SHE WON'T GO!
When you get paid half-a-millions dollars a year to run a state institution, serving as its President with no prior experience as President of a University, you’re bound to make some mistakes.
The University of Kentucky’s Half-a-Million-Dollar Man, Dr. Eli Capilouto, recently laid off a bunch of people at UK and then had to write a letter to the UK community in which he said he wanted to “apologize for any confusion.”
He went on to apologize for making half-a-million dollars while claiming that the school was financially struggling.
Also, this:
“We deeply regret — deeply regret — the loss of any jobs here, but we know and feel very confident that we have the workforce, the expertise and the excellence to provide a student the best education they can find anywhere,” Capilouto said Wednesday in an interview with the Lexington Herald-Leader.
Look, both my parents taught at the University and a lot of their friends did and I know a lot of other people who still do and I’m not taking anything at all away from them when I say — with absolute love and affection — that is one of the stupidest statements I’ve read this year.
The University of Kentucky offers great teachers, great employees, some good facilities, a lot of potential, and plenty of opportunity if you want it.
But if Dr. Capilouto truly feels “very confident” that UK has what it takes to “provide a student the best education they can find anywhere” then it’s almost criminal to hand him half-a-million dollars each year… or someone is going to have to redefine the words “best” and “anywhere.”
Or Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Berea, Centre, UNC, UC Berkeley… I mean the list goes on… have all ceased to exist.
On the other hand, if you consider that before he got here the University of Kentucky was flailing about trying to break the Top 20 in anything at all and proclaiming itself “America’s next great university” and now, just one year into his reign, we’re already providing “the best education anywhere,” then Dr. Capilouto has certainly earned his paycheck .
Also, he fired Chester Grundy because he had to keep his $500,000 paycheck in tact:
Outrage over the University of Kentucky’s decision to lay off one of its longest-serving and best-known black employees continues to ripple across Lexington and beyond.
Chester Grundy, who started UK’s first Black Student Union in 1969 and went on to found the Martin Luther King Cultural Center and direct it for more than 30 years, was laid off last week. As the news has filtered through cyberspace, his former students and fans are making their voices heard.
Grundy is one of 140 employees at UK laid off as part of budget cuts. An additional 164 positions are not being filled.
Blackford has all the details on both Capilouto’s letters and numbers and on the Chester Grundy situation.
THE DAILY YONDER
Half a mil from UK and Eli still has time to write for the Huffington Post for free. A funny thing about firing Grundy is that UK’s Diversity Director is in Europe and un-available for comment. Sacre bleu, mon ami.
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I have mixed feelings on this. Eli seems a breath of fresh air in many ways. I like that he is focusing on more on-campus housing for students. I like that he seems more responsive to the concerns of those of us who live in neighborhoods adjacent to UK. I like that he spoke out against the misbehaviour that occurred in conjunction with March Madness. And, I like that he apologized for any mishandling of the layoffs. Somehow, I don’t see some of his predecessors having the courage to apologize.
I don’t have a hard time saying maybe he is overpaid, but I suspect his pay is no more egregious than that of his predecessors. Not a validation of his pay rate, but an explanation.
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He says a lot of right things — students first! — and indeed the very notion of on-campus housing is refreshing. the outsourcing of it is suspect. And saying the right things is a classic corporate trick to cover up that you’re doing no such thing. Maybe he is, but it seems more like he’s continuing the University’s long held strategy (admit more and more students, increase tuition again and again, hold pay stagnant while not replacing retiring professors and just shifting more and more of the load onto “adjuncts” who won’t see tenure and TAs and so forth. That’s a good business strategy and Eli’s holding to it.
Re: his pay…
I agree that he might turn out to be a great dude but currently I’m not smelling it. On campus housing, as said, is a LOOOOOONG time coming and its good to even hear that its on their mind, even if the privatization of it raises eyebrows.
And, again, I think we can all respect that UK is now offering the “best education anywhere.”
Time will tell.
I hasten to add that Eli did have the good graces to announce he wouldn’t accept any bonuses this year in excess of his Half-a-Mil baseline. Which was generous of him.