Austin Community College Faculty Senate asks for 8.5% raise; college proposes 4.5%

Austin Community College employees are asking for an 8.5% across-the-board raise ― almost double ACC's proposed 4.5% raise ― to account for inflation and cost of living before the board could potentially vote on the budget July 1.

“We faculty are here for our students. We’re not here for the money, but we do need that to survive,” Juan Molina, Faculty Senate president, told the board June 3. “We need that to live.”

Last month, after hearing testimony from employees about the need for greater investment in their pay, trustees asked Chief Financial Officer Neil Vickers if he could present how ACC could meet the proposed 8.5% raise. Both he and Molina will have presentations Monday. The board is required to approve the budget before Sept. 1.

Under ACC policy, the college calculates raises based on market rate. Vickers said the college also considers cost-of-living factors and national inflation, though that is not codified in its policy. Molina said the proposed 4.5% raise is not enough to keep up with the last several years of inflation that have created an “erosion” of salary values.

“We hope that you include us in the priorities for the college,” Molina said to the board.

The next ACC board meeting will be 4 p.m. Monday at the Highland Campus.

What raises has ACC had before?

A 5% raise was passed in 2022 after employee advocacy and soaring inflation. The compensation package was about double the previous year, an ACC news release said at the time, bringing the minimum wage up by 28%. An additional 6% raise passed last July brought ACC’s minimum hourly wage up to $22 ― above the University of Texas’ lowest hourly staff wage and the city’s declared living wage of $20.80.

Both years, the lowest-paid employees received additional boosts, and employees making more than $100,000 received the lowest boost. Vickers said this was an intentional distribution of resources by the board.

Is the cost of living rising?

But Faculty Senate leaders said inflation impacted employees anyway.

The Faculty Senate calculated that an 8.5% raise would help all employees “catch up" and access a better quality of living, Molina said.

Vickers said the 4.5% proposed raise exceeds comparable community colleges surveyed and national inflation, which the U.S. Labor Department currently puts at 3.3%. According to data from the Texas Community College Teachers Association, ACC ranks in the top three for faculty salaries among the nine metro community colleges, aligning with ACC policy.

"We haven't found anybody that's doing more than 4.5% in our market," Vickers said.

David Albert, an ACC adjunct professor and the chapter president of the American Federation of Teachers union, said ACC’s proposed raise doesn’t account for the expiration of federal pandemic aid such as pauses on student loans, Austin’s higher expenses relative to other Texas cities or the extra work many staffers do to meet student needs.

“The quality of the education that we're delivering is dependent on employees having real opportunities,” Albert said. “When our employees have to work three jobs, they can't be there for the students in the same way.”

Though there is no inflation measure for just Austin, housing prices ― which skyrocketed during the pandemic and accounts for about a third of inflation ― have reportedly decreased this year, said Jeremy Martin, president of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce. Martin added that prices for utilities, food and transportation in Austin are also “at or below the national average.”

Martin said the drop in housing prices suggests that Austin's inflation rate is lower than the rest of the country's.

He added that the Council for Community and Economic Research says Austin’s cost of living is 1% above the national average.

Is it enough?

Amber Luttig-Buonodono, president of the Adjunct Faculty Association and an adjunct professor in English, said small fluctuations in costs affect adjuncts greatly because they are paid less than full-time faculty, a standard practice in academia at large, on the assumption they are working another job.

“But now with the way academia works, there are a lot of professional adjuncts who have this as our sole source of income, so going into this year’s compensation increase, we are very vulnerable economically,” Luttig-Buonodono said.

The Board of Trustees approved an additional week of pay for adjuncts in 2023 for preparation work, and Luttig-Buonodono said she hopes the board continues to consider adjunct professors' needs.

Annie Marks, an adjunct professor who typically teaches one American Sign Language Interpretation class a semester, testified before the board on June 3 about the need for greater compensation to accommodate the extra work employees do to meet students’ needs and course expectations.

“I can spend 10 hours a week just grading and reading and giving feedback on my student’s video work. And that doesn't include the time in the classroom and time planning for your class every week,” she said.

Marks also freelances as an interpreter part time, but securing a full-time job would "inhibit" her from working at ACC, she told the board.

Marks currently lives with her parents because she can't afford to live on her own in Austin, she said, and is a new nondriver due to a medical condition. The closest bus route would take a nearly three-hour commute, she said.

She calculated that a 4.5% raise to her paycheck would pay for one-way ride-hailing service trips, she said, but an 8.5% would cover both ways. Though Marks' situation is unique, she said the raise could transform many people’s lives.

“It’s just really important to consider what honoring that work looks like,” Marks said.

Vickers said the college has intentionally committed to compensating employees well and hopes faculty know how much they mean to ACC.

“Clearly ACC cares deeply about its employees, because look at all of the creativity, the effort and the money that ACC did put into … compensation,” Vickers said. “They are the best-paid community college faculty in the state of Texas, and that is intentional.”

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Before budget vote, ACC workers advocate for greater raise