Faculty May Offer Two Junior Faculty Pay Scales

The Faculty may offer two different pay scales to junior faculty members to help solve the problem of attracting the most qualified candidates to fill non-tenured posts, Robert E. Kaufmann '62, assistant dean of the Faculty for financial affairs, said yesterday.

Of the two different pay scales, "Alpha" will follow the current practice of giving a junior faculty members one term off with pay as part of his appointment to allow time for research, he said.

The second option, "Beta," will involve a junior faculty member giving up the leave in order to receive additional salary instead, Kaufmann said.

Pay Differential

He said that the difference in pay between the two scales will be from about $1000 to $1400 and added that in addition the "Faculty is prepared to raise the general salary level more for junior faculty than for other Faculty groups" in order to make those posts more attractive.

"Those departments that would find this option [Beta] interesting would be those in which people don't need to get away to write or would profit more from their research in a laboratory," Kaufmann said.

He cited departments in the natural sciences and hard social sciences--particularly Chemistry, Biology, Economics and Sociology--as ones "which might opt for the Beta scale."

Competition for the best qualified candidates, Kaufmann said, "is worst in these fields" and low salaries--in some cases as much as $3000 lower than that of competing schools--make this competition harder for Harvard.

OpenOption

Dean Rosovsky said last night the Beta pay scale will not be restricted to the sciences. "What we have in mind is to offer an option" to all departments.

Kaufmann said "The predilection at this point is to let departments choose one pay scale or the other "for all their junior faculty."

The Faculty has not yet tried to estimate how much money the two different pay scales will cost, he said. "We don't know how many people would choose Beta. That's the $64 million question."

"What we're trying to do is maximize everyone's happiness while keeping in mind the pocketbook" of the Faculty, Kaufmann said