MSU officials return from Dubai with news of progress

MSU officials traveled to Dubai last week and returned with reports of progress in the plan to be the first American university in the area commonly regarded as a hot spot for Middle East development.

“It’s tremendous progress,” said John Hudzik, MSU vice president of global engagement and strategic projects. “We have virtually reached an agreement on all of the programmatic and financial and support kinds of issues that take a lot of planning and so forth. All of these issues have really crystallized very nicely.”

The trip, which was the official public launch of the partnership between MSU and Dubai, was MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon’s first after finalizing the agreement in September. MSU will occupy space in the Dubai International Academic City, where, beginning in fall 2008, MSU students will be able to take classes and earn a degree, as they would in East Lansing.