Wednesday, April 23, 2008
YSU takes on an obligation that we hope it can afford
The Youngstown State University administration and board of trustees are gambling that they can afford the recent contract with YSU’s teaching staff that President David Sweet says is not only fair, but necessary.
We will acknowledge that YSU is in a difficult position. The state is demanding a higher academic standard from its state universities, YSU has set its own quality benchmarks and the university is in the job market to replace retiring staff.
Against that backdrop, and with the knowledge that the last three-year contract with the faculty union was reached only after a short-lived strike, the administration congratulated itself of reaching an early agreement that calls for a 2.5 percent raise the first year, and 3.5 percent each of the next two years.
That may or may not sound extravagant, but look at it this way: It means that three years from now, Youngstown State will be paying $110 for every $100 it pays now. Of course, that figure could be skewed if during the same period the university replaces higher paid senior faculty with lower-paid junior faculty.
Still, by the university’s own computations, the new contract will cost about $4.5 million over the course of the contract. That’s quite a commitment for the university to make at a time when higher education is being redefined in Ohio.
It has an eerie resemblance to the city school district which, about a decade ago, approved a similar pay package because board members were convinced that the district had the money and its employees deserved the raises. Unfortunately, the district did not anticipate the upheaval the district would soon face as charter schools began siphoning hundreds of students from city classrooms and millions of dollars from district coffers.
Positive attraction
Philosophically, it is difficult to argue with Dr. Sweet about a university’s need to attract candidates with good credentials to its faculty.
The April 4 issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education reported that one of the most important factors in retaining freshmen is strong, full-time faculty members teaching the “gatekeeper courses,” such as Chemistry 101, Biology 101 and introductory (not remedial) English courses. Freshmen who could seek out their full-time professors on campus for guidance and assistance outside of class had a better chance of eventually becoming sophomores.
And Dr. Sweet has the figures to show that YSU is only doing its best to retain a respectable spot in faculty salaries among those universities it must compete with in hiring.
Still, we find ourselves more aligned with Donald Cagigas, the one member of the board of trustees who voted against the agreement. Cagigas said he didn’t begrudge the faculty a pay raise, but was concerned with the effect that the projected opening of a community college in 2010 would have on the university’s ability to afford the cost.
Everyone can only hope that three years from now Sweet and board members Scott Schulick, John Pogue, Millicent Counts, Dr. Dianne Bitonte Miladore, Harry Meshel and Larry DeJane are shown to be right and Cagigas and we are proven wrong.