Performance-based incentives will keep academic talent in Canada
Contact:
Hymie Rubenstein, Ph.D.
University of Manitoba
Telephone: (204) 474-9396
Email: rubenst@cc.Umanitoba.CARelease Date: 7 December 2000
VANCOUVER, BC — Canadian universities are failing to attract and retain the best faculty because they do not properly reward and evaluate their academics says a new paper, Rewarding University Professors: A Performance-Based Approach, published by The Fraser Institute and released today.
"Many universities are suffering 'academic flight' as competition for the best brains increases between the ivory tower and the private sector, on the one hand, and Canada and the United States on the other," says the paper's author Professor Hymie Rubenstein, a highly-regarded academic from the University of Manitoba.
The loss of sought-after scholars who teach in popular or emerging fields and many top academics who are doing ground-breaking scientific research is a major blow to Canadian universities.
The labour market demand for highly-skilled employees is increasing and Canadian universities need high-calibre professors to train them. But the demand for superior scholars is not being met in some fields, despite a buyer's market for available Canadian academic personnel.
Rubenstein says that budget constraints at most universities make it difficult to recruit and retain the best faculty, but blames the current compensation framework for the shortage of star performers in Canada. Existing remuneration policies do not link rewards to performance, and powerful faculty unions, timid administrations, government indifference, and a pervasive egalitarian mind-set have penalized excellence and prevented reform.
"Many commentators both inside and outside of academe have pointed out that Canadian universities are in serious trouble. The lifetime tenure held by several thousand deadwood professors, for example, means that highly qualified young academics must either be content with a series of low-paid eight-month appointments, seek their fortunes at American universities or leave teaching altogether," states Rubenstein.
Using the University of Manitoba as a case study, Rubenstein says that most Canadian universities have moved away from impartial and transparent systems for evaluating the performance of academics. This makes it almost impossible to recognize and reward professors who perform above the average, or to identify and sanction under-performers.
In order for universities to attract and fairly reward the best academic faculty-and to reverse the academic brain drain-the following reforms must be considered:
- University tenure systems should be replaced with renewable performance-based contracts. Traditional lifetime tenure should be limited to truly exceptional scholars.
- Collective agreements should be replaced by flexible private-sector-style contracts for individuals that combine elements of basic employment agreements with incentives for drive, imagination, and productivity.
- Current performance reviews should be replaced with rigorous and objective evaluations.
- Performance and rewards must be closely linked.
- Teaching and research should be evaluated separately. Faculty who neither
conduct research nor publish should have their compensation reduced
accordingly. Average teachers who are not also scholars would have their
tenure revoked in accordance with existing private-sector professorial job
descriptions.
- Sabbaticals should not be automatic, but awarded in a system of unrestricted
results-oriented competition.
- Individual ability, not pay equity, should determine questions of academic remuneration.
"This is an arduous task that may require provinces to amend legislative acts governing universities to force these reforms on recalcitrant faculty unions and faint-hearted administrations. But taken together, these policies would do much to give Canadians the kinds of universities they both need and deserve," concludes Rubenstein
Established in 1974, The Fraser Institute is an independent public policy organization based in Vancouver, with offices in Calgary and Toronto.
For further information or for a copy of Rewarding University Professors: A Performance-Based Approach contact:
Suzanne Walters, Director of Communications,
The Fraser Institute, (604) 714-4582,
Email suzannew@fraserinstitute.ca
The media release and publication can be viewed on the web site at www.fraserinstitute.ca.
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