Forum Post
To meet its mission and vision WSU must invest in its faculty. The College and University Professional Association for Human Resources has shown that there is a national failure for higher ed pay to keep pace with inflation. This comes as no surprise to those of us who are on the faculty at WSU.
The faculty salary equity process initiated in fall 2022 by Provost Elizabeth Chilton and the Provost’s Office was an excellent start to delving into the problems that WSU faculty face regarding compensation. Salary compression, differential pay for career track faculty, and a decades long lack of salary increases for inflation or for merit at WSU have meant that faculty can only receive raises if they have an offer in hand through a retention negotiation or at the two promotion events from assistant to associate professor and from associate to full professor. The failure of WSU to have pay increases that keep pace with inflation or adjustments for all faculty based on changing starting salaries for new assistant professors mean that the faculty salary equity process in fall 2022 was just a very small attempt to manage a much larger and more systemic problem.
What can WSU do? WSU needs to be the leader in this area by instituting a much-needed compensation structure and salary increase scale with steps within each faculty rank such as that found at other peer and aspirational institutions like the University of California system. For example, a faculty member within the UC system may receive an increase in salary as a result of a general scale increase, a merit increase, a promotion increase, or an off-scale increase. The general scale increase is actually a salary step system that requires faculty to be reviewed in a normal period of service at a salary step and receive and increase if they are reviewed favorably. This is a normal part of their faculty compensation structure. For the policy see – Salary Increases.
Regardless of the national situation, the Washington State economy continues to be healthy with the 2022 revenue forecast indicating short term gains. What is desperately needed is for WSU to strongly advocate for a competitive compensation structure for its faculty to remain competitive in higher education to meet its mission and vision to serve the citizens of the state of Washington. WSU must initiate system-wide policy changes with budgetary support from the Washington State legislature to invest in the faculty. Otherwise, salary inequity and loss of expertise and talent will continue to be an insidious and pervasive symptom of the compensation structure problem at WSU. Without salary support directed by the state legislature, other pressing University priorities such as campus needs, infrastructure needs and debt reduction will always compete with and take precedence over faculty and employee salaries.
Laura Lavine
Department of Entomology
Response
In March 2023, Faculty Senate voted to create an ad hoc committee to explore step salary structures. The committee will do its work fall 2023-spring 2024. We are currently (the first two weeks of April 2023) soliciting self-nominations for committee members. ~04.03.23
Comments
Thank you for this submission, Laura. As you know, there will be approximately 250 faculty receiving equity adjustments to their base salaries effective January 16, 2023. This year’s process is the first step in an incremental process to reduce salary inequities for faculty. The longer-term intention is to address the broader range of inequities (including, for example, compression, geographical location, etc.). This first round provided useful insights that will inform changes to the process in future years. Please send any feedback on the process to Laura Hill: laurahill@wsu.edu. Also, funding for salary increases is our #1 ask in our state budget request. Developing a systematic and transparent process and then ensuring funding is in place to support both across the board raises and reduce inequities is a key priority for the WSU System.