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Professor earning $60,000 per year to ._.... teach two classes is contracted to pay much of her salary "- to Metro fund Jesse Stephenson The METROPOLITAN
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One of Metro's highest-paid professors is required to pay $34,657 of her state-funded salary into a private fund for the college this year. In her last contract, Courtney Price, a management professor and syndicated newspaper columnist who holds the title of Metro's Director of the Institute of Entrepreneurship, was required to contribute her entire salary to the Metro Foundation. Price is currently in Hong Kong and could not be reached for comment. Metro President Sheila Kaplan denied that Price is being forced to give thousands to the foundation, although Price's previous two contracts - both of which were signed by Kaplan - have included specific amounts she had to donate into the fund. "This is not a money-laundering operation," Kaplan said. "Who she chooses to donate to is her business." Price's 1995-96 contract stipulates that she "will make four quarterly payments of $16,556.75," which equal the sum of her entire yearly salary of $66,227, to the Metro Foundation. The foundation is the college's private charity fund that has been highly promoted in Denver's business community by Kaplan. This year Price is slated to teach only one class in both the fall and spring semesters, but her salary and benefits total $69,315, according to coIIege records. The "special conditions" section of her contract states that Price will pay
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Metro President Sheila Kaplan about half her wages into the Metro Foundation. Carolyn Schaefer, Metro's vice pres-
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ident for institutional advancement, who oversees administrative activities for the foundation, refused to verify that Price
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gave the amounts stated in her contracts to the fund. "That is private record," Schaefer said. "Donors give for private reasons." A Metro faculty member, who requested anonymity because he fears reprisal from Kaplan, said he believes Price is paid a high salary to ensure hefty donations for the foundation. Two other Metro professors said rumors and speculation about Price's employment at Metro and her dealings with the foundation have been rampant among the faculty in recent weeks. Robert Breitenbach, chairman of the management department, said Kaplan asked him to keep mum about Price's employment at the college but did say that Price's entrepreneurship program is a big asset to his department. Kaplan said Price is given ample release time from her teaching duties to develop the entrepreneurship program and credits her for bringing several prominent business leaders to speak at Metro. "I don't think anyone will say she's not worth it," Kaplan said "She is certainly a very valuable member of that department." Despite her title as director of the entrepreneurship program, Price's 199596 contract states she is only responsible for responding to requests for assistance in matters concerning the entrepreneurship curriculum from her department chairman and the full-time entrepreneurship instructor. Price's 1996-97 contract states that she is expected to teach two classes this year and must plan a luncheon/dinner event next semester for Metro graduates who have taken entrepreneurship courses at the college. Price is currently teaching one independent study student - not a course according to the management department's teaching schedule, and will teach MNG 402, a three-credit course called Entrepreneurial Creativity, this spring.