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Tennessee's New President Makes a $300,000 Promise

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By Jennifer Jacobson

John W. Shumaker hasn't even received his first paycheck from the University of Tennessee system and already he wants to give some of it back.

The university system's new president takes office June 5, but has already pledged a planned gift of $300,000 to support international travel for students from its five campuses. Mr. Shumaker announced the gift this month after he signed a six-year contract with the institution that could be worth up to $734,000 a year -- more than double the amount paid to his predecessor in the job.

"I just think it's important that a leader set a tone for philanthropy," says Mr. Shumaker, who currently earns $600,000 as president of the University of Louisville, where he has served since 1995. "If I'm asking donors and faculty and staff to contribute to the university, the president should do so as well. It's the secret of good fund raising -- to set an example."

Other presidents agree. Freeman A. Hrabowski, who earns $318,000 a year as president of the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, pledged $250,000 over five years to the institution in November. And last summer Mary Sue Coleman, president of the University of Iowa, returned a 40,000 raise that would have increased her salary to $275,000 for the 2002 fiscal year, since she and her husband had already planned to donate $250,000 to the university's $750-million capital campaign.

What sets Mr. Shumaker's gift apart is its timing. While it's not unusual for presidents to pledge gifts during or at the end of their tenure, John H. Lippincott, vice president for communications at the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, says he knows of no other instance where the president has made a gift at the outset. "It's a quite wonderful way to signal your commitment to the institution as you arrive as president," he says.

Especially if the institution pays the president incredibly well. The university granted Mr. Shumaker the most extravagant contract in the history of the system, paying its 21st president a base salary of $365,000 a year, $98,550 in bonuses, and a $20,000 a year expense account. He will also receive $250,000 a year in a separate deal he signed with the university's foundation. The university had paid J. Wade Gilley, its former president, and Emerson H. Fly, its acting one, a base salary of $258,000 each.

This isn't the first time that Mr. Shumaker has pledged money to his employer. As president of Central Connecticut State University from 1987 to 1995, he pledged a planned gift of $150,000 to support the institution's academic enrichment for honors students, including international travel, in memory of his wife, Michele D. Shumaker, who died of ovarian cancer in 1994. As president of the University of Louisville, he pledged $250,000 to the institution for international travel at the end of the institution's capital campaign, four years before the end of his tenure.

At both Central Connecticut and Louisville, Mr. Shumaker made a down payment toward his planned gift, starting a fund in each institution's foundation. He'll do the same at Tennessee. At present, the fund balance at Central Connecticut is about $26,000, and at Louisville, it's about $10,000. At Tennessee, he plans to contribute cash periodically to the fund.

Over the years, he says, his cash donations will create a principal that will grow as it is invested by the foundations. Interest accrued will be credited to the principal. Then, in his will, he's arranged for his estate to make up the difference between the cash value of each account when he dies and the total pledge of $700,000 that he has made to the three campuses.

"I want to make sure there's something left for my children," says Mr. Shumaker, who has two children, ages 17 and 20. "It's a lot of money. Both Louisville and Tennessee pay me very generously. I'm grateful for their confidence and their willingness to trust in me as their leader. I just think it's an appropriate gesture to say thank you and to let people know that those of us who make more money should be willing to give some of it back."

Mr. Shumaker says he was under no pressure to do so. In fact, the campus hasn't reacted to news of the president's gift at all, says Katherine H. Greenberg, president of the Faculty Senate and a professor in the department of educational psychology. "Our semester has ended," she says. "There aren't a lot of faculty around." However, she says, she's sure her colleagues would be pleased with Mr. Shumaker's gesture.

As far as his receiving such a hefty salary, she adds, "No one has come to me with any kind of protest or concern. People are very aware we need to pay competitive salaries to everyone who works at the university. You get what you pay for. We do want him to earn his pay."

Ms. Greenberg says many professors are excited about Mr. Shumaker's academic background as a faculty member. He earned a Ph.D. in classical studies from the University of Pennsylvania and was once a professor of Greek at Ohio State University. "We're delighted we'll have a president who really understands faculty issues," she says.