An interview with Vartan Gregorian, who is to be honored by Armenian Professional Society

by Florence Avakian

Published: Wednesday October 21, 2009

Dr. Vartan Gregorian in 2001. Carnegie Corporation of New York

New York - On November 7, Dr. Vartan Gregorian, President of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, will be honored as "Professional of the Year" by the Armenian Professional Society, at the Sheraton Universal Hotel in Universal City, California.

An interview with Dr. Vartan Gregorian is a unique experience. He impresses one as a brilliant, wise, self confident, and utterly forthright individual. As he came out of his office on Monday afternoon, September 28, his well-known exuberance was evident as he warmly greeted me with a big bear hug and a beaming smile. Expecting to see an opulent office with expensive furniture for a person of his exalted position, I was happily surprised to find a cozy room lined with thousands of books, many double-stacked in bookcases, on his desk and some even crowding the seats. It could have easily doubled as a comfortable library setting. As befitting the man, it was truly a working office, not a showplace.

Dr. Gregorian is a man on a mission, and his relaxed down-to-earth demeanor belies the intense passion he feels on the subject closest to his heart, education. His responses in the first of two parts of this exclusive interview reveal that earnest feeling.

Education, its values and pitfalls

Florence Avakian: Dr. Gregorian, why are you so devoted to the need to foster higher education?  

Vartan Gregorian: The United States has been the world's leader in higher education because of several factors. First, in the middle of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln established land grant universities. That was historically one of the most important turning points for America, whereby every state would have a university. He put universities in populated areas, and where the potential of those states would be realized. Lincoln's higher education system provided America with leadership in the industrial revolution.

Secondly, in 1944, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was instrumental in starting a future for science. During World War II, because of F.D.R., science, unlike the case in Europe and the Soviet Union, was to be invested in through universities, in order to bring competition, different perspectives, and also so that undergraduates and graduates could be exposed to research. This was very important. Roosevelt died, and Truman adopted that policy.

Thirdly, the G.I. bill democratized American higher education. Eleven million returning military servicemen, instead of becoming unemployed, went to universities. And this is true even today.

Then came the issue of how to organize support for higher education. Personal grants provided the source whereby the student was given the money rather than it being given to the universities. Portability led to much competition and put universities on the defensive. They had to satisfy their clients.

Then Sputnik resulted in a resurgence of science in America so as to lead the way for men to go to the moon. This was a reactive mode, not planned. The Cold War in many ways also accelerated the organization of higher education in the U.S. The Fulbright, Muskie, Humphrey, NEH, NIH, Fellowships, etc., provided the kind of research in all the fields, from humanities to the sciences. America has been the leader in all of this.

Problems and challenges

FA: Yes, I was one of the recipients of the NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) fellowship at Cornell University. You have said we were the leader in higher education. This all sounds very positive. What have been the problems, and what are the challenges of obtaining this higher education in the United States?

VG: We were, and still are the leader, but the rest of the world is catching up, and we're sleeping for two reasons. First, only 50 percent of our high school students graduate. In the 19th century, higher education was only for the elite. And we had only a population of 100 million. Now we are 300 million.

Secondly, as land grant universities were established, higher education was supposed to be supported by the state.

I came to California in 1956 as a freshman. Tuition was $750 at Stanford University. Berkeley was $50 a semester. Today, it is $40,000 at Stanford, and Berkeley, 10, 12, 14 thousand. These are public universities, not private.

States which were completely underwriting the costs of higher education, are no longer doing it, because they don't have the funds. The University of Michigan, one of the best universities in the country, provides seven to eight percent maximum. California is turning people away, and tuition for locals is 10 to 15 thousand. So 90 percent has to come from tuition, endowment fund raising, and faculty research.

FA: How can this very serious problem of finances be resolved?

VG: States have to support, but there are even more obstacles in universities developing their own resources. For example, Michigan says you can only have 33 percent of the students from other states. And foreign students are the only ones who can pay. So more and more, we are educating foreign students in order to make money and survive. And the worst thing is, the more we increase the numbers, the more the tuition goes up. We also have a 19th-century structure in the 21st century. So new solutions are needed.

Solution One is to fundraise for the public universities. Now there is no division between public and private universities. Public high-school students go to private universities, and private students go to public institutions. And also because the state has owned the university buildings, seven, eight percent shareholders still play the biggest role. So before you fill the building, you need state authorization.

FA: From what you have discussed, is this part of the 20-year plan you had envisioned?