Love said Wharton offers discounted tickets to students for the majority of its Broadway and non-Broadway shows.

About 68 percent of the center’s income comes from ticket sales, with the rest made up of donations, corporate sponsorships and the university’s contributions, Love said.

“We really value our student engagement and try to make it as affordable as possible for you to join us,” Love said.

Recently elected MSU Trustee Brian Breslin was at the meeting as part of his goal to connect with different groups in the university.

“I’m here simply to observe and learn a little bit about COGS,” Breslin said.

Health care continued to be a hot topic in the group’s discussion as it passed a resolution to ask the university to pool all the graduate students together to allow them, their spouses and children to be on the same plan that currently is offered to graduate assistants at the same rate.

Adam Lovgren, COGS vice president of graduate student wellness, said the plan offered to graduate student assistants offers more coverage than the current student base plan offered by the university, he said.

The group would like to see the university provide health care coverage on its own instead of contracting it out to a provider like Aetna, a proposal that could save the university more than $1 million , Lovgren said.

“The university is big enough to subsidize the risk,” he said.

One of the problems with the current system is only those dependants with high-risk, high-cost medical concerns are likely to buy health insurance, essentially “out-pricing” everyone else and deferring them from buying a plan, Lovgren said.

However, some members, including medical school liaison Suzanne Borkowski, said they probably would not participate in the plan. With the recently passed federal legislation, children up to age 26 would be allowed to stay on their parents’ health care plans, something Borkowski said she plans to do.

COGS representatives also are meeting with university partners, including Graduate School Dean Karen Klomparens, Friday to discuss their hopes to set up a child care endowment grant for graduate and professional students, Lovgren said.

“We hope to get that underway real soon so we can start building that endowment,” he said.
The group also voted to allocate $300 to help co-sponsor a Thanksgiving dinner for international students at MSU.

COGS President Stefan Fletcher said this is the third year the event has been held and typically has a turnout of 200 to 300 students.

“I’ve never seen so many people corroboratively cook turkey in my life,” Fletcher said.