THE MANHATTAN PROJECT. (manhattanmods) wrote in mnhttnprjct, @ 2010-07-20 20:16:00 |
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Entry tags: | !plot, !radio transcript, #local news |
RADIO TRANSCRIPT, MARKETPLACE FOR AMERICAN PUBLIC MEDIA.
RYSSDAL: For our last story on tonight’s broadcast, we’re going up the coast to New York to discuss an unusual case of bailing out the education system. Joining us from WNYC-FM in Manhattan is Marketplace’s Jasper Brin. BRIN: Students and employees at New York University have been waiting for this day for months: the final announcement about the University’s plan to refinance the school for the 2029-2030 academic year. Although there’s been talks about allowing private investors to inject capital into one of the most prestigious universities on the Eastern seaboard, the University went with a different approach: allowing two major government bodies dabble in some real estate, instead. NORRELL: On the phone. Given the University’s involvement with public health care and policy in the New York area, when we were offered the deal with the AHRQ to sign over abandoned dormitories in order to make a state-of-the-art radiation sickness testing facility, it was difficult to say no. The AHRQ and NYU are both committed to public health, and if this could help us get out of our predicament? All the better. BRIN: That’s Barbara Norrell, Chief Financial Officer for New York University, discussing the benefits that the University will have with signing over over 3 city blocks’ worth of real-estate to the Agency of Healthcare Research and Quality. In a sister deal, the University also agreed to join with Columbia University in relinquishing all fiscal operations of their collegiate presses to the newly-formed Bureau of Arts and Letters for the next five years. By entering this three-way publishing partnership with one of NYU’s biggest rivals and the BAL, NYU hopes to make up for lost operating costs courtesy of the toll of eBook sales across the board. Norrell: NORRELL: It’s no secret that paper publishing, especially in the post-atomic age when resources have depleted to all-time lows, is more the realm of a lost art form than a fiscally-viable option for a business – even a university, mind you – to maintain. By entering this partnership with Columbia and the BAL, we hope to keep the presses open as a monument to books and the book arts without worrying about operating costs, thereby ensuring the future of the University. BRIN: Despite all these groundbreaking deals, those students who used to be clamoring for more news on their fate earlier this summer seemed suspiciously placid – even clueless – when asked about it this afternoon. In the words of one student on the grounds of Washington Square: STUDENT: Um, didn’t we get that stuff finalized, like, a month ago with those refugee-sympathetic developer guys? RYSSDAL: Tomorrow: how end-of-life care is changing in the post-nuclear age. I’m Kai Ryssdal and this is Marketplace. |