Welcome

 

From: The Tennessee Conference of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP)
To: The Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR)

By the Tennessee AAUP Committee on Part-time and Non-tenure-track Appointments January 2008, Revised May 2008



The Tennessee Conference of the AAUP agrees with our national organization when it asserts, “Excessive use of, and inadequate compensation and professional support for, such contingent faculty exploits these colleagues and undermines academic freedom, academic quality, and professional standards. It is essential to improve the compensation and professional support opportunities for contingent faculty.”

Though we recognize that some level of part-time instruction is necessary to the efficient operation of each TBR institution, we also emphasize the principle stated in TBR General Personnel Policy 5:01:00:00, that “the president or director shall insure that all employees shall be paid equal wages or salaries for equal work in positions the performance of which requires equal skill, effort and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions.”  Because guidelines setting maximum pay levels for part-time faculty have not been adjusted since 1998, and because fair rates of compensation are more likely to attract and retain competent classroom instructors, we urge the TBR to amend personnel guideline P-050 to allow the maximum part-time faculty pay rates listed below. 

We further urge each TBR campus to verify its compliance with the directive in guideline P-50 to set “criteria for assigning part-time faculty to the four levels” according to “such factors as educational qualifications, market differentials, and professional experience.”

The proposed maximum levels in TBR guideline P-50 would be as follows:

  Semester Rate per Credit Hour
Level Maximum
1 $ 850
2 $ 900
3 $ 950
4 $1000

·        We urge each campus to set rates that best reflect local market and cost-of-living conditions, as well as its own budgetary constraints.

·        We also request that TBR conduct a system-wide review of adjunct salaries every three (3) years to ensure that adjunct salary rates remain appropriate and competitive. Ideally, TBR would adjust the adjunct pay scale to keep pace with the cost-of-living raises granted to all other state employees.