Senior faculty members stood up during President David Schmidly's meeting Tuesday to say they are distressed by the dwindling number of tenured professors at UNM.
The meeting addressed issues that have festered since April, when faculty members circulated a petition questioning the use of University funds and the growth of UNM's upper administration.
Since 2002, the number of tenure-track faculty on staff has shrunk from 1,143 to 1,114, while temporary faculty members have increased from 502 to 676, and non-tenure-track faculty has increased from 687 to 829.
John Geissman, chairman of Earth and planetary sciences, said revenue accrued through academic research is decreasing because there is a shortage of tenured professors.
"Over the last several years, as we all know, like it or not, research output or research productivity on this campus - dollars brought in - has been relatively flat," he said.
Geissman said more money could be brought in from research by requiring faculty to submit more research proposals, or simply by increasing faculty.
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Schmidly said adding faculty is one of his priorities.
"Ultimately, if you want to grow research, there is only one way to do it: grow the faculty," he said. "I mean, research proposals are done by the people that you see here. They're not done by the rest of us."
Feroza Jussawalla, an English professor, said disproportionate salaries were partly to blame for the decrease in faculty.
"The administrative salaries were compared to the average of other institutions, and among UNM's peer institutions, faculty salaries are at the bottom," she said. "I think having a commitment to get those salaries up closer to the average - like (administrative) salaries are at the average - will do a lot."
Schmidly said he researched the average pay of senior executive positions and, except for two recent hires, all University administrators receive paychecks below average. Some are almost 20 percent lower, he said.
Lawrence Guy Straus, an anthropology professor, said the growth of the University administration is affecting the morale of the faculty.
"I've taught here for over 33 years, and I've seen a lot of administrations come and go," he said. "Part of the problem with the faculty morale here is that we've heard stories about how the new vision or the new plan is going to change things, but we seem to be doing worse with the type of changes that are coming."
Les Field, an anthropology professor, said the administration harbors a misguided notion of growth.
"People are leaving, and they're not being replaced," he said. "We're not going to be able to maintain even the current status of what we do unless we're able to bring in more faculty, and there doesn't seem to be any movement in that direction."
Schmidly said he would do everything possible to retain quality, long-term professors at the University.
"There is great talent on this campus," he said. "It's the most talented place I've ever had the privilege to lead, and we do want the faculty to take maximum advantage of that."
Field said faculty and administrators have trouble solving the morale problem because of the University's notion that higher enrollment numbers will answer the need for increased funding for departments.
"We keep on talking and we keep on trying to tell our administration what we're experiencing as we face, for example, scheduling for the next semester," Field said. "The crisis isn't coming - we're in it."
