Daily Bulletin

Friday, September 26, 1997

Letter examines staff salaries

The letter notes that the faculty and staff pay systems are "profoundly different" and hard to compare. For example:

With respect to the faculty system, annual merit-based selective increases are awarded to faculty as they progress through their careers. Additional increases for career progression or reclassification are almost non-existent. Salary increases are based on an across-the-board increase or scale adjustment (1% in 1997) and selective increases as defined in Policy 11.

For staff members, no scale increases are given but ranges are adjusted (1% in 1997) and the size of the merit pool depends on the range adjustment. Individual increases depend on position in the range relative to mid-point and performance rating. Promotional, reclassification and equity increases are given throughout the year based on job changes, job evaluations or anomalies. In both groups, the merit component costs more when there are many individuals at the lower end of the salary ranges. . . .

In the staff system, a staff member who leaves at mid-point or above is generally replaced at between 80 and 90% of the salary range, resulting in savings to the salary budget of between 10 and 30%. In the faculty system, a faculty member who terminates or retires is often close to 2.5F. This means that if a replacement is hired at close to F, the savings to the University amount to 50 or 60% of the salary the University was paying the departing faculty member. In both cases, these savings help to pay for merit increases.

The letter also deals with other things the staff compensation committee has been doing in the past year, such as studying the "Hay" system for evaluating UW staff jobs and working on changes to the staff performance evaluation form. It also compared salaries at UW to what other employers are paying:

The Committee reviewed salary information collected through several surveys with other universities and with large public and private sector organizations in the Waterloo region. Several representative jobs were selected by the Committee to compare and each one was reviewed with respect to mid-point and actual salaries. Jobs included were from the technical, administrative, clerical, professional and management groups. On the whole, UW salaries compared favourably with those of other universities and organizations; some jobs were lower, some higher but on average UW's position relative to other employers is a good one.

Parking in a different place

• Users of lot H should plan to use the "visitors" entrance to the lot, by the green kiosk. "There is a card reader in place at that entrance, and the bollard gate will be opened allowing people to make a right turn into the permit holder section of H lot."
• Users of lot T "will be relocated to parking lot C on Seagram Drive. . . . Lot C requires you to use your card on exit. Both exits from C lot have a card reader in place."

The talk of the campus

My flying fingers got ahead of my brain yesterday, resulting in a Bulletin item which alleged that Martha Piper, the new president of the University of British Columbia, had come to UBC from UBC, which is nonsense. She came from the University of Alberta, where she was vice-president (research and external affairs).

And a couple of people noticed that in some versions of yesterday's Bulletin, Jean Chrétien turned into Jean Chritien. Not my misspelling, but a software quirk which someone more expert than I has (I think) helped me fix. . . .

There are big celebrations this weekend at Wilfrid Laurier University, partly because it's Homecoming for alumni and even more because Campaign Laurier, "the largest capital campaign in WLU's history", is winding up having raised more than its $15 million goal. "Campaign Laurier is particularly important in times of restrained public funding and ever-increasing institutional needs," says WLU's new president, Bob Rosehart. A celebratory barbecue starts at 12 noon in the WLU quadrangle.

This weekend at Waterloo

The annual general meeting of Imprint Publications Ltd. will be held at 12:30 today in Student Life Centre room 1116. All registered students who have paid the Imprint fee are entitled to attend.

The Club That Really Likes Anime (CTRL-A) will be having its first show of the term today starting at 4:30 p.m. in Engineering Lecture room 201. Says Karl Zaryski, one of those who really like anime: "The scheduled lineup includes Gunsmith Cats, El Hazard, Science Ninja Team Gatchaman '94, Key the Metal Idol, Psycho Diver, Blackjack, and Mobile Police Patlabor New Files." The show is free and everyone's invited.

The campus recreation triathlon, reborn as a duathlon because of the ring road closing, takes place tomorrow starting at 9:00.

Conrad Grebel College holds "Family Day" on Sunday, an afternoon of special events to let parents and siblings see what Grebel life is like. Several talks and choir presentations are planned, and the whole things winds up with a chicken barbecue.

Interuniversity sports: well, the football Warriors (who dropped to fifth rank in Canada after their loss last Saturday) are on the road, playing at Toronto's Varsity Stadium tomorrow, but a few teams are playing at home, including baseball (hosting Guelph at 6 tonight at Bechtel Park), women's rugby (hosting Toronto at 1:00 Saturday at Columbia Field), and tennis (hosting Western and McGill at the Waterloo Tennis Club all day Saturday).

And speaking of tennis, the Downey Tennisfest is all set to happen on Sunday, also at the Club on the edge of Waterloo Park.

CAR

September 27, 1967: B. F. Goodrich Ltd. donates $30,000 to UW to establish a library collection in polymer science as its centennial project.

Editor of the Daily Bulletin: Chris Redmond
Information and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
credmond@uwaterloo.ca -- (519) 888-4567 ext. 3004
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