Salary Card Exceptions Memo Response

MEMORANDUM

To: President Glen Johnson

From: Bryon K. Clark, Chair of Faculty Senate

Subject: Proposed Policy Concerning Exceptions to Salary Card

Date: 7 May 2001

A majority of the Faculty Senate supported the proposed policy (Attachment 1) concerning exceptions to the salary card proposed by the Salary Card Task Force on 14 March 2001 by a show of hands (Attachment 2). During this same meeting, a written survey was conducted to assess the degree of support for the proposed policy (Attachment 3). Listed below are responses to the two primary questions of the survey; written responses were added to the listed of previous comments provided by faculty concerning the proposed policy (Attachment 4).

Do you support the proposed policy concerning exceptions to the salary card?
Strongly Support Moderately Support Neutral Oppose Strongly Oppose
3 (17%) 5 (28%) 0 (0%) 4 (22%) 6 (33%)
Do you support the idea that faculty must maintain the standards required for accreditation to be paid above the salary card?
Strongly Support Moderately Support Neutral Oppose Strongly Oppose
9 (50%) 6 (33%) 1 (6%) 2 (11%) 0 (0%)

The results of the survey were somewhat surprising. Even though a non-unanimous majority supported the proposed policy by a show of hands, 55% of the Senators opposed or strongly opposed the policy. This seems to indicate that the Faculty Senate is willing to support the policy and its implementation; however, many members still have major concerns regarding exceptions to the salary card. Responses to question 2 indicate that most senators (83%) also believed that those individuals compensated above card should maintain standards required for accreditation.

The Faculty Senate also discussed numerous other items concerning salaries at Southeastern and nationwide. The Faculty Senate requests that the following two points regarding the salary card and its application at Southeastern should be considered in future budget allocations.

  1. The salary cap for years of service should be eliminated at all ranks this year.
  2. Future modifications to the salary card should address inequities in salary at the senior ranks. In order to retain high quality faculty, the salary structure should be changed such that all ranks are compensated closer to national averages (within 90%); currently this only is true for assistant professors for most disciplines.

PC: Salary Card Task Force (Bryon Clark, Ken Elder, Buddy Gaster, Doug McMillan, Jesse Snowden, and Ross Walkup)

4 attachments