Penn State President Graham Spanier will earn a $545,016 base salary in the 2006-2007 academic year, making him the third-highest paid president at a public university nationally, according to a survey released yesterday.

Spanier will earn $28,416 more this year than last year, according to an annual Chronicle of Higher Education survey.

David P. Roselle, president at the University of Delaware, earns $729,054, the top salary in the country for a public university president, according to the survey.

The Chronicle sent out a five-question survey to 853 colleges and universities asking about the president's base salaries, retirement package and expense compensation. Penn State reported only the president's base salary, said Marisa Lopez-Rivera, an editorial assistant at the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Penn State is considered a quasi-private institution and is not legally required to provide current salary information. This year, the Chronicle obtained Spanier's salary from university spokesman Bill Mahon, Lopez-Rivera said.

The university released Spanier's salary because the Chronicle of Higher Education released an inaccurate number last year, Mahon said.

"We wanted to make the correction and get an accurate number printed," he said. "But our policy hasn't changed. We still don't re-lease the salaries of employees."

In the Big Ten, Penn State ranks second for highest base salary. Only Northwestern, a private institution, pays its president higher, with a

salary of $774,004 for the last fiscal year. Indiana ranks the lowest with $275,500 base salary for the 2005-2006 academic year. Indiana's 2005-2006 salary information was the most recent number reported to the Chronicle.

In 2004, Spanier made $492,000 and received a $24,600 raise in 2005-2006. Before last year, the president's salary hadn't been released since 1999, when it was $379,516, plus $15,715 in benefits and deferred compensation and $4,258 in expense compensation.

Each year, a small group of Board of Trustees members evaluates the president's performance and decides Spanier's salary based on this review. The increase in applications, fundraising and research money from private industry acts as some indicators of Spanier's job performance, Mahon said.

"Most people get raises every year," he said. "It's pretty routine."

Spanier's not the only president receiving a raise. Across the country, the Chronicle found increases in higher-education compensation in both private and public institutions, with a 53-percent increase in the number of college leaders whose pay and benefits reached at least $500,000.

Rivera-Lopez said she thought Spanier's salary didn't seem exceptionally high for university presidents.

"I thought it was pretty much in the right ballpark," she said. "I wasn't surprised at all."