Pay for Private College Chiefs Pushing Upward, Study Finds

Salaries for the presidents of top private colleges and universities are pushing well into six figures, with two surpassing the half-million-dollar mark, according to a survey to be released Monday by the Chronicle of Higher Education.

That kind of pay is rare, however. It’s for those who run complex, prestigious schools. Even then, experts say, it’s still well below comparable salaries in the corporate, profit-making world.

Take William Brody, president of Johns Hopkins University, paid $446,419 in 1997-98, according to the survey. The world-famous school in Baltimore with 17,000 students includes more than a university, said spokesman Dennis O’Shea. Brody runs “the largest university-based research program, a medical system that includes three hospitals and oversees a $2.5-billion-a-year enterprise,” O’Shea said.

The Chronicle, a weekly newspaper in Washington that covers post-secondary education, examined the tax returns for 1997-98 of 475 colleges and universities.

The report will be available Monday on the paper’s Web site, https://chronicle.com, and in its Nov. 26 print edition.

The highest earners deserve it, boards and trustees said.

Defending the $528,000 paid to New York University President L. Jay Oliva, board Chairman Martin Lipton praised him as “principal architect of the transformation of NYU,” elevating the school of 37,000 students in New York’s Greenwich Village from a regional school to a national research institution. Oliva’s salary is his reward for tripling admissions, more than doubling fund-raising and nearly doubling the university’s housing, Lipton said in responding to questions about the Chronicle report.

Median pay for presidents the Chronicle surveyed--the midpoint, with half above, half below--was $175,389, an increase of about 4% from the year before.