Barry Munitz, who resigned under pressure in February as president of the J. Paul Getty Trust in Los Angeles amid questions about his use of the trust's money, has been hired as a professor by the California state university system. Mr. Munitz, who served as chancellor of the university system for eight years before taking over the leadership of the Getty, will teach a course in the English department at the Los Angeles campus, exercising his right as a former system executive to return to a teaching position there. His salary will be $163,000 during his first year, and then will decrease to $112,000, the top of the pay scale for a full professor, system officials said. Mr. Munitz will also help raise money for several new projects, they added. James M. Rosser, the president of Cal State, Los Angeles, said in a statement that he welcomed Mr. Munitz back. But Lillian Taiz, a history professor and president of the campus chapter of the California Faculty Association, said that she and many faculty members were unhappy with Mr. Munitz's hiring. "We were stunned," she said, "that someone of such questionable ethics will be teaching in our classrooms." Mr. Munitz could not be reached for comment. Mr. Munitz, whose travel and expense spending are under investigation by the California attorney general's office, was required to repay the Getty Trust, one of the world's richest art institutions, $250,000 when he resigned in February, and he was not given a severance package. At the Getty, Mr. Munitz was one of the nation's best-paid executives of a nonprofit institution, with salary, benefits and perks totaling more than $1 million.

A teachers group has won a partial victory in its challenge to the secret hiring of ousted former J. Paul Getty Trust chief Barry Munitz by California State University trustees.

A judge on Friday rejected the trustees' request that the faculty lawsuit be thrown out of Los Angeles County Superior Court, and it will be pursued, according to John Travis, president of the California Faculty Assn.

The university has stated that Munitz had an enforceable right to return to the Cal State system.

Munitz was hired behind closed doors in February to teach and raise funds after resigning from the Getty amid an investigation into alleged misuse of charity funds. He is being paid $163,776 — almost double the top salary of $85,000 for a Cal State professor with 20 years of teaching experience.

Munitz was chancellor of the Cal State system until he left to head the Getty nine years ago.

The faculty group challenged the Munitz appointment, alleging that it was not made in a meeting open to the public, as required by law.

"The whole way they make decisions and the kind of decisions they make reflect that they don't have an adequate understanding of their responsibility," Travis said.

Lillian Taiz, who heads the faculty group at Cal State L.A., said Munitz will teach a single class there for one quarter of the coming school year in the English literature department.

"Most of us — normal people — teach three classes in each of three quarters," Taiz said.

She said Munitz's "golden parachute" can't be justified by a school system that has experienced 20% in budget cutbacks in recent years, and for which student fees have jumped 76%.

"Is this an appropriate program for a public university that's struggling financially?" Taiz asked. "If you don't have these discussions openly, then who knows what's going on?"

A spokeswoman for the university system could not be reached. But in the past, Cal State officials have said the university was legally obligated to let Munitz return from what was characterized as a leave of absence. Faculty union leaders have questioned whether the university was required to rehire Munitz in a position called trustee professor.

Murray L. Galinson, chairman of the Cal State Board of Trustees, criticized union officials earlier this year for making "irresponsible" comments about the Munitz deal.

Superior Court Judge Robert H. O'Brien made the ruling. The next hearing is scheduled for Oct. 3.