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Current Status
of Merit Guidelines Approval Procedure
The Provost’s office is now starting to return some merit guidelines to deans to
give to chairs with directions for further revision. The Provost’s office has
created a “template” that all guidelines should follow in order to be approved.
The provost consulted with Akron-AAUP in creating this template, and agreed to
some revisions in light of our recommendations. However, this does not
necessarily mean that Akron-AAUP “endorses” any demands for revision that chairs
or deans may make. There may be varying interpretations of what this template
requires in different situations, and some deans or chairs may make
additional demands beyond what the
template specifies.
When a department chair returns the merit guidelines to the faculty for
revision, the merit committee in place last spring should consider the requests
for revision, consult Akron-AAUP with any
concerns, revise as they see fit, then present their recommendations to
all the bargaining unit faculty for a vote. Once the faculty have approved a
revision, the guidelines go to the chair for approval, then the dean, then the
provost. This process of negotiation between faculty and administration
continues until all parties are satisfied with the final document.
Akron-AAUP is prepared to file as many
grievances as necessary to ensure that the contract is followed fairly.
Contact Vice-President Priscilla Sakezles (pks@uakron.edu)
or Past-President Steve Aby (saby@uakron.edu)
with questions or concerns .
The provost has told Akron-AAUP directly that pay raises will be implemented as
each department has their merit guidelines approved. Each department’s fund for
raises is independent, so there is no reason to hold up some for the last
departments still working out details.
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Contract Administration
Issues: Implementation of Pay Increases For AY 2006-07
The contract calls for 2.0% increases across-the-board (ATB),
2.5% merit pools by department, a 0.5% amount set aside for "market adjustment,"
with all raises contingent on a "satisfactory" merit ranking. This linkage
between all raises and merit makes the approval of merit guidelines critical to
the implementation of the total compensation package for 2006-07.
Most departments had their guidelines approved by faculty, chairs and deans in
May, and the Provost’s office is just now (October) starting to release some of
them back to deans to give to chairs with directions for more revision. The
administration's position is that it was not able to fulfill its commitment to
implement pay increases in time for the first pay period in July 2006 for 12
month faculty, or for the first pay period in September for 9 month faculty.
Despite negotiating hard for the process currently underway, they maintain that
implementation is too great a task to be accomplished in the time frame that was
negotiated.
As you may recall, Akron-AAUP filed a grievance on behalf of the12 month
bargaining unit faculty in August, with the Office of Labor and Employee
Relations. In the grievance, Akron-AAUP offered as the remedy that the
University shall pay interest on the salary increases from the date of the first
paycheck for the 2006-2007 academic year until the salary increases are actually
implemented and paid.
Akron-AAUP filed a similar grievance for 9 month
faculty on October 9, 2006. We hope this will continue to motivate the
administration to implement the negotiated raises in a more timely manner than
they otherwise would do.
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Merit Guidelines Grievance
Resolution: Variable Weights for Probationary Faculty
As departments were writing their merit guidelines last spring,
the Provost announced in March that probationary faculty (tenure-track, not
instructors) could not choose variable weights for teaching, research, and
service as could tenured faculty. Many departments objected to this, arguing
that in their discipline variable weights were necessary to accommodate the
varying responsibilities of probationary faculty.
Akron-AAUP filed a grievance over this issue, and has since negotiated a
compromise with the administration..
Read the full terms of the resolution here. Of primary interest is
this: “Merit criteria may specify either fixed, variable, or hybrid weighting
schemes, and the weighting schemes are not required to be the same for tenured
and untenured (probationary) faculty... Probationary faculty in academic units
with variable weightings must consult with their chair in selecting weights and
the chair must approve the selection of weights.” - i.e.,
probationary faculty
may use variable weights, but must have
their chair approve them.
Now that departments are again revising their
merit guidelines, they may include the language of this settlement if they wish
to allow probationary faculty to choose variable weights.
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Market Adjustment
Exceptions
In negotiating market adjustment mechanisms in the contract, the University
wanted to use CUPA-HR data. When it came time to apply these data, however,
they discovered that numerous departments (approximately eleven) had no, or
not enough, comparable disciplinary categories among the institutions in
that dataset. So, for such departments, an exception has to be worked out
to create market adjustment comparative data. For each of those
departments, the Administration has come up with a suggested resolution for
creating the comparator datasets. The administration will present this
suggested resolution to the faculty in each department. Your job as faculty
is to negotiate this resolution with your chair/Dean and be sure that it is
fair to you and a reasonable solution. If you have questions or problems,
you should contact the Akron-AAUP. The departments in question include:
Polymer Science/Polymer Engineering; Biomedical Engineering; Modern
Languages; Classical Studies, Anthropology, & Archaeology; Family and
Consumer Sciences; Statistics; Counseling; Curricular and Instructional
Studies; Library; Wayne; Summit College.
Please direct any question regarding Akron-AAUP
dues to Russ Davis, Akron-AAUP Treasurer at
rdavis@uakron.edu or 330.972.7391
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Akron-AAUP
Communications Committee
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