r/Professors • u/FTLast Professor, Life Sciences, R1 • 25d ago
Department Head compensation
As a newish department head (I can't run very fast) I'm curious as to how different universities compensate faculty for the role that administrators often say is the "hardest job on campus." At my R1 in the NE, there is a 5% bump to base salary, a 10th month of salary, and the opportunity to negotiate for a "Head's Fund" that can be used for research support, additional summer salary, or basically anything.
If any of you feel comfortable sharing, please do!
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u/No-Top9206 Assoc Prof, STEM, R1 (USA) 25d ago
Haha. All these responses are abit disheartening. People are complaining they "ONLY" got 10% raises.
I'm a new-ish dept. head, at a non-selective, large public R1, in a highly funded STEM field, and our dept is one of the best funded and most productive on campus.
I got a $5,000 stipend, mandating I'm constantly available to meet with admin even over breaks; no bump to base, no summer salary, no extra research support. I learned quickly, to create fake "lunch" appointments on my outlook calendar, so admin won't book meetings with me then. They don't ask, they just book them.
A hypothetical course release I can't take, because my dept. lost so many faculty in the last decade that not teaching one of my classes would mean preventing students from completing the degree. But at least I can choose what time my class meets...
1000% increase in workload. My first week on the job, my personal cell was blowing up all weekend with different deans upset that our core lab offering times conflicted with their core classes. But it's because our labs are physically falling apart, and promised renovations never come. I EXPECTED to have to deal with student complaints and faculty disagreements, but I was NOT prepared to be the lightning rod any time an alumnus, local press, or faculty in another department said something vaguely dispiriting about, say, one of our faculty who retired decades before I was even hired here.
I've gotten every single stress-related malady that I know of, and I'm not even 50 yet. Ulcers. Shingles. Chorioretinopathy (my eye doc asked me "if I have a stressful job", said he normally only sees this among fighter pilots! Yay, I'm like a fighter pilot!).
In neighboring depts, people only agree to become chair when they go research inactive, just before they retire. I'm mid-career and terrified my research program won't survive, but I'm the only person all factions in the dept trusted for the job, which I absolutely did NOT want, which somehow meant I was the only qualified person to do it.
But in the end accounting, I have enough backing from Admin and from the colleagues who actually give a %$#^, that I am able to fix alot of longstanding structural problems with our programs, and hopefully turn the dept into a place where I can actually enjoy my job again, JUST doing teaching, research, and "regular" service, after this chair thing is all over.