UVa’s Faculty Hiring Strategy

UVa's faculty recruitment strategy revealedEvery so often, “Virginia,” the University of Virginia alumni magazine, runs articles shedding light on the administration of Mr. Jefferson’s university. The latest issue focuses on the challenge of replacing some 300 aging faculty members and recruiting 100 more as part of its five-year hiring plan.

The university underwent a hiring boom in the 1970s when the university was expanding to accommodate the Baby Boom generation. Now the young guns hired four decades ago are old dues on the verge of retirement. Not only must UVa replace a large cohort of senior professors, it has to compete against other universities doing the same thing.

UVa is adopting two newish strategies to reshape its faculty. The first is “clustering,” which is hiring up to seven professors in multidisciplinary fields. The idea is that innovation, insight and academic breakthroughs often occur at the intersection of disciplines — such as neuroscience and traumatic brain injury, an area that UVa has targeted.

“The best way to build strength in an interdisciplinary field like the brain and neuroscience, says Provost Tom Katsouleas, “is to bring together the top talent and best minds from departments that touch on that across the University.”

The other strategy is to stay open to a “TOPs hire” — a target of opportunity hire — that would pick up a superstar faculty member even if the university isn’t actively searching in his or her field.

The UVa administration has made it a priority to increase the prestige of university faculty in its bid to become renowned as a “top ten” university. The turnover in tenured professors gives it a once-in-a-generation chance to make big gains. Of course, hiring top faculty costs money — significantly more than the university could afford on a standard state pay scale. Salaries must be supplemented by endowments, foundation grants or other sources such as the university’s controversial $2.2 billion Strategic Investment Fund.

As a Virginia taxpayer, UVa alumnus and interested citizen, I’d like to know how much money UVa has set aside for recruitment, and where the money will come from. Faculty salaries must compete with other priorities such as administration, buildings & grounds, and, of course, affordability. Unfortunately, the article does not provide any numbers that would enable stakeholders to evaluate the hiring initiative. Perhaps that information falls in the domain of “competitive intelligence” and the UVa administration is reluctant to share it. But if UVa wants to maintain the trust of the public, it needs to make that information available.