“There is a crisis in pay; there is a crisis in equity,” says CFA Bargaining Team Chair and CFA President John Travis.
“Our salary structure is a mess,” he said. “It’s been allowed to erode to a state that there’s no quick road to a solution. It has left junior, senior and lecturer faculty alike angry and frustrated.”
CFA’s 64th Assembly (April 22-23, 2006) adopted a set of salary principles for bargaining:
• Reduce the CPEC salary lag (projected to reach 18 percent next year)
• Guarantee Salary Service Increases (SSIs) without reducing General Salary Increases
• Correct inversion and compression problems
• Obtain movement beyond the top step for full professors
• Restructure salaries in ranks and ranges into a more rational system
• Provide a fair GSI for each year of the contract
“We not only need more money, we need to construct a way to eliminate the problems,” Travis said.
CFA has heard from junior faculty members throughout the system regarding inversion and compression, which lead to new hires being paid thousands of dollars more than faculty members employed for some years.
Serious inequity abounds for top-step senior faculty members, as well. They depend on GSIs when they reach the top of the salary scale, and when there are no GSIs—even just to keep up with inflation—they make no salary gains.
“We have a traditional and specific salary proposal on the table, but our first priority is to make the administration take a comprehensive look at the salary structure and just not think in terms of GSIs and SSIs” added Travis.
CFA has proposed 5 percent GSIs annually for three years, four 2.65 percent SSIs—one each year over the next three years plus one retroactively. The team has also proposed that resources be set aside to address inversion and senior faculty salary lag.
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