Gutmann toward top of salary rise

University presidents' paychecks are getting larger each year.

And though her counterparts' salaries have been catching up over the last few years, Gutmann remains one of the most highly paid administrators among university leaders.

In the 2004-2005 academic year, more than 100 presidents of four-year institutions received compensation packages of at least $500,000, a 53 percent increase from the previous year, according to a recent Chronicle of Higher Education survey.

Gutmann earned $675,000 with $92,000 in benefits for the 2005 fiscal year, a figure that places her on the upper end of the earnings spectrum.

But even with these overall rises in salaries, experts say university presidents are still not compensated enough.

"I think [university presidents] are underpaid [given] the complexity of these jobs and what they are asked to do," Raymond Cotton, of the Washington-based Mintz law firm, said.

The average compensation of corporate CEOs was more than $6 million among the 350 largest U.S. corporations, according to the Chronicle article.

To date, the highest-paid continuing president is E. Gordon Gee, of Vanderbilt University, who received compensation of $1.2 million - the only continuing president to make a seven-figure salary during the 2005 fiscal year.

Most presidents whose salaries boast such high figures earn that much only in the last year of their term.

Still, some retired leaders have broken that high-figure mark.

According to the report, Audrey Doberstein, of Wilmington College, for example, earned $2.7 million - including $2 million in deferred compensation - and Lynn University's Donald Ross received a $1.3 million pay package, $720,000 of which was a deferred housing allowance.

Former Penn President Judith Rodin was likewise awarded a deferred-compensation package of more than $1 million for the 2005 fiscal year.

Meanwhile, Gutmann - who has stated repeatedly that she will continue her term at Penn for the foreseeable future - is still outdoing her peers with her lofty salary.

Gutmann is "definitely in the upper quartile," Cotton said, noting that Penn's budget is larger than that of many other universities.

And Gutmann's salary is likely to rise, according to Chairman of the Board of Trustees Jim Riepe.

"I think there is no question that the compensation will continue to rise as long as she's doing the kind of job that she has done these first two years," he said.

Gutmann's salary is determined by the Board of Trustees' compensation committee, University spokeswoman Lori Doyle said: "The compensation committee uses a variety of data in setting compensation, including market data on salaries paid at peer institutions."

"A big part of her job is responding to things that occur during the course of the year," Riepe said. "We review all of that." Riepe attributed the steady rise in presidential salaries to a high demand and limited supply for good university presidents.

Either way, officials say high earnings are not the main impetus behind administrators' decisions to become university presidents.

"Based on my interaction with presidents over the years, I certainly don't think salaries are the deciding factor," National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities spokesman Roland King said. "There are so many other components to being president of an institution."

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