The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com

Thursday, October 20, 2011 -

World Bank president talks plan
for global economy, countries' debt

Robert Zoellick
speaks to students
for Citigroup
Foundation Lecture
By BRANDON SHAW
Daily StaffReporter
The European debt crisis may
be at the forefront of World Bank
Group President Robert Zoel-
lick's mind. But yesterday, he
made a stop far from the Eastern
side of the Atlantic.
As part of the 2011 Citigroup
Foundation Lecture Series, Zoel-
lick spoke to about 350 students
yesterday in the Ross School of
Business about World Bank's per-
spective on the global economy
and his own ideas on movements
taking place worldwide.
The World Bank provides
low-interest loans and grants to
developing countries to invest in
areas like education and infra-
structure.
Zoellick also spoke about his
plans for his speeches at the
European Union summit this
coming weekend and the G20
Summit next month. Zoellick
said that at the two summit
meetings, he will present his
three-pillared plan for balancing

the global economy.
The first component of his
plan is the recapitalization, or
the rearrangingof debt and equi-
ty mixture, of banks. European
banks are seemingly moving
toward raising private capital,
Zoellick said. However, he added
that their stability is not yet cer-
tain.
Referencing Greece's high
amount of debt, Zoellick said
his plan's second pillar is assist-
ing developing countries, which
is crucial to his bank's global
expansion. Zoellick said the
third pillar is determining
whether or not Greece's debt
will worsen.
There are a variety of pro-
grams that can be initiated in the
United States and worldwide to
help with the growing economic
crisis, Zoellick said. Among them
are a comprehensive reform of
tax programs and balanced bud-
gets.
In response to the economic
crisis and the public's disillusion-
ment with the financial industry,
Zoellick explained that World
Bank prides itself on adapting to
the ever-expanding environment
through - economic policy initia-
tives and philanthropic work.
"Just as the world has changed,
so has the World Bank Group," he
said.

There are 187 countries that
are shareholders of the World
Bank Group, with the U.S.'s share
comprising 15 percent, accord-
ing to Zoellick. While he said the
World Bank differs from its com-
petitors on Wall Street in its daily
transactions and business goals,
Zoellick noted that it is still a cli-
ent-driven business.
"One of the things I try and get
people to do is to focus on their
clients - something I strongly
believe in," he said.
When asked to defend the
recent criticism from The Econo-
mist, which claimed that Zoel-
lick supports the gold standard
-- a monetary system in which
the standard economic unit of
account is a fixed mass of gold
-- he said that he was "misunder-
stood."
"Let me be clear - I was not
at all asking or calling for a gold
standard, but stating that as peo-
ple moved to gold, it was adding
to their uncertainty about the
value of currencies," Zoellick
said.
"My own belief is that the U.S.
dollar will remain the predomi-
nant reserve currency," he added.
In response to a question about
the U.S. economy's credit rating,
Zoellick said he predicts that the
downgrading - in which Stan-
dard & Poor changed the U.S. rat-

ing from AAA to AA+ in August
- will "serve as a wake-up call."
He said it will show future gen-
erations there are critical steps
the U.S. needs to take to improve
the economy.
"I'm a bigbeliever in more free
trade," Zoellick said. "Open mar-
kets spark the economy."
In an interview after the event,
Zoellick spoke about the Occupy
Wall Street movements and the
negative effect they could have
on the global marketplace.
"I'm more worried about the
effects on developing countries,
which you can see in the markets,
in the bond yields," he said. "And
the thing that we're watching
quite closely is the confidence in
the business sectors or the con-
sumer, and these countries have
less cushion, or less room, for
that to drop."
Ben Pierson, a second-year
MBA student in the Ross School
of Business, said he appreciated
Zoellick's willingness to share
his opinions.
"I wanted to hear something
that doesn't have a media filter on
it, which I feel like these things
often have," Pierson said. "I feel
like he was honest on what his
opinions were, even if he pivoted
away from questions that may
have been perceived as contro-
versial."

HOSPITAL
From Page1A
open in a reasonable amount of
time.
"We are still on target. We're
early," Warner said. "This is a
massive project, and we're on
time with construction, and our
overall plan is still on track."
The hospital's opening has
also been delayed because the
buildingstill needs an occupancy
certification. According to War-
ner, the-building was supposed to
be examined for its certificate of
occupancy last week. Instead, it
will be surveyed this week.
As a result of these complica-
tions, hospital administrators
decided to rethink their original
opening date.
"There's nothing magical
about the date November 15,"
Warner said.
She added that the safety and
comfort of the staff was para-
mount for the administrators in
their decision to postpone the
hospital's opening date.
"We have always said that we
will make sure our faculty and
staff feel they've had enough
time to be trained and oriented,"
Warner said.
The new date, Dec. 4, was
selected because it will not only
account for all the schedule
changes resulting from building
complications, but it will also
MCOMMUNITY
From Page 1A
ing last month, Kate Barald,
SACUA chair and a professor
in the Medical School and Col-
lege of Engineering, voiced stu-
dents' concerns on the issue and
described a student who didn't
want the public to know he
belonged to LGBTQ groups.
"After hearing about the issue,
we acted pretty quickly," Nielson
said. "We had to assess the exact
nature of the problem and find an
appropriate solution."
ITS conferred with the Office
of the Provost and the Office of
General Counsel before mak-
ing any final decisions and then
contacted the Michigan Student
Assembly to inform them of the
change before it was finalized,
according to Nielson.
While it is no longer possible to
see what groups a person belongs
to, users can still see a group's
member list if the group's owners

factor in the possible schedul-
ing conflict of the Thanksgiving
holiday.
Warner added that the new
opening date also has some
benefits for hospital adminis-
trators and staff. She pointed
to the benefit of holding facnlty
and staff training closer to the
opening date because the mate-
rial would be fresh in employ-
ees' minds upon the facility's
opening. In addition, hospital
employees welcomed the dcl i
and the administrators' concen ii
for their safety.
The 12-story complex, which
cost $754 million, is the larg-
est construction project ever
undertaken by the University.
"The majority of faculty and
staff are relieved and supportive
of this decision," Warner said.
"We don't make a decision like
this without the input of all of
our key faculty, staff and lead-
ers."
Warner said the hospital
administrators are excited
about the new facility, which
she described as state-of-the-art
and environmentally sustain-
able.
"We are so proud to be part
of the (University) commu
nity and to have been given thI
opportunity to design the most
extraordinary women and chil-
dren's hospital," she said. "We
can hardly wait to show it off to
everybody."
enable a setting that makes the
list visible to everyone.
Nielson said she hasn't heard
any complaints about the updated
website.
Though some students were
previously unhappy about
MCommunity's Groups feature,
many didn't know it existed.
Engineering sophomore Beth-
any Meyer said she wasn't aware
of the former online directory
privacy setting, but she wouldn't
have been concerned about the
Groups tab.
"I don't think it would be a
problem," Meyer said. "I mean, I
put that kind of stuff on a rdsum6,
so I think it would probably be
OK."
Though LSA freshman David
Carlson didn't know his groups
were visible to anyone logged iito
MCommunity, he said he under-
stands why the change was made.
"I don't see a problem with (the
change)," Carlson said. "I guess
it's more private and better for the
studentbody as a whole."


TRANSFER
From Page 1A
part of the University's Office of
Academic Multicultural Initia-
tives, M-POD offers mentorship,
one-on-one counseling and extra
orientation sessions to help ease
students through the transfer
process.
"Our goal is to increase aware-
ness among community college
students about the option to
transfer to Michigan," Das said.
Das said he does not believe the
University's increased numbers
related to decreases in enroll-
ment at community colleges.
In comparison to the Univer-
sity, enrollment at Washtenaw
Community College decreased

this year compared to the 2010-
2011 academic year. Numbers
shot up at Oakland Commu-
nity College and enrollment at
Macomb Community College
remained stable.
Kathy Currie, director of stu-
dent records at Washtenaw Com-
munity College, said there was an
8.8-percent decrease in enroll-
ment from last year. Currie said
she believes cuts to federal pro-
grams such as No Worker Left
Behind are largely responsible
for the drop. She added that many
education benefit programs
offered by businesses to employ-
ees have been discontinued.
However, Currie said this
fall's decrease in enrollment puts
WCC back at average attendance
numbers. The school saw record
enrollment in 2009 and 2010, she

said.
Despite the change in enroll-
ment numbers, very little has
actually changed at Washtenaw
Community College.
"We haven't cut any services
as a result of this," Currie added.
While WCC has a smaller
student body this year, Macomb
Community College has had
"virtually no difference" in atten-
dance, said Howard Hughey,
spokesman for Macomb Commu-
nity College.
"We have not seen any abnor-
mal increases or decreases from
last year," Hughey said.
With an opposite enrollment
trend from WCC, the five cam-
puses of Oakland Community
College, saw an upward shift in
student attendance this year.
OCC Spokesman George Cart-

sonis, spokesman for Oakland
Community College, said fall
enrollment is at an all-time high
with 29,262 students.
"We are the largest (commu-
nity college) in the state, and the
25th largest in the nation," Cart-
sonis said.
Many students choose OCC
before transferring to a four-
year university because of the
college's affordable credit hours,
Cartsonis said. Many OCC stu-
dents transfer to the Univer-
sity of Michigan's Dearborn
campus after two years at OCC,
and approximately 30-40 former
OCC students enroll each year at
the Ann Arbor campus.
"With higher education costs
skyrocketing, community col-
leges are the student's best bet,"
Cartsonis said.


FARM
From Page 1A
culture in Southeast Michigan.
People involved in the project
also hope the grant will create
opportunities for collaboration
between the farm start-ups, the
Ann Arbor Farmers Market and
the University.
Jennifer Fike, executive
director of the Food System Eco-
nomic Partnership, has arranged
sales between the farms at the
Tilian Center and the East Quad
dining hall since 2006. She said
the grant will offer young farm-
ers an opportunity to start their
own ventures, specifically those
whose parents did not bequeath
them land and agricultural
infrastructure.
"It's very difficult to make a
living at farming, and so we're
trying to help remove some of
the barriers that new farmers
are experiencing," Fike said.
"There are people who want to
go into farming, but it takes a lot
of money to be able to do that."
She added that the shortage
of young farmers compounds
the importance of the Tilian
Center's task. The Partnership's
2010 Future Farmer Research
Report found 76 percent of the
surveyed farmers in Jackson,
Lenawee and Monroe, Mich.
were age 50 and older.
ENROLLMENT
From Page 1A
year, however, the University was
"gratified" that it met its enroll-
ment targets, University Provost
Philip Hanlon said in an inter-
view with The Michigan Daily
last month.
The average high school grade
point average for this year's fresh-

Through the Tilian Center,
Southeast Michigan has the
land resources necessary to
shift that demographic, Fike
said.
"Now, through this grant,
there's access to capital," she
said.
There are currently three
farms on the Tilian Center
Land, two of which - Seeley
Farms and Green Things Farm
- sell their vegetables at the
Ann Arbor Farmers Market in
Kerrytown. Fike said she would
like to see the Ann Arbor Farm-
ers Market grow along with the
Tilian Center.
Regarding the federal grant's
impact on the University, Uni-
versity Housing spokesman
Peter Logan said the grant
does not necessarily present an
opening for increased business
between the University and
the farm start-ups. However,
the University has purchased
food from local and sustainable
sources for the past few years,
Logan said. He pointed to East
Quad chef Buzz Cummings who
requests locally grown foods
through the Partnership.
Fike said she hopes the Uni-
versity will increase its purchas-
ing of sustainable food from
these farm start-ups.
"Our experience in working
with the University is that they
are interested in local purchasing,

and I could see that there couldbe
room for growth in other areas of
the campus," she said.
Like Fike, Larissa Larsen,
an associate professor of urban
planning at the University, and
Molly Notarianni, manager of
the Ann Arbor Farmers Mar-
ket, said increased collabora-
tion with local farms would
be beneficial to all parties
involved and has the potential
to improve Southeast Michi-
gan's economy.
Larsen, who was the fac-
ulty leader of the food team on
University President Mary Sue
Coleman's sustainability ini-
tiative, said such relationships
could bring about a multiplier
effect in which aspects of agri-
culture production to consump-
tion within local frameworks
amplifies the effect on the local
economy.
"It's good to encourage or
retain the agricultural produc-
tion within this area," Larsen
said. "If we keep money locally,
it employs local people, it's good
for our local economy - those
have benefits."
Larsen said farm incubators
like the Intervale Center in Bur-
lington, Vt. are successful and
she hopes similar results can
be replicated in Ann Arbor. She
also said she foresees the future
start-ups at the Tilian Center
helping to achieve the Universi-

ty's goal of bringing in a portion
of its food from within 150 miles
of Ann Arbor.
"I know that the University is
interested in meeting their stat-
ed goal, so I don't see why not,"
Larsen said. "For the farmers to
know that there is a demand is
really powerful."
Notarianni said the demand
will be evident at the Ann Arbor
Farmers Market, where the
two vendors from Tilian Farms
already experienced success by
selling less popular vegetables.
"There is always more room
for people with innovative prod-
ucts at the Ann Arbor Farmers
Market," she said. "A lot of the
vendors who've been part of the
market for a really long time
don't really have children who
want to carry on their farms. So
I think that at sone point in the
next 10 to 15 years, there's going
to be a big change."
Notarianni thinks the grant
and the opportunities it will
spark might also help boost
enthusiasm about the Ann Arbor
Farmers Market and the local
pride and promise of sustain-
ability it represents.
"I think that there's a lot of
excitement and momentum
around local food in Washt-
enaw County and Southeast
Michigan, and continuing to fuel
that momentum will be good,"
Notarianni said.

n Ucu KU


man class was a 3.8, with 19 per-
cent earning a perfect 4.0 GPA.
Additionally, more than 34 per-
cent of freshmen students scored
between 31 and 36 on the ACT,
compared to 4 percent of students
across the country who scored in
that range.
"The bottom line is that the
quality of the class - if you mea-
sure by test scores and GPA - by
those measures, it's the best we've

ever admitted," Hanlon said last
month.
Underrepresented minority
students account for 10.5 percent
of the freshman class - a small
drop from last year when under-
represented minorities composed
10.6 percent of the freshman class.
Despite the stable underrepre-
sented minority enrollment, Les-
ter Monts, the University's senior
vice provost for academic affairs,

wrote in a press release issued
today that the University appre-
ciates "the overall excellence and
diversity" of the class of2015.
"In light of the challenging
demographics in our country,
we acknowledge the care and
intentionality, in our office of
Admissions and among the Uni-
versity's schools and colleges, that
is required to develop such a great
class," Monts wrote.

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