SPEAKER_05
ASEE's Race and Ethnicity and Higher Education Project has released the 2024 STAVIS report and updated the accompanying website. Supported by the Mellon Foundation, the report provides an updated overview of key topics in higher education, including undergraduate and graduate student enrollment, completion, student debt, and financing, by race and ethnicity. Explore the findings and download the report at www.
equityandhighered.org. Hello and welcome to .ddu, the Higher Education Policy Podcast from the American Council on Education.
And that sound you hear is the live audience we're in front of here at AC 2023 in Washington DC, as we record our first ever live .edu podcast. So welcome everyone, thank you so much for joining us.
You can cheer again. We're going to constantly prompt our audience to cheer for us. We are joined, well I am joined as always by my illustrious co-host, Sarah Spreitzer.
SPEAKER_06
Not always. I will just say.
SPEAKER_06
I think I got, I'm the lucky co-host because I got to do this with you because Mushach is obviously very busy doing all of his panels about the Carnegie classification, but we miss him very much.
SPEAKER_05
No, we don't miss Mushach. He's standing in the back of the room. For those of you who can only listen, he is ditching us entirely and sitting there laughing at us as he does it.
So, uh, Sarah, how are you doing today?
SPEAKER_06
Good, good. I can't believe we're only like five hours into the annual meeting. Six hours? I don't know.
Time seems to have just stopped. Eyes by. But it's great to see everybody in person.
You know, post-COVID coming back to in-person meetings has been really wonderful.
SPEAKER_05
It has. It's been great seeing people. And I think I especially love seeing the excitement of different members of AC and other folks around a huge range of programming.
That's been pretty exciting, pretty captivating. So, great to do this. And again, great to try this out and have people in the room hold different energy to doing this with people around.
SPEAKER_06
Yeah. Yeah. Well, and we're very lucky because this episode of the dot edu podcast is going to focus on data from the recently released report, the American college president. 2023 edition.
We're going to unpack findings related to gender and women's experiences in presidential leadership. The study was actually just released here at AC 2023. Just a little background before we get into the discussion.
A.C.E.s American College President Study, or ACPS, is the most comprehensive in-depth survey and report about the college presidency and pathways to higher education leadership. The survey has been conducted approximately every five years since 1986.
And if you'd like to download a copy, if you're not actually here in person getting one of the nice shiny executive summaries, you can download the report at acenet.edu slash acps. But we are very blessed to be joined by two fabulous speakers.
We have Kenya Ayers Paul Moore, the president of Torrent County College Northeast campus. And we also have Pamela Eddy, associate provost for faculty affairs and development and professor of higher education at William & Mary. So in the latest release of the ACPS, they found that men still outnumber women two to one in the presidency.
The data also points to gendered experiences within the presidency and gaps between men and women. Those gaps are even larger between men and women of color. So to start with Kenyan Pamela, can you tell us a little bit about your journey in higher ed?
SPEAKER_00
So a long time ago. We have two minutes, so I'll give you the condensed version. When I first went to graduate school after college, I was going to be a faculty member and I thought this is going to take too long.
And so I had the fall in love moved somewhere else have three children part of the story that came along with it. And as a trailing spouse, what I found is I kept having to start over and over and over again. And one of the positions I had done was in a community college doing continuing ed.
And I thought, all right, this will be great. The next move. I'll do my doctorate and then I'll go and become a community college president.
End of story. Except I got into my program and realized I actually like research and I ended up being a faculty member for 20 years. And so what I did was train other people to be college presidents and had the good fortune to cross paths with Kenya when I was in Michigan Working with the ac women's network of higher ed leaders.
And so trying to always have at the center of my research is how do we look at equity? Gender equity racial equity. And so that's been a real strong line throughout my career so far.
SPEAKER_04
Kenya. So first of all, I'm so excited to be here. This is I'm fan girling.
So I'm going to try and Just just focus in this moment. It is such a joy Especially to stage share the stage with Pamela as she mentioned at a time in my life where I had a president in michigan Kettering university who said to me you should come and be our institutional representative on behalf of the ac women's network in michigan I started down that path and eventually As I did that I became the president of the michigan ac network And Pamela was on the board and so we had a chance really to grow together for those in the room We had really dark hair at that time And I'll just share that you look concerned. It's okay.
I will share that what we really enjoyed about that time is that We really were grounded in a community of lots of women presidents and The joy now is that I get to sit as a president and so I'm excited about talking through this research with you
SPEAKER_06
That's great. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that um I think johnny of the next question.
I do. Yes, so um
SPEAKER_05
One of the findings from the survey is that over half of presidents are considering stepping down from their current position in the next three to five years Yes For those listening, there's a little bit of a technical introduction. So apologies What could this window of opportunity mean for increasing the representation of women in the presidency and and maybe more importantly, how do we do it?
SPEAKER_04
Okay, so there are a couple of things I would say One is as we think about, you know, there's the work from the women's network about, you know, moving the needle and and how we make a difference um, I think the challenge is we have to have real distinct initiatives that help us get there, right? And it seems to me that we start a little late In the game we start with people who are already on the path And in my estimation, we have to start with people In terms of their awareness that there even is a pathway So I alluded earlier to the fact that I had a president who tapped me in an elevator and said become a part of the women's network represent our institution I was I'm not shy if you know me, but I am introverted and so the thought of What does it mean to go represent my institution? I was in my 20s. What does that look like? um Was a little intimidating But then when it happened I walked in a room and there was a woman by the name of dr Martha tech from alabama and Martha said to me. Hello, my dear One day you will be president of this network just like I am And it you know, we talk about belonging it made me feel like someone saw me Someone saw potential in me and that there was a place for me within the academy of opportunity and a pathway But I come from a I always say I'm like I'm a little black girl from Detroit, michigan And the surrounding areas I didn't know any college presidents.
So it's hard to aspire to something you have not yet seen And that happens for a lot of women as well. Do we see ourselves in that place or does someone identify that as even a potential opportunity? It's in the data as well that women even find out about a presidency so much later or tapped much later
SPEAKER_00
And I think we often think of it as the woman's problem and that okay I have to be the one that is going to solve all of this where it's up to me to have the initiative Without looking at the structures of opportunities And who gets tapped matters and so if you're looking at the favored child syndrome It may not always be a woman or a person of color if we're looking in the same old places So instead of this looking at it structurally There was a dissertation. I read a lot of dissertations that was done on the state of maryland Wondering why was in maryland so many of the college presidents women? And so amy marten who did this dissertation who is now at michigan state Learned that it was because they addressed the structural issues. They said we're going to pay attention to this We are going to look at the pipeline.
We're going to open up Opportunities for women and people of color that are interested in this and lo and behold They are not like the ace data that we're looking at nationally You're going to see higher percentages of women presidents there. You're going to see higher percentages of Leaders of color as well. Now some of the things they had going with them is that there were opportunities for trailing spouses or partners So that if you get to go and become the president and you're in a rural community There are not always opportunities for a partner.
And so what does that mean as we're looking at the larger Infrastructure and structures to make these kind of things to remove barriers. I think that's a piece we often miss Because it's the women that are like, oh, you got to go into this. You got to get this checklist Then if you have not done that you're not going to be considered
SPEAKER_04
Sure So so that speaks to this idea of progression and that there is one right path Whenever we're gathered as women, I feel like I'm look all the nodding I feel like i'm always in a conversation and i'm happy to have it As many times as we need to but it's almost like giving women permission that whatever your path is It's not only okay. It's right for you and as long as you authentically walk it There is a space for you to helm the right institution And so I feel like that kind of affirming isn't happening consistently. I love what Pamela, I love what you said about that study now as a wolverine.
I don't know about the michigan state part, but But but I will offer this I I want to Sometimes i'm a little concerned that when we have the conversations I it's not about bashing the the men right that's not our our aim It's not about bashing the white men right It is however to say we have a responsibility to be conscious of Who we think about we have a responsibility to say what kind of criteria do we put forward? What is a board looking for in a president and how do we so agb does a great job of helping boards think about how they pursue Candidates when I think so i'm a community college president within the community college sector We have something called the community college president competencies So that boards begin to understand what are the expectations? At a dean level at a vice president level a president level and as you're looking for candidates How do you know exactly what to look for that are very objective criteria? Because it's it's a human tendency to say Because we're twins john and i That i'm going to replicate because this is who's in my social circle. It's not personal. It's not because I don't want john in my door It's because I just don't know John I mean we heard freeman robowski talking about it dr.
Robowski today So I just think there's some things with intentionality that we have to put some more structure around
SPEAKER_00
I'd love that example that you can I think the competency piece raises the issue if you look in the survey data of what presidents say They at troubles them or was something that they didn't feel as skilled at Often we think we have to know everything when we come in But if you look at that list and think well, these are the things and the demands that are going to come upon me How can I get those experiences? How do I learn about fund development? How do I learn about finances? How do I learn about unions and negotiation? And you can learn about them often in the scope of your work But you can learn about fund development by running the united way in your community And so trying to think I don't need to have all of this developed within just one narrow scope of my Job or position But I can acquire these competencies in a lot of different ways as well
SPEAKER_06
And I love that you guys are talking about these various efforts, right to help move women towards the presidency and You know at a c e we have the moving the needle program And there are many other places that that do those types of of programs Are you seeing a difference? As these programs are being undertaken within institutions within associations and are Are our groups holding ourselves accountable? Right for whether or not we're actually making a difference
SPEAKER_04
So I look around this room and there are search firm consultants You guys want to know where they are, don't you? I mean who are are beautifully well established There are the people who are you know sort of helping Institutions make these decisions To your point the data shows us that we've made some progress, but we've not made sufficient progress What that tells me is that we're doing good work. We're just not getting enough of it done So we're not making the impact at scale that would truly Make a difference so that more of the people who aspire to the positions can get through the door So what I think about and I feel very fortunate. I've crossed Sector so I've been at private you're gonna love this John.
I've been at a private Men predominantly male institution, which is Kettering University in michigan Mostly engineering and business and then I was at a Catholic women's private institution trinity in dc Then I've been at research one university of michigan. I'm at a comprehensive community college
SPEAKER_05
So I've kind of it is you're the perfect a c member really You encompass every sector that's great, but I but I do I love that
SPEAKER_04
Because you get to see what's happening in the different sectors and we tend to think of ourselves as really monolithic It's not it's only happening here. These great conversations are taking place across the sectors What we've got to do is get to the point which is why ac is so important where we're really framing up This is a consistent conversation. We've got to tackle it across the board, which means What effort is working for your group? What effort is working for my group? How do we put in those best practices together and come up with some national interventions that really will make a difference
SPEAKER_00
And I think it's the access also to national type of work is how do we bring that down because if again, I have worked a lot on world campuses They're not coming And and to be able to even understand the scope of information that is available is difficult because they're wearing 10 hats So what are ways that we could translate some of that national dialogue? Down into different kind of grow your own programs and into regional networks The more we could bring that to the ground is going to matter and so I think the The work in michigan that we did with the network there was phenomenal because you had representatives at institutions from across the state that came together So they were having regional dialogues and they would meet in the middle of the state for one day So most people could come for a day to have that as a convening So as much as we can take that national information What we know about leadership and bring it down that will make a tremendous stride, I think it's really helpful
SPEAKER_04
I still think it's got to go So when I think about those networks and they're great as I bounce around the country One of the things I've seen is there are other states ac does a great job with the women's network There are other states doing really great work in that regard, but the women who come in are already On the path. I still want to get at the little girl I don't know how many of you show up hands were like when you were nine or ten you thought I want to be a college president It's just not on your radar, right? For listeners. I don't think a single hand went on Thank you, John.
No, so how do we create the exposure early enough? Um, so that's one piece then when we talk about boards and presidents, so I agree with you It's it's a both hand. How also do we distill information? And I I think dr. Chesman you and your team phenomenal work How do you with the survey? How do you distill? Um, not just the findings, but then a set of recommendations So using the analysis from the findings to say we want to help you As you're doing searches in partnership with you got the you know board of search firms that work with you Here are you know 10 things that we really want search Firms and boards to know so that you are being more inclusive in your processes With career and technical education across the country are there opportunities? Everybody in the k-12 system is teaching leadership leadership to what end we give a very Limited segment of what leadership is applied to and we have the opportunity to expand that and if you look at the data
SPEAKER_00
From the survey that half the sitting presidents were faculty Trying to understand where are you going to sow those seeds? And so the the the challenge then also becomes is how do you diversify the faculty? Because that is the one of the first gateways into the pipeline and so college presidents would be able To be served well by having different conversations with faculty not on their first day maybe but Trying to expose them to different opportunities to lead on campus So as you look at mid-level leaders department chairs are a great opportunity because that's typically the first administrative Experience someone has it's also the hardest job on campus Because you're leading your peers who say you're not my boss I'm not going to listen to you and then you have a dean saying one thing and so trying to navigate that which is Often a temporary position unless they get drawn into saying i actually like this leadership stuff And so i think college presidents looking at that internal pipeline with faculty Could be one way we see some of that change as well
SPEAKER_04
Yeah, and it's the best practices there. I would offer institutions that If they cannot send, you know host an acu fellow or Send someone out for a fellowship. I mean that doesn't get us at scale in the same way.
Don't tell Ted Mitchell. I said that You might hear this. Oh, I'm in trouble.
That was pamphlet But the whole idea of um, I worked at one point for dr. Canender When he was president at harbour college one of the things he did was say What if I brought The same leaders that I know nationally to my campus instead of trying to take You know 30 people from my campus to a national conference and he essentially he's a fellow As well class of 94 95 and so he started bringing in national level leaders And he developed a program that didn't supplant. He still sent people to ace He sent people to aspen But it allowed people to sort of dip their toe in the water And he he democratized it so that whether you were an administrative assistant or you were in It didn't matter.
Um, we had people from facilities But one people got to work together across the institution and two people saw possibilities where they hadn't seen possibilities before And we started growing the pipeline and then Dr. Eddie to your point we um on my campus One of the things I've been doing is investing in that mid-level leader. I created something called ascending leaders where um, I just spend time with that mid-level leader and starting to Talk through some of the things and do some professional development around what I want to see in my mid-level leaders So building in um, how do you manage up down and across? Working on risk taking and those kinds of things that we'd like to build in strong leaders across the board So again, it does take that kind of momentum to really get it to to go But this organization has the best potential to really impact it
SPEAKER_05
Well, we are at a great point where if people in the audience have questions we would invite you to come up the microphones right there And we have someone coming if you don't mind identifying yourself that would be wonderful
SPEAKER_02
Hi, I'm astrid schill. I'm the dean of the business school at shenandoah university in winchester And uh, just two things I want to talk about real briefly. I came to academia late.
I had a full career in corporate work And uh, because my kids got to a certain age. I couldn't travel internationally I went back to school and started completely from the bottom working myself up About six years after I got into academia. I was a full professor.
I published a textbook I was doing x y and z And all of a sudden I was bored I wasn't using all of the and nobody talked to me There was no passageway to the chair because that guy was strapped in and belted in for life and I was looking around and I thought You know, so I literally Walked up and to the provost. I saw him on a walk and I said hey Listen, you better find something for me to do because I'm bored and I'm gonna go back into corporate work Could you not paying me enough? And he laughed and he said oh, I got you And he and I immediately not only did he help me, but I jumped Schools I went from arts and letters. I went to the college of business and I took over as chair of accounting and finance I don't recommend that It was a harrowing experience, but two and a half years into it Then the president tomas morales said Asked, we want to send you to a ce fellows program.
I came I interviewed I was in kenya's class and I remember the very first time I came to the the a ce meeting in washington dc I walked in and there were 2000 presidents provost it was like I found the mother load And I thought this is where it is But nobody had ever said a word to me until I complained and said I'm bored so I'm hoping that a ce takes that there are a lot of me's out there Ready and willing to do that talented. Yes, but you got to let us know I had no idea you all existed Until I came to interview So that's one thing the second thing just briefly for those of you who are recruiters in this room If I hear it once I hear it twice We worked for the university How about working for some of us as well? You know think about it and a little bit differently think about what happens with with Sports people they get represented. You know, I think about somebody like kenya or me We could make you a lot of money Right repping us around the country But I know that's a model that also has to change.
I believe
SPEAKER_00
I think an important point of that is creating opportunities so that um, I may have had a similar situation with a department chair and started going elsewhere on campus to be able to say I think I could be a benefit here And then you become a known commodity on campus as someone who actually Does what they say they're going to do so you get tapped for other kind of things The information piece of it is really critical though because coming up through the disciplines People don't know what they don't know. You know, it's like, oh, I know the chemistry association. Sure Okay, you know, but that's not going to get you At this table
SPEAKER_04
Yeah, if I can just have one one thing um in comment to that AC has always um done a real great focus for how we develop our Folks at the department chair level. I also see another am I going to take your question? I'm sorry, dr But okay, so one of the things that that I see as an opportunity as well is if you look at, um Depending on how your institution is aligned, but if you look at the department chair role Those are still your peers Whereas when you step into the dean level role and you have the full administrative responsibility Taking that leap from chair to dean a lot of times people walk into it without fully understanding How much you have to personally shift to make that leap? And I think we could do more to help people with that part I'm so struck by the conversation this morning And uh the journalist who talked about all the places in the pipeline Where we have the potential for people to fall out my dissertation research in the year of our lord 1999 So if I was on stop out students, well now I mean we stop out to talk about it routinely we weren't at that point Shame on me for not publishing the book then But in any case, but we were talking about that all those places where you can just lose people And how often we don't get them back and I just I think of all the women that could uh to your point astra could have done this Um had all of the ability or some of you may have been at the women's dinner last night to hear michelle asha cooper Who is vice president with lumina foundation? Who has she? Had the responsibility. I'd like to think of this kind of money She had 76 billion dollars in her hands to distribute her funding at the height of the pandemic And she's you know been with associations.
She's done all these things and for someone to say to her You don't quite have what it takes. She's written books on equity. I mean checking all the boxes of things Competency wise we say a president needs, but she can't get through the door Well, there's something wrong with that because we do see places where men Can easily make the leap? Political appointees and others.
All right. Sorry, jim. I know you're fine
SPEAKER_01
Uh jim fatsinger a ce fellow 1112 currently work at elon university and vanderbilt university Uh, enjoying every and encourage everyone in the room to join the council of fellows if you're an a ce fellow Uh, that being said, uh, a ce does a great job as an umbrella organization over all of the higher education institutions in the country and representing higher ed As a president and for the members of the panel, what do you see as some of the brightest opportunities on the horizon for higher education?
SPEAKER_00
Well, I think we have the chance to reinvent ourselves If we're willing to take the risk and understanding there's going to be failures along the way Which is a difficult pill to swallow when you might miss your job over that I think if we really tap into Understanding what it takes to reimagine and rethink the process We are losing a lot of our staff. We're we're working on enrollment. We need to actually think differently We need to understand how to articulate our value proposition So when you're in the grocery school door and someone comes up and say, oh my gosh college costs so much.
This is ridiculous How or at a family dinner when you're back home Um, how do you talk about that? And so when I start talking about the decline in state funding to my sister-in-law Who's not very interested in that? It has to be more than that to say this is why it costs a lot. What is what is the value? And in in the old days when we had dark care, we would be able to talk about well, it's all about learning and it's really about Personal development and growth and now we really need to address the economics of this And we have to tell our own story because a lot of other people are telling the story for us
SPEAKER_04
I got six different ways I could go with this. I'm just I'm trying to think So yeah, I agree with you about how we tell our stories. I also just think Um As as a president from from this lens of experience.
There's there's just so much more There's just so much more Jim and and when I think about what a ce has Or where we can make the most impact in higher ed in the near future I'll tell you I'll let you guys in on a secret in in my on my long wish list The things that keep me up at night are not about All the the legal things that happen or the accidents. I mean things happen, right? We I Effectively run a pretty a little city, right? So things are going to happen Emergencies happen things ebb and flow we get through them But what keeps me up at night are the barriers between educational sectors. They don't serve as well So what I'd love to do if someone just like waved their magic wand and gave me 76 billion dollars and I could just do what I wanted I want to create a system that Where k through 20 pipeline is all in one system where we could see how much we really could affect Through that kind of aligned organization.
That'd be fun. Thank you
SPEAKER_03
Good afternoon. Thanks so much for the opportunity to hear from you on the panel My name is Emma Jones. I'm the executive vice president and one of the owners at credo We're a national higher education consulting firm and we do a lot of work in the leadership space Have with women for years One of the things we've heard anecdotally for years is that often when women come into the presidency They are ill informed About the realities of the campus and I was struck to see that in the ace data That came out actually kind of thrilled to see it in writing, right? So it wasn't just the stories that we were hearing from presidents and I wonder what the take might be from this panel on What needs to change with boards in order for this to Not be the situation Issue that's happening through the presidential search process where Women and people of color are less informed about the realities of institutions as they're coming in.
Thank you
SPEAKER_04
Emma since you referenced the time shortage. I want to get right to the point I really feel like we have to deal with implicit bias And we have to help people understand that unconscious bias and ways in which it it refers and it happens for all of us It's not limited to one segment of the population But if we don't have the ability to have a reality check again, we'll keep replicating the same thing We've we've had in the past at the top of the hour we talked about what it looks like when there is a Opportunity ahead that's you know five years in the future with 50% of the presidency is turning over This is the time period that we've got to be building toward that. And so what are we going to put in place? It's professional development.
It is Bringing even in who you have do the development Um those folks, you know, are they women who are talking about these kinds of things? Not in an accusatory or an attacking way But in a way that says let me just share the reality of my experience. I've seen some people do some great things with Reality theater where they break the third wall and you have the opportunity to really play out what a faculty Search candidates experiences and then allow those People in the room who are board members to say well, how did that make you feel or why do you think that happened or what happened? I'll give you a quick example when I was I applied one year for presidency and I became a finalist in two And then I actually got a system offer But I knew I wanted to be on a campus so I waited till the next year and went out again In one of those finalist positions and and this is hard to know. I live at the intersectionality of race and gender And I'd like to say I looked young because it was pre-pandemic.
Well What happened was I went to meet the person who was supposed to greet me in the lobby of the hotel And I sat and I sat no one had described her to me and ultimately when Finally the people in the room came out the board members It turned out the young lady was sitting across from me But I didn't look like Who she thought a college president should be Well shame on her But I have to tell you it happens all the time even sitting in the role And that's not about this young lady, but it's about The the college presidency and the data shows it Is felt to look a certain way or someone looks presidential well A president can wear a green suit and stand up on a stage And love the work and cheer on people who don't look like them and stand up for students Who look very different because we just love the work and we love the industry So communicating those messages. Maybe you're capturing, you know, the experts who know the work do the work And maybe it's telling the stories of the women the women of color The presidents of color who are living that every day and have had some stories that Probably have to be heard to be believed
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I think boards would be surprised at the number and the tone of comments you get us a woman And To this day, well, I'm not going to hire another woman because they have babies and they follow their husband On my exit interview after, you know work in 60 hour weeks So as you try to think of that bias based on just that snap decision that makes a difference The other is the boards that may say well, we had our woman president We've done it. Yay for us And so trying to be able to think of where does it become the norm? So if we look at tipping points about 40 percent So there's some ways to be encouraged as we creep up towards that number in the totals But until we can come in and someone will go up and say, oh, of course, you're the the candidate here And and being as welcoming with that because these stories travel And so when you're trying to build that pipeline, you need to be honest with people And encouraging to be able to say it's possible and you know together we'll be able to make some of this change
SPEAKER_06
Great. Well to kind of wrap up our our questions and to bring it back to the acps 2023 report Which I failed to mention was supported by tiaa Institute Can you give us kind of your thoughts on what you thought the key takeaways were From the data in this in this report?
SPEAKER_00
I think one of them is is how do we learn about leadership so that we had identified a number of areas where presidents are struggling coming in Or needing to know more information or being surprised So as we think of that pipeline, how how do we help people learn about the role in real ways and coming in to be prepared for that? How do we take the presidents that are in place and use them as the advocates as well? And this idea of tapping cannot be understated So that if you've got your head down, you're doing your job You don't actually know you've always done the best job until someone says, you know, you Should think about And I can't tell you the number of women presidents. I've interviewed that said I never thought of this when I was nine years old When did they start thinking about that? I ran the self study for the accrediting body and my president said, you know, you've really did a great job on that You should consider And so those kind of opportunities happen with all of us as well and not just the president So I constantly am coming up to people saying you really should consider a presidency How might you think about moving up here? And how do we value the work of the mid-level leader as well? Obviously a holy grail here that we're talking about is the presidency But valuing that work that's occurring in the middle ranks as well
SPEAKER_04
I appreciate that. I also think so one Thinking more about the disparity between what a mentor is and what a sponsor is Sometimes we are asking for mentors. What we really need is a sponsor.
So to the point earlier We have to have the courage to walk up to someone and say Or to be in a position because we've you know, knows to the grindstone. We've done the work And to ask for what we need. I was so struck at one point I got offered an assignment and I just took it because I was an administrator and the president asked A colleague I was paired with on the same assignment called the grandfather of the faculty the oldest white male in the faculty Walked in and said to the president.
I need release time. I better have this and I need this We became great friends. We partnered with the project very successfully But what I learned when I was seething because I didn't think to ask for anything What's to take a breath and go back and ask and so I asked that president would you mentor me? And to this day he became the greatest sponsor I've ever had It wasn't a mentorship.
We look we joke about this. I just saw him last week and he got a lifetime award But what he did was he opened up and I'll tell my age his rolodex so to speak And he said I want you to go to future presidents If you give me three good years, I'll send you and I'll nominate you as an a c fellow Now I might have asked him if he'd do it, but um he because I had researched him, right? We know how to do that I'd done my homework. I knew he had been a fellow.
I knew he'd sponsored one But because I asked I became the first one he sent so stand up for yourself ask the question My grandmother said close miles don't get fed and then the last thing I would say is we have a responsibility to demystify the presidency Um to show people behind the veil so to speak Um, and so that's where a lot of opportunity lies I love the the results of the survey and I know they're a wonderful appropriate research disclaimers about what's Over sampled and all of these things But it has a lot to tell us and so I want to encourage those who read the survey don't discount what it is telling us Because it is speaking the voices of a lot of people that need to be heard
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It's a great note to hand on but before we go I'm going to ask our audience to do Three things for me three more cheers. I told you at the beginning We were going to do a lot of cheers First year we want to thank our producers Anthony Malcolm Audrey Laurie Jack Rebecca, uh, they make us sound good. They prepare us so we don't sound stupid They work very very hard.
So it looks at least as semi easy as it looks right now. So can we give them a cheer first? Secondly another group that definitely deserves a big cheer is all of you. Thank you for coming for such thoughtful questions Such engaged participation.
It really makes a difference the energy in a room and I think sarah and I can speak to that But then finally and maybe most importantly, please join us in thanking so much for such Insightful thoughtful commentary your generous participation your time. Pam and kenya Thank you. Thank you guys so much.
Thank you for joining us
SPEAKER_06
As Always you can check out earlier episodes and subscribe to edu on apple google podcast Spotify stitcher or wherever you listen to your podcast For show notes and links to the resources mentioned in the episode you can go to our website at acenet.edu Backslash podcast Well there, please take a short survey to let us know how we're doing You can also email us at podcast at acenet.edu to give us suggestions on upcoming shows and guests And finally a very big thank you to the producers who helped pull this podcast together Laurie arson, audrey hamilton, melko more anthony truhart, rebecca morris Jack Nicholson and faat ma gam They do an incredible job making this happen and making john moustach and i sound as good as possible Finally, thank you so much to all of you for listening