A University of South Florida Board of Trustees committee is recommending up to a 30% pay raise for school president Rhea Law.
The Governance Committee approved amendments to her contract Tuesday that would increase her base pay from $655,000 to $825,000 per year.
It’s an attempt to match the pay of other Florida public university presidents.
An annual review of presidential pay across state universities found that Law’s total compensation ranked behind that of the University of Florida, Florida State University and University of Central Florida presidents.
Law was inaugurated as president in March 2022 and has maintained the same base salary of $655,000 since, according to data used by the board. This does not include performance bonuses, of which Law received the maximum amount of $300,000 last year.
New College of Florida president Richard Corcoran is one of the highest paid university presidents in Florida. That’s despite the much smaller enrollment of around 700 students compared with USF’s enrollment of almost 50,000.
Corcoran’s current base pay is $44,000 higher than Law’s.
"Taking nothing away from the complexity of New College, I think we can all agree that the scope and scale of the University of South Florida is quite a bit larger," said general counsel Gerard Solis.
The committee also believes UCF should be used as an “appropriate market barometer” to compare USF to due to a similar student body size and focus on medical research.
UCF president Alexander Cartwright, who has held the position since April 2020, has a base pay of $825,000.
Following the limits stated in Florida law, any compensation above $250,000 will be covered by private funds.
Law’s amended pay will be officially considered by the entire USF Board of Trustees at a Sept. 10 meeting. Her contract ends March 31, 2025.
Law announced last week that eligible out-of-unit administrative and staff employees will receive raises of up to 3% starting Oct. 11.
