One of my faculty constituents wants to give a field technician a raise. This technician is essential to the program, has a Ph.D. and is supported by grant funds (soft money). This particular program has a history of losing field technicians due to non-competitive salaries. The faculty member would like to know why WSU wants to control the ability of faculty to give raises to employees that are funded from grants and/or commission funds. The department chair approved the raise but it was denied at a higher administrative level. The faculty member has heard from two other faculty with the same concern.
Michael Neff, – Crop and Soil Sciences
Thank you for this comment, Dr. Neff — the Faculty Senate Executive Committee has initiated a discussion with the President and Provost about these concerns and we were asked to gather qualitative data about the types of issues and general extent of these concerns. We recently launched a Qualtrics survey to gather information of this nature that will be summarized by mid-January and presented to the President and Provost. The goal is to then engage with HRS and other key stakeholders to see how policies can be modified to maximize facilitation of our academic and research enterprises. We hope to provide a report to the faculty senate during the spring of 2022.