The Diamondback has for years published an extensive, annual database of university employees’ salaries, and this year is no different. On the pages that follow, you will find what professors, administrators, coaches, housekeepers, health center employees and dining hall workers make each year.
This university is a huge, state funded agency that is supported in part by the taxpayers of the state of Maryland. Even in the face of mounting deficits, Gov. Martin O’Malley boosted state colleges and universities’ operating budgets by more than $120 million this year, allowing in-state students to pay the same tuition as the past two years. Many of the professors at this university are among the highest-paid employees in the state, but their salaries also reflect a the cost of making this university one of the highest-ranked and reputable in the country.
Maryland state law requires the salaries of state employees be made public, and this data is provided directly from the university upon a public information request. In providing these salaries, we ask that you draw your own conclusions. Glance through the pages and note university President Dan Mote brings in $403,300 this year. That’s a 7 percent increase over what he made last year. Women’s basketball coach Brenda Frese will earn $214,789 this year, a 10.8 percent rise over last year; Gary Williams will earn a base salary of $356,526, a 5.4 percent increase over last year.
Administrators also saw healthy salary increases. Provost Bill Destler, who oversees university academics, began the year with a $270,217 salary (he will leave this summer to assume the Rochester Institute of Technology presidency), Athletics Director Debbie Yow will finish the year with a $350,000 base salary. Destler’s salary increase over 2006 was 7.2 percent; Yow’s was 41.3 percent.
Each year, some question the necessity of publishing university salary data. Legislators, in writing Maryland’s Public Information Act, specifically included state employees’ salary data as records covered by the law. So whether readers are taxpaying state residents interested in seeing where their money goes, or university employees renegotiating a contract, you have the right to know.
Click here to access the 2007 Salary Guide
Kevin Litten
Editor in chief-elect
