TROY — Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Shirley Ann Jackson, one of the highest-paid college presidents in America, is among several leaders of colleges and universities in the Capital Region volunteering to take a pay cut to address immediate financial losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Rensselaer, along with other universities across the country, has faced revenue shortfalls, and continues to face extreme financial pressures," Jackson wrote in a letter to students, parents, faculty and staff. "As a direct result, we have undertaken a number of difficult decisions to preserve our ability to carry out our teaching and research mission. Effective immediately, I, as well as my entire leadership team, are voluntarily taking a 5% annual salary pay cut."

Colleges and universities have sent the majority of their students home for the spring term to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and are now dolling out millions of dollars in refunds for unused housing fees and meal plans.

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The federal CARES Act distributes $920 million among 390 higher education institutions in New York, with half of the funds intended to go directly to students, but the relief dollars cover "a fraction" of these immediate expenses, college leaders said.

The coronavirus relief bill does provide an additional $600 to laid-off workers eligible for unemployment for May and June, which has prompted colleges across the Capital Region to start furloughing employees whose jobs cannot be performed remotely.

RPI, which serves nearly 8,000 students, would receive $4.8 million in relief aid from the CARES Act, with half of those funds directed to student grants.

Other cost-saving steps taken by RPI include a reduction of discretionary expenses for things like travel, outside services, consulting and purchases. The Troy institute has also frozen hiring and pay raises, canceled sabbatical leaves and research stipends, and furloughed nearly 300 employees.

Jackson's seven-figure salary and top-down management style have long been a source of contention among students, as well as some dissident alumni and donors. Her email announcement of her own pay cut drew ire on social media and Reddit forums, where students ridiculed the 5 percent sacrifice, noting that other college executives who have given up more of their own salaries to help soften the financial blow.

"Let them have 5%," read one meme depicting Jackson as Marie Antoinette, Queen of France during the French Revolution.

Jackson was paid $5.877 million according to the college's 2017 tax filing, which was obtained by the Times Union. That salary would make her the second-highest-paid college official for that year, according to a ranking from the Chronicle of Higher Education. A college spokesman declined to provide Jackson's current salary, saying the college does not provide salary information "out of respect for all Rensselaer employees, including the President."

The spokesman didn't specify the current amount of the school's deficit in response to questions from the Times Union.

RPI's president topped the Chronicle of Higher Education's annual list of highly compensated college executives in 2012 when she earned $7,143,312 in total compensation. RPI has defended Jackson's salary saying it "reflects the high level of achievement and expertise she continues to demonstrate."

Jackson, a physicist, was the former head of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the first African-American woman to earn a doctorate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hired by RPI in 1999, her current contract runs through 2022. She is one of the college's longest-serving leaders.

Officials at other Capital Region institutions starting to grapple with the impending financial crisis are cutting deeper into their own salaries to help narrow an immediate financial shortfall stemming from room-and-board reimbursements.

Siena College's President-elect Chris Gibson, whose contract begins in July, has volunteered to take a 25 percent pay cut through the end of the calendar year. The Loudonville college is facing an $8.7 million deficit from room-and-board reimbursements, as well as hits to its endowment and losses associated with the cancelation of summer events.

The college's last president, the late Brother F. Edward Coughlin, who died last summer from complications during heart surgery, didn't take a salary.

President Carolyn Stefanco is among top-earning officials at the College of Saint Rose accepting a 10 percent salary cut in May and June. Stefanco earned about $328,991 in pay and benefits in 2016, according to the most recent data from the Chronicle for Higher Education survey.

Saint Rose will reduce the salaries of administrators and non-unionized staff by 5 percent for those making $50,000 to $100,000, and by 10 percent for those making above $100,000 for at least two months.

The Albany liberal arts school is facing a deficit of approximately $15.8 million. The furloughs and salary reductions are expected to reduce the projected deficit to about $13.5 million.

At Union College, where all but 60 of 2,200 students have left the Schenectady campus, refunds for room and board for the third trimester of the academic year will cost the college $7 million. The college has begun furloughing close to 300 employees and is considering administrative pay cuts, a college spokesman said.