S5. Ep. 4 Radical Access and Radical Opportunity

Teresa Valerio Parrot: Hi, and welcome to the Trusted Voices Podcast, hosted by Erin Hennessy and me, Teresa Valerio Parrott. Welcome to our take on the latest news and biggest issues facing higher education. We often welcome leaders who are living, studying, and reporting on these challenges and ask them to share their own experiences and perspectives. And we also make time for the two of us to share what we're thinking as we engage with higher ed's trusted voices.
Erin Hennessy: Hi.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Hi, happy birthday week. By the time this comes out, it will be your birthday week.
Erin Hennessy: Sure. Yeah, I'm telling you, October, if I make it to the end, this month has been both a marathon and a sprint.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes. It's definitely been something.
Erin Hennessy: a lot of good stuff. before things get too crazy? Let's talk about higher education. pro or con? Yeah,
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Depends on the day.
Erin Hennessy: generally pro, with some notable exceptions.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: We recently were talking about how it is the season for rankings. And with rankings, right after that, usually comes the season for saying which majors pay off or don't. So
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I want to talk a little bit about how much I hate this article that comes out every year and comes out quite often about what majors make what amount of money at what institution about four years after graduation.
Erin Hennessy: Uh-huh.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And this New York Times piece, not surprisingly, is going to lean very business and engineering heavy. And I would like to point out to everybody, this is always skewed for institutions based on that one athlete that you have that gets that really big contract. I'm curious if they take that one out. This is always very skewed based on location in the country. There's so many things that tie into this. And there also is that liberal arts argument that this is four years out, and they really should be thinking not just about four years, but further than that. because there is something about where liberal arts graduates end up and their successes as well. So please, parents, as you're encouraging your students to declare that major, especially if this is a semester that they have to, look beyond four years, look at a number of things, including what makes your child happy. And students follow your bliss, at least as a minor.
Erin Hennessy: Okay. just to just to give New York Times a little bit of credit, 'cause their story that that we're talking about is actually a college-by-college sortable index. And
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Correct. Correct.
Erin Hennessy: I of course toddled right in there and looked up my major at my alma mater and laughed and laughed and laughed because I'm the chump who got a polypsci degree, thought she was going to law school and went to work in the admissions office after graduation and made
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Ha ha ha ha.
Erin Hennessy: in my first year $21,990 in a bedroom
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Wow.
Erin Hennessy: community of New York. So if you think that number is a burn in my brain.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: And four years after graduation, I was working for this state, maybe making $26,000 and living at home.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Wow.
Erin Hennessy: Granted, this was back before the earth cooled, but I share your frustration because it's this data point that people think is determinative It's it's a snapshot, it's a data point, it means nothing,
Teresa Valerio Parrot: It's a data point. Yes.
Erin Hennessy: and you know, it opens the big old can of worms about what is college for. And my parents, you know, paid six thousand dollars more a year for my college education than I earned when I graduated. But we had the privilege of not having to, I didn't have to come right out and make a ton of money to pay back loans or you know all of these things. And so you look at that data point and you just don't, I just hate that people lean on that so heavily as an indication of quality, as an indication of success. Yeah. And it's
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I would say success. Yeah, that's the one that always irks me.
Erin Hennessy: it's it's not. And this is why
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: we as institutions don't Don't tell stories that way because it's impossible to tell a story with that one little number.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Well, I guess two numbers, and you are correct. There is a way to sort it by institution, sort it by major. So two data points. But I actually didn't even look up my alma mater and my major because I looked at it and I thought, well, you know, I'm not gonna give this the clicks and also the credence about what that means and what it doesn't. Because
Erin Hennessy: Right. Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: it really is just a moment in time and there's so much more that goes into this, but it always gives me pause, because of course
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: we're gonna talk about what is a music major going to make. Right? Of course we're gonna compare that with someone who majors in finance and then goes into industry. And we're gonna compare that to somebody who then also has a mathematics major, right? I just come on.
Erin Hennessy: And it also doesn't take into account any of the economic context.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right. Anyway, I just want to say that because obviously it gets a lot of clicks. We're gonna obviously send someone because we'll include a link in the show notes. But
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I always am hesitant about this one because I experienced, I had friends who experienced people looking at these types of articles and saying, you really should major in. If you want to
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: be successful, you should. And giving a pause and saying, okay, what is it that you enjoy? What is it that brings you joy? What is it that you want to do? And then how can you make a career of it? I just think is such a better conversation to be having. With that, take us to the next article.
Erin Hennessy: okay, well bringin' down vibes
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Where's we're uppers today, yeah.
Erin Hennessy: Bringing down vibes as I am wont to do. So the Cornell story has continued to unfold and who knows where it'll be by
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: the time folks are listening to this. And again, I don't wanna dive into the details of it all. but I am interested in looking at a bit of the strategy behind it.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: And I thought it was really interesting that the university decided to have the president sit with the New York Times.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: I think the piece dropped Tuesday of this week, so like the twelfth, thirteenth, somewhere in there. he was accompanied by his board chair, which is a statement.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes. Which to
Erin Hennessy: And
Teresa Valerio Parrot: various people, because we've seen this before where
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: someone will say, I need my board to put out a statement of support for me. And you and I always give each other a side eye because we always say, That's your kiss of death if you think you need your board to have a statement that they support you. So
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: others are gonna say, It, you know, the board chair was there to ask about other governance issues, right? There's so many ways that you can position that, but it feels
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: a little Strong armed to have your board chair next to you for that interview.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, I yeah, I agree. and there was also included in the piece a photo of the president and the board chair walking across campus, which I thought was an interesting choice from the Times.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes, but
Erin Hennessy: and I encourage folks to read the story because there is so much conveyed about the tone and the tenor of the conversation.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: and I think the piece that everybody is bumping on, and my jaw dropped, is that the president acknowledged that he had no idea this young woman withdrew until she filed her lawsuit. And I I don't know, call me naive. Never been a college president, never wanna be one. But if you had a young person who was assaulted by allegedly seven individuals
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: You wouldn't follow up on that case? You wouldn't?
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I'm gonna play devil's advocate for a second.
Erin Hennessy: You wouldn't ask for an update? This feels to me, and I'll let you play devil's advocate, but this feels
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That assumes yeah.
Erin Hennessy: to me in some ways the I hear echoes of Graham Spanier saying, Gosh, I didn't know there was a problem in the Penn State, or
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: or Ken Starr saying, Gosh, I didn't know that young woman emailed me. It just I don't know, it it beggars belief for me that That you wouldn't go you know, hey, at some point could somebody just let me know how that young person is doing?
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I think it assumes a structure where the president would get those types of updates. And I say that because Cornell is a very complex institution, very
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: large, very research-based, right? Fundraising is a priority. So I don't know where the follow-up on specific student situations would flow. and so there is a potential, there truly is, where this is something that would have been handled within student affairs. This is something that the only way, and we see this at a lot of institutions, that a president may not know about it. Because if the student appeals any part of the process, it would go to the president as the final determinant in a process. So there is the potential that. a buffer or a boundary was created so that the president wouldn't know all of the specifics of a case because they would be the final decision maker in whatever that process was.
Erin Hennessy: Sure.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That's not to say that there couldn't have been updates that were provided, especially with the egregiousness of this situation.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: But just to be fair, I know of a number of institutions that say, we need to make sure that based on our policies and procedures, based upon Title IX expectations, based on, based on, based on, right? Because that Title IX has been so interesting for many higher education administrations, that there may have been that buffer to provide the president the ability to say, as the final determinant in this process, I'm staying out of it up until it comes to me to be making a decision.
Erin Hennessy: Sure. And I absolutely acknowledge the point. I also would say this is after the process has concluded, the the student has left the institution. And at that point
Teresa Valerio Parrot: There still is the final appeal, right? There's still, it whatever it is can always be have a final appeal to the president. And that's even once they leave the campus. And I've seen that
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, I I just think
Teresa Valerio Parrot: at institutions. I'm not defending anything. I'm just trying to give
Erin Hennessy: As a reputational issue, it's one I would track.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I think that one of the things that I would, if I were them, look at is what were your policies and procedures that didn't allow your president to be knowledgeable about this situation? So
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I don't know all of their ins and outs. They are not a client, but I think it's very important for us to say this is one of those that if you have either a cabinet or you have an administration that is buffering the president, this is a fantastic opportunity to look at that situation and say, what could happen when we think we're protecting the president and the institution, but in reality, we're not protecting the student, we're not protecting the president, we're not protecting the institution. So that's just my takeaway from maybe how we should think about that too.
Erin Hennessy: I would also say to be fair, he did not, he acknowledged that he did not ask any questions about the dispensation of the allegations against any of the men either. So I suppose there's that.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah, again, I think there is this buffer that they I would guess that they created, policy based or
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, potentially.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: otherwise.
Erin Hennessy: I also you and I would have said because that's of course a question you're gonna prep the president for, you and I would have said, if you acknowledge that, put the context around it that that's
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: that's because of process and procedure. Yep.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right, exactly. Well, there are many things that I would have advised on. I would say an eight minute video, eight minutes is a long time. Eight minutes
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: is eternity in video
Erin Hennessy: Yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: t video terms. So that is something that I would question. I think, and we see this often, these pendulum swings on policies as well. So now
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: banning all fraternity parties. Think about what you really need to be solving here. rather than looking at these really big swings in policies or in approach or eight minute videos. What is it that you're really trying to achieve and how can you do that in the most impactful and
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: also the shortest way so that it's understandable. Eight minutes, I don't, that's a really long time to ask people to stick with you.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, and think how many times you probably had to reshoot that. Cause
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: that's a that's a lot of talking to get through. I also just note the statistic that I saw this morning in the Chron's Daily Briefing that Cornell had suspended or revoked the recognition, institutional recognition of a number of fraternities twenty eight times since two thousand eight, including after student deaths.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah, yeah.
Erin Hennessy: That's, I get when you're living it, it's it feels different. But looking at that statistic with fresh eyes and the context we're in right now, I don't think canceling parties is gonna give you the
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Ha ha.
Erin Hennessy: culture change you're looking for. But
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I agree. Well, but it's a bigger conversation. We've talked about legacy
Erin Hennessy: Oh yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: admissions and legacy traditions many times
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm
Teresa Valerio Parrot: on here about how those are sometimes used to defend decisions or to keep things that maybe shouldn't,
Erin Hennessy: Yep.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: shouldn't be kept. And usually we're told, well, we just don't understand because we didn't go there, right?
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And I think it's easy when you're in it to say, oh it's a fraternity a year and what institution hasn't had one fraternity or one sorority go sideways, right?
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And so I think thinking about that bigger climate and culture conversation that
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: you're talking about is really critically important.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. While we're talking about Cornell and Title IX, I just want to remind folks that as of a week or so ago, the Trump administration repealed the Biden era Title IX rules
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: and reinstated their own rules from the first Trump administration. So this is an important time to look at your policies and your procedures, make sure you're still
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: in compliance and make sure that the language that you're using to communicate about those processes, procedures, and resources that are available to students, make sure that's all still accurate because that's a pretty significant shift in how that the Title IX process will unfold on your campus.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Agreed. And the president also weighed in on this case gave his theory on culpability.
Erin Hennessy: Sure did.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And I think that's one of those to mention that just a reminder that Title IX is always very popular during an election year. And I can see that the timing of this is not lost on me. and I can see that this case other situations will be discussed nationally, will be localized in your communities. there are institutions right now that are looking over their own caseloads over the past number of years and reaching out to students to check in on them. And this is a great time for us to think about humanity and to think about resources and to make sure that at the end of the day we feel like we've done the right thing for our students.
Erin Hennessy: Yep. Good luck out there, friends.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes. We're thinking about ya. I'm gonna change this to something different. I've been tracking quite a bit conversations around international enrollment. I've been tracking visa numbers and a number of different pieces around that. And there was a piece that was in Times Higher Ed that caught my attention. it's the sibling publication to Inside Higher Ed. But they really do cover institutions predominantly outside of the United States. And they had a piece on Hong Kong Stays Keen on Non-Local Students Despite Fee Hikes. But the reason that I mentioned this is because we're so many countries across the world are trying to figure out how to stabilize their enrollment. This isn't just a United States issue. We're making the issue, we're making it harder on ourselves based on visas, but it's not just a United States issue. And public universities in Hong Kong have raised their fees by an average of 17%. And now there's worries that this could actually decrease enrollment from lower income countries. Do you think? So I agreed. Agreed.
Erin Hennessy: Hmm. I mean, Hong Kong wasn't a cheap place to live to begin with, you know? Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I just mentioned that because I've seen a lot of conversation around how we are the only country that seems to be you know banging our head against a wall when it comes to international enrollment. And what I would say is costs are rising across the globe for education for many, many things. There are a number of different countries, public and private institutions that are seeing tuition and fees raise. And this isn't unique to the United States. And we have to really think about that subhead, which talked about we're really impacting the students from lower income countries and the students with low incomes, period, the most in these decisions. So just wanted to raise that, that it's not unique to the United States. I know most of the coverage I've I've seen seems to think so. And those big tuition swings aren't unique to the United States either, and they have consequences.
Erin Hennessy: Yep, absolutely. Okay, well, I have a happy story.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Okay. Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: And it's not really news. It's old news. It is news, but it's old news from July. Thanks to the fine folks behind the new, Decision Makers newsletter from The Chronicle?
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: This morning or this week, rather, they chatted with the vice president of enrollment management at Sonoma State University. Which you may remember
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: two years ago, eliminated all of their athletics teams in an attempt to close a pretty gaping budget hole. Two years later, in this July, they announced that they are going to bring back 10 teams under new presidential leadership. And it was just such an interesting story in the newsletter this morning, talking to the vice president of enrollment, and it made me think about the time I spent this weekend at Penn for the new Athletics Paradigm Conference led by Karen Weaver and some of the fine folks at the Graduate School of Education. I had the opportunity yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes, you you previewed it last episode and I I think I screamed even. I was so excited you were going.
Erin Hennessy: It was so phenomenal. I wish more people could have been there and experienced it. It was just so, so great. And one of the things that, to do my Teresa Parrot impression, one of the things that made my heart happy was that the
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Ha ha ha ha.
Erin Hennessy: rooms were full of students from the masters and execdoc EDD higher education programs. So it was younger. career folks working in our industry, having the opportunity to really dig deep on some of these really big questions. But the story about Sonoma State made me think about the presentation that was made by Jim Troja, who is the president at Juniata College in Pennsylvania. And
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm.
Erin Hennessy: he basically walked through how he and his team approach athletics, its intersection with enrollment. in this
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: declining demographic era. It was really fascinating to hear him talk about, you know, everybody talks about athletics and enrollment. And this gentleman from Sonoma State University talked about that as well. But I what I feel like President Troja did really well was wrap that in mission. It's not just athletics for
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yeah, yeah.
Erin Hennessy: the sake of athletics. It's not just athletics for the sake of enrolling men. he talked about how a roster is not an enrollment strategy. And it was just so
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Erin Hennessy: refreshing to hear a president talk about how do we, as part of our larger strategy, use athletics to drive engagement, drive connection,
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: drive fundraising, and how do we make sure that it is driving mission as well. And it was
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: just, and you know I'm cynical as hell about college athletics, big-time college athletics. and it was just really refreshing to hear a president talk about this and acknowledge the realities and the difficulties of the moment that we're facing, but to hear him talk not about butts and seats, roster like it, really talk about this as part of mission.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Erin Hennessy: and the things that they're doing. they're thinking about, or have added men's and women's wrestling. And women's wrestling is huge huge out here on the East Coast. I don't know if it's the same in the mountain west, but it's growing really rapidly and that is the new
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: recruitment strategy at at a lot of these places. Women's flag football. They got a great package on the Today show the other day. I think the fastest
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And that and flag football for women, yeah. And men's flag football I hear. Yeah, yeah.
Erin Hennessy: growing sport in the country is women's flag football. Anyway, the whole thing was fascinating. There was an attorney there, a public interest attorney, who talked about the intersection of Title IX and revenue sharing and NIL and the
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: ways in which, and and he started his presentation, he was so charming. So you can absolutely tell he's just gonna eviscerate you in the courtroom. His name is Arthur Bryant, and he talked about, there's not an institution in the country that is completely in compliance with Title IX. it's just it was it was such a great couple of days. My brain lit up in a lot of different areas. I had fleeting thoughts about getting a EDD, which I've since, No!
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Do it. Yes.
Erin Hennessy: No! I've since driven them from my mind. But it was just really great to be in that room and be with those people
Teresa Valerio Parrot: You should do it. Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: and and think about these big topics. So and I
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That's what I loved about my doctoral program.
Erin Hennessy: think I previewed this, but it was really great to see Father Malachi from St. Francis University talk about the success that they have seen in the wake
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Miss you, Father Malachi.
Erin Hennessy: of their shift from D1 to D3. They're in year two of the shift. And you know, selfishly, it was very nice to hear him give credit to the counsel that you provided in terms of making that
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Thank you.
Erin Hennessy: transition go well. So anyway, I loved it. I'm excited for Sonoma State. I'm gonna be following them this year, because I just want them to do well and I'm excited that those students will now have that, student experience available to them, whether they are athletes or athletic supporters, hey
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Ha ha.
Erin Hennessy: I just think that's I'm really pleased.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I think it is fascinating that you've now spent minutes talking about athletics. So this is my thank you to Karen Weaver for getting you excited about athletics. Go team. Yes, excellent. Okay.
Erin Hennessy: I know. And I started reading her book, which is very good, yes. So yeah, I'm a new person. know who I am
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I saw a clip this morning. We'll go from one school of education to another. This is the College of Education. I saw an article this morning that I wanted to bring to everybody's attention. It's from two days ago, but I just became aware of it. And it is from state news. And this is about Michigan State, and
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: it is how a no-confidence vote shakes a college inside the College of Education's divide. And this article, it talks about how there was a vote of no confidence against the dean of education. And interestingly, there are discussions about whether or not it's that people don't like his leadership or they don't like him. So the decisions versus the person. But here's where I thought it was so fascinating. The faculty are really ticked because forever and ever and ever and ever. they have been ranked number one in US News & World Report for Colleges of Education, and
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: they worry that that could be at risk. Quote: "I think that there's a consensus that there's only a matter of time until we fall from that ranking," say the faculty. Woo! But
Erin Hennessy: I mean, probably.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: also, usually faculty are like, don't listen to those rankings. We don't want that.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. Rankings don't count. No rank.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: This doesn't matter and it's about impact and students, students, students, as it should be, right? But to
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm, uh-huh.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: see that the discussion is really pivoting on US News & World Report rankings, whoo,
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: that was a new one. I thought that was fascinating.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, and and a perspective change. Not even it's not like they dropped. Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right, it could, this could happen. And also by bringing more attention to it, and you and I talk about this in Comms all of the time,
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: you are letting people know we have a vulnerability here. So when
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, buddy.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: you rank us and you rate us as a peer, remember we suck in this way right now. Maybe that's not the thing to be putting in the news if you're worried about your rankings. Just a thought, faculty.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Hm. All is not well in the state of Michigan.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Anyway, I have all this, Michigan has some issues going on, everybody. Statewide,
Erin Hennessy: No
Teresa Valerio Parrot: not just yes, the big Not and I'm talking about the University of Michigan. Yes.
Erin Hennessy: Yes. Alright, well bring us home so we can get to our fabulous conversation with our fabulous guest.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I have a shout-out, and this is something that made my heart so happy. and I'm so excited for her. Marika Holland was named a MacArthur genius. And I mentioned this because Marika Holland is a friend of mine. But more importantly, the reason she's my friend is because she had a daughter who was in Savannah's preschool class when they were infants together. So I got to know Marika when we were very young. She had just finished her doctoral degree. We served on the student, or the parent association for little daycare together. And I remember the two of us being in the trenches in our own way in our careers. And
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: just to see how she was always so positive about her research. And she would go and talk to the students about climatology when they were infants and little. And she would bring in books for them about the environment. This is all true.
Erin Hennessy: I know, I laugh 'cause she's talking to infants about climatology.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So there were a couple of us moms that the kids in and her daughter called me the book mom because I would come every day at lunch and read books to the kids. And it's really I wanted to see my own child, but she didn't care I was there.
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I would read books to all of the kids. But Marika used to come quite often as well and read books to the kids on her lunch break too. So I would kind of pass off book reading responsibility to her. But it was just so fascinating and fantastic and happy to see someone who, I remember both of us coming in absolutely exhausted, trying to build our careers, thinking about what came next. And to have her named a MacArthur genius just made my heart so happy to know. I haven't seen her for 22 years, probably, but
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I got to see when she was in the early parts of her geniusness
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: and was able to see how she was able to get to where she is now, and that's just phenomenal. So congratulations
Erin Hennessy: That's great.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: to Marika.
Erin Hennessy: That's great. And she probably is hearing from a lot of people from various parts of her life, but I hope you send her a note.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: I absolutely plan to do so. I just want to let her know I saw her and I know she saw me. And sometimes that's everything.
Erin Hennessy: Yes, absolutely.
Erin: We'll be right back after a brief break. A big thank you for listening. You can subscribe to Trusted Voices on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you never miss an episode. And now, full video episodes are available on YouTube at youtube.com/@TrustedVoicesPodcast.
Erin Hennessy: Well, we are going to launch into our conversation with our guest. And before we do that, before I read her very impressive bio, want to just acknowledge as we do when we have TVP comms clients on the podcast, that this individual is the president of an institution that has been a client of ours, and it's a really special and unique place, which is why we thought
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: it was important to bring this conversation to folks, even though they are a client. We don't like to do that too often, but this one is well worth taking up a little bit of time to do a disclaimer up front. Today we are super excited to be talking with Dr. Cheryl Nixon, who is Berea College's 10th president and its first woman in the role. She is a champion of educational access and opportunity and leads a college that serves as a national model for college affordability, meeting this is not a typo, 100% of each
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: student's financial need. Starting
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes.
Erin Hennessy: in fall 2027, every Berea student will receive a fully funded degree. Covering tuition, housing, food, fees, and supplies for all four years without loans. Honored to serve the first racially integrated coeducational college in the South, Dr. Nixon's career has been dedicated to bringing transformative power of learning to students who face barriers to education. Before joining Berea, Dr. Nixon was provost and vice president for academic affairs at Fort Lewis College in Colorado, the most diverse public liberal arts college in the United States. At this Native American serving institution, she launched a nursing program focused on expanding healthcare in rural areas and established an academic hub dedicated to student success. At the University of Massachusetts Boston, New England's most diverse four-year institution, she was associate provost and developed programs for hands-on learning, first-year student support, and career exploration. She's got an MA and a PhD in English from a little place called Harvard University and a bachelor's from Tufts. And we're just super excited to share this conversation with you. She is accomplished, she is driven, and she is so perfectly aligned with Berea's mission. I think folks are just gonna be delighted by this conversation as we were.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Thank you for joining us, President Nixon. I would love to have you give a brief overview of Berea College because you're such a different type of institution. And I think it makes sense for you to kind of set the ground for where you are, your mission, and a little bit more about who you serve.
Cheryl Nixon: Thank you so much. And it I just have to say it's a pleasure to be talking to you and to be able to talk about
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Thank you.
Cheryl Nixon: Berea because
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: it really is a unique college. So we're located in Berea, Kentucky. We were founded before the city. And with the idea of a radical access to education mission in 1855, before the Civil War, by an abolitionist who wanted to educate Black and white, male and female students together. So at our very founding, we had an ideal of education for all and removing barriers to education and making sure that the idea of opportunity and access to thinking and learning and being in a community of fellow peoples that should learn together is a is a utopian ideal. And so we were
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes, yes.
Cheryl Nixon: founded with that radical vision and we've continued to try to lean into that throughout time. And that's taken different forms. And I'll just list a couple of examples. We went tuition free in 1892. So we've been tuition free for
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That's amazing.
Cheryl Nixon: over 130 years. So the idea of financial barriers to education remove those So that again there could be radical access to education. We're located in the Appalachian region. So part of our mission is really to reach out to communities that have been under resourced, that need
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: pathways into education. Rural communities, even or some urban communities are within our area. we make sure to again encourage this idea of access to education, no barriers. We want all peoples to have that access. And then one of the ways that we've put together this unique mission and tied it to unique financing of the college, again, no tuition, for example, is that we're a work college. So all students are required to work as part of being part of our community. We're learners together, but we're also workers together.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That's awesome.
Cheryl Nixon: so I hope that just gives you some ideas of just the unique facets of Berea and I'm I'm excited to dive into some of them with you today.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Excellent. Well, I know that you recently had a major announcement. So, as you said, you've been tuition free since 1892, but you announced something pretty spectacular for fall of 2027. Can you talk to us a little bit about that? what you heard from your students that made you take on this bold move? the demographics of your students that made this that much more appropriate, necessary, and visionary, and also. how you're funding this change?
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Yes. So we were very excited to announce at the start of this academic year that we're implementing what we're calling a fully funded degree. And we're calling this financial freedom as what one of
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Cheryl Nixon: the ways we're talking about it with our students. And what this means is that in addition to being tuition free, and again, we've been tuition free, that's been our foundational financial model for over 130 years, we needed to take it the next step further. and feel like we could do another groundbreaking move built on that foundation. So, what we did is we decided we will go not just tuition-free, but housing, food, fees, supplies, books free. So, cost-free for all of the pillars that students worry about when they're thinking
Erin Hennessy: Sure.
Cheryl Nixon: about a college education. One of the reasons why we determined we should be the school that tries to do this is that. All of our students are falling into a category that we would call Pell eligible. They're eligible for a Pell
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: grant. We select students that have great economic need. So 98% of our students are Pell eligible. That's that's by
Erin Hennessy: Mm.
Cheryl Nixon: far the largest economic access mission in the nation. With that type of serving that student body, we really heard from students that what we would maybe consider small amounts of money, do become barriers. Most of our students graduate with zero debt, but some of our students which graduate, the average debt they, if they do graduate with debt, it's a thousand to two thousand dollars. Sounds like a small amount when the average amount
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: of debt is something like $35,000 nationwide, right? But that small amount can be the type of thing that would cause them to drop out because they
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: might say. I can't come up with that type of money because when I work over the summer, I need to contribute that money to my family my family's income. I'm coming from a family where maybe my parents are not working. I'm living with my grandmother. My grandmother needs that money for medication. I need to serve my family. I have a brother who needs money for his schooling. I'm going to not go to college so that I can dedicate my summer
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: money to my brother. Right. So our students come from a background where small amounts of money can make a really big difference. And we decided that the biggest way that we could tackle the question around cost of education was to say, let's do this true to our roots in a radical way. All students have exactly the equal financial package for campus, on campus. No cost, right? That they don't have to worry about a term bill. but
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: I very much am interested in then what happens when you remove the question of the economics of education from the conversation? What happens when you remove all of that type of worry and anxiety and stress for students? I think we can get back to the heart of what education should be about, which is talking about learning, which is talking about, you've
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Ha ha.
Cheryl Nixon: got dreams for the future. You you will have you have financial freedom now. So you're free to think about something else. You're free to think yes and
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And all students can do that, not just those who financially have the ability to have that freedom, but all students.
Cheryl Nixon: Right. And all of our students on our campus are equal in the ability to go after their dreams in the same way, right? We don't just have a small sliver of students who are not worrying about money or a small sliver of students that are getting like a merit scholarship, right? It's all students can come into this community knowing that they, that they're not having to worry about their finances. And I think it's going to open up just some interesting different ways to think about educational community.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And how are you funding this? Just to make sure we get that last little bit there. And then I have one more question for you.
Cheryl Nixon: So yes, so we have different pillars of how we think about our financing. One is that we do rely on federal funding. We rely on PELL grants and we rely on being a work college. That is a federally funded stream of income that we have. And again, all students have to work. It's a very unique model that is a federal, federally funded program. So that contributes to that's a form of a scholarship going towards their tuition. In addition, we have a very large endowment. that is part of our model that all income that we get from donations goes into an endowment that is used as our tuition replacement fund. And again, this is part of our history that went tuition free. And then early in the 20th century, the foresight of our trustees said, Let's start start investing in this strange thing that's called an endowment in the stock market. So
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: we've had the run of the a great 20th century stock market build our endowment for us. And then the third pillar is that we do continue to ask for fundraising to donors to this day. So we're asking for individual donations. We ask for foundation funding. So we do a have an active annual fund that we're raising. And that goes directly all again towards our student support.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: here's something I also just thought was so fascinating. You all obviously are making the experience free for students, but that extends to those who might want to come and visit campus. And I hadn't thought about this until talking with you, but you were we were discussing about how every campus says, We know when we get them to campus that we've got them. They can imagine themselves here, they see it, et cetera.
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And for so many families, they don't have that luxury because staying overnight is just an expense they can't think about. Finding a way to get to campus is something that they can't afford. And you all actually work to help families have the ability to stay on campus. So you have a cottage on campus that they can stay on as a family because you know how. important that family dynamic is in the decision. Can you talk about that just a little bit? Because I had never heard of an institution going all the way back for that support that starts when they're even just looking at you.
Cheryl Nixon: Exactly. And again, you've stated it in a really clear way in that when families come and visit us, we want them to feel again welcome and feel like they're understanding that our campus would become a home, a home space for their student. And so making families feel welcome and comfortable and being able to imagine their students finding again a sense of acceptance and a sense of feeling that that home like comfort. and so we do. We have a cottage on campus, and that allows potential students to come with their families and feel like they're embraced and welcomed into a community that wants to demonstrate care and acceptance. Again, just think about it. With the the demographic that we serve, most of our students are first gen students, the first students in their family that have ever gone away to college. So we want them again to feel comfortable with that choice of what that what does that mean? What does a college campus look like? What does it mean to send
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: your child away? we want them to feel like they they understand that and they're they're actually even feeling that and they're part of the the journey alongside of their child.
Erin Hennessy: I have to imagine, you know, it's such a change for the students who arrive at Berea, but this is a big change for the family and it's a sacrifice
Cheryl Nixon: Yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: in a lot of ways. are potentially losing a caregiver, losing an income, losing a
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: real important part of how that family functions and to bring everybody to campus and say, this is what you're sacrificing for. I have to imagine that's so powerful for so many families.
Cheryl Nixon: Right, right. I think again our mission is idea of radical access and radical opportunity
Erin Hennessy: sorry.
Cheryl Nixon: and radical possibility and sort of radical dreaming. Like we really believe in that that education
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: is about opening new horizons, opening new doors. I think we know
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: this narrative of like sending your child away and they won't come back home again. And there In that narrative, a sense of loss. We don't we don't want that to be the narrative. We want it to be a narrative of empowerment. We encourage our students that they can always return home and maybe go back home with new skills, talents, gifts that they want to bring back to their home community. Now, some of our students really do want to move to a different part of the country or try out different things. But again, we're trying to embrace the idea of that every student can find the way that it feels right for them and their family. and they're I would even say they're community, right? They might be really representing the valedictorian of their high school in a small rural town in Appalachia.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm.
Cheryl Nixon: We want that whole community to be proud of
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: of their student coming to us. So it is that type of sensibility that we're trying to really inculcate.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, that's amazing.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And I love the way that you use the word radical. I don't think we use that enough in higher education. And I would encourage everybody to be thinking about that radical knowledge, radical education, radical opportunity, all of the ways that you just described that, because I feel like that's the spirit of where we all should be.
Cheryl Nixon: Right. And I think for us, you can see even the way I described the financial freedom model, this idea of a fully funded no cost education. Part of our idea of being radical is to try to go to an extreme, but again, to make sure that it's available to everyone, right? We feel that it's sort of doubling down on something that we believe is right, but trying to do it for everyone. and that's that's part of why
Teresa Valerio Parrot: That is the extreme right.
Cheryl Nixon: we use the word radical a bit, is that it's trying to say we can do something that's at scale that we we share completely as a whole community.
Erin Hennessy: We've talked a lot about the work college distinction and I think that's so important and it's such a unique model. You're in a real small group of peers. But I also want to go back to, as you mentioned, the founding in 1855 as the first college in the South that was interracial and coeducational. And I loved, I've been a a fan of the college for a long time. I loved seeing you all in the opening of Adam Harris's book a few years ago, really marking what a remarkable institution you all have been from day one. And I wonder how you are making that history of interracial coeducational education present in today's world when it feels like we're stepping back so quickly from civil rights, from gender equality, from all of these things that are really baked into who Berea is and what you are for.
Cheryl Nixon: Yes, again, you can hear me say the ideal of radical equality and just saying like
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: that is the core of what we were founded on. Our motto is God has made of one blood all peoples of the earth. It's a biblical quote from Acts 17:26 26. And our founder really took to heart the idea of love thy neighbor and wrote on what is a you know, again, I'll use the word radical, but what does that mean to love thy neighbor? It means a across difference. he used the term impartial love, we don't love partially, we love wholly. We don't show that we love some people and not others. So we talk about this like I would say almost daily on campus. We have something we call our eight great commitments that include things like equality, that include things like educational opportunity, includes the liberal arts, includes service to Appalachia, includes the dignity of labor, includes Christianity. So we have I guess what I'm trying to say if we have a very long standing way of discussing what it means to say the founding of America is about equality and the founding of Berea
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: is about equality. All peoples working across difference. And I think that's is what education represents, right? We bring all peoples into a classroom. Let's sit in a circle And let's talk about ideas and learn from each other. And our differences are one of the ways that we learn. So we work across difference of race. We work across difference of gender. I would say geography. We work, we have
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: students who are international on our campus. We have students who are from again small town rural. We one of our largest areas, because we're in Kentucky, we bring in students from urban Louisville across some geographic difference sometimes is not talked about as a form of difference. Even the
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: liberal arts, right? We get an artist sitting and arguing with a computer scientist.
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: So just that idea of a community of thinkers that wants to lean into the idea of equality and this idea of all peoples coming together in kinship. I think we've had that from the very beginning, and we're leaning into that. type of trying to express that that's what education is about. And at a moment when other forms of vocabulary,
Erin Hennessy: Are you getting any pushback on that message though?
Cheryl Nixon: you know, whether it's diversity or inclusion, like we just feel like we've got a long-standing way of talking about creating community that we're very proud of. And we try to be true to that every day. I'll just mention
Erin Hennessy: are you?
Cheryl Nixon: a good example of this is we just are working now on a partnership with the Muhammad Ali Center, which is located in Louisville.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm.
Cheryl Nixon: And they have a great way that they're talking about something they're calling their compassion index and the idea of what creates compassion, for example. And we just felt like that was such a Berean value in a way. We've we've never used the word compassion as one of our great commitments, for example. We use impartial love. But you know that's like finding fellow thinkers around what is it that binds us as human beings. I think education should claim some of these, if you want to call them moral or ethical frameworks of thinking and being. We're bringing young human beings, you know, like onto a campus to live in community together. There's gotta be an embrace and difference in that. And I
Erin Hennessy: Sure.
Cheryl Nixon: just think we're ready to to sort of create a new chapter what does that mean and how do we talk about that? coming out of this latest. I would say sort of attack on some of the ways that we've we used to talk about it. so I'm actually
Erin Hennessy: Right? Are you-
Cheryl Nixon: eager for all of higher ed to sort of figure this out and work on it together.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah. Yeah. Are you getting any pushback on that message? I mean, a lot of the things you're talking about, other political voices would cast as woke or, you know, soft liberal arts, you know, silliness and we need people who can,
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Snowflakes.
Erin Hennessy: yeah, who can, wrangle AI and, and do science and all of those kinds of things. And, it's refreshing to my little liberal arts heart to hear all of those things, but I wonder, particularly being in the deep south, are there spaces where you're getting pushback on that kind of message?
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So really quickly, my husband is from Kentucky. He would want me to say on behalf of those in Kentucky, they view themselves as
Erin Hennessy: Not Deep South.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: being in the Midwest. So go ahead, President Nixon.
Cheryl Nixon: And I think it depends on who you talk to, how they would situate themselves. But I I think I would say no, we're not getting pushback because it's so inherent to who we are. And
Erin Hennessy: Got it.
Cheryl Nixon: also, again, it's so embedded within again, I would call it our moral framework of who we are. And
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: it's not sort of an isolated ideal that is in one office somewhere. Again, our motto, which is printed all over campus. God has made of one blood all peoples of the earth. It's a biblical quote. That was our founding motto. So I think that the ideals we stand for carry such weight and they're embedded in so much of how we think and we live and breathe them. I think people understand That we're putting into action what I was talking about earlier, this idea of access to what education represents, which is each person can find their way to their dreams and who they want to become. And that for us, part of that is being comfortable talking about what I said earlier, our eight great commitments, which is like our moral framework, they're like our North Star goals. So I don't think we've gotten pushback because it's so inherent into who we are in our history.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I know we just talked about everybody, but I'm gonna narrow us to an audience, and I'm gonna do that with the perspective of dignity of labor. We continue to hear this conversation across the country about the difficulty that a number of institutions are having enrolling males and at liberal arts institutions and in the Midwest, and and and and and your admissions team works very hard, but they have success finding that balance. And when I was talking to someone in your enrollment management office, Luke, who was fantastic, he said he thinks part of why they have success attracting males and interest is because they want to give back in the prospect of this work college and of having a way not just to receive but also to give so that you don't feel as if you are just getting a handout, but instead you are giving a hand to others to pull them up. He thinks that that really helps, along with the fact that you have a forest and a farm. So it gives students some different kinds of opportunities to work. But
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Yeah. Yes, yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: he really does think that that positioning for that contribution really appeals
Cheryl Nixon: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: to your demographic. Can you talk a
Cheryl Nixon: Yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: little bit more about that?
Cheryl Nixon: So our work college model requires that all students work 10 hours a week on campus. And that can take many forms. For example, students can work just as you said, in our farm, they can work in our forest. They can work in, we've got a great IT kind of computer science aligned IT department, so they can work on the latest technologies, writing software programming and implementing it to solve questions on campus. Those types of applied contexts I think do appeal to many of our students, and especially I would say our male students. I do think we have an answer to this question of, how do you take liberal arts learning out of the classroom and put it into action? We have the
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: work college model. Students are doing it every day. There's not a question that some of what you're learning at in college can be immediately applied into sort of a skills-based, work-based space on campus. So you might be taking an agriculture class, but then you can go out and work on the farm immediately.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm.
Cheryl Nixon: Right. You might be taking an environmental resources class and then you can go into our forest and, our campus is also an arboretum, go do work, identifying our trees and helping to remove invasive species, right? You might also be a male student who's very intrigued by the idea of chemistry. You're thinking, I really want to go maybe to to graduate school. Again, small campus, they're able to go into that top rate lab, work side by side with a professor on a research project. So doing some undergraduate research. A male student might say, that is my future. So I think that idea of taking what they're learning in the classroom and putting those skills into action very quickly on a almost day-to-day basis is part of the model that I think makes education come alive. And then I think you said something really interesting about I do think that our students, all students, but I do think male students want to find community and want to find ways to give back. And I think that's a new way of sort of answering some of the questions we have about our culture becoming more and more isolated, where people are becoming more and more individuals, alone. on a screen not connecting. And I, we have many initiatives on campus that help students find community. And some of those are service initiatives, giving and volunteering and giving back. And some of those are leadership initiatives. We have male leadership initiatives on campus. For example, we have an Appalachian male leadership initiative. How do you be a leader? And maybe you go home to your community. and you're a leader that helps build that community. That type of goal I think resonates with our students, and again, probably all of our students, but maybe especially with our male students, answering those questions of what does it mean to be a very smart, bright, talented, eager, hungry male? But you want to give back. And how do you express that? I think that again, college should be tackling some of those questions and saying like we can we can provide really compelling, not just answers to that, but ways that students can put that into practice very quickly while they're at school.
Erin Hennessy: Well, I think you've sort of answered my next question, but I'd love to hear about the conversations you are having about ROI and the value of higher education with policymakers in particular, but with families and students. And I imagine that the version of the conversation that you're having is very different than a lot of your non-work college peers are having.
Cheryl Nixon: Right, right.
Erin Hennessy: And I imagine they might be a little bit jealous of the concreteness and the immediacy of the things you get to point to as the president of Berea.
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Yes, I think that we are really trying to take the language of the economics, of higher ed, and say what happens again when you can almost invert that and almost turn that inside out we invest in our students in different ways than just a dollar sign type of investment. So let's like turn upside down or turn inside out the word investment, the idea of value. There's a lot of question of what's the value of higher ed, a student needing to take out loans, and then they've got to find that high-paying job to pay back those loans. And that's the value trajectory. Well, you just heard me talk a few minutes ago about the moral fiber of our campus. we want to return the
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: idea to the value on a campus is not just an economic value. We want educational value to come back, intellectual value, right? Let's recover.
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: And reclaim some of those ideals. So one of the ways we're talking about this with our students, we're just trying out new ways of how do you almost philosophically think through what is a college campus for when it's not about a term bill and you're paying me in a transactional way for your education. And we're talking, for example, we launched this fall and we started talking about what if this is a more of a gift economy? Where our students are bringing gifts to us. I talked to students about this, you bring us gifts. What are the gifts you bring to us? You bring your talents, you bring your skills, you bring your perseverance, you bring your love of your home, you bring all sorts of interesting dreams to us. And those are the gifts you bring us, and we want to give a gift in return of giving you the space to realize those dreams.
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: We want to think of a different sort of virtuous circle You give and we give in return. And that virtuous circle is a way of talking about that it's a service economy, that you're you're serving each other, you're paying it forward. What is to pay it forward? What is a gift economy? So we're we're trying to think through what is a different way of thinking about like how could we replace ROI with a different
Erin Hennessy: Right, right.
Cheryl Nixon: way of like talking, but even just sort of transforming getting back to what is education really supposed to be doing.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, and there's all this conversation lately tied to AI, to take a hard left turn,
Cheryl Nixon: Yeah. Yeah.
Erin Hennessy: and how AI might impact higher education and indeed sort of take some of the knowledge transfer off the table and allow institutions to go back to this notion of formation and how do you become
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Erin Hennessy: a person who is going to contribute personally and professionally to the world around us and how do you think about things and the sort of moral and philosophical questions the robot overlords can handle the knowledge transfer
Cheryl Nixon: Ha ha ha.
Erin Hennessy: and we'll be over here making good people, which is at
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Right.
Erin Hennessy: the heart of so much of what we try and do for our students in the very brief time that we have them.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And I want to circle back around to Erin,
Cheryl Nixon: Yes, I love that.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: your question, where you were talking about how there's so much conversation around the value of higher education. And that's
Cheryl Nixon: Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: really underpinned with trust. And one of the things that I think is interesting is when I talk to people about Berea, the question I get more often than not is: is this too good to be true or what's the catch?
Cheryl Nixon: Yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And I think part of that, I keep thinking, is a reflection on the greater conversation around higher education and how little trust we have that when an institution is performing at this level that everybody thinks there must be a catch. President
Cheryl Nixon: Right, right.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Nixon, how do you address that question around gotcha mentality?
Cheryl Nixon: Yeah. Yeah. The catch is trust us and take a leap of faith and and come just what you were saying, Erin like come to us ready for human formation. Like I jotted down that word formation, right? Like
Erin Hennessy: Great.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: come to us with your whole personhood willing to think through that this is what education should be about, right? That you're coming into a community ready to be open and try new things and be challenged in new ways. and it's not gonna be easy, right? That
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: Part of what we hope would be you're coming into a community that is willing to ask big questions, make big moves,
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: bit radical. Yes, be willing to fail. Right.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Be willing to fail. We have fail.
Cheryl Nixon: And I think be ready for intellectual challenge. I think that some of what we want to do is regain that trust that becoming an educated person is not just about a career path. No, I'm very pro-career path on a certain level. We're
Erin Hennessy: Hehehehe
Cheryl Nixon: a work college, right? We we want students to be put into action that idea of again, you're learning skills that are going to create a great future for you, graduate school, career path. But I think that we have to reclaim that education is about so much more. It is this whole person formation that we're trying to wrestle with. And I think that's embedded in the liberal arts. I jokingly say, like our biggest goal is to build smarter people, right? Like you're building a bigger, bigger brain when you come here, quite literally. You should be laying down new neural pathways. You should feel some difficulty if you're reading a tough text. You should be questioning and you should not understand it at first. And only by talking to people and having guidance of a great skilled professor, then you come to understand it because you got smarter. Like we're
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: forgetting some really basic ideals of h of higher ed. I think it's because we're in a in a world that is all about creating frictionless experiences and a lot of entertainment value again on our phones or through something like AI. Why write that paper? Let AI do it. I think education should be friction full, right? And getting students to find joy in the struggle, right? And find joy in knowing the intellectual problem solving they're doing is exactly what education is about. So I hope that AI allows us to have some of this type of conversation that we're having right now and come again out the other side with some new ways of reminding people of what, again, what the value of education is, it's not just about a dollar sign version of value. It's about all these other values, whether it's moral values, intellectual values, community-based service values. Those are the issues I hope start to come back to the forefront as we move through this era that we're in right now of I think deep
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: questioning of higher ed and unfortunately deep distrust of higher ed.
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: So I'm going to differentiate you even further. A lot
Cheryl Nixon: Is it?
Teresa Valerio Parrot: of presidents spend a significant amount of time thinking about how to attract, enroll, and graduate legacy admissions. So they're really thinking about that pride for the institution that is multi-generational. And Berea is pleased to have very few children of alumni who qualify to attend. And I just think saying that
Cheryl Nixon: Yes. Yes.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: is phenomenal. But I'd love to have you talk about the impact of generational transformation among your alumni that allows you
Cheryl Nixon: Right. Right.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: to have that pride in not having legacy admissions.
Cheryl Nixon: Yes, we again have a very different way that we think about what a successful institution looks like. And I'm just lucky that I've inherited a model that's taken again a hundred years to work out some of this. And I think one of our again interesting sort of radical facets is that if you come here and you are successful, you can't send your children to us because they're not going to meet the economic need criteria that we've put into our admissions policy. So a sign of success is that you might love Berea. You love being a Berean, but your children can't become a Berean, right? So I think again, that's an inversion of the way we typically think about how higher ed works. So we do want our students while they're here and then as their alums to really think about this idea of paying it forward. That part of what they're doing is wanting to attract a next generation of students that are like what they were, but not necessarily their family members. So again, it's that idea of how do you want to pay forward what you got from Berea by opening up that same model of opportunity for others. So seeing that kin, we have a we have a phrase we call kinship of all people, seeing that kinship with other peoples that might not be your family kin, but are kin to you because they've had similar experiences and a similar hunger for that opportunity that Berea represents. So we talk about, maybe it's not legacy admissions, it's kin admissions.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: And then we do talk about paying it forward. You know, like try to think of that as the philanthropic model. You're paying it forward rather than again just thinking about giving in a typical legacy type of way. We also like to talk about that we transform families and the trajectory of a family and the trajectory even of a community, perhaps.
Erin Hennessy: I'm sorry.
Cheryl Nixon: So we do talk to children of alums, We call them descendants. They might not be able to come to Berea, but they often do understand that Berea was the institution that helped their entire family trajectory change. So we have lots of stories like that of you know, student comes to us, they really do undergo a transformation. They set themselves up for future success that was sort of unimaginable. And their children and even their grandchildren sort of know that Berea was the key piece that caused that difference. And so we do have a certain form of of a legacy in that way.
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: It's not admissions based though. So I think that idea of the sort of purity of what we're trying to do is say we want that educational opportunity to be for these individual students that are the right match for Berea. And that purity is that we do want every entering class to be individuals that are new, right? That that enter
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: into us because they match the criteria that we want.
Erin Hennessy: That's remarkable. This is going to sound like a greedy question, but you know, the institution has removed so many stumbling blocks that
Cheryl Nixon: Right, right.
Erin Hennessy: have historically been in front of the students and the families that you serve in terms of tuition, this latest announcement around room and board and fees and other expenses. What's the next barrier that you all are thinking you need to target? What's the next transformation?
Cheryl Nixon: Well, I would say I'm gonna answer this in sort of two different ways. One is academic preparedness. I
Erin Hennessy: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: do think that higher ed is facing upcoming generations of students that are going to come in less and less well prepared in math and now, with AI, reading and writing. And these are just such core backbone skills, kind of numeracy and also just literacy. When that's being replaced by artificial intelligence, I think that's going to transform how does higher ed move students into what we think of as a sophisticated form of knowledge. You we we all are talking about cognitive offloading and all of that. So if a student doesn't have some of those basic cognitive skills, how can they get to that advanced stage of thinking and understanding what knowledge is so that they can outthink AI? I'm a great believer in that the liberal arts are the way that we outthink AI. Critical thinking, asking questions, problem
Erin Hennessy: Right? Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: solving, working in teams, all of that, right? But you still need those basic, I think, foundational understandings of how knowledge and intelligence operates before you're gonna outthink
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: artificial intelligence. So I think there's going to be a lot of reckoning with what academic preparedness looks like and how students are entering into college and what the finish line of college looks like. How quickly can we transform intellectual skills, and get students to what we think knowledge is. So that's one thing I think that's a big challenge. The second form of challenge I do want to think about are some of the ways that we traditionally think of the sector of higher ed working. And it's a little bit of, goes back to even what we were talking about about thinking across difference. I think thinking across the urban-rural divide, for example, that higher
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: ed could do a better job of thinking across what does it mean to welcome rural students into an institution? What does it mean to encourage them to explore urban settings? We have a great internship program. Every student at Berea can do a fully paid internship. But what does it also mean to take urban students and introduce them to the rural economy, right?
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: We want to get our urban students out into rural Appalachia to learn about that part of the world. So thinking across that difference, urban-rural. And then I would say for the liberal arts, being a work college, I think a big divide is to think about what we typically think of the trades, meaning what we used to call kind of vocational training and the liberal arts. I just think that's a false distinction. And you heard me even wrestling with it, like skills. Like we think skills are the trades, and I said just a moment ago, I corrected myself to say intellectual skills. Again, what does it mean if higher ed was to tackle what we might typically think of as a divide between trade and the liberal arts? And I think that is going back to something we were saying earlier about attracting men to higher ed, but I would say attracting
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: rural students to higher ed, attracting first-
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: gen students to higher ed. Some
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Mm-hmm.
Cheryl Nixon: of our competition is not another college. It might be a community college getting a certificate, or it might be the trades for Berea. Right? You can make a lot of money in being an electrician. Why come to a liberal arts college? So I think erasing that barrier and helping students maybe do something that we might call a trade-based apprenticeship. But also embedding it into the liberal arts where you're becoming a very sophisticated thinker who can outthink AI because you
Erin Hennessy: Yeah.
Cheryl Nixon: want to create your own small business where you are practicing, we often say hands head heart, you practice with your hands, but you have to have that smart brain if you wanna have your own small business that you wanna go back home to a small town
Erin Hennessy: Right.
Cheryl Nixon: and be a small business owner, right? So I think some of that division, across different forms of education would be another big issue I would love to tackle.
Erin Hennessy: Okay, well, we'll be watching.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: Yes, we will be watching and celebrating.
Erin Hennessy: Yeah, we really appreciate
Cheryl Nixon: Thank you.
Erin Hennessy: you making so much time for us today.
Cheryl Nixon: Thank you. This has been a pleasure. It's fun to think big. Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: And thank you. It has been so fun. Yes. And
Erin Hennessy: You're so kind.
Teresa Valerio Parrot: it's so fun to celebrate what you do and who you educate and the impact that you have. Thank you for joining us.
Cheryl Nixon: Thank you.
Teresa :): Thank you for joining us for this episode. Links and transcripts are available at TVPcommunications.com. You can contact us with feedback or guest suggestions at trustedvoices @ TVPcommunications.com. Follow Trusted Voices wherever you get your podcasts. And until next time, thank you to Erin Hennessy, Savannah Parrot, and DJ Hauschild for a great episode. And thank you for listening.