Faculty Recruitment
and Retention
Task Force Report - May 31, 2001
Findings
2.5 Additional Reports
The task force also
reviewed several prior reports which address issues relevant to faculty
recruitment and retention. Summaries of these reports are provided in
the following appendices:
- Appendix M -
2/18/00 CU-Boulder Research and Creative Works Task Force Report
- Appendix N -
12/10/99 CU-Boulder Graduate Education Task Force Report
- Appendix O -
CU-Boulder Arts and Sciences Council Report on Retention, Career Management,
and Academic Community
- Appendix P -
CU-Boulder Status of Women Report 2000 by the Chancellor's Committee
on Women
- Appendix Q -
10/28/97 CU-Boulder Arts and Sciences Report on Retention of Faculty
of Color
- Appendix R -
5/8/00 Memo from Faculty Affairs on CU-Boulder Faculty Demographics
- Appendix S -
2/5/01 Chemical & Engineering News Article on Gender Equity: Promises
Made
- Appendix T -
3/13/01 CU System Diversity Symposium
- Appendix U -
4/10/01 CU-Boulder Arts and Sciences Council Report on Faculty Raises
The reports cited
above support the primary findings of the current report on faculty
recruitment and retention, including the key roles of faculty salaries
and benefits, research support, startup packages, partner/spouse employment,
and a supportive environment. Appendix U, in particular, notes the demoralizing
effect on faculty when the overall raise pool is insufficient to reward
both faculty with "exceptional" merit (and/or outside offers) and faculty
with "ordinary" merit with adequate raises. In addition, these reports
raise the following related issues:
Finding #15
- In supporting faculty research and creative work, there is a need
for increased campus funding for internal grants, graduate-student support,
proposal matching, library collections, and administrative and clerical
support (Appendices M and N).
Finding #16
- State support for higher education is relatively low in Colorado,
and there is a need for state-supported grants and for state matching
of major educational and research proposals (Appendix M).
Finding #17
- Graduate enrollments at CU-Boulder have declined by more than 10 percent
in the past decade, and there is a need for financial incentives (such
as higher stipends and reduced tuition for appointed graduate students)
to increase the pool of graduate students (Appendix N).
Finding #18 -
A faculty recruitment, retention, and benefits web site and office are
needed to provide coordinated information on faculty issues such as
benefits, dependent care, housing assistance, spouse/partner employment,
dependent tuition, leave policies, promotion and tenure, and mentoring
(Appendix O).
Finding #19
- Gender-based job segregation (e.g., 74 percent of faculty and 80 percent
of campus officers are male) and salary disparities exist at CU-Boulder
(Appendix P). Similar national trends were discussed at the Presidents
Workshop on Gender Equity in Academic Science & Engineering, held 1/29/01
at MIT, with the participants agreeing to work toward diversity, equity,
and recognition of individuals with family responsibilities (Appendix
S).
Finding #20
- African American, Hispanic, and Native American Faculty at CU-Boulder
are underrepresented relative to their respective population percentages
in Colorado and the Nation (Appendix Q).
Finding #21
- Contrary to reported national trends, the projected number of faculty
retirements from CU-Boulder (campuswide, with likely variations by college
or discipline) is not expected to increase significantly over the next
20 years (Appendix R).
Finding #22
- The CU-Boulder faculty resignation rate (not including retirements)
increased to 3.4 percent in 1999 from 2.0 percent over the previous
five years, exceeding the recent resignation rate of 2.2 percent reported
by the University of California (Appendix R).
Finding #23 -
Similar to national trends, a higher portion of women than men left
CU-Boulder, with women representing 25 percent of the total faculty
in 1998-99 but 48 percent of the departing faculty for the previous
five years (Appendix R). Moreover, assistant professors left at by far
the highest rate, with 32.8 percent of all CU-Boulder assistant professors
departing voluntarily over a five-year period, compared to only 3.3
percent and 4.5 percent for associate professors and full professors,
respectively.
Finding #24
- In general, replacement costs are much greater than retention costs,
and yet continuing budgets for faculty retention packages are lacking.
For example, the startup costs to replace a faculty member are $200-400K,
or more, in natural sciences and engineering (see Table 4), whereas
a fraction of these costs would go a long way in providing research
assistance, laboratory renovations, travel funds, and/or a faculty fellowship
to help retain a current faculty member. Moreover, a productive faculty
member may bring to the University about $100K per year in indirect
costs on research grants, but it would take several years for a new
faculty member to generate the same level of external support.
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