YSU's president-elect donates $100K to student scholarships

Staff report

Youngstown

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Cynthia Anderson

Cynthia Anderson, president-elect of Youngstown State University, will earn $350,000 in her first year on the job.

Scott Schulick, chairman of YSU’s board of trustees, announced that the board and Anderson have come to terms on a three-year contract. Her salary will be $350,000 in fiscal year 2011, $375,000 in 2012 and $400,000 in 2013.

Anderson, meanwhile, has donated $100,000 to fund scholarships for YSU students in memory of her parents.

“I was blessed with two wonderful parents who instilled in me many values,” Anderson said. “Hopefully, this scholarship fund will help to provide others with the opportunities and benefits, which I have had the privilege to have.”

Anderson’s contract also provides a vehicle, professional dues, travel entertainment and relocation expenses.

Vindicator files show that David C. Sweet, who is retiring after 10 year as president, earns about $300,000 annually.

Though previous YSU presidents also received an allowance for housing, Anderson’s contract calls for her to reside in housing provided by the university.

The board of trustees agreed earlier this year to renovate the Pollock House on Wick Avenue as the president’s residence. Renovations are expected to be finished by summer 2011.

With the gift, Anderson becomes a member of the YSU President’s Council comprised of individuals, corporations and foundations that have made major donations to the university.

Vice president for student affairs at the university for the past 15 years, Anderson established the Lawrence R. and Garnet P. Anderson Scholarship Fund after her father’s death in September 2000. Her mother died in 1991.

“I learned at an early age to be honest, to value hard work and that there was someone greater than all of us who would provide guidance and protection,” she said. “The value of education was also a constant in my life, instilled in me at a very early age.”

Anderson, who has served in a succession of faculty and administrative positions at YSU for 31 years, becomes the university’s seventh president July 1.

A recent study in the “Chronicle of Higher Education” revealed that the average salary for presidents at Ohio’s public comprehensive universities is $395,452.

YSU has more than 1,200 full-time employees, more than 14,000 students and an annual operating/capital fund budget of $220 million.

Anderson, who earned a bachelor’s degree in business education from YSU in 1973, said she is honored to commemorate her parents through the scholarship fund.

“When I graduated from high school, I was fortunate that my parents had set aside a college fund for me,” Anderson added.