Articles

University Bosses' High Pay No Ticket To High Standing

Opinion
April 9, 2004

Thomas Meredith -- who supervises the state's 34 public colleges and universities as chancellor of the University System of Georgia -- has disclosed that he is a candidate for a similar job in Tennessee. Meredith's interest in the job was prompted, in part, by the fact that the Board of Regents was late in paying him the full compensation owed. While the board has now come up with the delinquent $180,000, state higher education officials still don't know if Meredith will stick with the job he started just two years ago.

While Meredith can hardly be blamed for insisting that the regents live up to the promises they made, the pay dilemma nevertheless raises pertinent underlying questions: What do you get for the bucks spent on chancellors these days? Is there any link between chancellors' salaries and the quality of higher education?

A survey of university systems suggests there is no strong link between salaries and academic reputation. Tennessee paid its last chancellor $734,000 a year to supervise four campuses. But its flagship university ranks 47th among public universities, according to U.S. News & World Report's annual survey.

By contrast, Meredith gets a compensation package of about $480,000 a year to supervise more than 34 campuses. Georgia's flagship university, the University of Georgia, ranks 21st, according to U.S. News.

(Tennessee higher education officials say they will reduce the compensation dramatically for the next chancellor. He or she can expect a package totaling between $400,000 and $500,000, they said.)

Clearly, the quality of higher education depends on many factors, including the quality of elementary and secondary education and how much the state is willing to pay to boost actual classroom achievement. But neither the pay of chancellors nor university presidents seems to be a make or break factor.

Members of Georgia's Board of Regents have said that they must pay the chancellor enough to be competitive -- not only with other states' chancellors but also with private business, which might make a run at an exceptional academic manager. But, at some point, the regents must also realistically assess what the state can afford to pay.

Meredith has done a good job over his two years here -- holding the system together in the face of deep budget cuts, launching a strategic plan for growth and standing up to pressure from disgruntled alumni who wanted to dump UGA President Michael Adams. The University System of Georgia would no doubt be better off if he stayed, and regents have said they hope he will.

The regents might increase the odds in Georgia's favor if they got serious about the kind of fund-raising that would support the financial commitments they've already made to Meredith. (While more than half of Meredith's compensation comes from taxpayer funds, his pay is supplemented by the private University System Foundation.) But it wouldn't be prudent for the Board of Regents to get into an escalating salary battle -- a kind of arms race -- that it cannot afford.

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