01.001:  Preparation of Policies and Procedures

All policies and procedures are to be updated minimally every three years, or sooner at the request of the President or the Provost. Notices will be forwarded to departments regarding the update requirement, based on the "approved-on" date of the policy and procedure. Failure to update the policy and procedure on time may result in the elimination of that policy and procedure.

Policy and procedure statements' initiation, revision, and elimination are to be approached as an ongoing process. (See Procedures, subsection II, sub-subsection D, and Procedures, subsection VI, below.)

I.  Initiating Creation or Revision

1. A department head, a planning unit head, a Cabinet Officer, or a senate or committee working with the appropriate responsible administrator, may initiate a new policy and procedure or revise an existing one. The person identified as the Initiator of the policy will take primary responsibility for this role.

2. The new, or revised, policy and procedure will be typed into the standard policy and procedure template, which can be obtained by following the link in the "Forms" section, below.

3. After the new or revised policy has been prepared in accordance with subsections II through V, immediately below, it will undergo the review and approval process described in subsection VI, below.

II.  Primary Sections

The policy and procedure statement will include the following five primary sections:

A.  Purpose

Describes why this policy has been developed.

B.  Plan

1. States Ohio University's position, values, and beliefs on a given topic.

2. Provides the reasoning for the policy and procedure, and describes the intended outcomes in general terms.

3. Establishes legal and ethical evaluative criteria for assessing appropriateness of actions.

C.  Policies and Procedures

1. Identifies the participants and their responsibilities, lines of authority, and the materials and documents needed to carry out the policy and procedure.

2. Specifically describes appropriate protocols, practical methods, or step-by-step instructions, explaining how to carry out the policy and procedure.

D.  Reviewers

It is imperative that new, or revised, policy and procedure drafts be circulated to all interested parties, both individuals and groups (e.g., departments, senates, and planning unit heads), for review and comments. This review by interested parties is to be accomplished in three phases: first, during an early, on-going, informal review, while the successive iterations of the policy and procedure are being written, as described in subsection VI, item 1, below; second by the Cabinet, Provost, and President; and third, after the Cabinet review, through the role of the Policy and Procedure Review Committee, as described in subsection VI, items 5 and 6, below.

To ensure that new policy and procedure statements, and revisions thereof, are reviewed appropriately, the list in the Reviewers section should include at least:

1. All offices and individuals (e.g., the Bursar, or the Director of Campus Safety) who are identified by title in the policy or procedure sections as having specific roles.

2. The Cabinet, including the Provost and President.

3. The Policy and Procedure Review Committee, which will include specific members appointed by the President from various constituent groups who have relevant knowledge and experience of Ohio University's operations, and familiarity with its policies and procedures, so as to be able to assist in providing technical analyses, coordination, and formatting.

E.  Forms

This section either

1. States that there are no required forms associated with that policy statement, or

2. Includes a numbered list of all the required forms.

   The listed forms may include both blank forms and filled-out example copies. For each form, the list of forms will either specify the URL of the online version, or provide instructions on how to obtain a printed copy, or both.

III.  Organization and Format

The following formatting rules will provide a readable, uniform display of the policy across the widest possible range of Web browsers. Because the display is uniform, unambiguous citations easily can be made to refer to any part of a policy and procedure statement. This policy illustrates the application of these rules.

1. The title of the policy and procedure should be specific but informative. The title will include neither the word "policy" nor the word "procedure," except for the following three policies:
   • Policy and Procedure 01.001, "Preparation of Policies and Procedures."

   • Policy and Procedure 01.002, "Policy and Procedure Numbering System."

   • Policy and Procedure 01.003, "Exceptions to or Restrictions of University Policies."

2. The Signature Block will be similar to that at the top of this policy. The status of the policy will be either "DRAFT of" or "Approved by the President on" a specific date. The right column will be blank in the online version -- it is used on the printed copy during the formal review and approval process, as described in subsection VI, below. Each person will be identified by job title, in order to guide people needing advice about the policy, in order to facilitate the next revision cycle, and in order to facilitate the implementation of Policy 01.003.

3. Any of the five primary sections (as described in subsection II, above) may be organized into subsections, which may in turn have sub-subsections.

4. All subsections will be provided with titles and identified by sequential capital Roman Numerals, starting with "I" for the first subsection of each main section.

5. All sub-subsections will be provided with titles and identified by sequential capital letters, starting with "A" for the first sub-subsection of each subsection.

6. A section may have un-labeled introductory text prior to the first subsection, and a subsection may have un-labeled introductory text prior to the first sub-subsection.

7. All section, subsection, and sub-subsection titles will be presented in boldface.

8. An "itemized list," such as this paragraph is part of, is a set of items that do not each have their own title (unlike sections, subsections, and sub-subsections). Only one numbered, itemized list may occur in any one titled section, subsection, or sub-subsection, in order to permit unique identification when referring to each item.

   If an itemized list consists of a modest number of items that are all so terse that none will wrap to a second line of text, it may be presented with the browser's default graphic bullets, rather than numbers. All other itemized lists, including all step-by-step instructions, will be formatted with "hanging indents," and numbered with Arabic numerals, each such list starting with "1." (Hanging indents with Arabic numerals starting with "1" are a feature of all Web browsers. Hanging indents with letters, or with Roman numerals, or with other starting values than "1" are features of some Web browsers, but not of others, and hence will not display uniformly.) A numbered item of such a list may consist of more than one paragraph, as this one does.

9. Words and phrases may be emphasized by using boldface. Italics will not be used for emphasis, because they are harder to read on-screen. Underlines will not be used for headings, nor for emphasis, because of the likely confusion with selectable links in the online version.

10. All cross-references to other Policy and Procedure statements, to online forms, and to Web pages, will be selectable links in the online version.

    In order to simplify detection of typographical errors, the first reference to any other Policy and Procedure statement will be in the form,

    Policy and Procedure 01.001, "Preparation of Policies and Procedures"

    specifying both number and full title, with the number being the selectable link in the online version (e.g., subsection V, below, and item 1 of this list, immediately above). Later references to that same policy may be in the form, Policy 01.001, without specifying the full title.

    References to forms will include the full title of the form.

IV.  Content Considerations

The policy and procedure should be brief and user-friendly. The new policy, or revision, should take into account:

1. Legal and ethical implications

2. Fiscal implications

3. Personnel or human resources issues

4. Gender and diversity considerations

5. Simplicity in technical explanations

6. Cross reference of related, or companion, policies

7. Identification of an appropriate reference for questions and clarification

8. Definition of terms

9. Reference to a department Web site as appropriate

V.  Numbering

Policy and Procedure 01.002, "Policy and Procedure Numbering System," provides for the assignment of numbers to new policies and procedures.

VI.  Review and Approval

1. After preparing an initial draft of a new or revised policy, the Initiator will invite feedback and comments from an appropriate group of reviewers. The invitation will specify the method for communicating the comments and the deadline for their submission.

   The reviewers consulted should include the individuals and groups identified in the "Reviewers" section of that policy statement; see subsection II, sub-subsection D, above. Although listed as Reviewers, the President, Provost, other Cabinet members, and the Policy and Procedure Review Committee need not be consulted during this first step, because they will review the policy in steps 3 through 5, below. If the President, Provost, or any member of the Cabinet has a role defined in the policy, or is otherwise a particularly interested party, then they should be consulted during this step.

2. The Initiator will prepare a brief cover memorandum, using the template linked from the Forms section, below, explaining the need for the new or revised policy and procedure, and identifying the reviewers consulted during step 1, above. If the Initiator believes that any reviewer would not support the policy as it is submitted, then the cover memo will identify the reviewers in question and summarize the issues that are still unresolved, and the Initiator will simultaneously provide a copy of the cover memo and policy, as submitted to the Provost, to those reviewers not supporting the policy, in step 3 (immediately below).

3. After the formatting and the language developed for a new or revised policy are complete, the Initiator will forward the new or revised policy and procedure, with the cover memorandum, and with copies of any forms that are not already available online, to the Provost's Office, for review by the Cabinet.

4. If the Cabinet review identifies any issues that should be addressed, the Provost will inform the Initiator, and provide guidance as to their resolution.

5. After the Cabinet review and endorsement by the Provost, the Provost will instruct the Initiator to provide the draft policy and procedure to the Policy and Procedure Review Committee in electronic form, for final technical analysis and formatting. If the committee identifies any issues that should be addressed, they will work with the Provost and the Initiator to resolve them. The Provost may decide that resolving an issue requires further discussion by the Cabinet.

6. After the committee has completed its work, they will send the final policy and procedure to the President, for his or her approval.

7. If the President identifies any issues that should be addressed, the President or the Provost will inform the Initiator, and provide guidance as to their resolution.

8. Once approved by the President, the President's Office will inform Computer Services that the policy has been approved, and provide a copy in electronic form, for indexing and publication on the University's Policy and Procedure Web site, at http://www.ohiou.edu/policy/.

9. Computer Services will print the policy and procedure from the Web and send it to the Initiator, who will sign in the "Initiated by" section on the printed policy and procedure. The Initiator will then send the policy and procedure to the Provost.

10. The Provost will sign as the Endorser of the printed policy and procedure, and take it to the President for the final signature certifying approval.

11. The President will then forward the fully signed policy and procedure to Computer Services. Computer Services will arrange for hardcopy duplication and distribution to the Cabinet Officers (including the Director of Legal Affairs), and the University Archivist, will update the public Web site accordingly, and will notify University Communications and Marketing.

12. University Communications and Marketing will inform the University community of the new or revised Policy statement.

VII.  Policy Elimination

A department head, a planning unit head, a senate chair, a University standing committee chair, the President, the Provost, or a Cabinet Officer, working with the appropriate Reviewers, may initiate elimination of an existing policy and procedure. The Chair of the Policy and Procedure Review Committee may also act as an Initiator of a policy and procedure elimination.

Elimination is the ultimate revision of an existing policy and procedure. Once Initiated, as described in the prior paragraph, the elimination process follows the steps established in the previous subsection for the review and approval of new and revised policies and procedures, except that in step 9, Computer Services will print a Policy and Procedure Removal Cover Sheet for that policy (instead of a new or revised policy and procedure statement), to be signed by the Initiator, the Provost, and the President.

1. Cabinet Officers

2. Provost

3. President

1. The generic Policy template, a 33 KByte Microsoft Word (".doc") file, is online at:
   http://www.ohiou.edu/policy/00-000.doc

2. The generic Policy Cover Memo template, a 20 KByte Microsoft Word (".doc") file, is online at:
   http://www.ohiou.edu/policy/cover.doc