The Assembly’s Road to a Fairer Faculty Salary

Editor-in-Chief

   The role of the University of Arkansas at Monticello’s Assembly covers a broad range of duties, including the development and revision of policies and programs at the university.  During the 2004-05 school year, the Assembly undertook a massive project to improve and clarify faculty salaries with a salary study.

   According to former Assembly chair and professor of English Kate Stewart, the salary study will benefit both faculty and students by allowing the university to recruit and retain attractive candidates.  Stewart said, the university met with candidates who would have brought vitality and expertise to the university, but salary issues hindered hiring some of those candidates.  In addition, she noted salaries can also cause faculty to leave UAM for higher-paying positions elsewhere.

   “We’ve lost some crackerjack folks who had a large impact (on the university), but left to make more (money) even within Arkansas,” Stewart said.

   With the salary study, department heads will now have some guidelines to let potential faculty know their target salaries, including where they will start and where they could eventually be.  As well, the salary study will provide current faculty members necessary job security.  According to Stewart, recruitment and retention are important for the university.

   “Being able to recruit and retain faculty is ultimate,” Stewart said.  “You want to have a more diverse faculty – you don’t want cookie-cutters – and this (study) should promote more diversity.”

   According to Stewart, salary studies are common on most U.S. college and university campuses.  However, when Chancellor Jack Lassiter announced the plan to conduct a salary study, many did not receive the news well, the main cause of concern being a reduction in pay.

   “This is a serious study,” Lassiter said in October 2005, according to an issue of The Voice.  “It disturbs me to hear people say that value is measured by salary because that’s not true.”

   Lassiter assured concerned members that no one would receive a salary reduction as a result of the study.  Despite promises from both Lassiter and Salary Study Committee Chair John Annulis, the faculty would have to wait almost three years to see the final results.

   “The reason it took as long as it did, is you’re talking labor intensive research,” Stewart said.  “I commend the committee for not rushing into a formula.  They studied the impact from various angles, and they placed a good foundation.”

   Due to the amount of work involved in conducting a salary study, Stewart met with Chancellor Lassiter and Provost David Ray to discuss forming a joint Ad Hoc committee.  According to Stewart, the university structure contains administrative committees and assembly committees, and the Ad Hoc committee for the salary study would form the first joint committee effort between the two factions.

   “One reason we were actually able to have this study is because administration and the Assembly came together on this,” Stewart said.

   The university appointed a committee of about eight members to study the salary structure at UAM and identify the differences in pay and reasons for those differences.  The administration and then-Assembly chair Stewart looked at rank, discipline and tenure to form a committee with a variety of faculty members.  Members included:

   “We put together as fine a committee as any,” Stewart said.  “They were committed to UAM and excellence in higher education and worked hard in the classroom.  They really did a thorough and ethical job; they pulled data from all over the country.”

   As the committee began researching other universities’ salary studies, it became clear the study would take longer than the fiscal year.  Throughout the process, Lassiter reassured faculty members that the study would take time.

   “Remember, we’re addressing concerns that didn’t happen overnight, and the solution won’t come overnight,” Lassiter told the faculty in a December 2005 Assembly meeting.

   By March 2006, worried faculty members could finally see progress made by the Salary Study Committee when Annulis presented a Salary Committee Report to the Assembly.  By November, the committee gathered all the data needed for the campus.

   As the end of 2006 neared and the Colleges of Technology at McGehee and Crossett moved ahead with their separate studies, the Monticello campus’s progress seemed to slow.  Though the committee continued to work, it offered no reports at the end of the year.

   In March 2007, the study regained momentum as Annulis reported progress with the committee, which was close to presenting findings on the classified and non-classified salaries, and Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration Jay Jones announced the beginning work of the 2008 budget.

   Jones said the office received recommendation from the legislation session to administer a two-percent classified and non-classified salary increase.  However, UAM would still look at the budgets for final decisions before rejecting or accepting the recommendation.

  In late spring of 2007, Annulis provided the Academic Council with the faculty target salary model and reported 40 percent of UAM faculty fell below the average salary level based on rank and experience. 

   According to Stewart, the way salaries increased over the last 25-30 years put individuals with tenure making considerably less money than junior faculty members, which caused large gaps in salaries.  Furthermore, some disciplines pay considerably more than others depending on the job market.

   Even two years into the study, some faculty members remained skeptical.  As Annulis announced the new policy for the salary study from the College and University Professional Association, he reassured members no one’s salary would receive a reduction and provided faculty the opportunity to challenge the salary formula in case of mistakes.

   In August 2007, the university began plans for adopting a salary formula and set aside $50,000 to conduct the study on the Monticello campus, with McGehee and Crossett campuses setting aside their own funds.

   The committee followed through and presented definitive results in September 2007.  Lassiter provided the Assembly a packet including definitions and information on the formula, which allows faculty members to calculate their own salaries.

   Lassiter reported the first phase of faculty salary adjustments would go into effect Oct. 1 and faculty would receive those adjustments in the Oct. 15 payroll.  However, with the funds allocated by the 2008 fiscal year budget, faculty received only 53 percent of the total adjustments. Yet the committee promised to continue work to identify funds for the adjustments in future budget years until it funds the total amount in the present salary study.

   “We’ll continue to adjust until we reach all target salaries,” Lassiter said.

   A month after the previous prediction, Lassiter announced 52 faculty members would benefit from the salary studies in the first adjustment, three more than first expected.  Lassiter said of the approximately 114 faculty, about 62 would not receive an adjustment.

   The committee uses a standard for calculating target salaries from CUPA. The salary study does not address merit; instead, the study focuses on rank and years in rank. The study figures years in rank as the number of years spent in one position since the promotion.

   However, the study does put a cap on years in rank. For example, even if an individual remained at the same rank for 25 years, the cap may be 12 years. Faculty members relatively new to a rank are more likely to receive a negative multiplier based on the salary formula.  In addition to rank and years in rank, the study includes other factors in its salary calculations.

   CUPA implements the Classification of Instructional Programs code, which the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics originally developed in 1980. The code groups academic divisions into 53 categories based on a two-digit system. Reducing the code from six digits lumps divisions together in a broad spectrum.

   According to Lassiter, the salary study factors in averages based on the diversity of the institution's divisions. Depending on the two-digit CIP code, faculty in certain divisions may receive lower salaries. Lassiter said the majority of UAM's divisions rank at the lower end of faculty salaries because the university does not have as many high-tech or high-paying disciplines.

   The study also factors in class sizes. In order to have higher salaries, the university would have to have larger classes. Lassiter said this does not mean the university plans to make classes larger or cut faculty. However, smaller classes require more professors, which reduces the salary amount per faculty member.

   In 2004, the university had a 25-to-1 student-to-faculty ratio. The campus currently has a 19-to-1 ratio. The low ratio benefits the campus by allowing faculty members to give more attention to individual students. However, the university will have to hire more faculty to support smaller classes.

   "We probably have the lowest student-to-faculty ratio in the state," Lassiter said. "We have to have more faculty to offer more classes to keep those class sizes (small)."

   In addition to smaller class sizes, the university also has more faculty at instructor and assistant professor positions than any other rank. According to Jones, this helps put UAM close to the national CUPA salary average for the two ranks.

   This salary study did not include division heads or Executive Council members, though Lassiter plans to implement a salary study for academic unit heads. The committee has not completed the salary study for non-classified staff, though it should have final recommendations for the Executive Council before the end of October.

   According to Lassiter, it will take approximately three years to reach all the target salaries the university is currently reviewing. He said the Salary Committee plans to keep the data current and provide it to the academic unit heads. The committee also plans to put the most recent charts and data on the UAM Web site.

   During the September 2007 meeting, Lassiter said the Academic Council did refine the process somewhat, but it also approved the implementation of the formula.  By this time, administration set aside $150,000 for faculty and staff adjustments, with $105,000 for faculty adjustments alone.  The university will absorb any fringe benefits from the adjustments.

   Stewart said the administration will more than likely implement another study after the completion of the first phase.  However, she noted it may not happen immediately because the university has not been able to fund all the parities yet due to budget constraints.

   “It may take more than 2.5 years to see the impact,” Stewart said, “but down the road this is one of the best things the university has done.”

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