Mid-year UI Faculty Salary Increase
A Report by Mark J. Braun
State Relations Officer

As you may recall, The University of Iowa and the Board of Regents are now in the first year of the four-year Partnership Plan for Transformation and Excellence. This plan commits the University to moderate tuition increases, matching additional state funding with internal reallocations, and a realignment of priorities to meet the goals of the University's strategic plan.

The faculty salary plan is specifically targeted to recruit and retain faculty who are among the best in their fields, and whose disciplinary areas are most important, in terms of high student demand, strengthening areas negatively impacted by previous budget cuts, and developing new educational and research programs vital to the economic needs and growth of the State of Iowa. To reach that goal, University of Iowa administrators recently announced a mid-year salary increase for selected faculty members beginning January 1, 2006.

Through recent salary studies, it has been shown that UI faculty salaries were falling behind those paid at the University’s peer institutions. (The UI peer group includes the universities of Arizona, Indiana, Wisconsin, Texas, Minnesota, Ohio State, North Carolina, Illinois, Michigan and UCLA). In a 2004-2005 salary study, Iowa ranked 10 th of the eleven peers in average faculty salaries. Iowa’s average faculty salary was 4.4% below the peer median. The Board of Regents has established a target for improving the competitive position of faculty salaries at The University of Iowa. This goal is to be within the top third of the peer group, or 4 th of the eleven overall.

Unfortunately, funding for the University’s Transformation Plan was not resolved in time for the start of the fiscal year on July 1. However, the University has since identified sources reallocated further within the General Education Fund to support a mid-year salary increase for faculty, consistent with the goals to improve the University’s salary ranking and maintain academic excellence. The $1.3 million necessary to fund the salary adjustments effective January 1, 2006, will come from two sources: $650,000 will come from collegiate reallocations; and $650,000 from the redirection of central funding.

These increases will be selective and will be based on considerations of individual merit and relevant market comparisons. Moreover, it is important to remember that mid-year salary increases will be used to complement increases previously awarded in July, so that between the two increases, the average faculty salary increase for the year will average at least 5%, moving the University toward its goals for transformation and excellence. 

SPOTLIGHT: Outreach to Iowans
Iowa Cancer Registry

Cancer became a reportable disease in Iowa in April 1982 by an amendment to the Iowa Administrative Code. The Iowa Department of Public Health has delegated responsibility for cancer data collection in Iowa to the Iowa Cancer Registry at the State Health Registry of Iowa. More recently the Iowa Administrative Code was modified to indicate that the Registry is a Public Health Authority. The goals of the Registry include:

• assembling and periodically reporting measurements of cancer incidence, survival and mortality among Iowans;
• providing information on changes over time in the extent of disease at diagnosis, trends in therapy, and associated changes in patient survival;
• promoting and conducting studies designed to identify factors relating to cancer prevention and control;
• responding to requests from individuals and organizations in the state of Iowa for cancer data and analyses; and
• providing data and expertise for cancer research activities and educational opportunities.

Since 1973, the Iowa Cancer Registry has been a member of the National Cancer Institute’s prestigious Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program. For the years 1973-2003, over 400,000 cancers have been newly diagnosed among Iowans. More than 180,000 Iowans have died from cancer, firmly establishing cancer as the second leading cause of death in Iowa.

BENEFIT TO THE STATE OF IOWA:

The SEER Program's broad scope and rigorous standards make it the most authoritative source of cancer statistics in the United States. This national and international resource provides a vital, dynamic measure of progress toward cancer prevention and control and helps guide a vast array of research, prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and planning efforts. The existence of the Iowa Cancer Registry in the College of Public Health at the University of Iowa allows for the study of the cancer experience of Iowans and focuses national attention and research dollars on this issue. The Registry directly benefits Iowans. The Registry’s database is used to measure the burden of cancer in Iowa and to assess rates and trends in cancer incidence, survival, and mortality. Examples of where these data have been used to benefit Iowans include potential cancer cluster investigations, Healthy Iowans 2010, the Iowa Consortium for Comprehensive Cancer Control, The Face of Cancer in Iowa (a response to the requirements of House File 726), the Iowa Health Fact Book, and numerous research studies including two large-scale studies involving thousands of Iowans, the Iowa Women’s Health Study and the Agricultural Health Study.

Annually, Registry personnel respond to a few hundred requests from Iowans for data linkages, monographs/reports, cancer rates and frequencies, hospital-specific data, and non-funded research requests. These activities provide service and education about the cancer experience of Iowans. In addition to the above, the Iowa Cancer Registry bolsters Iowa’s economy. In 2004 alone, the investigators of the Registry and its affiliates brought over $19 million of federal research dollars into the state of Iowa.