What Quality Costs

The UW's biennial budget request for 1999-01 reflects the concerns and aspirations discussed in this report.

Included on this page:: Salaries; Change; Enrollment Growth; Capital Projects

In funding per FTE student, Washington's investment in the UW is now more than 13 percent behind the average investment made by other states in equivalent institutions. The gap has widened steadily since 1991. Both salaries and operating budgets have suffered.

I. Salaries: $45 million*

* Budget-request figures are accurate as of September 1998 but may change slightly before the legislative session.

The quality of a university rests squarely on one foundation: the quality of its faculty. At the UW, there is a dangerous crack in this foundation: the gap between high faculty performance and lagging faculty salaries. In the competitive national market for faculty, UW salaries trail significantly, no matter how that market is defined.

Chart of Average
Faculty Salaries

Within each of these groups, UW quality ranks high, by the measures cited earlier, but UW salaries rank low. To match the bars above, UW salaries would have to rise by percentages ranging from 6 to 19. Instead, they will rise 2 percent in 1998-99 well behind expected average increases at other universities.

For other universities seeking proven faculty talent, these numbers add up to opportunity.

In 1993-95, the UW made 94 competitive counteroffers to faculty members who were being wooed away. In 1995-97, that figure rose to 220. For year one of the current biennium, the number was 150, with a likely biennial total of 300 or more.
For 1995-97, the UW lost only 12 of the faculty it tried to retain, but it has lost 9 already in the first half of this biennium.
Eminent historian Richard White was one of those who left. The UW was able to match White's offer from Stanford, but he departed anyway because the low level of his colleagues' salaries made him fear for the UW's future.

Students on Quad The $2.4-million recruitment and retention fund from the 1997 legislature has been crucial in countering outside offers and keeping valued faculty. But as the White story makes clear, crisis management cannot ensure real stability. The only way to guarantee continued excellence at the UW is to make base salaries nationally competitive.

Once again, therefore, the UW's highest priority for the 1999 legislative session is raising salaries--for faculty and for staff, who are also vital to quality and whose salaries also trail the market. We propose a three-biennium strategy:

A state-funded increase of 4.5 percent a year, to keep salaries competitive with peer universities ($41 million)
An additional increment from UW funds, to help close the current gap over the next six years
Until the gap is closed, a recruitment and retention fund ($4 million)
Added flexibility to use available funds to maintain competitive salaries

II. Change: $31 million

To continue moving the UW into the future, the budget request includes two major components directed at change:

Technology Initiatives ($23 million)

Creation of the joint UW/WSU Advanced Technology Research Initiative, which will recruit faculty "clusters" to collaborate with the private sector in such areas as pharmaceutical development, micro-electronics, and multimedia
State matching funds (increasingly required by federal granting agencies) to help bring large, leading-edge research projects to the UW
Integration of educational technology into all academic programs

Expansion of Experiential Learning ($8 million)

Reshaping undergraduate curricula to integrate student research and service
Reshaping University research and service to promote student participation

In addition to the funds requested from the state, the UW will again reallocate $8 million internally to new, future-oriented projects through the University Initiatives Fund.

III. Enrollment Growth: $29 million

To meet enrollment demand at all three campuses, the UW requests funding for an additional 1,600 FTE students. For details, see Meeting Demand of this report.

IV. Capital Projects: $267 million

The bulk of the UW's capital request is for four major projects:

Law School Building ($44 million state funds). The law school's Condon Hall, several blocks west of the main campus, is rife with problems: inadequate and insecure library space, out moded teaching space, and isolation from interdisciplinary partners. A predesign study recommended a new building on campus, and the legislature appropriated design funds contingent on University fund-raising. The UW met its goal, but construction was not funded. The UW again requests funding for this high-priority building, to improve the quality of the program (the state's only public law school) and accommodate projected growth. The UW will bring $23 million in donated funds to the project.

Suzzallo Library Renovation ($45 million). The library is heavily used by the general public as well as by UW faculty and students--roughly 15,000 people a day. The oldest part of the building dates from 1925. Structural, mechanical, electrical, and life safety systems all require substantial upgrading to meet seismic, ADA, and building code requirements.

Bothell Campus ($46 million). Phase 2a of the new Bothell campus will accommodate 600 additional FTE students by autumn '01; Phase 2b will add another 600 FTE's by autumn '05. (These figures do not include co-located Cascadia Community College students.) This project is essential to meeting HECB enrollment goals.

Tacoma Campus ($76 million). As in Bothell, meeting enrollment demand requires staying on track in construction of the new Tacoma campus. Phase 2 will accommodate 1,200 additional FTE students by autumn '01.

1998 Report to the State Previous