The College Budget
T HE reputation and effectiveness of colleges and universities depend not upon buildings or enrollment but upon the capabilities of the staff engaged in teaching and research. This effectiveness must rest, in the long run, on the activities and the quality of performance of those staff members who receive the greatest reward in terms of promotion or of salary increase. It should be clear, further, that the criteria for promotion and those for increase in salary should be qualitatively the same.' The means, therefore, by which the appropriate activities and the satisfactory quality of performance must be encouraged is the use of the budget as an instrument of personnel policy. In fact, the proper aim in the use of the budget is the continuous improvement of the staff engaged in teaching and research. This point seems to have escaped some administrative officers, who have tried to spread the budget residue for merit increases so that almost everyone on the staff got something and hence could not complain too bitterly. This is so manifestly a misuse of the budget that we must remark that loud and constant complaint may be an indication of a very successful budget