Carleton University’s business faculty is basking in the big bucks.
Nearly half of the top 25 salaries at Carleton were from faculty members at the Sprott School of Business, the Ontario Sunshine List revealed.
The Sunshine List is an annual report disclosing provincial public sector employees who earn salaries of more than $100,000.
Excluding the seven senior management salaries in the top 25 — since these positions are not a part of any faculty — 11 of the 18 top earners were Sprott professors.
Former interim president and vice-chancellor, Jerry Tomberlin, had the highest salary at $423,964. He received a 39 per cent raise from 2023 and transitioned back to being a professor at Sprott, with Wisdom Tettey stepping into the role of president in January.
This salary bump nudged Tomberlin into the third highest salary in the history of the university, behind president and vice-chancellor, David Atkinson’s $467,836 salary in 2006 and vice-president research and international, Feridun Hamdullahpur’s $503,248 salary in 2009.
Excluding Tomberlin, three of the five top earners hold a position at Sprott.
Second of the five was Isaac Otchere, a full-time professor of finance, who made $330,289 — up 23 per cent from 2023. Otchere has been a professor for 18 years.
Third was newly appointed dean of the Sprott School of Business, Howard Nemirof, whose salary was $317,064 — a 23 per cent raise from last year. Nemirof has served various roles for Carleton for more than 19 years.
Fifth on the list was academic director and associate professor of finance, Yuriy Zabolotnyuk, who got a 22 per cent raise to $283,696. Zabolotnyuk has been with Carleton for 16 years.
These huge salary jumps exceeded the provincial norm, historic Sunshine List data showed.
The double-digit raises were in response to Bill 124 — a provincial act which capped public sector wage increases to one per cent in 2019, the university told the Charlatan in an email.
“These one-time payments have temporarily increased reported earnings and do not reflect current base salaries for Carleton employees,” the university said.
Bill 124 was repealed by Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government in February 2024. The Sunshine List now reflects the pay that many faculty members didn’t get when the bill became law.
Gender wage gap
Male faculty members on the Ontario Sunshine List made $13,674 more than the average female worker, analysis by the Charlatan shows.
This has been a widening trend since the $10,561 gap in 2022 and the $11,761 difference in 2023.
But the wage gap may actually be different than what the Sunshine List’s raw data shows, said Brett Stevens, Carleton University Academic Staff Association (CUASA) salary and benefits officer. CUASA represents full-time faculty and professional librarians at the university.
“There’s all sorts of contexts that are never kind of overtly talked about with the Sunshine List,” he said.
Because faculty members’ salaries are tied to their area of study, like business or chemistry, it’s difficult to determine if gender is the main axis of inequality, Stevens added.
Still, Stevens said he suspects there are disparities between male and female salaries at Canadian universities, but “saying exactly how much is difficult.”
Dominique Marshall, CUASA’s president, said she agrees, adding there are many intangible variables that decide a professor’s pay.
“These differences at hiring tend to solidify and transform into some considerable inequities later,” Marshall said of the list’s gender pay trend.
“Carleton remains committed to equitable and transparent compensation and continues to focus on attracting and retaining top teaching and research talent to support student success and academic excellence,” Carleton said in a statement.
Marshall, who has served on a number of hiring committees, said she has noticed Carleton’s commitment to training against hiring biases.
“It’s complex, but nonetheless, we have to work towards equity,” Stevens said.
Across all 862 faculty members on the list, the mean salary jumped 12 per cent to $177,120. Since the Sunshine List was created in 1996, there has been an average gender pay difference of $6,000 favouring male faculty members.
To see Carleton’s full Ontario Sunshine List statistics, click here.
Featured image by Simon McKeown/the Charlatan
