Background

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The data in this report are drawn from the University and College Academic Staff Survey (UCASS). Conducted since 1946, UCASS presents a national picture of the socio-economic characteristics of full-time university teachers in degree-granting institutions. The survey is conducted annually, with a reference date of October 1. Therefore, the data collected through this survey present a snapshot of full-time teaching staff as of that date.

This report presents information on the salaries of full-time teaching staff at 20 Canadian universities, along with information on salary scales for the 2007- 2008 academic year. In 2005-06 (the last year for which final data on full-time teaching staff is available) these institutions accounted for 27% of the full-time teaching staff of the 116 institutions that were included in the survey.

It should be noted that many factors can influence salaries, including qualifications and number of years teaching. As well, some universities impose a maximum to the salary range for each rank while others have an open-ended scale.

A note on confidentiality

The University and College Academic Staff Survey is conducted under the Statistics Act. To release data at the institutional level, institutions must authorize Statistics Canada to release their information. Furthermore, to ensure the confidentiality of individuals, Statistics Canada will not release data at the institutional level for any institution with fewer than 100 full-time teaching staff. For institutions with more than 100 staff, the data is available at the institutional level however, information is processed in such a way that results are not shown where there are too few individuals.

Due to the Statistics Act which, in part, prohibits the identification of individuals, a number of measures have been taken to ensure that no one individual or their salary can be identified or extrapolated. Information is processed in such a way that the mean is not shown when the given rank contains less than six (6) people and medians and percentiles are not calculated when there are less than 10 people.

Salaries of full-time teaching staff at Canadian universities and colleges

The following tables present, for each of the universities listed below, the number of full-time teaching staff, along with their average and median salaries.

In addition, as a measure of distribution, the salary at the 10th and 90th percentile is given. In other words, the teaching staff is ranked by salary from lowest to highest and divided into ten even groups; the values presented in the table are the cutoff points for the lowest and highest 10% of the distribution.

Target population

The target population of this survey is full-time teaching staff in degree-granting institutions who are under contract for twelve months or more. This includes all teachers within faculties, academic staff in teaching hospitals, visiting academic staff in faculties and research staff who have an academic rank and salary similar to teaching staff. Administrative and support staff and librarians are excluded, as are staff solely engaged in research. Teaching and research assistants are also excluded.

The salary represents the reported annual rate of pay plus administrative stipends, if any, for all reported faculty members, including those on sabbatical leave.

Notes on terms used in the tables

In the following tables, the title Canadian Universities and Colleges refers to degreegranting institutions. The column labelled Numbers refers to the number of teachers included in the salary calculations, that is, the average, the median and the 10th and 90th percentiles.

The column labelled Excluded shows the number of teachers at the institution who are excluded from the salary calculations. This group consists of:

• deans
• directors equivalent to deans i.e. directors who have significant administrative responsibilities
• staff not paid according to regular salary scales
• staff on leave of absence
• visiting professors

Note that while deans and directors equivalent to deans are not counted in the salary calculations for specific ranks, they are included in the category All ranks combined, and in the breakdown of this comprehensive category by gender.

The sum of the two columns Numbers and Excluded yields the total number of full-time teachers by rank at the institution.

Full professors and associate professors are subdivided into those with and without senior administrative duties. Assistant deans, associate deans, vice-deans, directors not equivalent to deans, department heads, coordinators and chairpersons are classified as with senior administrative duties. Persons in these posts are included in the salary calculations.

The category rank below assistants refers to the next rank directly below that of an Assistant professor. Institutions use a variety of terms to label this position however, in many institutions lecturers are included here. The category rank below preceding covers the remaining full-time teachers (in many cases instructors) with the exception of Other teaching staff which refers to ungraded staff.

Salary scales for university teachers

The final table in this report presents 2007-2008 salary scales for full-time university teachers. The 15 institutions included in this table are those that reported their scales by the middle of March, 2008. Note that the institutions included in this table are not a subset of the institutions covered in the salary tables.

All universities for which information is included here reported their salary scales as final.