The News sat down with Northeastern President Joseph E. Aoun this week for a 45-minute interview, marking the first time reporters from the newspaper have met with the president on-the-record since 2010.
Editor-in-chief Colin A. Young, News Editor Zack Sampson and Deputy News Editor Todd Feathers asked Aoun a series of questions. The interview started with a lightning round and ended with a pop quiz. Below is the full transcript. A condensed version can be found in this week’s newspaper.
The Huntington News: We wanted to start off with a lightning round of light questions to get to know you better. What is your favorite movie?
President Joseph E. Aoun: That’s a great question. There are so many great movies. But let me tell you about a genre that I love very much. There is a great Japanese director, his name is Kurosawa, have you seen any of his movies? I like his movies very much. He was very influential and impacted Steven Spielberg a lot, as you know. Rather than focusing on one movie, I will say he is, I think, a great director, a great director.
HN:Do you have a favorite meal?
JA: I usually like fish, on the fish side. So sushi or sashimi, if you want to invite me to sushi or sashimi I am always game. But fish, I like fish.
HN: What’s on your iPod, what type of music do you like to listen to?
JA: Very eclectic. It ranges from classical to Gotye to Lady Gaga. Do you like Lady Gaga? You like Gotye? Gotye, I was very impressed by the fact that he has millions and millions of people that watched his video. It’s amazing. It’s around three million people that have watched his video on YouTube.
HN: What’s your favorite spot in Boston that isn’t part of Northeastern?
JA: I love to walk on the Charles. That’s where I walk and where I run. I love that spot, it’s beautiful and I love the ocean. The second one would be the ocean.
HN: Which book are you reading currently?
JA: I usually read several books at once. So I am reading now, started the autobiography of Carnegie, Andrew Carnegie, I’m reading this one. I finished reading Steve Jobs biography too. I read also some fiction. There is a person I like very much, his name is Vargas Llosa, he is a Latin American writer. So I usually try to combine two or three books at the same time. And also, I read a lot on a daily basis; I read the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, and also I scan the international press, so the French, the Asian, et cetera. I scan because I don’t spend more than half an hour per day reading the international press, but I scan. I scan that because it gives me a sense, I don’t look for facts, but it gives me a sense of how different countries look at the same facts. I really recommend to look at the international press because it gives you a completely different perspective. Things we take for granted they don’t and vice versa.
HN: What is your standard order at Chicken Lou’s?
JA: I don’t go to Chicken Lou’s. I went two times [to] Chicken Lou’s. Let me tell you where I go. I go to International Village, to Stetson, and also to the truck [Hungry Hungry Husky]. I ate at the truck a couple of times. Chicken Lou’s I go to talk to the students, too.
HN: How does Northeastern solve the men’s hockey Beanpot drought?
JA: We have actually a coach; I don’t know whether you met him, Jim Madigan. He is building a great team and I have every confidence in him. So the only way to solve it is to support them. Short of you and I playing, and I don’t think we would do well, our job is to support them. So I’ll see you at the Beanpot.
HN: In preparation for this interview, we solicited questions from our readers on Facebook and Twitter. An alumna sent us this: I graduated from Northeastern 20 years ago with 20 thousand in loans. Now, I’m telling my high school junior not to even apply, although I loved the school, because we can’t afford to send her there, and I can’t imagine the debt she’d have upon graduation. Does that disturb him?
JA: What disturbs me is that clearly she is not, this alumna, is not aware of what we’re doing. Tweet back and invite her to go visit the admissions center, the visitor center, and talk to folks. Why? Because essentially, as you know, in the last five to six years, first the rate of increase of financial aid was double the rate of increase of tuition. That’s one. Also, we launched something called the Northeastern Promise, which says that when you come to Northeastern for four years, you know what your financial aid package is. And last year, we added another aspect to that. Namely if tuition changes your financial package will be amended accordingly. So, you know, that’s what I am saying. You know that last year we gave over $180 million dollars or so, over $180 million in financial aid. … So, that is something you can tweet back and say those are facts. And, you know, the period when various places were retrenching, we increased our financial aid enormously precisely for that.
HN: If tuitions at Northeastern and any other college do continue to rise, is that going to be the case where financial aid rises to match the increase in tuition cost?
JA: That’s our strategy. That’s our goal. That’s what we are trying to do and that’s why the increase, as I mentioned to you, the increase of financial aid over the last five to six years was double the increase of tuition.
HN: Do you anticipate that tuition will continue to rise in the next few years?
JA: Let me tell you what I anticipate. I anticipate that in higher education in general, there will be an increase. The largest increase that will be coming [will be] from the public universities because the public universities have been challenged in terms of their budget. And I think in terms of the privates you will see an increase not as high as the publics, the rate of increase, and you know, for us here I see that the strategy that I mentioned, namely increase in terms of the needs what we have, we are building the university. When you look at what we have done, as I told you, the first aspect is financial aid has increased dramatically. Second, also, we are recruiting faculty to serve the students and further the offerings of the institution. Have you visited, also, what we have done with the digital commons, et cetera? So, you see, we live in a city. And this city in a mini city within a city. The city within a city is called Northeastern, and the city, the large city, is Boston. We don’t stay still. So, we don’t set up to say we want to increase financial aid, what we do, we are doing it because there is a need. We are seeing this through this recession, there is a larger need. So what I focus on is not the rate of increase of tuition in absolute terms, but relative to financial aid going back to what you said.
HN: I know that within student government there has been some discussion in the last couple of years … of a tuition freeze referendum … is that something that you would support if the students voted on it?
JA: No. We will not support that. Why? Because as I told you, the most important aspect for us is how we look at financial aid. So, for instance, if we do something like that we would be freezing financial aid. But I just mentioned to you that the rate of increase of financial aid over the last five to six years has been double the rate of increase of tuition. That’s the point.
HN: Do you see, or have you seen, or do you see in the future, with the recession if it continues, a threat to the funding available for financial aid?
JA: Look, let me mention something, that’s a good point that you’re raising. The financial aid that I mentioned is the financial aid that we give, the $188 million is something we give, Northeastern gives to the students. It’s not coming from the federal government, it’s not coming from any other source. Now, to your question, what worries us is, you know, the support coming form the federal government, namely the Department of Education, because we have Pell grants, we have also Perkins Loans, et cetera. And at some point, there were discussions about stopping the Perkins Loans and we stepped in. We at Northeastern, I stepped in, and we asked other presidents to sign a petition to keep that going and to support it. To answer your question, yes I worry about the support coming from the federal government because if it is curtailed it’s going to impact us all as a community and impact higher education.
You want to realize, going back to the question, that higher education is in transition in the nation. The public universities are under tremendous challenges. Why? Because the states don’t have money so they have been cutting their support for the public universities. That is a matter of concern. Why? Because 80 percent of the students go to public universities. Second, 70 percent of the research and PhD students are in public universities too. They are impacted. Small liberal arts colleges, many of them are challenged. So going back to your question, I worry because, you know, I am mentioning that because I have another hat, I am the chairman of the American Council on Education. The American system is the best in the world but it is the best in the world because it was based on competition between privates and publics, within privates, within publics and there is enormous diversity. If suddenly, we start seeing the financial aid being curtailed, support for research being curtailed … We are competing on a global level. When I go to China and I visit Beijing University, Tsinghua University, Jiao Tong University, there are cities larger than ours and governments are spending a lot of money funding those universities. If we curtail that here, at the federal level, there would be enormous implications for the nation.
HN: Are you concerned about Northeastern’s expansion into the neighborhood with things like the YMCA dorm and calls from residents about gentrification? Is that something that is concerning?
JA: Let me mention something. The choice of your words are already coloring the answer. Why? Because you used the term expansion, correct?
HN: Right.
JA: So, let me tell you how I look at it and how we look at it. The Institutional Master Plan has been something that we worked on as a community within Northeastern and also with the community at large. But let me tell you, every time we look at Northeastern, we look at what makes us special, what makes us different. So what are we doing now? We have a model that we have been living with, called co-op. You know this model more than anyone. So, in the last five years, the number of co-op students going overseas has increased by 235 percent and the whole learning, experiential learning, overseas is now in 92 countries. Now, what are the implications? The implication is that our students are global. We want them to come to Northeastern and get out of Northeastern. Why they are here, through the co-op model. So we cannot be viewed like other universities and other colleges around because we are a global place. We are not telling the students we want you to come and stay here. We tell the students we want you to come and we want you to leave. Leave, by going and exploring the world. Therefore, what are the implications? The implication is that when we look at for instance what our residential needs, we have to take that into account, it’s important. We are not like any other college here because we are much more global from this perspective. So that is one thing to keep in mind. The second thing to keep in mind is that every community has needs. We have classroom needs, we have research lab needs, et cetera, so that is what we are focusing on. The previous master plan allowed us to become residential. Now, this current master plan here we’re going to look at research opportunities, we’re going to look at student experience, we’re going to look at classrooms and we will look at dorms too. Now, to go back to your question, what is the implication of what we are doing? The implication of what we are doing is that if you tell me if you are restricted completely to this environment, we will go vertical. So I don’t look at it, when I set up to discuss the master plan, I set up to look at, even if we are remaining within the perimeter of our campus, it doesn’t worry me. That’s how it is. We have our situation here, the master plan has various components … classrooms, student experience, research, residential … we can very well, within the perimeter of the campus, build opportunities here.
HN: How do you balance that, the idea of wanting students to come to Northeastern and leave, with some of the things like making freshmen and sophomores live on campus?
JA: In a way, when you want students to leave, you want them to absorb the campus the first two years. Because when do they start leaving?
HN: Probably after your second year or third year.
JA: Exactly. So we are creating an environment where we want the students to have the Northeastern experience fully in the first two years and afterwards in a hybrid way integrating co-op afterwards. That’s why we’re doing it. Incidentally, we’re the only place now, as far as I know, in Boston requiring freshmen and sophomores to be living on campus.
HN: What other colleges or universities around the country would you compare Northeastern to or would you aspire for Northeastern to be like?
JA: You know, actually, let me tell you my feeling about it. What attracted me to Northeastern, before I came here, is that Northeastern is very differentiated. Northeastern, over its history, charted its own path. It didn’t say I want to become like this place or like this place. Why? Because, essentially, Northeastern had a very differentiated approach to education. Very differentiated in the sense that it has the co-op, which means that in order to learn you need to integrate the classroom experience with the world experience. Similarly, we are here in this building where we have the nanotechnology center, we have nanomedicine, we have sensing, imaging, et cetera. Even in research, the research centers combine fundamental research and applied research in what we call use-inspired. In many places, there is a dichotomy and hierarchy between fundamental and applied research, where as here we combine both. So, the place is so differentiated and it is serving us well now. This allowed us, in a period of recession, to move forward at a time when others were retrenching and you know the results. We didn’t look at others and we said we want to become like others. We said, ‘We have a differentiation, let’s magnify it.’ And that’s why we took co-op globally, that’s why we made bets on emerging fields and research.
HN: What areas do you anticipate we are going to continue to pursue federal research funds in?
JA: We chose three fields in terms of funded research, and I like that the fact that you mentioned that because it doesn’t mean that we will not do research in other non-funded fields. But in the funded fields we chose three domains: health, security and sustainability.
HN: Why those three?
JA: Because those are the national imperatives. Don’t forget, our research is use inspired, namely meeting societal needs. So, we need an alignment with the needs of society and those have been determined as national priorities by the various agencies, National Science Foundation, National Institute of Health, Department of Energy, et cetera. You see them, you don’t even need to look at what they say, you know, health, security and sustainability are the three major drivers of our society and that is why we aligned ourselves with the priorities. But at the same time, we didn’t align ourselves by saying simply let’s align ourselves without looking at our strength and leadership, and in each domain we have a real strength and a real leadership so we are building on the leadership we have. And that’s what we’re doing. So, health, security and sustainability.
HN: How do you balance the pursuit of research and becoming a strong competitor in research universities with maintaining humanities and liberal arts and making sure that those type of programs don’t fall by the wayside?
JA: I like the first question that you asked, namely in funded research. Humanities and the liberal arts, in fact, are in non-funded fields. And this is where we have the opportunity to continue to invest in these. And that’s what we have been doing. We have recruited over the last five years 333 faculty, look at it here. [Aoun referenced a book of the university’s recent accomplishments] So you have all the fields ranging from I see here history, I see law I see International Affairs. So all the fields have been represented in our efforts, and don’t forget that we even invested in emerging fields, and we list them here. You look at them, and what do you see? Digital humanities. Those are fields that we didn’t launch, it’s the faculty who have launched in these disciplines. So we don’t look at it as a dichotomy.
HN: We understand that the university is going to be embarking on a comprehensive fundraising campaign. Could you give us the few-minute pitch of Northeastern University when you’re talking to a donor or a potential donor?
JA: You don’t start by pitching the university. The university, you don’t need to pitch the university. The university has an incredible momentum now that is carrying us all. What you need to do and when you talk to the donor, is to look at her passion, to look at her interests, and see how the university and her interests mesh. So you see you don’t go there with an elevator speech, and that’s very different. Now what is serving us very well, as I mentioned to you, is that we are very differentiated. Therefore when we approach somebody, an alumnus or alumna or a friend of the university, they know our differentiation. They know what we’re doing. They know about our momentum. They know about our track record. And therefore we try to mesh what they want to do, their passion, with our needs, and that’s what they do.
HN: Along the lines of fundraising, what do you anticipate being major components of the new campaign?
JA: In a comprehensive campaign, you’re going to look at student support, including financial aid, remember the first question you mentioned, and we have raised money for financial aid, we’ll continue to raise money for that. We’re going to look at faculty support. We’re going to look at student experience ranging from fields to support of our teams. And look at some examples of gifts: student support and financial aid, you have them here [in a booklet of university accomplishments]. Second, faculty advancement and expansion. Third, innovation funds for education and research. For instance, you know what happened also recently with the [Center for Entrepreneurship Education] and the D’Amore-McKim School of Business. Those were funded and allowed our students to launch ventures, new ventures, new companies, et cetera. So when you look at a comprehensive campaign, it’s comprehensive, all-the-above.
HN: Are graduate campuses across the nation, in places like Charlotte and Seattle, something you anticipate the university will continue to promote in the next few years? What do you see as the importance of online learning and getting away from place-based education?
JA: Higher education has been vertically integrated. What does it mean? It means that we have higher education institutions doing research, knowledge creation, knowledge transmission, assessment of the knowledge, and credentialing, the diploma. We are seeing now more and more places saying we are going to provide the knowledge dissemination online, for-profits, not-for-profits. We are even seeing places saying, ‘We’ll do the assessment.’ So let me tell you my views about online, since you asked me that. Online is going to be like electricity. Everybody will have it. So you don’t say, I have an advantage over you because you have electricity and I don’t. Doesn’t work this way. So what is going to distinguish us is how we are looking at the future and building the future of higher education. There will always be a place for place-based education. There is also an opportunity for a hybrid model, and that’s what we have done with Charlotte and with Seattle. And we’re focusing on the professional masters and the professional doctorates. Why? Because higher education has focused historically on two domains: undergraduate education and PhD/research. The MBAs are relative newcomers in higher education, and we said there is an opportunity because we live in a period of knowledge acceleration where there are new domains and new masters being created. And no one is stepping in to train people, the professionals in these domains, and that’s how we are doing it. And we’re doing it online and on site, Seattle and Charlotte. But the beauty of what we’re doing is that, first is the faculty are creating the curricula. The faculty are responsible for the quality, and third, quality is not negotiable. Remember what I mentioned to you about some industries’ missed opportunities. The railway industry defined itself as being in the railway business and missed their line of evolution. Kodak missed the digital revolution, Polaroid too, et cetera. Higher education is, our mission is education. Our mission is not education at the undergraduate level only or at the PhD/research. [There’re] lifelong opportunities for education. We have new fields being created. People need to be educated in these fields. That’s how we’re stepping in.
HN: Costs for Dialogues of Civilization have risen substantially in the last year. How do you balance the cost of studying abroad, of working abroad, with your desire for students to do that?
JA: This question was raised and I have asked the Provost [Stephen W. Director] to take a look at that and give us back a report because first of all, you know what I have done over the last four to five years. I moved all the presidential scholarships for international opportunities and international co-ops. So my goal is really to increase the number of students going overseas under experiential [learning]. So the provost and his office are looking at this issue, and we’re trying to see what prompted this, why is the cost increasing for the program, and therefore for the students, and how can we mitigate that. Absolutely. The goal remains to encourage the students, I cannot push for having more students and also limit it because of cost. So that’s why, going back to your question for instance about the [fundraising] campaign, it will definitely include an opportunity to raise funds also [for] overseas [programs]. So stay tuned for this one. Stay tuned. I asked the Provost to study that and give us a report on this one.
HN: Along the lines of that report, do you believe the report can be finished and any changes implemented within the next year, the next two years?
JA: No, I want the report to be done soon so that we know what’s happening. The next two years is too long. We need to look into that, absolutely.
HN: So it needs to be sooner than two years?
JA: Absolutely.
HN: Tying the last two topics together with global opportunities and the graduate campuses, is that anything that’s come up at all even in discussion, the possibility of having a graduate campus internationally?
JA: Look, you know that it is the responsibility of every person in charge of an institution, to look at opportunities and possibilities. Absolutely. We are very strong at Northeastern with respect to higher education because we have not only anticipated the trends, but defined the trends.
Forbes took us as an example when everybody was retrenching that this university moved forward. So going back to your question, we always look at opportunities, constantly. We never, never stay still. We’re very happy, but not satisfied. The day we’re satisfied that means that we’ve become a boring place, and we’re not a boring place. We’re a very exciting place, very exciting community, very exciting institution.
Pop Quiz
HN: What’s the Northeastern motto?
JA: What’s the Northeastern motto? I don’t know. What do you mean what’s the Northeastern…?
HN: On our seal, three Latin words.
JA: Ah, ah. I studied Latin.
HN: Yeah, I did too.
JA: Where did you study Latin?
HN: In high school.
JA: So what does it say? I can give you one, give me the second, I’ll give you the third. Lux.
HN: Veritas.
JA: No, virtue.
HN: Ok, that might be first, but there [is] both of them. It’s veritas and virtus.
HN: Ok, we’ll go onto the next question. What was the last year we won the men’s Beanpot?
JA: It was 16 years ago. Correct?
HN: A little more than that.
JA: How long?
HN: 1988. Too many years.
JA: Too many years.
HN: Do you know what year Matthews Arena opened?
JA: Actually we celebrated the hundredth three years ago?
Renata Nyul, university spokeswoman: About two years ago.
JA: So, do the math.
HN: Can you name all the presidents who preceded you?
JA: Yeah I see them [on the wall near my office]. Also, when you go to Frost [Lounge]. That’s easy. That’s an easy one. Thank you.
HN: You want to go for it?
JA: No, no. That’s easy. Too easy. … I’m the eighth president or the ninth president of Northeastern?
HN: Seventh, I believe.
JA: Ah, good. I tried to trick you. … You know how many are with us?
HN: How many are still alive?
JA: Yeah.
HN: Freeland, I think Curry is. Then Ryder is the — I think that’s it. I would say two, and you, so three. [Editor’s note: Including Aoun, four former Northeastern presidents are still alive.]
HN: What is the estimated total annual cost of attending Northeastern?
JA: That’s actually a very interesting question because you have various answers. You have the sticker price, and you have price after financial aid. So which one are you asking about?
HN: Do both.
JA: Ok. Essentially you have to count in terms of tuition and financial aid, et cetera. Without financial aid it’s over 50. Now with financial aid, it depends on people, it can range from zero … zero, namely zero tuition. Like we have groups, students who are fully supported. To around $5,000 as a discount or as a financial aid, etc. So overall it becomes around 29 thousand, something like that.
HN: Is there anything else you would like to add?
JA: Yeah. I like the fact that you asked me those questions at the beginning and at the end. What did you want to achieve?
HN: The first round, we thought, ‘Oh well that would be a sort of a fun, light way to get started.’ And then the last couple of questions we were talking about Channel 5’s Sunday morning show, “On the Record,” where they have politicians or whatever guests come on, and in the middle of the interview, they do a five-question pop quiz like that. And we said, ‘Oh that could be interesting.’
JA: Let me tell you something that’s interesting. I meet with students constantly, and we have the students who are here now, the next students, are the university scholars. That’s the third group that I’m meeting of university scholars, and I meet, I met with student leaders, SGA. I’m going to meet with various heads of clubs and athletic teams. If you want, you can sit in one of those meetings. You’re more than welcome.
HN: Sure
HN: I’d love to do that.
JA: More than welcome to be there. Let me tell you something. You said, ‘It would be fun,’ and you’re right, it’s fun. If you ask me, for instance, do I know everything about Northeastern? And the answer is no. No one knows everything about Northeastern. So for instance, if you’re asking me, there is a hole in the ground, do you know where the hole is and why it’s being patched, and what happened, et cetera. Now what you want is to be in an environment that is transparent and open enough, but also have great people and a great team. The fallacy that I think, or the problem that I see, is that people try to say that everything, everything, has to be known by the leadership. It’s not healthy. I don’t know everything. But I learn everyday. And how do I learn? By walking and talking to the students, by walking and talking to the faculty. And when I go to IV or Stetson or sit down in Churchill, in Rebecca’s Cafe, and ask, you learn. So that is something that is important to me. In a nutshell, you didn’t ask me which dance I like to dance.
HN: Which dance do you like to dance?
JA: The rhumba.
