Posted on 06/05/2009 10:09:44 AM PDT by ancientart
Recent articles have raised questions about whether or not it is ethical for David Chicoine to continue in his position as South Dakota State University president while at the same time receiving $400,000 per year as a member of the Monsanto board of directors.
First of all, it should be noted that Chicoine's $300,000 yearly salary as SDSU president is quite modest by the standards prevailing in academia today. Salaries for university administrators are shooting up at an unprecedented rate. During the 2007-2008 school year, compensation packages for public university presidents averaged $427,000 per year. Topping the list: Ohio State University president E. Gordon Gee whose annual compensation package is $1,346,225.
Why such high salaries? Partly, it's because public universities rely more and more on outside support rather than state financing. Public university presidents have had to become more like private university presidents, constantly in search of new donations. And to command the respect of the movers and shakers able and willing to donate a million dollars here or $5 million there, one has to be a pretty high roller oneself.
But the other reason top education administrators get higher and higher salaries is that the nature of the job has changed.
My dad, a successful administrator in the 1950s and 1960s, adopted the administrative strategy popular at the time in every level of education: find that right person for the job, then get out of the way and let them do it.
That's not the way administration works any longer. Gee explains that his job is to run a complex institution with 40,000 employees - and that that's what justifies his high salary.
Now how does a single individual make all the decisions necessary for running a complex institution? Well, first of all, you need information, and lots of it. Get yourself some data, and then more data. And to gather the data and to help you interpret the information, you better have plenty of staff. Further, in order for things to run smoothly, standardization and uniformity are a must.
The trouble is that faculty members aren't going to be happy with any of this. Requests for data and other assessment information will seem to them like a waste of time better spent on teaching, advising and research. Any growth in administrative staff will likewise seem to them a waste of resources. Attempts at standardization and uniformity will look to them like mandated mediocrity: a push for cookie-cutter classes without any room left for the pursuit of excellence. More vocal faculty members will fight such efforts every step of the way, making the job even more difficult.
And while faculty members want more flexibility and a return to faculty governance, the political winds are blowing in a very different direction. State and federal education bureaucrats (and national accrediting agencies) insist on more standardization and more in the way of centralized control - all in the name of accountability.
Caught between irreconcilable forces, university presidents (and administrators in general) have jobs that feel like 10 jobs, and it's no wonder they want correspondingly high compensation packages - and that they'll take advantage of lucrative moonlighting opportunities if they can.
South Dakota taxpayers might rightly resent paying a premium price for a part-time administrator, but it's important to recognize that the situation of the SDSU president isn't an isolated phenomenon. Once one accepts the principal of centralized control and centralized decision making, the deciders and controllers are going to insist on - and get- outsized compensation packages one way or another.
This must not go on... BHO must create a College Pay Czar pronto!!
I remember speaking somewhere to an OSU instructor, who made $36,000/academic year; he was going to have to quit because of it, as the pay didn’t include prep/grading time. IIRC, the highest paid profs at the time were said to earn $80K, specifically in geology. Several CIO and some other director earned over $100K easily. If you look at OSU job availability, earning $80-100 is possible for ‘certain’ people. And coaches.....don’t even go there for the big schools; then again, some programs pay their own ways.
The days are gone for the idea of universities as teaching places. Have been for a very long time.
Good thing they don't get penalized for poor quality.
They have an exceedingly stressful job, and most of them do not last long in a presidency. The really good ones are worth ten times what a good football or basketball coach is worth, but probably get a fourth as much, if that. We used to say in the Corps that aviators on flight pay didn’t really get paid more, they just got the same amount as the rest of us, only quicker. So do most college and university presidents.
The Administration offices compared to the condition of the classrooms, lunchroom and other areas for the students was like comparing the U.S. to third world countries.
The Admin building was like the Taj Mahal surrounded by crumbling classroom building with paint peeling off the walls and overflowing trashcans.
Hey man... I forgot to put the /sarc tag on my post... my opinion is that the private sector should be determining the salaries/benefits rather than the TOTUS... cheers! :)
I agree.
My alma mater (the University of Minnesota) stopped being a institution of higher learning about 15 years ago.
It’s all about money, money, money and grants, grants, grants now.
Actually teaching classes has become a burden for those professors who think their first responsibility is for research.
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