Rehovot Academic Community Wage: Up to NIS 25,000 a Month

For days, 4,500 university teachers have been on strike for better employment terms. They claim to be underpaid and complain of a brain drain. But as happens in the public sector, the first line on their payslip has little to do with their actual pay. Some valuable benefits are omitted.

Here are the figures. Some 4,500 academic staff work at 7 universities: Tel Aviv, Bar-Ilan, Ben-Gurion, Haifa, Hebrew universities, the Weizmann Institute and the Technion. These are divided into four groups: 900 lecturers gross an average of NIS 14,000, 1,300 senior lecturers average NIS 16,000 (gross), 1,000 associate professors earn about NIS 19,000 and 1,300 full professors make a monthly salary of more than NIS 25,000. Since each rank contains elements of seniority which translate into more pay, the wages of two lecturers of the same rank may vary.

On paper, with average wages of senior academic staff earning an average of about NIS 20,000, the data is not encouraging. Although the average salary in Israel is nearly NIS 8,000, academic staff members are highly-educated (at least PhDs), and can be expected to earn more. Nevertheless, based on the average in Israel, this group is in the eighth-highest-earning bracket.

These average wages are only part of the package. Senior lecturers are entitled to just under two months' sabbatical with full pay every year, so that the annual salaries are paid for 10 months of work, raising the average to NIS 24,000. Also, senior lecturers have tenure. Among academic staff, only non-senior lecturers are not entitled to tenure.

But the jewel in the crown is the work hours. It turns out that a lecturer in Israel is in classroom for an average of just 6 hours per week (3 lectures). The rest of their time is supposed to be invested in research. This time is not monitored, and each lecturer is in fact a free agent - a hard working, motivated one will conduct many studies and publish many papers, compared to one who may chose to work at an easier pace. No one actually knows what a lecturer does in the time spent outside the classroom.

And herein also lies one of the problems: an industrious lecturer and one who is not as hard-working are paid in the same manner, so it's no wonder that industrious and talented lecturers leave the country.

Also, the university pays for overseas travel and participation in conferences. A lecturer is entitled to the amount of $3,500, a senior lecturer to $4,500, an associate professor gets $6,000 and a full professor receives more than $8,000 annually. This money is meant, as noted, to be used for overseas travel and participation in academic conferences.

Source: Tal Levy. University wage: Up to NIS 25,000 a month. Haaretz.com (25 October 2007) [FullText]