Articles Tagged: Iowa Board of Regents

The Board of Regents on Thursday levied a rare rejection of a University of Iowa construction project, opting not to approve -- at least for a period of time -- a long-awaited renovation of the 100-year-old Iowa Memorial Union.

The University of Iowa’s living learning communities house students with peers who share similar interests or majors in hopes of forming deeper community connections. Administrators confirmed to The Gazette that three of those communities — serving LGBTQ+, Latinx, and Black students — will no longer be offered starting next year.

After an hour updating lawmakers on ways their campuses are serving students, the presidents of Iowa’s three public universities fielded questions from lawmakers -- including about cuts to their diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.

With lobbyists for Iowa’s public universities lingering in an “undecided” state on the dozens of bills introduced this session angling to reshape higher education, the Board of Regents this week will consider creating a new “legislative committee” tasked with taking a position on pending legislation.

In the year since taking over Iowa City’s bankrupt Mercy Hospital and transitioning the 78-year-old facility into its new downtown campus, University of Iowa Health Care has not completed a comprehensive review of staff badge access, “increasing the risk of unauthorized entry,” according to an internal audit made public this week.

A month after Iowa’s Board of Regents cut references to diversity and inclusion throughout its five-year strategic plan, Iowa’s public universities largely have done the same in response to legislation and regent directives curtailing all DEI efforts.

Proposed renovations going before the Board of Regents next week include an open study lounge with adjacent small-group study rooms; an expanded fitness center with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out toward Iowa City Park and the Iowa River; and a centralized vending area.

Despite a University of Iowa announcement in December of its intentions to seek approval this month of a new “School of Social and Cultural Analysis,” the plan has been shelved following legislative opposition and regent rejection.

That bigger Children’s Hospital window replacement budget — if approved by the Board of Regents next week — will bring the total cost to replace cracking and damaged windows encasing the eight-year-old hospital to $52.5 million.

After eight months without a full nine-member Board of Regents, Gov. Kim Reynolds has appointed University of Northern Iowa student Lucy Gipple to fill the vacant student-regent spot, according to UNI.

Three days after a pair of Republican lawmakers contacted the Board of Regents with concerns over the number of genders listed on admission applications to Iowa’s public universities, all three campuses updated their forms to offer just three options: male, female, or “prefer not to answer.”

House File 115 would require Iowa colleges and universities to establish policies prohibiting students, faculty and staff on nonimmigrant visas from “publicly espousing terrorist activity related to an ongoing conflict or ... persuading others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity related to an ongoing conflict or to support a terrorist organization unless it is the policy or practice of the United States to support such activity or organization.”

A day after the University of Iowa paused or slowed research-related grant applications, hiring, and general spending in response to funding cuts announced by the National Institutes of Health — the campus’ largest federal research funder — UI officials on Tuesday retracted that guidance due to a temporary restraining order on the NIH cuts.

The University of Iowa graduate student union is seeking a 25 percent increase in wages over the next two years, leaving the union’s president and members dissatisfied at the Iowa Board of Regents bargaining team’s offer of annual 3 percent increases.

Committee chair thinks that’s ‘a major problem’