The last week of Christmas vacation is upon us, which means it's time to compile my faculty activity survey for calendar year 2007 - otherwise known as the old merit pay application. Unlike the average asshat, I have never resented having to walk right up to the microphone: I have always put in at least as much as I have taken out. It looks like 2007 has been one more year I have staved off the descent into asshattery. Even so, I'm already starting to get angry about the likeliness of getting hosed out of merit pay in order to keep the looters somewhat mollified.
I have to admit that contrary to my expectations, I did pretty well on the old merit pay for calendar year 2006. Not only did I catch up somewhat on the asshats and other looters, the departmental merit process was far less acrimonious than it apparently was elsewhere on campus. For this I credit the department head and, to a lesser extent, the personnel committee chair. God knows I was expecting World War Three. The most important factor, however, was that the merit pay wasn't allocated in integers. That is, faculty were assigned an integer from 1 to 5 for teaching, for research, and for service - but the "final scores" were assigned on the plus/minus system. Instead of the 15% "5s," 35% "4's" and 48% "3's" forecast by the planning document, faculty could receive a 5, or a 4+, or a 4, or a 4-, or a 3+... and so on. More gradations in the final scores allowed finer differentiation in merit pay. An elaborate quartile system was built in to ensure "equity," but on this count I have to point out that certain people are in the lowest quartile because they deserve to be in the lowest quartile.
My concern is that the looters have had a year to figure out how it can finagle the new system. Finagling the system to get their "fair share" is what they do best: they consider inventing released time boondoggles and importunate pleas for equity adjustments far more gratifying than developing new curriculum or, heaven forbid, learning something scholarly and new. I predict an onslaught of minor syllabus tweaks and bogus committee service, all painstakingly documented but amounting to less than zero. The process will have greater urgency this year if merit pay is (as I suspect) to be allocated by integers this time, and not fractions.
My department has a bad habit of not calling looters out on crap like this. Last year I played nice like everybody else apparently did, even the asshats. Not this time. It's not a matter of the money, either. I make enough money. Sure, I wouldn't mind making more money. But money isn't why I got into academia. If I find myself locked into the same integer with the asshats and the rest of the looters, there will be hell to pay. But first I have to make sure that I have exercised due diligence by providing an accurate assessment of what they're up to when they sing their lives. We'll find out what happens with that.
Showing posts with label merit pay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label merit pay. Show all posts
Sunday, January 06, 2008
Thursday, November 29, 2007
The Headmaster Ritual
My generation of faculty was the first in Missouri State University history actually required to earn tenure and promotion. In some ways it was the worst of both worlds. President Marshall Gordon had been brought on in 1983 with an explicit mandate to raise the University's research profile, and woe to the tenure candidate whose publication record did not satisfy then-VPAA Donald E. Bowen. On the other hand, the departmental personnel committees were stocked with asshats who had never published anything, and who had gotten tenure and promotions just for showing up on a regular basis. The same was true for most of the department heads. My generation taught the same number of courses per semester as the belligerent ghouls who were already tenured - the difference was that we were expected to publish or perish.
As an incentive for faculty performance, President Gordon had also installed a "merit pay system." Part of any annual raise for the faculty would be doled out as an across the board percentage, with an additional raise for faculty who had been "meritorious." For purposes of merit pay, the workload for all faculty at SMSU was set at 40% research, 40% teaching, and 20% service. This was an ideal balance for newcomers like me, because we were expected to be all things to all people at all times anyway. But the oldtimers didn't like the merit pay system at all. They had been hired to teach, not to do research. They sure didn't want to receive a grade on their annual performance. Worst, the idea of their junior colleagues making up ground on them financially was downright perverse.
Naturally, the departmental merit pay committee and personnel committee were controlled by the oldtime asshats; they passed their recommendations up to the department heads, who tended to be even older timers (although heads were starting to be brought in from off campus by the time I arrived). Non-tenured faculty could serve on merit pay committees, but they tended to keep their mouths shut, even if it meant going along with some rather outlandish claims on the part of the senior faculty. A colleague I like and respect deeply, two years senior to me, chaired the committee once while still non-tenured. He had the nerve to call out an old-timer on a bogus conference presentation the old-timer was trying to take credit for. In return for this and other alleged instances of "uncollegiality," the personnel committee (they had to recommend tenure; this colleague had literally outpublished the whole department) unanimously recommended against promotion to associate professor. The department head concurred. If not for swift strong action by the then-College Dean, my colleague's promotion would have been toast.
As the Gordon administration plodded onward, the pool of money for merit pay eventually dried up. But the merit pay evaluations, and the wealth of bad feelings they produced, continued regardless. Acting President Keeling introduced a sliding percentage scale for faculty to set their own workloads; a worthwhile idea which only complicated matters in practice. The Keiser administration's solution was to pay off four years' worth of arrears with a maximum available raise of $1000 for a faculty member who had averaged 100% meritorious performance over that time. For what it's worth, I racked up $960. I wasn't happy to see the merit pay system go, but I respected President Keiser's decision to end the unfunded charade. It was replaced by a greatly increased number of faculty awards for research, service, and teaching. But that is another rant.
As an incentive for faculty performance, President Gordon had also installed a "merit pay system." Part of any annual raise for the faculty would be doled out as an across the board percentage, with an additional raise for faculty who had been "meritorious." For purposes of merit pay, the workload for all faculty at SMSU was set at 40% research, 40% teaching, and 20% service. This was an ideal balance for newcomers like me, because we were expected to be all things to all people at all times anyway. But the oldtimers didn't like the merit pay system at all. They had been hired to teach, not to do research. They sure didn't want to receive a grade on their annual performance. Worst, the idea of their junior colleagues making up ground on them financially was downright perverse.
Naturally, the departmental merit pay committee and personnel committee were controlled by the oldtime asshats; they passed their recommendations up to the department heads, who tended to be even older timers (although heads were starting to be brought in from off campus by the time I arrived). Non-tenured faculty could serve on merit pay committees, but they tended to keep their mouths shut, even if it meant going along with some rather outlandish claims on the part of the senior faculty. A colleague I like and respect deeply, two years senior to me, chaired the committee once while still non-tenured. He had the nerve to call out an old-timer on a bogus conference presentation the old-timer was trying to take credit for. In return for this and other alleged instances of "uncollegiality," the personnel committee (they had to recommend tenure; this colleague had literally outpublished the whole department) unanimously recommended against promotion to associate professor. The department head concurred. If not for swift strong action by the then-College Dean, my colleague's promotion would have been toast.
As the Gordon administration plodded onward, the pool of money for merit pay eventually dried up. But the merit pay evaluations, and the wealth of bad feelings they produced, continued regardless. Acting President Keeling introduced a sliding percentage scale for faculty to set their own workloads; a worthwhile idea which only complicated matters in practice. The Keiser administration's solution was to pay off four years' worth of arrears with a maximum available raise of $1000 for a faculty member who had averaged 100% meritorious performance over that time. For what it's worth, I racked up $960. I wasn't happy to see the merit pay system go, but I respected President Keiser's decision to end the unfunded charade. It was replaced by a greatly increased number of faculty awards for research, service, and teaching. But that is another rant.
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