Keene
The $41,658 payment represents 30 percent of her teaching salary, which was set at $88,860, plus a $15,000 lump sum departure incentive, spokeswoman Kelly Ricaurte said.
According to a list of faculty and staff who accepted the “voluntary separation plans,” obtained through a right-to-know request by The Sentinel, Huot was one of eight faculty members who agreed to leave the college between July 1 and Aug. 1 of this calendar year.
Huot’s separation payment comes after she received $327,225 in severance pay following her abrupt resignation from the presidency in June 2017, according to a resignation agreement with the University System of New Hampshire. Huot took a year of unpaid leave but was set to return to the college this year as a tenured biology professor, which made her eligible for the buyout program.
In a news release in 2017 announcing her resignation from the presidency, Huot cited “personal and professional reasons.” The Sentinel was unable to reach her directly for comment.
Less than two months after Huot stepped down as Keene State’s president, Castleton University in Vermont announced she was one of four finalists for the presidency there.
Huot later withdrew her application for that position, citing an “unexpected family event,” according to an email Jeb Spaulding, chancellor of the Vermont State Colleges System, sent Castleton University alumni, faculty, staff and students.
The Keene State faculty who accepted buyouts and left the college at the beginning of the fiscal year include Mark Arends, assistant professor of sustainable product design and architecture; Lara Bryant, associate professor of geography; Cynthia Cahoon, associate professor of nursing; Jennifer Ditkoff, associate professor at the Mason Library; Patrick Hickey, assistant professor and education librarian at the Mason Library; Carolyn Keller, associate professor of sociology, anthropology, and criminal justice; and Marin Sullivan, assistant professor of modern and contemporary art history.
Two more faculty have agreed to leave the college in January 2019 as part of the buyout program, the list indicates.
Among the 44 staff who accepted buyouts and left between January and May 2016, three were high-level administrators: Steven Goetsch, associate vice president for enrollment management; Rodney Miller, associate vice president for constituent relations; and Paul Striffolino, assistant vice president for student affairs.
Shoring Up a Gap
The Keene State buyouts were announced last December as part of efforts to close an estimated $5.5 million budget deficit for fiscal year 2019, which started in July.
In February, interim President Melinda Treadwell, who took over for Huot in July 2017, announced that the college was on track to close that deficit after about 50 faculty and staff accepted the buyouts.
The college also confronted a deficit in fiscal year 2018.
Under Huot, departments on campus based their fiscal year 2018 budgets on what they had been allotted in the prior year’s budget, Treadwell told The Sentinel in September 2017. But the budget submitted to the university system’s board of trustees worked off what those departments had actually spent during the fiscal year — a lower number, Treadwell said.
She also cited low enrollment revenue and the previous use of reserve money as factors in the deficit.
A finalized budget was released after the 2017-18 school year began, after about $7.5 million in cuts.
According to an email sent to staff and faculty in December announcing the buyout program, the plans include a lump sum equaling 30 percent of departing faculty’s base pay, plus a $15,000 lump sum departure incentive for a departure date of July 1, 2018.
Staff and faculty who took the buyouts also receive six months of medical benefits at the employee premium rate, or a $2,500 lump sum in its place. During that six-month period, both groups will also have access to the college’s library, recreation center, parking and discounts, the email notes.
Departing staff were offered continued base pay and benefits for 90 days after their last day worked, at which point they would receive a lump-sum payment equaling six weeks of base pay, the email says.
The original deadline for the applications was extended, and the length of service needed to be eligible for the buyout was reduced in January, after only 22 staff and seven faculty members applied. At that time, the buyouts were opened to all full-time faculty and staff with at least one year of service in the University System of New Hampshire.
Initially, only faculty with six years of service and staff with five years of service were eligible to apply.
A request for comment sent to an email believed to belong to Huot went unanswered Tuesday.