The University of Wyoming has not given a pay raise to its faculty and staff in four years now and the board of trustees is concerned that scrimping on salaries has begun to adversely affect the education the university offers. David Bostrom, the president of the UW Board of Trustees, says that employee salaries don’t just need to compete state-wide but must also compete nationally and internationally within their fields.
“We believe that, if the University of Wyoming is going to become a tier one institution,” Bostrom says, “especially in the areas of engineering and stem-related fields as we have asked to become by the legislature and the governor’s task force, we have to have tier one teachers, researchers, those kinds of people.”
The board of trustees will vote Friday on a budget proposal to present to Governor Matt Mead requesting a four percent pay increase. Other solutions to the lack of pay raises might be a moderate tuition hike or the reallocation of funds within the university’s own coffers.