Gov. M. Jodi Rell, of Connecticut, wants the Connecticut State University System to rescind recent raises given to top administrators, the the Connecticut Mirror reported Friday. In a letter to the chairman of the system’s board of trustees, she wrote, “Frankly, I am at a loss to understand why, in these difficult financial times, the trustees would approve salary increases of as much as 8 percent, 10 percent, or 10.27 percent for people who are paid between $285,000 and $360,000 a year.” The chairman later announced that the board’s executive committee would meet Monday to discuss salary adjustments.
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7 Responses to Governor Criticizes Raises for Top Administrators at Connecticut State U.
honore - July 25, 2010 at 9:43 pm
Note to the Gov…don’t be too shocked. It costs a lot of money to guarantee mediocrity, sloth and incompetence.
scintern - July 26, 2010 at 8:52 am
Nationally, there is a serious lack of integrity in leadership. At the top, that translates to high salaries paid for CEOs and Management/Administration finding ways to cut the workforce and in higher education… service that students and parents demand. Take a look at how business has been run in the last 5 – 8 years, and you can always see where higher ed is going. Claims of cutting staff… while the salary budget continues to grow. And who suffers and pays for it? The working class and those lower level administrators and faculty who do the real work. It’s time Grandma Rell left office. 12 years of Republican leadership has done this to our state and our nation.
mlisaacs - July 26, 2010 at 11:45 am
For at least 40 years, it has been commonly understood that if you want to make more moneyin academia, go into administration. In earlier years, Presidents, Deans and Provosts were faculty who worked their way up the chain, loved the institution and considered suchappointments to be a service. There was a great deal of loyalty involved. Now, it is a careerpath in which administrators move from institution to institution, each time increasing theirsalaries and perks. The gap between faculty and Presidential salaries has increased just the way it has on Wall Street. We now have the corporate university. The day is fast coming when no one will go into collegiate teaching. The pay is too low tocover the huge debt needed to acquire the credentials. With tenure disappearing, there willbe no continuity in any institution. Instead of being a “calling” , it has become just a job. Students are the losers. Ultimately, it is our country that will lose. It will become a national security issue as our educated population declines. Football players, Pop stars, Reality TV personalities, politicians and media talk show hosts will be supported handsomely by Wall Street. Dedicated teachers will disappear.
davi2665 - July 26, 2010 at 4:25 pm
I knew that the CHE could not go one day without another round of criticism of the salaries of presidents and provosts. Show me any other business with ranges of 10-20,000 employees, as is the case with many large universities, where CEO, COO, CFO, and other executive salaries are not at LEAST 5 times higher than the $285-360,000 figure cited above. I am amused at scintern’s lambasting of republican leadership. Connecticut (people’s republic) is somewhere to the left of Ann Arbor, and we have had a democratic congress for the past 6 years. The real problem is that the academic Marxist crowd just can’t stand to see anyone make more money than them, even for the miserably contentious and demanding job of president or provost of a university. If faculty think that dealing with a university administration is difficult, try dealing with a university board.
stinkcat - July 26, 2010 at 6:06 pm
There is a big difference between presidents of state universities and CEOs of corporations. State university presidents are government bureaucrats. They make their living off other people’s taxes. They just want a bigger share for themselves, why should the taxpayers let them get it?
davi2665 - July 27, 2010 at 10:58 am
Presidents of state universities are not exclusively government bureaucrats. Many large and prestigious universities, such as the University of Michigan, have only a miniscule portion of their budget provided by taxpayer money, and would probably be far more productive overall if they became a private university. Thus, many presidents of even large universities are similar to CEOs of private corporations. I do not see a huge outpouring of sentiment from the taxpayers for cutting support for education- indeed, the CHE is filled with wailings and gnashing of teeth over cuts to the California and New York educational systems, along with reports of protests and petitions to stop the cuts. The REAL issue is the sentiment from most academics that a president or provost should not make any more than a faculty member, a sentiment which I believe is based either on an elitist attitude that since nobody could POSSIBLY be smarter than they are, therefore their salary should be no greater, or otherwise based on the Marxist notion that everyone should make exactly the same pay regardless of their responsibilities and accountability.
stinkcat - July 27, 2010 at 1:17 pm
“The REAL issue is the sentiment from most academics that a president or provost should not make any more than a faculty member”Can you cite a survey which shows this? From my time in academia I have never met anyone who suggested such a thing. And I have known some far left marxists.