Note: Research institutions pay the best. In most states
(but not
|
AAUP: Women Professors Lag In Tenure, Salary |
There
are more women in full-time faculty positions than 30 years ago but research
institutions are still reluctant to hire women or pay them in parity with their
male hires, according to an annual report by the American Association of
University Professors released today.
The
report, “AAUP Faculty Gender Equity Indicators 2006,” highlights
data from individual schools for the first time in the hopes of generating
on-campus dialogue on employment and salary inequities.
“We
hope to move from a perspective of national diversity and equity to one of more
local dialogue on campuses about these issues,” says Dr. Ann
Higginbotham, professor of history at
The
report says that women have nearly reached parity and are 47 percent of tenured
full-time faculty at community colleges. The number of tenured women faculty
members decreases to a little more than one third at masters- and
baccalaureate-degree granting colleges. But doctoral universities had only one-fourth
of tenured faculty who are women. This means that full-time women faculty are
only half as likely as men to have tenure, the report says.
Among
historically Black colleges and universities that grant doctoral degrees, at
Among
full professors at all institutions nationwide in 2005-06, women held 24
percent
of the positions and men held 76 percent, says the report. Women comprised 19
percent of full professors at doctoral universities and men 81 percent.
Baccalaureate and master’s degree institutions were in between, with 29
and 28 percent women respectively.
“Basically,
the more prestigious the institution in the layer, the fewer the women there
are,” says the study’s co-author Martha S. West, professor of law
at University of California-Davis.
The
report also compared salaries between men and women faculty, which has remained
unchanged since the 1970s. In 2005-06, across all ranks and all institutions,
the average salary for women faculty was 81 percent of the amount earned by
men. Among all full professors at all types of institutions in 2005-06, women
earned on average 88 percent of what men earned. For associate and assistant
professors, the overall national figure for women was 93 percent.
The
authors say the salary disadvantage was due to two reasons: women are more
likely to have positions at institutions that pay lower salaries, and they are
less likely to hold senior faculty rank.
“This
doesn’t have to do with science disciplines,” says West.
“Even if there are more women Ph.D.s in English or psychology, the
doctoral institutions are not hiring them.”
The
authors also stressed the importance of academia to convey to women that they
no longer have to make a choice between raising children and becoming
tenure-track faculty members.
“We
need to do a better job of publicizing the whole cultural shift [of the
work-family ethic] and graduate students have to be convinced first,”
says West.
Higginbotham
adds there might not be overt sexism, but some subtle pressures at work on
campuses.
“Even
though there’s a lot of progress, we’re not sure what’s going
on in terms of model programs [for work-family] and the picture may not look as
rosy,” says Higginbotham.
The
report concludes that unless institutions establish a centralized review of all
salaries at the time of appointment, salary inequities will continue far into
the future.
“As
long as women hold 57 percent of the lecturer and instructor positions, but
only 36 percent of the assistant through full professor positions, these
significant differences between men and women’s average salaries will
remain,” the report says.
—
By Shilpa Banerji
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