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May 2, 2013

Report: Gender parity improving

A review of Pitt faculty salaries by gender shows that the University is continuing to make progress on parity, David N. DeJong, vice provost for academic planning and resources management, told the University Senate budget policies committee in an April 19 presentation.

“When we see anomalies, we bring them to the attention of the dean or president or center director,” DeJong said, adding that disparities in some areas don’t necessarily mean there is a problem. For instance, in some small areas, ratios may be skewed if a small number of newly hired faculty of one gender are outnumbered by returning longtime faculty of the opposite gender.

“We make sure they’re aware of the situation. Sometimes they can explain what’s going on; sometimes they are surprised and make adjustments.”

The two-part report, which DeJong said also was presented to the Provost’s Advisory Committee on Women’s Concerns (PACWC) and to the Council of Deans, compares the University’s Pittsburgh campus to its 33 public Association of American Universities (AAU) peers in the percentage of women faculty by rank and the ratio of the average of women’s salaries to men’s salaries by rank.

DeJong said that using overall averages as a metric “is not ideal and can be misleading,” recommending caution when working with averages. He added that comparisons based on attributes such as rank, tenure status, school and department bring the data into closer alignment.

Using University data, the second part of the report takes a closer look at Pitt faculty salaries, examining the ratio of the average woman’s salary to the average man’s salary by rank, controlling for tenure status, school and department.

For the first time, regional campuses are included in the more detailed analysis, DeJong said.

In addition, the report tracks the percentage of women in administrative positions at Pitt.

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The current report, based on fiscal year 2011 data, is the third such review undertaken by the Pitt administration. The report initially was commissioned by PACWC and is conducted every five years, using faculty salary data submitted each year to the American Association of University Professors (AAUP).

Full-time instructional faculty, both tenure- and non-tenure stream, are included, as are medical school faculty involved with PhD programs. Excluded are part-time instructional faculty, non-instructional faculty, administrators, clinical medical school faculty and graduate student instructors, DeJong said.

Percentage of women faculty

The report found that, in FY11, women made up 37 percent of the Pitt faculty, third-highest among the public AAU peer group. In the FY06 analysis, Pitt ranked No. 2 with 38 percent, up from 25 percent in FY99.

Salary ratios among AAU public institutions

Pitt’s faculty salary ratio has held relatively steady across the three gender equity reports. In the FY99 report, the average female faculty member at Pitt earned 76 percent of what men did, placing Pitt at No. 32 among its AAU public peers (where the ratios ranged from 76 percent to 86 percent).

In FY06, Pitt’s ratio was 75 percent, placing the University 30th among the 34-member peer group whose ratios ranged from 71.5 to 86.5 percent.

In the report to BPC, a graph that was presented as the FY11 ratio for faculty of all ranks actually included only the professor, assistant professor and associate professor ranks, and excluded instructors and lecturers.

At the University Times’ request, DeJong provided the FY11 data that included faculty of all ranks. Pitt ranked No. 30 among its AAU public peers with a ratio of 75.3 percent. FY11 ratios among the AAU publics ranged from 72 percent at Penn State’s main campus to 86 percent at the University of California-Davis.

In the data presented to BPC, for the three professor ranks (excluding instructors and lecturers), the ratio of the average female Pitt faculty member’s salary to the average male Pitt faculty member’s salary was 81 percent, ranking Pitt 27th among 34 public AAU schools.

Ratios ranged from 77 percent at the University of Virginia to 92 percent at the University of Oregon.

Women’s salary ratio by faculty rank

By rank, among full professors at Pitt, the women’s salary ratio was 89 percent of men’s, placing Pitt at No. 23 among its AAU peers. Ratios for the rank ranged from 85 percent to 98 percent.

For associate professors, Pitt’s ratio was 94 percent (ranking No. 16) and for assistant professors, 90 percent (ranking No. 24). Among the 34 peers, associate professors’ salary ratios ranged from 87 percent to 99 percent and assistant professors’ ratios ranged from 87 percent to 100 percent.

For lecturers and instructors, Pitt’s ratio was 96 percent, placing it at No. 5 among peers where women’s salaries for the rank ranged from 66 percent to 106 percent of men’s.

DeJong noted that Pitt’s salary ratios for each faculty rank were higher than its overall average, explaining that the University has a relatively large number of women at the assistant and associate rank, “which means when you don’t condition overall, the average salary is going to be relatively low.”

In addition, for some schools where the women’s salary ratio was higher, salaries were relatively low overall. “Parity can mean different things,” DeJong said.

Analysis of internal data

An analysis of Pitt’s own data, in which the faculty salary ratios were broken down by tenure status, school and department or regional campus division, provides a better comparison, DeJong said.

“These are the best numbers you can get because they have conditioned and gotten rid of extraneous reasons why you might see differences in these average comparisons.”

He said, “We’ve clearly made progress over the course of the times we’ve been tracking this. We certainly haven’t hit 100 percent equity. The more that you control everything else, the closer you tend to get to 100 percent.”

The data were not conditioned by length of service or for the number of years a faculty member had spent at a particular faculty rank.

Pittsburgh campus comparisons

The FY11 data showed among all Pittsburgh campus faculty, women’s pay was 75.3 percent of men’s (74.8 percent in FY06).

Among full professors, women earned 89.2 percent of what men earned (87.9 percent in FY06). For tenured/tenure-stream professors, the ratio was 91 percent (89.9 percent in FY06). By school, the ratio was 93.8 percent (92.4 percent in FY06) and by department, the ratio was 95.9 percent (no data from FY06).

For associate professors, the ratio was 94.1 percent for all Pittsburgh faculty at that rank (94 percent in FY06), 92.4 percent for tenured/tenure-stream faculty (94.5 percent in FY06) and 96.9 percent (97.1 percent in FY06) by school. By department, the ratio was 98.9 percent.

For assistant professors, the ratio was 90.1 percent for faculty at that rank (88.2 percent in FY06) and 93.7 percent for tenured/tenure-stream faculty (91 percent in FY06). By school, the ratio was 95.7 percent (94 percent in FY06). By department, the ratio was 98.2 percent.

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For non-tenure stream (NTS) faculty, the average salary for women at all ranks on the Pittsburgh campus was 85.5 percent of men’s in FY11. For full NTS professors, the ratio was 73.6. By school, for full NTS professors the ratio was 95 percent; by department, it was 95 percent as well.

For NTS associate professors, the ratio was 97.9. By school, the ratio at that rank was 97.9; by department the ratio was 99.1.

For NTS assistant professors, the ratio was 87.3 percent. By school, the ratio for NTS assistant professors was 89.6 percent; by department, 91.9.

For NTS instructors and lecturers, the ratio was 95.7 percent. By school, the ratio for those ranks was 98 percent; by department, 99.7 percent.

NTS comparison data for FY06 was not included in the presentation.

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Regional campus ratios

For the first time, the analysis looked at faculty salaries on Pitt’s regional campuses and found that, for faculty at all ranks, the salary ratio for women was 90.9 percent of men’s. For tenured/tenure-stream faculty at all ranks, the ratio was 94.5 percent and 93.8 percent for NTS faculty.

At the full professor rank, women on Pitt’s regional campuses averaged 103.3 percent of men’s salaries. For tenured/tenure-stream full professors, women earned 106.4 percent. Controlling by division, women earned 118.4 percent of men’s salaries.

At the associate professor level, women earned 100.2 percent of men’s salaries. The ratio for tenured/tenure-stream female associate professors was 98.7 percent (116.2 percent for NTS) and 100.5 percent (128.5 percent for NTS), controlling by division.

For assistant professors, female faculty earned 96.8 percent of men’s salaries, with tenured/tenure-stream women earning 94.7 percent (98.9 percent for NTS) and, by division, 97.5 percent (98.3 for NTS).

At the instructor and lecturer rank, the salary ratio was 89.4 percent. The ratio for NTS women at those ranks was 89.1 percent (no data for tenured/tenure-stream stream faculty at those ranks) and, by division, women’s salaries were 86.9 percent of men’s.

Women in administrative positions

In a comparison based on University data from 1996, 2003 and 2012, the report found that in 2012 women made up 22 percent of Pitt’s Board of Trustees, up from 12 percent in 2003, with no percentage reported for 1996.

The percentage of female senior administrators fell to 25 percent in 2012, down from 28 percent in 2003. In 1996, women made up 20 percent of Pitt’s senior administrators.

In 2012, women filled half of the provost senior staff positions, an increase from 29 percent in 2003 and 33 percent in 1996.

The percentage of female deans at Pitt in 2012 fell to 13 percent, the same as in 1996. In 2003, 25 percent of Pitt’s deans were women.

At Pitt in 2012, women made up 25 percent of all department chairs,  up  from  13  percent  in 2003 and 20 percent in 1996.

By area, in 2012, 26 percent of Pitt’s department chairs in Arts and Sciences were women, compared with none in 2003 and 16 percent in 1996.

In the provost’s area, 23 percent of department chairs in 2012 were women, up from 2 percent in 2003 and 19 percent in 1996.

In the health sciences, 27 percent of department chairs in 2012 were women, up from 20 percent in 2003 and 21 percent in 1996.

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In other BPC business:

• BPC member Michael Spring inquired whether there would be BPC action with regard to the suspension of admissions in three graduate programs in arts and sciences (see June 14, 2012, University Times).

Under the University’s planning and budgeting system (PBS), BPC is responsible for reviewing whether PBS processes are followed.

Baker said that discussion between Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences administrators and the chairs of the affected programs has been occurring.

“Other than to follow that the discussion has occurred and that it has included the chairs, that’s all I’m seeking on it. It has been occurring.”

• BPC’s next meeting is set for 1:10 p.m. May 17 in 156 Cathedral of Learning.

Baker said the administration’s annual faculty salary report is expected to be on the May meeting agenda.

He also expects to report on the University Planning and Budgeting Committee’s (UPBC) budget recommendation and have a discussion on a BPC salary pool recommendation.

As part of the University’s annual planning and budgeting cycle, UPBC (which includes administrators as well as faculty, staff and student representatives) forwards budget parameters and salary pool increase recommendations to the chancellor. BPC may choose to make its own recommendation to the chancellor, who takes the input into consideration as he prepares his budget proposal for approval by the Board of Trustees.

—Kimberly K. Barlow


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