Editorial

Dye Should Prove Her Commitment To Oberlin College

Even prior to the release of today’s issue of the Review, much of the student body was already indignantly aware that the College’s president, Nancy Dye, is due to receive a raise of considerable proportions. Not surprisingly, the general sentiment of the student body is not favorable to this particular piece of financial news. After all, last semester’s fiscal controversies left most Oberlin students with the impression that the school administration was in dire monetary straits and, consequently, desperate to save money. Most students attending Oberlin at the time can vividly recall the sudden announcements of budget cuts and the removal of highly-valued intern positions without the consultation of students or faculty.

Thus, it has been somewhat of an affront to the moral sensibilities of the student population that the College — now considered by members of the Administration to be suffering from a major economic blow, enduring a 3.7 percent reduction in its endowment — suddenly has enough money available to pay its president the equivalent an extra million dollars of deferred pay, in addition to Dye’s already substantial annual salary of nearly $325,000.

Some have wondered if President Dye herself were intentionally over-zealous in her support of drastic budget cuts and the elimination of cherished interns, opening up more funding for her possible bonus. In fact, it was only through an unintentional media leak that the public has any information at all about Dye’s new bonus. If there had not been such a leak, it might not have been until 2004, the time at which the College must file its federal disclosure form, that students would have even been made cognizant of the bonus. Students will certainly be suspicious of Dye’s new bonus, as the unfolding of events suggests that knowledge of it was meant to be kept from them.

Yet proponents of Dye’s major increase in compensation point to Dye’s strong record of fund-raising and the substantial growth of the College’s endowment as reasons why the Board decided that Dye deserved the bonus. However, the justifications for Dye’s bonus also seems to suggest that the President might have an incentive to leave Oberlin if she did not receive an increase in compensation. In other words, she might seek a fatter paycheck at another institution.

However, none of these reasons stand up to scrutiny. After all, Dye may very well deserve a raise for the work she has done, but it makes little sense to undermine an already precarious financial situation by spending money on pay-raises to compensate people who are already living quite high on the hog. President Dye lives for free in a house provided by the College, with an annual income roughly 10 ten times greater than the United States average, even before her new bonuses.

Is Dye’s commitment to Oberlin College so tenuous that she requires such egregious amounts of money simply to remain its President? If this were true, it would suggest more than a little duplicity in Dye’s public persona as the College’s greatest advocate. In fact, if the student body were dealing with a college president whose only tie to it was monetary compensation, then what would that president’s incentive be to continue to work as laboriously for the school’s fundraising after literally clinching a million dollar deal?

Thus, it might behoove Dye to consider all the things she might now do to improve her credibility rating amid the Oberlin College community. She should very carefully consider whether her commitment to Oberlin is healthy enough that she can bear going without a seven-figure bonus in order to help improve not only her own personal standing, but that of the entire College community. Dye should challenge herself to demonstrate her commitment to Oberlin by donating at least a significant proportion of the bonus she is to receive back to the development of the College.