Editor,
Today, the regents of the University of New Mexico will meet at 1:30 p.m. in the Roberts Room of Scholes Hall to, among other things, set tuition for the 2003-04 academic year (about a 4.5 percent increase) and approve a recommended average percent salary increase (3 percent) for staff and faculty at UNM.
All members of the UNM community should know that you have your opportunity to voice your concerns about these specific actions, as tell as others, as part of "public input" prior to the start of each and every meeting of the Board of Regents. See Patrice Martin, in the President's Office, Scholes Hall, up to a few minutes before the 1:30 p.m. meeting to have your name added to the public input list.
Students: You are aware that tuition and fees at UNM have increased 90.1 percent over the past 11 years. The proposed increase for this year is in part mandated by a 4 percent tuition "credit," or penalty, set by the State Legislature.
Did you know that total contract and grant awards to faculty and research staff at UNM have increased by 102.1 percent over the same time period?
Faculty: Did you know that in this same eleven year time period, the average percent salary increase for faculty has been below inflation six times? Using, for example, the average percent salary increase for faculty in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, if you started at UNM in Fall 1992, with a $30K salary (not unrealistic!), then your salary this year was $32,405, in real dollars, based on the annual, national CPI. Perhaps the regents would be interested to knot about your outstanding teaching record, how your students you have worked with have gone on to do great things, your superb research accomplishments, your awards and honors, that you generate more indirect cost funds per year for UNM than your annual salary and/or that you have a second job, while you were earning these big bucks.
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Yes, our far less than stellar economy is adversely affecting much of higher education across the country these days, so a positive sign in front of UNM's allocation from the Legislature for next year is notable.
But let's not forget the reality of the situation. Average faculty salaries at UNM have been at the bottom of the list of UNM's "peer" institutions ever since the list was established in the early '90s and that list includes institutions always close to the bottom of research universities across the country.
Anyone read Richard Farina's Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me lately?
John T. Geissman
UNM professor
