Twice recently, employees of the university system have asked if students understood the cost of answering questions related to the roughly $1.9 million per year from fees allocated to the University Student Center.
In a meeting about the building’s budget and revenue, USF Chief Financial Officer John Long asked two Crow’s Nest reporters on Sept. 17 if they had contemplated the cost of meeting with three senior USF system financial officers, a USF St. Petersburg administrator and two public relations employees.
Associate General Counsel Jodi Adamchak made a similar statement on Oct. 17 while answering questions during a Student Government General Assembly meeting. With the salaries represented in the meeting, the university could practically build another room for the USC, she said.
With the aid of publicly available salary information, The Crow’s Nest set out to provide a napkin-math answer to their question. First, a list of assumptions:
- A standard 2,088 hour work year.
- Non-salary benefits are not included.
- Staff and student employees fulfilling normal work tasks, such as reporters, elected student representatives and their advisers attending a Senate meeting, are not included.
- Individuals’ total time spent on the matter cannot be accurately determined, so this analysis focuses on the two, roughly hour-long meetings.
- A novel unit of measurement, the Individual Student’s Contribution, or ISC, is the minimum number of credit hours required for a Bachelor’s degree, 120, multiplied by the $13.80 per credit hour each student pays for the USC. That is, 1 ISC is equal to $1,656.
Sept. 17 Meeting with Reporters
Attendees: Chief Financial Officer John Long, Treasurer Fell Stubbs, Vice President Nick Trivunovich, Assistant Regional Vice Chancellor Julie Jakway, Public Affairs Manager Lara Wade, Communications Director Tom Scherberger.
Grouped salary: $840,414
Average salary: $140,069
Cost per hour: $402.50
Hours per ISC: 4.11
Oct. 17 General Assembly Meeting
Attendees: Interim Regional Chancellor Bill Hogarth, Assistant Regional Vice Chancellor Julie Jakway, Associate General Counsel Jodi Adamchak, Assistant Director of Administrative Services David Everingham, Manager of Fiscal and Business Administration Cam Ngo.
Grouped salary: $495,376
Average salary: $99,075
Cost per hour: $237.25
Hours per ISC: 6.98
