Since 2010, Amazon's hiring of graduates of the University of Michigan's Master of Business Administration program has increased two-and-a-half-fold, UM President Mark Schlissel told Crain's.

"My understanding is we're their No. 1 source of MBAs and their top two or three source of engineers," Schlissel said in an interview Wednesday. "They really love our students."

The brainstorming about how Michigan could possibly meet the talent demand Amazon would create by bringing 50,000 jobs to Detroit has given rise to serious discussions on state-level higher education strategy.

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During the past decade, when the state's auto-dominated economy was in a precipitous decline, Michigan's higher education policy and strategy was largely focused on steadily reducing state taxpayer support for public universities and community colleges to balance the state's budget.

Since Gov. Rick Snyder took the last 15 percent chop in 2011, state funding has been marginally restored with various strings attached, some of which focused on boosting the number of graduates in the fields science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).

University leaders have mostly gone along to get along with legislators, agreeing to keep tuition increases in line with inflation in exchange for the restored funding (total state spending on higher education is $1.63 billion this fiscal year, about $316 million less than in the 2002 fiscal year before the cutting began).

But pleas for a more robust reinvestment in higher education have been largely ignored. And there has been little discussion in Lansing on what exactly is the strategic goal of the state's education system.

Amazon's surprise announcement in early September of its intent to establish a second headquarters outside of Seattle that would rely heavily on a highly talented labor pool has spurred some of the state's business and government leaders into action.

Gov. Rick Snyder's administration is expected to lay out to Amazon how the state will boost its investment in STEM education programs, particularly certificates in computer coding and other information technology jobs that don't necessarily require a four-year bachelor's degree.

The governor has publicly referred to the initiative as a "Marshall Plan for talent" — drawing a vivid comparison of rebuilding Europe after World War II and rebuilding what most view as a broken education system in Michigan.

"Our hope is to impress upon Amazon or any new employer that wants to come to Michigan that we're already working on our education system," said John Walsh, director of strategy policy for Snyder.

Details of the proposal and how much financial commitment the state will make are not being made public at this point because of the competitive nature of the Amazon bid, Walsh said.

Snyder will make a budgetary proposal to lawmakers early next year that will focus building a more coordinated career and technical education system, spokesman Ari Adler said, "but do it in a big picture sort of way."

Schlissel, who is still a relative newcomer to Michigan having arrived in Ann Arbor just more than three years ago, said he's been surprised by the sudden "momentum" the Amazon bid has created for getting a unified strategy on talent development.

"Even if we don't win the Amazon competition, I think one of the beneficial byproducts is bringing together government, private business and academic leaders to formulate training programs at the scale we need to be competitive in the future for internal and external business development," Schlissel said.