UT sets policy to limit retreat salaries for administrators

A new policy at the University of Tennessee seeks to make pay more equitable between faculty members and former administrators in the classroom by placing limits on the salaries and stipends those ex-administrators receive.

The policy, approved Monday by the UT board of trustees executive and compensation committee on behalf of the entire board, will go into effect immediately.

In March, the USA Today NetworkTennessee reported on the university’s practice of paying former administrators 75 percent of their administrative salaries for unlimited periods of time after those administrators move to faculty jobs.

The so-called retreat salaries, while only reserved for a small number of former administrators, were often much higher than typical faculty salaries in the departments they were working in.

For example, former UT Knoxville Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor Susan Martin currently earns $258,386 as a professor in the Department of Classics, while the next highest paid professor in the department earns less than half that, at $120,384.

Under the policy approved Monday, Martin would not be allowed to earn more than 125 percent of the highest faculty salary in the department, meaning her salary would be no more than $150,480.

WHAT’S IN THE NEW POLICY?

The policy states that administrators who earned salaries for their appointments would earn at least the average of all full-time faculty in their department but no more than 125 percent the salary of the highest earning full-time faculty member.

Salary-based appointments typically include deans and higher-level administrators, while stipends for administrative appointments may be awarded to lower-level administrators such as department heads.

For those appointments, the new policy states that stipends must end when the administrative appointment ends, but merit increases can be awarded based on work as a faculty member and in keeping with the average merit increases for faculty in the department.

The policy also allows for the board of trustees to make exceptions for administrators who have “provided extraordinary service” to the university.

There are no written guidelines for what constitutes “extraordinary service,” but officials at Monday’s executive and compensation committee meeting said requiring a supervisor to come to the board of trustees to justify an exception would ensure that exceptions aren’t granted all the time.

“We can’t make it so rigid that we don’t have some form of exception,” said vice chair of the board of trustees Raja Jubran. “At the same time, we shouldn’t accept just any recommendation for a change. It does set a precedent and we have a way of falling into that.”

WHO DOES IT AFFECT?

At the UT system level, three of the university’s five chancellors have provisions for retreat salaries, though only one is set for an unlimited period of time. Those administrators would not be affected by the new policy, but future leaders who come into their jobs would.

The policy also would not affect UT President Joe DiPietro, who in March asked the board of trustees to amend his contract and place a limit on his retreat salary so that his pay will revert to the average salary for faculty in his department after four years.

There are currently eight former administrators in faculty jobs at UT Knoxville, collectively earning more than $1.8 million. At least six of those administrators have contracts that allowed for them to move to retreat salaries set at 75 percent of their administrative salaries.

Another 125 people at UTK currently hold both faculty and administrative jobs, including associate deans, deans, directors, and three vice provosts.

Generally speaking, department heads and associate deans are paid on a stipend basis while deans and vice provosts typically have salary-based appointments with terms set forth in their appointment letters.

DiPietro said in October that the policy would bring the salaries of former administrators more in line with what faculty in their respective departments make.

“The board has expressed concern about former administrators who were given an unlimited period of time for earning 75 percent of their administrative salary upon returning to the classroom,” DiPietro said at the time. “The policy in development will establish consistency and set limits on return-to-faculty terms — both for period of time and compensation level — that are generous but fair.”