Meeting of the Truman State University Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP)
April 16, 2018, 3:40-4:20 PM, in BH100
Present: Marc Rice (president), Marc Becker (secretary), Mark Hatala (vice-president)
- The Missouri state chapter of AAUP meets Saturday, April 28 in Kansas City. Marc Rice and Marc Becker will attend.
- Preliminary committee report on faculty compensation. New salaries are adequate, but there is a huge drop off for full professors. It appears to be a thorough report with a broader historical context, including Barbara Dixon’s attempts to correct the issue that were not implemented. A problem with a set percentage salary increase across the board is that it would not treat lower salaries equally to those with higher pay. Other possibilities include merit pay and faculty development grants. A danger is moving to higher teaching loads, and that they will pick and choose what they will implement. Another suggestion is paying for course overloads, although a concern is to put everyone on the same playing field—and it is not all the same. We’ll see how Sue Thomas responds to the report; hopefully she will want to do something with it. It will be contentious.
- Idea of creating a monthly newsletter with a couple of articles (or links to articles) with information of broad interest to faculty. It would give faculty a better idea of what AAUP does. It might be better to distribute a printed (rather than emailed) newsletter with numbers, charts, and pull quotes. Marc Rice will pull this together with 3 or 4 items from national AAUP.
- We are down 200 seats next fall, which does not help the financial situation. The next cuts to faculty lines may probably be long-term temporary people.