An ad hoc committee of the general faculty will meet today in response to the Board of Trustees’ vote to impose a merit pay system on the faculty.
Chaired by economics professor Kathryn Nantz, the committee, will try to determine the best course of action for the faculty with respect to merit pay. The committee was created”to study the issues and determine appropriate courses of action,” during a faculty meeting on Mar. 23 of last year by a vote of 79-5,
The trustees voted on Dec. 6 to impose merit pay on the faculty, and five days later Academic Vice President Orin Grossman sent a memo to the faculty to “give some guidance and direction” concerning the Board’s vote. Specifically, the memo outlined a proposed merit pay compensation plan.
Merit pay is a form of compensation that, in theory, rewards the best and brightest faculty members for various forms of achievement, such as publication in scholarly journals or speaking at academic conferences. But, how to decide who gets rewarded (and who does not) has prompted faculty members to discuss various issues with respect to merit pay.
“It sometimes seems that the Board is going at this willy-nilly,” said Nantz. “I don’t think that it’s the most efficient way of developing any sort of compensation scheme.”
Grossman thinks that the transition to merit pay is going more smoothly. “From what I hear, things are progressing reasonably well at most schools here,” he said. “However, the antagonism to developing these plans is mostly in the college of arts and sciences.”
“I would hope that everyone understands that this is not an unusual institution,” Grossman added. “Merit pay is fundamental to how most private schools do business. It’s not an extreme measure, it’s common practice.”
Still, Grossman was sympathetic to faculty concerns. “Change is difficult, and I didn’t expect totally smooth sailing. I appreciate a faculty with strong views, but everybody has to realize that the Board of Trustees is the governing body of this institution.”
The Board’s vote of Dec. 6 abolished the system of faculty compensation by which the Faculty Salary Committee meets every year with a special administrative team to discuss and create guidelines for faculty salaries in the coming year. Typically, a uniform cost-of-living increase would be given to all faculty so they would be paid at the 95th percentile of all professors at comparable schools.
Although full implementation of the new pay structure will not occur until 2002-2003, according to the Board’s vote, the trustees also mandated that “appropriate equity adjustments to individual salaries” be made, if necessary. This means that professors who can demonstrate that they could make more money at other institutions could be given pay increases to try to keep them at Fairfield.
Proposed Faculty Action – Both Immediate and Future
* Forming a faculty committee: Committee on Public Relations and Faculty Action * Refusing to participate in the design of a merit pay system or in the reporting requirements for that system. * Placing written material concerning our position at various places around campus. * Announcing the formation of action committees. * Informational picketing (handing out flyers on our position) at various places around campus. This could generally be escalated re: frequency and number of places. * Faculty marches on campus that end in large scale picketing of Bellarmine. * Bringing speakers to campus to address faculty on unionization, faculty rights, etc. * Sending letters to alumni and parents outlining our position. This could be done on a departmental basis, i.e., each department writing to its alumni and parents of its students. * Refusing to contribute our non-teaching services to Open House (April) and orientation for first year students (June). This could constitute two actions: first, the threat not to participate and second, the actual non-participation should that prove necessary.
MOTION: The General Faculty refuses to participate in the design of a merit pay system or in the reporting requirements for that system.
The motion passed, 73 in favor, 1 opposed, 2 abstentions. Information provided by the General faculty Meeting, Mar. 23, 2001
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