E-mails of the future…
Kevin Birth, Queens College
To:
Provost
From: ProfessorX
Subject: Being chair
Date: April 2, 2008
I am
flattered by your request that I serve as chair.
Before I
accept, I have two requests.
Other
institutions with appointed chairs have compensation
packages that are significantly higher than faculty salaries
and much better than what I have been offered. So I want an
additional $30,000 coupled with annual cost-of-living
increases.
Also,
with the new administrative burdens placed on the chair
under the new contract, I am not satisfied with the current
level of office staffing. I need a part-time administrative
assistant added to the department’s staff.
To:
ProfessorX
From: Provost
Subject: RE: Being Chair
Date: April 3, 2008
Your
requests are unreasonable. If I gave you what you ask, what
if other chairs found out? We cannot afford giving such
compensation packages to everyone.
To:
Provost
From: ProfessorX
Subject: RE: Being Chair
Date: April 3, 2008
I’ve
shared my information with all chairs and potential chairs.
Everyone knows what I have asked for and why.
Remember when summer salary for chairs first came about?
There was a great deal of debate because of the diversity
of chairs’ compensation demands. Back then, the union
helped to negotiate a package to which everyone agreed.
Appointed chairs are not covered by the union anymore, so
you need to negotiate with us as individuals. Rest assured,
we will compare your offers.
Because
of faculty attrition problem of the last decade, I am one of
very few faculty members in my department who can serve as
chair. As you know, most departments have the same problem.
Chair
is a lousy job, and you are not going to get many qualified
people to be willing to serve unless you make the
compensation package REALLY sweet.
So you
either need to improve the compensation you offer or try to
hire a chair from the outside (just wait and see what the
candidates for the position demand!).
So
either compensate me, compensate somebody else, or spend the
year trying to figure out how to run this place without
chairs.
To:
President
From: Academic Senate Executive Committee
Subject: General Education Requirements on Hold
Date : September 1, 2008
The new
contract has an unexpected consequence. By changing chairs
into administrators, we have lost several members of the
Academic Senate and its committees. Our by-laws require
positions to be filled by faculty members, not
administrators.
Several
years ago, when the “sunshine laws” were applied to the
Senate, it changed the number of votes needed to pass any
resolution. Now, for a resolution to pass, it must be a
majority of the seats in the Senate, and not simply a
majority of people present after we achieve quorum. The
sudden surge in vacancies because of the inability of
departmental chairs to serve in the senate has made it
almost impossible to achieve quorum or to pass any
resolutions—including the approval of courses for the new
general education requirements.
We are
exploring how to change the by-laws to reduce the number of
seats in the senate—this would alleviate some of the
problem. Unfortunately, we do not have enough seats filled
to obtain enough votes to change the by-laws. We are
hopeful that within the next several months, departments
will fill the vacancies on the senate, but for the
foreseeable future our general education requirements are on
hold.
The
consequence is that when the requirements are implemented in
Fall 2009, there will be no courses to fill them, and right
now, the Senate has no ability to push back the
implementation date to buy us some more time.
Sorry.
Posting on a union Listserv in 2009:
I am a
new mother and junior faculty member at ______ college. Not
only was I horrified to learn that there was no paid family
leave policy for me, and that there was no day care
available once I returned, I have now learned that I shall
not get a pay increase because I have not been “sufficiently
productive” over the last year to earn a merit increase.
Has
anyone else had this problem?
Do I
have the basis for a discrimination complaint?
Return posting on a
union Listserv in 2009:
Me
too! Every new mother in CUNY has had the same problem.
Give me a call at _________. We’re hiring a lawyer.
To: President
From: Provost
Subject: Accreditation Review
Date: October 1, 2012
In the
2007 review, Middle States identified faculty retention as a
major challenge facing the College. Our recent assessment
indicates that we are doing more poorly now than we were in
2006 when our last self-study was completed. We have
identified two reasons for this:
1.
Inequitable distribution of merit raises
2.
Conflicts between appointed chairs and their departments
Many
faculty complain that their wages are not keeping up with
the cost of living, and they are seeking employment
elsewhere. Amazingly, we are beginning to lose faculty to
the Teaching Fellows Program of the city public schools
because their compensation package is now considerably
better than ours. Also, since we initially awarded merit
increases based on productivity, we actually rewarded
faculty members who were highly attractive to other
institutions, and we have lost many of them.
In sum,
the faculty who are committed to staying in New York are
leaving because their merit increases, if they get any, do
not keep up with inflation, and the faculty who are
productive enough to earn merit increases are leaving for
positions at other universities.
I
recommend using the merit budget for step increases to
faculty. Hopefully, by insuring that everybody gets a raise
every year, we can improve faculty retention. I’ve talked
informally to some administrators at other institutions, and
have found that many universities with merit systems engage
in this practice.
I know
this means a de facto moving back to the old step system,
but until the state and city can ensure that faculty
salaries keep up with the cost of living in the New York
City area, we cannot effectively use a merit pay system to
reward productivity.
To: President
From: Provost
Subject: Middle States’ Site Visit
Date: April 2017
I’ve
talked with the site visitors. Based on the lack of
progress we have made in the area of faculty retention since
2007 and the assessment in 2012, WE ARE SCREWED.
We
retain only 15% of our new faculty for 5 years; we are
running over 50 searches a year at a cost of almost a
million dollars; in the last five years we have expended an
estimated $45 million on start-up equipment and other
non-salary compensation in an attempt to retain faculty—and
I estimate that most of this money has been spent on
professors who left within their first three years at the
college.
We are
hemorrhaging faculty and money, and are now facing a highly
critical accreditation report.
I
explained to Middle States that we have no control over the
merit budget we receive, that we are devoting a huge
proportion of our alumni and private donations to address
the problem, and that we are using all available funds as
judiciously as possible to retain faculty, but the site
visitors are not interested in the efforts we have made,
they are only interested in the measurable results, which
are not good.
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