<# Transcript: Dr. Ali Houshmand - 6:8:25, 2.12 PM.mp3 SPEAKER_00: Hi, Rachel. Hey, Janette. We just had a great interview with Dr. Houshmand, the president of Rowan University, which is a university that is, what is it, 33 miles from Philadelphia? SPEAKER_01: Yes, I did look that up and it was 33 miles from, I actually mapped it to South Street. SPEAKER_00: So it's really, I looked at the map too, it's right between Philadelphia and Atlantic City. So it's like right down there. It's a southern part of New Jersey and a lot of people don't know about it in northern New Jersey. And we're like, well, you need to. Yes, absolutely. Why do you say that, Rachel? SPEAKER_01: Well, he's so dynamic. This was such a fun interview, and I just loved hearing how, as a university president, he's been president of Rowan for, it's like 11 years, 10, 11 years now? Right. Yeah, something like that. And he's the epitome of a transformational leader. That's how I look at him. And that he is re-envisioning constantly what higher education should look like and enabling the staff and the students at Rowan to benefit from that. SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he came from Iran and he came from a humble beginnings and he tells us a little bit about this and his journey here and then we go on to talk about the university itself. And he is very much, as you mentioned in the interview, into experiential education, where people are getting their degree in combination with learning how to actually go and get the job, you know, training them for that specific job. And he goes on to tell us a little bit about his hot sauce that he makes. He gives us the background on the whole operation, which is quite big. Yes. Fascinating. And I would say the pepper on top of the interview. instead of the tree. I love that. Of this really wonderful university, very, as you said, formative president of a university who seems to hold all of the traits that one would want in a president of a university. Enjoy this interview. Enjoy. Welcome to Lost in Jersey, Dr. Houshmand. SPEAKER_03: Thank you. Thank you. Glad to be here. SPEAKER_00: I reached out to you because you are the president of Rowan University and the university came onto our radar because both of us have kids that have been, you know, heading off to college. I have a son right now that's heading off to college and my husband toured many of the New Jersey universities and he went to your university and he would not stop raving about Rowan. SPEAKER_02: Glad to hear that. SPEAKER_00: Yeah, everybody in our circle of friends were like, well, where is Rowan? And that was surprising to us. So we wanted to bring you on to let you to let people know more about it. And Rachel also had how did Rowan come on your radar? SPEAKER_01: I remember hearing about it through the Malcolm Gladwell podcast. SPEAKER_03: Yes, yes. Yeah, I had two interviews with Malcolm. There was one of them about The title was my little $100 million gift. Yes. Talked about Henry Rowan's money and the other one about the whole issue of how you rank institutions based on U.S. News and World Report. It's basically every president gets this survey of 4,000 or so universities and you want to scale, you rank them by a scale of one to five. I said, how the hell do I know that? The only way that I do it, I send every president a bottle of my hot sauce. Hopefully they will remember me and give me a better ranking. SPEAKER_00: I love that. I love that story, and we are so glad that you brought it up because we definitely want to talk to you about that. But before we get to the hot sauce and how Rowan found itself on Malcolm Gladwell, about the $100 million, we'd like to get a background on our guests and how you ended up in New Jersey. Now, you have an interesting background, and we share a little bit that we're both Iranian. Yes. And you grew up in Iran. Was it in Tehran that you grew up? SPEAKER_03: Yes, I did. SPEAKER_00: So tell us a little bit about your background. SPEAKER_03: My background is I was born in the rough part of Tehran. In rough part. Let's just leave it at that. Okay. Yeah. My mom and dad were illiterate. And my father came from the eastern part, Mashhad. My mom from another eastern town, Damgan. And they had many children. They were hardworking people, especially my dad. And they had 12 children. I believe two of them passed. And then the 10th. And I'm the fifth one. Oh, in the middle. Yes. And 1975, I finished my high school and I entered the entrance exam for the universities. The first time I didn't pass. And then I had the choice of either going to the military to do my two years of military service or find an alternative of going abroad. And I had taken a test in English. I barely passed it by 51 percent. I remember passing it was 50. Now the question was, could I afford to go in there? And my older brother who had just got a job at Internal Revenue Service in Iran. He basically bought me a one-way ticket to London, and it's $70. And that was my trip to the West. SPEAKER_00: So you arrived in London with $70. Yes. And you were going to go to school there. SPEAKER_03: Yes. So I went there, and after one week, I was frying Kentucky Fried Chicken for 50 pence an hour. And basically, I went through school paying for myself, working various jobs, cleaning the bars. You know, in England, when people go drink, they kind of drink a lot and they make a lot of mess, including throwing up and everything. So my job was, this was a university bar. I wake up on Thursday, Friday, Saturdays and Sunday morning at 6 a.m. and go and clean up the place. And so that was a job I was paying. I was being paid, I think, 50 pence an hour. That's a half a British pound. And that was enough because I was then living with a family, the Gilchrist family, who I was paying pounds a week for a room, breakfast, and dinner. And the breakfast consisted of cereal, milk, and one boiled egg and a piece of toast. So I would hide the piece of toast and a boiled egg and run from school, lunchtime, and eat that for lunch. And that's how I basically, you know. SPEAKER_00: It was a very struggling time. So you had a host family. Is that what that was? Was it a host family? Yes. And then you stayed with them and you just scraped by as you went to college. But it seems that you had a real acumen for mathematics. SPEAKER_03: Is that right? Yes. When I was a kid, I didn't need to study a lot. I did not. You know, things just came naturally. So, sorry. And so, yes, I had a strong math background. And actually, when I did go to England, I ended up doing a bachelor's and master's in mathematics. And it was really the greatest thing that I did, because actually, when my daughter was a teenager, I gave her advice. And I said, I'll give you three advice. I said, number one, learn mathematics, because it teaches you logic. And logical thinking is really the best way. Number two, become a runner, because it makes you humble and it hurts. And number three, never let a man pay for you. Learn to earn your own living and your own job so that you don't depend on others. And she did all three of them. SPEAKER_01: That's great life advice. SPEAKER_03: She ended up with a PhD in biomedical engineering. She worked for McKenzie and then now works for Boston Scientific. She's a leading authority in deep brain and stimulation. SPEAKER_00: Wow. That's impressive. So you're, does she live in New Jersey too? SPEAKER_03: No, she lives in Maryland. She lives in Maryland. SPEAKER_00: Yes. I see. So, well, how, how did you, I mean, while you're going to school, how did you end up coming to the United States? SPEAKER_03: I finished my master's degree at the University of Essex. They didn't have doctoral program at that time. And then I went to my advisor, Professor Winston, and asked Professor Winston, I wanted to study sampling theory, which many people use in polling and other stuff for elections. And where do you think I should go? And he said, you should go to India. And they are very good. And I said, I don't want to go to India. I want to go to West. What about America? And he said, well, there is this university near Detroit. Everybody has gone. They shoot each other, but the university is not bad. Honestly, he literally said that. He meant University of Michigan. So I went to the library. I got this stuff. And I got applications. Sent it to them. A week later, they accepted me. And that's how I ended up at the University of Michigan. Doing a PhD in statistics and after one year I switched because it was so boring and so theoretical. I switched to industrial and operations engineering and I got another master's and a doctorate there. SPEAKER_01: And did you find Detroit, that was an accurate description or no? SPEAKER_03: I consider Ann Arbor the greatest place on the face of the earth. It's my love city. It's a place that My kids were born. I absolutely adore that place. I would give my left hand to live in Ann Arbor. SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's so nice. SPEAKER_00: Yeah. That's a really common thing, I think, that overseas in Europe and other places, when people look at the United States, they really, you know, they get fed the big stories, the big things that hit the news. And it kind of frames a picture of this place. So I think that that's a common thing. That's true. That what they're hearing is not accurate. You know, so that's nice to hear that it was also that case here. SPEAKER_02: Yeah. SPEAKER_00: So after you were there, how did you end up at Rowan? SPEAKER_03: Okay. Once I finished my PhD, I got hired by United Airlines. And my job was to basically, with a team of other PhDs, we would schedule 2,100 flights a day, 310 days in advance. It was an optimization model to increase the revenue for the airlines. And it was kind of easy and boring. So after six months actually, somebody from University of Cincinnati called me and he said, would you like to be a faculty? I said, sure. The next day I flew over there, but in the afternoon they gave me a job. And that's how I moved to Cincinnati as a professor. I was there for 10 years. Then I, in year 2000, I moved to Drexel University as an, in the administration position, was there for six years. And then in 2006, I came here after I saw an ad and I applied and I was interviewed for three days and they were crazy enough to give me a job. SPEAKER_01: I didn't really know where exactly Rowan was located. And I see that you're very close to Drexel. It's like 30 minutes to Philly. It's such a great location. SPEAKER_03: Actually, our location, in my opinion, is very, very strategic because the southern New Jersey eight counties, about 4,600 square miles. and there are a lot of land available and the price of houses are ridiculously low. You can basically buy a house in a custom build with 10 acres of land under a million dollars. You would never find anything like that in North Jersey. So what we are doing, what I am doing right now, given that our location, within 25 miles radius, there are nine medical schools in this region. Number one eye hospital in the world is in Philadelphia. Number one children hospital in the world is in Philadelphia. Number one cancer ward cancer in Camden, Philadelphia. So what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to really focus on the Southern New Jersey and sell this thing as a new Silicon Valley, because the Silicon Valley of California has been exhausted. The property values are out of reach for many people. Even home insurance is out of reach for many people. And they have really exhausted themselves. And where we are, within 150 mile radius of Our campus, there are 45 million Americans live here, whereas within 150-mile radius in Silicon Valley, there are only 15 million people. Another thing, within 150-mile radius in Silicon Valley, there are only 11 top research universities, whereas within 150-mile radius, there are 36 top research universities in our region. So access to airport, seaport, highways of all sorts, population, and sandwich between the political world, center of the world, Washington, D.C., and financial center of the world, New York, and cultural world, Philadelphia, Atlantic City. There is not a place on the face of America that is as strategic, in my opinion, for that project. So that's what I'm promoting right now aggressively. SPEAKER_01: Well, I love that. We actually just interviewed Governor Murphy, and he was saying how New Jersey is the state that has the largest amount of scientists. SPEAKER_03: Yes, it does. SPEAKER_01: Of any state in the country. And he was also talking about being the new Silicon Valley and getting much more VC investment in engineering, AI, photonics, which he introduced a new science to us, and all the medical research, like you were saying. And you have two medical schools, correct? SPEAKER_03: We have three, really. If you look at the veterinary school, that's the third medical school. SPEAKER_01: The vet, right. SPEAKER_03: Yes. Yes. We are only one of two universities in the nation that have allopathic, osteopathic, and veterinary school. The other one is Michigan State. SPEAKER_00: To that point, what are the key points that you like to highlight about Rowan University? I know that it has been growing and the research institution has been growing and the medical departments are growing. Here's your elevator pitch to, you know, to people about Rowan. SPEAKER_03: Your child is safe. Your child will not be burdened with massive amount of debt. Your boy would have a great cultural experience in here. And after four or five years, your child is a successful citizen. Taxpayer, that's what I want. SPEAKER_00: What more could you want? That's what we want. That's what everybody wants. SPEAKER_03: That's what every parent does want. A decent education, not be burdened. We'll go and get a decent job and leave us alone, right? That's what we want. SPEAKER_01: Well, not leave us alone too much. Come visit. SPEAKER_03: Keep your distance. Don't give us no more problems. Come and see me when you don't need money. If you need money, don't come see me again. SPEAKER_01: That's right. That's perfectly well said. Well said. SPEAKER_03: First of all, Rowan University right now, I can tell you confidently as an engineer, Rowan Engineering is only next to UPenn Engineering in terms of quality. The quality of the students that come to Rowan Engineering are out of chart. Overwhelming majority of them graduate in four years, and more than 100 of them every year are hired by Lockheed Martin. And the average salary is $90,000. That's our quality. I mean, people need to investigate the quality of engineering. I would send my kids to here. In fact, my son went to here. And I would send them any day. because this is a top-notch engineering program. It really is. And every single one of those kids get a decent job, and they're a productive citizen. And that's what we offer in here. And the campus, the other one, is absolutely gorgeous. SPEAKER_00: It is. It's gorgeous. Within the departments, what have you seen? Now, one of the things that we alluded to earlier is about the Malcolm Gladwell interviews that you did. Now, Rowan University is about 100 years old now. I think you just celebrated the anniversary and that Hank Rowan donated $100 million to the university back in, what was it, 1992? 1992. 1992. And since then, that money has helped expand the university. You know, back then, $100 million, you know, shook the world. That was a large amount of money. Huge. And he went to MIT, but he didn't give it to them. Because, not that he didn't appreciate it, he just felt like, what a difference, it won't make that big of a difference to that university as it would to Rowan. How has that affected Rowan? SPEAKER_03: Honestly, before that, when the gift was given, before that, Rowan really was an unknown place, a highly localized and regional university around here. Kids from the counties around here would come in here. And it was, to a great extent, an open access university. It really wasn't anything that was impressive. That's why a lot of people in North Jersey didn't know about it. Increasingly more do, because right now, most of our applicants are actually from North Jersey. So up until then, they really were not anything. Until Henry Rowan came in and he said, in order for him to have the maximum impact of his gift, he wanted to create a college of engineering that is the best, that is unique, that every engineer will become a useful, productive citizen. That was his demand. And then what they did, they did a brilliant job of going and recruiting the top deans from MIT and other engineering to come in here and give them advice. How do we build the most amazing engineering college? And based on their advice, they have built something that is very, very unique. It's a clinic base in that students come in from year one, they work on an industrial project all four years. SPEAKER_01: See, that's what I would have liked. I studied engineering actually at UPenn. Okay. It was a long time ago, but I would say, you know, they've done a lot of improvements and I don't want to speak badly of my time there. I mean, I learned a lot there, but I did not love the engineering program. I did not feel it was very hands-on considering all that. SPEAKER_03: Very theoretical, yes, I know that. Because they prepare you for a PhD, that's what they do. Big universities like that, they really want to give you the kind of education so that you can go to graduate school. But for us, we want to get a person who can finish and go and work for Lockheed Martin. SPEAKER_01: I love that, to make it an experiential, you're in the labs, you're actually working and seeing how things work. SPEAKER_03: And that's why, as I said, the largest employer of our students right now is this major company, Global Company. And they're very proud. They don't hire from other universities around here. They get all of their engineers from us. SPEAKER_01: That's fantastic. SPEAKER_03: A hundred per year, that's amazing. SPEAKER_01: That is amazing. Because you're also knowing that the people are graduating from that kind of an experience really enjoy what they're doing. SPEAKER_03: And actually, like Martin, what they do, they also have a combat systems engineering certificate that they teach every one of those kids who they want to hire. So their staff teach them and get them an additional certificate above and beyond their engineering degree. SPEAKER_00: Preparing them to work for them. SPEAKER_03: That's exactly it, yes. And that, to me, is the future of higher education in this country. We need to do education based on make to order. If you are a company and you are in need of certain talent, we should be responsible to provide that to you. rather than the way that it is today. We just educate people without any connection with the real world. What is the need? And we do disproportionate graduates from different fields based on the need. Think about, for example, just an example, psychology versus mechanical engineering. The state needs 1,000 engineers, mechanical engineers, and we're producing 500, then we are not doing a service to the state. If the state needs 100 psychologists and we are producing 1,000, we are not doing any service to those 900 other people. And we need to make sure that we produce what the country and what the economy needs. And that to me requires a far closer collaboration with industries. They need to come in even at the curricular level to work with us to see exactly how do we need to train these future generations because this is a highly knowledge economy and you want to make sure that every single one of your kids are educated in a right way so that they can be a successful citizen. Because this is a very aggressive world. This is not a thing that people can kind of step back and wait for the opportunity. Opportunities come and go like this. And we need to create educated workforce, and especially today, because if you look at our situation right now, everybody, the country is very much against illegal immigrants. So we don't want immigrants. I mean, even this administration doesn't even want legal immigrants from some part of the world. So that's one thing. The other thing is that, unfortunately, people these days are getting married much later, and chances are they will have either one or no child. And two of them are my kids, 36 and 38, both married, no kids. So that's the second thing. And the third thing is that we are attacking DEI in a very, very aggressive way. What we are doing, we are basically aging the country and not producing enough young people to run this massive knowledge economy. And as a result, countries like China and India will get ahead of us. And that's the danger right now. In my opinion, if you don't want an immigrant, fine, great. I'm fine with that. If people don't want to have children, that's their business. That's their right. But why don't we go and look at every single one of our own citizens and turn them into productive ones? Think about a kid who lives with their single mother in Camden, and that kid could go one direction or the other, could end up in the wrong direction, end up in prison where you and I and everybody else pays to incarcerate them, or turn them into productive citizens where that person pays taxes for the benefit of all of us. That's the choice that we have, and we are killing it. My argument about DEI is not entitlement. It's really looking for excellence for the good of the country. SPEAKER_01: It's a really fascinating thing to hear your philosophy like this as the president of a university. SPEAKER_03: But it's the truth because, you know, I do not really believe in giving people handouts. I believe everybody should have a skin in the game. But it's crazy of us when there are brilliant kids around here with different, from different backgrounds, a different color and everything. They are the assets of this country. If we let them fade, they'll become a burden to this country. And we can't afford it because as I said, we are competing with countries that are very, very aggressive. India and China together have 3 billion people. That's nine times the population of the United States. SPEAKER_01: Yeah. SPEAKER_03: And they can afford to have tons of engineers and scientists and run the global economy. And the day that one country gets the perfect AI, that's when they rule the world. And we better be prepared for that. SPEAKER_00: How are, that is, you brought up a couple of points that I think that we wanted to discuss with you with regards to that, is the aging population and enrollment dropping. And I believe it was something, there's a cliff that's supposed to happen that there's not going to be as many people going to college. And there's also a lot of people, because of the extreme amount of knowledge available online now, are choosing to learn their skills. And I'll use my own family as an example. My oldest son goes to Baruch. He commutes into the city from Montclair to New York City. And he is taking computer science there, but he feels he knows more than the professors do. He's basically building a career on his own at night through all this technology that he's doing. And he just feels like he's going to college just because he's SAS. SPEAKER_03: We're forcing him. But that's the challenge that we are facing. That's the biggest challenge that the United States face in higher education is this. How do we transition the faculty members and professors from sage on the stage into a guide on the side? Because they're no longer sages. SPEAKER_01: Sage on the stage to a guide on the side. SPEAKER_03: You probably have got far more knowledge than many of those professors because they're better with this than they are. We are slower. So as a result, the question is, what is going to happen to, let's say, your grandchild, 17 years from now to go to college? How is that college going to look like? Is it going to be still a classroom with 30 people? The professor comes and writes on the board and everybody copies and takes the exam and get a degree? That's not going to happen. You're not going to do that. We are in the age of AI. We are in the age of fast-moving knowledge. And as a result, we need to restructure and redefine the whole notion of a university, not only the role of the faculty, role of credential, role of pricing, and the way that we educate people. And on the top of that, infrastructure. The buildings that we want to build today is going to last 50, 60 years from now. You're going to invest $100 million to build a building. It better be functional 50 years from now. The knowledge is going right now. Today's building, you build the technology first and then put the brick and mortar around it to support it. Up until now, it was brick and mortar first and a bunch of holes in the buildings to get wires through there. We need to transition all of this. Everything is going upside down as a result of knowledge. SPEAKER_01: Well, what do you think then about the professors that have been teaching a certain way for so long, how to retrain them? SPEAKER_03: We are giving them a lot of ways, but there are a number of ways. To begin with, the whole issue of promotion and tenure is going to become much more related to how they perform. But more importantly, we are giving them the tools, the ability to go and learn new way of delivering knowledge. Imagine that you can go in there and get a YouTube or TED talk and a five-minute talk to give it to the students, go and listen to these things and come back and let's discuss it. What I think the education of the future is going to be versus the education of today, the education of today is that knowledge transformation. That means I have the knowledge, you don't have it, I give it to you, you're going to use it to better your life. This is no longer the case. The future education is going to be, I know how to use this knowledge to make good decisions. I'm going to teach you how to use this knowledge to make good decisions, rather than how to memorize that knowledge. So both of us have the same knowledge, except that I know how to package it to make a good decision in life, and I need to teach you that. That's going to be the new education. SPEAKER_01: And do you feel that that can apply also to the liberal arts classes? Absolutely. SPEAKER_03: This is critical, absolutely critical for this country and universities not to damage or undermine humanities and social sciences. And the reason for that is this, because if we do, we're going to have a lot of robots. Art can become robots. We need to have a whole person. Because in today's knowledge, the notion of you going to college and get a degree and then work with your degree for the rest of your career, that's done. It's not going to happen. Chances are you're going to have 10 different jobs. Multiple careers. Multiple jobs. And some of the jobs that the industries have not yet been created. Imagine, I'm preparing these kids for the future of the economy that I don't even know what it is. 20 years ago, who knew that the largest hotel company in the world wouldn't even own a single hotel? And it's called Airbnb. Who would have thought that the greatest taxi company doesn't have a single taxi? Those are the knowledges that just came up and you're going to see many of those. So we are also have the responsibility to educating kids for the economy that we don't even know how it looks like. SPEAKER_01: It's teaching them also to be flexible and also to learn and to be to apply those skills broadly. SPEAKER_03: Absolutely. That's really that's see that as a result. This whole notion of mechanical engineering, psychology, this and that, you've got to question that. The whole issue of baccalaureate, master's, and PhD, you've got to question all of those. Because right now, majoring companies are coming up with these credentials, micro-credentials, and you can go and take it in three months, pay about $500, chances are you can get a $60,000 job with it. SPEAKER_00: And you know, and you probably know more about how to do it than the person who spent four years, you know, in courses. Well, the thing is that really strikes me though, is that the problem is nobody knows what to do yet. I was listening to the author of Sapiens, Yuval Harari, you know, he was talking on a podcast about that. that there is no one in government or business that can really help us guide us. The only people we have to look to right now are sci-fi writers. And they're the only ones that are trying to predict what our future is going to be like. And how, as a university, when you're having to make these decisions, I feel like you're hit with like so many, you know, it's like you have to brainstorm, like, okay, we could do it this way. Are we going to be an online school? Are we going to hire, you know, executives to come in? Are we going to become a big YouTube channel, a podcast that we're going to have teachers certificate for? How does it, how does it feel being in that position? SPEAKER_03: You're absolutely right on, because all the things that you just said are absolutely possible. And as a result, what you need to do, you need to bring as many brains as possible, talk to some industry leaders. We have been working with Cisco. We've been working with McKinsey. And get those outside perspectives of major advanced companies and see whether together you can build and imagine this future. Because as you're sitting, actually, we're looking at our campus. Our campus is divided by Route 322 that goes all the way to Atlantic City. And in the southern part is the old campus, and I'm trying to rebuild and get rid of all the old buildings and turn that into a campus of 21st century. It's going to be very different because there is going to be a dorm, there is going to be a certain knowledge, but it's going to be very, very different. Technology is going to play a major role in the way that these kids have to grow up. And in my opinion, universities should exist indefinitely because every parent should have the right at the age of 17 and 18 to trust their kids to go someplace that is safe and they can learn to grow up and make good decisions. That's called a university. SPEAKER_01: Right, because you're learning so many things besides just the actual major. SPEAKER_03: Absolutely, learning how to be smart, to function in this complex world. Those are the things that are absolutely essential for every one of us to continue maintaining that university. As we speak, we are planning an $80 million building for College of Humanities and Social Sciences, where we want to really, we have partnered with Arizona State in Dreamscape Learn, which is highly advanced technology-based education. And we are right now looking at digital humanities. You want to people put goggles on and they go in and you can literally be within the, let's say, art in a museum and you can fly in there and learn things that way. Or you can be in a field where you're touching a dinosaur or testing whether the dinosaur is sick and what kind of medicine you want to give them. All of that we can do right now at Rowan. So the newer classrooms are going to be very different also. Highly technology oriented. We are investing massive amounts of money on technology these days because that's what the future is. And these kids are, as you just said, your sons and daughters are probably far more advanced than many of the professors. SPEAKER_00: Well, that's an interesting thing, too, is that I've been hearing that a lot of white-collar jobs are being hit right now as the economy, with some of the changes in the government funding, and there's a shrinking of white-collar. Blue-collar jobs are somewhat steady, and they are, in a way, growing a little bit. Because if you get a degree right now, you're not sure you're going to get a job, as we were speaking to earlier, and what I think that you're saying that what Rowan is doing is they're trying to make it much more experiential, as Rachel was saying, in a way that you do feel like you're going to go to college and you're actually getting hands-on work, that you're going to go get a job that's not going to be disappearing. SPEAKER_03: That's really the fear now, is there isn't... Because it's a major investment on the part of every parent. When you send a son or daughter to school for four years, even to public schools, you're looking at tens of thousands of dollars. And when you look at the totality of this thing upon graduation, it's a mini mortgage for an undergraduate. If you go to professional degrees like medicine and everything, now you're talking about a serious mortgage. SPEAKER_01: Yeah. SPEAKER_03: And you cannot have a society where people, young people, come out of college with massive burden on their shoulder, and it delays everything else that they want to do, whether they want to buy a house, buy a car, get married, Everything needs to slow down so that they can deal with this thing. Now, with the federal government, with this one big, beautiful bill that are going to pass, that thing is going to devastate hundreds of thousands of Americans because Pell Grant is going to get hit big time. And that means the poorest of the poor are going to not be able to go to college. Furthermore, the loan guarantee is going to be even worse. Federal loan guarantee is critical because for a low-income person, They can go there and get a loan without paying interest until the day that they start earning. Now, these kids have to go to a bank. Many of them would not qualify, even if they qualify, the interest rate is significantly higher and it would be accrued from day one that they get the money. SPEAKER_01: That's an interesting way to look at the how, I mean, we do know that the equation is off. If the investment is so heavy into getting the college degree, then of course you're going to want the job right after that's the highest paying. So more and more people want to go into a major that will be high paying. And then all these other majors are just neglected because everyone's afraid of getting a job. But I hadn't also thought about it with all the burden, the financial burden, how it delays all the rest of your life. Because having a job is one part of your life. It's a big part. But then wanting a relationship, wanting a home, wanting maybe kids or a family, if you're pushing all of that out as well, what are those ramifications for the country? SPEAKER_03: And those are really, really serious ramifications. They really are. Because as I said, aging of a country is bad. If you look at a country like Italy or Japan, people are highly entitled. And it's age. As a result, the economy will shrink. And you can't afford to let the number one political, military, and economic power in the world to get into that situation. And as I said, based on those three factors, I'm afraid we are going in that direction. SPEAKER_00: We're very much living through a very quick evolution that we have to adjust to very fast. SPEAKER_01: Faster than at any other point in time, yeah. SPEAKER_00: Well, one of the things that I wanted to talk about kind of related. You brought it up at the beginning and talking about rankings of universities and U.S. news and world reports. There was a very interesting kind of telling interview that Malcolm Gladwell had with the publishers of it, that relationship with the peer review portion of that. And it's usually a president of Harvard is asked, what what universities do you like? And they're like, well, I like Princeton and I like, you know, whatever. And you talk about in that interview that the hot sauce that you have created that you sent it out to every president in the, in all the university presidents so they would get to know who you were. SPEAKER_03: With my picture on it too. SPEAKER_00: Did you hear back? SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah, a number of universities wrote and they were very, very thankful and grateful and that I was very creative. In fact, Rutgers copied us and they created their own hot sauce too. SPEAKER_00: Did they? Jersey! So what, when did this start, the hot sauce decision? Adventure. Yeah. SPEAKER_03: That venture started, I would say, 15 years ago when I love gardening. I do a lot of that. I love nature and outside. So I grow vegetable and one year I grew a lot of peppers and I basically decided what to do. And I like experimentally cooking. I like to do that kind of stuff. So I put it in a pot and made some hot sauce with some spices and other things. It was okay. And I kept improving this and eventually jarred them and gave them to some of my staff and all my colleagues. And that's how it became known as, and in fact, they referred to it the first time I gave it to them, I called it Ali's Nasty. And then eventually, I think about eight years ago, my staff from the marketing came and said, would you be able to make a batch and we will auction it and see how it goes. And I did. I had to actually go home and do that. My wife kicked me out of the kitchen because the fume will kill you. So we have a store in the garage, that's where I did it. It was auctioned and it was very popular and there were people in the waiting list. So I did another batch, another batch. The following year, we went big. We basically, I started growing in a farm and we have a lot of land in here and it has now gotten into a major, major operation. What I do is I do three things actually, it's not just the hot sauce. I grow various peppers, 10 different types of pepper, the hottest in the world. And we basically gather this thing tens of thousands, and we have got storage facilities over at Rutgers Food Center in Cumberland, and that's where we bought all these things. And we sell them, and all the proceeds, everything goes to needy students. So it's purely for needy students. And expenses, most of it, some of it, I actually covered myself. And we have raised about $3 million, and lots of students have been helped. So that's one project. And then the second project is I also grow fruit and vegetables, lots of that. Last year was 30,000 pounds, this year I'm hoping would be 50 tons. We box these things and we give them to people, whether it's church, whether people come and line up on campus, whether it's school district and we have a food pantry, so a lot of people get that. And the third thing that I do is I actually raise koi fish. And koi fish are used in aquaponic farming. We have a greenhouse where we grow vegetable inside the thing. So I've got, right now I've got at least 20,000 baby fish that I'm feeding every day. SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness, you're starting your own agriculture school. SPEAKER_03: We have it, we are trying. You do? That's what I was going to ask. We are moving modern agriculture to rural use. SPEAKER_00: Do you teach these, have these become courses, these particular? SPEAKER_03: Yes, there is a course, but I also teach the kids about the business, small business of hot sauce from the beginning to the end. So it's run by students, the students run this thing, they sell it and And I teach them, you know, if you wanted to start your own landscaping, what is the first thing you need to do? What is the second thing you need to do? How do you start a small factory? Is it a course? It's not a conversation. SPEAKER_00: I think it needs to be a course. SPEAKER_03: Yes, it should be a course, of course, but it's a business course. How do you go to a bank manager and borrow $5,000 to buy equipment? Those are the kind of things that kids don't know how to do. SPEAKER_00: That's exactly, it's the most, it's so tangible for them as well. SPEAKER_01: Ask also about the PhD in creativity. Well, I read about that. And as you were speaking so much about brainstorming about the future of universities and teaching, I mean, that is all about being able to be creative and think in different ways and taking sort of an engineering background, but also future think. SPEAKER_03: Absolutely, you have to really, the world is moving so fast that you really have to have the ability to predict the future. Because if you don't, you slow down, you stop. In order for you to move forward, you have to see what is ahead of you. So you really have to move and that requires constant education, constant learning, constant being involved. And it's essential to do that. SPEAKER_01: So in the PhD for Creativity, what are some of the things that people are giving you feedback on with it? SPEAKER_03: Well, actually, let me tell you, the PhD in Creativity came from the University of Arts in Philadelphia when they went belly up. Oh, yes. We adopted them. So we brought the two professors and the five students who were in the program already and they were finished. And they graduated. This is the first year. SPEAKER_02: That's great. SPEAKER_03: Basically, it's the idea of, again, creativity in all facets of life. The way that I do things in order to be creative, I always try to imagine the unimaginable. I go above and beyond what is crazy. SPEAKER_01: Do you get those ideas a lot while you're growing peppers? SPEAKER_03: Yes. Yes, actually. SPEAKER_01: Right? Being out in nature and doing something different. SPEAKER_03: No, I was also a runner. I was a marathoner. I ran many marathons. I used to really solve a lot of my problems during running, yes. When you're on your own and you're focusing, a lot of great things happen. Human mind is amazing when you give it a chance. SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is true. I think you've given us a lot of very hopeful, a lot of tips on how to live our lives and a lot of good hope for presidents of universities like you that are really, you know, Thinking about the tangible student and how you can help them go out into the world and succeed. SPEAKER_03: That's our role. That's our job, though. In fact, if we don't do that, in my opinion, we have failed. SPEAKER_01: Right. I feel like there is this, though, perception of many university leaders of them not being transformational leaders. And speaking to you, it's a breath of fresh air. But it's also nice to see that you really are and have been thinking this way for Rowan. SPEAKER_03: A long time yet. SPEAKER_01: Yeah, for a long time. SPEAKER_03: Higher education is very resistant to change. If you ask 10 professors, how many of you does it take to change a light bulb? They say, oh my God, change? SPEAKER_00: But you have to now, if you don't, yeah. SPEAKER_03: The reason that we are successful in here is the concept of openness and transparency and honesty. People cannot be fooled. And you should never look at any individual less than purely a dignified human being. You've got to have that attitude. We have 22 unions in this university. We don't have a single... 22. None: 22. SPEAKER_03: We don't have a single union problem. They come in here, whatever they ask, I give them the truth, always. We put our budget online for everybody to see. So you can see the university finances yourself. You can see what president does or where he goes. I think honesty is very important today. If you are that, then people come along. Because at the end of the day, every human being wants to have a dignified life and want to have a life with purpose. SPEAKER_02: Yes. SPEAKER_03: And I really believe the reason that this place is successful is exactly that. I became us. That's the key. You've got to become us. Because if you keep everybody inside the tent, those who are outside will not pee all over the tent. SPEAKER_00: Well, I completely agree with that. I heard something once. It's like, people, when they get into power, they really show themselves, you know, who they really are. And I think that what you demonstrated, because you've been in power longer than most presidents of universities, I think that... I'm the oldest in New Jersey, actually, right now. Is that right? The oldest president of a university or the longest? The number of years, I think. SPEAKER_03: The number of years. Yeah, yeah. The oldest maybe, too. SPEAKER_00: I don't think you're the oldest, but I think you might have been the longest. But so it seems that you definitely have kept this us and we theory working. Rowan is just growing and growing. I mean, we saw the rankings, whether they are truthful or not, as we hear that that U.S. World, whatever, news and report is sometimes questionable. But yours do seem to be going up and up and up. SPEAKER_03: I mean, we have, you know, many universities right now have enrollment problem. We have the reverse of enrollment problem. Our challenge for next year, actually, is how do we have enough dorm room for our students? We have to triple some kids. That makes one about the quality of the institution, the safety of the campus, the beauty of the campus. Because at the end of the day, you've got to create home away from home for these kids. These are the kids who have left the home for the first time. They were fed, their clothes were washed, the bed was made, all of these things. Suddenly, all of it is gone, and they've got to do it themselves. And it's a shock. SPEAKER_01: People don't realize that, honestly, because- That's a very good point, because I think that gets overlooked when all these kids, freshmen, go to college campuses all over, and then a lot of them are not prepared at all for that. SPEAKER_03: No, it's like a military camp. It's difficult, because think about the kid who has been in a very protective environment in a rural area. Suddenly you come to this university where everybody speak different language, they look differently, and there is a competition, and everybody wants to get ahead of you. It's overwhelming. You know, you've gone from high school where you have seen the same kid for the past 12 years, and you're very close, and suddenly all of it is gone, and a whole new group of people, vastly different in their look, in their accent, in their way, and that's a challenge. And then you have to balance your own budget, get up early in the morning, make sure that your time is, all of these things you have to do. So have some sympathy for our kids. SPEAKER_01: For sure, for sure. We do have a lot of sympathy. Well, because we're going through it with our own kids. SPEAKER_00: We are. We are. Well, it's such a fascinating story that you have from your humble beginnings in Iran to being the leader of a university that's just growing and taking care of all of our children, you know, and helping them navigate this world. It's been an honor to speak with you and to meet you. SPEAKER_01: Thank you. SPEAKER_00: Thank you for all that you do. We do close out our interviews with a question. And the question is, is there something that stands out to you that you really love about New Jersey? SPEAKER_03: Jersey to me. SPEAKER_00: The Jersey tomato. The tomato. That is so perfect. SPEAKER_03: I grow a lot of them and if you give me your address, I'll send you some hot sauce and tomato. SPEAKER_01: We will then. SPEAKER_03: Not only- Come in, actually pick your own. You could come with a truck, fill it up and take it there and give it to the churches around your home. SPEAKER_01: I love that. That's a great idea. That'd be great. Janette, let's do that. Road trip. SPEAKER_03: Road trip. Come and see Rowan, yes. If you want to, your kids here, come and see the campus. It's a beautiful campus. It really is very nice. I feel very good about this thing because people's kids are safe. SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, I wanted to, I was telling Rachel, I don't know whether I should say it or not, and full disclosure, my son picked Rowan. SPEAKER_03: That's correct. I'm glad to hear that. I'm going to see more of you, hopefully. What major do you want to do? What major? What is this? SPEAKER_01: He doesn't know yet. I think it's going to be, the thing is, it's good to explore. Yeah. SPEAKER_03: It's really 40, more than 40% or close to 50% of our students when they come in, they're exploring. They don't know what they want to do. I myself went through three major changes. I was electrical engineering, computer engineering, then mathematics, and then industrial engineering. So let them explore, let them find their own ways. And it's the best way because at the end of the day, they don't get to blame you for it either. SPEAKER_01: I think that is super important advice, and I try to give that to as many friends as I can, is do not push your kids into a major. You will regret it, they will be angry with you, and they can hold it over your head the rest of your life, and it's not worth it. Let them make their own decisions. SPEAKER_03: And all you need to do is stay in contact. And if they don't respond to you, they don't come and visit, write them a nice letter. Hi son, I love you, I love that you're so friendly with your girlfriend, that the classes are good, Oh, by the way, here is $200 money. Why don't you go to dinner with your girlfriend? And then don't put the money in there. He will call you. SPEAKER_00: I love that. Well, thank you, Dr. Houshmand, for coming out of Los Angeles. It's been a pleasure to meet you, and I'm just grateful that my son will be going to this school. SPEAKER_03: I'm so glad that she is, and I look forward to seeing you. Thank you for the interview. It was wonderful speaking with both of you. SPEAKER_01: This podcast was produced by Rachel Martens and Janette Afsharian. You can find us on Spotify, iTunes and Buzzsprout. Thanks for listening. See you next week.