Hiring
Freeze Announced For College Faculty, Staff
by Mackenzie Moore
Due
to a sharp increase in health care costs during the last fiscal
year, the College has announced an immediately effective hiring
freeze on all faculty and staff.
While it is unclear how long this freeze will last, most offers
have already been made to candidates for next years faculty
positions and the freeze will not keep departments from conducting
most planned job searches. The freeze is expected to have more immediate
effects for College staff. Certain administrative and janitorial
positions are currently in jeopardy, particularly many support service
positions. The College employs over 1000 people, and currently 68
to 70 positions are open and will remain unfilled.
We wont fill these positions right away. It is uncertain
how long the freeze will last, College President Nancy Dye
said. She emphasized that the College, regardless of its financial
situation, is being careful to protect its core educational mission.
We will go to some length to protect [it], she said.
We will be conducting searches for faculty this year,
Andy Evans, Vice President of Finance for the College, said. The
freeze will affect all employees, but it is unlikely it will affect
faculty because we have already made offers to those who will be
joining us next year, he said.
A College budget deficit for the last fiscal year has led to the
implementation of the hiring freeze. Along with a decrease in this
and last years endowment, rising costs in health care provided
as part of College employment contracts are largely reponsible for
current budgetary concerns. Costs increased from approximately $5
million to $7 million in the last fiscal year, which ended on June
30, 2001. In providing health care to its employees, the college
has gone over-budget and is now faced with a deficit.
We basically have three things happening with health care
[that are raising costs]. First, we had a lot of serious illnesses
of people who are covered by our plan. Second, we had an increase
in the overall use of services. And third, the cost of pharmaceuticals
went up 25 percent, and that resulted in a 2 million dollar increase
in costs from last year.
Changes in health care are slow moving, however. We want to
make changes to health care but that doesnt happen quickly,
so we are instituting a hiring freeze on any vacancy that we have
not yet filled, Evans said. With 50 percent of the Colleges
budget related to salaries and benefits, instituting a hiring freeze
is the quickest and least invasive way to limit expenses.
A re-evaluation of the health care plan is scheduled for January.
[The College] cant run deficits. We dont have
the reserves to cover deficits. To be fiscally responsible we cant
run a deficit, Evans said. The administration considers it
necessary to halt hiring for as long as it takes to make sure the
deficit will be erased.
According to Evans, the College has had hiring freezes before. In
1995-1996, we had a hiring freeze that was tied to the structural
deficit elimination of some $3 million in the operating budget.
That hiring freeze lasted almost the entire academic year.
Depending on the status of each academic departments personnel,
the hiring freeze is producing varied responses. David Orr, chair
of the Environmental Studies department, was not alarmed. This
wont effect us since our search is already underway,
he said.
Steven Volk, chair of the History department, expressed confidence
that he and his colleagues would be able to make it through the
hiring freeze fairly unscathed, although he did express some concern
for administrative staff in his office.
In the most critical sense, the freeze shouldnt effect
the History department since we have two authorized searches under
way (African History and Asian American History) and those will
continue, he said. The freeze might have a slight impact
if we apply for leave replacements for next year, but that is not
a major issue for us since very few faculty will be on leave next
year. It is our belief that our office staff (our administrative
assistants) are overworked and we would have liked to get some additional
help in the office, which now wont happen, and that is a problem.
But in terms of our ability to maintain and add to our curriculum,
I dont see any problems for us with the hiring freeze.
Some departments are not as grounded and secure as History, however.
The Comparative American Studies Program (CAS) is still in its formative
stages. Bill Norris, Professor of Sociology, who has been involved
in the CAS project since its inception, isnt sure about the
potential consequences of this hiring freeze, although President
Dye assured the programs security,
At this point we are finishing the documents for the EPPC
[Educational Plans and Policies Committee], Norris said.
Then our requests have to be reviewed by Educational Plans and Policies
Committee and the College Faculty Counsel. It is always difficult
to predict the future and so what will be the impact on CAS in a
month or two is very difficult to know, he said.
Many faculty members. in response to the announced freeze, have
assumed a wait-and-see attitude. Ana Cara of the Hispanic Studies
Department expressed the emotions of many department chairs and
administrators around campus. The hiring freeze does not affect
us enormously...so far!
President Dye admitted that inconveniences will be experienced by
many employees of the College, due to the budget deficit and subsequent
freeze.
It is nothing to be terribly concerned about, she said.
It will come back.
|