From the Orion-Online, November 16, 2005

After receiving close to a $33,000 raise and a $20,000 increase in his housing stipend, Chico State President Paul Zingg is giving his raise back to students through two new Presidential Scholarships.

The interest from his $60,000 endowment will fund three $1,000 Presidential Scholarships each year, Zingg said in an e-mail. Since he became president in 2004, he has planned to donate one-tenth of his net salary, which is now $237,756 according to a Mercer Human Resource Consulting report.

"I'd already been supporting a presidential scholar before the raise, so I thought it would be an appropriate thing to do to increase that commitment for student scholarships," Zingg said.

Thirty students with at least 3.5 GPAs earn four-year and one-time scholarships for $12,000 and $1,000 respectively, he said.

The President's Scholars Competition brings 300 to 400 prospective students to Chico State each February to compete for these scholarships, said Carol Berg, executive assistant to the president.

The California State University Board of Trustees increased salaries for CSU presidents and faculty to offset the rising cost of living, Statewide Academic Senator Sam Edelman said. CSU presidents make 49.5 percent less than presidents at 20 nationwide universities, according to the report.

Because of California's budget problems, the trustees increased salaries in part by raising student fees for the 2006-2007 academic year, Edelman said. Undergraduate and credential students will pay 8 percent more, and graduate students will pay 10 percent more, according to the trustees' report.

"Someone's got to pay somewhere," Edelman said. "If the legislature's not going to pay, the students have to pay."

The California Postsecondary Education Commission's report Oct. 27 showed that CSU faculty make less than faculty at 20 nationwide universities. In the 2004-2005 fiscal year, a 13.1 percent salary gap separated the universities. This fiscal year, the report projects faculty will make 16.8 percent less.

The trustees established a five-year plan to increase faculty salaries an average of 2.5 percent over the five years in addition to a scheduled 3 percent increase, according to the trustees' report. The legislature and others call for the education system to "cut the fat" to pay for faculty, but there is no fat, Edelman said.

"We've cut so far, we're into the muscle and the bone," Edelman said.

If the trustees had not raised faculty salaries, the universities would not be able to attract and keep quality professors, Edelman said.

But students should not have to pay more, Edelman said. The CSU system was designed to give lower- and middle-class students a college education at a reasonable price, but fees keep rising.

"Faculty salaries are being created on the backs of students," Edelman said.

But student fees make up a small part of the CSU budget, President Zingg said. The state's general fund gives the system 70 percent of its operating budget through tax revenues.

The Higher Education Compact between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the CSU system increases state funding, student fees and enrollment between 2005-2006 and 2010-2011, Zingg said.

First-year student Geniella Putman said the state education funding is a big problem, and the budget needs to be reorganized more efficiently so students do not have to pay more.

"If I was a professor, I would want a raise after such a long time," Putman said. "But at the same time, it's not fair to students."

Fees do go up though, and students have to deal with it, said graduate student Courtney Scott.

The legislature should move the budget around to give education more money because education should be its No. 1 priority, Scott said.

"Teachers at all levels don't get paid as much for what they do for students."