With university presidents earning consistently higher incomes each year, accompanied by countless job perks, including salary bonuses, housing loans and retirement payouts, some members of the post-secondary education community are concerned that institutions are shifting from the traditional university model to one reflecting commercialization.
“It is impossible to understand this rapid increase in salary outside of the context in which it is happening,” said Jim Turk, director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT).
A recent survey by CAUT revealed that, by 2006, there were 23 university presidents earning more than $300,000 and five earning over $400,000.
According to The Globe and Mail, Mamdaouh Shoukri, president of York University, was promised a performance bonus worth one-quarter of his salary for his first year in the position, in addition to an annual $50,000 housing loan in 2008. Peter George, president of McMaster University, will see a $1.4 million payout at the time of his retirement.
According to Turk, presidents at University of Waterloo, UBC and York University are all currently receiving about half a million dollars a year.
Figures published in 2007 by the Ontario government show that McMaster University’s president, Peter George, saw his salary increase 79 per cent over five years. Likewise, Waterloo’s president David Johnston received a salary of $500,000 in 2007, a 90 per cent increase from his salary in 2002.
Turk said the privatization of universities is to blame. He explains that until the 1950s, Canadian universities were “small, elite places, which only small portions of the populations were allowed to enter the door.” Starting in the late sixties and on, universities became mass institutions.
“There then came a simultaneous pressure from a variety of interests to focus universities increasingly on serving the private good, rather than the public good,” he continued. “In the context of this view of universities as serving more private interests, presidents have been increasingly seen — and increasingly see themselves — as CEOs.”
The specifics of a president’s contract is decided by a university’s board of governors and the salaries vary across Canada depending on the size of the university, said Turk.
“We have to do a lot of work to get the salaries, although they should be public because they are all presidents of public institutions, but that’s not the case in every province,” he said.
According to 2007 figures from CAUT, Emöke Szathmáry, the former president of the University of Manitoba, earned $355,436.
“But I’m sure it’s more now,” said Turk.
In addition to salary, current U of M President David Barnard lives in a university-owned home on King’s Crescent, which, according to John Danakas, director of public affairs at U of M, is part of the role of the president. Danakas explains that there are many functions held in the facility that are critical to a president’s role.
“Beyond that, the home is a taxable benefit for the president. [ . . . ] There is a personal cost associated with taking it on as a residence,” he said.
According to Turk, there are at least 10 or 15 university presidents in Canada who earn more than the prime minister.
Turk believes that instead of comparing a president’s salary to his fellow academics, as was done in the past, the salary is now compared to those of managers of private industries in the community.
“When you have a board of governors, made up of heavily corporate people, it is just a reality of their world,” he said. “The university president, in their view, is a manager of a big corporation [ . . . ] and universities are complex places so, naturally, they should be paid and treated like that.”
Turk recognizes that this trend is not unique to universities in Canada, but is a pattern found on an international level.
While the specifics of Barnard’s contract are not disclosed, “the situation at the University of Manitoba is not at all unlike that at other comparable institutions,” said Danakas.
