CASHING IN AT COLLEGES
The number of university bosses making $500,000 continues to climb
BY KEN WARD

Ken Ward is opinion page editor of the Press Journal in Vero Beach, Fla. A Las Vegas resident from 1990-2002, he was a freelance columnist with the R-J and assistant managing editor at the Sun. E-mail him at kenricward@juno.com  Other stories by Ken Ward

Times may be tight for public university students, but college CEOs are feeling no pain. Amid steady annual tuition increases and over-enrolled classes that often delay graduation, presidents at four-year public universities keep padding their record-setting paychecks.

Since 2003, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the number of college bosses making $500,000 has doubled. Of 182 public university presidents, 155 earn more than $300,000. Only two make less than $200,000.

The presidents at UNR and UNLV make $455,909 and $449,362 respectively. That’s more than triple what Gov. Jim Gibbons earns.

Even more bizarre, there’s absolutely no correlation between academic excellence and compensation. Milton Glick (UNR) and David Ashley (UNLV) each make more than the presidents at leading institutions such as UC Berkeley, University of Massachusetts, University of Missouri, University of North Carolina and the University of Wisconsin — to name just five.

Conversely, does it make any sense for UNR and UNLV to trail the likes of Akron, Texas Tech, Kent State and Georgia State?

The report highlights another anomaly. Just as the Chronicle notes record salary increases by public university presidents, another study finds that their faculty are slipping. Full professors at Ph.D.-granting public universities make just 78 percent of what their counterparts earned at Ivy League colleges last year. The figure was 91 percent in the early 1980s, according to the American Association of University Professors.

Florida may be the strangest place of all. Three of its college presidents rank in the top 10 — even as their poverty-pleading schools freeze freshman enrollment and slap students with a 5 percent tuition hike. Meanwhile, according to the United Faculty of Florida, salaries for the state’s college instructors average $10,000 to $20,000 below their colleagues nationally.

Adding to the absurdity, five Florida community college presidents pull down more than $300,000 annually.

As H.L. Mencken presciently put it: “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t do either, administrate.”

Public colleges at the top of national academic standings can at least make a performance-based case for fat presidential paychecks. Yet universities in Florida rate poorly in per-student support, and Nevada’s two universities are typically relegated to third-tier or “regional” rankings in U.S. News & World Report.

Obviously, trickle-down economics doesn’t apply in the executive suites. At some point, though, this feather-bedding will reach a point of diminishing returns.

Hubris and greed brought down well-heeled CEOs at Merrill Lynch, Yahoo, Home Depot and others. If universities cannot get their houses in order, they invite a similar backlash. Restive over government spending, taxpayers are in no mood for profligate Ivory Tower elitism.

Since many states cap the tax dollars they will contribute to presidential pay, college foundations are picking up more of the tab. That’s fine — after all, that’s how most big-time coaches get their paychecks, which are even bigger.

But presidential compensation packages need to be coherently structured to reward those campus leaders who increase private support, endowments, grants, etc., with the overriding goal of efficiently educating students.

This requires much more than playing slick marketing commercials during basketball games. A chief executive who can’t achieve ambitious academic objectives deserves neither donors’ respect nor support — whatever his or her salary.

Rather than fixating on their personal rewards, university presidents ought to refocus their talents and energies on selfless public service. That begins with bolstering student support and pushing forward with cost-saving innovations like distance learning. It’s time public universities got their priorities straight, starting at the top.