Ewu Chief On Road For Funds, Students Drummond’s Frequent Trips Help Build Network, And Fuel Critics
New York City, Orlando, Bangkok, Hong Kong and Tokyo.
For some people, these are far-away cities to visit once in a lifetime.
For Marshall Drummond, the president of Eastern Washington University, these are stops he made in just the past year to recruit students, call on donors and attend basketball games.
Between May 1996 and mid-August 1997, when Drummond took a three-week vacation, Eastern’s chief road warrior took 38 trips on business, including 16 outside the state and three out of the country, university travel records show.
Drummond’s exhausting schedule has cost taxpayers little, but it kept him on the road 125 days in little more than a year. That meant he spent every third day, including weekends and holidays, ferrying about in taxis, hopping airplanes, eating at restaurants or sleeping in hotels.
Drummond says his travels are no different than those of other university presidents who scour the globe searching for wealthy contributors and cash-paying students. The trips out of Spokane boost enrollment and revenue, two things the 115-year-old Eastern desperately needs right now, he says.
As the university struggles with enrollment declines and a shortage of money, the 56-year-old Drummond will resign his $110,000-per-year post effective next year. That gives officials time to search for the best replacement while Drummond oversees the school’s 10-year accreditation review and various fund-raising projects.
Since announcing his resignation, Drummond has traveled seven more times and logged 35 days away from the Cheney campus, including a flight to Hong Kong to witness the British colony’s return to Chinese rule.
Records show that the former professor travels far more than the presidents at Washington’s two other regional universities. And while Drummond has guided successful fund-raising campaigns during his seven-year tenure, student enrollment has plummeted to a level not seen since Jimmy Carter was president.
Ivory Nelson, the president of Central Washington University, logged 15 trips during the same period that Drummond took 38.
Karen Morse, president of Western Washington University, took just one international trip - to Vancouver, British Columbia, 30 miles north of the Bellingham campus. Drummond spent 39 days overseas this year.
“A president who sits here in his office doesn’t raise any money,” Drummond says from his second-floor suite in Showalter Hall.
“People don’t give $25,000 to a fund-raising letter, they give it after the university president comes to visit. I think my travel has brought significant benefits back to us.”
One benefit has been a dramatic rise in pledges to the EWU Foundation, a private organization that raises money for student scholarships, academic fellowships and equipment.
Money pledged to the foundation nearly doubled in the past year to $1.4 million and the number of individual donors jumped by 1,000, officials say. During Drummond’s reign as president, the assets of the foundation have rocketed from $3 million to $12.9 million; scholarships this year will hit $450,000, nearly double last year’s gifts.
But while the donations were pouring in, students were transferring out.
Under Drummond’s management, Eastern has lost more than 700 students in the past three years.
The Legislature funded Eastern for 7,739 full-time students in the current academic year. University officials said Friday they will have 6,834 students.
The exodus of students has alarmed lawmakers and triggered a financial crisis at the university.
Eastern has reacted with plans to cut 100 full-time faculty positions, eliminating one fourth of the instructional staff during the next two years.
The Legislature also hit Eastern with an unprecedented demand: Show evidence of increasing enrollment, decreasing costs and acceptable student-to-teacher ratios before receiving $3.2 million in state money.
Last month, Eastern won release of part of the money to cover teachers’ salaries. Officials next month will ask for the remaining $1.35 million.
Drummond’s travels draw criticism and yawns from Eastern faculty and staff.
English professor Dana Elder, who served last year as president of the EWU Faculty Organization, says Drummond has not abused the system.
Drummond’s travel is “well inside the envelope of normal for that position,” Elder says. “What people don’t understand about recruiting is that you can’t go in on a Saturday and bring back 100 students Monday. It’s a long-term investment that requires you to build relationships.”
Jeffrey Corkill, chemistry professor and president of the United Faculty of Eastern bargaining group, says Drummond acts as the contact person for people outside Cheney, while campus administrators manage the school.
“He seems to do an awful lot of traveling, but I suppose that’s part of his job,” Corkill says.
Drummond’s loudest critic, Tom McArthur, believes the president travels far too much for someone leading a regional university.
“We don’t have any business sending someone to Asia who has resigned and is a lame duck,” says McArthur, a campus heavy equipment operator and president of the nonfaculty Local 931 Washington Federation of State Employees. “I think a lot of it is for him to have a good time.”
Drummond shrugs off the criticism, but agrees that it is time for him to stay home. He recently alerted faculty that he will reduce his travel this academic year to wean major donors from his presence and to concentrate on running the university.
“I don’t intend to do any overseas trips on business,” says Drummond, who looks forward to more time riding his motorcycle and surfing the Internet. “I’ll minimize the number of trips beyond the state boundaries.”
Considering how many days he’s away from the office, Drummond’s globetrotting has cost taxpayers less than a used minivan.
All told, he billed the state $13,962 for rental cars, hotels, food and phone calls from June 1996 to mid-August 1997, travel records show.
Another $4,900 in grants and foundation money supplemented two trips to Asia earlier this year.
“I’m the first guy to beg and borrow off someone else for travel,” Drummond says.
Western president Morse, who oversees a university of 10,400 full-time students, spent nearly as much money traveling as Drummond, but took far fewer trips. Nelson, president of Ellensburg, Wash.-based Central, spent less than Drummond but traveled as far away as Ghana.
Drummond visited that African nation two years ago on a $50,000 World Bank grant. Money left over from the trip helped pay for this year’s Asian tours, records show.
Kenneth Dolan, who served in several Eastern administrations as executive assistant to the president, describes Drummond as a president who travels more than some, less than others.
“He’s an active traveler,” says Dolan, who retired last month.
Many of Drummond’s trips are routine, one-day calls to the out-of-town members of Eastern’s board of trustees. Others are for meetings with his President’s Council, a private advisory board that includes Seattle real estate developer David Sabey, an Eastern alum, and Bangkok businessman Pitak Intrawityanuat.
Drummond often visits Olympia to lobby legislators and regulators. At least once a year, he flies to a distant city to fulfill a commitment to the National Academy of Science, where he is a member of two boards studying the storage of high-level wastes. The academy picks up the tab.
An allergy sufferer, Drummond says he dreads trips to some parts of the world where, between sneezes, he must sip soup with potential donors, greet alumni and endure jet lag.
“(Washington State University president) Sam Smith only has to talk to the big fish, but Mark Drummond needs to visit everyone,” Drummond laments. “To some, it looks like Drummond is partying in Orlando, but I didn’t want to go to Orlando.”
Leaving just after Christmas, when Spokane was buried under 3 feet of snow, Drummond spent six days in Orlando’s 80-degree weather to host alumni parties and watch the Eagles women’s basketball team play in a tournament. The university’s alumni office lists 23 Eastern graduates living in the Orlando area.
“We’ll get donations (from Orlando) that far exceed the costs of that trip,” Drummond says.
Orlando wasn’t the only timely getaway for Drummond last year. Two days after the wicked November ice storm that shut down power across the Northwest, Drummond left on a four-day trip to Albuquerque, N.M., with the Eagles men’s basketball team.
Drummond took his first trip to Asia last February when the Legislature was in session. His second trip - a 22-day trek - came two days after resigning as president.
Drummond says the Asian trips were important to shore up relations with sister universities, alumni and donors.
Together, they sent nearly 300 students to Eastern last year. These students receive no financial aid, he says, contributing more than $3 million in tuition, room, board and personal spending to Eastern and the local economy.
University records show that 279 of the 396 foreign students attending Eastern last year came from the Pacific Rim. Japan and Taiwan were the largest source of students. None was from Hong Kong.
Drummond’s most important trip of the year may be just ahead. In October, he and other Eastern officials will go to Olympia to ask the Higher Education Coordinating Board to release the money withheld by the Legislature.
Drummond says Eastern will present a strong case and he’s confident the university will win back the funds.
“I’ll be there,” Drummond says. “I’m the president.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo