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Monday, October 03, 2005

LADNER, ACT VII


GOLDEN PARACHUTISTS MUST,
LIKE CHIMNEY SWEEPERS, COME TO DUST




Remarks by Paul Wolff, who sits on the American University board of trustees, in an online conversation today between Wolff and Washington Post readers:

I believe very strongly that we can choose to discharge him without any golden parachute and without any further loss of valuable university funds. I support the resolution of the business school asking the trustees to provide no golden parachute.


He has given no indication whatsoever that he is considering stepping down despite the fact that the faculty, the deans and the students have called for his resignation. … I wish it were already over. I had hoped that when the deans, the faculty senate and the students overwhelmingly asked Ladner to resign that he would have recognized that American University comes first and he would have resigned.

Regrettably, he has done just the opposite. He has dismissed the votes of no confidence and made it clear that he will fight to the end, including, as he has stated, litigation. This saddens me no end. I hope before the board meets next Monday, the 10th, that Ladner will rise above his selfish pursuits and do the right thing for the university by resigning.



[Ladner’s salary] was always wildly out of line. Even though A.U. does not rank among the top 75 universities in this country measured either by size or reputation, Ladner's total compensation would have ranked him among the top 10 of all university presidents in the country. One can only assume now that the audit committee has uncovered the additional expenses incurred by him that his total compensation would clearly put him near/if not at the very top... [T]he salary of our longest serving tenured professor is but a few thousand dollars more than the salary and benefits Ladner gave his chef.