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wednesday February 27, 2013
The Independent Student Voice of UNM since 1895
Sexual assaults prompt early safety walk Walks identify places with weak safety on campus by Ardee Napolitano
… they have to get involved and ask questions about things.” The University started conducting campus safety walks in the 1990s, but the student community lost interest on it. The walks were canceled for four years but started up again in fall 2010 after a woman was stabbed outside the Anthropology Building earlier that year. Burford said he now organizes campus safety walks once every semester, the last of which was in November. Safety walk participants inspect campus lighting, the upkeep of buildings, the functionality of the blue-light phones and the crosswalks around campus. He said that despite the recent increase in sexual assaults on campus, he still believes that the campus is safe. “I don’t think we lack any features,” he said. “I think the campus is safe at night just as how it is during the day. I just think we need to educate our students with the resources and information that we already have.” About 10 UNMPD officers, members of the student patrol and about 50 UNM students participated in the safety walk. Oma E-Nunu, a resident adviser in Laguna Hall who participated, said RAs are required to attend the walk every semester. E-Nunu said that although the increase in UNM security was fairly recent, he thinks the University is doing its best to help to
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In response to the recent sexual assaults on campus, the University decided to conduct this semester’s campus safety walk earlier than usual. Dean of Students Student Conduct Officer Robert Burford said the University was supposed to hold the safety walk by the end of March or early April but moved it to Tuesday night. Due to the sexual assaults, the University needed to assess the safety of the campus immediately, he said. “It was unfortunate that (the assaults) happened,” he said. “But hopefully we can bring some good from those incidents.” The first of the recent sexual assaults happened Jan. 27, when two men allegedly groped a female student at Johnson Field under her clothes. The second assault happened Feb. 4, when a man allegedly groped a female student over her clothes near Castetter Hall. Burford said the safety walk is the students’ opportunity to make suggestions regarding campus safety to the administration. He said it also makes students aware of the safety features of the campus. “It’s hard to stop every single thing from happening here on campus, but we got to make sure we get the whole community to be aware,” he said. “If they see something that doesn’t look right
Garrett Goeckner / Daily Lobo Resident adviser Oma E-Nunu, left, and risk management supervisor for Sigma Chi dorms Will Rael document faulty lights near Dane Smith Hall during the UNM campus safety walk on Tuesday night. The students volunteered to survey the campus after hours to identify unsafe parts of campus that need attention to ensure the safety of students and faculty. prevent similar cases from happening. Still, he said the University could use more patrols from officers. “If it wasn’t for all these groping incidents that happened, I don’t think we would have more security,” he said. “But I think they’re making a very honest effort so they can ensure the campus is safe.” E-Nunu said he found five
broken lights around Dane Smith Hall. He said he wants the University to put more lights in to prevent more assaults from happening, especially on the west side of campus, around the Engineering Building and along the pathway from Mitchell Hall to Castetter Hall. “Most of these assaults, I assume, happen in the dark,” he said. “If they put more lights
around campus and have people do more rounds, I think everybody should be fine.” Burford said he expects the results gathered from the walk to be evaluated in the following weeks. He said the University will work to fix the issues as soon as possible, and that it will seek more funding from the Legislature for projects that it plans to start regarding campus safety.
by Ross Kelbley
structional faculty. UNM ranked low in this category as well. For the second part of the proposal, Abdallah prepared a plan for UNM to catch up in five years, assuming other institutions only increase salaries in accordance with cost-of-living adjustments. Those adjustments are yearly increases, regardless of performance, which allow employees to maintain a standard of living. Most of this plan consists of 5 percent raises each year for five years, but part of it is also devoted to performance-based compensation. “It means that not everyone will get the same raise but instead will be evaluated individually,” Abdallah said. “Academic units have metrics they use to compare faculty … such metrics must weigh teaching, research and service. In particular, good teaching must be rewarded.” One consideration missing from the proposal was where the money for increased salaries would come from. “The plan only proposed what the salaries should be, not a source of funding at the direct request of the Board of Regents. In other words, I was not tasked, nor did I
UNM behind most peers in professor compensation Comparison of professor salaries 2011-2012 average salaries for a nine-month contract ALL FACULTY
PROFESSOR
ASSOC. PROF.
University of Virginia
$110,871
$141,629
$94,986
$80,270
UNM
$78,644
$102, 564
$74,739
$66,905
Percent difference
30%
28%
22%
17%
University of Iowa
$96,103
$130,025
$86,372
$74,081
UNM
$78,644
$102, 564
$74,739
$66,905
Percent difference
19%
22%
14%
10%
University of Arizona
$90,782
$119,892
$81,845
$70,771
UNM
$78,644
$102, 564
$74,739
$66,905
Percent difference
14%
15%
9%
6%
University of Utah
$85,878
$119,568
$82,889
$72,323
UNM
$78,644
$102, 564
$74,739
$66,905
Percent difference
9%
15%
10%
8%
University of Missouri-Columbia
$77,314
$114,060
$75,855
$61,960
UNM
$78,644
$102, 564
$74,739
$66,905
Percent difference
1%
11%
2%
1%
Inside the
Daily Lobo volume 117
issue 110
ASSISTANT PROF.
Express yourself
Time for fashion
see Page 3
see Page 8
news@dailylobo.com UNM lags behind all its peer institutions when it comes to average faculty pay for full professors, associate professors and assistant professors. Provost Chaouki Abdallah released a communiqué on Jan. 30 announcing the completion of a proposal to increase employee compensation and bring faculty salaries in line with those of peer institutions. UNM President Robert Frank and the Board of Regents requested the plan in the fall. “We were, and still are, losing faculty members to other institutions partly because of salary differences,” Abdallah said. The proposal was constructed using data from surveys of average faculty salaries at 16 peer institutions. The results of the surveys show that UNM’s average faculty salaries range from $7,000-$21,000 less than those of other comparable universities for professors, associate professors, and assistant professors on average. The survey also ranked the peer public research universities by their total number of full-time in-
see Compensation PAGE 6
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