A growing wage gap between public and private colleges, coupled with the increased reliance on part-time instructors, threatens to degrade academic quality at certain universities, according to a new report from the American Association of University Professors [1] (AAUP), says the Huffington post. The average pay for all types of professors, instructors and lecturers is $84,303 for the academic year 2012-13, but the report noted a big difference between public and private colleges [2]. At public institutions, the average is $80,578, while at private schools, it’s $99,771. For a full professor, the average salary [2] at a private university this year is $139,620, a notable hike over the average $110,143 at public colleges, and that difference has been growing. The AAUP report attributes the lower compensation at public institutions to declining state support [3] and says that public schools are at risk of losing their brightest faculty to private institutions…