By Mackenzie Mohr

Grand Rapids Mayor George Heartwell speaks with Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon and Spartans Athletic Director Mark Hollis about focusing on the success of children in Grand Rapids and the importance of higher education across the state of Michigan.

“If I could pick a defining topic for my term as mayor,” he says, “it would be children.” His platform focuses on children, public education, and the relationship between the city of Grand Rapids and the public school system. Serving his third term as mayor, Heartwell finds it important to recover his efforts to make Grand Rapids a better city for the children of Michigan. “36 percent of our children in Grand Rapids are living in poverty households,” he says. Addressing quality of life, family employment, housing issues, lead safety issues, nutrition issues, and supporting public schools, he says, are crucial to the improvement of life for the children of Grand Rapids.

Our Community’s Children is a an office where the city and the schools come together to work on joint initiatives, he says, such as the Upward Bound Program. This program prepares kids for college by working with them throughout high school to ensure that they are college-ready and is managed by Grand Valley State University and Grand Rapids Community College, says Heartwell. “90 to 95 percent of the kids who complete the Upward Bound Program, go on to college and they graduate from college at the same rate as their peers in any of the finest suburban districts in the state,” he says. These students come from poverty households and are first generation college students, says Heartwell. The program is minimally funded by the federal government, he says, so the city matches these funds to open the program to more and more students.

“We were certainly proud,” he says, “that Forbes magazine in their E-edition listed Grand Rapids as the best city in the country to raise a family.” Using crime, education, higher education, and housing affordability statistics, Grand Rapids came out on top of the 100 largest cities in the country, according to Forbes. “But, the fact of the matter is we still have an unemployment rate that is unacceptable, we still have children living in poverty, we still have children subjected to lead and the risks of lead poisoning in their homes,” Heartwell says, “and those are issues that we simply have to address.” Through the municipal sustainability plan, Grand Rapids uses 72 factors to measure and report issues of the city that need to be addressed. “In a public institution,” he says, “we’re certainly always open for criticism.”

Michigan State University has had a presence in Grand Rapids for over 40 years, says President Simon. “What Michigan State University did in the expansion of its presence here in Grand Rapids,” says Heartwell, “is nothing short of astounding, I think, for us as a community.” The city had a robust medical presence, but what Heartwell says was missing was the bridge between research and practice, which is what Michigan State brought to Grand Rapids. “It’s created quite a remarkable synergy here around medical practice, research and education,” he says.

“No matter what we say as politicians about creating jobs, there’s truly very few jobs that we create,” he says. “But, we can help to create the environment that’s attractive to business.” Bringing business to a city environment promotes business growth and provides employment opportunities, says Heartwell. The field of renewable energy as already produced jobs across the state of Michigan, he says, and some local companies have shifted production from automobile to wind turbine parts. Small start-up businesses are rising from the technologies stemming from the concentration of research, education and medicine in Grand Rapids, says Mayor Heartwell. “That circles it all the way back as creating that environment,” says Hollis, “creating that location where people want to live, where young people want to live.”

“Michigan State has a responsibility,” President Simon says, “to the entire state of Michigan and it’s been our honor to be able to work in Grand Rapids along with many other cities in the state.”

“In years past, engineering was our game and our game alone in this country,” MSU College of Engineering Dean Satish Udpa tells Michigan State University President Lou Anna Simon and Spartans Athletic Director Mark Hollis on MSU Today on News/Talk 760 WJR. “The world was our oyster, and we were at the top of our game.

“Now we have competitors around the world, so we need to operate at a much higher level and make sure that our students have the skills to survive and thrive in this new competitive world. One of our challenges is to equip today’s engineers with the skills to move ideas from concept to reality in the marketplace.”

One way the College is meeting these challenges is by immersing students in hands-on design projects as soon as they arrive on campus.

“Our joy comes from preparing our students to compete with the best in the world,” adds Dean Udpa. “But there are opportunities to join hands with competitors to get things done, too.”

Dean Udpa says the College focuses its research on both intermediate and longterm challenges.

“in the next 10 or 15 years, we’ll likely come up with solutions for issues in energy and water,” says Udpa. “But we also want to be where the puck is going to be when working on longterm challenges on issues like how the brain functions and operates.

“MSU is a place where by the diverse nature of the things we do here we can find solutions to problems in the intersection of working on the intermediate and longterm issues,” adds Dean Udpa. “Society has always benefited by taking the longterm view, and MSU is one of the few places where collaboration, diverse research activities and an embracing of this longterm view go hand in hand.”

From MSU Today on Impact Radio: Russ White talks with Michigan State University Vice President for Communications and Brand Strategy Heather Swain about branding MSU. “Communications is what we do, and brand strategy has become more important to universities over the years; having a strong brand brings value to universities,” says Swain.

Kirk Heinze from Greening of the Great Lakes talks with Michigan Pork Producers leader Sam Hines about “Asian Carp on four legs,” otherwise known as the feral swine. “Of all the invasive species, these are the worst of the worst.” The feral swine have adapted to the winter conditions of Michigan, are able to reproduce quickly and have very few natural predators, he says.

And Kirk talks with State of Michigan climatologist Jeff Andresen about the wacky early warm spring weather we had and how it’s now impacting Michigan’s agriculture industry. “The month of April may end up being cooler than the month of March, and we think that’s the first time that’s ever happened as well,” Andresen says.

Kirk also talks with Pulitzer-Prize winning Teddy Roosevelt biographer Edmund Morris. Morris believes “TR’s greatest legacy was the establishment of the modern conservation movement.”

Heather Swain is Vice President for Communications and Brand Strategy at Michigan State University.

“University Relations, our previous name, is confusing,” she says. “It’s hard for people to know exactly who we’re relating to.

“Communications is what we do, and brand strategy has become more important to universities over the years; having a strong brand brings value to universities.”

Branding is simply the associations people bring to the image or name of Michigan State University, adds Swain. And branding is the process of shaping those images and moving them in a positive direction.

“It’s the intentionality of moving those feelings and impressions in the way we want them to go,” she says. “And the stronger we can make those intentions the more positive things can happen for the university.

“From fundraising and acquiring research dollars to attracting better students and faculty, it impacts a variety of areas positively and is like a good rain that falls down on all of us.”

MSUAA’S Scott Westerman, with his annual message to the Spartan graduating class. Listen to an audio version of this message.

The greatest joy I associate with my work as the head servant for the MSU Alumni Association is the many opportunities I have to get to know our students.

We may exalt the more familiar names who paint Spartan pride on the front pages of our sports sections. But the true essence of what Michigan State University is all about are the other 46,000 seekers; Kids who come here to find a passion, to find themselves and to become Spartans in the process.

If you are part of this year’s graduating class, you are about to turn a page in your personal Spartan Saga. Some of you will return to The Banks of the Red Cedar to further fill your brain with MSU wisdom. But the vast majority will launch into a world that desperately needs you.

A funny thing happens if you fully commit yourself to the Spartan ethic.

You literally absorb the unstoppable power of 500,000 other Spartans who are out there living Spartan lives and are changing the world in the process.

Spartans populate thousands cities and towns across this great country and hundreds of MSU outposts around the globe. And I can tell you if you are a true Spartan, your power will be felt, wherever you decide to express it.

It happens wherever there is need, and a courageous person in Green and White stands up to help.

It happens wherever there is hurt, and a Spartan who has known pain is there with comfort.

It happens wherever a there is a dream and a Spartan challenges us all to help make it come true.

As human beings we know fear, suffering, loss and loneliness, but as Spartans, we are part of so very few who refuse to let that define who we are.

Spartans may have been hurt, yet we are determined to heal. Spartans may have known emptiness, but we seek experiences and role models to fill it.

Spartans are imperfect. We have bad days. We can be angry, sad, and feel like we’re not making enough progress. We stumble along the way. And because of our single minded devotion to what we think is right, not everyone will follow us.

That’s what makes us human.

But because we are Spartans, we are committed to the belief that life isn’t about how many times you fall. It’s about how many times you can get back up.

It’s the knowledge that finding true success, true happiness, true love and sustaining relationships requires courage, tenacity and being open to it, even if it includes setbacks and heartbreak.

At the center of your Spartan being, you realize that the only way we can really transform the world, is by transforming ourselves.

And model the behavior for others.

This is what it means when you make the commitment to become a Spartan. It’s why all of us in the MSU Alumni Association will always have your back. We will catch you when you fall, hug you when you hurt, and throw you onto our shoulders to cheer your inevitable success.

We come from many races and many nations. But we all running the human race and OUR nation is the Spartan Nation.

Our specialty is winning. We are never beaten. And we WILL always win.

We are one. We are Spartans!

Now you’ve heard it. Go out and live it.

In this edition of MSU Today on News/Talk 760 WJR Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon and Spartans Athletic Director Mark Hollis talk with MSU Broad College hospitality business professor Michael Kasavana about technology’s impact on the hospitality industry. And they talk about Mike’s other role as faculty representative to the Big Ten and NCAA and chair of the MSU Athletic Council.

They also talk with Business Leaders for Michigan CEO Doug Rothwell about the group’s Michigan Turnaround Plan.

Michael Kasavana is the renowned NAMA Endowed Professor with The School of Hospitality Business at Michigan State University’s Broad College of Business in the area of hospitality information systems.

Kasavana joins Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon and Spartans Athletic Director Mark Hollis for a conversation on technology’s impact on the hospitality industry.

“It used to be that the hospitality industry was a high-touch industry; you never wanted to show technology to guests – you wanted to have people interact with guests,” he says. “Over the last ten years we’ve shifted to much more of a self-serve society.”

In addition to his academic responsibilities, Kasavana serves as the MSU Faculty Athletic Representative to the Big Ten, CCHA, and NCAA conferences and is Chair of the MSU Athletic Council. He says academics have become an even greater emphasis for student-athletes.

“There’s been a trend over the last decade to treat student-athletes more like the rest of the student body,” Kasavana says. “A lot of the rule changes over the last few years have enhanced the student-athletes ability to choose majors and graduate.”