Approximately 100 people attended a discussion with Chancellor Biddy Martin about her Badger Partnership proposal Monday at the first of three forum sessions about the new business model.
Martin's resolution aims to organize UW-Madison more like a business to improve relationships with state government.
The ongoing proposal has received public attention recently as Martin presents new ideas for improving relationships between the state of Wisconsin and the university.
""One of the solutions that would allow us to do what we need to do, which is preserve quality and value, while remaining public in our mission, would be to become more entrepreneurial and to depend somewhat lesser on the state,"" said Martin.
Martin said the university needs more autonomy from the state to thrive. ""The state can give us a little more room to operate if we're going to compete among international research universities.""
""We can look at the Madison Initiative for undergraduates as an index of what the value would be to students of doing everything we can to preserve the quality of UW-Madison and of student's degrees,"" Martin said.
Martin spoke highly of UW-Madison's research achievements throughout the school's history in the state and the world.
""It's something of a miracle that a state of modest population and wealth has invested over 150 years in a university and made it one of the world's great research universities,"" Martin said. ""Part of what we need to do is protect that investment.""
Martin stressed the need for university students across the state of Wisconsin and the benefits of having educated students in jobs across the state.
""We need more young people in the state of Wisconsin to go to college and graduate from college, which is the return on a college degree in terms of income, health outcomes, and civic participation,"" Martin said. ""All of those returns on investment need to continue to increase overtime.""
