Changing the expense side. That is happening right now. I think that is an area where you could see some consensus. One that i also think was messed in the whole debate over obamacare. Frivolous lawsuits. There is some issue with regard to the federal versus state role. There is a clear opportunity to reduce cost. The Budget Office has laid it out for us repeatedly. It is over 50 billion over 10 years. There is some areas here where you can find some common ground. What about Medicaid Expansion in your state . This is a decision that our state made. The governor and legislature. We will see what happens. My concern has been that i think these important programs, unsustainable programs on the entitlement side, need to be addressed. A vital program, but we need a way to pay for it. Right now, these programs, medicaid, medicare and social security, are not sustainable. I am curious that some in the other party are talking about expanding these programs at a time when they are already looking at, for those retiring today, the very real possibility that most of these people would see their benefits sharply reduced. In social security, in a 2024 timeframe, there would be a roughly 24 cut in benefits without the law being changed. This is within the lifetime of people who are retiring today and we seem incapable of dealing with the issue. We need to figure out a way to come up with entitlement reforms that make sense. Small changes now to ensure these programs will be there. We have about 40 seconds left. We have six people who want to ask questions. Lightning round. I am going to ask one. You told the Washington Post, i am not eager to run for president. You added, if nobody is running who is able to win and willing to address these issues, i might have a change of heart. You made a trip to New Hampshire . My daughter goes to school up there. Part of my heart is in New Hampshire. I do feel the same way. I am focused on 2014 and on doing my job as a senator. Right now. After the election, as i said in that story that somehow the Washington Post got out of may, i am going to take a look at it after the election. Thanks for doing this. You will be mobbed on the layout by the people who didnt get their questions. Thank you all. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] mikeuth dakota governor rounds, the nominee for the senate seat, leading their according to recent polling followed by democrat rick wiland with larry pressler. Another independent, gordon howie, far behind in single digits. The three others did debate on wednesday. Heres a look. I recall my dad saying to me at our farm over in humboldt, south dakota, i was a Rhodes Scholar and they could have kept the deferment for several more years. He said to me, you can take your student deferment, your Rhodes Scholarship, but if you do not , that mightd serve go in your place. For service in vietnam. I was very disappointed in that war. I feel that i can speak with authority to boots on the ground. I think we need to strike lethally and quickly. As Henry Kissinger said yesterday, have a plan to get out. You strike with High Technology weapons and get out. That is what i would do. I would not have a forced to stay there. 60 second rebuttal if you would like it. Really an fortunate mike is not here to answer this question. These are the kinds of questions youre going to give answers to when you get elect to to the United States senate. Here we are on the verge of another middle east conflict where we are talking about at the minimum airstrikes the community, arming the syrian rebels. Au made the decision to take 54day vacation from all of these public forums. Isis is a threat. We need an international solution. We need to lead as a country. Sending our kids back to fight this war is not something i can support. Democratic senator tom harkin steakg his 37th and final fry. Former president bill clinton and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton live from iowa this sunday starting at 330 p. M. Eastern. You can watch it here on cspan. We are excited to announce that it is launch week for the student cam contest. One hundred 50,000 will be awarded. This years is the broadest ever the three branches and you. We went you to tell a story how by anyy, law, or Action Branch has affected you and your life or your community. It is open to students in grades six through 12. Students may work alone or in groups of three. Students are asked to produced a five to seven minute documentary and include some cspan programming. Cash prizes will go to 150 students and the 53 teachers. The grand prize winner for the best overall entry will win 5,000. The deadline for entries is january 20, 2015. Winners will be announced in marched. M. Org for morea information on this years contest, the three branches and you. On tomorrows washington cohn and why he thinks this election will favor republicans. An on anthony coredesm president obamas isis strategy. Washington journal with your facebook comments, calls, and tweets. From this mornings washington journal, co a discussion with the president of the university of iowa. Ke us on facebook. Wa joufrnl continues. Washington journal continues. Host interviewing University President s giving you a chance to talk to University President s. This is a cspan bus tour. Morning the cspan bus is in iowa city, iowa at the university of iowa and joining from the bus is the President University of iowa, sally mason. That been the president of University Since 2007. President mason, begin by whats the budget for the university of iowa, the annual budget. Revenues derive from . The total budget for the iowa is 3. 4 million. We have a Large Medical Center includinge operation, a big hospital. Its a big budget. Absolute ly absolutely. Its one that continues to grow Natural Disaster in 2008, a flood that impacted us significantly and were from. Ring were recovering in fine fashion with nearly 1 billion of construction going on in iowa right now. The education budget is 680 million and 220 million of this come trillions the state of iowa and the rest comes from tuition. Resident is going to pay about 8,000 a year to attend the university of iowa. Resident going to pay 28,000. Hy that discrepancy between instate and out of state . Instate bviously the students are subsidized by appropriations from the state of iowa. Always s in iowa have valued education very, very highly. Here in this state and were pleased and proud of that. And that continues to be the case. Or out of state students, we know, as a state university, out of state students need to pay the full cost of their education, hence the difference between the in state and out of state rates. Host you have proposed a degree, back laureate degree, havent you . Instead of a fouryear bachelor . Guest i have. Words about few that. One of the things that we ocused on in the seven years ive been here are Student Success and affordability. Priority ts a high for me. I was a first generation of college student. To t student in my family attend for college. It was a stretch for us to pay for college. Have a great deal of sympathy for students who are struggling and looking for ways to attend cost them t dont everything they have. So in terms of trying to make college affordable, we know are a number of ways we can do things. Degree. Year a threeyear degree not going to be for every student. Highly motivated serious. Include Summer School and we have a summer hawk tuition allow students in this threeyear program to attend Summer School for free. This will hasten their progress hope. Ds their degree we obviously complete in three years and be able to join the orkforce after that time or perhaps go on to graduate and professional school. E have a lot of great graduate and professional programs here that we encourage students to consider. Whats been the response so far for students, parents, faculty . Guest we Just Announced it this week. Were still in the process of the degree programs that this likely applies to. E want to make sure this applies to degree programs that are quite sought after by students. Degree programs that will likely be included for this the tunity for students in future. Host going to put the numbers up. K we divided the numbers against students, parents, and educators. You can see them there, theres the university of iowa, 2025853880 for students. 5853881 for parents. Educators, 5853882. We have set aside our fourth line this morning b for iowa especially you graduated from the university of iowa, weed like to get your perspective as well. 2025853883. An y mason, how i read rticle that youve secured or come to the agreement with the State Government to put a tuition freeze on for a couple years. How much work how much influence does the state of iowa and that government have on how how you function . Of well, the state board regents which governs all three of the public universities in the governing s authority. They have a great deal of authority when it comes to and policy and so forth. Theyre an important governing state obviously. Theyre appointed by the governor. Citizens of idual the state of iowa generally that have a great deal of interest in Higher Education and a passion for helping us maintain a very here educational system in the state. Its its always something on. Always something going i have to say, theyve been of our ry supportive moves towards threeyear degrees. Maker continued efforts to colleges affordable as we can, especially for iowa residents. Host is it worth a College Education to come out of four college and have 50,000 in student debt . Thats a lot of student debt. I have to say our students of our egin with 40 students graduate with zero debt, which is something that pleased and proud about. And then of the remaining tudents who do graduate with debt on average, their student debt might be in the 25,000, 26,000 a year range. This is this is something that we watch very carefully. Can actually monitor that amount of money and know how we of that debt is what call true needbased debt versus how much of that debt might be perhaps life style. And about half of that 26,000 needbased debt. Thats actually what the students and their families need be able to attain that College Education, that college degree. Now, is it worth it . That price, its absolutely worth it. I can remember graduating from 1972 with about 3,000 in student debt, which at that time was about the price of a car. An average car. Again, our students are graduating with a debt level for the most part that is very manageable. Counselors here. We encourage every student and family before they enroll to sit advisors our financial and our Financial Aid officers a plan that would allow them to go to college, not occurred debt that obviously would be impossible for them to deal with. Thats not the way we should do Higher Education today . What is the career track . Phd. In n purdue, a cellular and molecular biology at the university of arizona. Whats the career track for a College President . Uest well, im not sure theres a career track for a College President. Ranks as a the professor. Once i got to college, the joke was once she got there, left. Ever my familys concern, still there, still there. Still in t im college. It doesnt cost anybody any money anymore. Good thing. Bly a my career track probably would ave been what would have been typical for a College President. I came up through the ranks assistant an professor. Ook on administrative jobs ape long the way including serving as a department head, dean of a and provost at Purdue University before having the privilege to serve now in last seven plus years as the president of the university of iowa. My big ten roots are strong. Perhaps that comes from my mothers roots from going back to indiana. Job. Sally mason, your how much time is spent fundraising. How much time is spent being the administrat administrator, etc. , etc. . The job of a College President today is very, very different from a couple of years ago. Midst of a Large Capital campaign, the largest in the history of the state of iowa, certainly the largest in history of the university of the process of raising 1. 7 billion in the state of iowa, forever more campaign. About 1. 3 billion on the way to 1. 7 billion. A lot of that money is being raised to provide scholarships students, to provide professorships, infrastructure, the excellence of the university of iowa to continue well on in to the future. It. Joy to be able to connect with so many alumni, literally all across alumni the country and around the world who have a passion for the who have of iowa and been so generous in giving back to us. I spend probably half of my time fundraising and half of my time in administrative activities, in activities. I try to remain active in the number of organizations that are to Higher Education. Important to the university of iowa. Its important to be important world. Rest of the attendees are ge women. Of College President s are women . Uest we have room for improvement there. I tell the story of young women the chance to interact with today when i was coming through college and a ophomore in college taking organic chemistry, i was one of organic en in an chemistry class. One or two students in this class. We were obvious. Row d to sit in the front all the time because the instructor would know if we were there or not there. Us by name, not surprisingly. Today, you wouldnt see that. Chemistry rganic class would be much more heterogeneous in terms of the of gender, in terms and frankly in terms of diversity. Diversity is really what a lot focus our attention on. Theres r of women, still room for growth there. Opportunities in a we miss sometimes with women and the talent that they can bring to workforce in virtually every freshman. And Higher Education is no different. Its great to see the number of young women pursuing Higher Education today. Excites me a great deal. We have wonderful engineering programs here in the University Iowa and im proud of the engineering programs having spent a number of years as at Purdue University known for the engineering, the ngineering programs here, almost a quarter of our students are women. Thats actually unusual in the engineering programs today. If i look at the the of the young women, our retention rates and our etion rates as wellals placement rates for the young omen who attain those degrees are very, very high. 98 . Rds to 92 to that is tremendous. Bodes well for the future. Well be well served if we continue to grow these numbers, it be minorities or women in the underserved areas. This is your chance to talk with a major University President. We divided our lines a little bit differently. Were going to put it up on the screen. Students, parents, and educators. 2025853880. Students, 3881. 3882. Rents, for educators and iowa 2025853883. And the first call for sally mason, president of the from anty of iowa comes iowian and a parent. Iowa. In west liberty, hi, paul. Caller hi. Good to speak to you this morning. My son is going to be enrolling in iowa next year and engineering. Wondering if engineering would be include in the threeyear program. Aisle take my calls there. Thank you. Great, good , question. I believe there are portions of the engineering degrees we can years. Hree if hes highly motivated. He knows about this. He knows what he wants do do. On a good eye, hes track to complete in the threeyear period. Were going to do everything to including allowing him opportunities to attend Summer School for free. Host dee dee tweets in to you, does iowa project out a decade jobs will be in demand in the future and adjust programs accordingly . Your question ar appropriately, youre wondering about jobs in the future. We look at how we best prepare students for what we think the future might be. None of us has a crystal ball. I can tell you that. But as we look forward, one of he things we learned with our students is having that opportunity to earn that degree in a chosen major is great. A little bit further. One of the things thats familiar to our students entrepreneurship. Lets offer the student an opportunity to couple an entrepreneurship certificate a degree. Whether its art, engineering, might be. T we see students with the entrepreneurial spirit with the with ng we provide them are often deciding they can make their own careers. There are often great jobs out there. The Health Care Industry is just going to continue to boom. We have great strengths in ealth care here in the university of iowa training a lot of students for the Health Care Industry for the future. Have r the students who that extra Creative Edge and want to go on and do something different. Little nd perhaps a driver for future technology or future job pportunities that might be out there. We think learning and entrepreneurship, one of my top in entrepreneurship programs the country exists here in the university of iowa. Weve grown that program so that and every student here if the opportunity can have it. Atching our students start their own company is an exciti