John Thompson Jr. is Georgetown’s eighth-highest paid employee, almost 10 years after he stopped coaching the basketball team, University tax documents reveal.
In the 2005-2006 academic year, the latest year for which documents are available, Georgetown paid Thompson $418,845. Thompson is listed in the tax forms as a special assistant.
“John Thompson Jr. serves as a senior advisor and counselor to the President of Georgetown University on programmatic and philanthropic initiatives relating to student leadership, community engagement, athletics, and other issues,” University spokesperson Julie Green Bataille wrote in an e-mail.
Thompson did not respond to a request for comment.
Thompson has appeared on the list of Georgetown’s “Top Five Highest Paid Employees Other than Officers, Directors, and Trustees” on University tax forms every year since 2002, with the exception of 2005. In 2004, he was Georgetown’s second-highest paid employee, after President John DeGioia, according to a 2006 New York Times article.
In 2006, both Thompson and DeGioia told the New York Times that most of his salary is deferred compensation from his time as a coach. However, most of Thompson’s salary is not listed as deferred compensation on the most recent tax form.
According to the most recent tax form, Thompson works 30 hours a week at his job. He is the only employee listed on the tax form who works less than 40 hours a week.
At a December 2004 campus faculty meeting, Chester Gillis, then a theology professor, questioned why Thompson was receiving a large salary from the University, according to The New York Times. Gillis, now Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, wrote in an e-mail that he has not followed the issue since then.
In the 2004-2005 academic year, Thompson is not listed as one of Georgetown’s five highest-paid employees who is not an officer or director. Green Bataille would not specify whether this is because Thompson was not on Georgetown’s payroll or whether his salary declined that year. If Thompson was still employed by Georgetown, his salary would have had to be below $300,363, the amount paid to School of Foreign Service Dean Robert Gallucci, the fifth-highest paid employee.
