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Tuesday, September 26, 2006
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With a Name Like 'Vanderbilt'... ...your salary's got to be good! Oh...okay...I finally got the VUcast website to open... I assume it's slow because every Vanderbilt student and alumnus is rushing over to it in order to see how Chancellor Gordon Gee, subject of a front-page story in today's Wall Street Journal about his $1.4 million salary and general Ladnerian excesses, is handling this little crisis: An article in the Wall Street Journal on Sept. 26 analyzed the changing nature of corporate governance at colleges and universities and featured Vanderbilt University as a case study. The Journal's report on this important issue presented an incomplete portrait of Vanderbilt. The first page of the site goes on to list Vanderbilt's impressive achievements under Chancellor Gee, which the authors of the site seem to think will 'complete' the WSJ portrait of their school. But the WSJ is interested in news; and what's newsworthy about Vanderbilt is not its recent institutional accomplishments but its wildly overcompensated Chancellor.... Let's click to page two of Vanderbilt's crisis-response website -- "Questions and Answers" -- Why does Chancellor Gee have a chef? is, for instance, one of the questions. Turns out it's a money-saver! Other questions take up the customary shit unscrupulous university leaders tend to step into: conflict of interest, over-chumminess with trustees and their businesses, vague terms of employment contracts and executive compensation, excessive spending on The Residence, a wife who smokes dope... A wife who smokes dope? Q: What is your response to the allegation that Constance Gee used marijuana in the University residence? Tight-ass response to a rather intriguing question... Not that UD cares if Madame Gee, bored out of her gourd in the manse, likes to liven things up with hemp... But these things are awkward on college campuses, where you're supposed to be discouraging your students from doing that sort of thing by setting an example and all... Gordon Gee. It's a name calling out for a limerick... And now there's some amusing material for one... UD will give it a whirl... |