Trustees mull faculty pay raise
Student tuition funds may be used to help give the faculty pay raises, but not if President Kermit L. Hall can find another solution.
“It’s my very strong feeling that pay raises are the responsibility of the state of Utah, even though we’ve used tuition money to hire a lot of faculty,” Hall said.
Budget trouble in the legislature means the faculty may not get their raises from the state, though.
“Gov. Walker has made clear that she would like to see some help given on the salary front,” Hall said in the USU Board of Trustees meeting Friday. “We are a little uncertain at this stage whether enough funds will be there to do it.”
Hall has said USU cannot go another year without giving across-the-board pay raises to staff and faculty or morale will suffer. Students are telling him ‘OK’ to tuition helping to hire faculty because it improves student-faculty ratios, Hall said, but said they are not thrilled with use for pay raises.
He also said he is reluctant to let the legislature get accustomed to tuition paying for what the state should provide.
“I don’t want to get the legislature addicted,” Hall said. “I don’t want to get them on the heroine of student tuition paying salaries, at least in the form of pay raises. I don’t want to get them on that heroine because I think once they get on it they’ll never get off it.”
The Board of Trustees appointed a task force to map out the future of tuition for the next three years, notably regarding Tier II Tuition. The task force is chaired by Glenn McEvoy, department head of management and human resources, and includes Associated Students of USU representation by President Duke Di Stefano, Academic Vice President Karla Petty and Graduate Studies Vice President Stephanie Kukic.
The task force is expected to give its recommendations by mid-February.
Raising a child
Hall said he is delighted with the progress on the campaign to build a new child development center. USU men’s basketball Head Coach Stew Morrill and his wife Vicki will serve as the honorary chairs of the fundraising efforts. The Morrills are known for fostering orphaned children in their home.
“Some of you may be concerned about the university putting up more facilities,” Hall said to the trustees, “but in this particular instance, we think we have a base of support. It’s absolutely critical, given the National Science Foundation advance grant that we have, that we fulfill part of the pledge that made that agreement possible.”
The center will be more sophisticated than merely child maintenance and care, Hall said, and he hopes the College of Education will help accomplish that.
Teaming up with a rival
Trustees Gayle McKeachnie, Richard Shipley, Brent Nyman and Dinesh Patel and Hall met with University of Utah administrators two weeks ago, the purpose being to “bring the research and economic power of the two research universities of Utah into line to build a much stronger public presence,” Hall said.
“What we’re doing here is following what is a larger trend nationally at the major research institutions,” Hall said. “Hopefully, we can be able to achieve some additional success in the legislature.”
Hall said it would be beneficial to work together, rather than locking horns about football and basketball.
“We can agree to compete with one another on the playing field,” he said, “but what is important is that we begin to rally together in the interest of our collective research and economic development issues.”
-heidithue@cc.usu.edu