Northwestern University President’s Recruitment and $30M Overhead Deal Reveals Potential Misuse of Funds

190 Teaching Minds Series that determines the winner. The real determination is made by newspapers, or parents who want their kids to apply there, or poten- tial donors. But the battle is real enough. This battle was dead serious before U.S. News and World Report started publishing annual rankings. Now, it is the basis of how the university functions. When the current president was recruited at Northwestern, he essentially was told that his job was to get North- western into the top ten (in the U.S. News rankings). Northwestern was ranked 12th or 13th at this time. In his first year he succeeded. Why? Because Northwestern’s football team won the Big Ten title and went to the Rose Bowl. Of course, he had nothing to do with that. But the following year applications doubled (or something like that) and that is a Statistic that U.S. News uses, so presto, we were number nine. It didn’t last. Neither did it make sense. Recruiting me was like winning the Rose Bowl. Well, all right, not really. But a member of the Board of Trustees actually did say to me when he met me: “It’s our star quarterback.” I brought in money and prestige. It is natural to wonder who actually got the money that An- dersen offered and what was done with it and why it was given out, and, while we are at it, what exactly it was I did all day if I didn’t teach. First the university’s share. Every dollar of that $30 million went into Northwestern’s bank account. Then they let me spend it accord- ing to certain rules. The first rule is called “overhead.” The university charges an overhead rate on all contracts. The actual percentage varies and one of the first things I had to negotiate with Northwestern was how much their take would be. I don’t remember exactly now, but they got about 30% of what I brought in. So, about $9 million of this money went into Northwestern’s pocket. Do you see now why they didn’t care how much I taught? They just wanted me there and they wanted that money. By the way, they also got the interest on all the money. They also got the prestige. I set up a new institute that became in- stantly well known and was something the university could brag about. The Institute for the Learning Sciences was something unique. North- western had one and no one else did. Moreover, I might (and did) raise even more money for my institute. More overhead money. Yippee! What did I do with the money? Mostly what you can do with this money is hire people. If you have a research agenda, something you want to build or accomplish, you will need help. If you want to build a rocket ship that no one has ever built before, you will need to HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_023936