College president's salaries

Maybe some greedy bankers should take note of the actions of some college presidents.

"Pay Rises for Leaders of Colleges, Survey Says"

by

Jacques Steinberg

January 18th, 2010

The New York Times

Many of the nation’s public universities eliminated courses and raised tuition last year, but the salaries and benefits of their presidents continued to rise, though at a slower rate than in years past, a new study has found.

In its ninth annual examination of the pay of 185 public university leaders, The Chronicle of Higher Education reported Monday that the median rose to $436,111 in 2008-9, an increase of 2.3 percent when compared with the year before. (When adjusted for inflation, The Chronicle said, the median increase was 1.1 percent.)

By contrast, in the previous four years, The Chronicle said, public university leaders’ salaries and benefits rose, on average, by at least 7.5 percent each year, and, in 2005, by 19 percent.

Jeffrey J. Selingo, editor of The Chronicle, said in a statement that while the increases of past years had “riled parents, students and politicians,” it was most likely “the bad economy and the fiscal crisis facing many states” that “finally put a halt to these large pay increases.”

The Chronicle said that “for the first time in recent history,” the base salaries of the leaders of more than one-third of the institutions surveyed “stopped growing” last year, and that 10 percent of the presidents received less compensation over all than they did a year earlier.

Still, the largest compensation packages are unlikely to provide much comfort to students and families that have seen tuition rise or financial aid fall, or to professors who may have received pay cuts or even lost their jobs.

As in 2008, E. Gordon Gee, president of Ohio State University, topped the Chronicle’s ranking for 2009, with an annual compensation package valued at nearly $1.6 million.

He was followed by Mark A. Emmert of the University of Washington ($905,000); Patrick T. Harker of the University of Delaware ($810,600); John T. Casteen III of the University of Virginia ($797,050); and Francisco G. Cigarroa of the University of Texas ($787,260).

The Chronicle also calculated the pay of the leaders of 64 community colleges, and identified the three who were paid the most last year: Eduardo J. Padrón of Miami Dade College ($548,460); Michael B. McCall of the Kentucky Community College and Technical College system ($532,910); and Orlando J. George Jr. of Delaware Technical and Community College ($450,070).

In November, The Chronicle listed the top-earning presidents of private colleges and universities for 2007-8, and found that 23 earned over $1 million. (The highest-paid private college president, Shirley Ann Jackson of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., received about $1.6 million.)

At that time, Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, criticized private colleges and their leaders for being out of step “with the reality for most parents and students who are trying to pay for college in the midst of high unemployment and after savings for education were either wiped out or greatly diminished.”

The salary survey did say that “a growing number of presidents” have given money back to their institutions and cited Mr. Gee of Ohio State among them.

“Last year,” The Chronicle reported, Mr. Gee “donated $320,850 from a university bonus to help endow a scholarship fund. This year, he paid the costs for a student majoring in music.”

Other leaders who have rejected performance bonuses or other proposed increases in recent months, The Chronicle said, include Sally K. Mason of the University of Iowa and Gregory L. Geoffroy of Iowa State and Mary Sue Coleman of the University of Michigan.