In an effort to provide up-to-date information regarding the proposed self-insured health insurance, the UW–Madison Office of Human Resources (OHR) will be posting questions received and adding answers as they become available. The Group Insurance Board (GIB) voted to move Wisconsin to a self-insured health insurance model for state workers effective Jan. 1, 2018.  The proposed change still requires approval by the State Legislature.  The Department of Employee Trust Funds (ETF) has stated that the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee needs to approve self-insurance contracts by May 1, 2017 in order to implement the change by January 2018 as planned. If approved, OHR will hold educational sessions for UW-Madison employees.

Per UW System policy, political campaign activities by employees are restricted by Board of Regents policy and state law in three ways: (1) employees may not engage in political campaign activities, including solicitation of signatures for petitions, during work time or in their work unit; (2) they may not use university resources to engage in political campaign activities at any time; and (3) they may not solicit contributions or services for a political purpose from other university employees while they are engaged in their official duties.

Did you know that photos are protected by copyright, even if they are posted on the internet? With a few exceptions, it’s illegal for you to reuse a photo taken by another person without permission. The penalties for photographic copyright infringement are severe. To safely find and use photos, try the UW Campus Photo Library, which contains thousands of recent low and hi-res photos depicting the UW-Madison campus and the people there. Or try WikiCommons, a collection of over 36 million freely usable media files.