More than 100 instructors at Front Range Community College waited anywhere from a few days to a couple of weeks for their June paychecks due to an administrative error.
Melinda Myrick, the co-president of FRCC’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said some instructors filed for unemployment and can’t pay rent, while others are considering finding employment elsewhere.
“A lot of our faculty kind of piece together a living because they can’t get full-time living on our campuses,” Myrick said, adding, “If an administrative mistake like this happens and they don’t get paid, they can’t pay their bills.”
There were 21 people at FRCC’s campus in Longmont who didn’t get their paychecks on time. At the Fort Collins campus, there were 33; at Westminster, there were 51. The 105 who experienced the delay are out of approximately 325 total summer instructors. Instructors make up the majority of professors at FRCC.
“FRCC sincerely apologizes for the inconvenience and stress the error has caused,” FRCC Vice President of Academic Affairs and Provost Rebecca Woulfe said in a statement.
“Our instructors are the backbone of our institution, and the college is committed to providing the support and resources needed to resolve this issue promptly. Everyone here values their hard work and dedication to our students and community, and the college is taking all necessary measures to prevent any such delays in the future.”
Roughly half of the instructors had their pay delayed for four days and were paid on June 18. The other half experienced a two-week delay, receiving their paychecks on June 28. The pay date was supposed to be June 14. The college paid everyone who was impacted an additional $500 stipend.
According to FRCC Communications Director Jessica Peterson, the default date for instructors to get paid within the Colorado Community College System is one month into the summer semester. This has been the standard operating procedure for years.
This year, the first pay date would have been June 28. To pay instructors sooner, FRCC manually entered the system to override that date and get instructors an additional paycheck two weeks earlier. This year, the manual change was not made on some of the entries, due to human error.
The June paycheck delays come after additional pay delays in the spring and fall, affecting 12 and two instructors, respectively.
“Some of the delays last fall were due to the instructors’ supervisor being in a new position and having difficulty getting the necessary permissions for pay approval in our system,” Peterson wrote in an email. “This is a training issue that the college takes full responsibility for, and we have since resolved. In the spring, there was an upgrade to the computer system that CCCS colleges use for payroll, and there were some changes that had unintended consequences.”
Myrick said all the pay delays add a level of stress on faculty that compounds.
“Our goal here is that Front Range finally commits to fixing this,” she said, adding, “It puts some of our colleagues in a very precarious position.”
All of FRCC’s summer instructors have been fully paid as of June 28. For a few instructors who were experiencing more serious difficulties, FRCC issued additional $500 emergency grants through the Front Range Community College Foundation.
Peterson said FRCC is engaging in team restructuring, process reviews and meetings with the Colorado Community College System to prevent it from happening again.
“FRCC is taking these incidents very seriously and is taking immediate and comprehensive steps to address the situation,” Peterson wrote. “The college is reviewing our processes and systems to prevent any such delays in the future.”
