Everdeen Mason of the Plain Dealer reported 07/14/10: "¶ One year after becoming president of Cleveland State University, Ronald Berkman has begun to make his mark at the school. ¶ Berkman told a luncheon gathering Tuesday that a year from now, 20 CSU students will begin medical school in collaboration with the Northeastern Ohio Universities Colleges of Medicine and Pharmacy. ¶ It is part of his initiative to create opportunities for CSU students and hopefully keep many of them in town after graduation. He said at the Executive Caterers corporate Club at Landerhaven on Tuesday that most graduates would like to stay but do not think they have career opportunities. ¶ Berkman likes an urban setting far a college. He came to Cleveland from Florida International University, in Miami, where he was provost. ¶ In a city, students experience more than the typical college lifestyle, he said. They get a sense of real-life experiences that will ease their transition into becoming active community members. ¶ Berkman outlined several other projects he thinks will allow students to learn while bettering the community: ¦ Get more students to live on campus. ¦ Join with the Cleveland schools on a teaching opportunity that will challenge both the CSU and Cleveland students. ¦ Create more visibility for CSU’s nursing program. ¶ Beckman believes if more students live on campus, they will be exposed to the community’s cultural benefits. The community in turn will benefit from the diversity the students provide, he said. ¶ The university is moving quickly in this direction. A total of 600 new dormitory rooms are being built. ¶ The project with the Cleveland schools is still in the planning stages. Berkman wants CSU students to teach in a rigorous K-12 setting. He said he would like graduates of the laboratory school to be so accomplished that they would be proficient in two languages, such as Spanish and Chinese. ¶ Berkman also wants CSU to contribute to better health care for the public. In August 2011, CSU students with NEOUCOM, the public medical school in Rootstown. Berkman hopes the new doctors will provide the inner city with much-needed primary-care physicians. ¶ Berkman has pulled CSU’s nursing school from the College of Education and Human Services and made it an independent program. ¶ He said having a stand-alone nursing school should attract more students. More than 60 percent of nurses in Cleveland were hired from outside the city, Berkman added.”