About 85 percent of the 8,400 NIU employees required to complete ethics training before today’s deadline have completed it.

While that leaves a good portion of people yet to complete the training, there is anticipation of many people completing the training on the last day, said Steve Cunningham, associate vice president for administration and human resources.

Human resources forwarded a message to all employees Monday to remind them to complete the training.

“We are impressed with the way NIU employees have responded to this,” Cunningham said. “NIU looks very good in relation to other schools.”

The State Officials and Employees Ethics Act, mandated by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, requires all officials and employees to complete the training on a yearly basis.

Only employees hired on or before September 20 have to have the training completed by today. Employees hired after that time have six months to complete the training.

The training compliance falls under the office of the inspector general. Consequences of not completing the training could include fines.

“The inspector general’s office has the authority to levy fines, but more steps in the process will have to be completed first before it gets to that point,” Cunningham said. “I do not anticipate this being an issue, because NIU employees have pitched in to comply.”

Typical reasons for not having the training completed on time are medical leaves and leaves of absences, he said.

“I anticipate the offices will work with people to get the training done,” Cunningham said. “It will take some time to sort through the remaining people who have not completed the training.”

Having a complete list of employees required to take the training is a problem that other schools have encountered, but it has not been an issue at NIU.

“We have one of the most inclusive lists of people,” Cunningham said. “I think at other schools the issue has been gleaning the complete and accurate list from the computers, especially the part-time employees.”

There will be some internal review on how well the ethics training system worked this time, he said.

This year there were 30 days to complete the training, but there has been no information released on how long the window will be next year.

How to complete ethics training

– The training can be accessed from any computer, at home or on campus, with an Internet connection.

– If you do not have access to a computer, contact the NIU Human Resources Department at 753-6000 for a list of times and locations for an open computer lab.

– All employees can access the training through the State of Illinois Ethics Training and Compliance Center Web site at www.etcc.il.gov.

– Once there, scroll down to and click on the “training login” box.

– You then will be asked to enter your user ID. Your user ID will be your first name, middle initial and last name followed by the month and day of your birthday. An example is John L. Smith born June 5, 1970. The user ID would be JohnLSmith0605.

– The password will be “Illinois1.”

– From there, you will answer a series of questions.

If there are any technical problems, contact the NIU Information Technology Services

Help Desk at 752-8100.

For a list of frequently asked questions visit www.hr.niu.edu/training/ethicsfaq.cfm.

Source: NIU Human Resources