The average wage for all full-time faculty and staff at Loyola is 25% lower than the national average in higher education, according to the 2020 to 2021 compensation survey by the American Association of University Professors.

  The association’s results for the survey found the average salary at Loyola for all full-time faculty and staff to be $77,500. Full-time professors and associate professors make about 25% less than the national average. Over the past several years, Loyola paused faculty retirement contributions and salary raises in order to recover from financial hardships. 

Now that the university is no longer losing money, the university embarked on a compensation study in December of 2021 to try and achieve their goal of more competitive and equitable wages for Loyola’s employees, according to Loyola’s Associate Director of Public Affairs, Patricia Murret. 

The study’s results proved huge gaps in pay between Loyola and other institutions, Murret said, with Loyola’s wages coming in at the low end of the market. 

The first step towards solving the issue will be a one-time payment for all staff earning below the 25th percentile for their position, said Interim University President, the Rev. Justin Daffron, S.J. during a speech to the university this summer. 

Daffron said he hopes to make a more permanent fix to salaries in the upcoming year. Murret said that as of right now, the university is going to be focusing funds towards bonuses for the higher-paid employees whose wages were also behind. The specific details of the Loyola study, along with what exactly the bonuses looked like, will be kept confidential by the university, Murret said.

As of the Fall 2022 convocation in early August, Loyola welcomed 31 new faculty members according to. Tanujah Singh, senior vice president of academic affairs. Student enrollment is growing too, she said, even as it shrinks across the country. The continued growth in enrollment comes as Loyola is just now addressing a lack of growth in wages.

While Murret said the university understood the compensation study might identify gaps that were too large to fix at once, she added that the recently regained financial stability at Loyola has led to the first steps toward the university reaching its goal of competitive and fair wages.