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online at c-span.org. ♪ ♪ since 1979, in partnership with the cable industry, c-span has provided complete coverage of the halls of congress. from the house and senate floors, to congressional hearings, party briefings, and committee meetings. c-span gives you a front row seat to how issues are debated and decided, with no commentary, no interruptions, and completely unfiltered. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. we are talking about higher education in america with the president of princeton university, christopher icegrubber, chair of the association of american universities. welcome to the program. >> thank you, a pleasure to be here. >> you just started your term as

the chair. tell us about that organization, the mission, and who the members are. >> it's a great honor to be chairing the board for the association of american universities. this is a group of about 70 of america's leading research universities. so it includes public flagship universities, it includes private universities. what we share in common is a commitment to educating students at the highest level, and a commitment to research of the highest quality that enables our country to enjoy prosperity and promotes the security of the country, as well. >> so what are your goals and priorities going to be for this coming year? >> it's important to continue to -- for the government to continue supporting the research we have had in the united states. we have benefited tremendously in this country from having a partnership between the government and its universities that has produced both practical applied research and basic research that has laid the foundation for later discoveries. one of the things i want to do

is work closely with the president of the aau, barbara snyder, to support that funding in congress. we also need to protect the freedom of our institutions and make the case for what those institutions are doing for our students for the country. >> make that case. how would you describe the current state of higher education in america? >> i think the current state of higher education is terrific in the united states. part of the evidence for that is that people all around the world seek to come to these universities as students and faculty members. the return on investment from a four-year college degree, which is what all of us in the aau offer is tremendous for many families, that investment in higher education will be the best investment that they make in their lifetimes just by the financial return and of course, there are lots of other benefits to getting a four-year college degree. the research that our universities produce is a difference maker in terms of our health and in terms of

information technology, in terms of innovation and in terms of jobs for the country. >> you talked about return on investment. college degrees have become extremely expensive, and it continues to get more and more expensive. outpacing inflation, and it has put it out of reach for a lot of american students. why is that? why is a college degree so expensive these days? >> so i'm really glad you raised that point, because there are a couple of things in what is very common narrative. one is the actual cost that people pay for higher education over the past four to five years hasn't been going up, it hasn't been going up at the rate of inflation, it's going down, and that's something you can find in college board data. there's a great article -- >> but tuition itself has been going up. >> the sticker price is going up, but what people pay is the

sticker price minus financial aid. institutions, including mine, have been raising dollars from alumni and endowments. so in fact, our educations are more affordable than ever. i'll just use some of our own data around that. 71% of the students at princeton are on financial aid, and that aid involves scholarships that are larger than the tuition price. so the average student on financial aid at our university is getting a part subsidy for room and board at our university, in addition to full kompl of the tuition price. when people look at education, they have to keep two things in mind. one is what matters is the net price, and all of the aau institutions for example are offering significant financial aid to their students. so people have to look carefully at what they're going to pay if they come. and then the second is, the critical question about education is that return on investment, figure out what the

price is, and pay attention to what you're getting back from that. education isn't a consumer good that you simply use up in a way that we purchase much more like -- when you look at thab -- when you look at that investment, it's one of the best you can make in life. >> do you take a position on student loan forgiveness? >> the aau doesn't have an official position on student loan forgiveness. we have a commitment to affordability. we believe that the government should increase, for example, the pell grants that enable students from low-income families to attend college and flourish when they go there. we and other associations have supported the idea of doubling pell. again, one of the things that people need to know, as these narratives get out there through stories that i think often cover

outliars, is that these financial aid allows students to graduate without any debt. so all of them will get financial aid that will allow them to graduate with zero debt. more than 83% of our students graduate every year debt free. the others are taking out relatively small loans on a discretionary basis. so the reality, when parents take a close look at what these leading research universities and other colleges are offering, is different than what's offered out there in the narrative. >> you have to get into princeton first to get that financial aid. that's not easy. >> no, that is not easy, and we have extraordinary students who are applying to us. but what i've just said is true, in differing ways across this group of 70 universities and at many universities and colleges that are outside of that group. so it's not just the very selective universities where this is true.

>> there has been a decline in enrollment across the board of american universities. is that a concern among university leadership and what's being done to address that? >> we're seeing a generational shift right now that is the -- there is a -- as you look at demography, we have known that we will see declines in the numbers of college going students as demographic patterns change. for the leading research universities in the country, the applicant pools remain robust, and the sets of students that want to come to colleges and universities from within and outside the united states remains very strong. but i think we are going to see effects in the sector more broadly, as these demographics take hold. >> if you would like to join the conversation, if you have a question or comment about higher education in america, you can

give us a call. our guest is christopher icegrubber, president of princeton university. the lines are by party. and republicans are on 202-748-8001. democrats are 202-748-8000 and independents are 8002. and if you are a college student right now, give us a call. we would love to get your perspective, 202-748-8003 for college students. there have been fewer protests on the gaza war than we have seen in the past. how are schools addressing this issue this school year? >> i think what schools have to do around this issue is to respect basically the principles that are part of our united states constitution, and that's where -- we respect free speech,

and at the same time, we insist that students and others comply with what are known as time, place, and manner restrictions when they are protesting. so in this country, in the city of washington, d.c., where our government is located, you have more freedom to criticize our government than you do in just about any other country in the world. i think that's a good thing and you have to have that vigorous free speech on college campuses where people can speak up about controversial topics like the israel-hamas war. but we have rules in the united states and college campuses. you can't just pitch a tent to protest on the capitol mall. you can't occupy a building in washington, you can't spray paint your message on the washington monument. we have to have the same rules on college campuses. so that's what we have done at princeton and what other universities are doing around the country to enable people to speak up and to make sure they do so in a way that allows everybody to go about their business on the campus and

doesn't disrupt the activities of the campus. two other things about what we have to do there. we have to be elevating the conversation, so you get talk, again, in our country and on our campuses. a lot of that is shouted. that gets covered a lot about the news media. you can have a lot of discussions that are balanced and thoughtful. what gets the pictures are the students with the signs. but we have to take those conversations on tough issues happening on our campuses and elevate them. i think we're doing a good job with that. the second is i would say we do want students to be engaged around these issues. so there are people who just go about their business and don't pay attention to the issues that are happening in the world. we want our issues to be engaged leaders. so i respect the right to protest, but i don't expect the right to disrupt. >> what was your experience on the campus of princeton university, and not just the protests but the freedom of speech aspects? >> i think we did a good job at

princeton. that's what we hear from our students as we survey them, as well. when we ask them about their student experience, and we do this every year. last year, students continued to report a high satisfaction with their student experience. it was a little higher than the previous year. i mention that, because it's important when you have these tumultuous events, the feelings are raw and people get hurt, that you're able to give students the kind of educational experience that they want. we have a lot of people upset with me about various things that happe the campus. we had students chanting slogans. i'm ewish, i have relatives in israel. i found those offensive, but i have an obligation to protect the rights of people to say things. we also had to enforce our rules, including through arrests at princeton when people were

violating time, place, and manner rules. we were very clear about those rules. and that enabled us to get through the year. what i'm proudest of is we had a number of different events that allowed people to explore these issues in more detailed ways. i'm going to mention one. our dean of the chool, probably the most prominent palestinian american political scientist in the united states, she did a couple of sessions with our counterpart, who is an israeli previously in the israeli military. the two of them became friends when they were assistant professors at princeton. and they, in the fall of last year, not so long after october 7th, were doing public events at both princeton and columbia, to model for students who it meant for people of very different backgrounds to disagree with one another and disagree civilly.

that doesn't get the kind of attention that the protests do, but that's the heard of h what is going on. i don't think it's happening in many other places in our society. >> there's an article here, why colleges are turning to institutional neutrality. can you first explain what that means and is that a good approach? >> yeah. so institutional neutrality is a kind of slogan that describes a view about when universities should take positions and when presidents should make statements on issues. this had been -- something that had been discussed among university presidents and other people in higher education for a period of time that exploded into view after some of the unsuccessful statements that were issued last year. institutional neutrality reflects the view that universities at a broad level ought to be very circumspect

about when they speak out. the idea behind it is that to take a broad phrase that i agree with, that universities ought not then sell to be the critics, they ought not to take positions as princeton university that are critical of our government. they should be the sponsor of critics, enabling faculty and students to raise their voices. i personally don't like the phrase "institutional neutrality." i don't think i have a neutral institution. i have an institution that stands for the value of research, free speech, that people of all backgrounds should be able to flourish on campus. those are real values. so i think neutrality doesn't express this idea well. but i agree that universities have to be careful not to be taking positions as institutions except in a limited set of circumstances. >> let's talk to caller. chalk chuck is calling from syracuse, new york. republican. >> caller: hi. so a little bit surprised that

we have this gentleman out here that is saying you have -- he's saying you have to go to college to be successful, princeton is worth the money. mark zuckerberg and other people have been really successful. you have mike rowe, who has a show about dirty jobs about plumbers, electricians, other jobs that you don't have to be successful. but i think one person who would agree with you that it is a good idea to get a college degree would be ted kaczynski, the unabomber. i'm sure he put his degree to good use. >> what do you think? >> thank you for the question. thank you for the opportunity to clarify what i think about this. i agree entirely that you can be successful in a number of different careers without going to college, and i don't think that everybody should go to college.

and i think it's very important for us to recognize that as a country and for academic institutions as well with the government, who can support people who make other choices. on the other hand, what i do believe, and what i did say is that for people who want to go to college, and people who make that choice, it's going to be a spectacularly good investment to go to college. if you look at the data about my institution, the institutions in the aau or four-year college degrees more generally, the return on investment just in economic terms is very strong, and it provides you with other opportunities, as well. doesn't mean it's the right choice for everybody, but for people who are thinking about this choice and asking themselves the question, hey, i would like to go to college, the kinds of careers you get by going to college that make it -- or sound attractive to me, will that investment pay off? the economic news is very good about that. but it's not the right investment for everybody. just as other good investments

are not right for everybody. >> michael in denver, independent line, you're next. >> caller: yeah, thank you so much for taking my call. and thank you so much for being here this morning. i just had a quick kind of comment and question. what i was going to bring up is the issue of mental health at colleges. statistics have shown as high as 40% of students on college campuses are experiencing some form of mental illness. many times the problem is a lack of access that students have in many cases to forms of treatment or services. and so the question i was going to ask you about this is, what have you implemented or feel should be implemented in terms of making sure students have access to mental health care and identifying mental health issues kind of before it's too late? >> yeah. michael, thank you for this question, which is so important for our colleges and for our

country. what i would say first of all, we're facing a mental health crisis in the united states right now. for much of our population i would say, but it is especially acute among young people, that includes both high school aged and college aged students. i put it that way, because it's not as though it's worse for students in college. the numbers i have seen suggest that it's a bit better for students this college than it is for peers of the same age. but you are absolutely correct, that this is an issue we need to worry about on college campuses and we need to worry about in the country. i'll just give -- to respond to your specific question, a little bit from my own institution at princeton, because it's the one i know best, we have worked har hard to increase the availability of counseling and psychiatric services at princeton.

we work hard to educate our students as well as our faculty to recognize signs of distress in themselves or in their peers. we have take an comprehensive approach to mental health on the campus, recognizing that mental well-being isn't just a matter of counseling or psychological services but making sure people have ways of talking through problems and feel supported throughout their life in this academic environment. but i think you're right to bring up the question, and i think it's something that should concern us all, not just in terms of access to resources but in terms of understanding what are the sources of this issue? people point to things like loneliness in our society, they point to the impact of social media. we are providing, many of our college campuses at this point, better access to these services than people will ever enjoy in their lives. we need to find a way to make

sure we're producing citizens who are resilient and able to live flourishing lives. that goes beyond the care we're able to offer campus. >> n in seabrook, texas, says this, there's a great deal of waste in higher education, which significantly adds to the cost. these costs have been attributed mostly to nion and paying for tenured faculty that do little teaching. yet these costs continue to rise. what do you think? >> well, let me -- first of all, look, one of the things i do as a president and i did it before as provost of the university, is always to look for ways to cut waste and to find more efficient ways for the university to do things. i think my job, both now and when i was the each budget officer at the university of maximizing our mission-based dollars. but let me say a couple of things about why it is that any university is going to have to

invest aggressively in people, both on the faculty side and on the staff side. i'll just mention on the staff side, the conversation i just had with our previous aller, michael, about psychological services. all those staff are doing critical service to enable students to flourish. i think that's true of the vast majority of people who sometimes get grouped under this word staff or administration. faculty are the core of the enterprise at any great college or university and they're doing teaching and research. both things are important, especially in america's leading research universities. i think the thing that drives expense, whether you're at university level or when you're dealing with high schools or elementary schools is that what matters is to get great teachers and great minds and classrooms with students that enable them to push those students.

that means investing in talent, and that's what we do and i think we do it well. >> let's talk to thomas in michigan, a democrat. hi, thomas. >> caller: good morning, doctor. my name is thomas. i'm a princeton alum, so thank you for being on the show. i think princeton has done a pretty good job handling the complex issues and controversies that arise with the israel/palestine conflict. how can students get the attention of the administration when they -- about issues they want to address like divesting from weapons manufacturing, divesting from institutions that might support ideals that are not what princeton supports but princeton can serve in the service of the nation. >> thank you for calling in, thomas. just for our other viewers in

the service of all nations, actually princeton's motto now is in the nation's service and in the service of humanity. so our alum is quoting that back to me. thomas, i appreciate the question. there are multiple ways that students and others can bring their concerns to the attention of myself or the administration. you may well know as an alum that at princeton, we have meetings of something called the council for the princeton university community. basically once a month during the academic year. it ends up being about six meetings per year. one is a town hall where i take questions from whoever shows up. but i'm present at almost all of those meetings, and we hear what the concerns are of the community. people who are concerned about things like divestment have the opportunity to present petitions to a student, faculty and staff

or the use of university resources. it is permissible too to protest, like i said earlier, protest on a college campus is fine, disruption is not. sometimes students choose that as a way to bring things to people's attention. there is a difference between getting attention and getting the particular outcome that a group wants when you've got an issue and questions about the israel/gaza war. there are going to be multiple opinions on a college campus, multiple opinions and strong disagreement within the student body on those issues. and it may be the case that people bring up issues that are then discussed through a fair process. they're then discussed through viewpoints. and right thing. university says, look, i understand. you're really excited about this particular issue. but it's not one where the university should take a position. we encourage you to take

position. thank you for the question. >> and let me just show this, newly introduced bill. it's called prececonomic freedom ac and it essentllcuts off federal student aito commercial boyct. it says, it prohibitcolleges and universities fr receiving federal student aid if they engage in commeralboycotts dedicated by those -- diated by those in the boycott- sanction-divest or bds movement. and that comes from the house education and workforce committee. it's not expected to go anywhere. but your response to that? >> i'm going to say this first. both i and the a ada. i put out a statement opposing boycotts in the first year of my presidency, which is now about 12 years ago. i think that as universities, we depend on building bridges rather than creating walls. it's important for us to be

interacting with other institutions around the world. and again, with issues with what i prefer to call institutional strength. i just don't think it's appropriate for institutions to be engaging on those interactions. on the other hand, i think dangerous when they start staying we're going to pick on this political issue, or that political issue and use it to start cutting off aid that makes these institutions more affordable. >> here's g beer. >> high, mr. eisgruber. i'm jeanne ramirez from austin, texas. and i believe in higher education. i am 69 years old. i wish i could go on a high school tour and tell everybody, when you make bad grades, you

end up being an institutional housekeeper miltz. but i also went to learn phlebotomy doesn't play as well. i'm also a musician for 30 years, and that doesn't pay well. but it's my passion. >> governor abbott brought in the state troopers. and it got real violent because of the state troopers. and that was terrible. and i want everybody to know, i quit buying into the israeli propaganda about 5 years ago. i learned a lot. and to me, i learned that doctors without borders and their reports now, and all of these major newspapers saying that these children have bullets in their heads, they are kidnapping doctors, and yes, the students are passionate, and they don't want that! and i think universities should protest against that. but i don't want any, you know, with the republican, house announced senate, they're going topaz that bill y'all just

showed. anyway, thank you, c-span, for giving us, the people, a voice. >> all right, jeanne. thank you. >> thank you for calling in. the one thing we want to have our students engaged in passionate opinion. and they're going to have different ones than they do. and over the past year, they're sometimes protesting both sides out on the lawn with different slogans and we think that is important. but we don't think it should be the university doing the protesting or the speaking in those circumstances. and moreover, as important as protest is, it is really important, too, for what we do to have these conversations, like the one we're having this morning. that take these topics and try to elevate them and get people to appreciate one another sides to the extent that that's possible. and look for solutions that are going to make a difference for the future. >> we've got a text from do in toronto, ohio, who wants to know your opinion,regarding free college for all. and i'll just show this npr

article here, university of texas, m.i.t. and others, announced free tuition for some undergraduates. >> well, i think free tuition for some undergranduates is a great idea. and as i said earlier, i think the aau schools are doing this in one way or another. we all do it on the basis of financial need. for students who are qualified to attend our institutions and aren't able to afford our institution. we provide aid that makes it possible for them to do so. for some students, that makes it free. i don't believe in free tuition for all. because i think there are some who are able to afford to make this extraordinary investment in college education. it's a worthwhile investment and a good thing for people to do. >> m.i.t., as an example. it says that undergraduates, with family income below $200,000 can attend tuition- free starting next year.

that's up from its current threshold of $140,000. there is, as you know, president eisgruber, big endowments at some of these endowments, including yours at princeton. should those be -- should those be maintained at that level? or should that be used to increase the amount of aid given to students? >> mimi, it's a great question. i really appreciate the opportunity to speak to this. endowments are meant to be used. and we are using those endowments. and i talked earlier about how princeton had 71% of its students on financial aid, with scholarships that are in excess of the tuition price, and students as a result, graduating debt-free. that's because we're spending our endowments on financial aid. we're spending endowments on financial aid. we're spending them on research

endowments. people think they're like savings accounts that sit off to the side. they're not that. they like annuities. they're what pays for your retirement. at princeton, we're currently spending 3.5% every year. to operate across all that we do. and the reason why i was able to answer your first question by saying, look, the affordability, getting better and better. we are employing them aggressively to do things like what is happening at princeton or m.i.t. or the other schools you mentioned, to create scholarship opportunities we didn't before. that's what we ought to be doing. >> all right, christopher eisgruber, he is president of princeton university. also chair of american universities. you can find out more about that organization at aau.edu. thank you for being with us. thank you. it's been a pleasure to be here. welcome back. we are talking about presidents and pardon power with samuel morrison. he's in the office