Annual Merit Increase

University and SPS guidelines concerning annual salary adjustments for full-time continuing contract faculty for the coming year are set forth below. Also provided is the criteria to be used to evaluate performance and in determining individual salary increases. For FY2024, a 4.75% pool to be awarded to full-time continuing contract faculty. SPS has set aside .5% of this pool to recognize extraordinary merit, and Dean Kamath will work with unit leaders and the SPS HR Director to determine the employees who will receive an augmented increase amount based on their contributions to SPS, our desire to retain them and their leadership and growth potential at SPS.

The criteria for evaluating faculty should conform to SPS's Appointment, Reappointment, Promotion, and Grievance (ARP) Policy Guidelines. The ARP Policy specifies three areas of faculty responsibility:

• Teaching: including but not limited to: developing, creating, and teaching new courses; developing curricula; program review or revision; and advising, including supervising independent studies and internships.
• Service and Administration: these are key components of faculty engagement and all faculty are expected to contribute to these areas. For faculty whose responsibilities are primarily administrative, greater weight will be given to performance in this area.
• Scholarly Work, Creative Production, and Professional Activity: Professional engagement includes a range of activities that may strengthen a faculty member's professional profile, further fields of knowledge, enhance teaching excellence, and/or advance the mission of SPS.

Written justification is required for all proposed merit increases over 5%.

Recommendations will be evaluated to ensure that they fall within the range of the overall pool.

Determinations for faculty members who have had challenges meeting specific objectives and have been evaluated accordingly should be supported with a written rationale.

Effective September 1, 2023, all Tenure/Tenure Track and Continuing Contract faculty being promoted should receive an increase in the base salary equal to 7.5% plus AMI, with a minimum increase of 10% inclusive of AMI, at the time of promotion from Assistant or Clinical Assistant or Arts Assistant Professor to Associate or Clinical Associate or Arts Associate Professor, and also for promotion from Associate or Clinical Associate or Arts Associate Professor to Full or Clinical Full or Arts Full Professor.

• Each full-time faculty member is asked to submit an Annual Faculty Activity Report (FAR) to their Associate Dean, which addresses each of the criteria outlined above. As part of the FAR process, the Associate Dean submits a written evaluation for each faculty member. The SPS Dean and the Vice Dean of Faculty then meet with every Associate Dean to discuss the FAR reports, their evaluations, and AMI allocations. Based on these conversations, Associate Deans submit salary recommendations to the Dean for review and final approval. There is no salary review committee at SPS.
• Once SPS has received approval of the AMI submission, electronic letters are generated and e-mailed out to full-time faculty in advance of the start of the new academic year, typically in early August. The letters will include language directing faculty to the SPS website where they can find the guidelines for faculty AMI's.
  
• SPS expects to stay within the 4.75% pool and will seek prior approval for any overages.
• SPS may not distribute the entire AMI pool due to the following:
  • The AMI pool calculation includes lines where faculty have formally indicated they will be resigning at the end of the academic year. These funds will not necessarily be distributed during the process.
  • At SPS, AMI increases are not applied to faculty stipends.
  • Visiting faculty do not typically receive an AMI. The Dean’s Office will consider requests from academic units on an exception basis.

All eligible, full-time non-bargaining unit faculty in good standing with a start date on or before April 30, 2023 will receive — in addition to the AMI increase — a lump-sum payment equal to 2.0% of their salary with a minimum lump sum payment of $1,500 and a maximum payment of $4,000. This payment will be made August 1, 2023, and we will notify faculty of their reward by July 28, 2023.