now washington journal's interview with michigan state university president lou anna simon, she talks about priorities for the university and higher education moving forward. it's part of our special series on universities in the big ten conference. this is 35 minutes. the cou >> cspan bus has been on a tour of the big ten colleges across the country for the past few weeks and along the way here on the washington journal, we haver been talking withni university t presidents aboutat higher education issues, the point is e cspan bus is on the campus of on michigan state university, in east lansing, michigan, joining us aboard the bus, is lou anna

si simon. let me get started rightti away with the challenges that you see in higher education.value >> good morning, and it's a y. beautiful day in east lansing ge so the promise of higher education -- creating not 1i6rle a job, but a terrific life. and one of our challenges is always to be sure that we work in a way to be as cost effective and relevant as possible so we make people's dreams bigger, that means we have to be at theo front edge ofom -- >> how are you building that affordability for students when it comes to tuition and room and board et cetera. >> when you think about michigan

state, most of our students aree very middle class, families of . $125,000 or less. and the number of students that leave with -- it's about one year's full cost of attendance f with our tuition being about $14,000 for in-state students, so we have to make sure that we can do everything we can to reduce costs and one of our we h platforms would be a high performing organization, not simply a cost cutting organization. and at the same time we need to reduce enormous value when thigh leave michigan state at en thi graduation achkd also throughout their lifetime so we're focused on value. hi >> how difficultga has that bee given this headline from may the that michigan higher education budget cuts some of the deepest in the nation since 2008.

>> it been an extraordinarilily difficult -- if you listen to 2001 until now and you listen to the state tuition, that's only . grown $65 in total over inflation in that entire periodn so that's required us to be extraordinarily innovative, unfortunately, the burden has been shifted a bit as business d leader ts from michigan and oths have pointed out to students and their families. so we're pleased that our educational debt rate, our default rate are well below thec national average, at the same time we have picked up additional funding for our state program, to make michigan states as accessible as possible. but at the same time, we have de had to grow sevalue, which mean you have had to make difficult s priority decisions because our students deserve the best, and w that's what they come for. >> how much of your time the spent negotiating with the

federal government, the state yr governments, and how much of t: your time is fund raising and trying to raise muffin from private donations.ve >> well, michigan state was very late in the game, our legendarya president john hanna believed ve that we should keep our public heart and not raise a lot of private dollars, or about two generations behind in fund raising, even though our're endowment is about a billion and a half now, very low on the big ten but still substantial and tt we're going to be launching a capital campaign, so it's making more and more of our time, but the story is the same, it's about value, and about creating the opportunities for students across the middle class to be extraordinarily successful. when we talk to students we trys to talk about our s aspirations and also about the things we s i need to do to be better every day. >> there are this story about - msu joins the alliance to help o

lower income first generation o students that you will be among 11 public universities across the nation that will be part of a collaborative effort to ensure that these low income and firsts generation college. students ean degrees. what will you be doing?ok >> first of all, michigan state, going into this project was, if you look at u.s. news and world reports, if you look at our size and caliber, that actually had a plus number in terms of predictive and graduation rates for our lowest income students, but we need to be better, because the biggest loss to our society is actually student whob is come to our university and e don't succeed so we make sure ta that every studentbr that comesn michigan state succeeds. pro we're -- class experiences in new and innovative ways to pilo provide the insent tives and th support for students including

using data. our pilot programs showed a 20%e increase in the graduation rates of our lowest income student who is already are achieving at a higher rate than nationally. >> we're talking about affordability and accessibility among higher education with lou sna simon who's the president of michigan state university. we want to get our viewers we w involved in the conversation. you don't have to have any ant o relationship to msu, but we want to hear your questions and hige concerns about higherr educati, the students dial in at 202-585-3882. and michigan residents, you cann call usts at 202-585-3883. president simon, i want to show you thwae column this morning i "the washington post," college priorities adrift.

and what he bring writes in her colleges and universities are all taking part in competing for enrollments based on amenities. as of late 2012, 92 schools had embarked on 157 recreational capital products at a total cost of $1.7 billion.en that just one question, is this the best use of scarce resources. federal and state taxpayer i funding and that colleges are supposed to be, you know, educational institutions. since >> i well, since i haven't seen the entire article, but let me a comment, our research recently came out with the finding that s students who engaged in a healthier lifestyle, which in includesth exercise actually wet successful in the classroom, but there is a ed on

balance. we have notre embarked on a jure recreationalproject, we have for included exercise halls as part of our renovations. but it is important to put those things together, it's not about using amenities to attract students, we're using our outcome of education to attracti students and part of that is to make sure they have a healthy lifestyle. so weea have two big initiative on student success and on health think lifestyles, which is not a simply about exercise orphan si things, it's about developing a lifestyle through college that will make you successful in entf life, we make those things fit r together very, very well. >> do you feel pressure as the president of msu to attract a better student or more studentse to the university with these type of amenities? because a lot of your competition is doing it.cation

>> well, right now we're not a n part of the common application, so when you apply to michigan state, you have to make out a o separate application, our applications are growing, we believe, because we're focussed on the value of an education, not simply the experiences you have on the campus, but your orf success when you leave michigan state achkd tnd the fact that yn part of a net work of par stspa for life. to appreciate the value of their degree over time makes a fad. difference in recruitment, not a specific latest fad.lue, par we're sort of the persistent a consistent way of looking at t value, particularly with all of the students or middle class families that we have. our slogan in 1880 as a pioneer land grant was good enough for

the proudest and open to the poorest. and that's the model we use today. under the brick of empowering s. students of every socioeconomic class. >> we were showing our viewers the msu website and right there on the forefront is an argument for why college is worth it andn why kids should be going to college. why is that right there when you go to msu's website? >> because we know that a number of families, particularly if d you're fromep michigan and have experienced the -- what i would say the epicenter of the recession and you know with families who were educated and had a very, very difficult time, we have to be clear about what we believe is important for the future and why we believe we're a good value.it it's not just about accessibility for us, it's aboue value and making sure that we'rt doing everything we can to

enhance the value of our it. education and our degree for our students and it's right there. people can analyze it, you can u go to our website and dependingn on who you are and your family circumstances, you can actually figure out what it's going to tt cost you to come to michigan state university.case f that transparency is very important. and we have to make a case for value. >> all right. let's hare from stanley, a parent in westboro, massachusetts. you're up, stanley.ing, the >> caller: we do homeschooling, we have for five generations, from machine shop, to welding, the whole thing. i became a nuclear engineer without going to college. companies give courses when they get somebody that they know they can train to do a newfield co coming out that's out. there's a book on tv which i bought, they do the whole family.book is the harding family. and the name of the book is the

brainy bunch and they do exactly what we do, except we would send the kids to public school to cn prevent -- y ques >> stanley, let me jump in, can you get to your point or your cr question here? >> oh, and switzerland, they don't test people in any schoolt germany schools get out at noon and you have to be able to make what you design. they don't teach that anymore. >> what's your point, stanley. >> caller: it's hard to explain unless you read that book. >> lou ann simon, are we doing education right in there country compared to other countries? >> i think that as a land grant university, we were founded to blend thefo theoretical and the practical in ways that students would leave michigan state as t-shaped people with the do capacity to do the kind of things that stanley was talkingh about. and we need to do that in very larg

propel the s to economy forward, michigan state, any university is not rightch f everyone and that's why we have to have choices.may no i agree with stanley that we have a number of jobs that america that require high skilla but mayt not necessarily be something that is amenable to an education at michigan state or similar aau institutions, that'h why we have to have choice. i also believe that g homeschooling can work out effectively for some families, but it requires great discipline. so obviously stanley was a part of a family that was very successful, he sent his kids to public schools and we just and h happen to have the best model for americans and i think the land grant university concept that came out of abraham lincoln is one that's very important for the future. >> joe in annapolis, a parent : there. joe? >> caller: i would like to ask'' about thed admission process, te admission criteria, as i'm sure your guest is aware, recently,

there's a thin cord in fisher no versus texas rule that but h universitiesad can continue to e race as an admissions criteria but had to for the first time demonstrate, prove to a court that they use the least it offensive in terms of constitutional rights, manner to do that and it's not just to pick a word for it, as is sort of the case that involved the university of michigan and university of michigan law i school, so now there's a new mechanism, i think most people understand, and that the university has to demonstrate they have used a nonoffensive to the constitution process, to uso race, my personaln' experience my son's undergraduate acce acceptance that the schools will never tell you that. but it's a relatively new court mandate and i would like see if

we offer a specific response to that question, how do you use race? >> michigan passed a ballot initiate ive that prohibits universities from using race in admissions. so we are even though the university of michigan case was part of the discussion in the , university ofsu texas case, osit becauseio of the supreme court case, subsequent to that there was a michigan ballot composition. so we use a very hole listic admissions process that looks ae academic credentials, community engagement, because we believe m that studentsen who are the mos successful through college are multidimensional, but in ocess. michigan, race is not a factor w in our admissions process, givet the proposal. >> next up, pat who's an educator in michigan, pat, good morning to you.m a >> caller: hello, thank you for cspan. i'm retired, i taught education in a public school.

and i finding it amazing that ri yours ratio of professors to students at michigan state are 17 to one.a commen when i taught kindergarten, i taught 25 to 28 students. >> we work hard to make sure that our opportunities have a world class experience achkd faculty to student ratio is important in that element, but it's simply not what happens in the classroom, it's that our students are engaged in researci and a wide varietyty activitieso that ratio disprovide this capacity to provide this multidimensional experience that provides a college graduate. >> how many are tenured at es michigan state university.ve how many professors do you have that are adjunct status.

we have about 2,000 roughly faculty who are in the tenure ao system, and another 1,500 or so that are in a variety of ct. appointment statuses that are noted noted noted noted a -- adjunct. they are a a most -- and we have some folks who are on research appointments. >> steve's next in new york, a parent up there. ann hi, steve, you u're on the air. >> caller: hey, how are you? thank you for having me. i was curous about your political science programs.clin a lot of the colleges they're political science programs are a far left leaning -- they embrac. socialism, and i'm curious where

michigan state is in that area.c andie do you guys police your political science people and you know make sure that there's an equal balance? because conservatives have a tough time in colleges up there nowadays. >> well, steve, i think that wee have a political science department that has a worldwide track record of trying to look f at issues from a p variety of pe perspectives becausect you have know a variety of perspectives in order to have your own, but we have a very prestige you feda college.li you have to begin reading the re federalist papers. as part of your educational experience. >> good morning, leslie, you're a parent, what are your concerns with higher education? >> caller: i am so grateful thau university of michigan state tuition hasn't gone out of this world. i am a graduate of michigan

state university. >> leslie, can i ask you what ee did you pay i when you went the? >> caller: i paid tuition because it was cheaper and my dad paid room and board, i don't remember what per credit hour costs were, but i want eed the s wonderful president of michigan ied state university, i completed college in michigan state, it was hard, but i learned al. i wish i would have studied more, if there's any kids listening out there, study more. in college, you'll have more success. i regret some of the time i waisted there. and . >> beverly thank you very much and academic rigor is somethingr that is aep partnership between students and faculty and james madison dews represent that.

right now 60% to 70% of our students work because they are . very upper class upper mobility with a world class education.tsy >> edward on twitter states i hate that out of state students pay double, he thinks it's t ridiculous, why is that?ent to >> because the theory is that the state is making an investment to support the cost of education for its residents and as a result of that, out of state students then are part of the differential between the state and tuition.en >> how many owl ut of state students do you have versus in state? >> we're very unusual in the big ten because our undergraduate education, in terms of out of state students achkd actually

we're leaving about 60 -- we felt that we need to be that s c engine of opportunityat that wod class education from michigan residents, particularly if you think about the economy in michigan, so we have stayed true to our mission, but we do need state stinlts because it be p provides aar positive education and stuchbdents to have be parts a global society. >> and foreign students? do you have a figure on that? >> we have about 178 foreign international clients that began back in the 1880s actually with the first student from japan and we began our development work in china and actually in the 1980s with the rice famine and i michigan state had the first dean of international studies in 1957 because people at that time believed that north for michigan to be successful, we had to havr

an internationale perspective. >> we're talking with lou anna . simon, she's president of michigan state university. we have been interviewing university presidents across thu big ten, we will go next to suzanne in pennsylvania, a parent there, susan, go ahead. >> caller: thank you cspan for taking my call, i appreciate your program because you give us so much information. where are these kids? it's wonderful that they're ther goings to get a good education where are they going to work? their mothers and fathers are a out of work for so long.ment my son has had a good education, but he owes over $60,000 in government loans, when are they going to discount the loans that the older people that took these programs are going to w get any help? >> rookay, we'll leave it there?

lou anna simon? >> i share your concern about the high interest rates for somo of these old loan programs achkr in fact in a conversation with business leaders from michigan yesterday as a part of our gy, e higher education workforce e development, talent development strategy, we need more voices to worry about the large loan interest rates that are a part of the repayment cycle.ith as i said earlier, about 46% of our students leave with educational debt, that average is about $25,000. and our loan default rate ask g. very low, got 5.7%, even though many, many of our students are from michigan and have had verye difficults financial f circumstances over the lastin t years, but this is an investment in the future if we can drop those interest rates a bit. s >> "the washington post" says t reporting this northern that the government says that student loan default nationwide has

dropped, has dipped, but they say the figure is still too stus high. lou anna simon, after your michg graduate your students, how many of them are staying in the state of michigan and getting portun employment as the engine of opportunity as you say, what --t is it difficult for these students to say there and finding employment given the state of the economy after the recession? >> in the period of the recession, when there was such a dislocation of workers in michigan, the number of our loo students who hadk employment ini michigan ghdropped, but if you , look at over top employers right now, it's quicken loans, the auto companies, michigan based fompanies, we have obviously a very large agri food foot print that's obviously strong in michigan and we're working very hard around the state for

students to see detroit as an eo opportunity for the n future, a really cool city to be in and o beingit on the ground fwloor of the pine years of the resurgenca of detroit and we're getting more and more student who is want to stay in the state. we have about ten minutes left here with president lou anna sa simoten of michigan state university. we have someo ca phone lines op so we encourage stuchbdents to l in.. let me go to eric who's a michigan resident, and armada, is it, eric? >> armada.the >> caller: i'm a parent of two h children, one just graduated to ther and the other one is comeg us. i'm wondering if i send my chil to michigan state, will they get the education needed to create a

business not become some lackeyt for somebody else?ersity >> well, if you look at the recent report from the idor, university research co-door in michigan, michigan state and ime university of michigan, you'll see that we have produced many entrepreneurs over our lifetimeo there's a formal entrepreneur ship program, your son or daughter could go to the hatch and get support with their business ideas, we have a new a place called the hive in the residence hall where anybody can go and think about starting businesses. we have a media sand box if ing you're interested in sort of thr gaming technology, those are ft really organic now as part of our neighborhoods, and very, art the future. t for >> miami, florida, gene, a parent there, hi, gene. >> caller: how are you? very good. this message is to dr. simpson, i met her in miami with john vod

saxon from nyu and she gave a very good presentation while we were in miami.hool i i am -- i'm very interested in . michigan state and i know you o have an agricultural program. is there any support that your school will do with haiti or do anything with haiti pertaining to that? >> we have a -- we have had a historic program with haiti in o food and urhealth, and we have also a number of our faculty from the medical schools who are working in haiti periodically as is permitted, given the currentn circumstances. but it's important foren us to p wero also have included haitiani students, interestingly as a migrant program, because as you know, many students from haiti

migrated into florida. and we have a university of michigan migrant program for students from haiti.guest: >> the national security higher education advisory board, what is that? >> it was formed a while ago, to be advisory to the director of the cia and the fbi to try to st better connect the voices of e universities with national security issues, that were all'' need to bes worried about. and it's a group of university u presidents, that talks about everything from cyber security s to how we can better understand the dynamics around our international programs, we needt to be aglobal, we need to be smart about national security as well. and those are tough issues to deal with. we need to talk about them in th genuine way and share views about our programs and host

activities so the group is just a way of having those conversations. ry advisory this board. why was it formed? is it in response to a threat? >> well, if you think about post 911, it was easy for universities and the intelligence communities, the work of the fbi and the cia to become on very different to planets, so to speak, and our interests about the protection of our campuses, how we deal with terrorism, the list that we have been talking about today have to be usualre interests, b we come at them very differently. and it'sct a way to understand different perspectives, because if you understand different perspecti perspectives, you can finding solutions to different problems. >> good morning. i have a question, it's always been at the back of my mind, is how the university handless the professional athletes on their

campus? we have scholarship athletes, s coming on board, how many of these scholarship students actually graduate after four st years? >> well, we have scholarship student athletes who are both men and women, whose graduation rates are as a whole, about the same as our student body. obviously, there are a few individuals who come to the university who leave a bit early to pursue their athletic interests, but we see all of our students, no matter their mic athletic skills as students first and athletes second and u. provide academic support for sut them to be successful.ed to we have also had programs to th ensure that students athletes return to graduate achkd stay connected with us.

two examples currently might be just an advocate for who is he k playing hockey for the detroit red wings who keeps e-mailing mb thatec he's within six credits getting his degree, if that's possible. you look at people like steve lg smith who's a comment tator on basketball - who's making a gree living after his professional e playing career, he's stayed connected to michigan state as a role model for almost every the student we have. so the media tends to focus on the 1% of students who are really the student athlete who are not indicative of our scholarships. >> we'll hear from chris nextll who's a parent in providence, ea rhode island. >> it's clear that you are, but are you aware that you are a e, puppet to the globalist agenda taught out of the frankfurt

school in nazi germany't i don't know where you're going with that, we're going to move on to nooerm in florida. >> caller: thank you for cspan and i am a michigan state gra graduate, i have a bachelor's achkd a masters for michigan and state. and i was on theoc faculty of michigan state. talked i went up there last summer and got the shock of my life. i went in and talked to the geology department and found out they have 14 faculty members, and i asked them how many students they graduated last year and if at the bachelor's level and they told me eight. and then i asked them how many graduate students they had and they told me three. i was absolutely appalled at what i see in higher education,

i have been essentially a dean of a largest probably t oceanography ocean engineering group, teaching group in the world. sureg my ys madet students got jobs. evidently, these people aren't getting jobs, and the universe needs, including the one that i left here many years ago have all turned into environmental science. the geology department, i figured out there were probablyw about fourer or five at the mos out of that 14 who are actually geologists. >> okay. president simon. well, if you look at the job cl students for students today including the number of what i would call classifying geology

programs ash the country, we have been asked for support plac achkd to be sure that all of ous students are placed in the right kinds of jobs.ig and the placement rate across l all of our geology programs is high. we are have also kept that as part of an interdisciplinary program, that's also how you try to balance current job needs, sg current focus of employers, with keeping a strength in place to m build for the future. >> thank you to michigan state university for allowing us to a come to-- the university today d talk with you about higher education. >> gretaco,me thank you very mut and thanksio to all of your peoe who both listen and called in,

this is important dialogue about not simply michigan state, but n the future of our country and we appreciate everyone's concern as we try to build great value and enhance both competitiveness that all of our students deserve. >> thank you very much. wednesday on cspan 3, washington journal's interview with university of minnesota president eric h heeler. that's followed by part of this year's net roots nation conference. followed by the communist party usa convention. from the campaign for america's future. you can see it all beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on cspan 3. cspan's campaign 2014 is bringing you more than 100 debate this is campaign season. last night we showed you the first live debate between democrat amanda curtis and republican congressman steve danes. here's part of their debate.

>> you know, when our founding fathers wrote our founding st k documents, they never meant for -- to be making the decisions that affect us in our citizen legislature and i have found in meeting montanans that, you know, they're a little bit afraid of being part of the process, maybe they don't think they're quite smart enough to do it or don't have the right backgrounds and the reason that i stepped up to the plate is to prove that you don't have to be a silver spoon-fed politician, a career politician to represent working families and the best person to represent workers in the state is one of us. >> a follow-up to that just with amanda, i think we're getting to your experience, do you think you have the experiencing to represent th