WATERLOO - President Greg Schmitz on Tuesday said nearly two-thirds of Hawkeye Community College's federal stimulus money will be spent on hiring instructors for this fall.

The college is receiving about $1.8 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds after state cuts reduced the 2009-10 budget by a similar amount.

"We're going to spend the majority on faculty-related expenditures," Schmitz told the Board of Trustees. A proposed budget showed 59 percent of the total, or $1.07 million, would pay for hiring faculty.

Six full-time instructors will be hired at an estimated cost of $420,000. One of those instructors will be for a new health care program in physical therapy assisting or occupational therapy assisting. Officials are "still looking at program needs" to determine where to hire the five other full-time instructors, said Vice President of Academic Affairs Linda Allen.

The remaining $645,900 to be used on faculty will pay for hiring adjunct instructors. Officials say among those new hires will be some of the 43 instructors whose jobs were eliminated last spring to help deal with a $1.7 million state funding cut.

The instructors include 10 full-time and 33 regular part-time faculty, who don't teach a full class load and have a lower pay rate than their full-time counterparts. Adjuncts are given even more limited class loads and a lower pay rate than regular part-time faculty.

"Many individuals indicated their interest to continue teaching at Hawkeye as adjuncts," said Allen.

In the meantime, 31 regular part-time and seven full-time faculty filed grievances over the termination process. Their cases are currently being scheduled for arbitration.

"So the time frame on that is unknown, but it won't be before the start of school," said Galen Howsare, vice president of finance and administration. Trustees won't vote on the proposed terminations of the instructors unless and until the college wins the arbitration. As a result, some of those instructors will return next month as adjuncts but not in the positions they held last year.

Schmitz said $410,550 in stimulus funds will be used for student tuition and fee containment during the next year. The money will allow the college to use $420,000 in non-stimulus funds to continue paying for the six additional full-time instructors during 2010-11.

Another $288,000, or 16 percent of the total, is being used to offset insurance increases for the college's three employee groups. Use of a remaining $30,593 in stimulus money is undetermined.

Schmitz said two additional full-time faculty members are being hired without the use of stimulus funds. The cost of the other new health care instructor is being privately funded by an anonymous donor. A combined instructor and coordinator position for the Engineering and Manufacturing Careers Consortium program will be funded through economic development dollars through Hawkeye's Center for Business and Industry.

Schmitz warned there may be additional funding cuts this fall or early next year.