Article 11, Section I of the IFO MinnState Agreement creates a joint Salary Review Committee (SRC). The SRC includes one faculty representative and one administrative representative from each campus, faculty representatives from the IFO’s Multicultural Issues Committee and Feminist Issues Committee, and staff members from the IFO and the System Office.
The Agreement commissions the SRC to conduct periodic statistical studies of the salaries paid to all faculty members holding non-adjunct, non-athletic appointments. These studies examine the impact of variables describing program, rank, degree, and years of experience on faculty members’ base salaries. The studies check for any disparities in salary that might be attributable to gender or race. The studies also identify faculty members who are paid relatively less than might be expected. The SRC then reviews the results and makes recommendations on salary adjustments based on the study to Minnesota State and the IFO. Minnesota State uses the salary study to construct guides that administrators use in setting salaries for new faculty members. The SRC uses the salary guides to review the salaries of faculty at the time of hire, promotion and terminal degree completion.
The current study is an analysis of the salaries of faculty who were in non-adjunct, non-athletic appointments in the fiscal year 2016 (the 2015-2016 academic year). The study began with the construction of a database describing each faculty member in fiscal year 2016 (FY16). This past Spring, each faculty member was sent an email outlining the information of record describing their program, rank, degree, and experience during FY16. Faculty were provided with an opportunity to correct their data. Faculty members submitted hundreds of questions and proposed corrections to this information, which where investigated and addressed by staff from the IFO, System HR, and the campus HR offices. The result was a much more accurate snapshot of the Minnesota State university faculty in FY16.
The corrected database was provided to consultants from the Aon company’s Data Analytics division, retained by Minnesota State, who specialize in compensation analysis. The Aon team working on our study provided critical guidance on the methods to be employed in grouping faculty members for comparison and analyzing the factors which correlate with salary. Their basic findings are the subject of the campus presentations. The campus presentations may be found at https://www.ifo.org/salary-equity-committee/.
Over the next several months, the SRC will meet to review the findings and to determine criteria to identify faculty members who should receive salary adjustments. The SRC will make its recommendations on salary adjustments to Minnesota State and the IFO. Those recommendations will be addressed in the next round of contract negotiations. At the end of the process, each faculty member will receive a notice describing how they fared in the study and its impact, if any, on their salary.