Creating Contracts for Graduate Assistants

Victor Yellen, Assistant Provost

Academic Affairs has enhanced the Letter of Appointment File to enable you to produce contracts for graduate assistants (GA’s) using the following steps.

Enter the information for a GA on the first (demographic) screen of the Letter of Appointment File, press ENTER and go through the save process. Next press the PF9 key. This will take you to a new screen that is used to produce the GA’s contract. Most of the required elements of the contract will display at the top based on your input on the demographic screen. To this have been added fields for you to list special conditions and duties/responsibilities. Below that are required statements and signature lines for the employee and the employer.

Input the appropriate special conditions and duties/responsibilities for the GA. Press ENTER to save the information. You may then use your screen print feature to print the contract and have it signed. A copy of the contract is to be given to the GA and the original is to be filed in the appropriate departmental file.

At this point you may press PF7 to return to the demographic page of this student’s record, press PF8 to go to the tuition funding screen, or press CLEAR to return to Browse to input a new student.

If you have multiple GA’s who have the same special conditions and duties/responsibilities, you may use the copy/paste features available on the contract screen. To do this input the information for a student. You would copy it by pressing PF5, thus saving it in a temporary area. Exit that student’s record and go to the record of the next student. Enter and save the data on the demographic screen of the Letter of Appointment File for the second student. Press the PF9 key to get to the contract screen. You may then paste the copied data from the temporary area onto the new contract by pressing PF6. If any of the data that then appears needs to be changed, you may do so by typing in the corrections before pressing ENTER to save the data for that contract. The changes you make to the second contract will not alter the copied version of the special conditions and duties/responsibilities.

In the past when you saved the information on the demographic screen by typing in “Y”, you were automatically taken to the screen used to fund tuition waivers. We have changed this so that you may select the screen you want to work with next. PF8 will take you to the funding screen. PF9 will take you to the contract screen. If you are on the funding screen or the contract screen, you may press PF7 to take you back to the demographic screen. You may press CLEAR while on any of these screens to be able to input a new student’s record.

These instructions and the Questions and Answers will be available shortly on the Academic Personnel web page. Go to http://www.aa.ufl.edu and select Academic Personnel. The information will be listed under Creating Contracts for Graduate Assistants.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Q.
Will the copy information’s temporary area for special conditions and duties/responsibilities be available after I have signed off of the Letter of Appointment File?

A.
No. The copied data in the temporary area will only be available during the session you are on the File and will be deleted when you move back to the main menu of the Dean’s network.

Q.
Does the information on the demographic screen need to be input before I can create the contract?

A.
Yes. The information on the demographic screen must be saved before it will appear on the contract screen.

Q.
Does funding for the tuition waiver need to be input before I can produce a contract?

A.
No. The creation of a contract and the funding of tuition waivers are separate functions.

Q.
Do I have to create the contract at the same time that I enter the information on the demographic screen of the Letter of Appointment File?

A.
No. You may create the contract at a later time.

Q.
Can I change the “copied” information, especially if I have been doing contracts for teaching assistants and now wish to change the wording to do contracts for research assistants?

A.
Yes. To create a new “copied” version, press PF5 after you have entered the new language on a contract for a research assistant.

Q.
Can I change the special conditions and/or duties/responsibilities after I have pressed ENTER if they are incorrect?

A.
Yes. Simply make the correction(s) and press ENTER to save. Both the employee and the employer must then sign the new contract.

Q.
Can I create a contract for a pre-doctoral fellow?

A.
No. Since pre-doctoral fellows are not employees they are not covered by the collective bargaining agreement and do not receive contracts.

Q.
Do I have to use the contract screen to produce the contract for signature or may I continue to use the process our department currently has in place?

A.
You may use the process that is easiest for you or you may use a combination of the new process and your current departmental process.