U of A academics vote to accept pay raise for female professors

Article content

University of Alberta academic staff have voted in favour of a deal that gives female professors pay bumps and a lump sum to address a historic gender pay gap.

With 52 per cent of votes in favour, the university’s academic staff voted during the last week for a memorandum of agreement that gives female full professors a 5.8 per cent wage hike and a cash lump sum depending on their years of service. All female faculty will also receive a $1,500 payment for “damages to dignity and self-worth.”

Members of the Association of Academic Staff University of Alberta (AASUA) also voted 69 per cent in favour of a new two-year agreement for all 4,100 staff members that includes no across-the-board pay hikes. The deal, which runs from July 2018 to June 2020, include some improvements to working conditions, association president Kevin Kane said Monday.

The university’s board of governors must also ratify the new two-year agreement for all staff before it takes effect. University spokeswoman Anne Bailey said Monday board members will vote on ratifying the agreement within the next week.

“We would like to recognize the efforts and dedication of the representatives of the University and AASUA who brought this important work to a resolution,” Bailey said in an email.

Association will search new data for other pay gaps

Kane was pleased to see members approve an agreement to address the inequities and discrimination faced by women who have been on faculty for a long time.

“You can never undo what they may have experienced in the past, but at least they are getting some compensation to help redress that,” he said.

Some academic staff publicly implored members to vote against the gender-based pay agreement, saying it excluded assistant and associate professors and limited steps the association could take in the future to address the long-standing pay gap.

As part of the agreement, the association will, for the first time, receive compensation data for all its members, which will allow them to conduct their own analysis of any pay inequities, Kane said.

The association will comb that data for any other disparities based on gender, race, disability, Indigenous identity, sexual orientation and gender identity, Kane said. If members find further inequities, the association can attempt to seek compensation from the university in future agreements, he said.

During the year of negotiations, the university was “immovable” from its position of no new general pay raises, Kane said. Still, University of Alberta faculty, teaching staff, librarians and others in the association are relatively well compensated compared to their colleagues at other Canadian universities, he said.

The deal also requires the university to contribute more money to the workers’ benefits program, should funds fall short.

Slightly more than a third of eligible academic staff voted on the agreements.

jfrench@postmedia.com

Listen to our Canadian news podcast, 10/3