Elizabeth Hillaker, UF Alumnus
As you have probably heard by now, UF is preparing to lay off 14 faculty members and more than 100 staff as part of President Bernie Machen's proposed $47 million budget reduction. When coupled with the $22 million reduction made in October, UF's budget for the coming academic year will be a whopping $69 million less than this year's.
As a result of the cuts, the faculty members who are staying are losing colleagues and collaborators, and departments are stretching their support staff. Meanwhile, amid budget squeezes and salary freezes, five faculty members from the College of Education have left to take other jobs this year. Eight more retired. None of them will be replaced.
A similar brain drain is happening at the University of Wisconsin. This school year, it retained only 63 percent of its faculty who received offers from other schools. Budget cuts similar to those proposed for UF are largely to blame for faculty leaving for greener pastures.
The process of hiring professors is something like sports recruiting. If resources dwindle at one university, other, wealthier institutions swoop in to offer larger paychecks and other incentives to top professors so they'll switch teams.
UF ranks in the bottom third for faculty salaries among its peer institutions, and this presents more affluent institutions with the opportunity to steal away top professors. The cost of living is lower in Gainesville, and UF has wonderful facilities. But money talks.
And it's not just the money. Now, more than ever, faculty members are told to do more with less. On top of teaching and scholarship, they are encouraged to secure grants from outside sources to help make up for the budget deficit. A record $583 million in research money was given to UF faculty members this year. With faculty members leaving or being laid off and many departments being forced into hiring freezes, the strain will only build.
Why should we care? Regardless of what the billboards say, The Gator Nation is not everywhere. Employers will consider the value of your degree. As faculty members leave, the value of your education decreases.
Case in point: UF slipped from a five-way tie for No. 13 to No. 17 in the most recent U.S. News & World Report rankings. UF's fall in the rankings reflects staggering faculty-to-student ratios and poor faculty resources. The average faculty salary at UF is $109,300 for full professors, $73,000 for associate professors and $62,500 for assistant professors. Faculty members did not receive raises last year.
However, last fall, Machen received a $275,000 bonus to his $416,162 salary for meeting goals in his contract. While the bonus came from the UF Foundation - the fundraising arm of the university - instead of taxpayer money, it was still in poor taste.
Machen has guaranteed faculty raises for promotions and is working on a program to pay some faculty members merit-based raises. But meager pay increases won't compensate for decreased support staff and continued pressure on faculty to do more with less. Even the nearly $200 million raised for faculty support through part of the university's fundraising campaign will not be enough to prevent some of our top professors from leaving.
UF should stop obsessing about rankings and image and should instead focus on the people who make UF work. Try asking them what they need - other than money - to stay. Eventually, it won't only be professors leaving but top students as well.
UF Spokesman Steve Orlando has recommended students write to their legislators to request more funding for education.
The money legislators give UF is comparable to its peer institutions, Orlando said.
But their refusal to let our universities raise tuition more than 15 percent per year limits our ability to cope with Florida's economic downturn and stem the impending brain drain.
Budget cuts don't happen in a vacuum, and students should not just brush this off because they will leave UF in a couple of years. You will have your degree for the rest of your life.
Don't you want it to be worth something?
Elizabeth Hillaker is a UF alumna.
