It was kind of President Hitt to turn down his pay increase during the bad economic climate, but no one expected him to do otherwise.
The president of UCF could have sparked angry outbursts from students and probably faculty if he had accepted the pay bump in this era of tuition hikes and budget cuts.
The reason his decision was expected stems from the fact that he is already paid so much to be the president of UCF.
Hitt’s base salary is $463,000 but with the compensation package his earnings total $594,730. That includes deferred compensation, retirement pay, club dues and money provided by the state for his vehicle.
It is hard to take President Hitt’s decline of a raise as a sign of real sacrifice when he makes more than $500,000 each year.
He is the second highest-paid public university president in Florida and the 32nd in the nation. His base salary is $27,000 more than the median.
Although we are appreciative of Hitt’s refusal of a pay raise, we don’t really understand why he makes so much money. What has he been doing that warrants such a high salary?
Although UCF is the third largest school in the country, bigger is not always better. It is hard to say that UCF is the third best school in the nation.
If we were, then perhaps Hitt’s expensive compensation would make more sense. It would still be difficult to stomach a salary that is almost $30,000 more than the median pay.
Hitt is not the only person to blame in this salary situation. We are concerned about why the Board of Trustees keeps approving pay increases year after year.
Clearly, they don’t think the president is already paid plenty. Are they not aware of the current economic climate or the professors who were recently let go from UCF?
Classrooms are packed, professors are overworked and entire programs were eliminated because of the budget cuts last year.
We would have been shocked if Hitt had accepted the raise. We are disheartened that it was even recommended.
UCF is not the only school that is dealing with the high salaries of college presidents. There are presidents that deserve recognition for the steps they are taking to help their universities.
Other university presidents are taking pay cuts to offset the economic situations their students and schools are in right now. Pay cuts are happening in almost every industry and they should be happening in higher education, too.
The Board of Trustees should be advising cuts to President Hitt’s salary, and he should be approving them.
5 comments
Your disgust with him making UCF bigger and bigger is one reason your tuition is low, one reason we have so many degrees, one reason we have so many professors. If it is class size you are concerned with, there are plenty of small liberal arts colleges with higher tuition and less choices for majors you can transfer to
And by the way, his raise would not have raised the cost of your tuition. Nice try.
I'm actually upset he bowed down to the alter of this class warfare and did not take the bonus. If UCF can afford to pay him a high salary and he is deserving of it, he should get it. Maybe you should re-take your marcoeconomics class and re-learn supply and demand for producers.