Are Shaw University Executive Salaries A Bit Excessive?

Dr. Clarence G Newsome, President

Mr. Martel Perry - Executive Vice President

In 2004, GuideStar.org did a comparative analysis of highest salaries of North Carolina private colleges and universities. This analysis can be found by clicking >>HERE<<. In 2004, GuideStar reported Shaw's highest paid employees were the President at $150,000 and our Executive Vice President at $100,500. Though not officially disclosed, Shaw's executive assistants and secretaries have salaries near these figures. Indeed, one position for a Shaw staff with only a bachelor's degree in an ancillary office was blatantly advertised recently for $65,000. Executive salaries clearly place Shaw in the top twenty-five private schools even after considering elitist or large private schools such as Wake Forest, Duke, Campbell, Meredith, and Elon University. Furthermore, some of our executives received a 33% raise or large bonuses early last year before consenting to a 10-15% pay cut as part of our cost reductions. Such financial "sacrifices" should hardly be considered earth-shattering.

Shaw's Faculty Salaries Near Bottom

During the early part of the decade, Shaw contributed  salary information to the Chronicle of Higher Education and  the American Association of University Professors. During  most of the intervening years faculty members received no pay raises. Indeed, Shaw's faculty salaries have increased only 4% during the last five years. When discipline and institutional averages are considered by rank, Shaw's faculty salaries rank near the bottom in North Carolina's private colleges and universities. However, one uplifting note can be found when several faculty members responded to Professor James Kirkley's courageous challenge for Shaw teachers
to publicly share their salary, rank, field and degree. Teachers are beginning to "hang together."
Shaw's education graduates can also be gratified they will not share their teacher's shame of a low salary by clicking the following link.

In a few short years, the students we train to teach  elementary school with a bachelor's degree will have  salaries that outstrip almost all of their teachers.