Harvard may be number one in the academic polls, but when it comes to university presidents' salaries, President Neil L. Rudenstine is just in the middle of the pack.

According to today's issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education, Rudenstine earned $278,297 in pay and benefits in fiscal year 1993-94.

That amount was almost $20,000 less than the average research university president, whose median earnings were $295,140, and less than half of Boston University President John R. Silber's chart-topping $564,020.

Rounding out the list of research universities' most highly compensated presidents were Joe B. Wyatt of Vanderbilt University, $459,046; I. Jay Oliva of New York University, $381,269; William C. Richardson of Johns Hopkins University, $378,996; and Eamon M. Kelly of Tulane University, $372,069.

In fact, six university presidents made more than $400,000, and 19 earned more than $300,000, the Chronicle reported. Even in comparison with presidents' salaries at the other Ivy universities, Rudenstine's earnings were comparatively small.

The University of Pennsylvania's interim president Claire M. Fagin earned $346,919 in 1993-94, though figures on current President Judith M. Rodin's salary were not available.

Dartmouth's president James O. Freedman came in a close second in the Ivy League, receiving $307,725, with Princeton's president Harold Shapiro just behind at $307,104.

Rudenstine's earnings surpassed those of only two other Ivy League presidents. And one of those was Yale's Richard C. Levin, who earned a mere $169,615.

Even within the University's itself, Rudenstine was not the most highly compensated official.

Medical School Dean Daniel C. Tosteson '46 won that prize with a $303,150 salary plus $35,008 in benefits.

He was followed by recently retired Dean of the Business School John H. McArthur at $265,579; Walter Professor of Cell Biology Mark Kirschner at $254,838; and Fred L. Glimp '50, vice president of development, at $241,571. Radcliffe President Linda C. Wilson earned $147,963.

Not counted in the Chronicle's comparison were the million dollar salaries earned by some Harvard Management Company (HMC) officials. Jonathan S. Jacobson, a vice president managing the equity portfolio, received $2,964,965 in 1993-1994.

According to Vice President of Government, Community and Public Affairs James H. Rowe III, Rudenstine is not troubled his relatively low compensation.

"Neil thinks that he is well compensated and has no complaints over what he receives," Rowe said. "All I know is that President Rudenstine is happy."

Rudenstine does get to live in the spacious president's house, of course, and a car and driver are just two of the other assorted perks he receives.

Professors' Salaries

Across the board, according to the Chronicle, the highest paid employees at research universities are not presidents. They are physicians.

Generally hired to teach at the university's hospital, a medical school professor can make over a million dollars with a combination of incomes--a school salary and the hefty fees charged in medical practice.

For Harvard, the figures look different because the University does not own its teaching hospitals.

As a result, Tosteson is the only person from the medical school on the University's top-five list, as compared to Yale, Columbia and Cornell, whose top earners are cardiothoracic surgeons and opthamologists, several of whom make more than a million.

The absence of non-medical professors from the Chronicle's lists is not surprising to many in the field of higher education.

"We do a salary survey. This year, 1994-95, salary increases were 0.7 percent when adjusted for inflation," said Iris Molotsky, spokesperson for the College and University Personnel Association. "It marked the first time in the '90s that real salaries have risen in two consecutive years."

Without the benefit of doctor's fees, the mean professorial salary at large private universities was $105,480, according to Academe's March-April 1995 issue