The Penn State Board of Trustees met Thursday and Friday, July 17 and 18 at the Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport PA. My report below contains information available to the public, including quotes from public discussions. I strongly urge you to click on the links provided to find further information you might find interesting.

Attendance

Announced as absent from the meeting were trustees Russell Redding, Carrie Rowe, and newly elected Alumni Trustee Karen Keller. This would have been her first full Board meeting as an elected trustee.

Those attending only via video included most of the Alumni-Elected trustees, including: Carl Nassib and Brandon Short (neither of whom have attended an in-person meeting in the last six months) and newly elected Alumni Trustee Joe DeRenzo. Uma Moriarity attended via video on Thursday but was in attendance on Friday.

The only Alumni-Elected trustees who attended both days in person were Jay Paterno, Matt McGloin, Kelly Lynch, and Greg Pilewicz.

Aside from Trustees Paterno and McGloin, all alumni-elected trustees voted yes for all the action items listed below.

As we have seen in the past, we have a problem with with many alumni-elected trustees who are unable to prioritize their fiduciary duties to the university over their personal business (although in-person attendance does increase during football season). Perhaps the new trustee screening committee should consider a candidate’s willingness to attend the five meetings the Board of Trustees holds annually, as they cull candidates for ‘the right kind of people’.

Meetings:

On Thursday July 17th there were meetings of the committees on Student Success, Research and Technology, Governance, and Finance. On Friday July 18th the full Board met in private session in the morning, and then in a brief public session in the afternoon. You can find the agendas, supporting materials, and meeting recordings here.

The voting items, in the order in which they were presented:

4.a.1. Proposed Presidential Performance Bonus

RESOLVED, that the Board of Trustees approves an Annual Performance Bonus for President Neeli Bendapudi for the 2025–2026 performance period, in the amount and upon the terms recommended by the Equity and Human Resources Committee and presented to the Board of Trustees in Executive Session.

On top of her astronomical $2.8 million in annual compensation (see Penn State President Bendapudi Awarded 3rd Raise In Four Years – BARRY FENCHAK), the Board unanimously approved a 15% base compensation ($210,000) performance bonus for President Neeli Bendapudi. This bonus rewarded her performance over the past year:

• In a show of distrust for her administration, Penn State faculty overwhelmingly voted to unionize

• Research funding continued to lag well behind Dr Bendapudi’s stated target of returning to being in the Top 15 in the nation (we are currently 25^th)

• Tuition revenue missed budget projections by $37 million

• Penn State’s academic ranking continues to stagnate near the bottom of the BigTen Conference

• Enrollment yields, which are a clear indicator of the perceived value of a Penn State education, remain at alarmingly low levels and continue to trend downwards.

• Penn State remains in the bottom of the Value Rankings in US News College Rankings lists.

• The state continues to ignore Dr Bendapudi’s pleas for dramatic increases in the general appropriation from the state. Penn State received, as it has during every year of Dr Bendapudi’s tenure, $0 increase in its general appropriation.

This proposal passed unanimously.

4.a.2. Proposed 2026-2027 Presidential Performance Goals

RESOLVED, that the Board of Trustees approve the President’s 2026 – 2027 Performance Goals as presented in Executive Session.

Dr Bendapudi’s official performance goals remain a secret and only discussed in private meetings. The performance goals Dr Bendapudi wrote herself (read the Presidential Vision and Goals here) contain only one measurable metric (achievement of a position as a Top 15 US research institution) and no accountable targets or requirements. Instead, the Board declares that Dr Bendapudi is a ‘rock star’ and awards her more money.

This proposal passed unanimously.

4.b.1. Proposed Appointment to the Penn State Investment Council

RESOLVED, That Robert Beard, Chair of the Finance and Investment Committee, be appointed to the Penn State Investment Council replacing former Vice Chair, Mary Lee Schneider.
RESOLVED, That the appropriate officers of the University are authorized to take all actions necessary or appropriate to implement the foregoing resolution.

While this appears to be no more than a boilerplate housekeeping item, there may be a bit more underneath. The Penn State Investment Council’s primary role is involved with the governance of the endowment, which has been underperforming for years now.

Mary Lee Schneider, a member of the Board of Trustees for the last 11 years, has spent many of those years as a member of the PSIC. In fact, just a few months ago the Board changed its Bylaws in order to allow Schneider to continue to sit on that Investment Council.

There was no explanation of why she is suddenly being removed.

This proposal passed unanimously.

4.b.2. Proposed Budget for Fiscal Year Beginning July 1, 2027, with Corresponding Tuition, Fees, and Housing and Food Rates

RESOLVED, That the proposed University budget for fiscal years 2027-2028 and corresponding tuition, fees, and housing and food rates are hereby approved.

These two items, the University’s operating budget and the level of tuition costs, are always voted on as one comprehensive item. The Board approved of both with two dissenting votes: Trustees Paterno and McGloin (both alumni-elected trustees).

The headline will be that Penn State increased tuition again, but there is much more to digest here, so I will do so in a separate article focused solely on the budget. I think you will find that article to be educational and enlightening. I will guarantee you one thing: after reading it you will be tremendously more informed on the Penn State budget than are most of the members of the Board.

You can see Penn State’s current tuition rates here: Tuition Schedules 2025-26 | Tuition Information. As you likely know, Penn State’s tuition rates for in-state students remain the highest in the BigTen Conference. Drastically so, and it is not moving in the right direction (read Penn State’s Affordability Gap – BARRY FENCHAK).

The Board voted to increase tuition rates again: by 2.5% for In State students at University Park, and 4% for out of state students. Those are the ‘little’ numbers, let’s look at the big numbers.

The annual tuition costs will now be:

The largest increases, in both dollars and percentages, have been for upperclass students. This is not unintentional. Jacking up tuition rates for those students after they have been enrolled for two years allows for the huge tuition increases to be hidden from many prospective students and families. While the data is available for those willing to do a little digging, many families and students are still shocked when they get that first tuition bill as an upperclassman. At that point in the process though, there is not much to do but grin and bear it.

Room and Board rates, of course, also went up, most dramatically for students in the recently renovated dormitories.

Vote: Yes - 33 No - 2 (Paterno, McGloin)

4.c.1 Proposed Approval Limitation on Access to Classified Information

BE IT RESOLVED that in the future, when any individual enters upon any duties as Chairman or Vice Chairman of the Board, Senior Management Official and Facility Security Officer, such individual shall immediately make application for the required eligibility for access to classified information; and
BE IT RESOLVED AND DIRECTED that the following members of the Board of Directors and other officers or members shall not require, shall not have, and can be effectively and formally excluded from access to all CLASSIFIED information disclosed to the corporation/company and shall not affect adversely corporate/company policies or practices in the performance of classified contracts for the Department of Defense or the Government contracting activities (User Agencies) of the National Industrial Security Program.
• Joseph DeRenzo, Chief of Anesthesiology, UPMC Magee Women’s Hospital
• Karen Keller, Managing Partner, Shaw Keller LLP

Certain university business partners (US Department of Defense, etc) require that anyone with access to sensitive items of information must go through and pass a security clearance. Most members of the Board of Trustees either don’t have, or could not receive, the required clearances, and therefore cannot be given access to that information. This information is not Penn State proprietary information, which all trustees have a right to by State law.

This proposal passed unanimously.

4.c.2 Proposed Changes to the Bylaws of The Pennsylvania State University

RESOLVED, That the Penn State University Bylaws and Elections Appendix to the Bylaws be amended as set forth in Appendix II hereto. (See Appendix I)

Among the amendments to the Bylaws were:

• Formalizing the process for replacing a trustee who reaches the 12 year overall term limit in the middle of one of their elected or appointed terms. The process will be: A) For that trustees term to end once they reach the 12 year mark, and B) For the Nominating Subcommittee to select a replacement for the remaining unexpired term.

• Limiting the normal term limits for Chair of the Board or Vice Chair of the Board to three years (with a loophole inserted that would allow for longer terms, with Board approval)

The remainder of the Bylaws changes appear to be attempts at ‘wordsmithing’ of some of the most draconian elements added to the Bylaws in July 2024, when the Board was focused on silencing and removing trustees with dissenting viewpoints. The Board is currently facing multiple lawsuits regarding the drafting and the implementation of some of these provisions. It appears these amendments may be in reaction to those suits.

This proposal passed unanimously.

5.a. Proposed Election of Members of the Nominating Subcommittee

RESOLVED, That the following persons be appointed to the Nominating Subcommittee for 2026 – 2027: Daniel A. Onorato, Chair*, Kelley M. Lynch, Vice Chair, Robert E. Beard, Ruby Bjalme, Randall “Randy” E. Black, David M. Davis, Daniel J. Delligatti, Anand Ganjam, Naren K. Gursahaney, David M. Kleppinger *, Uma Moriarity, Tracy Riegel, Richard S. Sokolov* *Ex Officio

This nominating subcommittee was created two years ago for the sole purpose of determining inclusion, or exclusion, of candidates on the Alumni Trustee election ballots. These are the folks who will be charged with keeping the “wrong type of people” off of the board (read Penn State Board of Trustees To Alumni: Drop Dead).

This proposal passed unanimously.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com’

As I took my seat at the Thursday, May 7^th public meeting of the Penn State Board of Trustees Equity and Human Resources Committee meeting (video link here), I spotted a group of professionals from The Segal Group, the New York based consultants Penn State uses to advise on employment and human resource issues. (Side note: Segal positions itself as Benefits and Human Resources consultants, and often appears when pre-determined Board actions, like Dr Bendapudi’s previous raises, need to be justified).

I guessed immediately why they were there: Dr Bendapudi must think she deserved another raise.

After all, it has been nearly nine months since her last raise (where she received an additional $1 million per year, setting her total compensation at a Big10 Conference record-breaking $2.8 million per year). I will also venture that more money for her inner circle ‘President’s Council’ would be a high priority at the moment—to quote Machiavelli: “A dictator can survive unhappy citizens longer than unhappy guards.”

At this point, I am beyond being surprised or dismayed by the blatant cash grab.

In 2021, Dr Bendapudi was making a reported $800,000 a year as the president of the University of Louisville. In August of that year, Dr Bendapudi accepted a new five year contract of over $1 million/year to insure continued stability at the university. Less than four months later she ‘flew the Cardinal nest’ and was named Penn State president. Since 2022 she has received three raises and an evergreen contract, bringing her current compensation to $2.8 million a year. This makes her the highest paid president in the Big10 Conference and in the top five of national public universities (many private universities do not disclose their presidential compensation). Coming to Penn State has indeed been, to borrow a favorite buzz-phrase, a ‘transformational experience’ for her.

What is Penn State getting for its money?

I want to be very clear: if Dr Bendapudi had provided meaningful impact on any of Penn State’s core missions I would not begrudge her reasonable salary increases. Heck, I’d be cheering. But let’s see what Penn State and Pennsylvania taxpayers are getting for their money since 2022:

• Strained relations with the Pennsylvania Legislature, particularly with regard to her disingenuous claims regarding the Commonwealth campus closures decision.

• Failed to prevent the graduate students and faculty from unionizing. Given how strongly her administration opposed the effort, this is a critical failure.

• As the head of Penn State Health, she is responsible for the closure of the Penn State Hershey Med transplant and critical missteps at the cancer center, and now horrific reports of suboptimal operating room sterilization practices.

• Undergraduate enrollment is down, targets are missed, and yield is in the toilet. Compared to our peers, the academic quality of incoming freshmen is abysmal and continues to decline. Dr Bendapudi is on her third Provost in four years, including a long-term interim.

• Penn State Athletic spending is out of control and is carrying the biggest debt load in the history of higher education.

• Penn State’s national academic ranking and reputation continue to flounder.

• Compared to our Big Ten peers, philanthropic giving is anemic and Dr Bendapudi is now on her third fundraising chief (the last one barely having time to unpack before being replaced)

• Penn State Dickinson Law School is on the edge of a very damaging situation. Dean Danielle M Conway was recently hit with a civil rights complaint over her strategic plan to make ‘anti-racism’ the school’s core mission. This comes at a bad time to draw the Federal government’s attention to what it considers to be schools that thumb their noses at their directives. (read here, here, here and here).

• Penn State still hasn’t cracked the top 15 US research schools, a goal of Dr Bendapudi’s since she was hired (it is currently #25).

I could go on, but judging by her track record, paying Dr Bendapudi more money is only going to exacerbate these problems.

Why isn’t the Penn State Board of Trustees saying no?

Dr Bendapudi’s bosses on the Board of Trustees have a long history of avoiding setting concrete priorities and connecting accountability to them (see this article). In fact, they allowed Dr Bendapudi to write her own performance-based compensation rubric called the ‘Presidential Vision and Goals’, which tie to her Penn State Strategic Plan. Neither contain specific goals or quantifiable metrics. The plan seems to have last been updated in 2023 and ‘How we will measure success’ in the category of ‘Transforming Health Care Through Academic and Clinical Synergy’ still reads: “Measures are in development”.

From the point of view of a having recently been a trustee, I know that the thought of having to find a new president chills Board leadership to the bone. And I would be remiss to not acknowledge that higher education is a challenging business, demanding a capable administration that can lead through complex situations.

There are talented candidates out there who might turn Penn State around for the same salary. But these leaders would demand a major course correction, which would expose the chronic damage the leadership has done for over a decade. For example, closing the Commonwealth Campuses was not a traumatic event but instead the outcome of years of neglect and prioritizing University Park enrollment at the expense of the smaller campuses.

Penn State always finds money for the wrong things.

Perhaps the most intractable barrier to meaningful reform is the Board’s longstanding tendency to measure its success by how much it pays. It’s an unfortunate fact that Penn State always seems to find money for the wrong things: $700 million (and counting) for renovating thirty percent of Beaver Stadium, paying off the Sandusky victims, a $100 million art museum that has generated little philanthropy or interest … the list is long and the instinct to keep throwing cash at problems is strong.

Penn State has proven it hasn’t met an optics problem it couldn’t ignore

Back to the meeting.

The Segal consultants began by discussing executive compensation trends in ‘the marketplace’, which is the top 25 public universities and/or top 50 national universities that Penn State considers to be their peer group such as Ohio State, Cal Berkeley, UCLA, Yale, Penn, Stanford, MIT, Johns Hopkins, and Columbia University. Dr Bendapudi and her chief of staff, Michael Wade Smith, were present in that meeting and listened to Segal’s presentation.

At the 9:32 mark, you will hear Trustee Nareen Gursahaney make a startling comment:

“Just one thought for your consideration. If we’re going to use school ranking as part of the peer group criteria, I think we need to open it up. Because if you look at it the way it’s articulated today, you have to be within the top 25 of the public institutions, or top 50 of the national institutions. And if I’m correct, Penn State is ranked 26^th and 60^th. So we’re outside of our own peer group.”

“I just… the optics of that aren’t really great for us.”

Penn State Trustee Nareen Gursahaney

I believe Trustee Gursahaney hit the nail on the head. To be brutally frank: Penn State used to be a peer to these top schools, but isn’t any longer.

Will the Penn State Board of Trustees announce another raise for Dr Bendapudi and her staff?

The Board has set a meeting of the Human Resources and Compensation Committee for June 4^th. To the best of my knowledge, this meeting will be held in Executive Session.

I am not a betting man, but if I had to put $10 down I would wager that increased funds will be provided for Dr Bendapudi’s higher-level administration team (although such measures do NOT require Board approval) and also lay the groundwork for yet another increase in compensation for Penn State’s ‘rock star’ president.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

The Penn State Board of Trustees met Thursday and Friday, November 7-8^th, 2026 at the Penn Stater Hotel, State College, Pennsylvania. My report below contains information available to the public, including quotes from public discussions. I strongly urge you to click on the links provided to find further information you might find interesting.

According to the Board Secretary, all trustees except Russell Redding were in attendance, but I question that: of the nine Alumni-Elected trustees, only four were in attendance over the two days of meetings; Trustees Anthony Lubrano, Jay Paterno, Greg Pilewicz, and Kelly Lynch. Trustees Ali Krieger, Brandon Short, Matt McGloin, Carl Nassib, and Uma Moriarity were not in attendance, although Moriarity and Nassib appeared via Zoom.

It is difficult to represent the alumni constituents whose votes you begged for when you are not present. In all likelihood this will be the last time Trustee Krieger does not show up, as her tenure on the Board will end on June 30 (see the Alumni Trustee election results below).

In addition, trustees Carrie Row, Cindy Dunn, Abe Hoffman, and Matt Schuyler were also not in attendance, although Trustee Schuyler appeared via Zoom.

On Thursday there were meetings of the committees on Student Success; Audit and Risk; Governance; Equity and Human Resources; and Finance. You can find the agendas, supporting materials, and meeting recordings here.

Friday, May 8^th, 2026 public meeting of the full Board

Read the full published agenda here , links to supporting materials here, and video here , which I urge you to watch it in its entirety.

• Action Item: Proposed Project Approval, Physical Education Building Renovation, Penn State Abington

The project renovates the Physical Education Building at Penn State Abington. Constructed in 1973, the building serves as the campus’ indoor facility for athletic programs, physical education courses, intramural programs, general recreational activities and special events. The project will renovate the facility’s primary and auxiliary gymnasiums, weight training and fitness spaces, offices, and locker rooms. Additionally, the facility will undergo window and door replacements, introduce air conditioning, and vastly improve accessibility.

This $25,000,000 project was passed unanimously.

• Action Item: Proposed Reappointment of Directors for the Penn State Health Board of Directors

Penn State Health is the non-profit corporation established by the Board of Trustees for the purpose of holding and managing components of the health care enterprise controlled by the University, including the Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center.

This item was to re-appoint the following to the Penn State Health Board:

• Neeli Bendapudi

• Timothy P. Brown

• Mark H. Dambly

• David M. Kleppinger

• Keith E. Masser

• Dr. Gregory J. Moore

• Barry K. Robinson

• Sara F. Thorndike

• Steven B. Wagman

Given the horrific sterilization lapses at Penn State Hershey Med, recently exposed by SpotlightPA in their excellent article Workers in Penn State Health operating rooms raised alarms about safety, sterilization (Wyatt Massey, SpotlightPA May 14, 2026) and other significant issues like Penn State Cancer Institute Failed Leadership Exposed, that have arisen in recent years at Penn State Heath, it would be reasonable to question the strength of Penn State’s oversight of this organization.

Trustee Anthony Lubrano was the only trustee who voted against the re-appointments (technically, he abstained from approving them). His comments can be found here (26:50 minute mark):

“Mr Chairman: …. Given that we have a health system that requires a great deal of “outside counsel” if you will, I would prefer to have seen a few changes. So I am going to abstain from this vote.”

Penn State Trustee Anthony Lubrano

Over the last two years, I had voted against the re-appointments of the members of this Board. To the best of my knowledge, no other trustee had ever objected or voted NO when these Board members were re-appointed.

As I stated publicly, I did so because of the numerous disconcerting results and actions coming from Penn State Health and the failure of the Penn State administration to provide information I requested regarding some of Penn State Health’s operations. This included information related to the departments that would, a short time later, be the focus of inquiries and investigations, including those outlined here: Fear and disorder plagued Penn State’s $410 million pursuit of an elite cancer center, internal reviews found .

I’m not sure why Trustee Lubrano chose to abstain from this vote, but I do agree with him that Penn State Health cries out for greater oversight and governance.

• Action Item: Reappointment of Director to the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center Board of Directors

The Penn State Board of Directors is responsible for the approval of appointments to the Board of Directors of The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center.

This item was to approve of the appointment of the following members of the Penn State Medical Center Board:

• Dennis P. Brenckle

• Thomas E. Lenkevich

• Dr. Kenneth E. Wood

The proposal was approved unanimously.

Other non-voting activities:

• The Board discussed various closures/mergers of certain academic programs. These measures, which reportedly will effect 50 or so current degree programs, have been discussed in multiple media reports. This undertaking has included the controversial hiring of McKinsey & Co, see Penn State defends hiring of McKinsey & Company as consultant | WPSU

• Dr Bendapudi announced the hiring of additional high-level administrators to fill newly-created positions, along with the new hires of academic leaders to fill existing but vacant positions (including the Deans of Bellasario College of Communications, and the Dean of the Engineering College).

• Several budgetary items were discussed:

  • Educational revenues (tuition revenue) was below targeted budget. It appears that Penn State fell short of their targeted enrollment goals, and there was a reported drop in enrollment from 73,400 in Fall 2024 to 72,400 in Fall 2025

  • Spending for auxiliary operations, largely athletics, was above budget (see Penn State Athletics: The fuse on the timebomb is lit)

  • Financials surrounding the Beaver Stadium project: net cost (costs less contributions) are running above budget

  • Once again, the long-term investment pool (primarily the Endowment) performed at well below market expectations

The statements from the Dean of the Penn State Law School that recently grabbed national headlines (see Penn State law school plans to focus on ‘antiracism’ over next 5 years) were not, to the best of my knowledge, discussed. Whether or not these actions on the part of the Law School Dean will place Penn State in the crosshairs of the federal government remains to be seen.

Trustee Elections Results and Appointments:

The meetings concluded with an announcement of the result of the 2026 Alumni Election voting results. There were four candidates on the ballot for three available positions, and 17,720 ballots were cast out of a pool of 767,909 eligible voters (2.3%, the lowest turnout in seven years).

The winners of the election were:

1. Jay Paterno (Incumbent trustee, who was seated for his fourth and final term) – 12,066 votes

2. Karen Keller – 11,641 votes

3. Dr Joseph DeRenzo – 11,458 votes

Incumbent trustee Ali Krieger finished last with 9,436 votes, and her term will expire on June 30^th.

Clearly, the many recent efforts on the part of Board leadership, all designed to further disenfranchise alumni, is not a good strategy to enhance alumni engagement (see Penn State Board of Trustees to Alumni: Drop Dead.)

It does seem to be an excellent strategy to ensure more ‘rubber stamp’ trustees, and I will be watching to see how the new trustees represent their constituents.

Trustee Anthony Lubrano will be completing his fourth term after reaching the term limit of 12 years of service. He will be missed. Please read some of Anthony’s comments from his final Board meeting here.

Trustees Black and Dietrich were re-appointed by the agriculture caucus, and five non-elected members of the Board were all re-appointed for an additional term:

• Trustees Beard and Quintos were re-appointed as Business and Industry trustees (although those seats are no longer authorized by Business and Industry interests)

• Matthew Schuyler was re-appointed as an At-Large trustee

• Trustees Davis and Delligatti will have their appointments renewed by the Governor

Aside from one vote against the bylaws changes in 2017, and one vote against selling Beaver Stadium naming rights to West Shore Homes, all five of those trustees have voted for every agenda item proposed to them during their time on the Board.

No other candidates were even considered for these five positions. This, despite the fact that the Board’s much discussed creation of screening committees for Board membership was supposed to result in the delivery of ‘large and robust pools of qualified candidates’ for each Board seat.

This pretense would appear to be a smokescreen.

The only re-appointment candidate to not register unanimous approval was Matthew Schuyler. It was under Matthew Schuyler’s tenure as Board Chairman that Penn State’s board was the defendant in numerous lawsuits regarding the conduct of the Board, particularly with regard to openness and transparency and conformity to State statutes.

Trustee Lubrano voted against the re-appointment of Schuyler, and had this to say:

“Mr. Chairman, my fellow Trustees: Integrity is the quality of being honest, having strong moral principles, and maintaining consistency in actions, values, and methods.

During my time on this Board, openness and transparency continues to be evasive, in my opinion.

I have observed a sitting member attack other members verbally, physically and in writing without consequence.

I have observed the unilateral approval of an estimated $250 million in future expenditures on football WITHOUT any input from the full Board.

I have observed the misrepresentation to this body of the fact pattern surrounding the Paterno field-naming resolution put forward in February, 2024.

Finally, I have observed, in direct circumvention of the Bylaws, the undertaking of a covert investigation into the alleged conduct of a member, at a cost to the University of more than $1 million in legal fees.

Based on my observations, I cannot support this nomination. Thank you.”

Penn State Trustee Anthony Lubrano

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As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

Penn State Alumni Trustee Antony Lubrano attended his final Board of Trustees meeting last Friday, May 8, 2026. It marked the end of an era.

Anthony served two terms as a trustee from 2012–2018, followed by a third and fourth term from 2020–2026. Under the bylaws term limits rules, he is no longer eligible to serve as a trustee. After 12 years of service, he has certainly earned a break. Having served on the Board myself for three years, I appreciate just how demanding that commitment can be.

Anthony has been a steadfast and generous supporter of Penn State. In 2011, when the Board treated Joe Paterno disgracefully, Anthony joined Franco Harris in rallying alumni and fans in protest. Watching Penn State bring in Lanny Davis and Louis Freeh to construct a false narrative about the events surrounding the Sandusky scandal was enough to move him from concerned alumnus to active reformer. He ran for the Board in 2012, earned alumni support, and won election.

From the beginning, Anthony saw clearly how dysfunctional the Penn State Board of Trustees could be. Compared with many trustees, his comments were consistently well researched, substantive, and sharply focused. He refused to let Board leadership gloss over mistakes, evasions, and outright falsehoods. An accountant by education and training, he was frequently heard to say “I’m following the money.” He knew how to follow the money, and did.

Yes, he was outspoken, but also backed his convictions with action. He retained strong legal counsel and pursued litigation to hold the Board accountable to the law. Perhaps the clearest sign of his effectiveness is this: after completing the requirements to be named an emeriti trustee in 2018, Anthony Lubrano is, to the best of my memory, the only Penn State trustee eligible for emeritus status who was ever denied it.

This weak and vindictive rebuke from the ‘leadership’ speaks clearly of their cowardice and spite. When emeritus recognition routinely is extended to trustees such as Ira Lubert, Mark Dambly, and Rick Dandrea, yet withheld from Anthony Lubrano, it tells its own story.

Anthony understood something important: in many cases these are not simply well-meaning people with differing viewpoints. Many fundamentally misunderstand their fiduciary obligations to the university and its stakeholders. They misapply and misuse their self-created authority. He recognized when they could not be reasoned with in the normal sense.

His statement last Friday, opposing the reappointment of Matt Schuyler for another one-year Board term, reflected that view:

“Mr. Chairman, my fellow Trustees: Integrity is the quality of being honest, having strong moral principles, and maintaining consistency in actions, values, and methods.

During my time on this Board, openness and transparency continues to be evasive, in my opinion.

I have observed a sitting member attack other members verbally, physically and in writing without consequence.

I have observed the unilateral approval of an estimated $250 million in future expenditures on football WITHOUT any input from the full Board.

I have observed the misrepresentation to this body of the fact pattern surrounding the Paterno field-naming resolution put forward in February, 2024.

Finally, I have observed, in direct circumvention of the Bylaws, the undertaking of a covert investigation into the alleged conduct of a member, at a cost to the University of more than $1 million in legal fees.

Based on my observations, I cannot support this nomination. Thank you.”

Penn State Trustee Anthony Lubrano

I first met Anthony in 2012 when he was running for the Board. When I later became a trustee myself, he was instrumental in helping me understand the internal dynamics and realities of Board governance. He was a genuine peer, someone willing to tell hard truths, engage in honest debate – even when we disagreed, offer candid guidance, and keep the university’s best interests front and center.

His voice will be missed, and that may be precisely the point. The increasingly draconian measures imposed by Board leadership in recent years have made it far less likely that another trustee like Anthony Lubrano will emerge through the alumni election process. Board leadership has made it clear this is intentional.

Make no mistake: Anthony could have chosen an easier path. He could have ignored the waste, mismanagement, and what many believe to be unwise decisions and policies that have damaged our university. He could have spent the past fifteen years enjoying comfortable professional success, supporting Penn State athletics, and living a far less contentious life.

We are fortunate he chose to volunteer to serve as an alumni-elected representative. He felt Penn State – and truth and honesty – were worth fighting for. He did that knowing it would at times require conflict, scrutiny, frustration, and personal sacrifice. And for that, alumni remain deeply grateful.

His farewell remarks at the conclusion of Friday’s meeting were classic Anthony Lubrano. Combative, emotional, grateful, defiant, and unmistakably Penn State:

“Courage is the ability to feel comfortable being uncomfortable.”

Chairman Kleppinger, President Bendapudi, my fellow Trustees, what I am about to say might make some uncomfortable.

Let me begin by thanking the Penn State alumni for the privilege of serving as Trustee. I am profoundly grateful to you.

Your words of encouragement during my service as Trustee provided me with the strength to carry on during some rather bleak days. I’ll be indebted to you forever for the tremendous honor you bestowed on me. Thank you.

As I reflect on the past 14 years, I recognize that it was the alumni who stood tall through our most trying days. They knew the truth then, and they know it now– Joe Paterno was used as a scapegoat.

In 2012, those same alumni came forward in record numbers to serve Penn State. No less than an unprecedented 86 alumni candidates emerged for the three available alumni-elected Trustee seats.

Contrast that to this year when only four alumni sought election and this begs the question, “why are so few alumni interested in serving?”

Could it be that we have disenfranchised them by virtue of the changes we made to the Bylaws?

The creation of a Nominating Committee empowered to exclude alumni from the ballot under the guise of qualification deficiency is one plausible explanation. After all, with these revisions, we can eliminate prospective candidates from the democratic process simply because we do not like what they say.

The constraints we’ve placed on speech is also a reasonable explanation. So much for openness and transparency, right?

Fortunately for me that these Bylaws were not in effect when I first ran in 2012.

Considered an outspoken critic of the manner in which the events of 2011 were handled, I was the target of a smear campaign in the Philadelphia Inquirer, April 22, 2012, orchestrated by then-Board crisis consultant and spin doctor du jour Lanny Davis with the help of members of the Freeh team and then-sitting members of this body including Board Chair Karen Peetz, Keith Eckel, Ken Frazer and then PA Secretary of Education Ron Tomalis along with then-acting Athletic Director and former Trustee Dave Joyner.

POLARIZING FIGURE EMERGES IN A NORMALLY QUIET VOTE FOR PENN STATE BOARD was the headline above the fold, one early Sunday morning.

The effort to discredit me, however, had the unintended consequence of strengthening support for me in the Penn State community.

So let me take this moment to thank anyone who had a hand in such an ill-conceived plan.

I would also like to thank my board colleagues. Some of you are truly engaged Trustees, and your efforts on the part of our school are inspiring. I learned from all of you, even those of you with whom I haven’t agreed. For that, I thank you.

And you have collectively taught me a very, very valuable life lesson that reminds me of the immortal words of Winston Churchill: “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never in nothing, big or small, large or big, never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense.”

My very first Board meeting took place at the Hilton Scranton Conference Center in Lackawanna County on July 12, 2012, a day many of us will likely not forget any time soon.

That day Louis Freeh stood in front of the world and announced that the culture of Penn State was bad, driven by its love for football.

“In order to avoid the consequences of bad publicity,” he said, “the most powerful leaders at the University: Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley, repeatedly concealed critical facts…”

The alumni knew that to be untrue. Unfortunately, the Board of Trustees lacked the courage to defend the institution and its people. In fact, to this day, we have not refuted the “Fact-Freeh Report”. Instead, we have allowed the reputations of good men to be sullied.

Now contrast that behavior to what we witnessed from Franco Harris. In the face of adversity, Franco stood tall and made the alumni proud to be Penn Staters. He taught us all the true meaning of real leadership, and we owe him a debt of gratitude. Thank you Franco.

I love Penn State, and I’m unapologetic in my intemperance for my alma mater and the people who helped make it great.

We have many challenges facing this university. If we want to successfully face those challenges, we must all row in the same direction.

The recent hiring of Coach Matt Campbell goes a long way toward bringing us together. For that we have President Bendapudi to thank. Success With Honor is again at the forefront of our football program after a 12-year sabbatical.

So let me end where I began my service almost 14 years ago.

In order to move on we must heal. And if I might be impertinent, let me suggest that if we truly want to heal, we need to do now what we know is right and just.

We cannot allow fear nor political correctness to control the process by which we make decisions.

Let us recognize and honor the team that gave us collectively more than 120 years of service, or risk losing forever the loyalty of alumni everywhere.

In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, ‘Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.’

Honoring the Paternos matters to many of us.

So while I might be leaving this Board, I am not going anywhere.

Yes, this might be goodbye but it’s not farewell.

God bless all of you and God bless Penn State.

Thank you.”

Penn State Trustee Anthony Lubrano

I hope we have not seen the last of APL. He said this was goodbye, not farewell. Let’s hope he meant it.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

I wanted to provide an update on my case against the Penn State Board of Trustees.

While most of the items directly at issue in the filing of the lawsuit have been completed and Penn State was compelled to provide much of the specific financial information I requested during my time as a trustee, we remain in Centre County Court to adjudicate sanctions against Penn State.

During the course of litigation, Penn State leadership repeatedly delayed providing me with the information that they knew they were required by statute to provide. Those delays resulted in huge outlays of time, effort and legal expenses. At the same time, Penn State acted to pre-textually remove me from the Board of Trustees.

We are seeking sanctions against Penn State’s ‘dilatory, obdurate, and vexatious’ conduct, which is legalese for ‘bad faith’ deliberately stonewalling proceedings. Penn State is now refusing to cover the legal costs their conduct created. On January 29, 2026, I filed a petition and the Court has scheduled a hearing for June 30, 2026.

In preparation for that hearing, on March 16, 2026, my attorney, Steve Marino, requested subpoenas for David Kleppinger, the current Chair of the Penn State Board of Trustees, and Matt Schuyler, the immediate past Chair and a current trustee.

In response, Penn State filed an Emergency Motion for Protective Order and Stay of Discovery, an effort to block us from questioning Mr. Schuyler and Mr. Kleppinger about their roles in the conduct at issue. A hearing on that motion was held this morning, March 31, 2026.

At the hearing, my attorney argued that Penn State’s objections to these depositions are without merit, and that my claims are neither speculative nor ‘absurd’.

Penn State is going to considerable lengths to keep its current and former Board Chairs from providing testimony under oath. Their statements would shed important light on the actions taken during this process, and would be a meaningful step toward the accountability and transparency that Penn State claims to value.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

On Wednesday, March 11, 2026 Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi appeared before the Pennsylvania House Appropriations Committee. I watched the hearing so you don’t have to, but the full recording is available here.

Like many budget hearings, much of it felt like political theater. Bendapudi offered to freeze tuition for the 2027–28 academic year if the legislature approved Penn State’s request for a 20.23% increase in General Funds. Given that lawmakers have approved only flat funding in recent years, and that Governor Shapiro has recommended flat funding for the upcoming year, the offer came across as more rhetorical than realistic.

Fortunately, there were a handful of representatives who asked substantive questions, including Representatives Chad Reichard, Marla Brown, and Charity Krupa. One exchange stood out; State Representative Jim Struzzi (62nd District, Indiana County) challenged Bendapudi about what he saw as a lack of transparency during last year’s hearing (2:41:20 mark of the video).

When Bendapudi testified before the legislature on February 20, 2025, it was widely known that Penn State was completing a review of its Commonwealth Campus system and that closure decisions were imminent. But when Representative Struzzi and others questioned her about the plans for the Commonwealth Campuses, Bendapudi declined to discuss the status of the review.

This year, Representative Struzzi questioned why she declined to address those questions raised by the Committee, and then a few days later publicly announce that twelve campuses were potentially under the knife?

Bendapudi replied: “Our Board meeting was the 20th and 21st (of February 2025), and until the Board met I could not get ahead of them… At that time the Board agreed that twelve campuses would be under review… Because, truly, I cannot say what is going to happen until all of my bosses vote on it.”

That, the record clearly shows, was not correct.

The Timeline

By February 2025, the months-long process of reviewing all the Commonwealth Campuses for potential mergers or closures was being finalized and the situation stood as follows:

• All decisions regarding the Commonwealth Campuses were explicitly Bendipudi’s decision, not the Board’s.

• There were no Board deliberations, actions, or votes scheduled for the February 20-21, 2025 meeting or any other time. The minutes of the February 20–21, 2025 Board of Trustees meeting show that the sessions were informational only. There was no discussion of campus closures in the public meeting that followed, and Board Chair David Kleppinger explicitly stated that no official actions were taken (see video here, 10:30 mark).

• None of the Board meetings in February had this issue on the agenda, it did not appear in any of the post-meeting minutes, nor on the video archive of the meetings. Trustees were not permitted to deliberate or take action because the Commonwealth Campuses issues were not on the agenda.

In other words, when Bendapudi testified before the legislature on February 20, 2025 the Board had neither voted on any closures nor was expected to do so.

Speaking at a Faculty Senate meeting on February 25, 2025, the Centre Daily Times reported that Bendapudi confirmed where the authority actually lay: “I am saying that the decision will be mine. … I’m going to own this difficult decision.”

Those recommendations were to come to her from her selected administrative team of Michael Wade Smith, Margo DelliCarpini*, and Tracy Langkilde**.

At the same time, Bendapudi was also facing a highly publicized vote of no confidence from the Penn State Faculty Senate, which strongly opposed the closures. Shortly afterward, Board leadership decided to pivot from an ‘executive decision’ to one involving a Board vote of approval of any plan presented for the Commonwealth Campuses. While Board leadership gave no public reason for this involvement, a reasonable inference would be that a possible motivation was to provide institutional cover for Bendapudi’s controversial decision.

That move quickly backfired and raised even more questions.

On May 13, 2025, the list of campuses slated for closure leaked to the Philadelphia Inquirer. The leak, and Penn State’s weak public response, triggered another round of negative headlines.

SpotlightPA then reported that Board leadership began privately lobbying trustees to present a united front: “In private, Chair Kleppinger has told trustees the board should unanimously support Bendapudi’s proposal and that dissent could hurt her legacy.”

In the end, on May 22, 2025, the Board of Trustees voted 25–8 to close seven Commonwealth Campuses. The university projected that the action would produce savings of roughly $50 million per year, or about 0.5% of Penn State’s operating budget.

Those campuses will close at the end of the 2026–27 academic year.

Why This Matters

Bendapudi’s explanation to lawmakers this week points out a serious lack of transparency on her part. The public record shows she alone held the authority to make closure decisions when she testified in 2025. Why is she now misleading elected officials?

For Harrisburg, restricting funding is the clearest way to send a message. Between the concerns expressed regarding Penn State’s affordability, governance, and transparency, it appears lawmakers are saying: We don’t trust you with more taxpayer money. I would not be surprised to see that continue.

* Margo DelliCarpini was hired by Penn State as the Vice President for Commonwealth Campuses in October, 2023 and announced her departure March, 2025.

** Tracy Langkilde was appointed Penn State Interim Vice-President and Provost in April 2024 and Fotis Sotiropoulos was hired as the permanent Vice-President and Provost in April 2025.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

On Wednesday, March 11th at 10 am EDT Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi will appear before the Pennsylvania House of Representatives for budget hearings on Commonwealth funding of state-related universities. House members will question Dr Bendapudi and her colleagues from the University of Pittsburgh, Temple University, and Lincoln University as part of deliberations regarding state appropriations to benefit the residents of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I encourage you to watch those hearings here. As a reminder, Dr Bendapudi is the highest paid public university president in the United States at $2.8 million a year (see Penn State President Bendapudi Awarded 3rd Raise In Four Years).

State funding for Penn State has been flat for many years. In 2025, Penn State received $242.1 million in general support from the Commonwealth, an amount equal to $5,621 per in-state student. In past years I have been disappointed that these hearings appear to be nothing but rehearsed answers from the presidents to formulaic questions from the representatives. The following are five questions I would like to see well-informed members ask Dr Bendapudi. I believe her answers would be illuminating.

1) Why does Penn State have the highest in-state tuition of the 16 public Big10 Conference universities?

While Penn State does receive less funding per in-state student than most of its peers, many of us would support more robust funding. But Penn State has dramatically higher costs of attendance for in-state students compared to other Big10 Conference schools, of which only a small portion can be attributed to lower state funding.

A key lynchpin is how much Penn State charges for in-state tuition in comparison to our Big10 Conference peers.

At $20,234 a year, Penn State has the highest in-state tuition of our Big10 public university cohorts, while Ohio State at $13,244 a year is the median. Penn State in-state tuition is $6,990 higher than the median, or 153%.

2) Why does Penn State offer the lowest amount of aid to in-state students of all the public Big10 Conference schools?

The large disparity in tuition costs is only exacerbated by the huge gap in financial aid, an area where Penn State is the stingiest of its peers. The only number that really matters to students evaluating offers is the final bottom line: how much will they pay out of pocket for their education?

As shown in the following tables, taken from the US Department of Education database, compared to the costs at the median Ohio State, Penn State’s in-state students pay an incredible $14,306 more per year.

Penn State and Ohio State are very similar; both have roughly the same enrollment, offer a similar range of majors, and are in the same socioeconomic region, yet Ohio State has consistently out-performed Penn State in federal educational outcome metrics. And they’ve done it with a balanced budget.

Penn State at $32,598 per year for in-state students versus Ohio State at $18,292 per year for in-state students is a net cost differential of a staggering $14,306 per year. That is the true ‘affordability gap’ Pennsylvania students face.

And at Penn State, students with more modest means ($75,000 and below) pay twice or even three times more than the median. Penn State has essentially priced in-state students of average or lesser incomes out of the picture.

How much of that $14,306 differential is due to lack of funding from the Commonwealth? Ohio State received $432.344 Million in state support and enrolls 48,148 in-state students for a per student funding of $8,979. That is just $3,358 more in support per in-state student than Penn State, yet accounts for only 23% of the difference in costs charged to our students.

The remaining difference, $10,948, is fully at the feet of Penn State.

3) Penn State ranks last, or near the bottom, in nearly every federal metric of educational outcomes in the Big10 Conference (see
Penn State Finishes Second-to-Last in the Big10 Conference USNews Value Rating,
My comments from the Penn State Board of Trustees Meeting July 19, 2024 and
Penn State’s drop in academic rankings is the worst in the nation. How bad is it?)
What, exactly, are we getting for our money?

The strongest indicator of a public university’s value is ‘yield’, or the percentage of students who actually enroll at a university divided by the number who applied and were accepted. Student decisions are strongly driven by bottom-line costs, and university offers of substantial aid packages attract quality students to those schools.

Of the Big10 Conference public universities, UCLA has the highest yield at 50% while Penn State has now hit a historic low of 17%. Only the University of Oregon is lower at 14%.

With dramatically higher costs, Penn State is a less desirable option for potential students, 83% of whom choose to go elsewhere. Of the 17% that do enroll, only 37% submit SAT scores for an average combined score of 1330 versus the median of 1360 at Ohio State (64% submitting) and Purdue (100% submitting). The top incoming freshmen candidates are going elsewhere because they are getting better competing offers.

Yield is the biggest market indicator of what incoming freshmen think of a university. If a quality student can get a better offer elsewhere, they are going elsewhere. The market is telling us that Penn State is the second least desirable school in the Big10.

4) For the sake of attempting to balance the budget, Penn State seems to have become addicted to admitting out-of-state students who pay double the in-state tuition. What steps
are you taking to control university expenditures and return the seats to more qualified Pennsylvania residents?

In order to meet increasing budget expenditures, Penn State is filling incoming
freshman classes with 50% out-of-state students who are paying double in-state tuition. Unsurprisingly, the 9.8% yield for this segment is even lower than the in-state yield of 39%.

Because Penn State is desperate for cash, it forces the university to accept incoming freshmen with lower academic quality while lowering the opportunities for
in-state students.

Dr Bendapudi has framed this decision as a pragmatic response to “limited resources” and boasted that out-of-state revenue supports the entire university. She has repeatedly placed the blame on a lack of state funding support and ignored the effects the terrible yield has on Penn State’s national value ranking — #185 in Best Value Schools, or 14th out of 15 public universities in the Big10 conference.

5) Improving the investment performance of the Penn State endowment would create a significant increase in the university’s wealth, a small fraction of which could be used to
supplement aid to in-state students and reverse the trends we discussed above. This is an easy fix, why aren’t you doing it?

The sub-optimal performance of the Penn State endowment has led to a failure to maximize growth, a failure that has cost the university several billions of dollars of unrealized gain. Even a modest improvement in investment management could be used to enhance affordability and lower the burden on Pennsylvania taxpayers.

I have stated many times that for over a decade, Penn State’s endowment has been under-performing due to poor investment management. I sued the university to get access to endowment financial records (that I should never have been denied access to) and stand by my statement. The upshot of every year of endowment under-performance is the loss of revenue that we can never get back.

Managing the endowment with the appropriate growth focus, and reducing investments in high-cost under-performing ‘alternative investments’ would have resulted in well over $2.5 billion of additional value in the endowment, with no added risk. (see What good things could Penn State do with an extra $2.3 billion in the endowment?)

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations,
concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

Since last week’s post Penn State Athletics: The fuse on the timebomb is lit I’ve received a lot of feedback from readers who are expressing shock and disappointment about the situation Penn State has gotten itself into. Below are some of the questions I’ve been asked and my take on the answers. If I’ve missed your question or you’d like further discussion, feel free to reach out to me at barry@barryfenchak.com. I will reply.

And since it’s Alumni Trustee election season, I encourage you to reach out to candidates Jay Paterno (incumbent), Ali Krieger (incumbent), Karen Keller, and Dr Joseph DeRenzo. If you are able to contact them please let me know how it went.

You talked about the huge debt load Penn State Athletics is carrying, but how does that compare to other universities?

The $535 million in debt is very disconcerting, but it is not surprising nor something that snuck up on us. In fact, I wrote about that pending debt explosion two years ago, here: Why we can’t afford the Beaver Stadium Renovation Proposed by the Penn State Board of Trustees Leadership.

That level of debt is the most in the nation, and the highest in history for any university athletic program.

The previous record holder was the University of California-Berkeley (Cal) at $440 million, accrued during the tenure of Sandy Barbour as their athletic director. Florida State, which recently completed a major stadium renovation similar in style to the Beaver Stadium renovation for around $260 million, now has a total debt of approximately $437 million.

By the finish of the partial renovations to Beaver Stadium, Penn State’s Athletics total projected debt load of $800 million or more will be the most highly indebted college sports program in history and probably more than double that of second place.

Our annual debt service (the interest and principal we have to pay each year on that debt) will be, by far, the largest in the country at approximately 20% and will consume a far greater portion of our athletics revenue than any of our competitors. This will be the situation for the next 30 years, and any additional debt we take on will only compound the strain. Don’t forget that there is still two-thirds of Beaver Stadium left to renovate, at a estimated cost of $300 million.*

Why did the Trustees vote for the $700 Million renovation?

Many of you commented that the Athletic Department composed a long list of assumptions that (aside from me) went unquestioned, and that many of them have turned out to be, in your opinions, magical thinking:

• Revenue growth will outrun debt service and expense growth

• Operating cost growth will magically be reduced to one-third of the historical rate of 7.13%

• No large unbudgeted expenses

• No need for major capital expenses for 30 years

• Donor and corporate enthusiasm will be robust

• Football success will remain consistent

While most trustees did vote in favor, not all did. In addition to myself, Alumni Trustee Lubrano voted against, and three others abstained from voting (Alumni Trustees Brown, Paterno, and deLevie). An additional four did not show up for the meeting (Trustees Black, Hasenkopf, Mumin, and Pegula).

Why did most of them vote Aye? Simple answer, for those who are unfamiliar with the Board dynamics, is that voting Aye is what they always do. Many members of the Board have never voted No on anything, which is unsurprising given that the majority of trustees nominate and appoint each other. You can see the stunning history of Board rubber-stamping here.

What made this vote incredulous was the lack of information, and in my opinion the presentation of disingenuous information, provided by the Board and University leadership:

• No alternatives were presented or deliberated

• Critical information regarding the proposed project was not provided, and was denied when requested (by me)

• Incredulous statements where neither challenged nor discussed, and attempts to
  engage in deliberation or discussion were curtailed by Board leadership

In summary, as the official video shows, the Board approved this hugely impactful and costly proposal after what I would characterize as a slideshow and brief question and answer period during which many questions were ignored. My first-person observation was that most trustees appeared fine with that, which casual conversation seemed to reinforce:

• “As long as we get better elevators!” (to the President’s suite)

• “I don’t care.” (regarding the scope and cost of some items)

• “What’s the point of discussion? We all know we are going to do this.” (in
  regards to the $700 million renovation, when information about alternative options was being requested)

• “I’ll wait and see what management presents.” (Management never presented anything)

The increases in revenue are a good thing but expenses are also increasing at rapid rates. What has been done to control spending?

For years, the Board rarely required Athletic Directors Sandy Barbour or Pat Kraft to demonstrate any administrative rigor with regard to Athletics’ spending. Penn State Athletics’ operating costs have been increasing by roughly 7.15% per year for the last 15 years, but when trying to sell the Beaver Stadium renovations, the Board and Administration leadership contended that operating expenses moving forward would only average 2.5% per year. There was no discussion or plan how this 65% cut would occur.

To the contrary, the university-wide culture seemed to be ‘if we spend more money we must be doing a better job.’ Examples being the gigantic pay raises approved for President Neeli Bendapudi, having the highest paid football coaching staff, and the most expensive stadium renovations. This culture gives the appearance that it is all ‘Other People’s Money’, and that it will be someone else’s problem when the money runs out. This is a direct failure of Board oversight.

What ever happened to the $70 million for winterizing Beaver Stadium?

Great question. In May 2023, the Board was first asked to approve of a $70 million expenditure to study options for maintaining Beaver Stadium and to conduct a winterization project to make the venue usable in cold months. I was the only trustee to vote against the project, since it was apparent to me that this expenditure of $70 million was not designed to be spent on the stated purpose but instead a maneuver by Board leadership to initiate a massively expensive stadium renovation as a fait accompli, without Board deliberation, discussion, or evaluation.

After that vote, I continued to raise my concerns in multiple meetings with Board leadership and at full Board meetings, and was repeatedly provided with incorrect information and disingenuous and demeaning responses from Board leadership.

As things progressed, it was clear that funds authorized by the Board in the May 2023 expenditure (the $70 million) were, as I expected, not being used for the stated purposes. The winterization costs were $5-6 million, and the studies of alternatives were actually a $25 million payment to Populous to begin the design of the renovation. A year later, in May 2024, the Board was presented with a plan to renovate the stadium that focused on rebuilding the west stands, changing portions of the bleacher seating areas to premium seating, reconfiguration of various suites, and a rebuild of the west side press box. No other options were presented.

In the end, approximately half of the approved $70 million was used for the stated purposes, while the rest was misappropriated to start renovation work that had not been approved by the Board. This was work that the Board leadership had repeatedly and adamantly stated was not to be engaged in prior to thorough deliberation of Beaver Stadium options and with Board approval.

Sadly, to the best of my knowledge Anthony Lubrano was the only other trustee to ever raise and pursue these concerns. See: My comments from the Penn State Board of Trustees Meeting November 10, 2023

What were the other options besides spending $700 million on Beaver Stadium?

The $700 million partial renovation was the only option presented to the Board (see video here).

Unfortunately, when it came to the May, 2024 vote for the actual Beaver Stadium project, the transparency of Board leadership was even more opaque. Despite being repeatedly promised by Board leadership, there was never any meaningful consideration or deliberation of other options; for example, ways in which Beaver Stadium’s viability could be economically addressed to insure it remained a useful, safe, and thriving venue for Penn State football in the decades to come. Instead, the massive renovation project of one-third of the building was presented as the only viable option.

They said the first 15 years after the Beaver Stadium upgrade would be net cash positive, and that would then provide a buffer for the following 15 years of deficits. Why?

We knew that media revenue share for Big10 programs would rise substantially in 2024 due to the recently negotiated contract and the advent of the College Football Playoffs (which generate significant new TV money). In addition, the stadium project would bring in considerable up front revenue in the form of philanthropy (including naming rights and other new revenue streams). Those revenue stream increases and one time up-front contributions should be at their peak in current years before dropping off, while the debt costs would continue for 30 years and expenses increase at a compound rate throughout the entire time frame. The plan was for large net profits to be available to pack away to cover future deficits.

My concerns were, and remain, that the Days of Wine and Roses will not be as rosy as projected. Reasonable projections based on historical data show Athletics’ income statements turning to a systemic deficit (the term used to describe Penn State’s recent university-wide budget troubles) within the next 5-8 years, and long-term net income diving far more rapidly than Penn State’s projections.

Isn’t the money from the Elevate contract for ticketing supposed to cover all these costs?

It was certainly presented that way by Athletic Director Pat Kraft. The parameters of the business relationship between Penn State and Elevate (information that I had to sue the University for in court: Why I Am Suing A Board That Answers To No One) remain under lock and key in Old Main, so any details about the security and viability of Penn State’s main source of income will become evident only when financial reports are filed in the coming years.

The presence of the Elevate agreement raises, rather than mitigates, my concerns for the long-term fiscal health of Penn State Athletics.

* Note: It is worth pointing out that much of the funding transferred from general University funds to the Athletic Department in the wake of the Sandusky/NCAA settlements remains on the books, although those debts may not be reflected on financial statements. That sum is to be repaid to the University in future years, although the University is not charging the Athletic Department interest on most of those funds.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations,
concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

Last week, Penn State released its annual financial report to the NCAA covering the fiscal year July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025 (103 pages, read it here). It’s a surprisingly readable document and covers all intercollegiate athletic sports. It does not include club sports such as rugby and boxing, which operate under separate funding structures.

To summarize: both revenues and expenses, which were already at record high levels, increased to even higher record levels. Revenue ($254,867,598) growth was fueled by an increased Big10 broadcast revenue share, increased broadcast revenue share from the expansion of the College Football Playoffs, and donations (a large part of which were one-time gifts associated with the Beaver Stadium renovations).

The largest increases in expenses were the principal and interest paid on debt which increased from $14,819,769 to $22,934,838 (and will soon approach $60 million), in addition to the new cost of revenue sharing payments to athletes which came in at $18,368,391 million, as well as Alston payments of approximately $4,911,440 million*.

In the end, net operating income was a minuscule $223,679, or a margin of just 0.1%. That’s not a cushion, that’s a rounding error, and well below projections used by Penn State Athletics in 2022 to justify the borrowing and-building spree that began in 2022 and continues today. It certainly does not provide the cushion necessary to entertain the assumption of the massive increases in debt service and operational costs to come, let alone future capital expenditures.

The Debt Story

From 2010-2022, Penn State Athletics debt hovered in the $60 million range (with some COVID-era related additional borrowing before debt was reduced in 2022). There were big plans, though; in 2017, Athletic Director Sandy Barbour commissioned, for a reported multi-million dollar fee, the outside firm Populous to draft a Athletics Facilities Master Plan that included a palatial athletics administrative complex dubbed the ‘Center for Excellence’, a sports museum, and an aquatics facility that in cost and scope would have dwarfed Olympics scale projects. Renovating Beaver Stadium was far down the list.

Fortunately this plan has been largely ignored.

After Pat Kraft replaced Sandy Barbour as Athletic Director in 2022, debt began to grow dramatically. In the first year, numerous debt-funded projects were begun:

• $30 million+ to renovate the athletic Training Table

• $20 million+ for the Jeffrey Soccer Complex

• $20 million+ for another renovation to Lasch Building (the third renovation to Lasch in 8 years, totaling $98 million for renovations to one building)

In total over $100 million, financed overwhelming through debt, carrying an interest rate of 5.0 – 7.0%.

All of this building had to be funded through debt because the Penn State Athletic Reserve Fund was unfunded and endowment distributions and philanthropic fund-raising were minimal. There was no ‘Rainy Day Fund’ and the administration was, for reasons of their own, in a hurry.

These projects all had one thing in common: they were state-of-the-art, high-profile assets that would generate zero revenue. Typically, it is far more preferable to prioritize revenue-generating projects so they can generate revenue to finance non-revenue generating projects, so the reliance on debt is lessened. The entire process and timeline was, to coin a phrase, bass-ackwards. For more detail, see my comments from the May 2023 meeting.

On the heels of the 2022-2023 building boom, in 2024 Penn State Athletics and leadership of the Penn State Board of Trustees steamrolled forward with a plan to renovate 33% of Beaver Stadium. On May 21, 2024 the Board of Trustees approved $700 million in borrowing. I’ve covered this extraordinarily disconcerting process from a governance and fiduciary point of view here, here, here, and here.

But We Are Only Halfway There

The debt used to finance the $700 million project will be taken out over a series of withdrawals, called tranches, over the 2024-2027 construction period. At the point of this most recent financial filing (year end June 30, 2025) it is estimated that $200 million of the total debt has been issued, leaving another $500 million to be added over the next two fiscal years.

With this additional debt, and barring any further debt-funded projects in the interim, the total Penn State Athletics debt should approach or exceed $1 billion by June 30, 2027. For a comparison: A decade ago, the entire Penn State University system, including Hershey Medical, carried long-term debt of just under $1 billion. Soon, Athletics alone will match it.

What This Actually Means

Despite being in the early stages for adding debt for the Beaver Stadium project, Sportico has declared Penn State is “the apparent pacesetter among the nation’s most indebted athletic departments”. Its debt is now more than twice annual revenue.

More importantly, this is the third consecutive year Penn State Athletics has generated minimal operating profit, leaving it unable to replenish any reserves or accelerate the paydown of debt.

This lack of operating profit also makes it more difficult to project the ability to take on additional debt or to cover unexpected and unbudgeted expenses. We have already experienced some of these unexpected issues, such as the higher than budgeted costs for Athlete Revenue Sharing payments, or the $10 million+ costs incurred to fire James Franklin and most of his staff (which will be reflected on financial statements for the next few years).

Even if Penn State Athletics takes on no more major capital projects, it will spend the next 30 years diverting approximately $60 million per year of revenue just to meet debt costs. That is a huge burden to overcome. A burden that will be passed on to the next group of University leaders. Meanwhile, 66% of Beaver Stadium rests on an infrastructure that is already 60 years old.

Structural Risk or Temporary Bump?

This is a pivotal period and the Board of Trustees have made an enormous wager on the financial future of Penn State Athletics. In 2022 they made a calculated bet that:

• Revenue growth will outrun debt service

• Operating cost growth will magically be reduced to one-third of the historical rate of 7.13%

• No large unbudgeted expenses

• No need for major capital expenses for 30 years

• Donor and corporate enthusiasm will be robust

• Football success will remain consistent

Things look a lot different in 2026. How will 2036 and 2046 look?

What is clear: this is not a program flush with excess cash. Instead, it is a program running at full speed with very little cushion and an additional $60 million annual debt service on its back. And when you remove the cushion, even small missteps become big problems.

* Alston payments were to begin in 2022, in the wake of the Supreme Court case NCAA vs Alston. It is likely that Penn State began making those payments at that time, though the costs never appeared as a specific line item in the athletics financial report. Those payments may have been included in the ‘Other’ category or elsewhere in the report, but the most recent report was the first one that broke out these payments specifically.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

On Thursday, January 29, 2026, I filed a petition in Centre County Court, asking the court to intervene (‘provide relief’) by sanctioning Penn State to pay the legal expenses I incurred when I was forced to take legal action against them to provide important University information to myself, as a trustee in 2024 (read about that here).

I encourage you to read the Petition here, and the Memorandum of Law here. They are very interesting.

This quote from the Memorandum of Law, page 10 sums it up well:

“… The actions taken by the defendants and their counsel during the pendency of this matter were orchestrated to make a Trustee’s action to compel the production of information unduly burdensome, financially undesirable, if not altogether impossible, with the intended goal of deterring the plaintiff, and other Trustees, from compelling information not provided, and to accept the defendants’ decline of a Trustee’s request for information without dissent, question, critical thinking, or deliberation.”

When I was elected an Alumni Trustee in June, 2022 I began requesting information regarding the investments in Penn State’s largest asset, its $5 billion endowment. The management of this huge fund has been disconcerting for many years; the combination of underperformance and excess fees has cost Penn State and its stakeholders billions of dollars. These dollars could have been used to further any number of critical and core university missions, including making tuition more affordable.

The Board leadership repeatedly refused to provide this information, claiming it was unrelated to the duties of a trustee, although some trustees did have access. I was compelled to sue, and pay for costly and time-consuming legal actions, to get the information Penn State leadership knew they were required to provide.

My 2024 lawsuit was amended to include information regarding the parameters of Penn State’s contract with Elevate. Elevate is a global conglomerate management company that Penn State contracted to manage ticketing for Penn State athletics. Penn State claimed this contract would provide $1 billion of revenue to Penn State Athletics, which would offset the $700+ million Beaver Stadium renovation. Once again, I requested specific information regarding this contract and was denied.

The endowment and Elevate contract are obviously of key interest to trustees, all of whom owe a fiduciary duty to the University to oversee and assure its financial well-being. But Penn State engaged in a litany of tactics to prevent the legally required access. One has to wonder: why would they do this, unless they had something they wanted to hide?

Penn State eventually provided the requested information and shortly thereafter initiated a series of pretextual maneuvers to remove me from the Board.

This is Penn State’s playbook, in a nutshell: place a high price tag on some trustee’s access to information while providing it free to others. Preventing access to information also means preventing meaningful and accurate deliberation of critical decisions. This would force a trustee who cared about performing their fiduciary duties to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to receive the information they were legally entitled to.

Penn State’s clear aim is to discourage myself and any other trustee from challenging the university’s refusal to share details, or risk financial ruin. They did exactly the same thing in the wake of the Sandusky Scandal by refusing trustee access to the information surrounding the Freeh Report. In that instance, several trustees took the Board and the university to court and Board leadership was compelled to not only provide that information, but to also indemnify the trustees for the massive legal expenses they incurred (see Ralph Cipriano’s legal blog, Big Trial, for excellent coverage).

And as you will read in the Petition, they didn’t bother to disguise the fact.

We are very fortunate to be represented by Attorney Steve Marino, who is also representing us in our case in federal court against Penn State. I will keep you posted.

On Thursday, November 20th, Spotlight PA exposed a damning internal review of the Penn State Cancer Institute: chemotherapy overdoses, treatment delays that let cancers spread unchecked, incomplete patient records, and a toxic workplace driving mass exodus of doctors and staff. The article, titled “The Institute: Chemotherapy mistakes, treatment delays, a ‘toxic’ workplace: Penn State’s internal reviews found a top doctor’s alarming errors and disruptive leadership. He remains in charge of the cancer center” details the landscape at the Penn State Cancer Institute under the leadership of Dr Raymond Hohl.

For years, Penn State continued to focus on attempts to achieve a designation that would serve as a ‘gold star on their lapel’ rather than prioritizing patient care, despite numerous concerns being raised both internally and externally. Now, just one day after publication of this expose on November 21st, Hohl resigned as director. Too little, too late, and please note Penn State did not fire him.

Penn State’s response? A deflection: “We believe the reporting by this outlet is based almost entirely on materials more than two years old and it does not provide an accurate representation of Penn State Cancer Institute (PSCI) as it exists today. During the last two years—we have made significant changes to PSCI’s leadership, staffing, operations, clinical capabilities and research processes.” Yet the facts remain: patient harm, buried reports, and ongoing risks tell a different story. I urge you to read both Spotlight PA pieces here and here.

As outlined in these reports, the suffering inflicted on patients, families, and staff is unconscionable.

In 2024, as the lone dissenting voice on the Penn State Board of Trustees, I demanded information about the situation at Penn State Health’s Hershey Medical Center, including the Cancer Institute’s pursuit of the national cancer center designation and its disastrously mismanaged transplant center, now shuttered (read my meeting report with my full quotes here).

The events of the past 48 hours are a grim validation of every warning I sounded. I stood alone, and my repeated requests for information about the Cancer Institute were stonewalled. As Spotlight PA now reveals, the explosive December 2022 report documenting those failures, which contained much of the information I had requested, had already landed on President Bendapudi’s desk and was being deliberately withheld from most trustees, and shared only with a select few in leadership who chose to bury it rather than act.

These failures have exacted a brutal toll: lives endangered, Penn State’s reputation shredded, and the potential for multimillion-dollar lawsuits looming. I cast the sole NO vote against the Penn State Health Board of Directors reappointments of Bendapudi, Board Chair David Kleppinger, and former trustees Keith Masser, Steve Wagman, and Mark Dambly. They all knew, or should have known, these details and actively concealed them. They are still on the board of Penn State Health.

When I raised alarms both in private and public sessions, my fellow board members stared like I’d grown three heads, then rubber-stamped the appointments without deliberation or debate. Even now, their dismissive statement tries to sweep years of mismanagement under the rug.

Make no mistake: lives hang in the balance and I take no pleasure in being proven right at such terrible cost. This isn’t about a poorly managed endowment or questionable ticket deals (both of which have meaningful negative impacts on the University and its stakeholders). It is the sacred duty of university governance to safeguard patient’s safety and the institution’s mission. This Board’s loss of institutional control may place Penn State in perilous financial calamity.

They voted me off the board last June for my diligence and devotion to duty, and for asking too many tough questions. Vindication tastes bitter when it comes at such a cost, but the record must now show: every alarm I sounded was justified.

Now is the time for real accountability, not excuses. The Penn State community deserves better. Patients deserve better.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

The Penn State Board of Trustees met Thursday and Friday, November 6-7^th, 2025 at the Nittany Lion Inn, University Park, Pennsylvania. According to the Board Secretary, 35 trustees were in attendance, with Trustee Espenshade absent*. My report below contains information available to the public, including quotes from public discussions. I strongly urge you to click on the links provided to find further information you might find interesting.

Prior to Friday’s full Board meeting, on Thursday, November 6^th there were meetings of the Finance and Investment Committee, Audit and Risk Committee, Student Success & Research and Technology Joint Committee, Equity and Human Resources Committee, and Governance Committee. Read the full published agendas and find links to supporting materials here.

Friday, November 7, 2025 public meeting of the full Board

Read the full published agenda here , links to supporting materials here, and video here, which I urge you to watch it in its entirety. As a service to alumni and the public who were unable to access the live broadcast of the meeting or the recording, the following are my comments and personal opinions on the topics and the vote results for selected agenda items.

Meetings of the full Board usually begin with prepared remarks from the Board Chair which include a statement about public comments. As a reminder, in 2021 the trustees banned the public from addressing them in person, and instead comments must be submitted to an online portal, due several days before the Board meeting. The comments are then published on the Board website but not addressed by the trustees. The Chair usually has very brief remarks on the number of comments and their nature.

The following comment was submitted by Allen Soyster, who is a former Penn State department head, a recipient of the highest honor bestowed by the Penn State College of Engineering (The 2018 Outstanding Engineering Alumni Award), a former Dean at Northeastern University, and division director of the National Science Foundation.

Chair Kleppinger’s summary of Dr Soyster’s comment was: “The comments received related to … encouragement for the university to continue strengthening its national reputation and academic excellence.” (Please see Chair Kleppinger’s full remarks at 9:26 – 10:08), but I feel it’s important to read Dr Soyster’s full public comment:

This week PSU fired our Head Football Coach. For the first time in years, our team was dropped from the AP Top 25 and resides at the bottom of the Big10. The dismissal will cost Penn State (or some friends) an estimated $50 mil buyout.

It is noteworthy that $50 mil exceeds the total of the annual budgets for the seven Commonwealth Campuses to be closed. Our Penn State leadership, apparently, could not endure our bottom Big10 status, not even for 24 hours.

On the other hand, PSU has languished at the bottom of the USNEWS Best Value ranking for years and currently ranks #185 of 206 universities and at the bottom of the BIG10 (Michigan State #186, Nebraska unranked.) And recently, the 2026 Forbes ranking of 500 universities was released. This ranking features the increasing emphasis on the value of a college education.

The dominant Forbes metrics are cost of attendance, student-debt and alumni salary, key elements of ROI (Return on Investment). Penn State ranks #338, by far and away the lowest in the BIG10. Benchmarks are Michigan #20 and Rutgers branch campus at Camden #249.

Who gets fired here? Certainly not our President. She was just awarded a $1 mil raise. At the November 2025 Board meeting some Trustee must demand that our leadership explain how these rankings are determined, assess the damage to our national reputation and construct a path forward to address priorities other than football.

Allen Soyster

Action items of note:

d.3 Proposed Approval Changes to the Bylaws of The Pennsylvania State University

The Board once again revised the bylaws to suppress and allow punishment of trustees for public expression of their opinions, including the right (and fiduciary duty) to publicly question unwise actions. This comes on the heels of the July 2024 bylaw overhaul, which placed control of the Board, trustees, and alumni trustee selection squarely in the hands of the Chair and Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees. As a side note, I am the plaintiff in a federal case against Penn State for abrogating my First Amendment rights, which is directly related to that set of bylaw amendments.

The new bylaw revisions:

• Impose even more draconian punishments to eliminate trustees’ expressions of public opposition to Board actions that they feel are unwise and harmful to the University. (Section 2.04)

• Eliminate the ability of alumni to nominate or write-in candidates for Alumni Trustee Board positions. The exact wording is: “SECTION TWO: REQUIREMENTS FOR ALL CANDIDATES REQUREMENTS Candidates who have not satisfactorily completed all applicable requirements as determined by the Office of the Board are ineligible for nomination or election. As such, write-in candidate or nominations are not permitted.” (Section Two, Elections Appendix)

• Make legal indemnification of trustees at the sole discretion of the Board Chair. This means that if a trustee feels they have no resort but to sue the Board to compel them to follow the statues of Pennsylvania or the United States, they must be able to privately fund that legal action. This places an incredible financial burden on trustees who demand information necessary to properly discharge of their fiduciary duties. Unless a trustee is independently wealthy, this new bylaw amendment makes it virtually impossible for the university to be held to the rule of law (Section 4.02 v).

In total, these revisions further what I feel is the goal of Board leadership: a self-selected, disengaged, selectively informed, rubberstamp Board.

As of this publication date, Penn State has not posted the new bylaws, but WPSU was able to source a useful red-lined version which you should read here.

Only one trustee, Alumni Trustee Anthony Lubrano, voted against these further draconian gag orders and alumni disenfranchisement. All other trustees, including Alumni Trustees Paterno, Short, Krieger, Lynch, McGloin, Moriarity, Nassib, and Pilewicz voted for the changes.

Vote – Yea: 34 Nay: 1 (Lubrano)

4.a Proposed approval of the Penn State Strategic Plan

Please reference Dr Bendapudi’s new Strategic Plan here. I would summarize it as highly aspirational, with a strong emphasis on alignment, impact, and feelings.

Conspicuously absent is any section that addresses quantitative goal measurement. It is a best practice to include metrics, key performance indicators, or a monitoring and evaluation framework in any strategic plan to ensure accountability. In fact, no instances of ‘account’, ‘accountability’, or ‘accountable’ were found when I searched the plan. Without measureable outcomes, it’s impossible to know if goals were achieved or whether mid-course corrections are needed.

A directional framework lacking operational rigor and accountability mechanisms is called a wish list. And no one should be funding Dr Bendapudi’s wish list.

Vote – Unanimous approval

*I’m confused by this attendance figure, since it was later announced that 36 trustees had voted for the Vice-Chair position, which was Sokolov: 20 votes and Gursahaney: 16 votes.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

On Thursday, October 30^th, I filed suit in Philadelphia County Court against Penn State, seeking damages for violations of my rights during the time I was a Penn State alumni elected trustee (July 2022 – June 2025). The suit runs for 63 pages and I encourage you to read it in its entirety here. You’ll note that I am also suing former Penn State Board of Trustees Chair Matt Schuyler and current Chair David Kleppinger for their actions undertaken in their roles as Chair and Vice-Chair of the Board. Yesterday, November 10^th, the lawsuit was moved to federal court in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

During my tenure as an alumni-elected trustee, the Board of Trustees violated my First Amendment rights related to my requests for information and my expressions of dissent as a trustee. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania makes it clear that citizens sitting on public boards have a fiduciary responsibility to request information and ask questions, and that those actions cannot be construed as trouble-making, disruptive, or insurgency.

As a trustee, my job was to engage in open discussions and debates regarding University operations, including advocating for transparency and accountability. When I noticed red-flag irregularities involving Penn State’s $5 billion endowment, I requested more detailed information regarding the management of the endowment. These requests were denied.

A few months later I had strong concerns about a contractual agreement the university entered into, which Athletic Director Dr Pat Kraft characterized as “… a critical role in driving revenue growth that will support all 31 athletics programs through well executed ticketing strategies”. No details regarding this very important contract were provided to the Board, and when I formally requested more information, Trustees Schuyler and Kleppinger communicated to me that no information would be forthcoming, citing “it is unreasonable that trustees would need to see the grisly details of the contract”.

To be clear: Pennsylvania law says that trustees must dig in – that’s duty, not troublemaking. All of these requests for information, which are protected by the First Amendment and clearly in line with the fiduciary duties of all Penn State trustees, were repeatedly denied by Board leadership. In the end I had to sue to compel Penn State to provide me with this information.

In retaliation for doing my job as a trustee, the Board leadership targeted me. Their actions to silence, isolate, and then terminate me were intentional, deliberate, coordinated, and considered. They terminated my ability to participate in Board meetings and have open and collegial discussions with my fellow Board members. Defendants further created a ‘false narrative’ by claiming I had breached confidentiality, which included defamatory public statements. A public letter signed by both Trustees Schuyler and Kleppinger declared I was ‘untrustworthy and pose a risk to the University’.

Penn State failed to act ethically and in doing so created harm, so I am suing them. But this isn’t about me; I’m just a proxy for proper university governance in the institution’s best interest. The Board of Trustees attacked me for doing my job, which was to question the proposals and operating decisions that have driven Penn State to the bottom of the academic pile in comparison to our peers. In short, they got rid of me because I was disrupting their agenda by advocating for responsible governance.

I am pleased to be working with Attorney Steven F Marino of Marino Associates, who is currently representing Scott Lynch, MD in his lawsuit against Penn State for fraud. Marino Associates previously represented Dr Lynch in his successful May 2024 lawsuit again Penn State Health regarding his dismissal as a Penn State Football orthopedic consultant, where the jury found in Dr Lynch’s favor and awarded him a $5.2 million judgement.

The only way Penn State can begin climbing back to the top, where it belongs, is to stop the board culture that acts as if they answer to no one. I will keep you posted.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

If you’ve been following along, you’re aware that the Penn State Athletics Department is heading for a fiscal cliff. Even without the unknown of how much a new championship-quality football coaching staff will cost, the reality is stark: within the next four to five years, expenses will begin to eclipse revenues at a rapid rate that will only get worse. You don’t have to have an MBA and/or several professional certifications (which I do have) to understand that when expenses exceed revenue, you lose money. When you do this for an extended period of time, you lose a lot of money. So how did Penn State end up in this position?

Penn State Athletics’ long-term fiscal health and selling the Beaver Stadium renovations.

On May 21, 2024, Penn State’s Vice President of Finance, Dr Sara Thorndike, addressed the Board of Trustees Committee on Finance, Business, and Capital Planning to justify the $700 million Beaver Stadium renovation project. In her presentation, Dr Thorndike explained the assumptions the Penn State Athletics used in creating their 30 year revenue versus expense calculations, a process called financial forecasting. These forecasts were not solely for the Beaver Stadium renovations, but for the entire Penn State Athletics operations - all revenues and expenses - which makes that information extremely important.

Dr Thorndike explained that if the Beaver Stadium renovations were approved, over the next 30 years Penn State Athletics would almost exactly break-even, with total revenues of $10.86 billion and expenses of $10.83 billion. This remarkable, some would say almost perfect, match of money coming in to money going out over such a long time period is a huge red flag. Anyone with fiduciary responsibilities has a duty to question and evaluate the underlying assumptions, so of course I did just that*.

Why go the hassle of financial forecasting?

As difficult as it is, forecasting a university’s future revenues and expenses has two important purposes: to use ‘what if’ scenarios to guide better decision making today, and to identify potential trouble areas so they can be addressed proactively (and less painfully).

There are currently many unknowns in college sports. How will revenue sharing and pay-for-play shake out in the coming years? How will conference re-alignments proceed? What will happen with the next wave of media contracts? When and how will private equity invade college sports?

To answer these questions, good forecasters use sophisticated financial tools that study past performance and analyze current trends. They know their business and are not afraid to ask questions, as well as listen to a broad range of opinions. Lousy projections, on the other hand, work backwards from how they want the future to look and then simply rubber-stamp the forecast. This leads to bad decision making because the danger lights are turned off, leading us to fall off the cliff.

We do have a good handle on how much money will be coming in.

On the revenue side, I did not find a lot of concerning issues with Dr Thorndike’s projections. They were reasonable and at the time her assumptions of consistently selling out Beaver Stadium, growing television and media revenue, increased merchandise sales, and philanthropy seemed in line with historical data, our peers, and current markets.

The greatest risk of overstating revenues might be the assumption that Beaver Stadium would consistently ‘sell out’ over the next 30 years, even with increasing prices passed on to the spectators. On the other hand, her projections for philanthropic donations might be a bit understated. Many of our Big10 Conference competitors have raised far more philanthropy than Penn State’s forecast, but perhaps not unreasonable given our weakness in fundraising, relative to our peers, in recent years.

The concerns start on the expense side.

The largest portion of Penn State Athletics spending is the operating budget: athletic scholarships, travel, and salaries for coaches and administrative personnel. These costs are predictable and generally unaffected by future unknowns, and annual increases are regular and consistent. We have decades of historical data to track these known costs, which over the last decade have averaged a 7.13% annual rate of growth.

However, during her pitch Dr Thorndike promised that going forward, Penn State Athletics would be able to hold expenses to 2.5% growth annually over the next 30 years. She provided no plan or roadmap on how that miracle would be achieved.

At first brush, one might not appreciate the difference between 2.5% and 7.13% rates of growth, but a very large expense, compounded each year over 30 years, yields a huge difference. You can see that impact here:

I was in that meeting, and admit my jaw dropped to the floor at this blatant magical thinking. At the very least, one would expect the pitchman to have some rationale or justification to provide how such a dramatic decrease would be achieved, but none was forthcoming, even when questioned.

Using her forecasted 2.5% expense growth, Dr Thorndike showed that the first 15 of the next 30 years would have a net surplus that would almost exactly offset 15 years of projected losses to follow (the stronger performance in the earlier years would be expected in a stadium renovation, where revenues from naming rights and philanthropy are front-loaded and expenses like interest on the long-term debt are back-loaded).

This remarkable achievement would certainly justify a $700 million outlay if Penn State Athletics was able to demonstrate it was able to manage expenses. Instead, it might find itself having trouble holding to a 7.13% expense growth with the future revenue and expense challenges on the horizon:

· Travel will certainly get more expensive with the inclusion of the four west coast teams for all sports, which will multiply the cost increases due to inflation.

· Significant parts of Beaver Stadium will be over 70 years old in 30 years, and there is little money in the 30 year plan for any significant new athletic capital projects, including not only the bulk of Beaver Stadium, but also for aging facilities such as the Natatorium.

· The NCAA has approved a higher scholarship ceiling for many sports. If Penn State is going to be competitive, its scholarship costs will not only increase as tuition rises, but by even larger amounts to fully fund the rosters.

· The new private equity revenue sharing model is a huge unknown, and early reports on how such a deal might be structured would only further exacerbate Penn State’s long-term fiscal deficits.

· The number of full-time Penn State Athletics staff and administration positions has exploded, and senior administration has shown no appetite for curbing this growth nor of reining in gigantic compensation increases for the most highly-paid employees.

What 7.13% a year expense growth looks like.

If Penn State Athletics keeps up the trend of 7.13% average expense growth, at the end of 30 years Penn State will have a loss of over $11.6 billion instead of $28 million profit. That’s an almost $12 billion swing that inverts a modest projected gain into a massive deficit. Such is the power of compounded growth over long times frames.

How will Penn State keep the Athletics Department afloat?

In about four years Penn State will have three options: they can either increase revenue, reduce expenses, or do both.

Possible ways to increase revenue include the ‘private equity kick-the-can-down-the-road’ philosophy (currently being legally challenged); raise ticket prices (a tricky balancing act when needing to maintain sellout crowds); find a way to increase media dollars (difficult as Penn State is part of the Big10 Conference revenue sharing plan and has no unilateral ability to control that); raise more philanthropy (alumni and large donors remain resistant); and/or get more money from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (I will rate that one ‘highly unlikely’).

To reduce expenses, the Athletics Department would have to drastically cut their staffing levels, number of scholarships awarded, and non-revenue producing sports would have to be cut. The current and previous university administration have shown zero appetite for any reductions in these areas, especially staffing.

The final option is tapping into the only significant revenue stream available, the General Fund, aka tuition dollars. The university has already used these funds to collateralized debt taken on for athletics, like the $700 million debt on the stadium renovations. But direct appropriation of those dollars, or a tuition add-on such as an ‘Athletics Fee’, could be a public relations nightmare.

What happens now?

As we are constantly reminded, Penn State is a $10 billion a year enterprise and there is a lot is at stake. The current Penn State administration and Board of Trustees rubberstamped the Beaver Stadium Renovation Project, and many other unwise decisions regarding athletics, while fully aligning itself with everything they were told would make this year a national championship season.

They may have felt that Penn State’s prestige would be restored and hopefully attract back the alumni philanthropy that has been underperforming our cohorts since 2012. The Board of Trustee’s questionable behavior would be vindicated, and Board of Trustees Chair Karen Peetz’s 2014 prediction that ‘this will all be forgotten’ would come true. Or, perhaps, they may just be more focused on football than on prudent governance of the University and its assets.

Whatever the reasons for their actions, the result is that Penn State Athletics is soon going to face painful fiscal realities. The only question is how painful, and that will be determined by how long Penn State leadership waits to mitigate the pain and take prudent, decisive actions. I hope this is soon.

But hope is not a strategy and ignoring reality is not a good business plan. Penn State’s finances are in shambles, we have the highest tuition in the Big10 Conference, and close to the worst academics.

We also have the highest paid president among all sixteen Big10 Conference public flagships (who is also among the highest paid in the nation), and she has a lavishly compensated staff. They need to roll up their sleeves and find some solutions.

It’s time they earned their bonuses.

*I’m sharing my spreadsheets with sources here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JCJctRoFIqVgtKso7kgnwVoG3xQTC6TqEUK8AweHO4E/edit?gid=1244796576#gid=1244796576.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

After Penn State’s heartbreaking loss to UCLA on Saturday, alumni had a lot of questions and I try and answer them. If I haven’t answered your question please reach out me at barry@barryfenchak.com.

First, some thoughts:

Like many of you, I watched the Penn State-UCLA football game last Saturday and am as shocked as everyone. As disappointing as the result was, I must however congratulate UCLA on a well-played game. As Coach James Franklin said himself, “We have to give UCLA a ton of credit. We have to give their quarterback a ton of credit. We had a hard time stopping him all day long.”

Based on the pre-season expectations Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics built up, I was cautiously looking forward to a successful season and robust play-off run. And I will continue to be the optimist in the room and hope that the Lions sweep the rest of the season—after all, last year Ohio State won the National Championship with two regular season loses. And right now I can see no other choice but to dance with the date we brought.

Now it’s your turn:

What is James Franklin’s current contract buyout?

Franklin renegotiated his contract prior to the 2022 season and it runs through the 2031 season. He is being paid approximately $8.5 million a year, so Penn State would have to come up with $56 million if they terminated Coach Franklin’s tenure at Penn State ‘without cause’ (more on that later). That amount would decrease by approximately $8 million per season moving forward.

While all of the details of the contracts have not been shared, we do know that Penn State guaranteed to pay Franklin the entire value of his 10 year contract even if Penn State fired him at some point prior to 2031.

Last year, the Penn State Board of Trustees authorized additional levels of performance bonuses for Coach Franklin. Again, Penn State did not release details, but those bonuses could add many millions of dollars of additional compensation over the remaining term of the contract but would not have to be paid if Franklin was terminated.

What if Franklin is hired by another school?

I doubt that Penn State will terminate Coach Franklin, but there are a couple of items that would come into play in that scenario:

First, if another program hired Franklin without Penn State having terminated the contract, Coach Franklin would be responsible for paying a fee to Penn State to release him from the contract. That amount is currently, I believe, $1 million.

On the other hand, if Franklin is hired by another school after Penn State terminates the contract, things get more complicated and uncertain. While Penn State would be responsible for paying Franklin $8 million per year for every year remaining on his contract (currently seven years), such contracts generally have offset provisions. Not all do, and we don’t know about the contract with Penn State and Franklin (because Penn State claims they must remain secret), but most schools are open and up front with those details and generally have that offset feature.

Offset provisions open up many possibilities that can make the contract less of an albatross for the school. Typically, such a provision would say, in the case of Franklin: “We will pay you the $8 million per year, but that amount is reduced by any compensation you receive from other future employment during that term”.* If Franklin’s contract had reasonable provisions included to protect Penn State (which we do not know) the typical scenario would be a negotiated settlement, where Penn State might offer a smaller payoff (less than the $56 million) in return for releasing Franklin to pursue other opportunities without further limitations.

Can Penn State afford to buy out his contract at the end of the season?

Even at an amount significantly less than $56 million, the short answer is: No.

Longer answer: Penn State has spent lavishly on football facilities and athletics administrative staff, and has very little cash on hand. The university is now responsible for this elephant-sized pile of debt, all of which was approved by the Board of Trustees.

To make matters worse, our current coaching staff is the most expensive in the history of college football, operating costs are soaring, and the Board of Trustees approved taking on a gigantic additional debt for the $700 million renovation of 35% of Beaver Stadium.

Simply stated, Penn State Athletics are tapped out. They are not the only major conference program in a tough fiscal situation, but even in the first year of stadium renovation many of Penn State’s assumptions have been shown to be untenable. The Athletic Department did all they could to disguise the assumptions that went into the project’s fiscal projections, when primary analysis showed they were fantastically optimistic, either by design, disingenuousness, or omission.

To be metaphorical: they are already robbing Peter to pay Paul and things are going to get even tighter.

Could Penn State find the money somewhere?

Given the fact that Penn State has recently:

• Closed seven branch campuses, citing fiscal constraints

• Been unable to come up with a few million dollars per year to maintain Public Broadcasting affiliate WPSU

• Raised tuition, claiming that higher tuition is necessary to provide 3% raises to staff

I would have to say Penn State has very little fiscal flexibility and not a lot of options.

Spending tens of millions of dollars to buy out the contract of a fired coach–paying him to NOT coach the team–would certainly send a very disconcerting message to the entire University community (and likely the legislators in Harrisburg). It would not be the first time the University made tone-deaf fiscal decisions, but providing the Athletic Department with funds to buy out Franklin’s contract would, I believe, be seen as a bridge too far.

Dr Lynch is back in court suing Penn State and James Franklin for fraud. Could Penn State fire James Franklin for cause?

That’s a very interesting question.

Coach Franklin’s contract has never been made public so I am extrapolating here, but every university coaching contract I have seen contains a ‘for cause’ clause. These provisions allow a university to terminate the contract without paying the buyout in the event the coach violates certain standards. One may remember the recent firing of Pat Fitzgerald as Northwestern’s football coach, which then led to litigation and an out-of-court settlement.

Universities are generally reluctant to make such moves, but it is certainly not unprecedented. Even if Penn State would like to avoid the potential public relations fallout of a ‘for cause’ firing, such instances could often be used to negotiate a more favorable parting of the ways.

Last year Penn State had to pay a $5 million settlement to Dr Scott Lynch, who brought a wrongful termination lawsuit against Penn State. This trials was catalyzed by allegations of Coach Franklin interfering with medical decisions regarding players (a big no-no in the NCAA rulebook).

During this trial, medical staff members testified that Coach Franklin attempted to influence treatment protocols on several occasions, including the treatment plans for injured players. Evidence also revealed that Franklin enforced a Nike contract provision that prohibited ankle taping over the Nike logo. Most tragically, sworn testimony disclosed that Franklin had wanted doctors to medically disqualify a player undergoing psychiatric care, in order to free up the scholarship.

The jury found sufficient evidence to support Dr Lynch’s claims under the applicable legal standard. Dr Lynch’s new lawsuit, which he filed July 31^st in Philadelphia County Court, directly challenges Penn State’s handling of the situations and is asserting they practiced institutional cover-up of medical complaints. Dr Lynch is claiming Penn State and its former Athletics Integrity Officer Bob Boland fraudulently concealed multiple complaints from the medical staff. Dr Lynch is seeking punitive damages.

Didn’t the NCAA say that Penn State had to create a ‘watchdog’ to make sure this didn’t happen again??

Yes.

US Senator George Mitchell was appointed by the NCAA in 2012 to monitor Penn State’s compliance with athletics integrity following the Jerry Sandusky child abuse scandal. He released quarterly reports until 2015, and in 2017 the committee he headed was disbanded. Penn State then formed the Office of Athletics Integrity under the Office of Ethics and Compliance, which is supposed to be an ‘external’ monitor. At the same time, Intercollegiate Athletics created an ‘internal’ monitor position of Athletics Integrity Officer, a position currently held by Tamla Lewis but formerly held by Bob Boland, who is being sued by Dr Lynch.

This sounds like another case of loss of institutional control.

You might very well think so, I couldn’t possibly comment on how that might be interpreted.

* As an example, Penn State hired Manny Diaz from the University of Miami to be their defensive coordinator for the 2022 and 2023 seasons at $500,000 per year. Penn State’s current defensive coordinator, Jim Knowles, is paid $3 million per year. Why was Penn State able to hire Diaz for so much less? Because the University of Miami was on the hook to make sure Diaz was paid $3.5 million per year. So from Diaz’s perspective it didn’t matter what Penn State paid him, he was going to get the $3.5 million; in this case $500,000 from Penn State and $3 million from Miami. Technically, Penn State could have paid him $1, with Miami paying $3,499,999, but Miami would have likely filed suit for something that blatant.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

Yesterday, the 2026 edition of the U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings were published and once again Penn State is at the bottom of the pack in the most important metric: Value. This year, Penn State (#185) rates next-to-last among the sixteen Big10 Conference public schools, one spot above last place Michigan State (#186) (Northwestern University and University of Southern California are private).

The Best Value Schools are the universities and colleges that demonstrate high academic quality relative to their cost (after financial aid), also known as ‘bang for the buck’. The Value ranking is frequently cited as the number one metric high school seniors consider when making a final commitment to a university.

In Penn State’s case, it’s important to note that University Park is the only campus ranked in the Value metric. Penn State does not include Commonwealth Campuses in its reporting, although all campuses fall under one accreditation. If included, their subpar graduation rates would sink the Value ranking even lower.

How the Rankings Are Determined

• Academic quality vs. price (50%): measures a school’s overall quality, as determined by its score in the U.S. News Best Colleges rankings, relative to the actual cost for students with need. Each school receives a 0-100 overall score in the main rankings. This score is divided by a net cost, calculated as total expenses (tuition, fees, food, housing, books, transportation and personal expenses) minus the amount of a school’s average need-based scholarship and grant for students with need.

• Percentage of students receiving aid (20%): measures the percentage of all students who receive need-based scholarships or grants. The more students who receive this type of aid, the better the school’s score.

• Grant and scholarship aid (20%): Evaluates how much of a school’s need-based financial aid is provided as grants and scholarships, which do not have to be repaid. A school must have awarded need-based aid to at least 10% of its full-time undergraduates to be scored on this ranking factor.

• Average discount (10%): measures the average percentage of a school’s total cost that is covered by need-based scholarships, like Pell Grants and other support. A higher discount percentage leads to a better score.

Why is Penn State’s Value ranking so low?

Penn State has consistently ranked near the bottom of the Value list for over the last five years, driven by the highest net cost among our peers, plummeting standardized test scores, and the lowest need-based aid in the Big10. The Big10 public schools also outperform Penn State because of their ability to control costs, lower net costs for students (from low tuition or generous aid packages), and stronger social mobility metrics for low-income/Pell students.

It is important to note that the Value ranking favors schools with strong Pell graduation rates and low debt (like the University of Michigan and Purdue). Penn State’s abandonment of underserved, middle-class, and low-income students, who disproportionately attend Commonwealth Campuses, sinks its Value ranking.

What is Penn State doing wrong?

Penn State’s struggles stem from policy choices that show the administration cannot control net costs and refuse to boost aid. Also, as reported in this year’s ranking data:

• High (and rising) tuition: In-state tuition rose 2% for 2025–26 (to $20,644), out-of-state 4% (to $41,790) for the fifth straight year.

• Less Generous Need-Based Aid: Penn State provides the lowest level of need-based aid in the Big Ten, $3,417 per eligible student, less than half of the Big10 public school average of $7,059. And fewer and fewer students qualify for any aid at all, as Penn State has largely priced out middle-income students.

• Pell graduation rate: Penn State (63%) trails Big10 averages (75–80%), signaling weaker support for low-income students.

• Elevated Student Debt: The average amount of Federal loan debt carried by Penn State graduates is $48,037, the highest in the Big10 and nearly double the average of $28,272.

• Equity Gaps: Penn State’s social mobility ranking, a measure reflecting a university’s ability to elevate disadvantaged students through an affordable and quality education is, unsurprisingly, near the bottom —16th in the Big10 and 321st among national universities.

How can Penn State improve?

Penn State could vastly expand need-based aid via the Endowment, now at $4.9 billion, or cap tuition hikes across the board. USNews’s increased emphasis on recognizing schools that give powerful support to low-income students, which results in higher graduation rates, hurts Penn State. A disproportionate majority of Pell Grant recipients attend a Commonwealth Campus, and Penn State’s Value ranking would be much lower if it included the graduation rates of Commonwealth Campus students:

• There are ZERO Commonwealth Campuses where Pell Grant students have a 50% or better chance of graduating in 4 years.

• There are only 3 Commonwealth campuses where Pell Grant students have a 60% or better chance of graduating in 6 years.

• At Penn State Harrisburg, which has the best 6-year graduation rate, 32% of Pell Grant students do not have a degree after 6 years. But they still have the accrued debt.

What’s the bottom line?

Evidence clearly shows that even a modest increase in grants to underserved students greatly increases their chances of graduating in six years. Penn State knows this, but has stubbornly refused to prioritize these students success.

It is a fact that budgets show priorities, and Penn State’s reveals theirs:

1. Paying high-level administrators top salaries

2. Football

All the flowery prose and aspirational goals of affordability, student success, and inclusion can be replaced with one phrase: Let them eat grilled stickies.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

"The President is hired by the BOT and is therefore a proxy of the BOT’s perceived success. The BOT will never not love the President, because if she fails, they failed. Both sides are self-interested to pretend everything is great as long as they keep getting invited to banquets.”

Kevin Horne, Penn State '14, '17 @KevinHornePSU

The Penn State Board of Trustees Committee on Equity and Human Resources meeting on Thursday, September 11th 2025, provided a rare public glimpse into the emotions that go into university president compensation negotiations.

The meeting, which was held in-person at the Bryce Jordan Center and also publicly available on livestream via a link on the trustee website, was chaired by Trustee Tracy Riegel and attended by trustee committee members Suzan Collins, David Davis, Dan Delligatti, Ali Krieger, Mary Lee Schneider, and Brandon Short. Along with other non-committee member trustees, the group discussed Dr Bendapudi’s evident dissatisfaction with her current compensation, which had been restructured February 16, 2024, just two years into her five year contract.

The 2024 contract increased her annual pay by $255,000 to a total of $1.8 million a year, making her the highest paid president of the 16 Big10 peer public universities. Shortly after being given that new contract, Bendapudi was widely reported to be a candidate in the North Carolina State University Chancellor search. In the end, NC State hired well-respected senior administrator Kevin Howell at a base salary of $600,000.

Included in Bendapudi’s 2024 contract was an “evergreen” provision, effectively giving her a lifetime contract. Board leadership claimed the raise was deserved because Bendapudi’s current contract was ‘median’ for Penn State’s peers. This was a disingenuous statement at best, since in addition to being the highest paid Big10 president, it was also among the highest public university in the nation (and six times as high as the nationwide average).

Now, just one year later, Penn State trustees were being asked to amend Bendapudi’s contract for a third time in four years, raising her annual compensation to an incredible $2.845 million per year, more than double the average for Big10 public presidents and 49% more than the second highest paid Big10 public president, Walter ‘Ted’ Carter at Ohio State.

At the meeting, Board Chair Kleppinger related that shortly after last year’s raise, Dr Bendapudi again began expressing feelings that she was “underappreciated” and “underpaid”. Trustee Sokolov then beseeched the committee to approve a one million dollar increase for Dr Bendapudi, stating that her administration was “so far ahead of the curve” and “much more sophisticated then our Big Ten peers”. There was no mention of Penn State’s recent national rankings, in which it tied for 13th place among Big10 universities, and is at or near the bottom of nearly all quantitative academic metrics.

“It is critical,” Sokolov continued, “that we do everything we can to keep Bendapudi because her style of leadership is essential in today’s higher education landscape.”

The committee then voted unanimously to forward their recommendation that Dr Bendapudi be awarded the one million dollar raise. The next day, September 12, 2025, the full Board approved the increase with only one dissenting vote from Trustee Anthony Lubrano.

The text of the approved proposal reads: “The Equity and Human Resources Committee recommends annually to the Board of Trustees consideration of compensation adjustments to the President’s compensation based upon the President’s performance in light of established goals and objectives;”

Setting aside the fact that the Board has set no independently created ‘established goals and objectives’ and instead uses the aspirational ones Dr Bendapudi wrote for herself, here is a partial list of her accomplishments since she became president in May, 2022:

• Bendapudi’s legacy defining initiative, the Commonwealth Campus closure planning, has been disingenuous and poorly managed, including dubious justifications based on weak analysis, and leaks to the Philadelphia Inquirer. Some Commonwealth Campuses like Mont Alto and New Kensington, are vigorously contesting the conclusions drawn by her group of University Park senior administrators Michael Wade Smith, Tracy Langkilde, and Margo DelliCarpini.*

• The restructuring of the law schools displayed weak leadership, a lack of understanding, and did not lead to any rational conclusion.

• A faculty vote of no confidence, citing budget issues, the closure of Commonwealth Campuses, and a lack of diversity, equity, and inclusion, was narrowly averted last February.

• Turnover in key administrative positions has been heavy, and hiring inconsistent on quality despite greatly increasing salaries and compensation. Bendapudi appointee Provost Justin Schwartz left after nine months on the job, and ‘Commonwealth Campus Czar’ Margo DelliCarpini departed after 16th months. Both left just as the University was facing critical decisions directly related to their responsibilities. The remaining highly-paid administrators continue to balk at giving even minimum raises to faculty and staff, citing ‘market conditions’, while lavishly enhancing pay to top administrators, citing those same reasons.

• The ability to cajole increased funding from the Commonwealth, one of the priority goals of any public university president, has gone nowhere under her tenure.

• Tuition continues to increase unsustainably while objective national rankings and academic quality continue drop to embarrassingly low levels. In July, the Board yet again increased Penn State tuition, with several trustees making emotional pleas justifying the increase, arguing they ‘had to’ increase tuition in order to provide sub-inflationary 3% raises to faculty and staff.

President Bendapudi’s raise increases her annual compensation from $1.8 Million to $2.8 million, in addition to various perks that include residence in the President’s mansion, use of the University private jet, and cars. It can also be noted that the cumulative annual pay increases Dr Bendapudi has demanded would be more than enough to sustain multiple Commonwealth Campuses who are now being closed.

Her new contract, which the Board leadership said would place her just into the upper quartile of our peer group, places her not only well higher than every Penn State peer, but also higher than most of the elite prestigious private universities in the nation.

Also on Friday, trustees voted to close WPSU, the Centre County PBS and NPR affiliate station, which has been operated by Penn State since 1964. They rejected an offer from WHYY of Philadelphia to transfer WPSU’s assets, and instead blamed stagnant state funding for their decision. The budget for WPSU is $3.4 million, or 0.03% of Penn State’s annual budget.

Board leadership seems to adopt the strategy that “paying more” is a suitable substitute for top performance. It doesn’t work that way.

*It is my belief that the fiduciary duty of every trustee is to act in the best interest of the university, regardless of the impact on Dr Bendapudi’s legacy. My voting record shows that I soundly rejected the Board’s bylaw mandate that trustees unanimously support unwise actions detrimental to the university.

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal observations, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com.

Two days ago, on September 10^th 2025, I received a text: “Did you see what happened to Charlie Kirk?”

I was horrified to see on the newsfeed that he had been shot while hosting a Turning Point USA event at Utah Valley University, in Orem. Half an hour later it was announced he had died from the wound. Like many others, I am still in shock and praying for his family. As I write this his assassin has not been captured, nor have any accomplices been identified.

I have admired Charlie for founding Turning Point USA and their focus on promoting civil discourse on college campuses. His mantra was ‘Let’s talk about it’ and he toured tirelessly to engage with anyone who wanted to debate any topic with him. He showed up to listen, discuss, and debate in open forums. Where else is that supposed to happen besides a university campus?

I was fortunate to meet him almost a year ago, on September 19^th 2024, when University Park was a stop on the Turning Point USA “You’re Being Brainwashed” tour. As I approached the Hub Lawn I was shocked to see thousands of Gen Z’s in a sea of red hats cheering and laughing. The midday crowd was larger than any I had ever seen on campus at Penn State (that wasn’t carrying a goalpost).

There were (permitted) tents to distribute literature and people standing in line to register to vote. Charlie, whose voice was ragged from endless events, was using a microphone to speak to the crowd. Shortly after I arrived, the power to the microphone was cut and his voice was silenced. In a statement issued after the event, Penn State spokesperson Lisa Powers cited a longstanding rule prohibiting amplified outdoor speech due to the disruption it caused to the ‘educational environment’.

My personal recollections of other recent politically focused events on the lawn that involved microphones with no university interference were echoed by many in the crowd. But Charlie and his group abided peacefully by Penn State’s decision and he began meeting and greeting anyone who wanted to engage with him. We chatted for several minutes and I found him affable, well-reasoned, and most of all welcoming. His energy was infectious. It was obvious he lived his beliefs.

Despite Charlie not being able to speak, it was a wildly successful afternoon. Over 350 people were registered to vote and more than 1,500 joined Turning Point USA. The gathering was fun, safe, and the positive energy undeniable. A group of protesters were welcomed but ignored. That’s the way democracy is supposed to work.

As Power’s statement after the fact attests, the university was keeping a close eye on this event. Turning Point USA was obviously aware of Riley Gaines’s cancellation a year earlier for a ‘Real Women’s Day’ event, which Penn State blamed on staffing issues and risk management. They knew they would be under scrutiny.

I’m very familiar with Penn State shutting down public speech they don’t agree with. They’ve gone to great lengths and spent a lot of money in efforts to silence my alumni-elected voice of fiscal reform and fiduciary responsibility. They similarly shut down my voice at meetings, and have taken draconian measures to extinguish the voice of alumni by disenfranchising their vote.

College campuses are supposed to be a place of open, respectful, discussion of ideas. Ideas that might be different from mine, and yours. The Constitution of the United States guarantees this right, and Penn State cannot, and should not, take it away from anyone. They have to figure out another way to deal with setbacks they encounter and opposition they attract. Because silencing the speaker, no matter how it’s done, is wrong*.

We do not know the motive behind Charlie Kirk’s assassination, only that it was premeditated and very public. Charlie was undeniably very effective and unafraid. He inspired others, like me, and made people feel they have a voice. And he did it at institutions that are actively denying their students, faculty, and trustees their rights as American citizens.

I cannot hold a candle to Charlie Kirk’s courage, eloquence, and determination. But I am resolved to make college campuses across the United States, and Penn State in particular, a place where those who come after Charlie Kirk will find a place to engage in open debate. Talking must work. Dialog must be the answer.

Because the alternative is too awful to imagine.

* Yesterday, FIRE released their findings on free speech on campus. Of 257 universities evaluated, 166 received an F (including Penn State). FIRE | Pennsylvania State University

As a former Penn State alumni-elected trustee, I enjoy sharing my personal thoughts, concerns, and ideas about Penn State. I invite you to contact me with your opinions so that we can engage in meaningful conversations on those topics: barry@barryfenchak.com. Follow me at BarryFenchak.com.

The Penn State Board of Trustees leadership has deemed this behavior unacceptable and the only remedy is permanent expulsion from the Board. I now look to the Board to vote on the other instances of unacceptable behavior we have all personally witnessed:

• A current trustee who has repeatedly verbally and physically threatened other trustees, to the point of needing to be physically restrained. When several trustees submitted written concerns to Board leadership expressing fear for their safety and requesting additional security at Board functions, no action has been taken.

• This same current trustee has made baseless, public allegations of racism against other trustees, and made baseless, public claims that other trustees are actively working to undermine the University. No action has been taken.

• A current trustee who, at the beginning of a Board meeting, made defamatory statements laced with sexual innuendo about another colleague. No action was taken.

• A current trustee stated, during a virtual online meeting “if this meeting was in person, I’d punch him in the nose” referring to another trustee. No action was taken.

Why is this behavior condoned and yet I am the only target for removal? Because I’m the only one asking for access to critical information, and the only one to have the nerve to follow the rule of law when that information is illegally withheld from us.

I am a direct threat to the Board of Trustees culture of laissez-faire, rubber-stamp governance. Yes, it is true we are told the importance of providing unanimous support for the leadership actions, and are retaliated against when we don’t.

I had the audacity to demand accurate and relevant information and expect thorough deliberation of critical decisions. I also had the audacity to call out blatantly erroneous information provided to the Board. We all know the landscape of higher education is being quickly reshaped and looks nothing like it did twenty years ago. Which is exactly where the university is still operating.

Ohio State and the University of Michigan have figured out how to have low in-state tuition, high enrollment yield, excellent academic metrics, a sustainable budget, and a national football championship. Most of the other Big10 Conference schools have adjusted to surviving in the new reality as well.

Except Penn State. We have a systemic operating budget deficit, which means a deficit not created by some unpredictable occurrence, but which is ‘baked into the cake’ through years of Board actions and in-actions.

The $3 billion cash reserve the administration claimed to have? It isn’t on any balance sheet I’ve ever seen.

They may prefer to shoot the messenger, but they’re not going kill the message.

Every trustee who has a perfect ‘yes’ voting record is responsible for the current situation. And every trustee who voted ‘yes’ to remove me from the Board will continue to vote for Penn State’s collapse. I’ll go out on a limb and predict that they will be the same trustees who were so gosh darn surprised we couldn’t save seven Commonwealth Campuses, and who will be shocked when the next administration comes in and delivers more bad news.

I can’t think of a greater act of shame.

If there is one thing that I believe my fellow Penn State trustees would agree with, it is that my first term as a trustee has been, to borrow a phrase from Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi, a ‘transformational experience’.

Almost three years ago, when I ran for my first term as a Penn State Alumni Trustee, I wrote "How I Will Fix Penn State”. At the time, Penn State’s tuition was the highest in the Big10 Conference, our academic standing was plummeting, and the long-term debt had quadrupled to nearly $3.5 billion.

Those challenges continue to exist, and I am proud to say I have voted NO on every unwise proposal that contributes to these issues (and have frequently been the only NO vote). I have proposed solutions and advocated for changes that build solutions. And in July 2024, I was duty-bound to sue the Penn State Board of Trustees for financial information necessary to fulfill my obligations after I had exhausted the prescribed protocols the Board leadership dictated, yet still withheld. Believe me when I say, I am putting my money where my fiduciary responsibility is.

One thing I have learned in the last three years is that I may be the only trustee who understands, first hand, what a 5% yearly tuition hike means to the average Penn State family’s bottom line. Penn State now has the most expensive in-state tuition in the Big10 Conference and many students are hopelessly priced out of the opportunities generations of Pennsylvania families used to raise themselves up economically and socially. That is very wrong, and the fact that our cohorts at Ohio State and the University of Michigan have figured out how to avoid this trap is embarrassing.

A few weeks ago, in court, Board Chair David Kleppinger scornfully referred to Penn State alumni as my ‘alleged’ constituents. My (and the eight other trustees) formal title is Alumni Trustee, and I’m at a loss to understand why Board leadership is working so hard to silence our voice. Alumni have serious concerns that I rarely hear addressed in meetings, except by me and a few others. And while the alumni are a core constituency, I listen to all stakeholders and try to be their voice as well.

Penn State’s issues are symptomatic of poor governance and a lack of focus on the University’s core missions. Unanimous YES votes will not fix Penn State. I know this because conformist trustees are what got us in trouble in the first place, and are keeping us there. I care deeply for our alma mater and there is no one who understands Penn State’s challenges and is more qualified to address them than me. I have proven that I am not a rubber stamp, and that I can, and want to be, held accountable.

I humbly ask alumni for your write-in vote so that I can continue to work for a better Penn State future. On your ballot, enter ‘Barry J Fenchak 1984’. For help getting a ballot, to contact me, or more information visit https://barryfenchak.com.

Let’s do this for the glory.

As a member of the Penn State Board of Trustees, I will from time to time be made aware of certain confidential information. Any public opinions or statements made now or in the past are from me, individually, and not by or on behalf of the Board of Trustees. I will also engage with Trustees and administrators in private, off-the-record conversations, with the expectation of privacy on both parties. I take these expectations seriously, as they are required in order to catalyze important discussions. As a fiduciary, it is also important that I engage in conversations with all stakeholders of the University. Stakeholders like you. Discussions will involve publicly available information and issues before the Board, as well as my personal thoughts, concerns, and ideas. I also will continue to solicit your thoughts, concerns, and ideas, and plan to engage in meaningful conversations with you on those topics. I hope that you will continue to share your concerns and ideas with me at barry@barryfenchak.com.