Barry did a story on the Board of Trustees meeting. References to possible new deal for Franklin.

[PSUFTG]

Wow. Just wow. It’s hard to argue with the simplicity of those points and benchmarks.

It’s hard not to rush to the “incompetence or worse” conclusion.

Isn't (or wasn't) one of the former BOT members a big real estate developer or in construction and his company was often used in Penn State capital construction projects? Lubert?

Lubert's primary funky relationships begin with the development and lease-backs of properties at the Research Park northeast of Beaver Stadium. He is also, of course, the Casino guy involved in the project going on in State College. He was also a large beneficiary of the Penn State endowment - managing, for an oversized fee, large chunks of Penn State's endowment dollars, invested in his private real estate partnerships.
Lubert's partner, in many ventures, Mark Dambly - the guy who couldn't remember being incarcerated - makes his living as a real estate developer. He has been, for years, the biggest catalyst behind much of Penn State's construction project push (probably with Lubert's behind the scenes assistance). As a developer, he is not directly involved in construction - but many of the Penn State projects use large contractors who also work on Dambly's private projects. That is where people should first start investigating when trying to locate the "smell of rotten fish" surrounding Penn State's inexplicable costs. It doesn't take a Phi Beta Kappa to put together the dots in those relationships.

 

[PSUFTG]

It's my understanding that his current contract does have incentive clauses. I guess we won't know the details until the terms of any new contract are announced. Your claim that Franklin is "just showing up" until he gets fired is asinine.

Every contract Franklin has signed contains incentive clauses - as do at least 90% of coach's contracts throughout the country. You can look up the specific clauses in Franklin's current contract - I am sure they are out there, as I have seen them myself in the past.
The incentives, IIRC, max out at $1 Million. Some of the incentives are lay-ups - things like qualifying for a bowl - others are longshots - like winning the Big Ten championship. That is a lot of money, but even without them he is making a base salary in excess of $6 million, IIRC.

 

[GrimReaper]

You’re wrong. But by all means continue.

And you have data to support that? Take your time.

 

[GrimReaper]

Regarding the quality of applicants - it doesn’t necessarily require that additional applicants be from a better distribution than the existing ones, just that there are some incremental applicants above the lowest tier that were previously offered/admitted. Of course there is there is an element of resources needed to evaluate the apps, so there’s a little more than that to it. Gotta think the avg cost of evaluating an additional application is declining, or at worst flat.

Except that if a school is filling its class from the top, say, 20% of its applicant pool and a sizeable number of that cohort is rejected simply because of numbers then it may be difficult to improve the quality of the pool. Not sure that anyone would want to argue that for their school.

 

[GrimReaper]

I served on the Advisory Board for a decade at one of the Commonwealth campuses. I can tell you we were told by folks in Admissions that applications rose when the football team had a good season.

In terms of numbers, I wouldn't doubt it. My question is with regard to the academic credentials of those applicants. But if a school is admitting 75% or more of its applicants, the quality could rise. Just don't expect that school to become Harvard overnight.

 

[PSU Mike]

Except that if a school is filling its class from the top, say, 20% of its applicant pool and a sizeable number of that cohort is rejected simply because of numbers then it may be difficult to improve the quality of the pool. Not sure that anyone would want to argue that for their school.

That’s why I qualified if by saying some incremental applicants had to be above the previous cut point. There’s still the incremental cost of processing/screening factoring in so it may be a wash.

 

[GrimReaper]

That’s why I qualified if by saying some incremental applicants had to be above the previous cut point. There’s still the incremental cost of processing/screening factoring in so it may be a wash.

Let's put it this way: a school that is looking to its football program to materially and permanently improve the quality of its applicant pool, and by extension its student body, is seriously misguided.

 

[TiogaLion]

Let's put it this way: a school that is looking to its football program to materially and permanently improve the quality of its applicant pool, and by extension its student body, is seriously misguided.

For what they're paying Franklin they could have hired 30 - 40 Pulitzer Prize and/or Nobel Prize winners. Then, take the Lasch modification money and create an endowment for these new guys to attract the best and brightest students and we would vault up the academic rankings.

 

[GrimReaper]

For what they're paying Franklin they could have hired 30 - 40 Pulitzer Prize and/or Nobel Prize winners. Then, take the Lasch modification money and create an endowment for these new guys to attract the best and brightest students and we would vault up the academic rankings.

Pulitzer Prize winners are cheap: see Sara Ganim.