Corporations Pay at 'Sustainable Operations Summit' to Meet With University Officials

Angela Januzzi

July 10, 2007

In lieu of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators’ decision to disallow lenders to be sponsors at their conferences, a new higher education conference has now come under fire. At the Sustainable Operations Summit in Albuquerque last month, a vendor could meet individually with 15 officials—for $18,500. Through private meetings with the higher administration members of universities, company representatives had as forum to network with the school officials who could potentially be their clients.

The elite conference has drawn sharp criticism about its effect on the welfare of higher education. As a marketing consultant to colleges, Richard A. Hesel stated about the conference: “This is a form of trying to buy influence. People are paying for access.”

However, other school officials counter-argue that paid events such as this are merely the evolving state of the higher education industry. Lisa Glover Henderson, director of energy initiatives at the University of Rochester, said that: “It doesn’t both mer. That’s part of the world we live in today. I don’t think there is a conflict.”

This event is of course not the first “higher education summit” to convene. Over the past decade, more and more conferences are cropping up to promote relationships between corporate executives and college and university officials. However, during the past six months of New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo’s statements that lenders have been setting loan rates college-by-college, sensitivity has skyrocketed concerning liaisons between higher education and corporate business.

Source: Finder, Alan. “Paid Event for Education Officials Sets One-on-One Sales Meetings.” www.nytimes.com. Posted: July 10, 2007.