/ Modified aug 25, 2017 4:45 p.m.

Episode 152: The Return of Students, and a Lively Events Calendar

The UA has a new president. See what's new as the school year gets started.

University of Arizona is a major economic, intellectual and cultural driver in Tucson. Metro Week talks shop with new president Robert Robbins and look at businesses around campus.

Tucson’s sleepy summer season has come to an official end, with classes at the UA back in session. We’re here on campus to ask what’s new this year.

This is the first semester on campus for Zahra Hasan and 10,000 other new students. It’s also the first academic year for the UA’s new president Robert Robbins. We visited him in his office this week and we started by talking about how his first few months on the job have gone.

Robbins’s office is just a few steps from the shops and restaurants on University Boulevard. Metro Week sits down with Jane McCollum, the general manager of the Marshall Foundation, which owns and leases most of the property in this area. McCollum talked about how businesses here are feeling about students’ return.

The Marshall Foundation has a unique structure. It’s a major landowner and also a large charitable organization with a long history in Tucson


The return of students and those who flee Tucson during the summer months is also a relief for businesses downtown. For the past 12 years, there’s been a music festival at Hotel Congress marking the end of summer called HOCO fest, and this year it’s going big

HOCO fest begins Wednesday, Aug. 30 and runs through Labor Day weekend.

Jane McCollum, Marshall Foundation general manager

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