Waubonsee full-time faculty get raises in new contract

Waubonsee Community College's full-time faculty will receive raises of 4 percent under a three-year contract trustees approved Wednesday night.

But they will have to start paying part of the premium for their health insurance starting Jan. 1.

The contract covers instructors, assistant professors, associate professors, professors, counselors and librarians. It calls for raises in base pay of 3.5 percent in the second year and 3.5 percent in the third year.

The faculty will have to pay 5 percent of the individual employee health insurance premium in 2014 and 2015 and 10 percent in 2016.

The contribution for dependent coverage remains the same: 10 percent of the premium, minus the equivalent of the individual employee premium.

In the last year of the old contract, which expired June 30, an instructor with just a bachelor's degree, in their first year of teaching at Waubonsee, made a base of $41,365; that goes up now to $43,639 this year and $44,715 in 2015.

A professor with a doctorate who is making $103,873 will see the salary rise to $105,545 in the first year of the new contract and $115,961 in the third year.

Waubonsee has 116 full-time faculty this year. It has about 550 adjunct faculty, who are not covered by the contract.

Waubonsee Community College Faculty Council 604, which is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers, negotiated the contract. Members ratified it the week of June 28.

Negotiations began in February.

The contract, just like the last one, has a no-strike clause.

David Quillen, the college's executive vice president of finance and operations, said negotiations went more smoothly this time than they did for the last contract. That one was settled 9 months past expiration.