The Board of Supervisors approved a 4 percent pay stipend Friday for University coaches who reach the postseason.
“It’s a well-deserved compensation for coaches who get our teams past the regular season,” said Ronald Anderson, Athletics Committee chair.
The board also encouraged Chancellor Mark Emmert — along with the AgCenter and Law Center chancellors — to continue to move the University forward. The three leaders are “engaged in a common venture” to make LSU a nationally competitive land grant University, Emmert said.
The school will celebrate its 150th birthday in February 2010, and Emmert said he would like to be able to compare the University to national research institutions by that time.
In order to achieve this goal, University leaders first must decide which schools they should compare the University to, Emmert said.
Emmert said they then must determine how the University can aid the state’s economic, social and cultural development.
“Our competition is in the Floridas, Californias, Georgias and Michigans of the nation, not in our own state,” he said. “We have to put ourselves on the same level as them.”
The chancellors should compare the University to its competition in the areas of academics — including admissions standards and academic programs — and human and physical resources, Emmert said.
“We cannot do what we want to do with our University if we don’t have enough faculty and staff,” he said.
In other business, Lonnie Stockwell — a New Orleans businessman and University alumnus — spoke to the board on a program designed to enhance the state’s economic development by bringing education and businesses together.
“Fish or Cut Bait” is a grassroots operation that will bring Louisiana university students and graduates into successful Louisiana businesses through jobs and internships, Stockwell said.
“We have good businesses and schools here [in Louisiana],” he said. “We need to use them.”