Posted on 08/24/2002 7:21:28 AM PDT by GailA
UT chief's pay 2nd in U.S. Report ranks public university leaders
By Rebecca Ferrar, News-Sentinel business writer August 24, 2002
University of Tennessee President John W. Shumaker is the second-highest paid public university chief in the nation, according to a new report.
The report compiled by The Chronicle of Higher Education shows Shumaker, whose annual compensation package is $733,550, is second after University of Texas System Chancellor Mark G. Yudof, who is to receive $787,319 for the 2002-2003 year.
In comparison, Shumaker’s predecessor, Wade Gilley, was paid a base salary of $258,000 a year when he resigned from UT.
"As the governor told a group of distinguished leaders and scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (Thursday), you get what you pay for," said Kriste Goad, press secretary for Gov. Don Sundquist, who led the search to find the UT president.
"He knows that some people might criticize the salary package that was put together for Dr. Shumaker, but he is the right person at the right time for the University of Tennessee."
The Chronicle survey, to appear in next week’s editions, was the first to examine salaries of public school heads. It surveyed 131 public research universities and state university systems.
Goad said public university heads have many duties that make them earn their pay.
"They have to be fund-raisers, they have to be chief executive officers, they have to understand academia, they have to deal with government, with the public, with students, so they have to be well-rounded,’’ she said.
But House Education Committee Chairman Les Winningham, D-Huntsville, disagrees.
"I guess if he’s ranked second in the nation, that’s too much money,’’ Winningham said. "I would have been inclined to put the salary somewhat lower and put in incentives on an annual basis to justify a raise. This system was set up by the (UT) board of trustees."
Winningham said the compensation seems especially out of line because UT funding is hurting and Tennessee is ranked 50th in the nation in education.
"We constantly hear about the needs for higher education funding and certainly the University of Tennessee," he said. "There’s more pressure and more requests for increasing funding."
Jim Haslam, the only Knoxville UT trustee who served on the UT president search committee, said the business of higher education chiefs is competitive.
"At this moment in time for UT, it was very important that we get the best possible president, and the board of trustees felt like Dr. Shumaker was the best man for the job and we had to pay the best to get him," Haslam said.
"There’s tremendous demand for capable CEOs of major state research universities, and the demand is more than the supply."
Johnnie Amonette, a UT trustee from Memphis who also served on the search committee, said Shumaker had a "handsome salary" at the University of Louisville.
"We could not expect him to come from a smaller campus at Louisville to a system with five campuses for less money and a lot more responsibility as well," Amonette said. "We really see this as a great investment, not only for the University of Tennessee, but for the entire state."
At Louisville, Shumaker earned an annual compensation of $600,000.
His six-year contract at UT calls for a base salary of $365,000, a $20,000 expense account and a possible yearly bonus of $98,550. A separate agreement with the UT Foundation will provide Shumaker additional benefits worth $250,000 a year. Mary Sue Coleman at the University of Michigan is ranked third in The Chronicle of Higher Education report at $677,500. Texas leads the nation in compensation for public university chiefs, with Yudof leading the pack and three others making the Top 10 in the report.
"Texas is a very ambitious state generally," said Scott Jaschik, editor of The Chronicle of Higher Education. Yudof was pried away from the University of Minnesota in June to lead the Texas school’s 15 campuses.
Other Texas public university executives who made the Top 10 are University of Houston President and System Chancellor Arthur K. Smith, Texas A&M University System Chancellor Howard D. Graves and Texas Tech University System Chancellor David R. Smith.
The survey shows public universities are just playing catch-up with private universities in the compensation game, said Bill Funk, managing director of college-presidential searches for Korn/Ferry International, a Dallas-based executive search firm. Funk was the consultant for the UT search that found Shumaker.
"The publics are having to compete or they’re going to lose their better presidents," Funk said. "In many ways, what sounds extreme or very high, it’s still a bargain by corporate standards."
The Chronicle’s latest survey of private university salaries found the highest was $808,000 paid to University of Pennsylvania President Judith Rodin.
Still, Yudof says there’s a breed of public university executives he may never outrank.
"I’ve yet to make even half of what football coaches make at any institutions where I’ve served," Yudof said. University of Texas football coach Mack Brown makes $1.7 million.
UT Coach Phillip Fulmer’s compensation package is $1.65 million.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Rebecca Ferrar may be reached at 865-342-6357 or ferrarr@knews.com.
New facilities, construction to greet Vanderbilt students
By MICHAEL CASS Staff Writer
When students start arriving at Vanderbilt University for the fall semester next weekend, they'll find a new hub for Jewish life and a thoroughly renovated engineering school.
A bridge that will connect the university's main campus with its Peabody College will be under construction.
New athletic fields will be coming together. A 300,000-square-foot, interdisciplinary science and medical research building will be towering over most of the campus. Workers will be filling in the structure of an 800,000-square-foot children's hospital. And numerous other construction and renovation projects will be well under way.
It will be hard to miss all the cranes, building materials, hard-hat-wearing workers and dirt. But Vanderbilt officials think all the mess — as much as a half-billion dollars' worth of mess — will eventually yield results that transform the university.
''We try to tuck it in, but there's no way to be really discreet about some of these projects,'' said Judson Newbern, associate vice chancellor for campus planning and construction. ''This is certainly one of our heavier loads.
''There tend to always be a few things going on. It's just the process of responding to emerging fields of research or putting in new programs.''
Growth on campus
The projects include:
• The Schulman Center for Jewish Life, across from Memorial Gym at Vanderbilt Place and 25th Avenue South. The 9,900-square-foot, $2.3 million building is designed to be a gathering place for Jewish students, whom Chancellor Gordon Gee has made a focal point of recruiting.
• A $95 million biosciences/medical research building that will bring together undergraduate, graduate and medical programs in neuroscience, structural biology, genetics, genomics, and cell and developmental biology. It's one of the tallest buildings on campus and is visible from some parts of downtown Nashville.
Newbern and Richard McCarty, dean of the College of Arts and Science, said the building was conceived in the late 1990s, when the federal government started pumping research money into genetics and genomics, the study of the human genetic structure. The building will allow Vanderbilt, with its relatively compact campus, to bring its medical school and the College of Arts and Science together in ways that aren't possible at many universities, McCarty said.
''Our campus really offered this opportunity to build a building where researchers can be housed together and function in a seamless way,'' he said.
• A new building, Featheringill Hall, and two renovated buildings in the School of Engineering complex. Kenneth Galloway, the school's dean, said the $28 million effort added about 30,000 to 40,000 square feet and that ''the quality and organization of the space is tremendously improved.'' The additions include state-of-the-art labs and classrooms.
• The Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital, a freestanding facility that will have 206 beds, 16 operating rooms, a complete emergency department and full radiology services. Scheduled for completion in the fall of 2003, it will replace the children's hospital that now exists within the larger Vanderbilt Hospital.
Dr. Arnie Strauss, director of the children's hospital and chairman of Vanderbilt's pediatrics department, said the public would have ''one building to go to for any problem a child has,'' with convenient parking in the adjacent Capers Garage, connected by a second-floor bridge.
''It will be a very comforting place if you've got to be sick,'' Strauss said.
The project is expected to cost $187 million.
• The Bill Wilkerson Center for Otolaryngology and Communication Sciences and the Musculoskeletal Institute, part of the university's medical center. Otolaryngology is the study of ear and throat disorders. The Musculoskeletal Institute will offer treatment of conditions involving the foot, ankle, hand and spine, including cancer and pediatric care, and will house centers in arthritis and joint replacement, trauma and sports medicine. The estimated cost is $74.5 million.
• A 2,400-seat soccer and lacrosse stadium and two other athletic fields behind McGugin Center, Vanderbilt's athletic headquarters, and a new running track on Blakemore Avenue, totaling about $7.2 million.
• A pedestrian bridge connecting the sidewalk at Peabody's Magnolia Circle to a second-floor, open-air terrace on the biosciences/medical research building. Four cranes were scheduled to lift two sections of an almost 100-foot span of steel over 21st Avenue South early this morning. The rest of the $1.9 million bridge will be assembled on site and should be completed in December.
Future endeavors
Vanderbilt already is looking ahead to the next round of construction. A consulting firm has completed a land use study, and Newbern said officials were considering a grassy mall called ''New Commons'' in the area around the University Club, which might be moved to the top of another building. The mall would make it more enjoyable to walk along that part of campus, Newbern said.
A studio art building and a student life facility, which would complement the existing Sarratt Student Center by providing a ballroom for large events held by student groups, would likely be the first buildings along the mall.
McCarty said the university hoped to break ground on the studio art building, which also would house art history classrooms and faculty offices, next year.
The project, for which final plans have not been approved, is expected to cost at least $10 million.
''We're hopeful we can keep the cost at an affordable level but still get a fantastic building,'' McCarty said.
''It should be visually quite stunning.''
Then after the HillaryCare attempt failed, we found that healthcare was suddenly completely normal. The articles in the newspapers about rising costs dried up. In fact, healthcare costs in the mid-1990s rose at roughly the rate of inflation, and below in some cases.
Here in Tennessee, we saw this "crisis" of not having enough money, and the push for the income tax. But the push failed, and suddenly everything is back to normal. The universities have money, despite the claims during the tax debate that they were "suffering". The articles on various state programs being underfunded have strangely dried up.
The big difference is that we really do have a problem - TennCare, the bastard child that HillaryCare sired before dying. Let's hope Van Hilleary can win and take it on before it gets any further out of control. (Thank goodness his last name has that "e" in it.)
Problem is, public schools and private schools keep building elaborate buildings and sports facilities and otherwise spending funds in ways that don't contribute to learning (real learning - not all the off-beat left-wing departments) and then jack-up tuition and scream for more dollars.
Some journalist has a heck of an investigative piece waiting for them if they want to tackle why college costs so damn much (too much government intervention in funding, wreckless spending, useless departments, collusion on tuition assistance etc.). America screams every time gas prices go up temporarily but no one is outraged that education costs increase faster than inflation like clockwork every year.
Private school bump!!!
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