Two-year pact on faculty salaries

Negotiators for UW and the faculty association signed an agreement last Monday about the salary increases that professors will receive on May 1 this year and May 1, 2009, it was announced Friday.

The agreement is for a 3.0 per cent scale increase on each of those dates, plus a “market adjustment” to each faculty member’s pay of $400 this year and $425 more next year.

With faculty salary negotiations finished, discussions on staff salaries for the coming year (or two) are just starting, and the faculty agreement was presented to the staff compensation committee on Friday afternoon, associate provost Bruce Mitchell says.

Mitchell and management sciences professor Beth Jewkes were the salary negotiators on behalf of management; Metin Renksizbulut of mechanical engineering and Jock MacKay of statistics and actuarial sciences were the negotiators for the faculty association.

May 1 is the annual date for pay increases for both staff and faculty members, and also for unionized staff (Canadian Union of Public Employees local 793) and graduate teaching assistants.

As of May 1, 2008, the minimum salary for assistant professors will be $65,949 per year. That number rises to $68,158 in 2009. The “market adjustment” of $400 this year and $425 next year is to be “applied to base salaries across-the-board following the scale increase”, and amounts to about an extra 0.4 per cent on an average faculty salary.

The salary agreement includes some special provisions as well: “The Vice President Academic and Provost will establish a working group, in consultation with the President of the FAUW, to determine by an appropriate method of its own choosing if faculty salary inequities exist related to gender. The working group will examine all cases where salary inequities exist for women faculty and recommend how such cases should be resolved. The working group will provide a written report (due 1 February 2009) to the Vice President Academic and Provost and an appropriate summary of methodology and findings to the President of the Faculty Association. It is expected that all recommended salary adjustments will be implemented before 30 April 2009.

“The Vice President Academic and Provost (VPAP) will establish a working group, in consultation with the President of the FAUW, to review the arrangements for annual performance evaluations, and to determine whether opportunities exist to strengthen the process. Emphasis will be directed towards identifying the most significant limitations or weaknesses, and to recommend changes to eliminate or minimize them. The working group’s findings will be provided in a written report (due 1 November 2008) to the VPAP and the President of the Faculty Association, with the expectation that opportunities for change will be discussed at the Faculty Relations Committee prior to performance evaluations for 2008.

Back to top

CKMS loses its fee, refugees gain one

Undergraduate students have voted to stop paying a fee to support radio station CKMS, but to start paying one that will support a refugee student through World University Service of Canada.

Results of the annual Federation of Students election, this year including two referendum questions, were announced Friday from the Fed office. Here's the word:

• "Do you support the removal of the $5.50 per term fee for CKMS, the campus community radio station at the University of Waterloo, effective the Fall term of 2008?" Yes 2,280; no 1,081; declined 47. "Quorum for this referendum was 1863 on the winning side, and thus the results are binding," the election committee announced.

The fee, which is refundable, is the source of about 90 per cent of the station's budget, statements during the campaign said, putting the future of CKMS in doubt.

• "Do you support the implementation of a refundable fee to support the University of Waterloo World University Service of Canada Student Refugee Program at the University of Waterloo, at a cost of $1.00, to be paid by every full-time undergraduate student as part of the Federation of Students Administered Fees each academic term that they are enrolled in classes on the University of Waterloo campus, to be implemented through a system designed at the discretion of the Federation of Students, and to begin in the Fall 2008 term?" Yes 1,999; no 1,145; declined 50. Again, the referendum is binding.

Students also elected two members of the Federation executive for the coming year (terms beginning May 1). There was a close contest for vice-president (education), with Andres Augustin Fuentes-Martinez polling 1,163 to the 1,133 votes for Fatima Ahmed. There were 242 declined ballots. For vice-president (internal) it was 1,184 votes for Andrew Falco and 969 for Steve Hayle, with 242 declined ballots.

Earlier, Justin Williams (of environment and resource studies) had been acclaimed as Fed president for the coming year. And the incumbent vice-president (administration and finance), Del Pereira, was acclaimed to fill a second term.

Elected to positions on students' council were Chris Neil (St. Jerome's) and Sam Andrey (science), with other council positions filled earlier by acclamation.

The Federation said 26,608 full-time undergraduate students were eligible to vote.

Back to top

Renison names its interim principal

Renison College has announced that Bob Rosehart (left), former president of Wilfrid Laurier University, will be its interim principal, starting March 1, while a search for a new principal is carried out.

John Crossley, who has headed Renison since 2002, announced in December that he would leave February 29 to take on a new challenge as president of a still unnamed university: “The new position is unusual, being at a non-traditional university and allowing me an opportunity to help build a new institution. As much as I enjoy Renison this is an opportunity that is unlikely to come up again during my career.”

At the end of last week Lynn Schumacher, chair of the Renison board of governors, announced that Rosehart would step in, following unanimous approval by the board at a meeting on February 7.

Rosehart is returning to the college where he lived during his first year as a UW student in 1962-63. He earned his BASc, MASc and PhD degrees in chemical engineering from Waterloo, then taught at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay. He served as president of Lakehead 1986-1997 and then president of WLU 1997-2007. "His interests," a summary sheet says, "are in economic development, science and technology policy, and government policy. . . . Dr. Rosehart has an extensive background relating to the nuclear and environmental engineering fields." He's also been serving as an "economic facilitator" for the Ontario government, working on the future of northwestern Ontario. He received an honorary degree from UW in 2006.

Renison's statement notes that the college "enjoys a good relationship with WLU" based on their overlapping activities in the field of social work, with Renison offering a bachelor's program and WLU a master's program. "Dr. Rosehart has enjoyed a good collegial relationship with some of our past principals," it adds.

Back to top

Productivity book launched tomorrow

Former UW provost Tom Brzustowski (right), a well-known champion of innovative university research, will be in Waterloo tomorrow to launch his new book on boosting productivity in Canada. A celebration of the book will be held at the Accelerator Centre at 295 Hagey Boulevard in the Research and Technology Park.

The former president of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada will speak about his book, entitled The Way Ahead: Meeting Canada's Productivity Challenge, on Wednesday starting at 5:30 p.m. in the AC's Val O'Donovan Networking Area. He will also sign copies.

"Tom is one of our own. He has had an outstanding academic and public service career, beginning here at the University of Waterloo," says UW president David Johnston, adding that Brzustowski then served an Ontario deputy minister before heading NSERC for 10 years. "We look forward to helping him celebrate this wonderful event."

Brzustowski was a longtime professor of mechanical engineering — a specialist in combustion — and served as UW’s vice-president (academic) starting in 1975. He added the newly created title of provost in June 1987, but left Waterloo a few months later to join the Ontario civil service.

More recently he’s back at UW as chair of the board of directors for the Institute for Quantum Computing, and also holds the RBC Chair in the Commercialization of Innovation at the Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa. His book was published by the University of Ottawa Press.

As NSERC president, Brzustowski has long called for strengthening links among universities, industry and government to commercialize research while dealing with issues of funding and conflict of interest. He argues that as Canada relies on university research, rather than work done in company labs, the country must become more adept at commercializing innovative campus discoveries.

In his book, he says that while Canada is a prosperous country, this prosperity is being stressed by demographics, pressures on the public purse and low productivity growth. To maintain a high quality of life, prosperity must increase while remaining sustainable. It's a challenge Canada is prepared to and must face, he argues.

Brzustowski proposes raising productivity growth by embracing an economy based on innovation, prioritizing research and development, marketing Canadian products internationally and encouraging entrepreneurial activities in all sectors. As well, increasing prosperity will require a new level of understanding, strategic coherence and mutual support between the private and public sectors in Canada.

The book, drawing on a wide knowledge of government, industry and academia, articulates a strategy for moving the economy toward higher-value products based on research and development. It describes the practical steps government, industry and academia must take to improve things in the short term and prepare strategically for the long term.

Brzustowski's career as an engineer, researcher, professor and public servant spans more than 40 years. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. In 2006, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Professional Engineers of Ontario.

CAR

Back to top