At the March faculty meeting, the AAUP brought two important sense of faculty motions forward, both focused on wage equity. Both passed with overwhelming support. The texts of the SoFMs are below.
Sense of Faculty Motion Regarding Winter Term Compensation
When employees of Middlebury College teach a Winter Term class and it is not part of the employment contract, they should be paid the same as outside instructors. Currently, some staff employees receive $1000 while visiting instructors receive $4500.
The College’s Curriculum website currently offers a rationale for this policy with the following language:
“Please note that the standard stipend is different for members of the Middlebury staff who teach winter term courses. We welcome the exciting contributions that staff colleagues make to the curriculum, but also recognize that staff continue to be responsible for their regular duties, and continue to be compensated for that work. For that reason, when a staff colleague’s course proposal is approved, and the relevant supervisor gives permission for it to be taught, the College pays a modest stipend in thanks to the colleague, on top of their regular pay.”
The implication seems to be that staff employees who are not contracted to do J-term may take on this work in addition to their contracted responsibilities, but those who choose to do so will not be equitably compensated for this additional work.
It is unethical for people to do labor above and beyond their contractual obligations (i.e. teach winter term) and be compensated significantly less than others for the same work. Furthermore, it is clearly a huge service to the College to have these courses offered and staff who teach them should be compensated accordingly. Paying staff colleagues fairly for winter term teaching would also be beneficial to the college’s administration of winter term—as members of our community, staff members do not require extra housing (which is currently in a massive shortage) and offer a long-term mentoring presence for our students rather than visitors who might only be on campus for a single month.
Sense of Faculty Motion: Middlebury College should pay the same base rate to all winter term instructors whose job description does not include regularly teaching at Middlebury, regardless of whether they are external visitors or ongoing college employees.
Sense of the Faculty Motion: Bring All Employees at Least Up to 2019-20 Fiscal Year Wage Levels
The AAUP, in collaboration with colleagues across the college, are proud to put forward this sense of the faculty motion on compensation. As the Resources Committee and Faculty Council are revisiting how we identify faculty raises and merit, we believe that a cost of living adjustment (CoLA) is warranted for all Middlebury employees. We thank our colleagues for getting these conversations started and hope our sense of faculty motion propels further action on closing wage compression and gaps among employees (from full professors to long-term staff), as well as addressing lower salaries adjusted for unprecedented inflation over the past five years. The AAUP is happy to take part in these conversations and action planning but we ask that the administration makes a clear and actionable plan to address CoLA and other wage issues related to inflation since 2019.
Rationale:
A large number of employees of Middlebury College are in fact making less than they were in 2019 after adjusting for inflation.*
Everyone should be brought up to 2019-2020 levels adjusted for inflation, which is a total increase of around 19%. Most faculty and staff have received some increase, but very few have received anything equal to the rate of inflation. Some staff have received little or no increase because they are considered earning at the top of the “market.” All faculty and staff who make this place run are worth at least what we were worth four years ago, if not more, given the extra work that we performed during the COVID-19 pandemic and since. This is especially true when members of the administration have received increases far above the rate of inflation.
To give you some idea of the how salary increases below inflation are reducing the effective salaries for Middlebury employees:
- If you made $50,000 in July 2019, your salary would need to be $59,572 in July 2023 to have the same buying power.
- A salary of $75,000 in July 2019 has the same buying power as a salary of $89,358 did in July 2023.
- If you were paid $100,000 in July 2019, if your salary had kept up with inflation, you would be making $119,145 now.**
This on-line calculator can do the math for your own salary for you.
At this rate, many faculty salaries will not catch up to the rate of inflation for another three or four years, and the cumulative losses to retirement savings are huge. It will likely take the salaries of many staff members even longer to catch up. That’s almost a decade of not just salary stagnation, but actual loss. We
have also lost staff in large numbers in several senior positions, in part because many were told they were no longer eligible for raises. This loss of institutional knowledge and expertise is devastating.
The burdens of the pandemic were real, but they should not be used as an opportunity to make employees work more for less money.
*You can use this calculator to figure out how much you’re actually making today compared to the 2019-20. https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl?cost1=100000&year1=201907&year2=202307
**These hypothetical numbers are based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation rate.
Sense of Faculty Motion:
This sense of faculty motion calls on the administration to prioritize getting every employee up to 2019-2020 levels of compensation (in addition to merit raises and raises for promotion) for the 2024/25 fiscal year. We all deserve to earn at least what we earned in 2019. This is not a raise but a Cost of Living Adjustment to account for inflation. Actual raises must be above and beyond inflation rates and should not be tied to them. In the past 60 years, inflation has only been negative two times (2009, 2015) and in the event that inflation is negative in the future, then there is no need for a Cost of Living Adjustment, but, given the rarity of deflation, it is imperative that all employees receive a Cost of Living Adjustment for inflation.