Compensation

yellow flower in the foreground with people walking in the background

Our staff play an integral role in the fulfillment of Swarthmore's mission, creating and maintaining the foundation that supports the College's rigorous educational experience. Our compensation system supports the hiring and retention of excellent employees, and our culture challenges them to contribute in meaningful ways to the mission of the College. Working at Swarthmore offers an inclusive community, a collegial and intellectual atmosphere, and access to a range of resources. We encourage continued professional growth among our staff, strive to retain our internal talent, believe it is important to recognize superior contributions by our staff and faculty. 

In order to attract and retain our talented staff, we are focused on maintaining both wages and a robust benefits package are competitive with other employers. A Swarthmore College employee's total compensation includes their annual base salary paid in monthly or biweekly, and the value of College benefits, such as health, life, and long term disability insurance, retirement plan contributions, and plans such as employee educational assistance, and tuition grants for staff children.

Swarthmore's salary system aims to:

  • Retain and motivate a highly qualified staff through a competitive compensation system.
  • Evaluate jobs consistently, fairly and communicate findings to the staff.
  • Regularly measure the external market value for comparable jobs and adjust the salary structures accordingly.
  • Place staff positions in the appropriate pay grade with salary ranges that are competitive with the marketplace for comparable jobs.
  • Be inclusive, fair, and non-discriminatory

Human Resources participates in numerous local, regional and national salary and benefit surveys in order to establish and maintain competitive salary levels within the marketplace. Swarthmore's marketplace reflects our recruiting practice and is defined as local for non exempt staff, local/regional for entry to mid level exempt staff and regional/national for director level and above. Human Resources researches data from general industry and education in establishing and maintaining our competitive salary levels.