The determining factor in deciding between an F9 vs. an FY appointment for an administrator should be the percentage of effort devoted to administrative duties throughout the year. As a general rule, a SAC may be considered if the faculty member is spending equal to or greater than 50% of his or her time on administrative duties during the fiscal year contract. For example, a Chair is likely to spend at least 50% of his or her time on administrative duties that rise to the level of justifying a SAC. An FY appointment should be considered if administrative duties are well above 50% and continue year round.

Anyone with questions about what appointment type is most appropriate should contact the Office of Faculty Affairs and Services (OFAS) for guidance. You should be prepared to describe the position duties and amount of administrative effort that is expected from the position. Some administrative duties are episodic or de minimus in nature and will not rise to the level or warranting an official administrative appointment or a SAC. Use FHB C140 Extra Compensation processes, e.g., EPAFs, to compensate faculty for occasional administrative work that is not normally part of their regular faculty workload.

Faculty Executives (FE) are hired specifically for year-round academic leadership roles, e.g., provosts, vice presidents, deans, executive directors, etc. These contracts are governed by FHB B3.6.3, Senior Academic Officers, and by UNM's Policy on Contract Employees, UAP 3240.

Administrator appointment offer letter templates are available on the OFAS website.

The preferred means for compensating most faculty members for additional administrative duties will be temporary Special Administrative Components (SACs) via FHB C180, and/or workload adjustments via FHB C100/C110.

During the term of an administrative appointment faculty members should still be considered eligible for compensation increases for meritorious performance to their underlying base (9-month) faculty appointment, in line with what all other faculty on campus are eligible to receive as new revenue is allocated for compensation increases. That way, when the administrative appointment ends and the faculty member reverts to an academic year (F9) classification, an appropriate academic year basis will be in place. If additional compensation for administrative service is appropriate, it should not be permanently added to the regular base salary or retained after the administrative role ends.

Although Executive Faculty have underlying academic appointments, FE salaries are set independent of what the administrator's regular faculty, academic year base salary might be if they held a regular faculty role. Thus FE salaries should fully compensate the administrator for their work without resorting to SACs.

Converting Salaries from F9 to FY and Vice Versa

FHB C50 provides a formula for converting an academic year base salary to a fiscal year base salary, and vice versa. Briefly, an F9 equals 9/9 of an academic year base salary, whereas an FY fiscal year appointment equals 11/9 of an academic year base salary.

SAC's

Most faculty administrators are appropriately compensated by means of their 9-month, academic year (F9) base contract salary, with the addition of a Special administrative compensation component (SAC). SACs are appropriate while administrative roles are in force, particularly in cases where administrators also retain portions of their academic role.

Other faculty administrators may be more appropriately compensated by holding 12-month, fiscal year (FY) contracts, with or without a SAC.

SACs are governed by FHB C180. C180 requires academic units that intend to use SACs to have guidelines in place describing the work for which SACs may be awarded, and the factors that determine compensation rates. Compensation amount should derive from a general standardized payment scale that reflects the work and in the interests of equity should be awarded consistently. Current SAC guidelines are published on the OFAS website.

Special consideration should be given to vacating fiscal year appointments (FY or FE) on June 30th because fiscal year contracts do not provide for deferred compensation throughout the year to provide for a July payroll. In other words, an administrative appointment ending on June 30th with a return to regular academic year appointment in August frequently means no salary is available for the July 31st payroll. Because fiscal year appointments accrue annual leave, administrators may be in a position to cash out up to one month's worth of accrued annual leave for the July payroll. If no annual leave is available, there will not be a paycheck on July 31st and the employee will be billed for their share of benefit premiums such as health insurance. Alternatively, the final term of an administrative appointment can be timed to end on July 31st rather than June 30th.

If a Faculty Executive (FE) also holds an underlying tenured faculty appointment, the academic appointment home will be obligated to provide an academic-year base salary in the event the administrative role should end. The terms and conditions of the executive's return to a regular faculty role, including base salary which will be in effect once the executive appointment ends, should be expressly stated in the initial appointment offer letter.