Faculty angry about McDavis’ big raise
By Nick Claussen
June 30, 2008
Faculty leaders at Ohio University reacted angrily Saturday to the Board of Trustees granting President Roderick McDavis a 29 percent raise worth more than $85,000 on Friday.
While one predicted that the move will boost efforts to form a faculty union at OU, another said the presidential raise reflects the Trustees’ — and society at large’s — skewed priorities.
“There is something terribly wrong with this picture…” said professor Sergio Lopez-Permouth, who chairs Faculty Senate at OU. “Universities should be leaders, and yet we simply replicate the errors of society at large where CEOs get rich and employees get laid off. The Board of Trustees may well be at the root of the problem. Something has to change; the inequities of the current system are unsustainable.”
History professor Kevin Uhalde, president of the OU branch of the American Association of University Professors, agreed, and predicted that McDavis’ new contract will further demoralize faculty members, and should persuade more professors to support a faculty union.
The Trustees, however, made it clear that they feel McDavis has done a good job, in particular with OU’s academic quality, diversity, anti-binge-drinking efforts and finances.
Trustee Chair C. Daniel Delawder explained at the board’s meeting in Walter Hall Friday that the raise will put McDavis’ salary more in line with other college presidents in Ohio.
McDavis received an annual salary of $294,665 during the 2008 fiscal year (which ends today) and will receive a salary of $380,000 in the next year.
The Trustees also granted McDavis a five-year contract, which Delawder said the Trustees will review every year. Delawder stated that the Trustees will complete a comprehensive evaluation of McDavis.
“It’s a lengthy process,” Delawder said, adding that the evaluation will include input from many different constituent groups at the university.
The Trustees also continued the employment agreement with First Lady Deborah McDavis, who will receive $28,144 in the coming year.
Delawder did not mention the First Lady’s position during the regular meeting, but explained in a press conference after the meeting that she attends events for the university both with President McDavis and without him.
“She represents the university quite well,” Delawder said.
As for the president’s salary, Delawder said that the Trustees compared OU to seven other similarly sized and types of public universities in Ohio. These institutions include the University of Akron, Bowling Green State University, the University of Cincinnati, Kent State University, Miami University, the University of Toledo and Wright State University. In the comparison of the seven universities and OU, McDavis had the lowest salary, Delawder said. At the same time, faculty at OU ranked fourth in the eight institutions for annual salary.
Increasing McDavis’ salary to $380,000 will give him the fourth highest salary among the eight institutions, Delawder said.
Of all of the public institutions of higher learning in Ohio, McDavis now has the fifth-highest salary, according to Delawder.
It was important to the Trustees that the president’s salary is in line with other college presidents at comparable institutions in Ohio, Delawder said.
Uhalde, however, noted that the Trustees’ quick work in “correcting” McDavis’ salary level is in stark contrast with the university’s lagging efforts to improve faculty salaries. “There's a five year plan to try to lift faculty salaries from the bottom of our peer institutions, but the president jumps up the ladder five days after the Trustees met,” Uhalde said. “Faculty share a raise pool of 3 percent; the president's raise is almost 30 percent. This is the same president who in April backed a plan to freeze faculty salaries next year if things get tight. And this huge bump comes after the year he quit all responsibilities except fund-raising…”
Faculty Senate Chair Lopez-Permouth echoed Uhalde’s complaints. “President McDavis’ raise of $85,000 amounts to a 29 percent raise,” he said. “The dollar amount is larger than the yearly salary of most faculty and employees at this institution. The percentage is incongruous with the 3 percent raise that has been given to all employees and with the average of about 5 percent to be expected by faculty as a result of the faculty compensation initiative.”
THE CONTRACT ALSO CALLS for modest increases to the president’s benefits package, and it eliminates the incentives that were included in the contract when McDavis was first hired. Delawder said McDavis received an incentive bonus in just one year.
Delawder said the Trustees are pleased with the work McDavis is doing at the university, and are also happy with the work of faculty and staff.
“We have a superb administration and a superb faculty,” Delawder said.
Uhalde argued that the Trustees’ satisfaction with McDavis illustrates the substantial disconnect between the Trustees’ impressions of McDavis and that of faculty and students. “Trustees formally decided not to listen to what faculty, students and staff have to say about the president's performance when they adopted new evaluation procedures this year,” Uhalde said. “Then they violated their own procedures by not even requiring the fourth-year comprehensive evaluation they'd just created. Instead, they agreed that they're all happy with the president and hired him for another four years.”
He said that he’s been receiving ample negative feedback from other faculty members since the media started reporting McDavis’ raise and new contract. “These aren't AAUP members but professors who've kept giving the administration the benefit of the doubt,” he said. “They're done with that now, furious and exhausted by the Trustees above all, and they're asking me about having a union meeting.”
Lopez-Permouth confirmed that faculty feedback has been negative since the raise was announced on Friday. “I have been hearing voices of disgust from the faculty, and the announcement was made less than 24 hours ago,” he said. “When you would have thought faculty morale could not go any lower, this may have done just that. They could have not asked for a worse time to make this move. While Budget Planning Council has been working on contingency plans for contingency plans, apparently finding money for administrative raises continues not to be a problem for Ohio University.”
He was particularly critical of the Trustees. “It is ironic those after decades of imposing layers of superfluous assessment on top of the workload of the faculty in the name of accountability, the Board of Trustees seem to be immune to any demand for accountability as they renew contracts and raise salaries without even completing an evaluation.”
Uhalde said the AAUP plans to bring in professors from other campuses who have faculty unions, in order to show OU faculty how shared governance can work in that environment. “Ultimately, professors must decide for themselves, but the Trustees are making the choice easier each time we meet,” Uhalde said. (The first such meeting is planned for July 9.)
MCDAVIS’ RAISE COMES at a time when the university has a 3 percent raise pool for faculty and staff, and an additional $1.2 million raise pool to increase faculty salaries. The incentive to increase faculty salaries is part of the university’s Vision Ohio plan.
At the April Board of Trustees meeting, McDavis and administration officials recommended that the university delay the pay raises as part of a contingency plan for the budget. At that time, OU officials recommended the contingency plan in case of state budget cuts and other funding shortfalls.
The Trustees spoke out against delaying the raises, though, and urged the administration to keep them in the budget.
In the budget the Trustees approved Friday, the 3 percent salary pool for faculty and staff was included, as was the $6 million for Vision Ohio priorities (which included $1.2 million for additional raises for faculty). — Athens NEWS Editor Terry Smith contributed to this story.
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