To. One is theres a changing social compact between companies and the work force and companies are increasingly looking for individuals who have some important technical skill which is why Stem Education is so important. We were fortunate to see an 8. 6 increase in our enrollment of students in engineering programs and i think students are realizing that skrg these skills is important because its what employers are looking for. Were talking with james linder, the interim president of the university of nebraska lincoln, part of cspan buss big 10 college tour. We kicked that off this weekend. We will continue next week, a monthlong series here on washington journal talking to University President s about Higher Education issues. We want to get your thoughts as well so weve divided the lines by students, parents, educators and nebraska residents. There they are on your screen. Parents 2025853881, educate orts 2 025853882. Nebraska residents well hear from you, 2025853883. Also send us an email if you would like. Dr. Lynder is here to talk about his university and issues of Higher Education. We isle begin with michael in new jersey. Michael, are you a former student at the university of nebraska . Unfortunately, i wasnt. Im with the students from new jersey. If i makes i just wanted to comment on the kind of culture around rearer career resources. A lot of students in my experience in the past felt as if their Career Services office didnt help them that much. Couple that with the fact that it may not be aware of the resources, negotiation the fact that a lot of students really lack a lot of confidence in knowing themselves and how they believe belong in the work force. So a lot of it these do with career resoursces juggling part time jobs after college and searching for jobs and careers is a parttime job. So with that said its about management of time and management of understanding themselves and having confidence in themselves afterwards. I agree with you. Its a process as one goes from being an entering student to graduating and it can be very enlightning for students to either individually or as a group walk into a workplace and feel the excitement of a team say theyre trying to bring a new product to market and open their eyes were try provide that experience to our students. Dr. Lynder, we want our viewers to call in and weve divided the lines by students, parents, educators, nebraska residents. Nebraska residents. Talk about your outreach to the state of nebraska and how much suppo support, resources, the university of nebraska gets from the state. So the university of nebraska has always felt that we have a Strong Mission to educate the next generation of nebraska. Our state is geographically very long, 500 miles so we often talk about a 500 mile campus. We have resources in every county in the state through our extension services, through telehealth, through teleeducation and a variety of programs that try and bring the university to every community. Were very proud of that. Were humbled by the opportunity to shape our future in this state. You have an annual budget at the university of nebraska lincoln of 1. 2 billion. Endowment of 1. 3 billion and alumni contributing a little over 188,000. Can you talk about those numbers and what is the cost . How is the money spent . The budget. The budget of the university of nebraska lincoln is, as you say, 1. 2 billion. Of that money is it different principally on instruction. Theres also a strong Outreach Program in our Service Activities through the state to extension and, of course, the Research Budget is substantial, approaching 300 million in itself. Weve been very fortunate in the state of nebraska to enjoy solid support from our state legislature which has helped us keep tuition rates low. Weve also had a very Successful Campaign through university of Nebraska Foundation to raise funds for student scholarships, the campaign that just ended created more than a thousand different scholarship funds as well as building the infrastructure that supports the university. So really you see a broad gamut of people in the state of nebraska working together to support Higher Education. Next, castle wood, a parent, go ahead, aggie. Yes, im a parent and a student, too. I went back to school after i got laid off from work and got a degree, an Associates Degree in engineering and half my classes were classes that i really didnt need far degree, like history, music, pe. I want to go back and get an education in engineering technology, the first two classes i want to take are u. S. History one and two. You dont need do that for the job and i think we want wellrounded students but when we go to college we want welltrained students in that profession. And i think it would drive the College Costs down if they would get these classes that you dont need out of these Degree Programs and the colleges dont want to admit that but thats that was half the cost of my Associates Degree was classes that i didnt need for the degree. And you could get these degrees in half the time. Dr. Linder . The caller makes several good points. First of all, if you can get a lot of support in high school you can shorten your College Experience. Here in nebraska we offer whats called the university of Nebraska High School and this provides University Level courses to students throughout the state that are duel credit so theyre satisfying their College Requirements while they are in high school. The other important point is the issue of transferability once youve had certain courses. You should have systems that allow those courses to transfer into your next degree we have such programs between the different colleges in our state and the university and we have a unique program where we are piloting reverse transfer of credit back to Community Colleges so someone who did not complete their Associates Degree can use some of their University Course nrc purpose. The more dialogue there is, the more efficient it is and the more cost is reduced as you point out. Dr. Linder, you said earlier 300 million for research at the university of nebraska lincoln. What is the University Researching . Whats the Different Air zblas whats its main focus . Well, obviously there are a variety of areas but being that we here in an ago churultural state, some of the focuses are on how to properly use Water Resources and how you grow food with less water. We face a population crisis in this world where we have more and more mouths that need to be fed and they need to be fed to ensure political stability in the world. So we have a Strong Initiative with the doherty water for food program. We have nebraska Innovation Campus thats focused on food, fuel and water. And this is just a handful of some of the programs that our fact you will tri working on key ones given our agricultural roots. Medically at the university of nebraska, lincoln, youre a professor of pathology and microbiology there. This is a headline in the Washington Post this morning u. S. Looks personnel trained to fight ebola. Shortage will lamper the militarys efforts again the disease. Also the third medical mission anywhere to become infected with the ebola virus was wheeled on a borny into the Nebraska Medical Center in omaha for treatment. Why the Nebraska University hospital . Just so for clarity here, we have four campuses and the university of Nebraska Medical Center is based in omaha not at the university of nebraska lincoln. We have in recent years worked hard at the Medical Center in omaha to address some of the threats posed by infectious agents and so many years ago during the sars outbreak we developed a comprehensive biocontainment unit to provide care for patients that might be infected by infectious agents and the u. S. State Department Recognized that capacity. That has been an important learning experience. To provide Education Programs for Health Care Providers throughout the country so they can deal with this type of infection its a critical issue right now. Roger green on twitter wants to know how do you feel about College Athletes forming a union and being compensated for generating millions for the universities . Well, the university of nebraska lincoln has had very successful athletic programs. About 23 different sports and over 620 athletes. The Athletic Department is entire entirely generates a lot. The question about student organizations and how money is spent in athletics is certainly in the headlines. We try and focus on student Athletes First being students as students wed like to see they are fairly compensated with full scholarships and support of their expenses. And we think that some of the dialogue that is happening now to better support those students is very important. But in terms of compensating students as if they were employees and unionization, that carries many downsides for the student experience. Dr. Linder, jodi on twitter quotes a Strong Mission to educate. Is that why the football coach makes more than the top three teachers at every Big University in the United States . Well, i think that compensation of football coaches is very high. And each university exists in a marketplace, unfortunately. Having a cap on football coaches salaries would be an interesting National Discussion but its not one that i want to participate in. Why not . You sound reluctant. Explain that. I think that the question about capping any profession salary, whether its a coach, an entertainer, a ceo is a more complex discussion than we can take on this morning. But we do live in a marketplace. If youre trying to attract toptier coaches at any school, youre competing for the employment of those coaches with other schools so i think thats whats driven these salaries to the level where they are. Professor linder at the university of nebraska, lincoln, what is the state of tenured professors . How many do you have . How does the process work . At the university of nebraska lincoln the socalled tenure density the around 60 and the process at the university of nebraska lincoln is that a faculty may enter a tenure track after several years of service, develop a portfolio that would be assessed to determine whether that faculty would be tenured or not. There are different systems used throughout the country. At our medical examiner in omaha, all faculty enter on whats called a Health Professions track and sometime during their career, it could be three years, it could be ten years, they may opt for a consideration for tenure. But it isnt the classic up or out situation you see in some tenure programs. Back to calls, well go to texas. William is watching us there. Go ahead, william. Yes, i would like to ask mr. Linder how the philosophy of the count crease that was accomplished in the early hundred years ago has changed. It was originally organized to support the agricultural area or the agrarian society. How has that changed and is the change in the right direction . Well, the university of nebraska was established in 1869 as a Land Grant Institution and i think by all measures we still function as a Land Grant Institution to provide substantial support for the agriculture efforts in nebraska. We have the institute for ag and Natural Resources that has many faculty that are working to develop better agricultural techniques throughout the state and the world. This is part of the food, fuel and Water Initiative that i mentioned earlier. The scope of a Land Grant Institution has certainly increased. So in 1902, the Medical Center joined the system. So the activities have grown as Society Needs have increased but we still focus on agriculture as one of the Core Missions at the university of nebraska lincoln and actually our agricultural programs showed the secondhi secondhighest increase in enrollment this year. Were talking with dr. James linder, the interim president at the university of nebraska lincoln part of cspan buss big 10 college tour. We kick that off this week, monthlong series of interviews here on the washington journal with University President s. On friday the bus will be at the university of iowa and we will talk with the president there, sallie mae son, on friday. This morning dr. James linder aboard the cspan bus in lincoln, nebraska. Dmarls south sioux city, nebraska. A parent there. Charles, go ahead with your question or comment. Good morning. I have a question i have two grandsons going to your university in the Ag Department and i was wondering why is so difficult to find scholarship or any kind of money to go to school . If you dont do the right research, you end up getting none. Well, at the university of nebraska lincoln, there are a wide variety of needbased scholarships and, in fact at unl 3,000 students attend the university with no tuition charge. There are also other academicrelated scholarships depending on what field the student is in. Very few student scholarships are actually focused on the potential research that a student might be interested in doing. Graduate student and we have extensive support for graduate students who are pursuing masters degrees or phd degrees. Dr. Linder, twitter wants to know schools get more must be for outofstate students. Do these students get preferences . In my experience, outofstate students do not get preferences. E enjoy bringing students to nebraska to both diversify our student body and to hopefully create a student who will stay as an employee of a nebraskabased company. We would appreciate if those costs to bring students in could be lower but that wouldnt be fair to the citizens of nebraska who are paying taxes to support the ininstate students. But we try and look at students inside new england to diversify or student body. This current year is probably the most diverse student body we have relative to ethnic minorities. How many slots are there for foreign students . In terms of slots we dont think that way. We evaluate students based on their academic activities and each campus at the university has a Different Number of foreign students. There are several thousand that are studying here we have Exchange Programs with brazil, china, eastern europe. Interacting with students from brazil, teaching them about our culture and learning about the culture from another country. Do they pay the full price of College Tuition . Yes, they do. They pay a nonresident rate. Bill in florida, youre up next, good morning to you. Good morning, greta. Id like to know if you have any affiliation with monsanto and what theyre doing with the food, with their new techniques and all that and how [ inaudible question ] so the university of nebraska lincoln has had Research Relationship with a variety of companies that are seeking to improve both crop yields and to develop crops that are resistant to pests. That includes the monsanto corporation. On twitter here is a tweet from one of our viewers asking president linder, with respect, College Sports have become big, no, huge, business. Why should bit treated as why should it not be treated as such . I think that the question is the use of revenue that comes from College Sports if i understand it correctly at the university of nebraska and thats largely to support the athletic programs. But theres also some strong benefits to the Academic Mission of if university for example, on our east stadium of the football stadium we have two Important Research activities. One of them s the Nebraska AthleticPerformance Library which looks at motions athletes might have and tries to optimize their performance. But it also ties into Research Studies done on gate disturbances, people with neurologic problems have and gait disturbances as well. The center for brain biology and behavior is studying concussions that can occur in sports but is looking at developmental abnormalities in children. So its not just a business. Its integrated into the Academic Experience and for the student athletes and i again emphasize students they get valuable experiences. I ha