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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 21, 1975)
Vol. 76, No. 92 Eugene, Oregon 97403 The weather machine is still pumping out warm sunny weather through Wednes day. No chance of rain, so soak up the sun. Tuesday, Jan. 21, 1975 Investigation of University is suspended By TOM FLUHARTY Of the Emerald A two-year investigation of sev eral University departments to de termine compliance with the Equal Pay Act has been sus pended pending a Supreme Court ruling sad a U.S. Department of Labor spokesperson. Compliance officer Bob Hall, of the labor department’s Wage and Hour Division, said word was re ceived from Washington not to work on any Fair Labor Standards Act cases, of which the Equal Pay Act is a part, that involve civic agencies. This includes state, county and city organizations. The University is a state institution. According to Hall, interviewed Thursday, the labor department is awaiting a ruling by the Supreme Court regarding the constitutional ity of the 1974 amendments of the Equal Pay Act. Hall said the investigation of the academic staff was started two years ago when an investigation of the custodial staff was also begun. That case has just recently been completed, with the staff being awarded back pay and raises as a result of an out-of court settlement. Myra Willard, affirmative action director, explained that the inves tigation was begun to determine it the University complied with the Equal Pay Act amendments of July, 1972, which included pro fessional people under the Act. The salaries of the professional staff were studied to find out if they were being given equal pay for equal skill, work and responsibil ity. She said, “We wanted to look at Drawing by Guy Michel HEW issues new statement on hiring discrimination By HARRIET JOHNSON Of the Emerald The University has been told to hire the best qualified per sons for any position “without regard to race, sex, or ethnic ity.” These familiar words from the Department of Health, Education and Welfard (HEW) were first heard on camDus in an executive order issued by President Johnson in 1965. Now they have a new meaning. A memorandum from Peter Holmes, director of the Office for Civil Rights of HEW, indi cates that equal opportunity employment programs should not include “reverse discrimi nation" against other job ap plicants, such as white males. “A major purpose of the af firmative provision of th execu tive order is t broaden the pool of applicants so that women and minorities will be consi dered for employment along with all other applicants,” the memo said. The executive order “does not require that job requirements be waived or lowered in order to attract women and other minority candidates. "The oollege or university, not the federal government, is to say what constitutes qualifi cation for any position,” ac cording to the memo. HEW, however, monitors affirmative action programs to determine if there has been a sufficient number of minority applicants. Complaints can be filed with the Equal Employment Com mission about discrimination. Withholding of federal funds can result, although this rarely occurs, according to Harry Al pert, University vice-president for academic affairs. “Quotas are unconstitu tional,” says Alpert, but the University is “doing all it can to insure that women and minorities get equal considera tion." Alpert feels that the Holmes memorandum clears up difficulties from misunder standing of the original execu tive order, and does not make any real changes in the regula tions. Myra Willard, director of the University's Office of Affir mative Action, is “pleased that the Holmes memorandum closely conforms to our original policy." The University’s revised statement on equal opportunity and affirmative action appears in the Jan. 16 issue of Oregon Week. It declares “that dis crimination based on race, color, religion, sex, age, hand icap or national origin shall not exist in the University." This policy, which has been in effect since 1972, provides a prog ram for all Jobs on campus, which is administered by the Office of Affirmative Action, as well as the director of Univer sity relations and the vice presidents. The affirmative action pro gram is in "good-faith com pliance" with the executive order, according to Alpert. As specified in the Holmes memorandum, recruitment in cluding advertising and job re quirements for positions are made without designation to race, sex, or ethnicity. If re cruitment efforts do not yield an applicant pool which includes a proportion of minorities, the re cruitment period for all can dates may be extended. Wil lard says this happens "not very often, only in areas of sig nificant underutilization, where you would expect women and minorities to apply.” All job re quirements must be "bona fide qualifications’’ that are job related. The University has set affir mative action objectives, in cluding "to increase the emp loyment of women and minority group persons and merit ser vice positions at least equival ent to their availability within comparable work forces.” It aims “to maintain salary equity between male and female em ployes and between minority and non-minority employes in every job category." The program has provisions for equal treatment of all emp loyes, concerning relations while on the job, as well as be nefits and promotions. "To im prove the ratio of female and minority admissions in Ph.D. and other graduate and pro fessional programs, and “to maintain proportionate re presentation ot women ana minorities on appointive com mittees” are also included in the program. That is the policy, but how does it work? James M. Harris, president of the National Edu cation Association, feels that "fully qualified women and minorities have been sys tematically exluded from top faculty jobs while preference was given to white males." Re ferring to the Homes memorandum, he said, "we must not allow the HEW state ment to be used as a new de fense for the old bigoted think ing.” Willard, on the other hand, said the University met its numerical goals for last year. These goals are based on a utilization analysis of the data on the availability of women and minorities qualified for fil ling vacancies. The University's goals are multiple, divided into professional schools, the College of Liberal Arts, administration and fi nance and student services. "Goals may not be rigid and inflexible quotas which must be met," according to the law. Wil lard adds that goals may be al (Continued on Page2) all the women on campus along with men comparatives.’’ According to Willard, the inves tigation was first begun in the li brary in order to develop a tech nique of research. The inves tigators came up with a.com puterized regression analysis which told the criteria for salary determination. The salaries were then compared to each other. The next step, according to Wil lard, was the formation of a faculty committee to extend the investiga tion to the entire University. She said that shortly afterwards the Wage and Hour Division wanted to limit the inquiry to four or five departments. The purpose of the committee, according to Excutive Dean John Lallas, was to determine guidelines on which the investiga tion was to be based. He also said the experimental investigation of the library to which Willard referred was to develop criteria of what a teacher does and give a basis on which to determine if two persons are doing equal work. Some definitions had to be developed, he explained. Hall refused to give any details about the present findings of the investigation. He stated that the case was still considered to be under investiga tion even if it was suspended. Therefore he said, the case is still regarded as confidential. Harry Alpert, Vice-president for academic affairs and provost, commented that the Wage and Hour Division asked the Univer sity to provide them with informa tion about four areas of the Uni versity. He named biology, physi cal education, classics, Japanese and Chinese, and the housing de partment as the areas now being investigated. It appears, however, that the in vestigation was suspended be fore much work was complete. Sanford Tepfer, biology de partment head, said he did not think it would be appropriate to comment on the investigation at this time, since no one has dis cussed it with him yet. He said he just received notification “a couple of weeks ago" that an investiga tion was under way. Tepfer said he approves of the investigation, but thinks it's dif ficult to determine what’s equal The head of the Department of Classics, Chinese and Japanese, Angela Palandri, said her depart ment has also been notified, but she has not heard anything else. Philip Barnhart, housing de partment director, was unavaila ble for comment due to what his secretary described as illness. Vernon Sprague, P.E. depart ment head, said approximately three years ago there was a major equating of all salaries in the de partment and it has continued that way. He added that proportion ately the P.E. department has more women on its faculty than any other department.
