As Wayne State University president, Irvin Reid\'s mission is to make the school world-class. In the last five years, he\'s been abroad 15 times to such places as India, Brazil, Chile, Turkey, Germany, Egypt, France, Japan and to Syria. The total cost was roughly $50,000, not including the expenses of university personnel who traveled with Reid. By contrast, University of Michigan President Mary Sue Coleman traveled abroad twice since becoming president in 2002. Michigan State University President Lou Anna Simon has been abroad twice since she became president in 2004. Reid, who became president in 1997, said his trips were primarily to forge joint programs with other schools and to foster student or faculty exchanges. \"If I am the University of Michigan , I don\'t have to have the president as cheerleader,\" Reid said this week. The same is true for Michigan State , he added. \"Our profile is not as high. I think we\'re very good, but we\'re not as well known.\"