Minutes of Benefits Advisory Committee (BAC) January 29, 2013

Attending: Amy Diehl, Heather St. Germaine, Yaniris Fernandez, Jerry Bohdanowicz, Nancy Booth, Steve Roof, Jim Miller, Shelly Ruocco (ex officio), Janice Perez from Tufts Health Plan and David Hoffman from SBA

I. Minutes from Thursday, October 31, 2012, were approved.

II. The benefit survey from 2012 highlighted employee interest in a wellness program. Janice Perez from Tufts Health Plan led a discussion about workplace wellness and what Hampshire College could initiate in partnership with Tufts Health Plan to begin a wellness program. She spoke about a detailed confidential survey our employees could take called the personal health assessment (PHA) and how members of the Tufts health plan could use the results from the PHA to reach out to members regarding their individual health management needs. She also briefly discussed other wellness initiatives Tufts supports including: smoking cessation, walking and nutrition/weight loss. The BAC will continue to discuss ideas and next steps in future meetings.

Action: Nancy and Shelly will schedule a meeting with Dave to begin the first steps in designing a wellness initiative.

III. David provided an overview of the five colleges' health plan designs, benchmarking Hampshire's health benefits to Mt. Holyoke, Smith and Amherst College. While the colleges have different vendors handling their health plans (Blue Cross, Pilgrim, Tufts), the presentation did benchmark similarities and differences in contribution sharing for the individual and family plans. The information will help the BAC with future contribution sharing discussions.

IV. Amy was asked about our vacation policies for the exempt and non-exempt staff. Given the time remaining in our meeting this month, this topic will be addressed in more detail at our next BAC meeting.

V. Benefit Survey Update - Nancy completed the draft document giving information and updates on topics covered in the Benefits Survey employees completed in March/April, 2012.

Action: Nancy will mail the update all Hampshire employees as soon as possible.

VI. Future meetings located in HR:

Action: Nancy will email the BAC with suggested dates and times.