Skip to Navigation
University of Pittsburgh
Print This Page Print this pages

June 10, 1999

AAU FACULTY SALARY SURVEY

AAU FACULTY SALARY SURVEY

Average salaries of assistant professors and faculty librarians at the Pittsburgh campus gained ground last year compared with salaries at other Association of American University (AAU) schools.

But average salaries of full and associate professors here slipped again.

In all four categories, Pitt average salaries ranked in the bottom third among 60 public and private AAU universities, and in the bottom half among the 32 public AAU schools.

Average salaries at Pitt's four regional campuses were in the bottom half for most professorial ranks, compared with those at AAU branch campuses.

The rankings appear in a report released last week by Pitt's Office of Institutional Research.

The AAU is a group of prominent North American research universities that includes public institutions such as Pitt and the state systems of California and New York, as well as Ivy League schools and other private universities, including Carnegie Mellon.

Pitt's administration and University Senate groups agreed during the 1980s that Pitt should aim to raise faculty salaries here to the AAU median for each faculty rank. Pitt hasn't met that goal yet, although average salaries for some ranks have met or exceeded the AAU medians over the years.

At Monday's Senate Council meeting, Provost James Maher re-emphasized that Pitt benchmarks its faculty salaries against AAU averages.

"That's a market-based goal that the public can support," Maher said, even at a time when many parents, state legislators and business leaders protest tuition increases and other higher education expense hikes that exceed the inflation rate.

According to the Institutional Research report, the average salary of a Pittsburgh campus full professor during the 1998-99 academic year ($82,800) ranks 44th among 60 AAU institutions in the United States, down from 42nd place last year and 35th place the year before that.

The average salary of a Pittsburgh campus associate professor ($58,600) ranked 41st, down from 39th place last year and 32nd place the year before.

For assistant professors (average salary: $48,100), the Pittsburgh campus ranks 46th, up from 51st place last year and the same as in 1996-97.

Limiting the comparison to the 32 public AAU universities, the Pittsburgh campus ranks 20th in average salary for full professors, 18th for associate professors and 22nd for assistant professors.

Pittsburgh's average salary for full professors increased by 2.5 percent over last year, while those of associate professors increased by 3.9 percent, assistant professors by 5.3 percent and librarians by 3.6 percent.

The median change in average salaries at other AAU institutions was 4.25 percent for full professors, 4.4 percent for associate professors, 4.75 percent for assistant professors and 3.7 percent for librarians.

Harvard pays the highest average salary for full professors ($122,100) of any AAU school. Stanford ranks No. 1 for average salaries of associate professors ($79,800). The California Institute of Technology pays the highest average salary to assistant professors ($66,100).

Salaries at the University of Oregon rank at the bottom of the AAU for full professors ($67,400 average) and associate professors ($50,000). Catholic University of America had the lowest average salary for assistant professors ($42,700).

The average salary of Pittsburgh campus librarians ($42,800) improved from 52nd to 51st place, the same rank as two years ago, among the 55 AAU universities in the Association of Research Libraries.

Among the 55 schools, Stanford pays the highest average salary for librarians ($65,100). The University of Rochester pays the lowest ($41,400).

Among the 16 AAU branch campuses that focus on baccalaureate-level education (classified as Category IIB institutions), Pitt's Bradford campus ranks 9th for average salary of full professors (Bradford average: $57,000), 12th for associate professors ($46,400) and 11th for assistant professors ($37,200).

Last year, Bradford ranked 8th for full, 13th for associate and 14th for assistant professors' average salaries.

The Greensburg campus ranks 10th for average salary of full professors ($55,400), 15th for associate professors ($45,000, tied with Indiana University-East) and 15th for assistant professors ($35,600).

That's compared with 10th, 13th and 16th place, respectively, for those ranks at Greensburg last year.

The Johnstown campus ranks 6th for average salary of full professors ($58,700), 11th for associate professors ($46,900) and 16th for assistant professors ($34,800) — compared with 6th, 9th and 17th place, respectively, last year when there were 17 IIB campuses.

Among the four AAU campuses that confer at least 75 percent of their degrees below the bachelor's level (Category III), Pitt's Titusville campus ranks last in average salaries for associate professors ($38,000) and assistant professors ($32,800). Because Titusville employs fewer than five full professors, salary information for that rank was not reported for the campus.

Penn State campuses pay the highest average salaries in Category III for full ($63,200), associate ($51,300) and assistant ($44,000) professors.

For a further comparison of Pitt and Penn State faculty salaries, see story.

The Pitt Institutional Research report is based on data published in the March/April issue of Academe, the journal of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and in the Association of Research Libraries' Annual Salary Survey 1998-99.

Pitt Institutional Research staff cited what they called a number of problems inherent in the AAUP data: * The AAUP reported on faculty salaries for a nine-month academic year. "As a result, average salaries of institutions with a large proportion of faculty on 12-month contracts can be seriously misrepresented," the report states. "At the Pittsburgh campus, 502 out of the 1,264 total instructional faculty had 12-month contracts. The ratio one uses to convert a 12-month salary to nine-month equivalent may vary among institutions and one can debate the rationale for converting the salaries at all."

* Faculty members' ages and tenure status are not taken into account. Universities with proportionately more senior and tenured faculty tend to pay higher salaries.

* The data don't account for faculty discipline areas. Schools that emphasize technical and/or high-demand fields such as engineering and business tend to pay higher salaries than liberal arts schools.

"This point particularly brings into question the appropriateness of comparing public institutions to private institutions," the report states. "While the public university has a responsibility to teach a broad spectrum of topics, thereby limiting the ability to specialize heavily, private institutions are not so bound. In addition, private schools often lack the limits placed on public institutions in terms of compliance with state and federal governance rules and also reliance on public funds."

The best way to judge the competitiveness of Pitt faculty salaries is by comparing them with AAU averages according to academic discipline, a University Senate committee was told last week by Robert F. Pack, vice provost for Academic Planning and Resources Management.

"Obviously, what's missing [from Institutional Research's report] are school-specific data. What's most revealing are comparisons between faculty salaries at our engineering school, say, or our arts and sciences unit, and faculty salaries at similar units at other AAU universities," Pack said at the Senate budget policies committee's June 4 meeting.

Administrators at AAU institutions do exchange school-specific salary information, but only on condition that it is not made public, said budget policies committee chairperson Richard Pratt. "Perhaps this committee should seek access to that information, even if it's on condition that we keep it confidential," Pratt said.

Pack noted that it is difficult for Pitt to catch up with its AAU rivals' salaries during an era when Pitt's educational and general fund increases from the state average just 2-4 percent annually, and Pitt is heavily pressured by lawmakers, students and parents alike to minimize tuition hikes.

One way the Provost's office is trying systematically to improve Pitt salaries, Pack said, is by hiring assistant professors at competitive, "market-level" salaries to replace senior professors who have left Pitt through the early retirement incentive plan.

As those young professors move up through the ranks, Pitt's salary rankings in the AAU should improve, Pack said.

"Our assistant professor differentials are already heading in the right direction," he said. Pitt's AAU rankings at the assistant professor level improved this year in Pittsburgh and at two of Pitt's regional campuses. Also, assistant professors at the Pittsburgh campus received higher percentage raises (5.3 percent) than did any other rank of professors here.

— Bruce Steele


Leave a Reply