APUO Bulletin

À la dernière assemblée générale annuelle de l'Association des professeurs de l'Université d'Ottawa (APUO) le 26 avril 2001, le président, Mario Lamontagne annonçait aux membres que le paiement du progrès dans le rang (PDR) serait versé dès le mois de mai 2001. Il a souligné que cette décision découle de 'négociations informelles' avec l'administration. L'APUO a assuré l'employeur qu'elle s'engage à essayer sérieusement une approche différente lors des négociations à venir, c'est-à-dire une approche fondée sur les intérêts mutuels. De son côté l'employeur, comme preuve de sa bonne volonté, a accepté de payer le PDR à tous les membres de l'APUO dès le 1 mai 2001, avant l'entente finale. «Ce genre de négociations est très différent de celles du passé et j'espère que cette nouvelle approche des négociations entre l'employeur et l'APUO sera positive pour tous les intervenants. Ceci est sans doute un geste concret et transitoire qui nous mène dans la bonne direction pour les négociations à venir».

Les négociations «fondées sur les intérêts (NFI)» ou «sur les gains mutuels» désigne la façon de procéder pour arriver à une entente en discutant, en théorie du moins, les enjeux qui touchent l'une des parties ou les deux. Bien que cette forme de négociations soit assez nouvelle dans le milieu universitaire, elle a donné depuis plusieurs années, des résultats importants et positifs dans le secteur privé. Ainsi, en visant les enjeux au lieu des solutions, chaque partie peut partager les préoccupations de l'autre et tenter de trouver des solutions communes aux défis de l'université moderne. C'est une approche fondée sur la confiance commune, une confiance où chaque partie a à coeur les meilleurs intérêts de l’Université d’Ottawa. Il faut se parler!

À l'assemblée générale, le professeur Michel Morin, président du comité des négociations collectives a souligné que la transition vers les négociations non traditionnelles n'est pas facile et ne se produit pas du jour au lendemain. Au contraire, c'est un processus d'évolution à long terme ou la confiance et la compréhension des deux parties s'établit graduellement. «Il va sans dire, que ce processus réussit seulement si l’on jouit de la pleine confiance de l'autre partie». Il ajoute : « Les experts dans ce domaine nous disent que ce processus est possible seulement si les intervenants comprennent bien et appliquent les principes de base. Il est donc nécessaire de suivre quelques séances de formation avant d'entamer des discussions».

Depuis le mois de février, l'équipe de négociation et le Comité exécutif de l'APUO ont rencontré les consultants du secteur public et privé ainsi que l'Association canadienne des professeurs et professeures d'Université (ACPPU), pour discuter différents aspects de la NFI. Deux séances se sont tenues en collaboration avec l'administration de l'Université. Selon les professionnels oeuvrant dans ce domaine, il semble, que le processus a de bonne chances de réussite à l'Université d'Ottawa. Selon Bruce Hamilton de Concerpro Enterprises Inc., «S'il y a un milieu où le NFI doit fonctionner c'est bien ici.»

Le Conseil d'administration de l'APUO a donc décidé de s'engager dans ce processus de NFI à condition que l'administration, comme geste de bonne volonté, s'engage à payer d'abord le PDR, dès le 1er mai, 2001. À la dernière rencontre des représentants de l'APUO et de l'employeur, l'administration a officiellement fait cette offre.

Tous les intervenants suivront des séances intenses de formation le 13 et 14 juin 2001 à l'Université. Ces séances seront dirigés par Concerpro Enterprises Inc., de Montréal. Les négociations suivront peu après.

Prof's salary 100 (000)!!
(The Editorial Page - The Ottawa Citizen – Friday, 6 April 2001)

The following letter was submitted to The Ottawa Citizen by Frans De Bruyn, the Bulletin editor, in response to an outrageous editorial on the subject of professorial salaries published early in April. A shortened version of this letter was published in The Ottawa Citizen on 8 May 2001.

In an editorial published on 6 April 2001, The Ottawa Citizen attacks what it alleges to be the “high salaries” of university professors and administrators in Ontario. The paper states that the number of professors and administrators earning in excess of $100,000 has doubled in the last five years and that even more faculty earn this kind of money “once you combine their salaries with their income from . . . jobs as consultants, writers, and entrepreneurs.” To compound this alleged scandal, the paper charges that working conditions of professors are far too cushy: “Teaching loads are small, the teaching year lasts at best for 26 weeks, and faculty are entitled to a paid sabbatical every five years.”

These charges, if true, would be serious indeed, but because they so thoroughly misrepresent the true situation in Ontario universities, they cannot go unanswered. The writers of the editorial show a fundamental lack of understanding about the careers and earnings of professors, and their facts in many instances are plainly wrong.

To begin with the factual errors in the editorial, contrary to what The Citizen believes to be the easy teaching conditions of professors, teaching loads at Ontario universities have in fact increased significantly over the last ten years. A combination of increased student enrolments and reductions in the numbers of full-time professors (a result of the cutbacks of the Rae and Harris governments) has led to classes that are in many cases twice the size they were at the beginning of the 1990s. With the upcoming influx of extra students in 2003, when grade 13 will be abolished, these class sizes will increase even more.

Moreover, while it is true that the teaching year for the individual professor lasts 26 weeks, the teaching duties of professors go well beyond that. The marking of exams and assignments takes up several more weeks of professors’ time at the end of the fall, winter, and summer semesters, and the supervision of graduate students, especially Ph.D. candidates, goes on all year. And teaching duties are only the tip of the iceberg as far as the job responsibilities of professors are concerned. Research and publication take up a great deal of faculty time (40% of a professor’s workload, on average), and that, together with administrative duties, committee work, and community service more than fills up the time when professors are not in the classroom.

The editorial goes on to state that professors are entitled to sabbatical leaves every five years. In fact, sabbaticals (for which professors must apply by submitting a viable program of research) take place on a seven-year cycle, and professors on sabbatical earn reduced salaries, as low as 62.5% of their normal earnings, depending on the length of time since their last sabbatical. The term “sabbatical,” which suggests a period of rest, is in fact a serious misnomer: professors must demonstrate that they have been productive in their research when they return from sabbaticals. Without these periods devoted to intensive research, the research productivity of Ontario universities would be seriously compromised, with tragic consequences for the Ontario economy and society.

But what seems most offensive to the editorial writers of The Citizen is that professors at the end of their careers can actually earn in excess of $100,000. Stating the case in this way ignores the fact that professors must undergo a long period of education, including graduate school training and post-doctoral apprenticeship, before they receive their first job appointments. By the time professors are hired, they are on average in their early to mid-thirties in age, and their starting salaries are approximately $44,000. Average salaries for full-time faculty at the University of Ottawa are about $79,000 a year—far short of $100,000. For the vast majority of professors, those magical salaries of over $100,000 are not attained until the final years of their careers, and in many instances professors never reach this level. Compared to other careers, where individuals begin earning salaries when they are in their early to mid-twenties, professors actually earn much less: their total career earning potential is much smaller, because their earning years are significantly shorter. A few years of high earnings at the end are only a partial compensation for this reality.

It is true that an increasing number of professors show up on Premier Mike Harris’s hit list of public sector employees earning six figures. But this increase is much less dramatic when one excludes the clinical professors in faculties of medicine on the list and university administrators (deans and vice-presidents). Surely The Citizen does not seriously think that capable doctors can be attracted to academic careers at salaries of $44,000, when they can earn many times that amount in private medical practices. In other areas as well--such as high tech engineering, law, and business administration--universities must compete in the marketplace for first-rate experts in their fields.

Finally, The Citizen complains that even more professors would show up on the Harris list if consulting income were included. As a professor in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Ottawa, I would like to know where I could find such a consulting job. The vast majority of professors teach subjects that do not lead to any significant outside income. For most professors in Ontario, the salaries they are paid by their universities are their only source of income.

In conclusion, when The Citizen looks for the causes of the “rocketing costs” of higher education, it will have to look elsewhere than at professors’ salaries. Over the last decade, the proportion of the University of Ottawa’s operating budget earmarked for full-time faculty salaries has actually decreased significantly, along with the numbers of full-time faculty. Wherever the money from increased tuition fees is going, it is most assuredly not lining the pockets of university professors.

Frans De Bruyn
Professor of English
University of Ottawa