Faculty accuse Syracuse of failing to address 'gender pay gap'

Hundreds of female faculty members are demanding that Syracuse University address its alleged gender pay gap before it becomes “a crisis of major proportions.” 

In a statement published last week in the print edition of The Daily Orange, the school’s student newspaper, the faculty members noted that a university-wide “Faculty Salary Report” showed that there is “substantial inequality between the salaries of female and male professors.” 

The advertisement, notably, was timed to coincide with Equal Pay Day, a national movement dedicated to bringing awareness to the gender pay gay. 

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A Syracuse University Senate committee commissioned the 2017 faculty salary report, which did in fact reveal a disparity between male and female faculty salaries, though The Daily Orange pointed out that the report didn’t have access to a number of variables, including performance. 

While the signatories of last Tuesday’s statement noted that they were “pleased that the university commissioned the report,” they took issue with the “ways in which the university is addressing these inequities.” 

In particular, the faculty members are concerned with a plan to offer money “to the dean of each college” who will then “use that money to address those inequities,” saying that this “puts both the burden of and the capacity for making chance on the Dean’s [sic] rather than the university itself.” 

[RELATED: UGA profs refuse to believe study showing no gender pay gap]

The faculty conclude their statement with four specific requests, including that “the process of implementing salary equity not stop at the deans’ requests for selective raises but be thorough and systematic across all schools and overseen by the Provost.” 

Additionally, they are asking the “cumulative effects over time of this past inequity be acknowledged and addressed,” while requesting that the “university require every college to correct ALL inequities in a standardized way,” and do so with “transparency.” 

Some administrators, however, pushed back against the faculty members’ insinuations that they have not done enough to address the pay gap, according to The Daily Orange.

Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs LaVonda Reed, for instance, had previously announced that there will be new bias training programs for all university deans, and that the Provost’s Office will hire more staff to address issues of inclusion and diversity, both efforts intended to help the deans address the pay gap.

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