By Justin Muszynski

CCSU is searching to fill 38 tenure-track positions for the fall that are open either because of retirements or emergency hires that will be concluding.

Twenty three of these positions were approved early last semester by President Jack Miller. The other 15 were added shortly before the end of 2011.

“For the past two years, because of the budget crisis, President Miller adopted a strategy of filling more faculty positions than usual with emergency appointments,” said Carl Lovitt, the Provost. “The reason for doing so was his reluctance to make tenure-track offers to incoming faculty members that he was not sure we would have the resources to make long-term employment commitments.”

Miller says being able to hire tenure-track faculty is more about finding someone fully qualified than it is about finding money in the budget for it.

“These positions being tenure earning as opposed to short term commitments are far more about being honest with people concerning their potential future at the University than they are about cost,” said Miller. “There is no significant cost difference between ‘emergency’ hires and tenure line hires.  Thus this is really about honesty in terms of the potential length of the commitment the University can make to an individual.”

The desire by many faculty members for the university hire more professors will not be accomplished by these positions because they are simple filling what would be vacancies.

“None of the positions are ‘new,’ they are either replacing an emergency hire or replacing a tenure track faculty member who resigned, retired, etc.,” said Anne Alling, the Chief Human Resources Officer.

However, these positions will address the issue CCSU has had for the past three years in regards to the increase in emergency appointments.

“Over five years, our average number of emergency appointments at CCSU was around 40,” said Lovitt. “Over the past three years, that number climbed to over 60. When we fill the 38 tenure-track searches the President approved last semester, we will be well within the previous five year average for emergency appointments.”

The issue of hiring more emergency appointments wasn’t helped by former Gov. Jodie Rell’s two retirement incentive programs that were passed during her administration. This encouraged many state employees, including faculty, to retire sooner than they normally would have. This added to budget cuts the state has been making and made it difficult for CCSU to commit to faculty long-term.

CCSU’s administration isn’t as optimistic as one might think. Lovitt says that while he is glad the university has made room in their budget for these tenure-track positions, it will still face many hardships in the near future due to the economy’s current state.

“It would not be accurate to suggest that we are escaping the effects of the recession,” said Lovitt, who is also the Vice President for Academic Affairs. “The Governor has just imposed a recession on all state agencies, including the state universities, and we are planning for a further recession in 2013. Many non-teaching positions remain vacant as a result of budget cuts, and all operating budgets have been reduced.”

However, he also feels the university will be able to continue on this path in hopes that it will maintain a faculty roster that minimizes emergency-hires.

“Even though it is clear that the state has not fully emerged from its economic difficulties, we believe that our cost cutting measures and careful stewardship of resources over the past few years will enable us to meet our commitments to additional tenure-track hires,” said Lovitt.

Miller says this decision did not need to go through the Board of Regents and was ultimately made by himself along with input from Lovitt.

“These were approved prior to the Board taking full charge, but of course we forward all decisions regarding personnel and budgets to them,” said Miller.

The university hopes to have these positions filled by the fall.

“The desire is to have all the searches completed and the positions filled for Fall 2012, some searches take longer than others, depending on the discipline,” said Alling.