $3 per month, with two exceptions: Employee-only coverage would cost the employee $1 more per month, and employee and family coverage would cost $4 more per month.  

Warren Madden Building

Iowa State is asking to name the north-side Administrative Services Building the Warren Madden Building (PDF) in honor of the alumnus (1961, industrial engineering), who retired in 2016 as senior vice president for business and finance after serving the university for 50 years. Among many contributions to the campus and Ames communities, Madden helped preserve several 19th-century structures and the central campus greenspace as the university grew, develop the Iowa State Center in the 1970s, expand campus utilities and the residence system, collaborate with city leaders on town-gown initiatives such as CyRide and the ice arena, and coordinate major campus flood recovery in 1993, 2008 and 2010.

The Administrative Services Building opened in 1998, and currently is undergoing a water damage renovation necessary from a burst pipe in January.

New academic programs

Iowa State will seek final approval for two bachelor's degree programs:

• Bachelor of Science in game design (PDF), an interdisciplinary and inter-college degree program based in the College of Design. Students who complete the degree will be prepared to work in major or boutique-sized game design companies as game artists, programmers or writers. This is Iowa State's second "degree of the future" sent to the regents for approval.
• Bachelor of Science in education studies (PDF) in the School of Education. The degree meets the needs of students interested in education but not in working as a K-12 classroom teacher. This could include educators for settings such as museums, zoos or libraries; and community-based education, international education, educational technology, instructional design or educational policy.

Appropriations requests for July 1

Iowa State leaders are proposing a total of nearly $11.8 million in state appropriations for the fiscal year that begins next July. The board office sends the universities' appropriations requests to the state by Oct. 1 each year. Iowa State's seven proposals are:

1. Incremental operating funds to the Ag Experiment Station ($3.75 million) and Cooperative Extension ($1 million) to help maintain the state's agricultural competitiveness and explore opportunities for growth. Three proposed focus areas are: agricultural workforce and entrepreneurship, digital and precision livestock and crops, ag economics policy and training.
2. Incremental support ($1.5 million) to cover the cost of occupying and operating the Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory's stand-alone Biosafety Level 2 facility. Current appropriations and the lab's fee income can't cover this expense.
3. Incremental support ($250,000) for livestock disease research, to leverage even more external research funding and combat threats to the state's livestock industry.
4. New support ($1 million) for scholarships to provide in-state tuition at the College of Veterinary Medicine for up to 10 students/year accepted into the ISU Production Animal – Veterinary Early Acceptance Program established in 2023. Upon graduation, students would be required to work as food animal veterinarians in rural Iowa for five years to have their scholarship forgiven.
5. New support ($4 million) to launch four manufacturing hubs in partnership with regional educational institutions and create new avenues for students and manufacturing employees to complete advanced credentials. Funding would upgrade existing training centers with advanced technologies and refresh and update and align curricula.
6. Additional support ($36,000) to reach a total of $3 million annually for the three state bioscience platforms based at Iowa State (biobased products, vaccines and immunotherapeutics, and digital and precision agriculture), getting to the goal established in 2017 when the initiative launched.
7. New support ($0.25 million) to support staff and operations in entrepreneurship, for example, competition prizes, travel to national conferences and competitions, professional mentoring for faculty founders, etc.

In addition, the board will seek a $30 million capital request in FY 2026 to allocate to deferred maintenance projects at the three universities.

Building projects

Iowa State leaders will present a proposed budget ($14 million) and project description for phase 1 of the National Testing Facility for Enhancing Wind Resiliency of Infrastructure in Tornado-Downburst-Gust-front Events (NEWRITE) in 1380 Howe Hall. Fully funded by a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant, this first phase would build a 1/15th scale prototype of the phase 2 facility that would study the impact of short-term downbursts of wind such as tornadoes and derechos. Phase 1 funding also includes designing phase 2 up to construction bid documents and site selection. A second NSF grant (up to $80 million) is needed for phase 2. Partha Sarkar, professor of aerospace engineering, leads a team of researchers from nine universities involved in the project.

University leaders also will present revised budgets and plans for:

• Stange Road reconstruction between 13th Street and Blankenburg Drive in the summer of 2025, $3.65 million (increase of $2.2 million). Additional road funds from the Iowa Department of Transportation will allow the project to be completed in a single season, not two as originally proposed, minimizing the impact and saving costs. The work will include concrete pavement, sidewalks on both sides of Stange Road, street lighting and storm sewer improvements.
• Lloyd Large Animal Hospital expansion in three phases, $12 million (increase of $2.8 million). Changes to this equine-focused project would expand the in vitro fertilization embryo transfer lab addition (phase 2) and add a rehabilitation room with sports medicine, physical therapy, exam space and a treadmill (phase 3).
• Seasons Marketplace remodel (Maple Willow Larch Commons), $6.25 million (increase of $3.8 million). The increase adds dining room and food service upgrades to a "back of house" renovation completed in the kitchen, food prep and office area this summer. The expanded project also would add a dedicated special dietary needs station, improve the venue circulation and entrances, upgrade the heating/cooling, plumbing and electrical systems and establish some environmental continuity with other campus dining locations.  The work would be completed over the next three summers.

Presentations

The board has invited these reports or presentations:

• Annual report (FY 2024): Performance of regent endowment portfolios against their peer groups, to the investment and finance committee, Wednesday, 11:45 a.m.
• Update presentation: Admissions and the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid), with the admissions directors, to the academic affairs committee, Wednesday, 1 p.m.
• Update, Annual required training on First Amendment and Free Speech, to the free speech and student affairs committee, Wednesday, 2 p.m.
• Presentation, Advising student organizations, with senior vice president for student affairs Toyia Younger and Memorial Union director Chad Garland, to the free speech and student affairs committee, Wednesday, 2 p.m.
• Presentation, Digital Innovation and Iowa Farming, with Matt Darr, professor of agricultural and biosystems engineering, John Deere Endowed Chair in Ag Innovation and leader of the Digital Ag Innovation Laboratory, to the full board, Thursday, 9:45 a.m.