Faculty to discuss budget

By Elliot Njus

Published Oct. 16, 2007

MU administrators invited faculty members to attend two forums later this month to discuss salaries and the university's budget.

Provost Brain Foster will moderate the forums. He said 50 faculty members could attend each one.

"It's just an attempt to be open, communicate with people and see what they've got to say," Foster said. "It gives people a chance to raise subjects they want to talk about."

At the meetings, there would first be a presentation about the budget to faculty and then the floor would be opened up to discussion, he said.

The presentation, made by a member of his staff, would help put faculty concerns into context.

Foster and Faculty Council chairman Frank Schmidt asked faculty members to reserve a spot through an e-mail address set up for the event.

Provost office Executive Staff Assistant Kirsten Olson said faculty members have already filled 40 slots in each session.

Faculty members responded quickly after receiving an e-mail from Foster and Schmidt.

"We got these 80 replies on approximately the day the e-mail was sent out," she said.

Foster said this is the first time they invited faculty to discuss the budget.

Schmidt said this is a necessary change.

"The faculty are the ones who hold the university together," Schmidt said. "We're the ones who are around. Students graduate, administrators come and go, but the faculty are the institutional memory."

Schmidt said the idea behind the forums is to give faculty an idea of the state of the university's budget.

"We need to come up with new ways of operating the university," Schmidt said.

The forums are scheduled for Oct. 22 and 23 in the Reynolds Alumni Center. Olson said she expects both forums to fill up.

"We'll try to add other forums if these fill," Foster said.

Foster said although the forums are about the budget as a whole, the discussion would probably focus on salary because of a UM system initiative to raise faculty salaries.

According to an August UM system news release, MU ranks last in salary growth among 33 Association of American Universities member institutions.

From 1997 through 2006, salaries at MU increased by an average of 20.4 percent, while salaries in surrounding states increased by between 29.2 and 47.2 percent.

At the UM system Board of Curators meeting in August, the board adopted a plan to raise faculty salaries by leaving some open positions open and eliminating certain centers and institutes.

In addition to faculty salary increases, Foster said the university also has to account for new expenses and commitments, some mandated by the state legislature.

"That's going to create some tension on the budget," he said.

— Staff Writer Nathan Winters contributed to this report.