CSU Faculty Get New Contract
Gazette Newspapers 4/5/07
“We have a tentative agreement that will be good for the CSU, good for our students, good for the faculty,” CFA President John Travis said in a press release. “Through this agreement, faculty will make real progress toward closing the pay gap between us and our colleagues in other states.”
The deal gives all CSU faculty guaranteed base salary increases of 20.7% over four years (retroactive to July 2006) and step salary increases of up to 2.65% each year. In addition, it assigns $28 million to fund two new merit-based programs that will provide raises for senior and junior faculty. As part of the deal, faculty would receive an extra 1% raise for each of the last three years of the contract, contingent on additional state budget funds for the university system.
This would raise the average base salary of a tenured or probationary faculty member from roughly $74,000 to $90,749, and of a full professor from roughly $86,000 to $105,465 by the end of the contract period, according to CSU officials.
“CSU employees, including our faculty, are the university’s greatest asset,” CSU Chancellor Charles Reed said in a release. “This agreement strikes a realistic balance between providing deserved raises to our faculty and our limited financial resources.”
Contract talks between the CSU system and the CFA had deadlocked over the past several months, mainly on salary issues. The CFA had announced last week that its members would begin striking at six CSU campuses during the week of April 9-13 if a contract agreement was not reached with CSU administrators by tomorrow (Friday). Both parties had agreed to extend contract negotiations until April 6, giving them the chance to frame an agreement based on the recommendations of an independent fact-finder’s report.
The fact-finding report — which was made public March 25 — says CSU faculty lag behind their peers at comparable institutions in the double digits when it comes to salary, and recommends a nearly 25% pay increase throughout four years. It suggests that pay increases be distributed at different times of the year, creating savings that would help offset money required to fund step salary increases.
It also suggests that both the CSU and CFA establish a joint Salary Structure Committee to review the university system’s salary schedules — a recommendation that both parties agreed on as part of the tentative deal reached this week.
The tentative agreement must now be ratified by the CFA membership. CFA officials said it most likely would be sent out to the membership for final ratification in late April. Once that is done, the contract agreement will be submitted to the CSU Board of Trustees for approval.