Faculty pay
continued from page 1
ty concerns at the Feb. 18 meeting.
“We’re talking about building
these peaks of excellence, but the
only way that can happen is if you
hire quality instructors,” Richmond
said. “It’s terribly important that we
can lure those teachers to our cam
puses, and we cannot do it with the
current entry-level salaries. ”
Statistics
Schools in the Oregon University
System pay their faculty far less
than the national average, accord
ing to information from the U.S. De
partment of Education and OUS.
University faculty overall are
paid almost $5,000 less than the na
tional average faculty salary, ac
cording to the statistics, while at
Western Oregon University, faculty
overall earn up to $18,000 less. Sta
tistics also show that OUS schools
rank well below the average
salaries among their “peer univer
sities” — schools of similar size
from around the nation, such as
Purdue University, the University
of Colorado at Boulder and the Uni
versity of Washington. The OUS
uses information from the peer uni
versities for comparison in areas
such as student demographics, tu
ition rates or faculty salaries.
Schools throughout the OUS
Eire beginning to show the conse
quences. Some are already having
difficulty recruiting new profes
sors because the starting salaries
they offer are so low.
“When there are low salaries
and high workloads, new instruc
tors leave for higher-paying
schools,” said Dean Braa, a sociol
ogy professor and faculty union
president at WOU, which has had
difficulties recruiting candidates.
“It’s hai'd to stay competitive.”
Faculty searches are time con
suming and expensive, he said,
and the school is sometimes hav
ing to settle for candidates who are
not among their top choices.
“We’re having a devil of a time
getting candidates interested in
our programs,” he said. “And
when we do find someone, we
usually have two chances of sign
ing them — slim and none.”
Students’ opinions
The issue of faculty salaries af
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fects more than just the instructors
— it has a direct effect on students’
education, ASUO President Wylie
Chen said.
“We’re not spending ten grand
a year to get mediocre professors,”
Chen said.
Robin Miller, a sophomore po
litical science major, agreed that in
order to recruit quality professors, the
OUS needs to raise faculty salaries.
“In order to make Oregon a more
enticing place, you have to have
salaries that will attract those profes
sors,” Miller said. “I think the legis
lature has left professors’ salaries at
the wayside. They haven’t done
much to respond to the reality that
professors in the Oregon University
System aren’t paid enough.”
OUS spokesman Phillip Brans
ford said that students and faculty
have to remember that salaries are
just one of many different compet
ing needs within the OUS.
"Balancing needs is part of the
challenge,” he said.
Lorraine Davis, vice provost for
academic affairs, said that the
University is actually more com
petitive salary-wise at the associ
ate professor level than at senior
professor levels.
“When we try to recruit at the
senior level, it’s far more difficult,”
she said. “That’s when salary be
comes a bigger issue, and we’re
talking more dollars to do that.”
Until the state legislature in
creases the amount of money going
to higher education, the situation is
unlikely to change, she said.
“Certainly, more state support
would be more than welcome to
solve some of our problems,”
Davis said. But for the amount of
money the University is able to
pay their faculty, the school and
the OUS are “getting a lot of bang
for their buck,” she said.
Closing the funding gap
Bransford, said the chancellor
and members of the board “remain
committed to closing the gap” be
tween the average OUS faculty
salary and the national average.
“Faculty compensation has
been increasing, but not to the ex
tent that we’d like,” he said. “But
we recognize the importance of
staying competitive. That point is
undisputed.”
Wykoff, agreed that keeping
salaries competitive is important,
and said that “while there’s al
ways a cadre of people who are
looking to climb up the economic
ladder,” higher salaries could per
suade many faculty who are enter
taining offers from other colleges
to stay at the University.
“When faculty are looking at
low salaries and a state that hasn’t
shown a commitment to increase
funding for education, they go
elsewhere,” Wykoff said.
Money from the state doesn’t go
as far as it did in the past, mostly
because of inflation, he said,
which translates to a cut in the
buying power when schools are
looking at faculty salaries.
The OSA is researching ways
the legislature could help reverse
the trend, Wykoff said, such as of
fering free college tuition to the de
pendents of faculty who attend
that university. The group will
present its findings to the legisla
ture during its next session.
Miller is also planning to lobby
the legislature, a step she said is
the most effective way to get more
funding for faculty salaries.
“It’s the biggest thing we can do
as students,” she said. Members of
the legislature “need to put their
money where their mouth is. ”
Web site
continued from page 1
social services and resources. Al
though the service is available to
anyone, it is targeted toward peo
ple with low or no income. The
site’s address is www.thelane.net.
TheLane is a combined effort
from local organizations to pro
vide users with information
about health care, income securi
ty, individual and family life, lo
cal organizations and communi
ty services.
“The site is intended to em
power people to be self-suffi
cient,” project coordinator Lise
Stuart said. “TheLane provides
step-by-step instructions for indi
viduals and families that need in
formation about local resources to
help get them through hard times
and promote their well-being.”
Although most libraries and
public schools offer free access to
the Internet, educating people
about how to navigate the Web is
of central concern to the backers of
the new Web site. Stuart said she
was concerned about the level of
access her target audience has to
computers and the Internet.
“If you’ve never used a comput
er before and have had limited ac
cess to the Internet, when you sit
down to use a computer for the first
time, it can be really hard to navi
gate,” Stuart said. “As more and
more kids come out of the schools
with prior experience navigating
the Web, educating our audience
won’t be as much of a concern.”
The cost of running the site is
$80,000 to $85,000 a year. Stuart
said the site is funded by social
service organizations and private
organizations interested in em
powering the community to use
Internet services.
In addition to the new Web site,
the Eugene Public Library and Eu
gene Free Network are offering
free Internet instruction to low-in
come residents of Lane County.
“You can’t give someone a tool
without teaching them how to use
it,” EFN general manager Ruth
Ann Howden said. “People who
can afford to pay for classes, we
ask them to pay. For those who
can’t pay, we raise money for the
classes through OPN [Oregon Pub
lic Broadcasting].”
Although the Web may some
times be difficult for beginners,
Rebecca Teasdale, a reference li
brarian for the Eugene Public Li
brary, said TheLane is a great re
source for finding just about
anything in one location. Teasdale
contributed her database on Liter
acy and English as a second lan
guage to TheLane.
“TheLane is useful for a broad
range of resources,” Teasdale said.
“The site brings together a lot of
social service resources in one
database.”
Teasdale said she thinks the
site may aide underprivileged
people in Lane County to become
more knowledgeable about the In
ternet and computers.
“The site is very easy to navi
gate,” she said. “There are several
search options, and you don’t
need advanced computer skills in
order to use it.”
Renters’ rights
continued from page 1
living space, while organizing
methods to effectively deal with
those issues.
Originally, the intent of the cam
paign was to develop a West Uni
versity area housing code, which
currently does not exist. However,
enacting such a large change in city
policy would require much more
information than the campaign has
gathered so far. While developing a
housing code remains the ultimate
goal, its status has been relegated to
the longterm.
In the meantime, the focus is on
a more achievable goal: imple
menting a renters’ rights hotline.
The hotline would be a referral
service for students that would let
them know what their options are
and/or point them in the direction
of legal specialists.
“We’re kind of setting ourselves
up for the bigger fight for the hous
ing code while providing a service
for the students,” said Matthew
Lieuallen, ASUO housing advocate.
The ASUO and OSPIRG hope to
have the hotline in place by the
end of the school year. The imme
diate obstacle is finding a perma
nent location, which could possi
bly be a cubicle outside the ASUO
office. Beyond that, implementa
tion is simply a matter of logistics.
“Really what we need is a
phone, a filing cabinet and some
people who are trained,”
Lieuallen said.
Although it was initiated last
fall, the campaign didn’t really
kick in until this term. Through
“days of action,” which included
information tables around campus
and walking door-to-door around
the community, a number of sur
veys were distributed to Universi
ty students. The surveys asked re
spondents to detail what problems
they have had while renting and
what the responses of the land
lords were if they were reported.
So far, the response from stu
dents has shown that there is a def
inite need to address the issue of
renters’ rights.
“We’ve gotten a lot of really
good feedback,” Marian Fowler,
ASUO community outreach direc
tor, said.
At this point in time, the cam
paign has gathered around 200
surveys and is currently in the
process of compiling the results to
see what the main problems are.
Many of the issues that have ap
peared seem to deal with “a lack
of response for immediate con
cerns,” Fowler said, such as heat
ing complications during winter
months or backed-up plumbing.
Owing to the fact that Eugene
does not have a housing code, this
movement has become an impor
tant one for students.
“Students do not know how, for
the most part, to go about getting
things fixed,” said junior political
science major Brian Tanner, who
has been helping with the cam
paign since the beginning of this
term. “We’re a financially handi
capped segment of the population,
and for us to go through these legal
means is a headache. ”
Once the ASUO and OSPIRG
have gathered sufficient informa
tion, they plan to compile the re
sults with a legal assistant and
present their findings to the city.
“We’d wrork with city officials to
develop a housing code,” Fowler
said. “It’s possible if there’s a lot of
support.”
OSPIRG addressed the issue of
renters’ rights a few years ago,
when it distributed a renters’
rights pamphlet. Though the cam
paign fizzled out, OSPIRG still re
ceives calls in response to the
pamphlet, which prompted OS
PIRG member Greg Bae to join up
with ASUO when the idea was
brought up again.
“If we’re getting five to 10 calls
a week out of these outdated
numbers, then we know this pro
gram is really needed,” said Bae,
who is acting as the renter’s
rights campaign coordinator for
OSPIRG.
Meanwhile, the campaign will
continue, with members planning
to engage in another door-to-door
night when they will distribute
surveys to other areas of Eugene.