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Actionline NEA

We Aren’t Taking It Anymore!

NEA’s innovative salary initiative promotes professional pay for professional work throughout the entire education enterprise.

According to NEA research, faculty salaries shrunk by 1 percent in 2004–05 (the last year for which salary data are available)—the second straight year that increases did not keep pace with inflation. In addition to watching their purchasing power shrink, faculty have a host of other pay issues.

For contingent faculty, the picture is far worse. These academics teach the lion’s share of courses at many colleges yet are paid substantially less than their tenured or tenure-track colleagues, and they have few rights or benefits. And for education support professionals who work in higher education institutions, low pay has long been an issue, as has pay equity for female support staff.

Now higher ed members and their Association are fighting back. NEA’s recently launched salary initiative aims to improve pay for higher education faculty and support professionals, as well as their K-12 colleagues. Take the pledge, learn the facts, and get involved at www.nea.org/pay/hepay.html.

In October, NEA President Reg Weaver returned to his alma mater, Roosevelt University in Chicago, to speak at a forum, “Academic Freedom Under Fire,” sponsored by the Roosevelt Adjunct Faculty Association (Illinois Education Association-NEA).

Students and faculty from the Roosevelt community heard Weaver, Kathy Sproles, president of NEA’s National Council for Higher Education, United Faculty of Florida (AFT-NEA) president Tom Auxter, and others discuss the importance of preserving academic freedom.

Weaver stressed that academic freedom is essential to develop an educated citizenry and preserve democracy. He also called for the nation to expand college access and success by increasing funding of need-based financial aid.

The 2006 Thought & Action will hit members’ mailboxes shortly, with an interesting array of articles by authors with special interests in the nature of academic work. The issue also has its usual fare of thoughts and commentary on issues important to our members.

NEA’s 25th annual higher education conference, The Academy at Work—March 2-4, 2007 at the Hilton San Diego Resort on Mission Bay, San Diego, California—will explore external and internal pressures affecting the academy as a workplace.

Conference sessions will tackle issues such as the changing academic workforce and changes in the nature of academic work itself. As usual, in a series of faculty development workshops for faculty and staff, participants will share ideas on life in the academy. You can find updates on the conference—including the titles of sessions and the names of presenters—as well as online registration instructions at www.nea.org/he/conf.html.