The Daily Iowan: What did you do over the summer?

President Mason: Well unlike students who get to go away and do other different kinds of things for the summer, I stay here and work for the most part, and a lot of my work, of course, involves not only work on campus but work off campus as well. This summer, we did a lot more of our alumni work off campus than I typically do in a summer. Two summers ago, I was here for the flood. This year, the plans are to really catch up on some of the alumni and external work that I typically do for the university. I was off-campus a lot, mostly on behalf of the university or doing some of the projects I have going on in Washington, D.C.

DI: What kinds of projects?

Mason: I sit on a number of committees and boards that are with higher education. Organizations like the American Counsel on Education and the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities. So they had some meetings over the summer. I also do some work that helps the NIH and NSF funding organizations when it comes to peer review. So I did some projects this summer for those as well. Which I think also helps the University of Iowa. So it was a very busy summer. I didn’t have any dull moments at all this summer.

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DI: What are your thoughts on this weekend, since the students are back, with the 21-ordinance? Any reflections?

Mason: It’ll be a while before we know fully what’s happened. The things I’m hearing are probably the things you’re hearing, which are that it was quiet, it was quieter than most people expected downtown, and I think it’s because that the students do understand that past a certain hour now if you’re underage, under a legal age, you can’t be in the bars, and that’s been a big change this summer too.

I think we’ve seen the change start during the summertime. We’ll see what it means this fall semester. I’m certainly hoping that our students understand that this is as much about, in fact it’s all about, health and safety. It’s not about trying to make this less enjoyable for them. Our new students won’t know the difference, and many of our older students are now over 21, so they won’t see much of a difference in their lives either. So it’s a time of transition for us, and we’ll see what happens, obviously, in November when this comes up for a vote.

DI: When you first selected Provost Wallace Loh, you expected him here for five years, and now he’s only here for two. What are your thoughts on that and how will that affect your search for the interim provost?

Mason: Well, you know, for some reason people think this isn’t a good thing. It’s a great thing. I mean this speaks well for not only Provost Loh but for obviously the choice we made here at the UI when you hire the best people. Not surprisingly, they get other opportunities. Our best people are always being persuaded for other opportunities. No one should be surprised by that. If anything, I’m going to miss him. He was a great part of the team, a great member of the team he did great things for us in terms of helping us to shaping a strategic plan going forward and working in the community as well as he did especially on the health and safety issues. He’s been involved in all of this from the start. So my intent, obviously, is to make sure that we don’t miss a step going forward in the strategic planning process or with the things we have jointly with our community and to make sure that the UI continues to choose the very best people we can find for these important jobs. It’s an opportunity. It’s an opportunity for him; it’s also an opportunity for us. So there’s no disappointment here I’m really very pleased for him. I would have enjoyed working with him for however many years I could have persuaded him to stay.

But this is just too good of an opportunity for him. You know there is only 62 universities in this country that are members of the American Association of Universities. So to be chosen as president for one of these 62 very special institutions is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I’ve had that opportunity, and I’m really pleased that Wallace now has that opportunity.

DI: How do you feel that it will affect the programs he helped initiate as well?

Mason: Well, if I do my job well, it won’t affect them at all. We’ll make a good selection for interim provost, and we’ll get the search started fairly quickly here so we can do this and not miss a beat.

DI: With the influx of incoming students, some students have commented on how their class sizes are larger. Will it affect the quality of education that the students are receiving?

Mason: Are students really noticing that? I’m surprised, actually, because the class sizes are not that much bigger. We are talking, for small classes, we’re talking one or two students at most. For larger classes, it’s more students, obviously, but I don’t think and I hope that they aren’t going to notice anything in terms of quality. I think our instructors will notice it more because it does mean more work for them; more papers to grade, more work in terms of the daily interactions with their students. I probably worry as much about our instructors and our faculty as I do about our students when it comes to the class sizes so we don’t go too far with this. In the past we’ve enjoyed, I think, a good ratio of class sizes, and we’re pushing that a little further then I’d like to.

And I think now as we see, if these numbers stay with us, in other words, if our retention rate goes up and if we continue to recruit good class sizes like we did this past fall, we’ll have more revenue on an ongoing basis through those tuition dollars to be able to regularize the temporary faculty we’ve hired and to make certain we have enough of the graduate teaching assistants that we need, and I think you’ll start to see those numbers come back down, and that’ll be a good thing. So, it’ll take a little time, but I think that over the long haul — in short term, you shouldn’t notice anything quality-wise, and in the long term, the desire is to bring us back down.

DI: What is your response to the Mills lawsuit?

Mason: It’s ongoing litigation and a personnel issue, and I don’t comment on either of those publicly.