College Board OKs Early Retirement Plan : Education: Community college district offers 43% of full-time instructors an incentive package. Financial strains and a desire to diversify the faculty prompt the move.

In a move aimed at revitalizing academic programs and saving money, trustees of the Los Angeles Community College District have voted to offer faculty members an early retirement package that could produce one of the district’s largest shake-ups in years.

Under the plan adopted this week by a 5-0 vote, 43% of the district’s full-time 1,683 tenured faculty members--those 55 or older--would be eligible for early retirement incentives. District officials said up to 300 of the 719 eligible teachers, about 18% of the total faculty, might accept the offer.

The nine-campus, 101,000-student district has suffered financially in recent years, in part because of declining enrollment. The district also has an unusually large proportion of older instructors. Many joined the faculty more than 25 years ago during the system’s rapid growth in the 1960s and early 1970s.

District officials expect to save money with the buyout plan. The cost of providing the retirement bonuses to faculty members would be more than offset by the savings from replacing veteran instructors at top pay scale with younger, lower-paid teachers.

Another goal is to diversify the ethnic makeup of the full-time faculty, which is about 70% white, although the district’s students are 75% minority. District officials hope that the new faculty will allow the district to update and reorder its class offerings.

The outcome of the retirement proposal will not be known for several months. District teachers will have one chance to apply this fall and another near the end of the spring semester. The district has set a minimum of 150 retirement applications in order to put the program into practice.

At present, a top-scale faculty member without a doctorate earns an annual salary of about $50,550. Under the plan, faculty members taking early retirement would have an extra 7% of their final basic salary added to their retirement pension in a lifetime annuity. For an instructor age 60 with 30 years of experience, that would add about $3,500 a year to an annual retirement pension of about $30,330.

Part of the savings would come from a provision that requires the district to replace only 75% of the retiring full-time faculty within an 18-month period. The other 25% could remain vacant or be filled with less expensive part-time instructors.

The district could save about $20 million over 10 years--most of that in years five through 10--if 165 teachers retired and the district replaced 75% of them with full-time instructors, filled 12.5% of the jobs with part-timers and left 12.5% vacant, said Robert Standen, vice chancellor for human resources.

Among the campuses, according to district records, Harbor College in Wilmington has the largest share of faculty--49%--who are 55 or older. Close behind are two San Fernando Valley campuses--Valley College in Van Nuys with 48% and Pierce College in Woodland Hills with 46% each.