Indiana University’s Board of Trustees on Friday awarded President Pamela Whitten a bonus of $175,500.
Trustee Cathy Langham recommended awarding Whitten the full amount and it passed with two trustees voting in opposition — Vivian Winston and Donna Spears. Whitten earns $702,000 a year. The trustees awarded Whitten the maximum amount allowed by her contract, 25 percent of her salary.
Langham noted that Whitten launched new programs such as IU Innovates, improved relationships with the legislature, secured funds for research and the IU Foundation, and made significant improvements on the IU 2030 plan.
"This recommendation is based on President Whitten's meeting key benchmarks," Langham said.
Read more: ‘Our Beyoncé of higher education’: IU board awarded President Whitten’s $162k bonus
Trustee Kyle Seibert said the evaluation process could be clearer and include feedback from students, staff and faculty.
"I think we can agree, though, that there's more work to be done in how we create a fair and equitable evaluation process," Seibert said.
Spears said she supports Whitten, but she disagreed about the amount awarded.
"We tend, as a society, to focus on the negative and what we are not happy about," Spears said. "So I do greatly appreciate our president, and I like her personally."
The Board of Trustees, particularly Chair Quinn Buckner, has supported and complimented Whitten throughout her leadership. Buckner did not comment on Whitten’s performance Friday.
While the trustees speak highly of Whitten, students, faculty, staff, community members and free speech organizations have sharply criticized her administration. The Friday meeting was attended by a handful of silent protesters. They held a Palestinian flag and signs calling on the university to divest from relationships with Israel and Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane.
Read more: IU Trustees aren’t unanimous on letter supporting Pres. Whitten
In April, the Bloomington Faculty Council passed a no confidence resolution against Whitten, Bloomington Provost Rahul Shrivastav and Vice Provost for Faculty and Academic Affairs Carrie Docherty.Faculty had concerns over shared governance, censorship and a culture of fear on campus. Additionally, the Indiana Graduate Workers Coalition, the campus graduate student union, went on a three-day strike for better pay.
Following the vote, controversy grew. Whitten’s administration gave Indiana State Police the go-ahead to arrest 57 anti-war protesters in Dunn Meadow this spring. The protesters, following a national pro-Palestine movement on college campuses, pitched tents in Dunn Meadow. Leadership decided on a new policy hours beforethe camp went up, effectively banning tents.
Prosecutors didn’t pursue charges, but some students and faculty were issued bans from campus. Whitten drew more criticism after the community learned of police in sniper positions during the protests.
Read more: Protesters and state police respond to dropped charges
More no confidence votes from campus units followed the arrests.
Protests continued into the fall, mostly in response to a new “expressive activity” policy. The policy bans camping, displaying unapproved signs and symbols, protesting within 25 feet of entrances, and activity on campus between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.
Read more: IU cites 14 protesters with violations for candlelight vigils
Whitten has also spearheaded a new IU Indianapolis campus. The campus marks the end of IUPUI, a joint campus with Purdue University. IU plans to build the Indianapolis campus’ enrollment and facilities. It welcomed more than 20,000 students in August.
Trustee Isaac Torres was not present for the vote, according to an IU spokesperson.
This story was updated to include a photo of protesters and information from Trustees Langham, Seibert, Torres and Spears.
Aubrey is our higher education reporter and a Report For America corps member. Contact her at aubmwrig@iu.edu or follow her on X @aubreymwright .
