Board of Regents candidates offer their opinions

University of Nebraska Board of Regents candidates Steve Glenn and Rob Schafer squared off in a forum hosted by the Beatrice Area Chamber of Commerce Tuesday night.

The two fielded 30 minutes of questions about everything from agriculture and accreditation to stem cell research and the hunt for the next university president.

Glenn, a Pawnee City property owner and owner of seven businesses across Nebraska, said his campaign focus was on making college affordable for students and improving the teaching, outreach and research aspects of the university.

Schafer, an attorney in Beatrice, said his goal is to make the university a worldwide leader in agriculture.

In April 2011, the University of Nebraska lost its accreditation with the American Association of Universities. The candidates were asked how they would help the university regain accreditation.

Schafer said a large part of the reason for losing accreditation was because the AAU did not include the University of Nebraska Medical Center in its assessment because of its distance from the UNL campus.

What I would like to see happen is that we be able to change how they determine membership so that we can include all the research, not just at the University of Nebraska Medical Center and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln campus, but also the University of Nebraska-Omaha and Kearney campuses as well as Curtis, Schafer said.

Glenn said the university planned very poorly.

There are very specific metrics that define membership in the AAU and we did not look at those metrics and say, How do we plan and aggressively deal with that? Glenn said. We have to build a very specific plan that should be in writing, the metric should be defined and that should be held accountable for our administration.

The two both said lowering student debt upon graduation is part of the reason they are running for the Board of Regents, even though the position comes without a salary or benefits other than free football tickets.

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Board of Regents candidates offer their opinions