FACULTY SENATORS BACK 4% PAY HIKE

CAPE GIRARDEAU -- Faculty members at Southeast Missouri State University are pushing for a 4 percent across-the-board pay raise for the 1991-92 fiscal year.

In addition, they want the university to absorb an anticipated 25 percent increase in the cost of family medical/tax sheltered annuity benefits.

The salary hike and the absorption of any increased premium cost regarding family medical/tax sheltered annuity benefits would cost the university slightly more than $1 million, according to the Faculty Senate Compensation Committee, which made the proposal.

The Faculty Senate Wednesday unanimously endorsed the compensation proposal.

Faculty Senator Shelba Branscum, who heads the Compensation Committee, said the proposal would be introduced at today's meeting of the university Budget Committee, on which Branscum also serves.

Branscum said it's estimated that a 4 percent pay raise for faculty would mean an added cost to the university of $760,000, including contributions to the retirement program and Social Security.

As to the family medical/tax sheltered annuity benefits, Branscum said it's estimated that the increased premium would amount to at least 25 percent of the current $2,721.12 per person cost or $680.

With 397 faculty members, it would cost the university just over $270,000 to absorb the increased premium expenses rather than passing that cost on to faculty members, said Branscum.

For the past few years, the university's employees have seen money taken out of their salaries to pay for the premium increases, Branscum said.

The written proposal states that Southeast's salaries for associate professors and professors are below the 50th percentile as compared with other comprehensive public universities nationwide.

But with tight state finances, it's unlikely that funding can be obtained to raise faculty salaries to a more nationally competitive level, said Branscum.

The financial woes, she said, also mean that the university can't afford to implement a flexible benefits plan for the next fiscal year.

"The budget is tight," said Branscum. "There's no doubt about it. I think the picture is pretty clear. We're not really all that healthy."

Branscum said a 4 percent salary increase would amount to little more than a cost-of-living raise.

But coupled with the family medical/tax sheltered annuity portion of the compensation proposal, the total package would amount to about a 5 or 5.5 percent increase, she said.

Figures for the 1989-90 academic year, the latest figures available from the American Association of University Professors, show that the average salaries for professors and associate professors at Southeast are below the 50th percentile as compared with those of other comprehensive schools.

But the average salaries for assistant professors and instructors at Southeast were slightly above the national figures in that same year, information gathered by the Compensation Committee shows.

At Southeast, the average salary for professors in 1989-90 was $42,000, or $3,300 less than the 50th percentile figure nationally.

Associate professors' average salaries were $35,900, or $1,300 less.

But assistant professors made $30,900, or $400 more than the national figure. Instructors at Southeast made an average salary of $25,200, or $1,100 more than the national figure, the statistics show.