Podcasts about Duke Kunshan University

Andrew Field, in his new book Rocking China (Earnshaw Books, 2023), documents one of the most exciting moments in the history of Chinese indie music. Through interviews with key players in these scenes over a period of two decades, Field explores the meanings of rock music in Chinese society as well as the many challenges and obstacles to the development of indie rock scenes in China. Highlights include a journey by rail into the heartlands of China with the hardcore rock band SUBS and legendary “rock godfather” Cui Jian. Along the journey to document the live rock music scenes of Beijing, he discovered an emerging world of musicians, bands, clubs, festivals, promoters, record shop and record label owners that were pushing the envelope of indie music for China and the world. This book takes the reader deep into the world of independent rock music that has been flourishing in urban China since the 2000s. Andrew Field is an American historian, documentary film producer, and professor at Duke Kunshan University. Based in Shanghai, Field is a scholar of musical history and creative culture in contemporary China, including the role jazz music played in 20th century Shanghai. He is the author of Mu Shiying: China's Lost Modernist (2014) and Shanghai's Dancing World: Cabaret Culture and Urban Politics (2010), and one of the co-authors of Shanghai Nightscapes: A Nocturnal Biography of a Global City (2015). Yadong Li is a PhD student in anthropology at Tulane University. His research interests lie at the intersection of economic anthropology, medical anthropology, hope studies, and the anthropology of borders and frontiers. More details about his scholarship and research interests can be found here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/music

Rebecca Liu is the Assistant Director of Undergraduate Studies at Duke Kunshan University. She shares her passion for serving students from all over the world. Students from Duke Kunshan University learn how to cultivate their own sense of rooted global citizenship. She speaks of her own journey to understand what this concept of rooted global citizenship means to her as she traveled from rural China to the urban city of Wuhan to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Drawing wisdom from her local and global communities, Rebecca urges us to think of the people who shaped us and deepen our connections with one another. Enjoy the conversation!

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/political-science

Welcome to the first episode of our new podcast season 'Ancient Wisdom For Modern Living'.  Each episode aims to provide practical insights and actionable advice, helping listeners incorporate ancient wisdom into their daily routines to achieve greater balance and wellness. In the opening series of the season 'Lessons From Ancient Philosophies,' host Anshu Bahanda will look back on timeless teachings, and talk about adapting them to address current personal and global challenges. The series will feature guests who are experts on topics such as Taoism, Zen Buddhism and Sufism. In this episode, Anshu Bahanda delves into the ancient philosophy of Taoism with Professor James Miller from Duke Kunshan University in China. Taoism is a philosophical and spiritual tradition that originated in ancient China all the way back in 500 BCE. Miller explains the core concepts of this ancient Chinese philosophy, focusing on Wu Wei (effortless action), which advocates for aligning with the natural flow of life rather than forcing one's will upon it. The discussion highlights how Taoism emphasises the importance of balance in all aspects of life, drawing parallels with other ancient philosophies such as Hinduism and Stoicism. He elaborates on the Taoist approach to conflict resolution, which involves deflecting aggression and seeking harmony rather than engaging in direct confrontation. He gives insights into how Taoism addresses ecological balance, underscoring the interconnectedness of human well-being and environmental health. This episode provides a comprehensive look at how Taoist principles can offer valuable guidance for living a balanced, harmonious life in this century.For a transcript of this show, go to https://wellnesscurated.life/taoism-and-the-art-of-balance-2/If you liked our episode, you can subscribe to our podcast on any of the major podcasting platforms like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts. Please leave us a review on Apple iTunes and help others discover this podcast. You can visit wellnesscurated.life and follow us on Twitter @WellnessCurated, On Instagram @wellnesscurated.life,On Facebook @Wellness Curated by Anshu Bahanda,On LinkedIn @Wellness Curated by Anshu Bahanda, And on YouTube @wellnesscuratedbyanshubahanda. for more wellness tips to help you live your best life.

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/politics-and-polemics

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/law

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Seeking a second term as US president in November, Donald Trump joins a roster of politicians whose declared aim is to use legal means to bend democracy to their will and in their interests. The system withstood his first term. In Venezuela, Ecuador, Turkey, and Hungary, the systems didn't, and they are undergoing stress tests in Israel, Slovakia, and Georgia. In Venezuela, Turkey and Hungary, elections still happen and parliaments, courts, and media are intact but checks and balances have been steadily eroded as one party bids for sustained majority rule. Since the turn of the millennium, 80% of cases of democratic retreat have taken this form rather than through violence. Worst of all, “illiberal democracy” is popular. Between 2016 and 2020, Trump added 11 million votes. In 2022, after 12 consecutive years in power, Hungary's ruling party extended its support. Recent polls show that a third of Americans would prefer a strong unelected leader to a weak elected one while a fifth of French under-35s are indifferent to the prospect of an end to democracy. In Democracy Despite Itself: Liberal Constitutionalism and Militant Democracy (OUP Press, 2024) Benjamin Schupmann addresses this democratic internal rot and how to defend against it. "Democratic cannibalism is a perennial problem,” he writes. “It is a question of when, not if, popular anti-democratic movements will erupt from within and try to use legal revolutionary methods to devour democracy. Democratic constitution should be designed to provide democrats with the means to defend it and themselves". Benjamin Schupmann is an Assistant Professor at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He got his PhD at Columbia University and then taught at Duke Kunshan University and the National University of Singapore. Democracy Despite Itself is his second book. His first – Carl Schmitt's State and Constitutional Theory – was published in 2017. *The author's book recommendations are Sovereignty Across Generations: Constituent Power and Political Liberalism by Alessandro Ferrara (OUP Oxford, 2023) and Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity by Hartmut Rosa (Columbia University Press, 2013).  Tim Gwynn Jones is an economic and political-risk analyst at Medley Advisors, who also writes the twenty4two newsletter on Substack. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

More at https://www.philosophytalk.org/shows/im-yunjidang. 8th-century Korean philosopher Im Yunjidang was the first Confucian to argue for women's equality in matters of morality and to claim that women, just like men, can be sages. She also argued that it isn't just what you do that matters morally—it's also how you decide. So what does it mean to be a sage and how does someone become one? How did Im Yunjidang use traditional Confucian texts to argue for women's spiritual equality? And what did she think was important when it comes to making difficult moral choices? Josh and Ray explore her life and thought with Hwa Yeong Wang from Duke Kunshan University, editor of "Korean Women Philosophers and the Ideal of a Female Sage: The Essential of Writings of Im Yungjidang and Gang Jeongildang." Part of the "Wise Women" series, supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Dr. Andrew W. MacDonald, Assistant Professor of Social Science at Duke Kunshan University, shares research from his new book Directed Digital Dissidence in Autocracies: How China Wins Online. We discuss the Chinese digital and social media context, citizens' perceptions of online propaganda, and how the state manipulates digital information to further its political interests. We also discuss survey methodology, how citizens circumvent the Great Firewall, and what affect using the internet and VPNs has on trust in the state. 

People-to-people exchanges, especially educational ones, play a key role in the bigger picture of United States-China relations, and sometimes the events with the most impact "occur quietly", said an expert on Sino-US educational cooperation.中美教育合作专家表示，人文交流特别是教育交流在中美关系大局中发挥着关键作用，有时影响深远的事件反而会“悄然发生”。"I'm hopeful that as we continue the dialogue in 2024, we will see even more progress that will help to sustain and support the continuation of educational exchanges and cooperation between the two countries," said Denis Simon, a distinguished fellow at the Washington-based Institute for China-America Studies, in an interview with China Daily.华盛顿中美研究所杰出研究员丹尼斯·西蒙(Denis Simon)在接受《中国日报》时采访表示：“我希望，2024年的持续对话能带来更多进展，这将有助于支持和助力两国教育交流与合作”。Simon most recently served as a clinical professor of global business and technology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Kenan-Flagler Business School. He also was vice-president and executive vice-chancellor of Duke Kunshan University, a joint venture of Duke University in the US, Wuhan University in Hubei province and the city of Kunshan, Jiangsu province, from 2015 to 2020.西蒙最近担任北卡罗来纳大学教堂山分校凯南-弗拉格勒商学院全球商业和技术临床教授。2015年至2020年，他还担任美国杜克大学、湖北省武汉大学和江苏省昆山市合资的昆山杜克大学副校长兼常务副校长。Simon emphasized the role of exchanges in overall US-China relations. "If we can maintain the progress and maintain the discussion, I'm hopeful that the education relationship can insulate itself to some degree from these larger problems," he said.西蒙强调了交流在整个美中关系中的作用。他说：“如果交流能持续推进下去，两国间教育关系能够一定程度上免受更大问题的影响。”"Sometimes these kinds of people-to-people diplomacy occur quietly. They're not accompanied by a lot of fanfare and noise, but they accomplish a great deal," he said.他说：“有时这种民间外交会悄然进行。阵仗虽不大，但会取得大成果。”Simon said the first post-COVID US-China Higher Education Dialogue, held in New York in September, was "extremely successful".The event, co-hosted by the Institute of International Education and the China Education Association for International Exchange, involved about 15 Chinese universities and a similar number of US universities.西蒙表示，今年9月在纽约举行的新冠疫情后首届中美高等教育对话“非常成功”。此次活动由国际教育协会和中国教育国际交流协会共同主办，涉及约15所中国大学和约15所美国大学。"The discussions covered every aspect of the bilateral education relationship", including undergraduate education, graduate education, university research collaboration and also policy issues like visa issues that are affecting the bilateral education exchange, Simon said."I think that we can keep talking and have dialogues like this and have them conducted in such an open and frank way. That gives me great hope," he said, adding that relations involving education are still in a "transitional phase".西蒙说，“讨论涵盖了双边教育关系的各个方面”，包括本科教育、研究生教育、大学研究合作以及影响双边教育交流的签证问题等政策问题。我认为中美可以继续进行这样的对话交流，并一以贯之如此开放和坦诚的风格。这给了我很大的希望，但不可否认，中美两国的教育关系仍处于“过渡阶段”。"We've gone from a height of having 370,000 Chinese students in the US before COVID, and now we're down to about 289,000," Simon said,"we're starting to see some recovery, of course, in this post-COVID era. But it's yet unclear whether or not we're going to go back to the good old days of… big numbers wanting to come to the United States."西蒙说：“新冠疫情爆发之前，在美国留学的中国学生人数最多为37万人，现在已降至28.9万人左右。当然，在后新冠时代，已经呈现一定复苏。但目前还不清楚我们是否会回到过去的美好时光，不确定是否还会有大量人想要来到美国”。On the other hand, the number of US students in China "is really limited", he said, noting that the number peaked at about 15,000 around 2011, while by 2022 it was around 400. "The ability of our two countries to understand one another really does depend on the young people who are crossing the Pacific, learning about each other's cultures and countries, learning to speak the languages," he said.另一方面，他表示，在中国的美国留学生人数“确实有限”，该数值于 2011年左右达到峰值，约为15,000人，而到2022年，仅有400人左右。但两国互相理解很大程度上正是依靠这些漂洋过海去到对方国家的年轻人，他们学习对方国家的语言、学习了解彼此的国家和文化都能极大促进两国互相理解。"And if they don't achieve that, then the United States, in particular, is going to suffer because we will not have a generation of professionals, whether they're in business, government or academia, who have a deep understanding of the situation in China, and that does not bode well for the long term," he added.“如果他们做不到这一点，美国会尤其遭受损失，因为美国会失去一大批对在经济、政治、学术方面对中国国情有深入了解的专业人士，从长远来看这可不是好兆头。During the November summit between President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden in San Francisco, Xi said that China was ready to invite 50,000 young people from the US to participate in exchange and study programs in China over the next five years.Simon said it was "a wonderful gesture" by China's president.Because I think he, too, realizes, as do many, many of my Chinese friends, that Americans need to have access to China and need to have an experience living and working with Chinese counterparts.""And now there's a whole new generation of students who want to study China in terms of its global role," Simon said. "That means they want to understand more about China's environment policy, China's health policy, China's policies about food security, and all sorts of things that influence the way China interfaces with the rest of the world."西蒙说：“与过去不同，美国的新一代学生对中国在全球发展中扮演角色很感兴趣，因此想进一步了解中国的环境政策、卫生政策、粮食安全政策，以及影响中国与世界其他国家交往方式的各种事情。”peak英/piːk/ 美/piːk/n.山峰，顶峰；v.达到顶峰

In this episode of "Student Affairs Voices from the Field," Dr. Jill Creighton welcomes Brian Medina, the director of Bias Incident Support Services at the University of Maryland, College Park, for a conversation on transitions in Student Affairs. Brian, an openly queer genderqueer and Latinx sexual assault survivor with multiple disabilities, discusses zir journey and experiences. Brian started zir career in student affairs in resident life and student conduct, eventually transitioning into the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) space. They emphasize the importance of authenticity and finding one's true self in the workplace, highlighting the role of supportive colleagues and institutions in this process. They also share zir experience of transitioning in terms of gender presentation, including using gender-neutral pronouns (zee/zir) and embracing a more authentic self, both personally and professionally. Brian's journey has been marked by self-discovery, self-acceptance, and gaining the confidence to bring zir full self to work, which has been transformative. Brian discusses the evolving landscape of bias response work in higher education and its intersection with Title IX regulations. They emphasize the importance of building solidarity across different identities and experiencing intersectionality in tackling power-based violence. The conversation also touches on the regional differences in student affairs work and the impact of state legislation on diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in higher education. Brian reflects on zir transition from a career in residence life to DEI work, highlighting the challenges and successes along the way. They acknowledge the frustrations of job searching and the importance of resilience in navigating the field. As co-chair elect of the NASPA Gender and Sexuality Knowledge Community (KC), Brian talks about the KC's activities and its commitment to expanding its reach by collaborating with other KCs, fostering inclusivity, and encouraging involvement from a diverse range of professionals in the field. Brian wraps up the conversation by encouraging listeners to embrace transitions as part of life's journey and to remember the resilience and progress made by previous generations in creating a more inclusive world. Overall, this episode explores the theme of transitions in higher education, emphasizing the importance of authenticity, self-discovery, and solidarity in the field of student affairs. It also highlights the evolving nature of diversity, equity, and inclusion work and the significance of regional context in higher education. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues!   TRANSCRIPT Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices from the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your essay Voices from the Field host on today's episode of Essay Voices, I'm pleased to bring you a delightful conversation with Brian Medina. Pronouns z here. Hears. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:31]: Brian has been a social justice activist within higher education for nearly two decades. Brian has worked in New Hampshire, Maryland, Ohio, and is now the director of Bias Incident Support Services at the University of Maryland, College Park. As an openly queer genderqueer and Latinx sexual assault survivor with multiple disabilities, zee advocates for marginalized communities to center those harmed by systemic oppression and trauma. Brian is also the co chair elect of the NASPA gender and sexuality knowledge community. Brian. Welcome to the pod. Brian Medina [00:01:04]: Thank you. Lovely to be with you. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:06]: I'm so glad to talk to you today about your transition story. When we reached out to the KC leaders in NASPA, your response was one of the ones that immediately stood out because you've had so many experiences with transition in the last couple of years and we always love to start by getting to know our guests. You're at UMD now you're also leading in the KC space. So what was your come up both in the student affairs realm as well as in the KC realm? Brian Medina [00:01:31]: Thank you for asking. Brian Medina z here and heres and coming up through resident life and student conduct and then also now being in the De I space, the last three years have certainly been a journey. I wouldn't have said if you asked me when I first started my career where I would end up. This would be where it would be. And I'm so grateful and delighted that I can be in this space, particularly, actually, in some ways, very connected, the KC space. I started out with the gender and sexuality casey, different name at the time. And then have been involved with multiple other tam KC. Menamasculinities KC. Brian Medina [00:02:06]: And trying to really see the kind of connectedness of not just the work that I do, but my full existence and my dignity and an authentic self, not just at work, but beyond as well. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:02:38]: One thing you just introduced really resonates with me, which is how do you find your authentic self and feel like you can show up with your whole being at work every day? You mentioned your pronouns are z here, hears. And then also when you reached out to us, you let us know you've had some transitions in your gender presentation in the last couple of years. So I'm wondering if you're willing to tell us about how that impacted your ability to show up at work finally as your whole self and also what you want the profession to know about supporting other professionals who are going through that transition. Brian Medina [00:03:07]: It's a wonderful question. Thank you. For me, over the past decade or more, I have been out as genderqueer. I've been using these pronouns z here and heres for about eight of those years. And I will say that it's been mostly in the last three, three and a half years. Although, obviously, that's overlapping with our COVID existence. That being in space, certainly virtually, but in physical space with folks to explore a bit about, my body to check in with and fortunately, with my university, my supervisor, my colleagues. Have been so supportive and really showing up for me and alongside me in zir own authentic selves, thus giving me in some way, some invitation and welcoming space. Brian Medina [00:03:46]: So, yeah, the last couple of years have certainly been an exploration of I'm extending myself with I wear dresses now exclusively. And I wouldn't have said that four or five years ago, wearing dangly earrings, as I have on right now, and I wouldn't have said that a few years ago. And for me, it has been a combination of both the opportunity and the kind of welcoming space that I have at my current institution. But I will say that some of it has come more internally of feeling confident to be able to bring my full self and share and support various populations on campus in a different way. And it has been the best part of my life over these last couple of years, for sure. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:04:20]: Part of our theme of transitions on this season of the Pod is really thinking about transitions from all perspectives. And you are really our first guest who's come on this season to talk about that internal transition as the biggest driver for other areas of success. So let's hear more about what that internal transition has done for you in terms of your professional development internally. Brian Medina [00:04:42]: I think another factor that I want to make mention here is that I'm also a student in the School of Social Work at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and that has coincided a good bit with my work related activities and certainly my responsibilities. I'm in charge of all bias response for the entire campus. And I will say that showing up in classroom settings, in one sense, showing up in work settings has caused me to reflect right, not just on an intellectual basis, but a true connection with my body, checking in with other folks and how they're feeling in space as we talk about marginalization writ large. And so that internal processing for me has been ongoing, for sure it has been over decades. But I will say the last couple of years I've had the encouragement and the kind of exploration also with a really good therapist and some good friends who've checked in on me and kind of allowed me that space to be able to express myself and therefore I'm much more readily interested and be able to explore that with them as well. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:05:36]: I think the work you're doing at UMD is really difficult work. Right. You're looking into all areas of bias, and we've seen a lot of transition in the way that we're managing our university and institutional responses to that work in the last couple of years. And we're also expecting a major Title IX rule drop to change and rock our worlds one more time. I'm really crossing my fingers. It's the last time that doed makes that happen. But can you talk about your transitions in that space as well, given the way we talk about bias and response to bias now is just really different than even the way we would have framed it in 2013. Brian Medina [00:06:10]: Yeah, my first inclination and thinking is as you're referencing the regulations coming out for Title Nine soon, and in 2011 when I first really started doing work around sexual misconduct and sexual response, sexual assault response, that was kind of on the earlier days of me even coming out as a survivor of sexual violence. And so thinking about that transition coming out in a different lens than it would be in a queer space, and then kind of maybe a couple of years later sharing about my gender identity and sexual orientation as well, I think they really combined. And it was at a time and place, I think, in our society where there was a lot of momentum and drive to make change, but also maybe a lot of confusion as to what that meant. We got this guidance, but what does that apply? How do we actually launch programs and offices and Title IX offices? And even for De and I spaces, many offices didn't see the interrelationship of power based violence, sexual violence, as well as how that affected queer folks, BIPOC folks very uniquely. So, I will say over these last couple of years in that space, specifically in this kind of back and forth. Back and forth because of administrations and certainly across the country, many states who are enacting legislation to harm a whole host of populations, including trans folks. I will say that I think the center of mine for me has been building solidarity across difference rather than this simply being a movement inside one's identity, but across identities, folks that experience similar harms. So I'll use the comparison with sexual violence work. Brian Medina [00:07:43]: Being a survivor, I've actually been a volunteer for the largest national group, reign as a sexual violence hotline. I've been a volunteer for eleven years there, and that work and supporting survivors uniquely on a hotline like that has been so instrumental for me to be able to hold space, provide space, resources, checking in with folks who are experiencing other identity based harms like anti blackness, like anti trans sentiment on our campuses. So I see them as very much connected as how we address trauma by holding space and support for folks uniquely in zir identities, but also seeing that we are more full amongst one another rather than just in ourselves. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:08:24]: You've transitioned also all over the country. You've been in the Midwest and the East Coast and a couple of other places. Do you see the work shifting its orientation or its priorities as you move around the country? Brian Medina [00:08:36]: Absolutely. And I think that many of my peers and friends in the field would acknowledge that depending on what state you're in or region of the country you're in, not only does the state legislation afford or deny you opportunities, and access within your identities and your existence. It also kind of more broadly provides either a chilling effect or an emboldening effect for folks to make change, to do programmatic risks that maybe they wouldn't have taken some other spaces. So I'll note a couple of pieces. When I first started off in resident life, it was up in New Hampshire, a very white space, but also progressive in some areas around sustainability, not so much around racial justice. And so I really entangled that because most of our students of color were student athletes and trying to navigate how to support students uniquely in zir identities but also seeing the friction that they're finding in the community was very much top of mind. And that actually aligned very similarly to my experience in Ohio in a very rural white space. Whereas in Maryland, being a much more perceivably progressive state, I found a much different experience where folks were much more open, interested in gaining resources and also promoting a bit more progressive ideals to support marginalized populations than I had in the other spaces. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:09:49]: That must really shift where you put energy in terms of training for your campus community and also how you're able to frame responses. So with that all kind of put together, what is the common thread between all of those experiences? Brian Medina [00:10:05]: I don't know if I can pull out one specific common thread. One of the things that I came to find early on in the career. Granted, I was in resident life spaces and so I was often doing social justice or de. And I work on the side either for RA trainings or for recruitments, doing programming, advising on the side from what folks perceived as a generalist position that I had to do many other things. And I'd say that that common thread of showing empathy, compassion, concern for the other. I was also a philosophy major, so I should share that from the share there from the get go that as a philosophy major I was always intuiting and thinking through and processing and reflecting. And now as a social work student, kind of that common thread around psychology and caring for full well being, if there is a common thread, it really is seeing the fullness of one of many of society as interconnected and there be no way for us to completely disconnect that from one another. And so in these various career points I would say that De I and social justice was a common thread, even if it wasn't my actual position, responsibility. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:11:10]: Societal structures and pressures are fairly consistent within the culture of the United States. They can be similar to neighboring countries. I can tell you from my own experience living in Asia now our structures around justice and our concepts around justice, marginalization, oppression, they don't apply at all here. It's the wildest thing to break my brain in that way and to stop looking at certain situations through my Americanized justice perspective has been a real interesting challenge. And I've come to the conclusion that dei work is so important in the US. Because of the structures of the way the organizational kind of hierarchies are created in the US. And then when I got here, it was like square pay, ground hole. Some of the concepts are similar in terms of wealth, wealth gap and things like that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:11:55]: But the idea of race is different here because it is kind of a fairly monoracial society. Ethnicity plays a much larger role. Individual achievement stands out even though it's a collectivist society. It's so fascinating. So it's interesting to hear you talk about it from that lens as well. I wanted to hear more about your transition from a res life professional to deib professional. More or less that res life space is one you occupied for 15 years, and a lot of times it can be both difficult from a job search perspective and difficult from an emotional perspective to leave res life and to go into other areas of higher education. So tell us about that. Brian Medina [00:12:31]: I appreciate this invitation and in all vulnerability and honesty, that road was filled with potholes and filled with roadblocks and filled with turns and detours. If you would have asked me when I first started my career if I would have been in res life for 15 years, I would have said absolutely not. That didn't make any sense, there's no way. But as I continued to grow in that, being on call was always a challenge. But I will say that I adapted to it. Different institutional structures. Being going from a smaller private liberal arts college in New Hampshire to then a more mid sized institution of Towson University in Maryland allowed me, I think, a different perspective because there's a much different resourced institution, public institution. I will say that part of my journey, because of thinking about this and around going to De I work specifically at Towson. Brian Medina [00:13:20]: That was where I came out in a lot of settings. That's where I found student groups that even though I wasn't a student, I was advising a couple of student groups within the queer community. I was attending social justice retreats and then helping to facilitate them. And so I think that even though I was very heavily as a position as a resident life director, being in Res Life, I was very much tapped into the ethos and the mores of deib in a way that I don't think most of my peers had access to. And that was a privilege that I had, but also something I sought after. Folks had kind of encouraged me and mentored me. I will say, as I continued through my Res Life career going on to be Assistant Director, then Director, associate Dean in Res Life, each of those elements of social justice had a ring to it, but it was mostly in those other institutions because they were smaller. Me bringing it to those institutions rather than me learning as I had at Towson and now being at University of Maryland, being the largest state school in the state, being at a place know, recently give them a little bit of props, they recently were named number one for LGBT students. Brian Medina [00:14:18]: Acceptance across the country from the Campus Pride Index. To see that there's not only an acceptance and embrace about who I am and my fullness, but also that students can get that experience also brings me joy. So I'll say that some of that transition from Res Life to Edib was organic in its own. And if I were to admit to you, I applied to many Res Life jobs to be a senior leader within ResLife and got turned down. And so there's much about failure as it was success throughout the process. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:14:49]: That's a really important message in that job search transition. There are so many reasons that maybe the universe is pointing us in some directions sometimes, and other times it's just really, really frustrating. So I just want to give a shout out to all of you who are trying to make that next move up in the student affairs funnel. It is a real, real challenge when you're moving from that mid level professional and that assistant and associate director to that director space, because that funnel gets really, really tight at that level of organization. So I just want to cheer you on a little bit and let you know that I empathize. I understand. Brian Medina [00:15:18]: And you got this agreed. We can do this together. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:15:21]: I want to chat a little bit about the gender and sexuality. Casey, you're currently occupying a co chair seat. Can you tell us more about the hopes for this year's KC activities, what spaces you're providing, and really how listeners and NAFA members can also find authentic space for themselves in the KC? Brian Medina [00:15:41]: I would certainly shout out to Antonio and Clint, our current KC chairs. I'm actually the chair elect. I'll be taking on this starting in March. But a lot of those responsibilities we've been sharing throughout this year as a know, as a small group that have really cared for one another, not just in terms of the tasks that we do for conferences and programs and receptions that is all important, but really holding space for each other throughout the year. When something is tragic on one campus, it's tragic for the rest of us as well and also uplifting. So going back to the job search process, when we see folks promoted or getting new positions, we also hold folks in that celebration and joy. One of the things that I'm really looking forward to in the gender and sexuality Casey is the expansion for us to connect with other KCS in collaborations. So the last few KC chair rotations have been a building up of that of building relationships with the Latinx Aokc, indigenous peoples, KC Wisa, women XKC, and to be able to see us as a gender sexuality KC be as kind of a point to various intersectional identities. Brian Medina [00:16:43]: To hold space within the KC, but also across NASPA and different other KC spaces has been a joy. I anticipate even more so as the years to come. So that's one of the target interests that I have. So folks listening out there want to get involved and they're eh this KC may be all one identity or maybe kind of stereotypically all gay white men. It is very much not at this point and certainly won't be in the future. We're recruiting a lot of folks and we'd love to have you as a part of that revolution toward more broadening of queerness. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:17:12]: You also did an Essay Speaks very recently. Can you tell us, especially for those who are unfamiliar first, what is Essay speaks and how can folks find your conversation? Brian Medina [00:17:22]: Essay Speaks starting with what it is. It really is equivalent to what a Ted Talk would look like. So it's a ten to twelve minute talk. It's an opportunity for presenters. Rather than sharing kind of research or anything like that, it's really integrating our stories of who we are alongside kind of takeaways for audience members. And this is at the annual conference itself. So this past year in Boston and April I did share that from the topic of embodying gender fluidity, which in some ways is very relevant to the topic we're talking about in transition. I shared a bit of my journey over the course of my career and how I presented myself in my gender, how my gender fluidity and gender queerness have shown up in workspaces, but also other spaces given interest to anybody in the audience, those that are listening. Brian Medina [00:18:05]: And the video is out there if you want to check it out. NASPA has that available for folks to explore on zir own campuses, where they can advocate alongside zir trans non binary colleagues and students seeking some opportunities for healing. But also some joy along the ride. So I really encourage, if folks want to check that out, please do. So. Going into just sharing about that experience, jill and I shared off script a little bit about how different, how so much goes beyond the production and so much goes into the planning of this was a nine month planning cycle of creating a twelve minute sharing of one soul and heart. And so for me, it was a lot of work. I also have multiple disabilities, but one disability impacts my speaking when I'm public speaking. Brian Medina [00:18:47]: And so for me to put myself out there on the stage with hundreds watching, other thousands perhaps watching at home at some point was super nerve wracking, especially when a lot of complications happen last minute. So I just want to firm for those folks out in the audience that may be fearful to do these kind of speaking engagements. I am with you. I was there, and I certainly encourage you if you would like to have another support as you're exploring this opportunity to tell your story and who you are in your fullness. I would love to be there alongside you for that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:19:16]: Brian, any other thoughts on the theme of transitions in higher ed or for yourself as a human? Brian Medina [00:19:22]: I guess I'd love to share a little bit about how transitions, fluidity, as I just was talking about gender, fluidity transitions are happening all the time, right? We talk about transitions for our students coming in and off campus, graduating and going off about zir lives, transitions for us in the job market, transitions as I shared about gender and understanding how I present myself. But I want to encourage so much of our talk about transitions, talk about the tense, the tenseness and kind of feeling of anxiety that is present there. It's the fear, and some of it rightfully so because of our world and how much we can be harmed in that transition and showing who we are. But I also never want to forget how much we are taking upon our ancestors to get to where we are today. The transition of a more human wide transition to be in a place and space where I can be who I am and be present even on this podcast with you and alongside you is dedicated to many of those folks well before me, marcia P. Johnson, Silvio Revellitrera, who could be kind of conduits and revolutionaries in zir own right. I would love to for the next generation to see many folks alongside me, not just me, but to provide transition opportunities and emboldening us to be better and do better for our work. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:20:35]: It's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Christopher Lewis [00:20:41]: Thanks so much, Jill. Glad to be back in the NASPA world. And as always, there's a ton happening in our association, and I'm really excited to be able to share some of these things with you. One of the first things that I wanted to share with you is that the 18th Manassa NASPA Conference will be hosted by Qatar University April 20 eigth to April 30, 2024. Right now, the call for programs is open, and the conference registration is open, and the early registration is open until January 31. The Manassa NASPA Conference provides student affairs practitioners with the knowledge and skills to effectively address and support college students. Higher education is witnessing a wide array of changes, especially in the era of fast technological evolution. This conference coming up. Christopher Lewis [00:21:36]: The theme of it is Student Affairs changes and Challenges in the Era of Emerging Technologies. It's a three day conference put on by NASPA and the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia or Manassa area. This is an opportunity to connect with colleagues both regionally and abroad, and the conference provides you with a space for discussing innovative ideas, adaptive approaches, use of technology, best practices, lessons learned, and provide tools to understand the next generation of student affairs. Definitely want to take advantage of the early registration rates that are open right now, and if your campus is in the Manassa region and would love to be considered for the 2025 Manassa NASPA Conference, the bid for that conference is currently open as well. You can find out more about this conference on the NASPA website and the bid for the 2025 hosting of the conference. Deadline for that is on February 15, 2024. You can find the Manassa NASPA Conference campus host Bid, the secure platform on the NASPA website. You can put in a bid right there to be able to be considered. Christopher Lewis [00:22:59]: The Fall 2023 Leadership Exchange magazine has been sent out. If you didn't see the email or haven't checked it out yet, I really encourage you to check it out. The theme of this issue is consolidation. Fosters collaboration. Advancing student success at a newly integrated institution. Inside of this issue, you're going to see a ton of great articles that are tailored to Vice Presidents for Student Affairs and other leaders in Student Affairs administration. Even if you're not at that level, I still encourage you to read the articles in this. They will challenge you, they'll push you, and they will encourage you to think about things in a different way. Christopher Lewis [00:23:40]: Also inside of this issue, you're going to find conversations about the college mental health cris. Also, you'll be able to learn what it's like to be a Vice President for Student Affairs through the lens of four new VPSAs and also thinking about holistic advising approaches to student success. This and more are a part of this Leadership Exchange, and I really encourage you to go and check it out for yourself. Go to the NASPA website, click on Publications, and go to the Leadership Exchange magazine. Christopher Lewis [00:24:13]: We're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself where do you fit? Where do you want to give back? Each week. We're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas that will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in. That knowledge, community. I see myself doing something like that or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Christopher Lewis [00:25:33]: Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:25:37]: Another fantastic NASPA World segment. Producer Chris, we continue to appreciate you and all of your work to keep us informed on what's going on in and around NASPA. Brian, we have reached our lightning round. I have seven questions for you in about 90 seconds. Ready to do it? Brian Medina [00:25:52]: I love it. Let's do it. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:25:53]: All right. Number one, if you were a conference keynote speaker, what would your entrance music be? Brian Medina [00:25:58]: The entrance music that I already use. Crawling by Lincoln Park. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:02]: Number two, when you were five years old, what did you want to be when you grew up? Brian Medina [00:26:05]: I wanted to be a soccer star. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:07]: Number three, who's your most influential professional mentor? Brian Medina [00:26:10]: My former supervisor, Brenda Ice. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:12]: Number four, your essential student affairs. Read. Brian Medina [00:26:16]: Student affairs must read. I would have to say cast by Isabel Wilkerson. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:22]: Number five, the best TV show you binged during the pandemic. Brian Medina [00:26:25]: I have to admit that I haven't been watching many full shows lately, but I am a sucker for any historical docuseries, so please send your recommendations. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:34]: Number six, the podcast you've spent the most hours listening to in the last year. Brian Medina [00:26:39]: While I clearly love the SA Voices podcast, I also want to give a shout out to a friend of mine, Tracy Guy Decker, who recently developed a podcast called Deep Thoughts about Stupid Stuff but replaced the word stuff with something we're not allowed to say on the air. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:26:54]: And finally, number seven, any shoutouts you'd like to give, personal or professional? Brian Medina [00:26:58]: Always love to give shout outs to my peers and friends in the gender, sexuality, casey and other Casey's, and certainly. To my partner for continuing to hold space for me as I have shared my fullness on this podcast and beyond. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:10]: Ryan, I'm sure there are many listeners who would love to chat with you after the show airs. How can they find you? Brian Medina [00:27:15]: I'm less on social media. I would love to hear. If you'd like to send a long letter, send it snail mail or you can send an email at bamadina at. Umd.edu. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:28]: Ryan, it's been such a pleasure to talk with you. I always love getting to know other leaders in NASPA. There's so many of us, we don't always get to connect. So I want to say thank you so much for sharing your voice with us today. Brian Medina [00:27:38]: Thank you so much, Jill. It's been a pleasure. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:41]: This has been an episode of SA Voices from the Field, brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at savoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn by searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:10]: And please, like, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible role in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton. That's me. Produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:29]: Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

In this episode of "Student Affairs Voices From the Field," Dr. Jill Creighton welcomes Dr. Eric Stoller, the VP of Marketing and Digital Content at territorium, for a conversation about the evolving landscape of higher education and the role of technology in student affairs. They discuss various trends in higher education technology and how it impacts both academic and student affairs divisions. Dr. Stoller traces his journey from his early experiences as a marketing specialist at the University of Illinois, Chicago, to becoming a respected thought leader in the higher education technology space. He emphasizes how technology has become an integral part of the entire higher education experience, noting the importance of CRM tools, mobile apps, and the shift toward hybrid and remote learning during the pandemic. The conversation delves into the changing value of higher education credentials and the importance of measuring and verifying outcomes related to critical thinking, skills development, and employability. Dr. Stoller discusses the growing focus on micro-credentials, badges, and the idea of a learner's "digital wallet" to showcase skills and experiences. They also touch upon the need for interoperability in higher education technology and how data and analytics will play a more significant role in student affairs, helping institutions understand student needs and provide better support. The episode concludes with a discussion of the evolving role of student affairs in helping students navigate diverse pathways to success, emphasizing the need for personalized support and pathways for learners, regardless of whether they complete a degree. This episode sheds light on the transformative impact of technology on higher education and how student affairs professionals can adapt to these changes to better serve students in an evolving landscape. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues! Transcript Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices From the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your essay, Voices from the Field host today on SA Voices, I'm pleased to bring you a conversation with Eric Stoller. Eric is the VP of Digital at territorium with over 20 years experience in higher education and education technology. As a Strategist writer and thought leader, he founded and led a global higher education consultancy from 2010 to 2019 and created the Student Affairs and Technology blog for Inside Higher Ed. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:46]: Previous Ed Tech roles include leadership positions at list. Ed tech element 451 and Gecko engage. Earlier in his career, he was an academic advisor at Oregon State University and a marketing specialist at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Eric. Earned an associate's degree, a BA in Communications and an EDM. In College student Services Administration. Eric, welcome to SA Voices. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:01:07]: Thanks so much for having me, Jill. Great to be here. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:09]: It's really great to see you. For our listeners, Eric and I met, I'm going to say 2005 maybe. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:01:16]: I think dinosaurs were just still roaming the earth. Yeah, it would have been 2004. Five Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:25]: I think we were just escaping the trends of dial up internet and smartphones weren't smart yet in that time. So Eric and I actually worked together in the Office of Student Conduct when we were graduate students. So it's really lovely to see old friends and see careers blossom. And I'm really looking forward to talking about your transition today because I think you have a really unique one for someone who received their master's in Higher Ed. So would love to start with if you could tell us about your current position. And we always like to begin with a good come up story. How did you get to your current seat? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:01:57]: A good come up story, I love that. Well, so my current role is Vice President of Marketing and Digital Content at territorium, which is a global ed tech company that is all about bridging education to employability. And we'll probably get into that later on in the show. And it gets highly technical and I can't wait to dive into that. In terms of how I got into this seat, it is a long, winding story that started on a gravel road in Iowa, and I'm not going to bore your listeners with the full, you know, I went to community college, went to university. I thought I was kind of done with higher education. And then I actually started working at the University of Illinois at Chicago way back in the day in marketing and just loved the work. I was located within Student Services, and that's when I sort of first learned about what student affairs was even all about. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:02:42]: And was, as I am today, still very much into technology back then. And even I remember calling up Kevin Krueger, who's now the executive director for NASPA or the president of NASA. I'm not sure the exact titles nowadays, but Kevin and I had a conversation when I was very new to the field, and I said to him, why is the information Technology knowledge community, as it was known then, why is it gone? Because they had just gotten rid of it. And his first thought or question know, who are you? And I said, yeah, I'm just new professional, kind of bothering this leader of this association, or at the time, I think he was the associate director. Anyway, I went out to Oregon State, as you referenced, and I got my master's degree in higher education. Worked in a variety of different areas from enrollment management, financial aid, registrars, kind of a stint at Student conduct, was an academic advisor. And then during that time when I was an academic advisor, I started writing for Inside Higher Ed. I started the Student Affairs and Technology blog and just loved that experience as a writer for Inside Higher Ed. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:03:41]: And it was also at that time when I started getting invitations to go out and do some freelance work and consult for institutions and speak at events. So I stopped working full time for Oregon State and I became a consultant for nine years in the US, the UK and beyond, various global events and working with institutions all over the place. And the focus was all around digital engagement. This was when sort of social media was kind of coming into its own still and really focusing on how student affairs divisions could just transform what they were doing with all things digital. Because the origin story of student affairs is one that it was all about face to face, one on one experiences with students. And technology was seen because my Grad program, it was what, 2004, when I started, and technology was seen as this kind of gets in the way of that student experience. You fast forward to today, almost 20 years later, and the idea that technology would be separate from the student experience is something that people would never think about. It's really connected deeply. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:04:40]: And so I had this nine year experience as a freelancer, and then I started working for a higher ed chatbot company that was based in the UK and Scotland and did that for a little while, went back to Freelancing, and then I worked for a higher ed CRM company. You're getting kind of a theme here in terms of my Ed tech experience, right? Sort of chat bot to CRM. And then we moved to the Netherlands in 2022 from the US. And so I was doing Freelancing again, and a connection of my wife, professional connection, started talking to me about this potential marketing role at territorium, and they were launching their kind of US presence. territorium as a company has its origins in Monterrey, Mexico, and we're all over Latin America in terms of providing testing and a learning experience platform as well as our comprehensive learner record. But we hadn't really had as much of a presence in the US. And so we launched this US team back in December of last year that's for listeners on the call. I can't even do the math now. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:05:42]: Right? 2022. And so been with territorium since then and leading on all things marketing and digital combination of leading, strategy, producing, execution, go to market, a lot of things that are not part of our Master's degree program that Jill and I went through, but connected to both my undergraduate experience as a PR and marketing major. And then of course, my deep connections and network into higher education have kind of got me to this place. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:06:10]: So I'm going to just do a quick backup to a terms definition. You mentioned CRM, which might not be a term that's familiar to those in Higher Ed. Can you define that for us? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:06:18]: Of course. So this is where things really get interesting because as you know, every institution in the US kind of does things differently. If they're a college, they're a university, they're a community college. The structures, the systems, some institutions have divisions of student affairs, some have smaller sort of scale depending on their organization. But the one thing they all have in common is they all recruit students, they have admissions and they have recruitment. And whether they use a higher ed specific CRM, which is back in the day, it would have been a Customer Relationship Management tool, which is effectively how you keep track of who you're trying to recruit and communicate with them and engage them on a level from maybe they're a junior in high school or if they're an adult. Learner how you're connecting with those folks through a variety of communication vehicles like email, SMS or maybe a chat bot. How it's all interconnected. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:07:10]: So there's the Gargantuan CRMs out there like Salesforce or I happen to be working for Element 451, which is a much smaller shop, but they have quite a few clients as well. That's the CRM. I think the interesting thing about being in Higher Ed is I always say that you live in an acronym soup because you've got all the associations for higher education, all the different tools and platforms. You've got the SIS, the Student Information System. I mentioned the Comprehensive Learner Record, which is shortened down to Clr, which is a record of skills and experiences and credentials for learners. That goes far beyond the transcript because it goes inside the classroom and outside the classroom. So that's the clr. And so, yeah, if we need to, we can have a glossary of Terms attached to this podcast. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:07:53]: In terms of all the acronyms that I might mention, I think for Higher Ed pros, most of these things you're already familiar with, you just didn't know. That's what it was called in corporate land, but things you're quite familiar with. I think the one that we've been using lately is Slate in terms of our CRM for prospective students. It's quite a popular rising one right now. So you do know these things. You just maybe got a new term to associate with it. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:08:15]: I think if you work in enrollment management, if you're in the admissions side, you're in these tools on a daily basis. I think it's one of those things if you're in student conduct or academic advising or every sort of functional area has its set of digital tools that it uses on a day to day basis. But when I was at Oregon State as an academic advisor, I was in banner every single day. And so that was the tool of choice. That's from Elusion. In terms of providers, I'll try not to too much name dropping, but I think that in terms of the Edtech universe, there's so many different providers because so many different functional areas require just different tools to help with the work that they're doing. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:08:53]: One of the reasons I was really looking forward to our conversation is because you can talk about transitions in the digital space. A lot of the conversations we've had this seasons are personal transitions in career, which you've certainly had. But I think one of the things you've always had your finger on the pulse of in higher Ed is how digital kind of arenas, the digital vertical for higher education has really changed and reshaped the way that we do the work in our campus based positions. So I'm wondering if you can talk to us a little bit about that process and what you've seen in terms of trends and bed tech field is really new 2030 years in terms of its boom. So any trends that you're seeing in terms of how educators are using these tools really well, yeah. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:09:34]: I mean, I think it's always good, like you said, to kind of look back where things were. When I was writing for Inside Higher Ed, I remember going to EDUCAUSE a couple of different times. The annual Educause Conference, which is kind of a giant ed tech convention. And most of the providers back then, those events, they were very much focused on the academic experience side of things. There weren't a lot of providers that were doing things that would even slightly sort of go into the student affairs areas. And now you fast forward to today and Edtech providers are in kind of every single space within institutions. As we've already referenced, the CRM tools have become extremely important because with the approaching enrollment cliff for that traditionally aged population, which is kind of a loaded phrase anyway in terms of what is traditional, but that sort of 18 to 22 year old, that population of university, that's a decline. There's just not as many young people that will be going into higher education. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:10:33]: And so the CRM becomes a tool that is even more important as you communicate, as you hone your message, as you try to showcase the value of your institution, of the degrees that students will receive and earn and other systems as well. I mean, it used to be the digital experience was much more based on the staff or administrators who were at their desk with a big screen and students would come to their office and they would sort of navigate a system on behalf of the student. And then mobile apps kind of really entered in in a meaningful way. And no longer are students sort of tethered to an individual and their desk and their office, but they can look things up on their phone and they can access a variety of services. They can ask questions to 24/7 chat bots. They can look at their course schedule. They can look at various activities and events on campus. Now, of course, when you said this, you referenced the question. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:11:29]: You kind of framed it as on campus. I think what the pandemic did was it showcased the need to serve and support students who weren't necessarily going to be on campus, or at least accelerated. Maybe more of a hybridized environment where students were on campus for a portion of the time, but they were also on their computers at home because it used to be that all your lectures were in a big auditorium. And then the idea of the sort of the flip classroom came into play. Professors were recording their lectures and students could listen to a lecture at home and so that the discussion would actually happen when you went to the classroom. And then with the Pandemic, it sort of said, okay, everything's going to be remote for certain people. And it was interesting because you start thinking about how did student affairs serve learners, who historically student affairs would have been saying, okay, in res life, there's no such thing as remote. Students are actually physically located on campus. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:12:27]: But then say, what about the other side of our institution that was serving adult learners or online only learners or people that were coming in for micro credentials, they were never going to set foot on campus. They maybe came once a year, if that. And so technology has really embedded itself throughout the entire higher education experience because the higher education experience has changed. It's such a blended, multimodal thing where students are learning through their phones, they are communicating like we are right now through zoom or other media like this because you don't have to be bound to a certain geography. You could be in Iowa and studying an institution in Oregon, or you could be in Berlin and studying at an institution in South Carolina. So the variety pack now and I think that's where I think back to our higher education master's program. And the fundamentals that we were taught were still very much constrained to a sort of model that was still constrained in some ways. It's like know, we were on a basketball court, for example, and we knew where the boundary lines were for everything, and we knew, like, okay, here's the two baskets, and we know how things work. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:13:39]: But then all of a, you know, I live in Europe now imagine if that basketball court was transported to a football pitch, which is enormous in size and different boundaries and different scope and scale. And I think that's where higher education finds itself. It's having to, as a sort of nebulous thing, now recruit students that in the past might not have been recruited because, like I said, that enrollment decline for a certain demographic, and so all these technologies are really coming into their own. For instance, the territorium, one of the things that we've been really talking about a lot is this idea that why do people go to college? Why do people pay the bill? Why do the people get into debt? Most of us were not financially wealthy enough to just pay for school right away. You have to get a loan. You pay your student loan off over the course of a lifetime or however long it takes. And what's the value of higher education? Right? Yes. It's the experience. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:14:30]: It's about giving back to your community. It's about access. But by and large, most people go to university because they want to improve their overall employability or their chances for a career that will perhaps lead to financial stability because that's why they're doing it. And higher ed, I think, for the longest time, hasn't really talked about that. We shy away from that. We shy away from the fact that people are going to get their BA in English, for instance, and they're going to get in $50,000 worth of debt. But they're doing it because they love writing, they love the work, they love the art. But at the same time, is there a connection to employment at the end of that journey, or are universities just leaving students in debt? And so I think that's where you may have heard people talk a lot about the skills based economy. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:15:16]: And I went to community college for my first two years. I got my Associate of Arts. My brother, he went to the same community college. He got a two year technical degree. That's what he has, a technical degree. And he has done really well for himself career wise. And I think one of the things, when people hear the word skills based economy, they think, well, that's more technical or community college workforce based. But universities are really getting into that space now when it comes to micro credentials and badging and trying to sort out the sense of, okay, it's not just about a pretty campus. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:15:48]: It's not just about a winning football team. It is about what's the direct correlation to you get this degree or you get this credential and it's going to have a direct impact on your success? Because right now I think there's something like 39 million Americans have some college but no degree, and yet that accompanies that with a ton of debt, right? So there's a lot of issues there. And so how do you take folks who have maybe some college but no degree and let them showcase the sort of skills that they have, even though they don't have the diploma, because they might have a transcript that shows that they've taken five classes, but at the same time, how do they show that to employers? Because employers look, traditionally, employers wanted to see the diploma or that you've earned your 40 year degree or you've earned your Master's or whatnot. And so I think that part of the things that higher ed has had in the past is, okay, we've kind of built this foundation of these are our core technologies. But I think there's this transition to, okay, what are some of those core technologies that might need to change, might need to evolve? Because if you're a registrar, for example, you need something more than just a transcript because you're no longer just awarding ABCDF, you are awarding micro credentials. You're giving badges away to students. Faculty members are sort of looking at, okay, my students are learning these skills during the course of this particular class, and now we're going to award them badges that never would have happened 510 years ago. And now you've got employers saying, hey, we are going to hire students based on these skills that they have that are verified by the institution. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:17:15]: Those are really important points because what we're seeing is a transformation of the value of higher education that's not just US. Based, that's globally. Because when we look at what a degree means, I believe it means something extremely different to those of us working in the academy, to those folks that are outside of the academy looking to employ people who need individuals who can demonstrate critical thinking, problem solving skills, technical knowledge, all of those things. And that's part of what the degree is designed to do. But I would believe that, especially at a liberal arts institution like mine, we're teaching ways to think, not just facts and figures and things like that. And you need both. So the question is, how are we transitioning not only our offerings at the university as a whole from a credentialing perspective, but how are we also doing that in student affairs? And how can technology support those transitions for what the work needs to look like? So I'm wondering if you have any thoughts on that. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:18:12]: Yeah, well, I think part of it has to do with the fact that because you mentioned critical thinking, critical thinking is a huge part of the experience of higher education and a lot of student affairs programs the underpinnings of those programs definitely includes critical thinking, equity conversations, cultural diversity conversations. And I think that all those aspects, they just weren't measured in the past. Right, so what did you actually learn throughout your experience that wasn't in the classroom? NASPA, for as long as I can remember, has always talked about learning reconsidered. Right. That learning happens throughout the experience of a student, regardless of where they are on campus, off campus, in a class, outside of the class. And so I think that is part of the work that student affairs is going to have to do going forward, because there's a lot of scrutiny right now, obviously, on institutional budgets and outcomes. And the two big R's, of course, are recruitment and retention. And student affairs plays a big part in both of those areas. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:19:08]: And so I think that the student affairs side of things in terms of transforming kind of what was done to what is being done and what will continue to be done, is going to be verifying and measuring those outcomes so that there's a tangible way to sort of I mentioned badges earlier. How many student affairs divisions are awarding badges to students? You think a lot of times about badges is maybe coming from the academic affairs side of the house. I think that look at Career Services shops, look at the evolution of Career Services because like career centers, they have probably one of the most important roles at institutions. And yet for the longest time, not so much now, but for a long time it was, okay, I'm a junior or a senior, I'll go and talk to career services kind of at the end of my institutional experience before I graduate. And now you see Career Services, they're front loading their engagement with students. So they're at orientation, they're there at first year experience courses, and they're also working alongside employers to connect students to this idea that this is just a step in your journey and we're going to try to help you along. And so I think we're going to see a lot more student affairs divisions awarding badges and getting into the LMS, getting into the badge systems, either coming directly out of a clr or it comes from another provider. I think that's the other thing with this is Ed Tech providers have been very insular in the past. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:20:28]: Like, we've got a platform and it only works with our platform. And so student data is kind of stuck in this database that's very proprietary and an organization called Oneed Tech, unless you're really deeply involved in sort of the Ed Tech space, you might not be aware of them. But one of the big facets of their work is interoperability sort of this idea that all these digital assets that students have are like Lego and that you can kind of plug and play them independently of a certain system. So, for example, if you have a digital wallet, that has all of your badges and has your skills, your credentials, all that stuff in there, you can take it to another institution. Kind of how students transfer from community college maybe to a university, but usually that's with a traditional transcript. But the overall vision will be learners will have this wallet of all of their verified skills and experiences and credentials that they carry with them in an interoperable plug and play type way. And so the sort of sovereignty of learners becomes a much bigger part of the conversation because there's a lot of data that has been part of this as well. And in student affairs, we don't really talk about data. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:21:36]: We don't talk about sort of the technical piece because we've been so much about the soft skills, the one to one. If you want to be a dean of students, you're not necessarily getting into a huge portion of the data unless maybe it's connected to retention or some other issue on campus directly. But the Ed tech space, there's so much data that is coming out of that. And so the thing I think will be interesting to see with student affairs throughout every functional area will be the various dashboards and analytics and outcomes coalescing into a space where you can sort of see, okay, where are students at? What do they need? What kind of support do they need? How is that going to influence things that we're doing programmatically as well as for the next as a student goes to another institution for the kind of a handoff, so to speak, because it won't just be your data is stuck at some institution. It's going with you. It's actually traveling along with you, and it might be enabled in some sort of bitcoin wallet that's kind of independent from an institution that's kind of a buzword. But at the same time, that's kind of the ultimate goal, I think, for a lot of companies that are thinking more about the openness of all this. I mean, when you think about the space that I'm currently in and how we interface into higher Ed, it's not just know, NASPA and Acro are playing a big part in this. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:22:53]: Acro is the Admissions and Registrars Association. They're kind of the home of registrars professionally and technically. Usually that's where the transcript resides. The Lumina Foundation, the big organizations focused on learning and outcomes over the years to even Walmart, because Walmart, I think they're the largest employer in the US. And one of the largest globally. They employ a huge number of people. And so they're thinking about the pathways from higher ed into different careers. I think the pathways piece is one I also want to introduce to this conversation, because it's important to give learners pathways even if they don't graduate, so that people aren't just left with debt and a handful of credits. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:23:31]: What is it they're actually going to be able to get, even if they don't finish. Because as you know, Jill, sometimes success for one person is just a couple semesters of college and that is like a hugely successful outcome for them. Whereas for a lot of other people, maybe it's graduation, maybe it's master's degree, maybe it's a certificate. Success is very much an individualized thing. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:51]: Still, it's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:23:57]: Jill's, so excited to be back again in the NASPA world. A ton of things happening in NASPA. So many of us have been hearing a ton about artificial intelligence. We are starting to explore it or delve deeper into it on our own college campuses. And in the most recent Leadership Exchange magazine, which you all have access to as a member of NASPA, the editors and authors of that magazine did delve deeply into artificial intelligence in the Metaverse and really asked a broader question of whether our profession, whether student affairs is ready for this. It was a fascinating article and definitely a fascinating magazine. To delve much deeper into this topic. I highly encourage you to go to the NASPA website and you can go under publications to the Leadership Exchange magazine and log in and be able to read that for yourself. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:25:03]: If you want to check out all the different professional development opportunities, and I know I share a lot of them with you on a regular basis, but if you go under the Events and Online Learning tab, you're going to find everything that is happening within NASPA and around NASPA, all the different professional development opportunities that are available. And this is a great way for you to be able to find things that connect with your professional growth and professional learning that you want. And it will open up opportunities for you to be able to see different ways in which you can grow and learn in your own professional journey. So lots of things happening in NASPA, lots of ways to stay connected with NASPA. Start at the NASPA website, naspa.org, and go and check it out for yourself. Every week we're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:26:24]: And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself where do you fit, where do you want to give back each week? We're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas. That will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in that knowledge community. I see myself doing something like that, or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:19]: A wonderful NASPA World segment as always, Chris, we really appreciate you keeping us updated. What's going on in and around NASPA? Eric, we are now at our lightning round. I have 90 seconds for you to answer seven questions. You ready to roll? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:27:31]: That's like one of those if a train leaves Chicago heading 5 miles an hour kind of questions. I'm ready to go, Jill. Let's go. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:36]: All right, question number one. If you were a conference keynote speaker, what would your entrance music be? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:27:42]: Well, I've been a conference keynote speaker for many different events, so I always like to go with the Glitch mob. They were always pretty good. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:27:49]: Number two, when you were five years old, what did you want to be when you grew up? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:27:52]: When I was five years old, I was a little kid in Iowa on a gravel road. I think I wanted to be probably an NBA player because then I would have pavement. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:01]: Number three, your most influential professional mentor. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:28:04]: Gosh, there have been so many. I'd say one of the most influential professional mentors I've ever had. Just one. So Kevin Krueger, when we were doing our pre show talk, he's been an instrumental part of my career over the years, and I always appreciated his leadership at NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:20]: Number four, your essential higher education. Read. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:28:23]: I would be remiss if I did not say Insidehired.com. I Know that Scott Jassic is retiring as Editor co Editor Of Inside Higher Ed. It's still, in my view, one of the best sites out there for comprehensive coverage of what's going on in higher ed. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:37]: Number five, the best TV show you binged during the pandemic. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:28:40]: Oh, gosh, that was years ago now. The best show? Well, my second son was born during the pandemic, and I watched ridiculous amounts of things late, late at night. I would say some sort of Scandinaro thing on Netflix, because that was kind of what I was into at the time. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:28:56]: Pandemic's been over for years for you. It's only been over for eight months. Where I'm at. Number six, the podcast you spent the most hours listening to in the last year. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:29:04]: I would say anything from the Enrollify Podcast network. I like the work that they've done. I feel like their shows are really put together nicely, and there's always interesting topics in terms of higher ed innovation and technology. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:29:17]: And finally, number seven, any shout outs you'd like to give, personal or professional? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:29:20]: First of all, I'd just like to say thank you to Jill for asking me to come on the show. I think that it's always nice to reconnect with folks from Oregon State. So I'll just give you a big shout out because it's been a blast to follow your career sort of vicariously through social networks and social media know you've been just a huge leader around the globe. I mean, you've been everywhere, it seems. So I'm going to give Jill a shout out because I don't think she probably gets enough on these things. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:29:45]: Thank you. Appreciate it. Eric, it's been such a joy to catch up with you. I've also followed your career just on social. This is the strength of weak ties. I'll cite Granavetter here as a scholar that I read a lot in my public administration doctorate program. But the Strength of Weak Ties, we haven't spoken maybe ten years probably, but it's so lovely to understand and see how we're both contributing, knowing we started off as babies in grad school. And it's very nice to see what success looks like and means for various people from that time in our lives. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:15]: And if folks would like to reach you after the show, how can they find you? Dr. Eric Stoller [00:30:17]: Territorium.com? Or you can always just Google Eric Stoller. Something will come up, most likely. My email is Eric@territorium.com. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:25]: Eric with a C. Exactly. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:30:27]: E-R-I-C. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:28]: Thank you so much for sharing your voice with us. Dr. Eric Stoller [00:30:30]: Thanks so much, Jill. It's been great. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:32]: This has been an episode of SA Voices from the Field brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at savoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn. By searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:58]: We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. And please like, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton Seth Me produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:23]: Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

Welcome to another episode of SA Voices from the Field podcast. In today's episode, we have a special guest joining us, Kenneth Samson. Kenneth is not only a first-generation American college student, but also a new father.  In this episode of "Student Affairs Voices From the Field," Dr. Jill Creighton welcomes Kenneth Samson, a first-generation American college student who also falls into the category of a 1.5 generation student. Kenneth's parents have college degrees, but they graduated in the Philippines, which presented unique challenges for him as he navigated the American college system. He shares his journey, starting at Pasadena City College and eventually transferring to California State University, Los Angeles, where he graduated with a BA in English. Despite needing guidance as a first-generation student, Kenneth struggled to seek help due to his unfamiliarity with the process. Kenneth's story doesn't end there. He went on to teach English to medical school and high school students for over a decade, many of whom were also first-generation or 1.5 generation students. He recently completed his Master's of Education in educational counseling at USC, with the goal of supporting students and promoting help-seeking behaviors, particularly for marginalized students in Southern California Community Colleges. Kenneth is embarking on a new career as a counselor at Long Beach City College and a counseling instructor at multiple colleges while celebrating the arrival of his two-month-old son, Kenji. Throughout the conversation, Kenneth emphasizes the importance of networking and utilizing resources, especially during transitions. He discusses how he manages his various roles and transitions by meticulously organizing his schedule with Google Calendar. Kenneth also reflects on how his teaching approach has evolved from K-12 to higher education, emphasizing empowerment and bravery in students. He encourages others to follow their dreams and not be afraid to make career transitions, even if it means taking a leap of faith. He shares his experience of dealing with rejection during the job application process and the importance of seeking feedback for personal growth. Kenneth's story serves as an inspiring example of perseverance, adaptability, and the pursuit of one's passions in the field of student affairs. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues! TRANSCRIPT Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices From the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your essay, Voices From the Field host today on Essay Voice, we welcome Kenneth Sampson, a first generation American college student, also known as a 1.5 generation student. His parents have college degrees but graduated in the Philippines. While maneuvering through college. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:36]: He had a little help from his parents, who had no experience navigating the American college system. He attended Pasadena City College, transferred to California State University, Los Angeles, and graduated with a BA. In English with little help from academic counselors, not because he did not want help, but because he did not know how to ask for help. He's taught English to medical school and high school students for over a decade. Many of those students are first generation American students and 1.5 generation students. He's most recently graduated from the educational counseling program at USC with a Master's of Education in hopes of serving students by promoting help seeking behaviors while increasing outreach for first generation and marginalized students in Southern California Community College. He's beginning his new career this fall as a counselor at Long Beach City College, as well as a counseling instructor at Rio Hondo College, East Los Angeles College and Pasadena City College. Kenneth is also a new father to his two month old son, Kenji. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:30]: Kenneth, welcome to SA Voices. Kenneth Samson [00:01:33]: Hello, Jill. Happy to be here. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:35]: We're doing our season all on transitions, and you have quite a few of them, and I'm looking forward to getting into your story and what you've learned. But we always like to start our episodes by asking our guests how you found your way to your current position. Kenneth Samson [00:01:48]: So I'm in transition right now, so I have a few current positions. I'm actually a teaching adjunct counseling instructor at Pasadena City College, also East Los Angeles College, also Rio Hondo College, and I will be getting actual counseling hours as an adjunct counselor at Long Beach City College. I honestly got that through networking. I graduated from the educational counseling program at USC, and I honestly got it through networking from USC. The USC network is very strong, very powerful. Educational counseling program is also very strong, and I would not have any of these jobs if it was not for that program. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:02:25]: So that is a lot of transition happening for you. You also have transition happening in your personal life, right? Kenneth Samson [00:02:31]: Yes. I am a new father. My son is two months old. His name is Kenji. Hello, Kenji. If you ever listen to this in the future yes. So that's brand new, super exciting. I also just graduated my program, so going from student to professional and then basically also to fatherhood. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:02:51]: So that's a lot happening all at once. So my question in this area is really about how you're managing all of these transitions, what you're thinking about, what is working, what is scaring you, all of those things. So why don't we start with how are you finding yourself managing through all of these transitions? Kenneth Samson [00:03:07]: I think the biggest thing is Google Calendar. I'm not sponsored by Google. This is not product placement, but because when I was doing my grad work, I was using my calendar on my phone. I was using Google Calendar. I was using Calendar on Outlook, and I had three different calendars going at the same time. And I learned from that mistake. Someone told me, just put it all on one calendar. I was like, okay, which 01:00 a.m. Kenneth Samson [00:03:31]: I going to use. The most accessible and easiest one to use for me was Google Calendar. So I just have it all there. Easy for me to see. In addition, my partner can see what I'm doing, what site I'm at, right? Because I'm at four different colleges. So it helps her. Also. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:03:46]: That's an interesting part of your transition, too, that you didn't just move from student to professional. You moved from student to professional with four different work environments. And so daily or weekly, you're transitioning. Kenneth Samson [00:03:57]: Through those as well. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:03:58]: So tell us about how you found yourself able to settle into each community, knowing that each community is a little different. Kenneth Samson [00:04:05]: So knowing the they're all in Southern California, right? And when you are adjuncting, especially at community colleges, right. They call you a freeway flyer. So I'm definitely a freeway flyer, right. Flying from one campus to another. How I really got with this community was honestly through again, that network at USC, the educational counseling program, being able to build from that and meeting people through there, getting support through there and then having people from that program. Connect me with other people in the career center or in student affairs or at the transfer center. Just building that community within those college spaces. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:04:43]: And what about your first couple of days at each space? How did you ensure a landing that worked for you? Kenneth Samson [00:04:50]: So for some of them, I have not started yet. Right. I just got hired at HR. Interesting. For the ones that I have been able to land, actually, I was also interning there beforehand, so I mentioned Pasadena City College. I was actually a student there way back when. I was a community college student, eventually transferred, so I felt home there. That's definitely where I want to end up. Kenneth Samson [00:05:14]: But I'm open to ending up any community college, supporting any population or any specific group of students. But that's really where I feel at home, because that's actually where I met my partner. So we were actually freshmen first semester, right out of high school. We were in something called a block program, which basically was like a cohort model. And I noticed her, she noticed me, and we've been together ever since, basically now we have a child together, right. And she actually works there as well. So she's a full time tenure English professor over there. So for Pasadena City College. Kenneth Samson [00:05:47]: Really felt home there. East Los Angeles College is the other place where I'm also familiar with I was an intern there at the transfer center. Everyone just talked about how great this graduate internship was at the transfer center, and really I learned so much there. The director over there, Kirby Dominguez is it. He really wants you to learn and really isn't intimidating and allows you to ask questions. Right. To make sure you're giving the best information and the correct information to students, especially when it comes to transfer. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:06:17]: What does that mean for you to move from that intern space to that professional space? Kenneth Samson [00:06:22]: For me, it's huge. It's definitely a shift. The biggest jump or the biggest change is the paycheck. Obviously you're like, oh wow, all of a sudden I'm making good money. So that was interesting. But in terms of the professional space, both places, honestly, I didn't feel like an intern because neither one of those places, they don't really call. On paper, you're an intern, but the title that they give you when you're there, it's not intern. At PCC Pasadena City College, I was a success coach. Kenneth Samson [00:06:52]: And even their interns or their hourly, they don't call hourly or interns. They call them professional experts. So they already gave you that idea of, oh, hey, you're a professional, you know what you're doing here? We hired you for a reason. Same thing at East Los Angeles College, even though it's unclassified paid. Intern is what they're called right. At the transfer center. The transfer center, they call us transfer mentors because we're mentoring these community college students to transfer to a four year university, whether that's in state, out of state, private. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:07:19]: Have you had to do any redefining of your relationships with colleagues that knew you as that success coach that are now seeing you as an instructor? Kenneth Samson [00:07:26]: No, honestly, and I think because they know my past. I actually was a K through twelve teacher for quite some time after getting my bachelor's, so I didn't go back to get my master's until a decade later, basically. So I was in the professional space in K through twelve for a while. So they knew that, oh, he has teaching experience, which is probably why I've gotten so many classes at three different colleges. Right. Lucky enough that helped me leverage my experience, helped me leverage getting those positions. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:07:58]: That K twelve space to higher ed is a jump that I hear a lot from K twelve educators who are looking to break into the higher ed space. Do you have any advice for others who are trying to make that leap? Kenneth Samson [00:08:08]: Yes. And this is the advice that someone gave me. If you're going to do that leap, jump in the deep end, jump in headfirst all the way. Right. I had a full time position going K through twelve teaching, and I decided that, oh, I want to work specifically at the California Community College level. And someone told me, if you're going to do that, you have to go all in and you have to really do the internships, you have to really invest your time and it'll pay off. And that's what I did. I left my full time job with benefits, took a huge pay cut, right. Kenneth Samson [00:08:40]: I was doing like two, three internships, but still, that was nothing compared to what I used to make. And also I was paying a USC tuition, so luckily I had some savings. But it was definitely a shift economically for me. But that's my advice, because at the end it'll pay off. And really what you'll learn as an intern is invaluable, and it's so much easier to ask, I think, administrators, deans, oh, I'm a student and I want experience in this. Right. The thing is, if have a full time job, when will you have the time to ask for that, get that experience? Dr. Jill Creighton [00:09:13]: And that is definitely an amazing thing that you're able to do. And at the same time, I know there's a lot of folks for whom that would not be economically possible. Do you have any advice for those who can't maybe take that leap as deeply scholarships? Kenneth Samson [00:09:25]: That's something I learned not just at USC, but even as a transfer mentor at East Los Angeles college scholarships. Right. Apply to any and all of them. Don't tell yourself no, let them tell you, you know, there's a scholarship for anything and everything under the sun. In addition, there are scholarships. Even if you don't identify with that specific group, if you're supporting that group, they'll recognize, oh, this person is helping our community. They're giving us something, why not give something back to that individual? Dr. Jill Creighton [00:09:52]: What about mindset? Transitions, transitioning from that k twelve space where you're teaching children to the collegiate space where you're teaching adults. How have you shifted the way that you think about teaching? Kenneth Samson [00:10:04]: I teach at a supplemental education center also, so I still actually teach just a few classes on the weekend to K through twelve students, middle school and high school specifically. And I think being in the program and seeing the college space that they're hoping to get into has changed my mind into not necessarily hammering them with content, but helping them develop ideas. Because before at the supplemental education center, I teach grammar and writing, right. And I teach grammar to first generation students and also 1.5 generation students. And it's something where their parents really want them to learn the grammar and syntax of the English language because maybe they're not getting it at home. And so initially, that's how I kind of hammered it down, even with their writing, even with their reading comprehension to break it down, grammatically syntactically for them to understand. But with my counseling training and even entering the college space, I've learned that they're going to get that eventually. There is time for that. Kenneth Samson [00:11:01]: But thing is to build up their confidence, allow them to come up with ideas, not make it seem like college is so scary. Because I think when I was a high school teacher and before I entered the college space as a professional, it was like, oh, well, college professors, college instructors, they're going to expect this from you and that from you. And being in that space, it's like, oh no, actually they're compassionate as well as compassionate as I was in the K through twelve. Right. They understand life circumstances. They understand that life happens and that they're human. Also. It's not that, oh, because you're in college now, there's some type of rigor that they won't be used to. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:11:37]: I want to co sign something you said about encouraging people to come up with their own ideas. And it sounds like what you're really teaching is bravery. And I read an article recently that bravery is the number one trait or skill set that we can help instill in young people, to help create a kind of a forward thinking human being or encourage a forward thinking human being. More so than anything else, there's all these articles about resilience and critical thinking and all these other things, but bravery is really that number one. Kenneth Samson [00:12:03]: Yes, empowering students, and not just empowering students, but giving them that space to feel empowered I think is important. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:12:10]: Absolutely. So in all of these transitions that you're experiencing, is there anything that you can look back on and say, I really wish I would have known X, Y, or Z before starting the transition process, or anything that you wish you would have done maybe a little differently? Kenneth Samson [00:12:24]: I really wish I would have prepared more. I think before graduating, I knew what jobs I wanted to apply to and I knew what colleges I was going to apply to and doing that preparation into the professional world because I had a resume, I had a cover letter, and it was kind of generic. It wasn't tailored to that college that now I know, oh no, you need to tailor it to that college, to that program. It was difficult for me because then I had the time right before I graduated to do that, but I didn't take it because I was like, oh, I worked so hard in my master's program, I'm going to kind of coast till the end. Well, after I graduated, my son was born. And then it's like, oh, you don't have time to work on your resume or your cover letter or these applications like you wanted to. You should have done that earlier. Right. Kenneth Samson [00:13:10]: So just definitely pre planning, especially since I knew he was coming, maybe had. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:16]: A little advanced notice. Kenneth Samson [00:13:18]: Yeah. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:19]: And with that in mind, the transition to parenthood is a major shift in any human being's life. How have you managed the transition to balancing the needs, your family and also the burgeoning career that you're developing? Kenneth Samson [00:13:31]: Yeah, I think definitely carving out time that is dedicated to my family and telling my coworkers, my colleagues, and even my friends, oh, this is my family time. Right. Because with all those jobs, with those classes that I teach and those counseling hours that I will eventually be covering, I want them to know, oh, when I'm there, I'm there for you wholeheartedly. I'm there 110%. You have my undivided attention. But then when I'm home, that's home time for my family to make sure because I want to show my son that he can do all of these things right. But I also want him to know me as well. I don't want to be the parent that, oh, he comes home at like 08:00 P.m. Kenneth Samson [00:14:07]: And then leaves at 08:00 A.m. Or even 07:00 A.m. Because right. I'm in Southern California, in Los Angeles area, so traffic is crazy over here. And he's gone to I can tell now, but it's summer, so I'm excited for the semester to start. But I'm also sad because I know I'm going to see less of him, but I want him to you know, that's my dad. He's here, he's got me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:14:28]: And is there any other major transition that you're going through right now? And we've talked about family. We've talked about graduating, starting new positions, and even switching industries. There's just so many transitions that you're reflecting on. Is there anything that we're not talking about? Kenneth Samson [00:14:45]: I hope that's all. If there's anything else, I think that kind of covers it. I think that's enough. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:14:51]: Oh, absolutely. Is there anything in all these transitions that didn't go well for you? Kenneth Samson [00:14:56]: Yeah, going back to application process, I did apply to one specifically that I really wanted to work at, and it didn't pan out. I didn't even get an interview, and I was like, One of my Femtors works there. And I was like, how awesome will it be that I'm going to work under my Femtor at this college? And it basically didn't happen. And that really hurt me a bit. Kind of shattered some dreams because that application in all the application pools was the first one to open. So right after that, I was kind of discouraged. I didn't know I didn't even get an interview, and I thought I was a pretty competitive candidate. That one really still hurts. Kenneth Samson [00:15:35]: But I was lucky enough to do meet with my Femtor, get some feedback, not just on my application, but my cover letter as well and my resume. I'm like, oh, I know I'll eventually end up there. I'm going to apply next year and keep applying. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:15:48]: That's a really wonderful approach to that kind of disappointment. It's not a question of beating yourself up about it. It's a question of how can I improve so I can be more competitive in the future, and we just don't know what we're up against often in those job pools or what it is about our materials that weren't necessarily attractive to that search committee in that first round. So I just really appreciate your approach of going, okay, let's turn this around and just look a little differently. Kenneth Samson [00:16:12]: Yeah. And after that, right now, I'm at four community colleges. I'm like, oh, so maybe I wasn't the right fit for them at that time, but I was the right fit for these other community colleges right. That needed me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:16:24]: Is there anything else that you want our listeners to hear about your advice for transitioning? Kenneth Samson [00:16:29]: Maybe as cheesy or as corny as this sounds, honestly, follow your dreams. Like, I'm living proof. I'm working at where I started my higher education career as a student. I'm an adjunct instructor there now. Also, don't be afraid. I was very afraid to leave my job, leave my full time job with benefits. But if it's something that you want to do and something that you're passionate about, go and do it, because it's better to see how it turns out than live in regret, I think, right? And for really, it's no regrets. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:17:03]: It's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:17:09]: Jill's so excited to be back again in the NASPA world. A ton of things happening in NASPA, and it's exciting time to be a part of our profession because there's so much going on. And it's an exciting time just on campuses because fall has started. We're back into the mix of things, and there's definitely a lot happening on our campuses. Sometimes it's hard to stay on top of things. I know that. I sometimes feel that way. I'm sure that you feel that way as well. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:17:39]: But it's always important to try to stay connected with what's going on in the profession broader than our campus. And there's a ton of ways to do that. There's ways to do that and getting involved at the association level. You can get involved in different knowledge communities in different divisions and groups. Lots of ways to be able to not only give back your own talents, but also lots of ways to stay connected. And when I say get involved, that doesn't mean that you have to take a leadership role. It could just be reading what's being sent out. It could be being a program reviewer and giving a little bit of time. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:18:17]: There's lots of ways. One of the things that I always encourage people to do every fall is to log back in to your NASPA portal. And when you go to the NASPA website, you'll see a login button at the top of the screen. You just log in there. And when you log in, one of the things to do is to review all of your information so you can click on my NASPA and where it says Edit my profile, click on that and review all your information. Make sure that all your information is correct. And if your membership is coming up too close to be due, you want to make sure that you do renew your membership, but also set those notification preferences on your profile. Make sure that you're signed up for the knowledge communities or the areas that you want to get information from because this is a way for you to be able to stay connected. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:19:13]: And if you're not connected, if you haven't signed up for any of the different engagement opportunities, then you're not going to end up being able to get information from those. So make sure that you go in and I say to do this at least once a year to make sure that everything's up to date. And then you'll be up to date. You'll be getting all the information and be in the know, talking about being in the know. One of the other things that I have talked to you about in the past, but I encourage you to do on a regular basis, is go back to the NASPA website, go under the latest and under the latest. This is where you can find not only all the past episodes of Essay Voices from the Field, but this is where you can find the blog for NASPA, all the statements that NASPA puts out, the press releases, other projects and initiatives that they're working on. But on the blog you're going to see up to date information that will keep you in the know of new things that are happening within our association, within higher education and beyond. Urge you to keep an eye here. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:20:31]: All of the knowledge communities try to keep this up to date. Many of the different areas within NASPA try to keep it up to date with blogs and articles to be able to engage you as members. And these are written by members of the association like yourself. So jump on here, make sure that you stay in the know and be able to see what is happening within the profession. So lots of things happening in NASPA, lots of ways to stay connected with NASPA. Start at the NASPA website, naspa.org and go and check it out for yourself. Every week we're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:21:24]: Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself. Where do you fit. Where do you want to give back? Each week? We're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas that will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in that knowledge community. I see myself doing something like that. Or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:22:36]: Chris, thanks so much for keeping us updated on what's going on in and around NASPA. We really appreciate you putting together those segments every week. Kenneth, we have now reached our lightning round time. I have about 90 seconds for you to answer seven questions. You ready to go? Kenneth Samson [00:22:50]: Yeah. Let's do it. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:22:50]: All right, question number one. If you were a conference keynote speaker, what would your entrance music be? Kenneth Samson [00:22:56]: Bohemian Rhapsody. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:22:57]: Number two. When you were five years old, what did you want to be when you grew up? Kenneth Samson [00:23:00]: A karate instructor. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:01]: Number three. Who's your most influential professional mentor? Kenneth Samson [00:23:04]: Dr. Robert opentile. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:06]: Number four. Your essential student affairs. Kenneth Samson [00:23:08]: Read anything inside the higher ed. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:10]: Number five. The best TV show you binged during the pandemic. Kenneth Samson [00:23:13]: The Big bang theory. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:15]: Number six. And I know you commute a lot, so hopefully you've got a good one for this. The podcast you've spent the most hours listening to in the last year. Kenneth Samson [00:23:22]: American capitalism or capitalist America? Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:24]: And finally, number seven. Any shout outs you'd like to give? Personal or professional? Kenneth Samson [00:23:27]: Yes. Shout out to Juliana Sampson, my wife. I love you so much. Shout out to Kenji Sampson, my two month old son. I love him so much as well. I do everything for you all. Shout out to my family, friends. Shout out again to the USC Educational Counseling program. Kenneth Samson [00:23:45]: I would not be where I am without all of you over there. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:47]: Kenneth, it's been such a pleasure getting to know you better on the show here. If anyone would like to reach you after this airs, how can they find you? Kenneth Samson [00:23:53]: LinkedIn is probably the best way to reach out to me professionally. So it's basically LinkedIn.com. Kennethsampson. That's K-E-N-N-E-T-H-S-A-M-S-O-N. That's probably the best way to get to me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:08]: Thank you so much for sharing your voice with us today. Kenneth Samson [00:24:10]: Thank you, Jill. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:12]: This has been an episode of Essay Voices from the Field, brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at savoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn. By searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:37]: We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. And please like, rate and review us on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton. That's me. Produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.  

In this episode of "Student Affairs Voices from the Field," Dr. Kevin Kruger, President of NASPA, discusses his upcoming retirement and the transitions in student affairs. Dr. Kruger reflects on his 30-year journey at NASPA and the reasons behind his decision to step down as president. He emphasizes the importance of retiring on his own terms and while still making meaningful contributions to the field. Dr. Kruger also discusses the challenges and opportunities facing student affairs professionals, including the need to close attainment gaps for underrepresented students and navigate financial pressures on higher education institutions. He highlights the importance of staying intellectually engaged in retirement and shares his interests in history and leadership. Dr. Kruger also expresses his hope for NASPA's continued role in supporting student affairs professionals and advocating for the value of their work in higher education. He discusses some of the initiatives and partnerships NASPA has undertaken during his tenure, including the Center for First Generation Student Success and efforts to secure external resources to benefit NASPA members. Dr. Kruger concludes with gratitude for the privilege of working in the field of student affairs and the incredible people and teams he has had the opportunity to work with during his career. He reflects on his love for the work he has done and the positive changes he has witnessed in student affairs over the years. Dr. Kruger's unwavering dedication to NASPA and his desire to leave a lasting legacy have guided his decision-making process, ensuring a smooth transition for the organization as it enters its next chapter. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues! Transcript Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices from the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your essay Voices from the Field, host today on SA Voices, it's truly my pleasure to welcome back Dr. Kevin Krueger, president of NASPA, to this season of Transitions. We've introduced Kevin a couple of times before. He's our only three peak guest on the podcast, so I'm not going to read his bio again, but just know that this is probably the last time we're going to have Dr. Kruger on the podcast as he has announced his own major transition. I really hope you enjoyed this episode, Kevin. We're so glad to have you back on SA Voices. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:00:50]: I'm super thrilled to be here, and I understand I'm the only person so far who has had three podcasts with you all. So it's exciting to be doing my number third podcast. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:00]: Yes, you are the only three-pete, so far in the history of the show. There's a couple two Peters that we've got, but we're so glad to have you on for the season on Transitions. And I think this was actually a really apt theme given everything that's going on for you personally and for NASPA. So for those who have not yet read their NASPA email, kevin has announced a really, really big transition, which is coming very soon. And Kevin, do you want to tell us what that is? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:01:24]: Yeah, sure. So I've made the decision to step down in my role as President of NASPA. There's some sort of timing around that that made sense for me. My contract ends this March of 24, and June 30 of 24 will be my 30 year anniversary of working at NASPA. So it made sense to lots of different personal ways as well as some professional ways to use that as an opportunity to open up a transition for NASPA. So me being here for 30 years and being serving as president for the last twelve, I think, creates a really unique opportunity for some new leadership of a great organization like NASPA that is a huge transition. And some of this is personal. Right. I've had a philosophy about my career for a long time and talking to people who have retired before me. And not to be kind of cute or clever about it, but I wanted to retire on my terms and when I thought I was doing my best work, when I was declining. Because there's a natural cognitive decline that occurs when you age. And so it was important to me to kind of do this in a time when I was still doing what I think is my best work and not to do it at a time when people are wondering, like, when is he going to go? Isn't it time. So that was important to me. So I've given a lot of thought to this over the last several years about what the best time was. And to be honest, I might have done it a little earlier, but the Pandemic, of course, created some serious organizational challenges for every association and business in the world. And so it was also important to me that I leave NASPA in the best possible financial position coming out of the Pandemic. And so I've been spending the last three years with my team trying to find out what the new kind of normal is for NASPA as an organization in terms of membership and programs and relationships with outside entities. And I feel like at this point, in a pretty good place, we've come out of the Pandemic in a very, very strong position. And so I feel like I'm able to hand off this organization to someone else who have a new vision in not having to worry about finance and organizational structure in the early goings of their term. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:03:14]: That's a gift. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:03:15]: Yeah. I've thought a lot about sort of legacy and what's next. And Gwen was executive director. A lot of folks who knew Gwen and were around Gwen talked about Gwen being the right person at the right time when she came in and what she brought to NASPA. And I think in some ways I think of myself in the sort of same place. My strengths played very well to the opportunities that were presented when I came into NASPA as the President. And I think while I could continue to do that work, I think it's a great time for someone else to put their brand of leadership and vision on this great association and great profession. We've gone through a lot of transition over the time I've been here in twelve years. I mean, here's just a couple of markers. When I started as president, I think we had about 17 staff. We now have 95 staff. And that's in twelve years. That's a tremendous amount of growth. That's due to lots of different things. But clearly, I think my tenure at NASPE as the President will be a period of taking advantage of the opportunities that student affairs had, which is to expand its portfolio and its influence on campus. In a lot of ways, NASPE has been alongside the field in that way. And so I think that the next phase of NASA may not have that same kind of growth but will build off of where we are right now today as a profession and the challenges that we're facing. Right. So I think that's important as well. Last thing I would say is that I'm very cognizant of the fact that I have one of the best jobs in higher education and it's an enormous privilege to have that. And I also feel like it's such a good job that someone else should have a chance to do it. And so if I would work into my 70s, which people do yeah. I would just not create that opportunity for someone else to have their shot at this kind of really incredible job and opportunity. And I'll say something else that sort of doesn't preclude anybody from applying for this job. And by the way, I'm not involved in the search at all, nor should I be. But I think student affairs as one of the most, if not the most diverse sectors of the higher education world or the academy, I think that I have been able to lead with some integrity as a white male in this space. But I think that we need the next leader should represent who the field is demographically in a more significant way. And so I think it's time for a woman or a person of color or a woman of color to lead NASPA because I think that's important that we reflect who our field is. And the times have changed. And so I think that that is I really want to open up the opportunities for all kinds of new leadership that can come into NASPA. And so I give a lot of thought to that as well. As a person with enormous privilege as a white man who has had great opportunities that have come my way, I think it's time to step aside and let new leadership come into the space. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:05:42]: That's a lot of intentionality behind the why retire and why now? Questions. I'm wondering if you have advice for others who are considering that type of transition on how to identify that time that's not necessarily financially motivated. And I understand that that is probably the number one factor in determining when someone can successfully retire is that hopeful number or magic number, whatever they call it. The rule of 24, I think. Rule of 25 in your bank account. And that feels very unattainable to me. And I know a lot of other student affairs professionals, but let's pretend the financial piece is not in the picture. What are those factors that really led you to this space? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:06:17]: Yeah, I think for me, this kind of job is all encompassing. It's a seven days a week. It's not 24 hours. But I mean, you're never not on this job. I'll give you a quick anecdote. We were I was on vacation and with my wife, something big happened in the United States. It was a terrible incident and had a racially motivated but it wasn't a higher ed incident. And so I knew that right away that I had to mark to my team and we were going to say something to our members about this incident. And in the middle of my vacation and my wife, who was not a higher ed person, she's in the sports broadcasting business, she was like, Why are we even commenting? And this has nothing to do with higher ed. I'm like, Because it matters to our students. It matters to the people in our field, and it doesn't matter that I'm on vacation. This is what you do. So my point of the story is that there's an exhaustion that just occurs when you're in a senior leadership role like this. That is part of the reason I've thought about retired hiring, because I just came back from a trip overseas, which is great, but I spend the first two, 3 hours of every day, even on vacation online doing work, because that's the nature of this job. And anybody in these kind of jobs does this. I'm not the only person that does this. Vice President affairs do this. AVPs do this. Directors do this. Lots of people do this. But after doing it for so long, I feel like it's time to step away and do something else. I'm also very thoughtful about this notion of passages, and your theme about transitions fits for me. It's a time in my life when I want to spend more time doing things that are personally renewing and a little less on the professional side. But I will tell you, the dilemma is we know that from people who study aging and people who are in this life transition space, that happiness is also tied to staying intellectually engaged. How do you step away from this but still do something that has meaning and that still engages me professionally and where I can also still give back where I have something to offer. So I've spent the last five, six years not just thinking about where I want to retire and in what place I want to retire and what my hobbies might be. But I've spent time actually literally interviewing people I know who have retired and asking them, what worked? What's working? What do you wish you had done more of? And lots of different approaches that people have had at this transition. So I was just given a lot of thought to basically have been a student of retirement. Yeah, the money part, of course, is a piece of it, but for me, it's more about what is the next phase of your life? What do you want it to look like? And I remember listening to someone was talking about retirement since maybe seven or eight years ago, and they were saying, when they ask people, Retire, what are you going to do? And they say, Well, I want to travel. And they would press a little further and say, well, how many trips are you going to take in that year? I'm like, maybe one or two trips. All right, 52 weeks. Let's just say you take two, two week vacations. What are you going to do for the other 48? Eight weeks? And I think that's an important thing to think about, right? Because yeah, sure. Do I want to travel? Of course. I love traveling. I have the privilege to have some resources to allow me to travel. But what am I going to do when I'm not traveling. So you have to think about a life that has meaning and richness to it, that goes beyond just going to London or Ireland for a two week vacation. And that's what I've given a lot of thought to. So where does that meaning come and what is it, and how do I want to spend my know? So I will be somebody, I'll tell you sort of maybe this is a question you might have asked me, but I'll tell you, I'm going to be someone who won't disappear. So I'm going to try to find the right space between giving the person who takes the presidency of NASPA who has that job, all of the space they need to do the job without me sitting near them. But for me also to use over 45 years of higher education experience to offer some perspectives that I have about the work and about the field without the constraints, perhaps, of the position of president. I mean, I can say things post presidency that I can't say in the presidency. So I'm kind of looking forward to maybe exercising my voice a little bit in ways that are not in the way of NASPA or not in the way of the new president, but sort of might have some value for the folks that I know in the field who are doing the work. So that's something I've given a lot of thought to, but I don't want another full time job. I've had people come to me and say, well, do you want to run this organization or you want to do this? No, I already have a great job, a great full time job. I'm not looking for another one. But I think it is important for me to find some spaces where I can stay intellectually engaged. I can't imagine a life where I don't think about higher education or I don't think about the work and think about how we can continue to serve our students. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:10:18]: I think the intellectually engaged component is so critical. I will wish my father a happy birthday. We're recording on his birthday today, and he is deep into his retirement life as well. And one of the things that both he and my mom talk about is that retirement doesn't mean you're done. It means that you get the freedom to do what you want to do. And they take classes at the university nearby. They go to lectures at their local art museum. They're huge theater buffs. They're deeply intellectually curious readers, and that intellectual engagement. They're also in very excellent physical health. But for the ages that they are, they don't look or act like people typically would expect them to at those ages. And I think that is truly because of that ongoing intellectual curiosity and also staying socially engaged and not just sitting around existing. You're working to live in a different way. I totally get that. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:11:07]: Yeah. Health and money are the two big variables about retirement, some of which you have control over, some of which you don't. Right. So there's a gift if you're physically healthy. So far I am. But this notion of there's actually an organization that calls it so this is not my language, but of your encore career of what are you going to do? Post the work that you have now, where making money isn't necessarily the most important thing. Right. So when I talk to the people I know who are still engaged, some of whom you know, who are retired in the field but are still doing work, they're doing it because the love of the work rather than the necessity of the work, and they're not in the kind of the drive that we would necessarily have. So I think that gives you some opportunities to be creative and innovative in the way you want to live your life. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:11:47]: So I think I'm hearing blogger in your future. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:11:50]: No, not blogger. I do think I want to write, though. I enjoy writing. I've always been a writer. This job has forced me to write in certain kinds of ways. But I think I'll think about I haven't quite figured out where and how in what way, but maybe I shouldn't say no blogger, but I mean, that's some kind of writing that would allow me to reflect on what's happening in higher education from a different seat. So I think that's part of it and some of it maybe not necessarily outward facing, might be just more inward facing. So I've always been intellectually curious. You talked about your parents being intellectual, and I've always been that way. And many of the people listening to this well, have heard me speak before. So you know that I spend a couple of hours every day reading. And right now I read mostly higher ed stuff. I mean, that's just the nature of it. But I have a lot of intellectual curiosity about other things in our world. Higher education is one of them. But when I go into a bookstore, which is kind of anachronistic theme right now, but Barnes and Noble still exists, when I go in Go bookstore, I'm just struck by how much stuff I want to read. I just walk through the nonfiction section. I'm like, I want to know more about that. I'd love to know more about that. I'd love to know more about that. And I think that that will be part of my journey, will be also be just continuing my lifelong education about lots of things that want to know more about. And some of that has nothing to do with higher education. So I think one of the things I'm most excited about is being able to explore some of my own intellectual interests that aren't higher ed oriented, where now I don't have the time to do that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:06]: Do you mind sharing what those are. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:13:07]: Strong ones for me. I was a European history major in college. So history has always been a part of my kind of curiosity. And so I'm very, very drawn to the lessons that we can learn from understanding history, and particularly sort of in geopolitical sense. So as we think about where our world is today, a lot of that has roots in history. And so there's more of that kind of analysis that I'm interested in understanding just as I try to make sense of this complicated world we live in. So that's one of them, for sure. The other one is my second job in the field was running the leadership program at the University of Maryland. And I don't know how that came about. I kind of stumbled into it to some degree. But I understood very quickly that I had a really huge interest in understanding how people I've been very introspective about myself, my own leadership style over the years. And so I'm fascinated with reading about how people are successful in organizations. And so that's another place where I've spent some time as well thinking about. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:58]: All of the things you're excited about for the future in your own world, in your own life. You also mentioned kind of excitement for the field as well. So I'm just wondering if you have any future wishes for where NASA will go next. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:14:10]: Well, I think that student affairs is at a little bit of a nexus right now. So I think post pandemic, there's elements of the work that we do that have been elevated in some important ways. And then I think, as we think about some of the really serious challenges that institutions face around addressing what I consider to be the most important priority for higher education, and that is, how do we close attainment gaps for low income students, first generation students, students of color in particular, black students, Latinx students, some portions of the API community, indigenous students. These things have been around for decades, these attainment gaps. And there seems to be a lot of energy in higher ed now about addressing some of these issues. We call it now student success. And I think student affairs is at the table for that conversation with its economic colleagues. I think that's great. So I see a lot of really high priority areas where student affairs and the value of his work is recognized. At the same time, the financial pressures facing higher education are enormous and financial challenges are coming to almost every institution in the country, and some of that will affect student affairs. So how do we do our best? Work is work that is so important for our society at a time when financial structures are being challenged. I'll give an example without naming the institution. So this institution, maybe seven or eight years ago, understanding this sort of challenge around attainment issues and student success created a Student success center and hired a team of student success coaches. It's a strategy that works, has been proven to work very effectively, particularly with some of these populations that I'm talking about. That particular institution is one that's in a part of the country that's experiencing enrollment challenges and demographic challenges. And so they had some budget challenges and one of the first moves they made was to fire almost all those student success coaches. It probably seemed like it was a more recent ad. They didn't want to cut an academic program. The challenge that college presidents and boards are facing today. But that very decision works against the goals that the institutions have about increasing enrollment for low income, first gen students of color. And so I think that these are the kind of really tough decisions that institutions have to make. And sometimes student affairs is going to be negatively affected by that. And so when I get in front of an audience of student affairs folks, I talk about this sort of dual challenge, the work and the money, the resources. And everybody's asked the same question, well, how do we do this? How do we do this? So NASPA, this is a long answer to a short question. So I think NASPA has to be part of helping institutions and student affairs professionals guide them through how you can maneuver these dual challenges. It's not easy, right? And I think we need examples of institutions have done this effectively and how they have reorganized or reoriented the resources to address some of these challenges and still do the good work where they've had to make tough decisions about doing a little less of this and a little bit more of that. And so I think NASPA has always been sort of shoulder to shoulder with our field in helping the field sort out how to address some of these challenges. And there's no simple answer to this, but I can think of examples. I was at a program that we ran summer before last. And so I have said this in some of my speeches. I've said that student affairs is going to have to make the difficult choice to move resources to the students who need us the most and away from students who don't need us as much. Okay? So there are students who are highly privileged economically and perhaps for other reasons as well that simply don't need almost any support in their journey through college and they will thrive. And there are others who have enormous barriers facing their progress. So higher education, which was built on serving the elite, we've always been sort of tilted sometimes to serving population of students, sometimes who don't actually need the services we're in, the support we're providing, can we shift that to a place where we're providing more resources for students who need us more? Simple thing to say. So at this meeting, one vice president of student affairs said, we did this. And they talked about the things that they did to make that difficult change. And this person shared some of those examples. And then at the break, after I was done with this particular session, it was like a crowd gathered around this vice president who's like, tell us how you did this. That's the NASPA story. Okay, so the NASPA story is, how do we find these examples and help others think about strategies to get there? So that's what I hope for NASPA. And I think that to some extent, I think that I would also say that the future for NASPA and NASPA's role is the same one that existed for my tenure here. And that is that the work that we do with students, I think is enormously important and sometimes isn't valued in the same way by the academy. And so I have spent twelve years getting in front of presidents, chief business officers, admissions officers, procurement officers, facilities people. I've been on a tour of higher education to try to lift the understanding of the value of what we do, not for our own sake, but because I believe it's important, because I believe it makes a difference. And I believe that the best institutions have figured out a way to marry this curricular academic world with a rich, out of class, cocurricular, whatever you want to call it, world. And that those institutions have created that secret sauce that allows students to thrive. And I think sometimes people just don't understand what we do, and it seems like wasted resources. So I think the next phase and aspect is a continuation of taking advantage of the megaphone that we have to talk about why what we do is important, why it exists, and what makes this so unique that it's worth investing in the resources. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:19:26]: I'd like to take a moment to talk about legacy a little bit. And I'm just wondering if there's anything in your tenure at NASPA and you came up from a mid level position into the presidency over a period of time, but anything in particular that you're extremely proud of or a program or service or an idea that you were on the team of leading that you feel like has really changed the profession positively? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:19:47]: First of all, and I don't say this casually, my legacy is the profession's legacy. It's the team that I've worked with. I've been gifted to work with unbelievably talented people at NASPA and still do. So I think I never have thought about it as my legacy as much as helping student affairs as a field move in directions that are in the best interest of serving our students. So I can give you a couple of examples. I think I'm enormously proud of the work that we're doing with the center for First Generation Student Success, working with over 300 institutions now to lift up first generation status and student as an asset for campuses and how we can help campuses think about their policies and their programs and the way they support students in order to increase attainment for those for first generation students. A highly intersectional population, right? Of we're disproportionately low income and of color. It's personal for me. I was a first generation student myself, and so obviously I'm a long ways away from those challenges with the enormous privilege I have in my life. But I can speak to those issues and I know that that's important for us to pay attention to. Enormously proud of the work we've done in lifting up health, safety and well being initiatives on college campuses over the last ten years. Something that now is sort of a given in our conversation about the work that we do about the work we do around well being and mental health and sexual violence and a variety of other components. But that wasn't necessarily a given 15 years ago. And so I think the work that our team has done in the health safety wellbeing space is enormously important, not just for helping student affairs folks, but also for guiding the academy forward in those areas. I think that those are two that really stand out. I think when I became president, I said to my team at the time, if the educational philanthropic community doesn't want to fund the work that we are about in student affairs, that says a lot about how the world views student affairs. And so part of my priority also has been to engage the educational philanthropic community in important ways to support initiatives that are serving students through the work we do in student success and student affairs. And we've been successful at that. We are one of the three coordinators of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's post secondary education initiatives. We coordinate the advising reform movement in higher education through the Gates Foundation. We've done incredible work with Alumina foundation. Strada Cresky. I mean, there's so many folks who are interested in funding the work that we do to serve our campuses and our students. And I think that is also something I'm extremely proud of. In the depth of the pandemic, everybody had to shift to online work, right? We all did that immediately and right away, myself and our team was like, well, I wonder who's doing it the best? What are some really good examples of how we can lift up examples of how campuses have pivoted so quickly to provide outstanding service and support to students? And so we went to the Gates Foundation, said, hey, we have this idea, would you be willing to fund it? Yes. And so that borne this sort of project where we actually gave money to campuses, to twelve campuses who were doing exemplary work in providing online student services. But that comes about through a relationship you can have with the educational philanthropic community. And so that's something I'm really proud of. And our team has been very successful in bringing in resources, external resources, which has also. As an aside, allowed us, for example, to not raise individual membership dues for almost ten years. Something that we don't really talk a lot about, but we kept our membership dues kind of flat. And we were able to do that because we're able to bring external resources to the organization, which allowed us to serve our members in as cost effective ways as possible. Registration fees for conferences. We're probably, if you list 20 organizations at the bottom in terms of registration fees, they're still high. But we've been able to do that because we have been successful in seeking external resources. So I think those are some things that I think provide some real support going forward. Another thing I'd mention, though, is NASPA has been a very entrepreneurial organization. The Placement Exchange is a good example of that, which now is virtual. But at the time when we partnered with a Kuoi in that we created a new vision for how we can bring together multiple associations together. The idea of hiring the best possible people in our field, that was kind of a revolutionary idea at the time. Now everybody sort of knows about the Placement Exchange. That's something like that. We saw opportunities to serve populations that we hadn't been serving. So, for example, we have continued with a partnership. Initially, from the University of Louisville, we created the Military Connected Student Conference, now the only place in higher education where people who work with veterans and military connected families and military connected students can come together to talk about how we can serve that population. So I think that the legacy is seeing places where there have been needs and then trying to create programs and resources and research and opportunities to serve those needs in ways that perhaps weren't around maybe ten or 15 years ago. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:15]: Any final thoughts for the NASPA community on this transition? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:24:19]: Well, it's not a thought. It's really gratitude. I mean, I have been unbelievably privileged to work in this field. I loved the work I did on campus, and I have loved the work I did at NASPA. And part of what I love about NASPA is really two things. One is I'm going to say three, the belief in what we do, amazing people that I've gotten to meet over the last twelve years, just for sure. And then the incredible team of people that work at NASPA who are committed to this work and who wake up every day thinking about how we can serve our members and serve our students. So I have a lot of gratitude about just what an incredible opportunity that has been for me personally. And to have had a front row seat on the evolution of student affairs over the last 30 years. We're not what we were 30 years ago, and we're not where we were ten years ago. And so to be in this chair has been enormously privileged. And so I have enjoyed literally every single day I've come to work. Just leave you with that thought. I mean, very few people have a job where they come to work every day, and they love what they do every single day. And I've had that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:25:18]: It's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:25:24]: Welcome back to the NASPA World. Really excited to be able to talk to you again today. There is a ton of things happening this fall that I know I want to make sure that all of you have the access to taking advantage of and you don't miss out on. One of the things that's coming up here in January of 2024 is the 2024 NASPA Symposium on Military Connected Students. This is an annual event, and in this event, it is running from January 30 to February 1 in Louisville, Kentucky. The Call for Programs deadline for this great event has been extended, and you have now until October 2 to be able to put in a proposal. You can showcase your expertise, research innovative ideas to people that are completely supportive of military connected students. So whether you have a comprehensive program, insightful research findings, or best practice to share, we definitely want to hear from you and have you submit a program for this amazing conference. If you don't have a program that you want to submit, you can also be a reviewer of the programs. And if you'd want to be a reviewer for the program, again, the deadline is October 2 as well. And you did get an email about this from NASPA, but if you didn't, you can also go to the 2024 NASPA Symposium on Military Connected Students website. On the NASPA website under events to be able to get more information. It's a brand new term, and that means that all of us have different goals, things that we're doing professionally, personally, to be able to extend our own learning as well as doing more to be able to connect with our students. One of the things that I always encourage people to think about is your own professional development. And one way to be able to grow and learn is through books. So this is a great time of year to be able to go to the NASPA Bookstore and be able to discover or rediscover the joy of reading. And as a special treat, the NASPA Bookstore is providing NASPA members with a remarkable 30% discount on their catalog of books spanning various subjects. So whether you're a devoted reader, an inquisitive learner, or searching for the perfect gift to a colleague, the NASPA Book Collection has something for everyone. So don't miss out. Use promo code Fall 23 at checkout. And that's all one word, Fall 23, to unlock this exclusive offer and enrich your reading experience. Another conference that's coming up in December, december 7 through the 9th in Washington, DC, is the 2023 NASPA Racial Equity and Social Change Conference. This was formally known as the Multicultural Institute. The NASPA Racial Equity and Social Change conference fosters dialogue on Equitable campuses. The shift to a racial equity framework amplifies the focus on dismantling racialized systems for broad benefit. This inaugural conference emphasizes content centered on promoting racial equity, equity leadership, institutionalizing justice and equity through organizational change, as well as creating a climate of care for staff and students. The program looks to have amazing program, amazing sessions, but one of the featured speakers that was just announced is Bettina Love, who is the William F. Russell professor at Teachers College of Columbia University. She's also a best selling author of We Want to Do More Than Survive in 2020, and the Kennedy Center in 2022 named her one of the next 50 leaders making the world more inspired, inclusive, and compassionate. Registration for the conference has an early registration deadline of October 6. So if you're ready to make plans to come to Washington, DC. For this upcoming conference in December, you definitely want to take advantage of that early deadline and jump in right away. Every week we're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself where do you fit, where do you want to give back? Each week. We're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas that will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in. That knowledge, community. I see myself doing something like that or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:04]: Chris, it's always great to hear from you on what's going on in and around NASPA. Kevin, we have reached our lightning round, and as our only three Pete guests, we have completely unique lightning round questions for you that our audience has never heard. So you're in for a ride. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:31:18]: You ready? Ready. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:20]: All right. Question number one the album or song you can listen to on repeat forever? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:31:25]: Oh, wow. Ramble on by Led Zeppelin. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:28]: Number two, what was your graduate degree or degrees in and did you use it in your job? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:31:34]: I'm laughing because my graduate degree was in counseling and personnel services, basically a master's in PhD in Higher Ed student affairs. And yes, I have used it. I use it every day. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:44]: Number three, your guilty pleasure book series. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:31:47]: I love reading mysteries, so Harlan Cobin would be the one I would pull out. I've read every single one of his books. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:53]: Number four, if someone visits your city, Washington, DC. What is the top tourist destination they have to see? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:31:59]: The Madagascar cockroach exhibit in the Natural history museum. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:03]: Number five, the best advice someone ever gave you? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:32:05]: Gene Ward, Director of Housing at Southern Methodist University in 1982, when I was getting ready to leave go from being an area coordinator, and I applied for a job at the University of Maryland, and he said, I was really worried about that, I hadn't finished my work and I had more to do. And he said, Kevin, stick your finger in a glass of water and then pull it out and you see there's no hole left, is there? He said, Organizations will always adapt to you moving on. And that's how I feel today. That's perfect advice for the mind. NASPA, I will leave and ask will continue to live and thrive. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:31]: Number six, any new podcast recommendations? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:32:34]: Yeah, I just on my ride to North Carolina, listened to Scamanda, which is this staggering story about a woman who raised all this money going through her journey with cancer, and it turns out she never had cancer. It was just amazing. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:48]: Oh, I'm adding that one immediately. And finally, number seven, any shout outs you'd like to give, personal or professional? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:32:55]: This is so many people that I would shout out to, but I have to really kind of come back to the people that have supported me in my life. My wife, Lisa Hansen, who was beside me through this entire journey of being national president. We started dating, actually, when I applied for the job, so she's been here with me the whole time and in some ways, in a weird way, my kids. My daughter just graduated from the University of Maryland and is working, and my son graduated in the Pandemic. And so I've had them both as a proud father, but also as sort of watching their journey through college in real time. And I think that's helped me be more effective in the work that I do. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:33:29]: Well, Kevin, it's always a pleasure to have you on the show. Since you are going to be with NASPA just a little while longer, what's the best way for folks to get a hold of you? Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:33:36]: So you can always go to the website and find my email address, but I'll tell you what it is. It's KKR Uger Kruger@naspa.org. I answer every email personally, so if somebody finds anything I had to say here. Interesting. I want to expand on it. I'd love to have a dialogue with you about it. So just write me a note. It's easy to find me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:33:52]: Well, thank you so much for your service to the profession and to NASPA over the years. And of course, thank you so much for sharing your voice with us today. Dr. Kevin Kruger [00:33:58]: It's been great being with you. Jill, thank you. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:34:01]: This has been an episode of SA Voices from the Field, brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at savoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn by searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. And please, like, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton Seth Me produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

Welcome back to SA Voices From the Field. In this episode, titled "Discovering Resilience: Clarissa Mae Calimbas' Story of Professional Transformation," we are joined by Clarissa Mae Calimbas, Assistant Director for Student Organizations at San Jose State University. Clarissa Mae takes us on a journey through her professional career, from her early days as a transfer student to her current role overseeing 350 student organizations. She shares her experiences of being terminated from her first professional position during the height of the pandemic, and how she found the strength to rebuild her professional confidence. Through her story, Clarissa Mae reveals the importance of finding the right fit and staying true to one's values, even in the face of uncertainty. We also delve into the topic of transitions in Student Affairs, exploring the challenges faced by professionals and the various opportunities for growth and development. Join us as we dive deep into Clarissa Mae's inspiring journey and gain valuable insights into navigating transitions, building resilience, and finding one's voice in the world of Student Affairs.   Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices from the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your essay, Voices from the Field. Host Welcome back to a new episode of SA voices where our Transitions guest today is Clarissa Mae Calimbas. Clarissa Mae is the assistant director for student organizations at San Jose State University, or SJSU. In her role, she oversees the recognition and compliance processes of 350 plus recognized student organizations. She did her undergrad at SJSU, where she majored in Child and Adolescent development and completed her master's in Educational leadership at Old Dominion University. Clarissa Mae is also a current first year doctoral student studying Educational Leadership at SJSU. Outside of work, Clarissa Mae enjoys going to Orange Theory Fitness and learning how to DJ. You can connect with her on Linkedin. You can find her on Twitter @_Clarissamae or on Instagram @_Clarissamae. Clarissa, welcome to the show. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:01:14]: Hi. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:15]: How's it going for our listeners? Clarissa and I met, I think, two annual conferences ago, maybe two or three annual conferences ago now when we were doing some sort of I think it was a scavenger hunt for discord. Does that sound right? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:01:27]: Yeah, it was like a discord group. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:29]: And I ended up finding you in person at the Apikc Social. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:01:33]: Yes. Now I'm starting to remember. Yeah, that tracks. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:01:35]: We're glad to have you today to talk about your transitions in higher education. We always like to kick off our episodes by asking our guests how they got to their current seat. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:01:44]: That is such a good question. I've been really reflecting on this because this academic year is my fifth year as a professional, and I also currently work at my alma mater. So it's been exactly ten years since I first attended my current institution that I work at. How did I get there? I think I first came in as a transfer student. Didn't really like, there wasn't much for transfer students to get involved, and I kind of put myself out there because all my friends were out there, and then people took notice and were like, hey, you're good at this. You should do this field of student affairs. And they always told me, if you're going to go do this, you have to go away before you come back. And so I went to grad school across the country before coming back to my home state of California, worked at a couple institutions. Before I came into my current position, I've been in an interim role, and then I came back as a coordinator, and then just this past May, actually, last week was three months into my new role as an assistant director. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:02:49]: Congratulations. That's a major, major thing to especially get that interim title taken off it's. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:02:54]: Been surreal to kind of been in two interim roles before coming back and being able to permanently be an employee. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:03:00]: That interim space is one of the reasons I'm really excited to talk to you about your transitions on the show for this season. I think that interim space for people who have never been in it is a little bit nebulous. And so I'm wondering if you can talk about why you decided to take an interim position, as well as what it's like to transition into a space that, you know, is a bit ephemeral. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:03:21]: Yeah. So I had actually done my first interim appointment in 2017, and it was the first it was kind of my first paraprofessional job at the time. They had offered it to me as a way to prepare me before I went off to graduate school, and that is exactly what it did for me. And I finished my grad program, came back to my home state, worked at other institutions, and in 2021, I was actually terminated from my first position as a professional. And it was tough because it was like, at the peak of COVID and I wasn't sure if I was going to come back into student affairs. And so I took a job working as a sales associate at Orange Theory Fitness, where I would sell memberships and help set up the equipment for the coaches and whatnot. And another position at my current institution had opened up. A search had failed, so they had to move people around, and there was an opening, and they reached out to me because they knew, of course, it got terminated. She's searching, she's grinding it out. And they reached out to me and had offered me an interim appointment. And I work at one of the California state universities, so I work at one of the 23 campuses. When you're appointed an interim role, it's anywhere between four to six months. And I had just started at Orange Theory. I think I was like one or two weeks in when they called and were like, hey, we want you to come work for us. And I had actually interviewed for a job there and didn't get moved on as a final candidate. So for me, I had some animosity, but I was like, I have nothing to lose at this point. I needed the insurance, I needed the benefits, and it was a place that I was so familiar with, and I felt safe enough to kind of rebuild my confidence as a professional. And so I took the job, and I was also applying to other institutions for a permanent role. And so once I had landed a permanent role at another institution, I ended my interim appointment, and I worked at this other school for six months. And once they opened up the role for my first permanent position at the institution I'm at, I jumped at the opportunity to apply. So I was with institution B for six months. And then I moved back to Institution A, which is the institution I'm at now. And I was also told, hey, you've applied for this job you've interviewed. You deserve to be here. And I had done the work before and that was kind of like that common, like, we want you and I want you. So to be in that interim space is really scary because it's like for me, I felt like I was on a time crunch to apply, apply. But also I think for me it was a scary time, right. Because it's like you're not guaranteed permanency. You're not guaranteed the idea of, oh, that safety net of having a permanent job. And so being in that unknown professionally is just really scary. When your livelihood is on the line. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:06:10]: You said something really important and very real for American student affairs professionals, which is when you don't have a job, you may not have health insurance. And that puts an interesting crunch on a job search that doesn't exist for professionals in many, many other parts of the world. So I think that puts a lot of pressure on these types of transitions, more so than you might see other places. So I actually want to back up a little bit to the moment where you started to figure out how are you going to get on your feet after that first job came to an end and you ended up in a sales associate position. So just not necessarily aligned with your training and your master's degree and things like that. So how did you make the determination that sales was the place that you wanted to get on your feet? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:06:51]: Yeah, so I was let go in early May and I used all of June. I wasn't going to apply. I was just going to really sit and process and also going back to the whole thing about health and the benefits. I was told your benefits were going to end like that end of the month in May. So I took advantage and booked all my appointments to make sure that I was going to use it until I was covered that whole like two or three months. When I didn't have healthcare benefits or insurance, I knew I could go into sales. And I chose Orange Theory specifically because I was a member of the studio. And so I kind of had always had so much respect for the people that worked at the front desk. I've had a lot of respect for some of the coaches. Some of the coaches were actually student affairs professionals. Like this was their side hustle. And I'd always joked around like, hey, I want to be a coach one day. Maybe this will be my side hustle. I'm currently in a doctoral program, so this Orange Theory side hustle for me is after the doctorate. But I knew I wanted to go into Sales because I knew the money was kind of there. I knew we were going to be paid on commission and it was biweekly, so I knew I would have some sort of security, like financial security and financial stability coming through until I could get fully on my feet and figure out everything else. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:08:11]: So then you decided, okay, I'm going to head back into the land of higher education. Thought process did you go that? Yes, you were going to make that decision? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:08:21]: I wasn't sure if I was going to go back into higher ed. I just want to give a shout out to everyone in Apikc that who knew what was going on to me at the time. They were sending me job postings. They knew I was location bound. They were helping me with my resume, all the interview prep. As much as I thought my heart wasn't in it anymore, other people could see that I was really meant to be in the profession and I'm really meant to be in the field. And I think if I didn't have that community and that network, I for sure would have been out of the field by now. So I think it's so important when you're going through transitions, whether it's personal or professional, to really have that network and have that community of people that just hold you accountable. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:09:04]: And so when you're thinking about the things that mentorship did for you and your support in this process, what are some of the best pieces of advice you got from mentors? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:09:13]: The best piece of advice that I had got from a mentor was that and I learned this the hard way, it was that my first job was not going to be my dream job. And I think I had had these rose colored glasses in the time that I was in that first position where I was like, oh my God, I'm actually a student affairs professional. It's all great and whatnot, and when that plug gets pulled, suddenly it's a wake up call. And I realized once someone pointed it out to me was I had seen it as a dream job, but that wasn't the case based on how I was being treated, but also just how much I was putting in and not really seeing the payoff there. I think one of my favorite pieces of advice was that all of this happening to me was just building character in the end. It's not the end for me, but I think had I gone through this later on in my life, I probably would have left the field and not looked back. And I think to be able to go through this so early in my professional career, like first job, I think it's built that grit and resiliency that they don't really teach you in grad programs. And that's also the first time where I really learned what Fit meant and how important and how it's okay to really put into perspective what is important to you, like what are your values and whatnot? Because I felt like I lost so much of my values and what mattered to me in that first position, just trying to fit in and trying to be the perfect employee that in the end it didn't work out and who ultimately lost it was me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:10:45]: And I always like to be careful about the word fit because how it can be weaponized to marginalize people. But what I'm hearing you say is there was a values misalignment between what you were hoping to do and what the institution maybe was looking for. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:10:59]: Yes, that was something hard to sit with. And I think one of the earliest red flags for me was watching the other color of people leave on my team. They all had left within the first 88 days of me starting in this role. And it's so easy to count because we were on a 90 day probation when you first get hired. And so every month since I had started in that role, someone had always left and it was always someone who was of color. And so when you're the only person of color and a predominantly white team working at a very marginalized serving institution, I felt like I had the worries of my students on my backs and trying to carry that and bring it to the table and advocate for them was tough. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:11:45]: Then we are really talking about fit in that kind of coded, pushing out marginalized populations kind of way. And I think that's something that we need to remain conscious of in student affairs and really in all professions on how that can be used as a weaponized tool to further marginalize those who already struggle systemically to be included. So you've then decided that, yes, you are going to employ that grit for yourself and you're going to try again, you're going to reenter the field. You did this interim role, you took a second position after that. So how did you take that grit that you've self described as well as the things that you process to say yes to coming back into student affairs? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:12:28]: That was such a good question. I think after processing everything and the grit and that resilience, I think it's knowing that this is my own experience and no one has the same experience as me and the same thought process and being able to take that and bring it with me wherever I go. I used to be so ashamed to talk about what had happened to me and now I'm not afraid to speak up about it and talk about it and lead into how it's made me into a better professional now. It's helped me better understand every different things and different issues students go through. I feel like I came back with a thicker skin, which I think is so important to have in this field. And I think now coming back and feeling like I'm a little stronger, and I'm a little more. I have wisdom, and my opinions and my thoughts really matter. It's given me the opportunity to speak up more. I used to be so scared to speak up. I used to be so scared to talk about my ideas. But I think the experience of all these transitions and all of these experiences, good and bad, has just kind of made me into the person that I am now, where I'm a little more unapologetic now. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:36]: As a professional, we always need women of color to be less apologetic. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:13:39]: Yeah. Period. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:13:41]: So as you've grown into your career, now you're sitting in an Assistant Director seat. I believe you went from being a member of your team to being part of the leadership team in your department. Is that right? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:13:50]: I started in the office May 2022 as a coordinator, and then in May 2023, I started as the Assistant Director. So they treated it just like a typical search, where it was like the job posted and I applied and interviewed. And it is so hard and so scary to interview in front of your coworkers because they know you and they know your personality. And I think to be able to do that and get over that fear and to also be in this position I've been in this Assistant Director role for three months. And then just full context, our Director has just started last Thursday, so we have a brand new Director. We have an interim Associate Director, and a couple of openings on our team. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:14:36]: Tell us about how you prepared to interview with people that you already know and who know you. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:14:41]: I think what carried me through in that preparation was I knew what was on the line because the previous role that I was doing, it was a coordinator for Student orgs role, and it's one person that oversees 350 student organizations. It's a lot of compliance work, and I feel like misunderstandings where no one really knows what you're doing. And the easiest way that I explain it to people is that, oh, I just look at spreadsheets and I grade canvas quizzes and I email people, but there's just a lot of behind the scenes that nobody really gets to see. And so I knew personally what my role consisted of as the coordinator, and I knew what the coordinator needs from the Assistant Director. And so I carried that thought process with me as I was preparing for the interview. Preparing for the presentation was like, if there's anyone that knows what this job is going to need, it's going to be me. And being a woman of color, where's the line between being cocky and being actually confident was something that I had struggled with, like preparing for the interview. And also the role that I'm currently in is also brand new. So I'm like the first person, so I feel like there's a lot of weight carried on in terms of, like, I have to perform a certain way. I said I would do XYZ Am I going to be able to do it? I don't have a coordinator underneath me, so I feel like I put a lot of pressure on myself to really be great, but also not let anyone down on my team. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:16:12]: And you prevailed, so your strategy was a good one. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:16:15]: Yes, and I'm surprised it worked. Why? I think because of just feeling like I'm always misunderstood and no one really kind of understanding my thought process and how I process things. And so I think to be able to articulate it in a way where people actually understood it in this one moment in this presentation that I had to give for my interview, where in my head, I feel like I'm fighting for my life. I will never forget when I came back to work the next day, there was a lot of buzz with the team. I didn't know you could be this confident. I didn't know you can bring it like that. I think a lot of the times people just kind of see me as really laid back and kind of quiet and minding my business. And I think the person they saw in that interview was someone who doesn't really show out that way on a daily basis. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:17:03]: And now that you've occupied the role for a couple of months, how has that changed the way you approach your team and the work? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:17:10]: It was interesting because they consider it a promotion, which I understand. For me, the way that I approach my work has shifted significantly because I'm also in the doctoral program. So I'm balancing work, I'm balancing school, which is really exciting. But I remember being offered the job, and I was told there's going to be some dynamics that change, and I didn't understand that at the time. Sometimes I feel like I'm excluded from my coworkers. Now they're on the coordinator level and I'm on the assistant director level. And in our office, if you're an assistant director or an associate director or the director, you're considered the leadership team. And I understand that that is part of the process of being a leader. It's hard. I'm such a people person, and so being excluded kind of hurts sometimes. But now I'm beginning to understand that that's okay because I have other besties and other friends and partners across campus who are in the same parallel position as me, where it's like we also are on leadership teams for our offices, and we can't just vent down, and so we just vent across to each other. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:18:18]: That's one of the most interesting things about coming into mid level leadership, is that you're a part of many teams, a junior member of some teams, you're a senior member of other teams, you're in the middle of some teams. And that really changes the way that we process and talk about information, I think, either consciously or subconsciously. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:18:33]: I think since joining the leadership team at work, I've definitely been a little more conscious about what I share and what I open up to the team in terms of operations or what's going on with other coworkers, just because I now understand that some things are better kept private. Or it's like, I would rather you find out from senior leadership than from me because I'm still brand new. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:18:57]: So kind of looking at the culmination of all the transitions you've had over the last couple of years, what would you like to say to past Clarissa when these transitions all began? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:19:07]: Oh, my God. I would tell Past Clarissa that everything you're going through, it's not the end of the world. You're going to be okay. Take a deep breath. I feel like, at the time, I thought it was the end of the world. I thought it was the end of my professional reputation, and I thought no one was going to want to hire me because I just had so much trauma. Like, I was carrying that with me professionally. And I think I would tell Past Clarissa, too, that everything you want is on the other side of fear. You just have to be able to get over it, whether that's going to therapy, whether that's just kind of facing it head on. There's good people out there that will always be in your corner and support you. And I know this process of transition and coping and processing, it's not possible to do this all alone. And I'm just so thankful that so many people just had my back and really pushed me to, like, hey, you need to get uncomfortable. You're wasting your own potential by not going after this job, by not coming back into the field. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:20:10]: That is such a word. Everything you want is on the other side of fear. Good nugget, Clarissa. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:20:15]: Thanks. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:20:16]: So let's look at it in the other direction, too. What do you want to tell future Clarissa two years from now Clarissa or three years from now? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:20:22]: I would love to tell her to just not stress, and I just say that very candidly because I'm going through a lot of health issues right now, and I know part of it is just all rooted in stress. And I would love to tell future Clarissa, like, hey, you made it through all this. Let's take care of ourselves now. And I think the most exciting thing that I would want to tell my future self is, like, you got everything you want because you worked hard for it, and don't ever let anyone undermine the work that you've put in to. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:20:53]: Get to where you are and then thinking about your kind of holistic perspective as well. Is there anything that you would definitely want to repeat in terms of identifying how to transition successfully? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:21:04]: I think speaking about it is so important. I used to be so scared and so embarrassed to tell people, hey, I'm going to apply for this job. Or like, hey, I'm thinking about making the jump from this functional area to that functional area because I was so afraid of what people would think about me or think about, like, oh, I don't think you're making the right career choice. And I think if there's anyone that's going to know you best, it's yourself and your instinct and your gut. And I think as much as I say I've had good people that have supported me, a lot of it has also been my instinct. I knew I could do this work. I know that I'm good at this, and I think that's also carried me. So I think from a holistic approach and thinking about all these transitions, I think your instinct carries you through it. I think talking about it too to the people that you know would support you and keep it very candid and honest with you are the ones are the one thing, two things that I could say have helped me in the. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:22:03]: Last four or five years and also thinking about this whole process. Is there anything you wished you would have done differently? You mentioned talking about it, but anything else? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:22:10]: I think what I wish I could have done differently, I wish COVID didn't happen. I graduated in 2019, so I had that fall semester in person and then 2020 to 2021, 2022, it's just a blur. And I just say that because I feel like it just took my prime years as a professional away. And so I've always been told that your first year to your fourth or fifth year is like your new professional years. And I felt the Pandemic really took my new professional years where I kind of only know things as remote and not really pre COVID. But I think the lessons that I learned through the Pandemic really helped. And going back to grit and resilience, if it wasn't for the Pandemic, it wouldn't have built all of these personality traits and these values for me. So it's kind of like good and bad. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:00]: Also just state for the record that grit and resilience traits, oftentimes for women of color, come out of a system that wasn't built for us, and we have to figure out how to navigate that system. So I think it's awesome that you found yourself being able to build those traits. But I also would encourage and challenge anyone listening to the show today who has authority over a system to really look at how that system is built for people and not built for people. Because that's really the driving. Force behind real inclusion and real progressive deib for your organizations and all of the values that we talk about a lot and sometimes we struggle to operationalize. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:23:39]: I love that. That was great retweet. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:43]: I'm completely off of Twitter now, or X or whatever the heck that it's called. I had enough. I think my account I still own my username because I don't want anyone else to have my username, but haven't been active in a little while. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:23:55]: Yeah, it's been tough with that whole change with X. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:23:58]: More transitions. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:24:00]: Yes. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:00]: Any final advice you'd like to give our listeners on their own transitions or wisdom from yours? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:24:05]: I think transitions can be such a beautiful thing. I think it's just how you look at it, because again, everything you want is on the other side of fear. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:24:13]: It's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:24:20]: Welcome back to the NASPA World. Really excited to be able to talk to you again today. And there's a lot happening in NASPA. I know I say that every week, but it's true. So many opportunities to learn, to grow, to expand your horizon to the future that you have in front of you. And one of the things that is coming up in January january 24 to 27th in Atlanta, Georgia, is the 2024 NASPA Institute for Aspiring Vice Presidents for Student Affairs. We are currently seeking dedicated professionals to apply for the 2024 NASPA Institute for Aspiring Vice Presidents for Student Affairs. Make sure to block off a few minutes in your calendar as you look at the deadline that's coming up on October 15. This institute is a four day program for professionals considering or seeking to learn more about the Vice President for Student Affairs role. This application based program is an institute so unlike conferences where you may choose to participate or not in concurrent session, during this institute, all attendees will participate in the same cohort experience and are expected to engage fully in all aspects of the program. This is a powerful program that definitely prepares individuals to look at becoming a Vice President for Student Affairs. The ins, the outs, the positives, the negatives, everything in between, and you have a ton of great mentors that support you throughout the Institute and beyond. The institute faculty include claire Brody, Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs at Anna G. Mendez University jose Luis Riera, Vice President for Student Life at the University of Delaware pauline Dabrowski, Vice President for Student Affairs at Stonehill College. Sheila Higgs Burkhalter, Vice President for Student Affairs at Winthrop University brian Mitra, Vice President of Student Affairs and Enrollment Management at Queensboro Community College melissa Shivers, Senior Vice President for Student Life at the Ohio State University and Alvin Sturdavant, Vice Provost for Student Development at Seattle University. If you think you want to be a Vice President for Student Affairs in the future, I highly encourage you to consider this great opportunity. And just remember, the deadline for applying is October 15. Another great professional development opportunity that really falls into our last season of the podcast is the fifth European Conference for Student Affairs and Services. ASPA is partnering with Ayuka, which is. The European University College Association and Perodus College American Farm School as they all invite you to the fifth annual European Conference for Student Affairs and Services that's going to be held in Thessaloniki, Greece on November 9 through 11th. In a world where the availability, functionality and accessibility of technologies are growing exponentially and where new realities such as the metasphere appear, education providers need to reimagine their role in what is starting to be called the onlife world. Student affairs departments are well placed to support students in gaining invaluable experience, to get to know themselves better, and to grow and mature in this program. You can find out more about this program on the NASPO website. As you delve a little bit deeper, you're going to find that there are many different topics within this conference, including student affairs, staff preparation and professional development, career readiness and preparation for the future, mental health and well being and cultural skills and inclusive learning. The conference will definitely open your eyes to the broader world of student affairs outside of the United States and will open you to being able to consider perspectives that you may never have considered before. Highly encourage you to take a look at this conference and see if it's a right fit for you. Every week we're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself where do you fit, where do you want to give back? Each week. We're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas that will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in. That knowledge, community. I see myself doing something like that or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:29:50]: Chris, always appreciative of your work with the NASPA World segment, keeping our members updated on what's going on in and around the association. Clarissa, we have reached our lightning round, so I have seven questions for you in 90 seconds. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:04]: You ready to go oh, my God, yes. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:06]: I promise you already know the answers. Okay, question one if you were a conference keynote speaker, what would your entrance music be? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:15]: Probably the man by Taylor Swift. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:17]: Number two, when you were five years old, what did you want to be when you grew up? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:20]: A pediatrician. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:21]: Number three, who's your most influential professional mentor? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:24]: Her name is Dr. Sanja Daniels. She's the associate vice president for Campus Life at San Jose State University. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:30]: Number four. Your Essential Student Affairs. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:32]: Read it's. The purple book from Anaspa. Asian Pacific Islanders. Knowledge, community understanding. I don't know the full title, but the Purple Book, that's what I call it. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:43]: Number five, the best TV show you binged during the pandemic. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:46]: This is gonna say so much about me, but Tiger King. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:50]: Number six, the podcast you've spent the most hours listening to in the last year. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:30:54]: It's a split between Call Her Daddy by Alex Cooper and the True Crime Podcast. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:30:59]: And finally, any shout outs you'd like to give personal or? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:31:02]: Oh, that's a good question. I just want to shout out my partner, Joshua Cruz, for letting me use his setup. I just want to give a shout out to the team at San Jose State University and student involvement. And I just want to give a shout out to my family, my mom, my had, my sister for being super supportive of me being in the doctoral program and just for letting me be in student affairs. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:21]: And I know everyone can't see Clarissa's setup that borrowing from her partner, but it is kind of an epic, twitch streamer kind of situation. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:31:28]: Yes. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:29]: Got a lot of anime posters and giant professional microphones, so I hope that you're enjoying her audio quality today. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:31:37]: Yeah, apparently this is supposed to be, like, smooth and crispy, like a microphone quality. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:41]: Clarissa, if people would like to reach you after the show, how can they find you? Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:31:44]: I am on LinkedIn. Just look up Clarissa May. That's M-A-E Columbus. And then I'm on Twitter or X at Underscore Clarissa May. And then I'm on Instagram at two. Underscores Clarissa May. I think that's the only three social media platforms I use. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:02]: Thank you so very much for sharing your voice with us today. Clarissa Mae Calimbas [00:32:05]: Thank you. I had so much fun. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:08]: This has been an episode of Essay Voices from the Field, brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at favoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn by searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. And please, like, rate and review us on Apple podcasts, spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton. That's me. Produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

Welcome back to another exciting episode of SA Voices From the Field! In today's episode, we have the pleasure of hosting Dr. Chicora Martin, the board chair of NASPA, the leading association for student affairs professionals. Dr. Martin shares their incredible journey in leadership, from initially doubting their own nomination to now serving as the board chair. We dive into their experience at NASPA, the importance of color and texture in leadership, and the outstanding work of the NASPA staff in keeping the organization running smoothly. Dr. Martin also walks us through NASPA's thoughtful process of selecting the board chair, emphasizing the importance of representation and engagement within the association. We'll also touch on Dr. Martin's involvement in the LGBTQ+ knowledge community and their commitment to addressing gender issues within the profession. So tune in and join us as we explore the dynamic world of leadership and higher education with Dr. Chicora Martin in this episode of SA Voices From the Field! Dr. Chicora Martin serves as the Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students for Agnes Scott College in Decatur, GA.  Chicora provides leadership in the areas of student development, wellness, sense of belonging, social justice, and transformational learning experiences for Agnes Scott College students.  Before coming to Agnes Scott, Chicora was Mills College in Oakland, CA as the Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students for seven years and at the University of Oregon for fourteen years serving as the Assistant Dean of Students, Director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Education and Support Services, Area Director for the Center for Multicultural Academic Excellence, and coordinator of the Bias Response Team. Chicora various leadership positions include Region V Knowledge Community Chair for LGBT Issues as well as the 2018 faculty and 2020 Faculty Director for the Manicur Institute for NASPA, co-chair for the National Consortium of LGBT Resource Professionals from 2003-2005, member of the American College Personnel Association's Standing Committee for LGBT Concerns and ACPA Senior Student Affairs Officer Advisory board.  Chicora was honored as the 2015 ACPA Voice of Inclusion Medallion recipient and by the Consortium of LGBT Resource Professionals as the 2014 Contribution to the Profession award. Chicora received a doctorate from Colorado State University in Educational Leadership and Human Resource Studies, a Master's degree in College Student Personnel with a concentration in LGBTQ services from the Florida State University, and a Bachelor's of Science from East Carolina University.  Chicora's research and teaching interests include the intersections of higher education policy, gender identity, as well as marine conservation and emergency management/crisis response.  Past presentations have focused on gender identity, Title IX and policy development, multiethnic/queer identity, access and equity, bystander engagement, and crisis and emergency preparedness.  Chicora enjoys travel and adventures of all kinds including experiences to Everest Basecamp, rafting the Grand Canyon and scuba diving the world, as well as triathlons and serving as Red Cross Disaster Volunteer. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues! Transcript Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:02]: Welcome to Student Affairs Voices from the Field, the podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season nine on transitions in Student Affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Dr. Jill Creighton. She her hers your SA SA Voices from the Field. Host. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:00:23]: Shakura. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:24]: Welcome to SA. Voices thank you so much. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:00:27]: I'm excited to be here with you. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:00:28]: We're so glad you agreed to be our season premiere of season nine, transitions in Higher Education. Think you're the perfect person to kick off our season because of your professional transitions, your institutional type transitions, and also your leadership transitions within NASPA. But as our season premiere person, that also means that we get to explore the direction of where we're going to go. And one of the things we will always keep consistent though, is we like to start our episodes with your come up. So how did you get to your current seat both at your institution and in NASPA? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:00:59]: Well, first of all, let me congratulate you on nine seasons of bringing forward our profession in a way that's really accessible to folks and interesting and lets us tell a little bit deeper story about what we're doing. So that's an amazing opportunity for you, for NASPA, and for Student affairs. So super excited to be a part of it. How I got here, I was just actually meeting with a grad student. So I have a general policy that if a grad student reaches out and wants to connect, I try to make that happen because I feel like that's an important part of the profession. So I actually had lunch with a graduate student last weekend who happens to be in the Atlanta area doing some work this year. And that was one of their questions, like, what was your student affairs journey? And I said, first, I said, I think I'm still on it. I'm not quite sure. Trying to figure out what I'm trying to do. But I went to college and really was as a first gen student, really with very little college knowledge. Got to my undergraduate because my mom's best friend's husband coached football there. That was part of my decision making factor in Student Affairs for thinking about the work we do around recruitment and trying to get students to come to our college. I'm sure all of the admissions professionals out there who hear this are going to cringe that. That was part of my college decision making journey. But alas, I got there and I was on a career trajectory to be into law and be a judge. That's what I wanted to do. That was my original career aspiration. So I got involved with the honor know, that seemed like a good extracurricular fit with being a judge. Right? And summer of my sophomore year, this person calls me in July. In the summer I'm working. They're like, hi, I'm your new dean of students at ECU. East Carolina is where I went my undergrad, and I'm going to be working with you next year. Really excited. I'm like, who calls you in the middle of the summer? I'm like, not even in the college frame, but alas. So that person was Dr. Karen Boyd, and she ended up being my dean for several years. Is actually a great friend of mine. At my wedding, we vacationed together even 30 years later almost. So it was because of her making me realize the opportunities available to me. I did want to go home for the summers back to my house in Virginia Beach, so I got connected with orientation so I could work. No real intention of it being a career. Hey, it was a job and a place to live and three meals. And I met the wonderful orientation director at Carolina, Beth Am. Pretty. And it really just went off from there, I think. I got a job in student affairs and got into law school the same week right when I was getting ready to graduate. My mom was a little surprised. You're going to do what? You're not going to go to law school? You're going to do this thing. I don't understand. But I did. I thought it was the right thing for me. I said then that I can always go back to law school. So yeah, so that's how I got into student affairs. It was sort of a circuitous serendipitous, I guess, is the better word for it, route. And I just kept taking advantage of opportunities and decided I wanted to go to grad school. So I had to wait a year, took as many advantages as I could where I was at ECU to do different jobs. I worked in admissions, I worked in the student union. Really cool opportunities. And I went to grad school so I could do this as a job. And my family, many of which have still not gone to college, are always like, how is school? School's still good? As if I'm still enrolled. I don't know. I don't know what they think I do, but it's really cute because they're always like student of life. Student. Exactly. I'm like school's still great. I think they think either just always in school or maybe I'm the principal, I don't know. But yeah, so that's why I got here. And I've just continued to have really great opportunities. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:04:20]: The reason you heard me go, oh, wow, is I know Karen as well. Clearly not as well as you do, but I grew up in the conduct world, so Karen has been quite a presence stalwart in the conduct world for so many years. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:04:30]: It's true. I say she's always been really committed to this work and is a great connector, so it doesn't surprise me. Right. She's a great connector. She's always introducing people to each other. And I think I also, thankfully have learned that a little bit from her. So I try to do the same thing with people that I work with or mentor, just connecting them to the great people in our profession, for our. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:04:48]: Listeners, Shakur and I on each other's journey. We met actually at the University of Oregon in 2000. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:04:55]: A long time. Sometime between somewhere. Yeah. Mid 2000, I think. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:05:02]: Student affairs always comes around on itself, and I think it's a really great example of how small the profession can be, good, bad or ugly. But Shakura actually interviewed me for a job at one point when I was a much younger professional. So we all stay connected regardless of how those things turn out. I didn't end up working with Shakura on a full time basis, but we're still definitely in the Nasca space. You know, like, we're all those of us who've been around the block a few times, the six degrees of separation gets tinier and tinier. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:05:29]: It's true. I tell that to new professionals all the time in our field, is we have really tons and tons of amazing opportunities, and it's still a really small profession. And to your point, that can be good and challenging, I think good, because sometimes that sense of connectedness also is how we take care of each other. We look out. But I also know if you're coming from the outside and or you have identities that are not historically represented in our work, it can feel like you can't get in. Like, it's sort of an inside outside club. So I think we nurture that, but we also recognize it can feel a little clubbish, and we have to work on making sure everyone feels like they'd be a part of that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:06:04]: Absolutely. And on our theme of transitions, you have now transitioned into the Nasca board chair role. You're in there a couple of months now, so I'm hoping you can talk to us a little bit about your come up in NASPA specifically and then also what that transition has been like from being, like, a general leader or a volunteer to suddenly sitting as the leader of the board. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:06:25]: Now, I appreciate that it's accidental leadership. If you heard, I giggle because when I remember talking to my partner when I was first approached about this opportunity and I said, it's a great thing. I mean, I won't get elected or anything. They probably won't even put me up. But it's a cool thing to be nominated or recognized, just to be to someone to reach out and say, hey, you're doing great things. We see you. So she laughs at me still that's, you know, you say that, and here you are doing you know, my role of work at NASA actually kind of parallels my work in student affairs in that I got my job. At the University of Oregon, and I was there in August, and Laura Blake Jones, who was the Dean of Students there at the time, said, hey, by the way, a bunch of us are on the Portland. It was a regional conference planning committee, and now you are yay. So welcome. I love being volatile. It was amazing. It was a very important job. I was in charge of parking. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:07:22]: Oh, that was on a college campus. Do not underestimate the importance of parking. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:07:26]: I know it's true. I joke about it, and people are like, well, but if they can't park, no one can come. I was like, It's true. And parking in downtown Portland is not like most major cities. It's really challenging. But it's interesting though. I decided, like, okay, one thing, I was going to take that beyond and sort of my personality too. I was like, oh, what else can I do? So I had like, bus routes, and I got some free bus passes as giveaways. I just went and did all kinds of transportation things. So parking and transportation is important and fun, and I made the best of it. But I also said, hey, I know there's an LGBT knowledge community. I'm connected at that time. I was just I call it like a listserve member at the time, right? I got the emails and I said, I'd like to also provide some resources around LGBT things to do at the conference. And folks were really excited. So I took on that piece as well and just kind of ran with it. And it was a great opportunity. I met wonderful people in NASPA. It was really my first big involvement. And I think for the early part of my career, I was involved in both NASPA and ACPA fairly equally. ACPA was much bigger at my graduate institution, and I stayed connected to both. I think each organization has really valuable pieces for professionals and having each organization and lots of other ones, and I'll talk a little bit about that later, but that really benefit your professional development. So it's cool. Got connected to cool people and just stayed involved. Really got involved in the LGBT knowledge community. And that's what it was called at the time, right? And worked with that group and some wonderful leaders around some of the cool changes that we were working on as far as the organization being more inclusive, being more welcoming, and stayed connected there as well as the standing committee for ACPA. So it was really cool in working, and then as many of us sometimes do, I kept volunteering with NASPA, reviewing programs. That was one of the things I've constantly done. People are like, how do I get involved with something right away? I'm like, offer to review program proposals. It's one of the easiest ways, but really meaningful ways. You really help sculpt the professional development curriculum of our organization. So I've done that for years and generally was just open, especially when NASPA was close to us. So if it was close to me in an area as a relatively I'm not going to use the word poor that I don't think that's appropriate. As a relatively lower income employee at the time, I really couldn't travel nationally, so it was really taking advantage of whenever NASPA came by. The Bay Area first story. Get another bay in heights. So I was really excited in looking at my trajectory as a mid level professional and how you get to become into sort of a vice presidency. It's not a very clear process. It's somewhat opaque sometimes. How do you get the skills and experience? So I think my first really big opportunity to engage was when the faculty director of Manicure, which is a wonderful institute to help support women to get into VP positions, I would say argue sometimes to decide they don't want to be a vice president, which is a completely appropriate reason to also do it. Mamta Akapati reached out to me, and Mamta and I have known each other for a long time, more from afar. She's an amazing leader, really, I think sets a lot of opportunity in our community to talk about inclusive leadership in a particular way. And I've always really appreciated her work in that area and said, hey, you want to get involved with this thing, Manicure? I had never been, and not because I didn't think it was important, but because of my gender identity. I wasn't exactly sure if it was that space for me. I want to honor and respect spaces that are set for people who particularly have marginalized identities to sort of honor that. I think it's important. I think we can have lots of inclusive spaces, but I think those are vital too. And she moms and I said, let's talk. So we talked, and she really shared with me that this was about folks who are marginalized because of their gender, having a path to a VP position. And that really speaks to me because I would say that one of the reasons that I'm at a historically women's college is because we talk about gender all the time. All the time. You have to. It's what you do. So being able to really do that in a way through the NASPA leadership opportunities was exciting, and I think we had an amazing faculty. It was a really profound experience for me as a faculty member, and I had the honor. So it's every two years, the next two years, usually a faculty member is asked to be the faculty director. And so in 2020, I was able to be the faculty director. And again, just those leaders that I'm connected to the faculty, I have a text chat with all of them. To this day that we chat with each other, and some of the participants I'm still connected to reach out, and we have conversations about their careers, what they're doing, how things are going. It's really exciting. And so that was really my first national opportunity. Besides always being involved with the national conferences volunteering and doing all the things I could. I even remember volunteering at TPE for those of us who were older and remember volunteering at TPE. And mine was the mailboxes. So people asked me of one of my most memorable NASPA experiences is working at the mailboxes, at the placement exchange with folks, applying for jobs and trying to be really so my journey with NASPA was just about saying people, you know, opportunities with different groups and just saying, yeah, I'll try that, I'll help out. I will do whatever that thing is. And when I was approached to be the board chair, I really said, if the NASPA membership feels I can be of service, then I'm there. If they feel my leadership, what I bring, how I approach the work and our profession, then I would be honored to serve in that way. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:12:46]: So let's talk about that process a little bit, because I think that too can be a bit opaque. How does one be considered to become the NASPA board chair, and what does that feel like as the person who just went through it and the transition from prospective candidate to candidate to sure. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:13:01]: There'S actually it's a pretty thoughtful process. It kind of goes back to what I said earlier about ensuring that we have a process that's clear to our membership, but it feels like there's an opportunity to engage with it at a variety of levels. So NASPA will reach out to folks around being the board chair. You can throw your own name out there and say, hey, I'm interested. They also solicit from NASPA leaders, ideas, folks who might be really interested. And the first part of that conversation is looking at, do we have a good slate of folks to talk with? Right? Are we representing different groups, different regions? That's a huge part, right? We represent a very diverse constituency, have our regions. Of course, I throw that all in the loop as I move across country. But we'll talk about our regions represented, different backgrounds, different functional areas. And then the past chair part of their responsibility is actually to run this process. So you serve three years, incoming chair, current chair, and past chair. So the past chair then reaches out to folks and has a conversation. I remember my conversation with Angela Batista, and it was really, really important because Angela named what would be expected. And I think that's important to really have a thoughtful conversation with yourself, to the demands of them, to have a conversation with your family, your boss, the people who work with you. Because I would say specifically the board chair year, you're going to ask those folks in your sphere of the world to sort of take on more and to support you. So I think in that process, then folks really name, okay, yeah, I'm interested, or it's not my time. And I would say a lot of folks will say that I am very interested, but it's not my time to do that. And I think that allows us to recognize that this is a volunteer position, that all of us have other jobs. You're required to be in a student affairs role while you're in the board chair position. So it is really on top of everything else. And from that, the slate of candidates, those two candidates that rise to the top through this committee selection process, through the interviews, go to the membership, and the members get to vote between those two folks. We do a great sort of webinar kind of conversation. We have to do a video. That two minute video. I feel like it took me 20 hours to make. It is so hard to get everything you want to say in two minutes. That was, I think, the hardest part of it. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:15:09]: And in one take. That is rough. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:15:11]: I know. It was so arduous. My staff will tell you here, I hate doing videos, especially when they're scripted. I don't like conversational. I love having a conversation. But those sort of scripted are when you really and you have to in two minutes, you have to write everything down, because if you don't, at least I I will name for myself. I'll wander off talking about whatever you want to talk about, but that was the hardest part. And then it goes out to the members, and they vote and make a decision about who can lead. And I would know. I ran against Eddie Martinez. He is an amazing human, and frankly, the NASPA would have been in a great hands no matter who they elected. So, thankfully, Eddie is now on the foundation board. I'm glad we've kept him close. He's a wonderful person, and I know he'll really serve that foundation board well. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:15:56]: And it's such a delightful thing to think about. Your colleagues nominating you for this leadership role, but also really important to know that there's an interview process that you have to really think about why you want to be in this position and what does it mean to you. And the interesting thing about association leadership, which is much different than campus based leadership, is that you are actually more of a steward of the association for the period of time you're in the seat, rather than kind of operationally leading like you would in a division of student affairs. So let's talk a little bit about the transition of hat that you have to wear between your day job and your board chair job. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:16:29]: Yeah, that's a great analogy. That stewardship I describe it as I'm a threat. And one end of my thread is connected to Danita, right. She's already gone through and served our organization and still does this past year. And the other end of my thread is connected to Anna Gonzalez, who will come in next year. And I sort of hold this for a year, but I need to figure out how do I add texture and color to that. That's unique to me and my leadership that really helps serve the organization overall, because that's the most important thing. And I think my leadership style and what I bring to that. But you're right, there's a whole I use the word gaggle, very fondly gaggle of amazing staff at NASPA who do exceptional work to make this manageable for someone like me. I mean, quite frankly, if it wasn't for them, this would not be possible. They are leaders in higher education. Almost all of them have worked in higher education or in something really closely related. Many have. So they understand the flow. And I always joke we have a pretty routine bruton and I schedule throughout the year, but we don't meet in August in the same way. And people are like, oh, we're not meeting in August. I'm like because it's August. And Beth understands what August looks like for most of us. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:17:35]: Unless you're on quarters. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:17:36]: I know. I bet our term schools are like, in September. I know, but we do try. I think it's important. So the NASPA staff are great, and they're know I think every board chair comes in with a sort of a vision of how do I support the organization? And a big part of mine is sort of being with folks in community. So I've made it a real effort throughout the past summer to be able to go to as many regional conferences, specialties conferences, like our Student Success Conference. I'm looking forward to our Strategies conference in January, our racial equity conference in December. So being there and having conversations, I had wonderful visits with region Two and Three at their regional conferences in June. So I think that's an important part of what I think I'm bringing to that sort of stewardship of the board chair is helping our membership understand that, yes, there's this amazing group of staff, but the responsibility and opportunity of NASPA is with us. It is our organization. And you have a board of volunteers who represent all of the regions, all of the divisions, all the wonderful areas that are so important to us. And they are working really hard to make sure NASPA is your organization. And we want you to engage and participate by being in volunteer roles, reading whatever way you can participate. So that really, I think, is my sort of opportunity to steward the relationship our membership has with not. I would say in some ways, it's not unlike being a vice president in that I spend a lot of time ensuring that everyone understands what the Division of Student Affairs does, the important work and contributions we make to the learning and education for students. But thankfully, in my day job, I do a lot of problem solving. And I would say that generally, the Nasca staff ends up being a great know. Kevin and I meet monthly to do that, and by the time we hear about. They have like six solutions. They're like, here are the six solutions the board can choose. Pick one. So I wish I had that group of people all the time. Although I would say, here my current role. My staff also do a pretty good job of that. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:19:37]: So when you think about the transitions of institution types, you've also spent time at large publics. You're now at a small private. You changed and transitioned between the east and the West Coast, or really the West Coast to the south. Tell us about those transitions and what you've learned and what made them successful, or I guess also what made them really scary. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:19:55]: Does that make me like a sort of student affairs unicorn? When I was talking to someone, they were like, you went from a big public to a small private, from the West Coast to the East Coast. Right. I think it just shows you what we talked about earlier, that our profession, while large, is also small in some ways. There's some consistent things that we think also. For me, transitions are about remaining really open to bringing your experience, but recognizing every position you come into as an opportunity to learn, as opposed to assuming you know all the answers. So I think that's always been a very successful sort of transitions approach for me. I went from a school of 25,000 to a school with less than 2500 and being able open to say, yeah, I've got some great ideas, but I need to also see how I could apply them here. I'll use a funny example. So when I went from Oregon to Mills College, when I got there, they had all these posters and flyers everywhere, and they were all like handwritten and were and I said, well, why don't we create a way so they can create more digital posters or we can get a tool people can use. And I'm thinking this in my head because my policy is when I come to a new position, I'm just sort of soaking it in. And then it only took me about a month to realize that was just an important part of that way that campus communicated that sort of homemade and or high touch approach. It wasn't just that they put these banners up, but the fact that the organization who did them all got together and made them together and then put them up, that was part of the culture of gathering for them sense of belonging. And had I just come in and said, oh, we have these great tools at this big school and we're going to do this thing, I wouldn't have seen or felt that. So instead, I bought them a stencil machine. So little cutout stencils for those of you who have those on your campus, you know, little machine, you hope nobody takes their finger off it. Makes me a little nervous. But alas, then we had little classes. You had to do a little class before you could use the stencil machine. And then I bought, like, every color butcher paper on that cool wheelie thing known to student affairs so that students could just make better posters. They could be clear, you could read them better, they could do them more quickly. They had the right supplies, and we had a little big table in a space where they could do it. So I think that's an example of sort of recognizing that in transitions, we bring a lot of knowledge and experience, but to do it well, we have to be able to adapt it to the community we're a part of. We have to just recognize. And I think this is also one of the things I take away from traveling abroad a lot. You and I have talked about this. We both have this love of travel, and I traveled very young. My father imported spices for a living. That was his job. And so I had the opportunity to be in countries in the Middle East and in Europe pretty young. And I took from that also, like, oh, my way of doing things is just a way of doing things. It is not the way of doing things. And I think that has helped me in every transition to recognize I have great experience, but I need to figure out how to apply that to the benefit of that campus or that volunteer role to make it better and to kind of contain be nimble and also learn stuff. I mean, that's the coolest part. I'm always learning things from those around me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:22:56]: Is there a time that you made a mistake in a transition that you've learned from and applied towards future transition. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:23:02]: Mistake, opportunity for learning? Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:23:04]: I don't know. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:23:05]: I'm kind of an optimist. No, I would describe as mistakes. You do things in a silo that you are unwilling to own. Like, that's sort of a mistake. For me, everything else is an area where you did probably the best with the knowledge you had, but you have to own when it's just it's not the right thing or it didn't work or you weren't as inclusive. And sure, certainly I think sometimes I get ahead of myself. I'm about recognizing that not everybody has a different tolerance for change and a good leader number one job is to recognize that actually not just to do the change, but to actually recognize folks tolerance for change. I was at Mills College when Mills College merged with Northeastern. Talk about learning. I never thought I would do that in my higher education experience. And I think there were certainly times where it was challenging. Right. It's challenging for an organization to change that significantly. And I learned a lot from trying to apply kind of traditional roles of sort of change management in a way that we've never done before. Right. But it's also having some grace with myself and with others. Around me. So I'd say that's a takeaway. Even when I mess up, which I think the first thing is just I actually not that long ago said to Sioux staff who brought forward, hey, we don't like the way this was going. This is how it's impacting us. First thing is I said thank you for trusting me to bring this to me. That can be scary. I'm your boss. Second, I'm sorry, I hear what you're saying. I wasn't coming from that perspective, we need to do some things, but I see how doing it that way is problematic. So let's get together in the end. I should have gotten together first, but sometimes we get moving so quickly that we don't recognize everyone who needs to be there. And that that change is really important. And as I said to my folks that work with me, hopefully we can build a layer of trust that if I do have to do that, you can trust me enough to know that it's not the typical way I want to make change, but the situation required it. So doing that, naming that, and then what I think that big opportunity always takes is that change is never easy. It sometimes feels a little easy when you're in positions of power and positions of decision making. And information really is just about everything. How we control information, how decisions are made, who gets to make decisions. I think that's the key to not making mistakes and to just learning from those opportunities. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:25:25]: It's time to take a quick break and toss it over to producer Chris to learn what's going on in the NASPA world. Dr. Christopher Lewis [00:25:31]: Welcome back to the NASPA World. Really excited to be able to talk to you again today in a brand new season. And there is a lot going on in NASPA. Coming up in only a few days on September 20 at 02:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, is a webinar that is available for members and nonmembers alike called Career Readiness. A shared responsibility between student affairs and academic affairs. At research focused institutions, career outcomes have focused on the first destination, corporate hiring and graduate school enrollment. Today, the measures of student success are more broad than a first destination. Career readiness is now an accepted student success outcome. How do research intensive institutions frame this? Explicitly as tied to institutional learning objectives and a shared responsibility of academic and student affairs? In this webinar, three institutions Stony Brook University, SUNY, the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota, and the University of Texas at Austin will share their models and approaches. You can still register, so go to the NASPA website to find out more. There's another new volume of the Journal of College and Character that is currently out. All NASPA members do have access to this journal. Among all of the other journals of the association in this issue, there are a number of great articles, peer reviewed articles, as well as opinions and perspectives that range from topics involving career development to university chaplaincy to even considering antihazing messaging. It's a powerful journal that I highly encourage you to check out. It is a part of your membership, and you can take advantage of reading through the different articles from many different authors and practitioners here in the field. Know you get a lot of emails from knowledge communities and other aspects of NASPA, but it's important for you to check those emails, read through them, because there are specific dates and deadlines and things that you need to keep in mind in regard to your membership, in regard to how you can recognize people on your own campus or programs on your own campus. And I don't want you to miss out on these opportunities. One such opportunity is the annual awards process that happens every fall, and the deadline for submitting programs and people for different awards that are hosted by knowledge communities within NASPA or NASPA in general, typically have a deadline of Friday, October 6, 2023. So I want to encourage you to go to the NASPA Awards portal on the NASPA website, and you can go into the NASPA website, go to awards, and find out more. But in there, you can go in, you can look at Knowledge Community Awards, division Awards, dissertation of the Year Awards. There's lots of different awards that are out there and different deadlines, and all the deadlines that are out there as well. Most are October 6. But the Dissertation of the Year award is Saturday, September 30. So I don't want you to miss out on taking advantage of submitting for these awards, submitting others for these awards, because it is a great opportunity to be able to recognize the work that is being done, the people, the programs at your own institutions, and being able to have them potentially get recognized at the national Conference. So, again, the deadline is October 6. I really highly encourage you to at least go check out the portal itself. To make it simple, I know I said you could go to the NASPA website to access this, and you can, but I'm going to make it even simpler. I created a short link for you to follow to be able to check out all the awards, and it's just bitbit lynaspa, 20 fourawards, all one word. So again, bit Lee NASPA 20 fourawards. Every week we're going to be sharing some amazing things that are happening within the association. So we are going to be able to try and keep you up to date on everything that's happening and allow for you to be able to get involved in different ways. Because the association is as strong as its members and for all of us, we have to find our place within the association, whether it be getting involved with a knowledge community, giving back within one of the centers or the divisions of the association. And as you're doing that, it's important to be able to identify for yourself. Where do you fit? Where do you want to give back? Each week, we're hoping that we will share some things that might encourage you, might allow for you to be able to get some ideas that will provide you with an opportunity to be able to say, hey, I see myself in that knowledge community. I see myself doing something like that. Or encourage you in other ways that allow for you to be able to think beyond what's available right now, to offer other things to the association, to bring your gifts, your talents to the association and to all of the members within the association. Because through doing that, all of us are stronger and the association is better. Tune in again next week as we find out more about what is happening in NASPA. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:21]: Chris, thanks so much for kicking us off with season nine's very first NASPA World segment. As always, we are so grateful for you putting together this list. And if you're new to the show, we want to remind you that our mission here is to provide free and accessible professional development for you, our student affairs professionals, especially as we know, as our travel budgets are seemingly restricted more and more every year. So we thank you for joining us and we're glad that you're here. And Shakura, we have reached our lightning round time. I've got seven questions for you in about 90 seconds. You ready? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:31:51]: Okay, I'm ready. Let's do it. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:31:53]: All right, question number one if you were a conference keynote speaker, what would your entrance music be? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:31:58]: Oh, I have two choices if it's a chill conference. The rainbow connection by Kermit the Frog. If we're going a little more fly it's. I was here by Beyonce. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:06]: Number two, when you were five years old, what did you want to be. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:32:09]: When you grew think? I'm not sure I wanted to be a judge quite yet. I definitely want to be underwater, so I would say maybe I want to live underwater or be a marine biologist. One of the two. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:19]: Number three, who's your most influential professional mentor? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:32:22]: Oh, Dr. Karen Boyd. I think, like I said, is the reason I got here. And I would say just about every person I've worked for and with is a mentor to me. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:31]: Number four, your essential student affairs read. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:32:34]: Reading the books that we learn from every one of them has a student affairs message. My current one is Braiding Sweetgrass, which is a great context on science and indigenous folks. So that's the one that's going to inform me today. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:45]: Number five, the best TV show you binged during the Pandemic. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:32:48]: All right. The mass singer. That was it. I wouldn't say it's the best, but it certainly helped me get through the pandemic. And the other one was Bridgerton, so we could talk about that. That was a great piece. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:32:58]: Number six, the podcast you've spent the most hours listening to in the last year. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:33:02]: This is amazing. I don't listen to a ton of podcasts, but my wife does and she tells me all about them. So The Hidden Brain has been a really recent one that she's been listening. I've been listening through her. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:33:12]: And finally, number seven. Any shout outs you'd like to give? Personal or professional? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:33:16]: Thank you for that. I have one for you for taking the time to do this to my great wife and all of our kids who are attached to us. We have about seven and some grandkids for putting up with us and to all the student affairs professionals who are new to the field and finding your path and journey. There's a place here for you and we're excited to have you with us. And for the folks who've been here a while, leading is challenging, so we're here to support you as well. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:33:35]: You made it, yay. Really appreciate you taking time out of your very busy schedule and balancing the time zones that we're currently in. Currently, Shakur and I are recording 12 hours opposite, so very early in the morning for them and very late at night for me. So we're making it work and then we're going to do this for the rest of the season. But this is part of my joy as a student affairs professional, getting to have depth of story with the amazing humans who make NASPA happen and who make our profession work and who are committed to positive change in our profession. So I'm grateful for you and your leadership and looking forward to seeing what the next semester and a half bring in your stewardship of the organization. I think it'll be over before you blink. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:34:14]: Oh, it will. Thank you for hosting this and for the opportunity for the world to be able to have, like you said, accessible professional development at their fingertips. One of the most important things we do. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:34:24]: And finally, Shakura, if anyone would like to connect with you after the show airs, how can they find you? Dr. Chicora Martin [00:34:28]: Sure easiest is LinkedIn. And then if you Google Shakura Martin, you will see my position and the NASPA website. So check those out and then message me on LinkedIn if you have questions. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:34:37]: Thank you so much for sharing your voice with us. Dr. Chicora Martin [00:34:39]: Thank you. Dr. Jill Creighton [00:34:41]: This has been an episode of SA Voices from the Field, brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners. We are so grateful that you continue to listen to us season after season. If you'd like to reach the show, you can always email us at savoices@naspa.org or find me on LinkedIn by searching for Dr. Jill L. Craighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. We'd love it if you take a moment to tell a colleague about the show. And please like, rate and review us on apple podcasts spotify or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals find the show and helps us become more visible in the larger podcasting community. This episode was produced and hosted by Dr. Jill L. Creighton. Produced and audio engineered by Dr. Chris Lewis. Guest coordination by Lu Yongru. Special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Michigan, Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

China's Belt and Road Initiative marked its 10th anniversary this month, prompting a lot of discussion about what's next for Beijing's controversial development agenda. While BRI spending in Africa and the Americas has plummeted in recent years that is not the case closer to home in Southeast Asia.Cambodia, in particular, stands apart from other countries in terms of its growing dependence on Chinese economic engagement -- both from government-backed BRI projects and private investors who have transformed major cities like Sihanoukville (not always for the better).Wang Yuan, an assistant professor at Duke Kunshan University, and Linda Calabrese, a research fellow at the Overseas Development Institute, published a paper last month that examined China's hugely important economic presence in Cambodia and join Eric & Cobus to discuss what lessons other developing countries can learn from Phnom Penh's experience.SHOW NOTES:World Development: Chinese capital, regulatory strength and the BRI: A tale of ‘fractured development' in Cambodia: https://bit.ly/3PlXqTUJOIN THE DISCUSSION:X: @ChinaGSProject| @stadenesque | @eric_olander | @lindacalabFacebook: www.facebook.com/ChinaAfricaProjectYouTube: www.youtube.com/@ChinaGlobalSouthFOLLOW CAP IN FRENCH AND ARABIC:Français: www.projetafriquechine.com | @AfrikChineعربي: www.akhbaralsin-africia.com | @AkhbarAlSinAfrJOIN US ON PATREON!Become a CAP Patreon member and get all sorts of cool stuff, including our Week in Review report, an invitation to join monthly Zoom calls with Eric & Cobus, and even an awesome new CAP Podcast mug!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

China's Belt and Road Initiative marked its 10th anniversary this month, prompting a lot of discussion about what's next for Beijing's controversial development agenda. While BRI spending in Africa and the Americas has plummeted in recent years that is not the case closer to home in Southeast Asia.Cambodia, in particular, stands apart from other countries in terms of its growing dependence on Chinese economic engagement -- both from government-backed BRI projects and private investors who have transformed major cities like Sihanoukville (not always for the better).Wang Yuan, an assistant professor at Duke Kunshan University, and Linda Calabrese, a research fellow at the Overseas Development Institute, published a paper last month that examined China's hugely important economic presence in Cambodia and join Eric & Cobus to discuss what lessons other developing countries can learn from Phnom Penh's experience.SHOW NOTES: World Development: Chinese capital, regulatory strength and the BRI: A tale of ‘fractured development' in Cambodia: https://bit.ly/3PlXqTUJOIN THE DISCUSSION:X: @ChinaGSProject| @stadenesque | @eric_olander | @lindacalabFacebook: www.facebook.com/ChinaAfricaProjectYouTube: www.youtube.com/@ChinaGlobalSouthFOLLOW CAP IN FRENCH AND ARABIC:Français: www.projetafriquechine.com | @AfrikChineعربي: www.akhbaralsin-africia.com | @AkhbarAlSinAfrJOIN US ON PATREON!Become a CAP Patreon member and get all sorts of cool stuff, including our Week in Review report, an invitation to join monthly Zoom calls with Eric & Cobus, and even an awesome new CAP Podcast mug!www.patreon.com/chinaafricaproject

We are very excited to be preparing for Season 9 of SA Voices from the Field. This season we will be looking at things that we do something we do many times in our careers, transitions. Take a listen while Jill Creighton and Chris Lewis talk abmany times in ourout the new season. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues!   Transcript Jill Creighton: Welcome to Student Affairs voices from the field. The podcast where we share your student affairs stories from fresh perspectives to seasoned experts. This is season 9 on transitions in student affairs. This podcast is brought to you by NASPA. And I'm Doctor Jill Creighton. Sheherhers, your SA voices from the field host. Happy August, Chris. Christopher Lewis: It is great to be back and really excited about this new season and new school year. and just new in general. Jill Creighton: You've got a lot of major things happening in your life right now about to sun. Well, I'll I'll let you talk about it. Christopher Lewis: that we do. And not only with work, but personally, I'm sending my oldest to college. So she is a freshman the university of North Carolina Chapel Hill. She's there. She started, and she is living her best life. So we are stepping back and watching from a distance and doing the whole parent thing. And I'm watching from the pilons and watching to see how student affairs works at other institutions. Jill Creighton: It's such a fascinating thing to going from the person who's behind the scenes to the person who's experiencing the thing that we all try to make sure it works. And that's a huge transition for you. I also know that I've got a huge transition on my campus this fall Over the summer here at DKU, we opened 22 new buildings. And I know that is such a wild concept for pretty much anyone in American Higher Ed. But because my institution is only a decade old, we're still building infrastructure. So our phase 2 campus just opened out of 22 of those facilities. 11 of them are under student affairs. And I've got a new sports complex opening, our student union building, which is called our community center. Just came online. And I also have 8 undergraduate residence halls and 1 graduate student residence hall. And, you know, I've opened new buildings in my career before. but I've literally never opened 11 at once. So big transitions for both of us, which got us really thinking, what do we wanna focus on this season? So, Chris, do you wanna make the big announcement? Christopher Lewis: Really excited because this season, we're going to be talking about transitions gonna be talking about transitions in our personal life, but we're also gonna be talking about transitions in student affairs to get some amazing guests throughout the entire season. they're gonna be talking about transitions that they've gone through in their careers and the things that worked, the things that didn't work, or might not have worked, and we'll definitely be learning from all of them along the way and pass that learning on to you. Jill Creighton: And we want to really take your guest suggestions this season as well. We're always open to them. But if you know someone who's making a transition in their career, whether it be from undergraduate to graduate student pursuing a master's in higher ed or a graduate student to 1st full time position or from a new professional to mid level professional, especially if you're going from never supervising full time professionals before to leading and supervising full time professionals. We're also very excited to be experiencing along with them at the transition to NASA board chair for Doctor Shikora Martin. And then I'll also give a teaser that one of our long time NASA members and pillar of the profession, Doctor. Lori S White, will be coming on to talk about transition from VPSA to a university president, which is a very, very big transition. So all of these folks are going to be sharing their stories and We really do hope to hear from you on other folks who we should be featuring. Christopher Lewis: One of the things that I would really throw out there, and they said this at the beginning is that if you know of somebody or if you have had a transition that wasn't the best transition and it wasn't a positive experience, we'd like to talk to you too. because we don't want any of these episodes to come across as being that all transitions are great because they're not. And so many times where you might make a choice you may step into something and it doesn't work out, but you learn from it and the learning that you had from that experience or others have had from their experiences could help others to not make the same mistake and to be able to learn and grow from the steps that you were in or that others were in. Jill Creighton: The other type of transition that we'd love to hear from you on is if you're experiencing leadership transition, maybe you yourself are sitting in the same seat, but perhaps the people above you are changing. I know that's happening on my campus. We're getting a brand new chancellor as well as a brand new executive vice chancellor, which in the structure that I operate in, is effectively the COO of the campus. And so having kind of the top two roles that my campus changing at the same time is a major transition. So while my role is staying stable, I don't know what the priorities of the new leadership will be, and I think that's always an thing placed to navigate. And so wherever you are in your organizational structure, if that's happening for you, you would also be a great guest. Christopher Lewis: Oh, Jill, I'm just really excited I'm excited to not only be a part of this season, but to learn about from all of the guests because I know there's going to be so much that they're going to share, not only with us, but it's great to be behind the scenes. And I know that you that are listening are going to learn so much from the season as well. And we just love having you listen every week. Jill Creighton: So thank you for continuing to come back. We will be releasing our first episode sometime in early to mid-September still on that Thursday drop. So for those of you who are commute-based listeners, and you can look forward to like I said, early to mid-September, and we look forward to, bring you all the content. So see you very soon. Jill Creighton [00:05:32]: This has been an episode of essay voices from the field brought to you by NASPA. This show is always made possible because of you, our listeners, we are so grateful that you continue to listen me on LinkedIn by searching for Dr. Jill L Creighton. We welcome your feedback and topic and especially your guest suggestions. We'd love it if you take a moment tell a colleague about the show, and please like Bait and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you're listening now. It really does help other student affairs professionals buy the show and helps us after Chris Lewis. Guests coordination by Lu Yongru, special thanks to Duke Kunshan University and the University of Flint for your support as we create this project. Catch you next time.

We're talking rock and roll with Dr. Andrew Field, Associate Professor of Chinese History at Duke Kunshan University. Andrew is the recent author of "Rocking China", a book that traces the rise and spread of indie rock from the rock capital of Beijing to Shanghai and to other places in China. Through interviews with key players, Dr. Field explores the meanings of rock music in China society and many obstacles to developing indie rock in the country.

Joanna Hutchins is a Fractional CMO at JKH Consultancy, an independent consultancy working with B2B and B2C businesses to drive growth. She is a global marketing and business executive with brand management experience combined with an entrepreneurial drive. Before JKH Consultancy, Joanna was the Global CEO of Cowan and is a current Adjunct Professor at Duke Kunshan University. Joanna is also the author of Chinafy: Why China Is Leading The World In Innovation And How The Rest Of The World Can Catch Up, where she shares her insights on disruptive growth in China.In this episode…Do you have a good brand with great products? How can you get noticed, liked, and chosen by local and international customers?Marketing is fundamental to the success of a business. Don't be among the entrepreneurs that allow a brand with a promising future to collapse because of inefficient marketing. Being an international marketer for years, Joanna Hutchins has encountered many challenges, giving her the experience to create custom marketing solutions. She now shares how she helps entrepreneurs drive growth. In today's episode of The Radical Global Marketing Podcast, Steven Proud sits down with Joanna Hutchins, a Fractional CMO at JKH Consultancy, to discuss marketing tips to help you grow. Joanna shares her journey as a marketing professional, how to overcome the challenges of international marketing, her role as a fractional Chief Marketing Officer, and her book Chinafy.

Danny and Derek welcome to the program Zach Fredman, assistant professor of history at Duke Kunshan University, to discuss his book The Tormented Alliance: American Servicemen and the Occupation of China, 1941–1949. They get into the background of the US military presence in China at the end of “the century of humiliation”, the US-China relationship prior to WWII, General Joseph Stilwell, the day-to-day interactions between American GIs and both Chinese military and civilians, the occupation's place in the broader American imperial history in East Asia, and more.Dr. Fredman will be speaking at the Harvard International and Global History Seminar (HIGHS) tomorrow, Wednesday, May 3, which will have a remote option to participate as well. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.americanprestigepod.com/subscribe

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/environmental-studies

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/intellectual-history

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology-and-society

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the United States in recent decades. But as Joseph Giacomelli shows in Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America (University of Chicago Press, 2023), this is actually nothing new: as far back as Gilded Age America, climate uncertainty has infused major debates on economic growth and national development. In this ambitious examination of late-nineteenth-century understandings of climate, Giacomelli draws on the work of scientists, foresters, surveyors, and settlers to demonstrate how central the subject was to the emergence of American modernity. Amid constant concerns about volatile weather patterns and the use of natural resources, nineteenth-century Americans developed a multilayered discourse on climate and what it might mean for the nation's future. Although climate science was still in its nascent stages during the Gilded Age, fears and hopes about climate change animated the overarching political struggles of the time, including expansion into the American West. Giacomelli makes clear that uncertainty was the common theme linking concerns about human-induced climate change with cultural worries about the sustainability of capitalist expansionism in an era remarkably similar to the United States' unsettled present. Joseph Giacomelli is Assistant Professor of Environmental History at Duke Kunshan University. Brian Hamilton is chair of the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy. Twitter. Website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/book-of-the-day

Oggi andiamo alla fonte della ricerca storica contemporanea, per parlare con il professore Tommaso Tesei della Duke Kunshan University, uno dei ricercatori moderni più apprezzati sul tema delle origini dell'Islam. Parleremo di quanto abbiamo visto nella doppia puntata sulla Umma, ma anche dell'evoluzione dell'Islam nel corso dell'intero VII secolo. In coda, un breve riassunto da parte mia! --Per acquistare i miei libri:IL MIGLIOR NEMICO DI ROMA, Amazon (link affiliato): https://amzn.to/3DG9FG5PER UN PUGNO DI BARBARI, Amazon (link affiliato: https://amzn.to/3l79z3u---Ti piace il podcast? Sostienilo, accedendo all'episodio premium, al canale su telegram, alla citazione nel podcast, alle première degli episodi e molto altro ancora:Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/italiastoriaTipeee: https://it.tipeee.com/storia-ditaliaPer una donazione: https://italiastoria.com/come-sostenere-il-podcast/---►Informazioni sui miei libri "Per un pugno di barbari" e "Il miglior nemico di Roma":https://italiastoria.com/libro/►Registrarsi alla mia mailing list:https://italiastoria.com/mailing-list/►Trascrizioni episodi, mappe, recensioni, genealogie:https://italiastoria.com/►FacebookPagina: https://www.facebook.com/italiastoriaGruppo: https://www.facebook.com/groups/italiastoria►Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/italiastoria/►Twitterhttps://twitter.com/ItaliaStoria►YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzPIENUr6-S0UMJzREn9U5Q►Contattami per commenti, idee e proposte di collaborazione:info@italiastoria.com---Musiche di Riccardo Santatohttps://www.youtube.com/user/sanric77---Livello Giuseppe Verdi: Massimiliano Pastore e Mauro SamaratiLivello Dante Alighieri: Musu Meci, Manuel Marchio, Marco il Nero, Massimo Ciampiconi, Mike Lombardi, David l'Apostata, Luca Baccaro, Guglielmo de Martino, Daniele Farina.Livello Leonardo da Vinci: Paolo, Pablo, i due Jacopo, Riccardo, Frazemo, Enrico, Alberto, Davide, Andrea Vovola e D'agostini, Settimio, Giovanni, Cesare, Francesco, Jerome, Diego, Alanchik, Flavio, Edoardo Vaquer e De Natale, Stefano, Luca da Milano e Luca Lanotte, Arianna, Mariateresa, John, Fasdev, Norman, Claudio, Marko, Barbaking, Alfredo, Manuel, Lorenzo, Corrado, Piernicola, Totila, Vito, Tascio, Carlo, Matteo, Luigi Loreti e Boselli, Simone, Deborah, Pietro, Tuscany discovery e Giorgio!Grazie anche a tutti i miei sostenitori al livello Galileo Galilei e Marco Polo! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on SA Voices From the Field we interviewed Dr. Raphael X. Moffett about his own experiences working in China after many years working in student affairs within the United States. A native of Washington State, Dr. Raphael X. Moffett began his career in higher education working in Residence Life at Clark Atlanta University in 2002. He was inspired by working with college students and made the decision to pursue a career in student affairs. During the past 20 years, he has gained valuable experience serving in progressive leadership roles at Clark Atlanta University, Georgia State University, Morehouse College, and Trinity University. Known as an inspirational leader, Dr. Moffett has also served in senior leadership positions as the Vice President for Student Services at Texas Southern University in Houston, Texas and the Vice President for Student Affairs at Langston University in Langston, Oklahoma, and Dean of Students at Duke Kunshan University in Kunshan, China. Currently, Dr. Moffett serves as the Chief Student Affairs Officer at the Schwarzman Scholars program located at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. In this role, he is responsible for strategic initiatives that support the holistic development of graduate students from 32 countries. Dr. Moffett is also the Founder of Inspire YOUniversity, LLC, a consultancy supporting universities, sports teams, corporations, faith-based organizations, and non-profit organizations to become the best versions of themselves. Dr. Moffett is a visionary that is committed to serving others by providing opportunities for students and staff to define success for themselves and pursue their goals. He is known in higher education as being a servant leader who is personable and values driven. He believes every person has the ability to achieve professional success and personal growth with the proper guidance and support.  Dr. Moffett earned a B.A. in English and Education from Washington State University. He earned a M.Ed. and Ed.D. in Educational Leadership from Clark Atlanta University. In his leisure time, he enjoys spending time with his wife and son, visiting family, reading, watching and playing basketball, calligraphy, music production, trying new restaurants, and traveling. Please subscribe to SA Voices from the Field on your favorite podcasting device and share the podcast with other student affairs colleagues!

-A native of Washington State, Dr. Raphael X. Moffett began his career in higher education and motivational speaking at Clark Atlanta University in 2002. He was inspired by working with college students and made the decision to pursue a career in student affairs. During the past 20 years, he has gained valuable experience serving in progressive leadership roles at Clark Atlanta University, Georgia State University, Morehouse College, and Trinity University. Known as a leader that motivates people to succeed, Dr. Moffett has also served in senior leadership positions as the Vice President for Student Services at Texas Southern University in Houston, Texas and the Vice President for Student Affairs at Langston University in Langston, Oklahoma, and Dean of Students at Duke Kunshan University in Kunshan, China. Currently, Dr. Moffett serves as the Chief Student Affairs Officer at Schwarzman Scholars located at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. In this role, he strives to create and promote a community that supports the holistic success of students both inside and outside of the classroom. Dr. Moffett is a visionary that is committed to enhancing the quality of life for others by providing them with skills and tools needed to succeed. He is known in higher education as being a servant leader who is personable, goal oriented, and values driven. Dr. Moffett focuses on providing all of his constituents with effective services and unique developmental opportunities with the intent to help them maximize their potential. His philosophy is that every person has the ability to achieve professional success and personal growth with the proper guidance and support. Dr. Moffett also is the President and Founder of Inspire YOUniversity, LLC, a consultancy supporting universities, sports teams, corporations, faith-based organizations, and non-profit organizations to become the best versions of themselves. He specializes in motivational speaking, executive coaching, team building, professional skill development, cultural competence training, and leadership development. His goal is to help participants grow their capacity to succeed and live fulfilling professional and personal lives. He has keynoted and/or consulted for several organizations including but not limited to Sam's Club, Harvard University, Texas A&M University, University of Central Oklahoma, Marshall University, University of West Georgia, Langston University Men's Basketball, Clark Atlanta University, Executive Women International, and Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Incorporated. Dr. Moffett received his Bachelor's degree in English from Washington State University in 2002. He earned his Master's degree in Educational Leadership from Clark Atlanta University in 2004 and earned his doctorate from Clark Atlanta University in 2008. In his leisure time, he enjoys spending time with his wife and son, visiting family, reading, watching and playing basketball, calligraphy, music production, trying new restaurants, and traveling. To follow him and his family's journey, you can follow Dr. Moffett at the following: IG: @rxmoffett WeChat: @rxmoffett Thank you for taking some time to listen to this episode and for leaving your constructive feedback. The success of our show and the promotion of mental health in underrepresented and global communities depends on your support. Please subscribe to our Youtube channel, @aspire_counselingwell, and if you are interested in receiving more relevant mental health information, visit www.aspirecounselingwell.com and subscribe to our newsletter to join our community. You can also follow us on Instagram at our new account, @blackexpatexperience and on Twitter at @blackexpatlives. Be well and remember to prioritize your mental health today! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/blackexpatexperience/message

Andrew Gordon, chief executive officer and founder of Diversity Abroad, leads the conversation on the importance of providing equitable access to global education.   CASA: Hello, and welcome to CFR's Higher Education Webinar. I am Maria Casa, director of the National Program and Outreach at CFR. Thank you all for joining us. Today's discussion is on the record, and the video and transcript will be made available on our website, CFR.org/academic if you would like to share them with your colleagues after today. As always, CFR takes no institutional positions on matters of policy. We are delighted to have Andrew Gordon with us to discuss the importance of providing equitable access to global education. Mr. Gordon is the founder and chief executive officer of Diversity Abroad, an organization focusing on topics pertaining to access, diversity, inclusion, and equity in international education. He works with higher education institutions, nonprofit and for profit organizations, and government agencies for developing strategies for increasing access to international education for diverse, first-generation, and high financial needs students. Mr. Gordon is a member of NAFSA: Association of International Educators, the Association of International Education Administrators, the European Association for International Education, the National Association of Black Accountants, and the Association of Latino Professionals in Finance and Accounting. He is an alum of INROADS and the Association for the International Exchange of Students in Economics and Commerce. Welcome, Andrew. Thank you very much for speaking with us today. GORDON: It's great to be here. Thank you. CASA: Can you begin by giving us an overview of what equitable access to global education means and its importance in higher education? GORDON: Yeah. Absolutely. First, just want to say thank you, Maria, for the invitation to speak and to CFR Academic for hosting this session, particularly, this important topic. As I delve into my remarks, I'll give a little bit of background as to the—where my remarks are going to come from. As Maria mentioned, I founded an organization, Diversity Abroad, that centers diversity, equity, inclusion in global education. And over the last sixteen years had an opportunity to work with higher-education institutions, everything from community colleges to liberal arts, R-1s to Ivy Leagues, on this question of what does equitable access to global learning and global education mean. And we get this question often and, usually, when I get this question sitting in meetings with academic professionals, I, in some ways, put the question back and I say, well, what's the benefit of global education and global learning. Why do our campuses invest in infrastructure for global education and global learning, whether that's sending students abroad, supporting international students, ensuring that global themes are embedded into the curriculum? We often hear in the field of international education the term campus internationalization. Why are we investing in that in the first place? Well, when we think about global education and global learning and the students that engage in it, one of the organizations that many on the call may be familiar with, AAC&U, puts global learning and global education as a high impact practice, the kind of opportunities that help our students excel academically, grow interpersonally, and also be positioned that much better to thrive professionally once they leave school. And so taking a step back and thinking of the benefits of global education, we talk about students who engage in global learning opportunities. Many times this helps open their—broaden their perspective of the world as a whole. If they're participating in a physical—or education abroad program, many times it helps them in building resilience, a deeper sense of self, having more empathy for those who are, if you will, “different” than they are, embracing difference, something I think we can all appreciate we need that much more so in our society. So when we think—and we could probably, Maria, spend the entire time that we have talking about the benefits of global education and global learning. But the thing is that we know that—those of us who work in higher education know that and in many ways we are the gatekeepers to the kind of experiences inside the classroom, outside the classroom, that we say will fall under the umbrella of global learning. So if we know the benefits of these opportunities, we know how it can impact our students, then it is—well, the onus is on us to ensure that all of our students have equitable access to the benefits of global learning. We can't, on one side, say these are all the benefits of these phenomenal opportunities and so on and so forth, and then on the other side be OK with only certain students having access to global learning opportunities because, essentially, what we're saying is, well, this is a great thing that we have but only certain students are able to. And when we think about what—I would say, for many folks, when we talk about global learning, I would say one of the first things we often go to is study abroad. Study abroad is a phenomenal, phenomenal experience, and we'll talk about other forms in a moment. When we think about that particular opportunity that, I would say, is very high profile on many campuses, students graduating from high school going into university, the percentage is that eightieth, ninetieth percentile of students who are interested in study abroad. We know that is one of the global—one of the experiences that would fall under global education. We also know that, traditionally, study abroad has not reached a vast—too many of our students, we'll say, particularly our students of color, those who are first generation, those who are coming from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. And so I think, in many ways, we'll get students who we say are—the growing population of students on our campuses are also those that study abroad has not supported, and even when campuses have been more successful in getting students to study abroad they haven't necessarily been as—we haven't necessarily been as successful in supporting the success of our students while they're there. So, when we think back to study abroad, if you will, being an aspect of global learning, which is a high-impact practice, you know, high-impact practice is only a high-impact practice if it's properly administered. So we send students but we're not prepared to really support our students in a very holistic way, in an inclusive way. Great, we've sent them but we're not really giving them equitable access to the benefits of a global education. And, likewise, global education exists in different parts of the campus as well. Think about what happens in our classrooms. In the curriculum we have a variety of different area—academic areas of focus. Frankly, how we support our incoming international students—our international students—every student is not going to study abroad, but our campuses are globally diverse environments where our students from all backgrounds exist and our international students and how they acclimate to U.S. culture, how we prepare them to engage with students from a variety of different backgrounds, Americans from a variety of different backgrounds. That's also part of the global learning that happens. And so when we take a step back and just, again, think about why is it that we invest in global education and global learning, it's because we know the benefits of it. We are 5 percent of the world's population, and I think if anything in the last two years, sort of two and a half, three years, we—it is very clear and currently as well is very clear how incredibly interconnected we are as a globe, even as their call—you hear the pundits and otherwise say, like, oh, well, globalization is dead, and so on and so forth. It was, like, regardless of what those conversations are, we know that as a world we are all reliant on each other, and the world that the students, particularly the younger students, if you will—younger age college students—are going to inherit is going to be that much more interconnected. And so for us, as a country, the United States, to be able to take on the challenges and the opportunities that the twenty-first century puts before us and to be successful in taking on the—both challenges and opportunities that has to be a global approach because we're not on this globe by ourselves, and for our future leaders to be prepared to do that it's incredibly important for them to appreciate the importance of global learning and global education, have equitable access to a variety of those opportunities. And, frankly, we are shooting ourselves in the foot if we only allow our—maybe we say not intentionally but structurally the situation is such that only a certain population of students has access, real access, to these kind of learning opportunities. And so, I think, as higher education institutions we have to ask ourselves, what does that mean, yes, for the International Education Office, but also what does that mean for our academics in the classroom? What does that mean for our senior administrators who are deciding where to invest funds and otherwise of an institution? What does it mean for our chief diversity officers, for our VP of student affairs, and otherwise, who also were tasked with ensuring equitable access to a variety of opportunities that are available on campus? And so, when we think about these questions at Diversity Abroad, I think being in association and being able to work with the three hundred-plus institutions that we do on these topics, we really do look at it holistically. What does that mean—global education, equitable access, and education abroad? Global learning at home, what happens in and outside the classroom domestically? Support for our international students? But also how are we also ensuring that the professionals—faculty, staff, and otherwise who are engaged in global educational opportunities or experiences in and outside the classroom—that those faculty members and those staff are reflective of the rich diversity that our students embody? CASA: Thank you. Thank you for that introduction. Now let's open it up to questions. As a reminder, please click the raise hand icon on your screen to request to ask a question. On an iPad or Tablet, click the more button to access the raise hand feature. When you are called upon, accept the unmute prompt and please state your name and affiliation, followed by your question. You may also submit a written question via the Q&A icon or vote for other questions you would like to hear answered in your Zoom window at any time. We do have a raised hand from Basilio Monteiro, associate dean and associate professor of mass communication at St. John's University. Basilio? (No response.) You could accept the unmute prompt. Q: Thank you very much, Mr. Gordon, for your introductory remarks. You know, this internationalization of education—oftentimes what happens is I find that students go and stay within the one small bubble instead of mixing up with other students from the country where they go to. That interaction is not there, and oftentimes, it's not even promoted to go. They will go—they go as tourists. They don't go as learners to learn, and that seems to be the kind of trend, so I find. And I talk to the students. They'll say, OK, oh, I went here. I went there. I saw this and I saw that, and that's it. So that is—what is your overall national experience at this point on this particular context? GORDON: Yeah. Thank you for that comment, and you're right. I think that as the field of international education we have not been as intentional as we could be in ensuring that once we've put in the investment dollars, human capital, and otherwise that helps get students overseas that we're really creating kind of an environment where our students are going to have the kind of experiences that they come back and they really have been able to develop deeper empathy, embracing difference, and so on and so forth. We think about it here in the U.S., right. The students at our campus, a lot of them are having a good time but they're still learning. They're still having very, in some cases—I hate to overuse the word transformative, but experiences that are shaping who they are becoming as people. That doesn't have to change when our students go abroad, and so whether we're talking about programs that are led directly by faculty, I'm thinking about how are we intentionally finding opportunities for our students to engage in the host community; what are opportunities of reciprocity when they're in country in a certain location so that our students don't just have a stamp on their passport but they'd have the kind of experience that is changing how they view themselves, how they view the world, and, frankly, how they view both the challenges and the opportunities that lie before all of us. What is incumbent on, I think, institutions as well as the organizations, institutions that work with a lot of third party organizations to help facilitate study abroad, it's incumbent on those organizations as well to say, we know our students want to have a good time. They're going to have a good time. That's excellent. We want that. But we also—the core reason why our students are engaging in these opportunities needs to be academic, self-development, and otherwise. The fun is going to happen, but that other piece needs to be there because if it's not then, frankly, we become glorified travel agents, taking students from point A to point B. I don't think if you asked anyone in international education what their role is that we would say that's what our role is because it's not. But we need to be intentional about ensuring that the kind of outcomes that we want, that we say our students can gain—we've built the structure to be able to—for our students to be able to achieve those outcomes. Thank you for that question. CASA: Our next question comes from Beverly Lindsay from the University of California system. Q: Thanks to both of you for your introductory comments, Maria and Andrew, for your statement. As a former member of NAFSA and a number of other professional organizations, I actually have several questions, but I will limit them. One is, as you know, throughout higher education, particularly in comprehensive research universities, there is an emphasis on the African diaspora, the Latino diaspora. So many of the undergraduate students tend to go to those countries that are African, the Caribbean, or South America, for example. How do we encourage students, regardless of demographic background, to go anywhere in the world because they would get more experience? For example, when I was the international dean at Hampton we set up a program where the undergraduates could go and do internships at the British parliament, which was really innovative. The second question I would ask you is to what extent do you involve graduate students through your organization? Now, I realize that they're often focused on their thesis or, in rare cases, we don't think of study abroad. We think of research opportunities for our doctoral students. But to what extent do you involve students from different levels? Because I know in community colleges there is considerable emphasis now in terms of having the Los Angeles Community College system, the Dade County students in the community colleges, go abroad. So, as I said, I had many but I'll just focus on those right now. But thank you for your forthcoming answer. GORDON: Yeah. Thank you for that, Beverly. I think when it comes to destination, where our students go, again, unfortunately, I think, that our field has an opportunity to go in a different direction as far as a narrative about certain places. I think, unfortunately, in the U.S., when we think of Africa, when we think of the Global South as a whole, it's often positioned through the lens of deficit of the people, of the governments, health care systems, and so on and so forth. And, without question, there's work to be done. But there's a lot that's happening of innovation in—I mean, Africa, the continent, I mean, obviously, the different countries. Same thing in Latin America. But if we position these locations as you go here to help, you go here almost in a savior type mentality, whereas if we position locations like Europe and Australia and otherwise, like, well, you go here, this is where you're going to learn, this is where you go on internships and this is where you're going to prepare yourself professionally, really, seems like amplifying this narrative of parts of the world are important for learning, growth, innovation. Other parts of the world are more focused on philanthropy, giving, and so on and so forth. And I think that puts us, frankly, as a nation in peril. There was a recent survey that came out—I want to say it was in the last couple weeks—and it—they surveyed youth in Africa. I can't remember which countries. But it asked—the question was who has a more positive impact on your country, China or the U.S., or maybe it was a variety of countries. But China eked out ahead the U.S. So the continent with the youngest population in the world, and we know what that means for the future, of future work and otherwise, views of different countries having a positive impact. We don't see a lot of study abroad programs on the African continent, for example, or Latin America that are focused on innovation and technology. I can—I can go on and on. And so I think we have to take a step back as a field of international education—I think, higher education as a whole—and push back against narratives of how certain regions of the world, certain countries, are viewed so that our students are encouraged to want to engage anywhere in the world as they're looking to deepen their understanding, grow interpersonally, be that much better positioned for their post-degree careers, and so on and so forth. So that—I think that onus is on us as institutions, as organizations, to increase that perspective. But I also think that that also has an aspect to deal with incoming international students as well. With the incoming international students how are we helping them have opportunity to tell more their story about the countries they come from, the contributions their countries make to the U.S., to other parts of the world, and so on and so forth. As to the other question as far as how we engage with graduate students, we were—I would say primarily graduate students who are working in higher education programs, international education programs, that are interested specifically in this work will engage with Diversity Abroad in a variety of ways, either participating in one of the communities of practice that we have, coming to our annual conference, Global Inclusion, in a kind of variety of different ways from that perspective. As far as specifically looking at mobility-based programs for graduate students, that's not our focus at this time. CASA: Our next question comes from Hemchand Gossai, associate dean of humanities and social sciences at Northern Virginia Community College. Q: Maria and Andrew, thank you very much for your comments and also for providing this opportunity. My institution is very large with a multi-campus sort of setting with seventy-five thousand students. It's almost ubiquitous among institutions of higher education, particularly in their admissions process, to extol the importance of how many countries are represented at the college or university, and that's a great thing. We have that as well, and we have a large contingent of international students. One of the things that has struck me and that you have sort of alluded to, Andrew, has to do with the role of our international students as they arrive on our campuses, and I'm wondering if you can reflect a little bit about how best our large contingent of international students might not only be integrated but might actually interact and shape our local community of first-generation students, of students of color, and so on. If you would, I'd appreciate it. Thanks. GORDON: Yeah. Excellent, excellent question. Let me start off by saying, for us, when we think of international students—well, not when we think of international students—but the process of the experience that our international students have operationally, if you will, in many ways it's the flip of our students going abroad. We had a question earlier about how do we better ensure our domestic students are integrating once they're in country. We're just flipping that and saying that for our international students. So what we're saying is that we want the same for both. We don't want our international students to be seen as, hey, this is a revenue source. You're here on campus. Now we're done. No. We want them to be successful, and our international students embody the same identities that our domestic students do. They're students of color. They're first-gen, disabilities, come from different religious backgrounds, LGBTQI. They embody all these same identities that we're trying to support with our domestic students and we want to do the same thing for international students. So and thinking of what that means is really asking the question is what does holistic support look like for our international students. Too often, our international students once they get on campus, they're seen as that international student. I mean, simply, that's their passport. That's where you're actually born. They need the same support, and then some additional at times, as our domestic students. Are we asking them, what contributions do you want in the classroom? Are we appreciating that our international students are coming from a different perspective during certain discussions and are we giving them space to be able to share those perspectives and honor the fact that it comes from a different perspective but that's still important? Because that's part of global learning that our domestic students benefit from as well when you have those rich discussions in the classroom, when you have a variety of different perspectives that are being shared, and we think about being able to hear that, analyze what's being said, and develop your own sense of, OK, this is my thought on this topic or otherwise. But when we just have a conversation, for example, in the classroom that's focused on domestic, even though we have a wide or very diverse population of students that—of international students in our classroom we're really missing an opportunity to both engage with the international students, help them have a deeper sense of belonging on our campus and, frankly, for our domestic students and all students to be to be able to learn that much more so. The other part of the question I mentioned, and kind of tying back to what I mentioned a second ago of how our international students embody so much of that—so many of the identities of our domestic students, you know, when we have programs for first-generation college students are we just thinking about our domestic first-generation college students? Our international students can be the same way. When we think about our disability services, when we think about programs that are maybe related to race in ways, are we thinking intentionally about that? Yes, an African American and an international student from Africa who's from Africa and who's Black and has grown up in Africa their entire life very well are—some shared experiences, but very different. Are we thinking about opportunities for learning and growth from that way? So as I would say it's the intentionality in the programming and the intentionality in thinking of what is our role in—and, obviously, helping our students be successful, but particularly from an equitable access to global education, we have all the ingredients to the salad, if you will. What's our role in making sure that this comes together and this works in a way that serves our students, our domestic, our international students—frankly, serves the institution. And so there's broader goals that we have in higher education around learning but also preparing a generation of citizens that are thoughtful not just about home but thoughtful about the relationship between home and abroad and how our world is broadly interconnected and reliant on each other. CASA: Thank you. Our next question comes from Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome, associate professor in the department of political science in Brooklyn College. Q: Good evening. I'm calling from Nigeria now. And I'm a professor, not associate. I was wondering if there is a two-way stream in terms of the way in which international education is conceived of thinking about students coming from foreign countries as exchange students, and I'm particularly interested in this from an African perspective. It's unbelievably difficult for many African students to come to the U.S. as exchange students. They face formidable visa barriers, and for many of them that are from socioeconomic backgrounds where they are not flush with money it is actually an impossibility. So, I mean, is there any kind of thinking about how skewed the pool is that the educational institutions in the U.S. is joined from, given all the constraints that are put in the way of students from the Global South, especially Africa— GORDON: Yeah. Q: —who want to just come to the U.S. just like our students go to those places? GORDON: Yeah. Yeah. No. Wonderful, wonderful question, and I'd kind of bifurcate my answers. I think with respect to visas, I think that's a question—offices handle that at State and I think there has to be a broader question of are we creating enough opportunities for students or making it easy enough for students or talented students that want to come take advantage of the rich diversity and the academic opportunities, some professional opportunities that exist in the U.S. Are we making it easy enough for those students to come to our shores? And I think that's a question that—State has to continue to be evaluated from that aspect. I'm not by any means an expert with visas, so I'm going to—I'm going to stay in my lane to an extent. But I think, broadly speaking, is we do—I think as a nation have welcomed and want to continue to welcome talented folks from all over the world to be able to come. And then I think the second part of the question, what's the role of institutions, I think similar to our—to domestic students, we know who our students are. We know what the challenges they have and being able to access opportunities that we have. And so we say—going back to what I mentioned earlier, we say we know what these—we know the benefits of these kind of opportunities. We're the gatekeepers to that. We know who our students are, and we know the challenges they have and this includes international students that are interested in coming, be it exchange or otherwise. How do we in higher education create more opportunities for talented students to be able to take advantage of these opportunities that we're very clear the benefits to them? And so from an exchange standpoint, looking and saying are we building exchanges—do we have the infrastructure, are we investing in the infrastructure so that we can have more exchanges with the Global South? Because many times exchanges, while not always cost neutral, is usually much more cost neutral than a paid study abroad or otherwise. So are we creating those kind of opportunities? Again, realizing that that benefits the student—the international student, the domestic student. It benefits our campus community and our broader community as a whole when our international students are out and engaging with the broader community around the universities and otherwise. So are we investing in that? And then when it comes to fully matriculated students, whether at the undergraduate, graduate, or doctorate level, are we doing enough? Is there more we should be doing to ensure that if funding is a challenge that the funding is—funding schemes that are available to better create opportunities for students to be able to come, and then also like we've mentioned in the last question is our campus infrastructure—our campus set up in such that our international students feel like they belong, the campus is thinking about them, and this is a place where they want to, frankly, stay and contribute their knowledge or insights, their experience, and otherwise, which, again, benefits them, benefits the campus, and benefits the community and the nation as a whole. Q: Next we have a comment from Pamela Waldron-Moore, a professor at Xavier University of Louisiana. You have touched on this topic but you might want to go a little deeper. She writes, as a professor at Xavier University of Louisiana, I know that this is a helpful conversation. One area of global education that does not seem to have had much exposure is the opportunity for national institutions to provide exchange opportunities that allow low-income students to appreciate diverse education. For example, students can learn much from institutions located in naturally global environments—New York, DC, California, et cetera. Many U.S. institutions are teeming with international students who are happy to interact with a wider body of learners. GORDON: Yeah. I'll just comment on that briefly, and I know Xavier does great work with our national exchange as well as with international. But your point is right on. When we think of the globally diverse cities that exist in the U.S., they're learning labs. I'm from the Bay Area. I like going to San Francisco. I go to places in Oakland and otherwise. These are learning opportunities. I think when you think of the flow of migration to certain areas within the country, there's so much to learn there for our domestic students as well as for our international students. And so when we think of global learning holistically, as much as—I started Diversity Abroad based on study abroad. I'm a fan of study abroad, absolutely. But I think when we think about global learning, we have to get—mobility from the standpoint of getting on a plane, crossing an ocean, and using your passport is not the only way. And when we think about the institutions, where our institutions exist, what does the community look like? How globally diverse is our local community? Are there opportunities for us, thinking of co-curricular activities, to better engage with our local communities as well, because part of the broader goal that we talked about, the benefits of global learning, those benefits can be gained—different benefits, different places, in different ways, but can be gained locally but also can be gained abroad. So, an excellent point. CASA: Again, as a reminder, please click the raise hand icon on your screen if you would like to ask a question, or write it in via the Q&A icon. Andrew, can you talk a little bit about the specific activities that Diversity Abroad engages in as an organization? GORDON: Yeah. Absolutely. Happy to. So Diversity Abroad founded in 2006. We're a member-based consortium, around three hundred and fifty colleges and universities. As I mentioned, it ranges from small liberal arts to community colleges, Ivies to R-1s, and, really, we—our focus is looking at diversity, equity, and inclusion within internationalization and global education. And so what does that mean? We look at four key areas of our work. It's education abroad, international students, global learning at home, and then career and organizational advancement, and we—the actual practices of the work that we do focuses heavy on learning and development. So everything from our annual conference, Global Inclusion, to our DEI certificate for folks who are engaged in global education or are interested in global education, as well as a leadership certificate for student leaders who want to embed DEI, global, into their leadership. We publish a set of good practices called the Global Equity Inclusion Guidelines, it's a set of policy practices for embedding DEI into a campus's global education operation, and then there's a ton of thought leadership that we do, collaboration with organizations. We have a phenomenal team that is always working to continue to push this conversation forward, and maybe more than moving the conversation forward, to push forward resources, learning opportunities, and otherwise to ensure that, frankly, as a field a decade from now we're not having this same conversation but that we've made some real tangible progress in going forward. So, much harder to execute on a daily and weekly basis than to kind of go over in a couple of seconds. But I'm really proud of the work that we're doing and always interested in collaborating with professionals and institutions that share—frankly, share our vision of equitable access to global educational opportunities. CASA: Great. Our next question comes from Krishna Garza-Baker from the University of Texas at San Antonio. She's assistant director of experiential learning. Q: Hello, Maria and Andrew. Thank you so much for this conversation. I'm actually a current member of Diversity Abroad and absolutely love all their resources. I'm there on a daily basis. So I would like to reflect back to the idea on promoting the benefits of global learning. As much as I promote the benefits of global programs to my students—I work specifically with business students at the Alvarez College of Business—what are some ways in which you have seen or experienced navigating the topic of the financial investment into educational experience and what are some other barriers to global learning that you have seen for domestic students? GORDON: Krishna, thank you for that comment and happy to have you as part of the Diversity Abroad community. So finance is interesting. Without question, finances can be a barrier to students engaging in global educational opportunities, particularly mobility-based ones. What's interesting, though, is that at times when you ask a student, are you interested in studying abroad, for example? They say, no, I can't afford it. And I was, like, well, do you know how much it costs? Well, I'm not actually sure. Are you sure how your financial aid works and how your financial aid can support? It was, like, no, I'm not actually sure. So you have students sometimes that see study abroad and there's an interest, but for a variety of other reasons, maybe they're becoming a little bit more hesitant, and finance is an easy one to go to say, oh, I can't afford it. And so I think it's important for, one, us to understand, from a financial standpoint, A, is the students—can they really not afford it? How are we addressing that? Or is this a question of, I'm interested and I'm on the fence and so on and so forth and I'm just kind of saying financial. I think for the aspect of students not being able to afford it, as an institution, again, we have to go back and say what's the value of global educational opportunities. We know that students who are statistically—we're saying that students who study abroad graduate sooner, graduate with higher GPAs as well. So that is hitting part of a broader goal that we have of higher education about persistence and completion. And so as an institution are we investing in the kind of activities like global education opportunities that are supporting the broader goals that we have as an institution around persistence and completion, and that is something that's strategically at institutions that—are questions we have to ask ourselves. We say, you know, yes, global, you know, the importance of all these opportunities to study abroad and so on and so forth. Are we investing in it in a way that any of our students that are interested finance is not going to be the barrier that pushes them back? Now, I think, on the other aspect of it with respect to finance and being able to talk with students and their families, students and their families who are from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. They're on campus, and they're on campus, in a way, because they've seen being a student at your campus as an investment, something that is valuable enough to either, personal finances—going out and fundraising in a variety of different ways because they see the value in that. The question, I think, that we have as—in higher education and particularly in international education are we positioning global education as this is an investment? And this goes back to a comment that was made a little bit earlier about, hey, you know what, we're sending these students abroad. They're not really engaging with the populations. It's kind of like it's just vacation. OK. Well, if I'm a serious student and I'm concerned about finances, and I have to make choices about what I invest in, if study abroad is positioned as, you know, go have fun abroad I'll say, well, listen, I'll go on vacation at another point in my life. I'm focused on getting in school, doing the kind of things that's going to position me to be able to thrive, support family, and otherwise. So in education abroad and study abroad, the onus is on us to make sure that the way we're talking about these opportunities, the way that opportunities are actually taking place, is such that a student that has to make that decision looks at study abroad or other global opportunities and says, you know what, this is where I want to invest my time, my resources, and otherwise because this is something that's going to help me continue to grow with the broader goals that I have. CASA: Our next question comes from Maggie Mahoney, director of global engagement at the University of Houston. Q: Good afternoon, Maria and Andrew. Nice to talk with you. Hello from Houston, Texas. Andrew, my question is about our teams, because we want to bring the best of our teams to our students. We know that burnout is an ongoing issue. We've had the pandemic. We've had the murder of George Floyd that kind of shifted things even more for the bigger focus of DEI and that has become exhausting, not to mention in Texas we face our own Texas state issues and now inflation changing. So there's a lot of stress on our teams, and in institutions of higher ed we should have offices that mirror the diversity of our students. But we don't always have that. Do you have any recommendations for our diverse staff team members and their self care in the face of this burnout and too often being turned to in the support of DEI efforts whenever we should all be doing the work? And do you have any recommendations for team leaders on how to continue doing our work while supporting our diverse team members, as we know they're overwhelmed? GORDON: Yeah. Thank you for that comment. And that's—I think a very important point is that we can't ignore—when we think of—we think of some of the organizations that we've looked AT and say, hey, these are great companies or great organizations that I'll support. The folks who are at the table many times come from incredibly diverse backgrounds, and in international education if we want the work that we do to have the kind of impact, we want to make sure that we're drawing the best and brightest, most diverse folks that say, hey, higher education, international education, specifically, this is a place where I want to go work. Our faculty members who may potentially be leading programs abroad, there's a lot that our faculty members can be doing over the summer when we say, you know what, I want to lead a study abroad program because this is—not only the impact this could have on students, but I know I'm going to be supported by the international office and otherwise as I'm going abroad. So what I would say is a couple of things. One is from a team leader perspective, and I think what you pointed out being something that is really a very salient topic. You know, DEI work cannot fall on folks of color or folks who we look at and say, OK, well, you represent XYZ identity so, yes, diversity worked for you. All that does, as stated, is it leads to burnout and it doesn't lead to us moving the needle. So, organizationally, are the practices or the policies in place. So, operationally, DEI is just embedded into what we do and regardless of what your role is, the DEI tasks that are there, is there for you to do. So regardless of what your background is, whatever the DEI tasks are connected to your role, those are there for you to be able to do. And so that'd be one aspect of it, really looking operationally from that perspective. But then another question is asking ourselves whether it's at the department level within an office, like a global education office or whatever it may be, are we building a climate of belonging. Are we building a climate where our staff that come from historically marginalized backgrounds feel like, hey, we can come—we can come here. We can be ourselves. When we're having challenges we're being supported and otherwise because, again, then we're able to be able to do the work that's needed to increase participation in global educational opportunities, being able to work with the faculty members to think through how do we better embed global themes into the curriculum, being able to support our international students. Which is saying none of this happens automatically. It is run by people, on people power, and we've got to take care of our people. If we don't take care of our people, all the other things that we want to do, ultimately, we won't be as successful as we'd like. CASA: We have a question now from Professor Waldron-Moore from Xavier. She says—she asks, how can we generate interest in study abroad from the classroom? Shouldn't we address seriously ways to motivate students to learn more about diversity in order to raise their awareness about higher education? We need to get the excitement about other countries and people going before we grow an interest in study abroad or a study exchange. GORDON: Yeah. So that's—I would say it's not an either/or but I would say they very much work in tandem. So the more—and to the point, the more that we—the more that global themes are presented to our students, the more interest that will start to generate with our students. If you have a population of students that from the time they set foot on campus they know they're going to study abroad and so and so forth, that's great. We want those students. But you have another population of students who maybe that's not the case, and so how are we embedding global themes into the curriculum regardless of what our fields may be? What are—are we finding opportunities to embed global themes into the curriculum so that, one, we're helping to promote the idea of there's a lot to learn outside of the shores of the U.S. as well, but, two, for our students—and every student's not going to study abroad. For our students who aren't going abroad are we finding opportunities to ensure that they still have access to global learning themes within the classroom. And so they very much play off each other, and I will say that now much more so for the students who, ultimately, decide not to participate in a study abroad or a formal study abroad program it's an opportunity for them to still get access to global learning opportunities. But I will say—one other thing I want to bring up and I started bringing this up in my earlier comments, I think when we're thinking about global education and diversity, equity, and inclusion, definitely thinking of it through, say, two lenses. One is the lens of what we've primarily been talking about of how are we supporting our historically marginalized students, supporting our staff and our faculty, our people, as they're engaged in global education, and that many times, again, are folks in historically marginalized populations. But when we think about learning global DEI competencies, all of our students need to access that. DEI is not just populations to support or competencies to be learned—to learn. So inside the classroom, when they're participating in study abroad or otherwise, are we thinking through how we position our students to learn the kind of competencies that can position them to be better citizens, to be better—that much more thriving in their professional careers and otherwise. And, again, that takes place—many times that takes place in the classroom. CASA: Our next question is also written and comes from Wendy Kuran, associate vice president for development and alumni engagement at Duke Kunshan University. Actually, she has two questions. The first is, following up on the earlier question and Andrew's great answer, is the career and self-development value proposition of study abroad clear to diverse students? Is there credible, accessible research about the value? What could we, at universities, including students, do to help make that case in new ways more effectively? And the second shorter question, do you ever work in secondary education intercultural exchange programs and, if not, are those in your ecosystems? Are there those in your ecosystems who do? GORDON: Yeah. So I'll start with the second question first. We work with some secondary institutions and organizations that support secondary students at that level. I would not say that that has been the traditional group of professionals or organizations or institutions that have come to us. But we are seeing some growing traction there. So I'm always interested in connecting with folks who have interest with that. With respect to career, I would say there are definitely institutions who have been at the forefront of centering the connection between global education and career, and I think as the field of global education that's work that's improving. But there's still work to do, I think, particularly for being able to make the case for students who, for a variety of reasons may be hesitant about study abroad. What we find in engaging with students, yes, research is important. Using more factoids are important. Firsthand experiences being important of students who embody similar identities and otherwise that can say, I had this kind of experience. I went from point A to point B to point Z. I know when I've had an opportunity to go to campuses and speak and otherwise telling a little bit about my own personal trajectory from doing accounting consulting to becoming an entrepreneur and otherwise and how study abroad impacted that, that's one of the things that attract students is really wanting to understand, OK, you look like me. You had a similar experience. How did you do that? So which is to say particularly with that—the part of your question asking about historically marginalized student populations, are we telling the stories of success? Are we telling the stories of how our students from historically marginalized backgrounds have been able to leverage global opportunities to advance in their career? For them to be able to say very concretely, I had this experience and then I'm working in this job and this is how this experience helped me and so on so forth. Again, that is intentional work, yes, by our global education offices but also, frankly, in collaboration with our career centers, our offices that are doing career development on campus. How are we working with them to be able to bring them back to connect with the students, the alum, and otherwise to be able to tell those stories, which, again, is part of the broader ecosystem of what does engagement look like to be able to increase participation and the success of students who are interested in study abroad? CASA: Have you been able to develop dedicated assessment and evaluation tools for success or gauging the success or the results of study abroad programs? GORDON: So we, ourselves, have not. There are some tools out there and some studies that are out there. Gosh, I'm trying to think of his name right now at the University of Georgia. There was a study in the early kind of 2000s called the Glossary Study. It was just recently built—they built upon that with a new study that showed the connection between academic success. I wouldn't say that for me, I'm familiar with a survey or research that goes as deep on the career success aspect of it. But I know there are some resources out there that talk deeper about the connection between career development and—study abroad and career development. CASA: And do you have thoughts on how global education and study abroad contribute to U.S. foreign policy creation and international relations? GORDON: Yeah. Well, in part, I mean, I think there's an aspect of just civics that's connected to every time you get on a plane, you travel, and you flash that green—I always say green—that blue passport, why is that so easy? Because even being able to understand the ability that you have to travel to the vast majority of the world without having a visa, without—and, frankly, other countries aren't able to do that. So almost, certainly, encourage deeper appreciation for the privilege that we have as U.S. citizens, being able to travel as freely as we do for most of the world, but also being able to engage, I think, for students of—U.S. students to be able to engage in other populations, hear their perspective. You know, sometimes there's perspectives that are critical to the U.S. Sometimes there are perspectives that are wildly in love with the U.S., and that's great. It's important to hear all of that, to hear how you're perceived, and then you bring that back home with you. Now you're thinking about your role as a citizen, what that does to you to be able to understand positionality of the U.S. and the rest of the world and what role that you personally want to take with that. And so I—and I guess I say for myself having a deeper appreciation for the, frankly, benefits of being a U.S. citizen by traveling and having had the opportunity to travel as much as I do and interact with folks all over the world. And so I think for all of our populations I think the populations that maybe haven't been as civically engaged or as deeply civically engaged it creates that many more opportunities to have that appreciation for. CASA: Yes. GORDON: And then, frankly, just people-to-people. I would just say—this is the last thing I'll say. It's funny, I mean—I mean, people-to-people exchanges, what they say it's hard to hate someone you know. (Laughs.) I mean, it's true. I mean, and I think that it's easy to turn on the news and hear XYZ about any number of people and locations in the world. I think when you sit down you break bread and you have coffee, whatever it may be, with folks from other parts of the world it does develop, I think, a deeper appreciation, really helping push us down that road of embracing difference and, I think, developing a deeper empathy, which we could all use more of that. CASA: Great. Well, we've come to the end of our time and, Andrew, thank you so much for sharing your insights with us, and to all of you for your questions and comments. You can follow Diversity Abroad on Twitter at @DiversityAbroad. You will be receiving an invitation to our next Higher Education webinar under separate cover. In the meantime, I encourage you to follow at @CFR_Academic on Twitter and visit CFR.org, ForeignAffairs.com, and ThinkGlobalHealth.org for research and analysis on global issues. I hope you're all having a great summer, and thank you again for joining us today. We look forward to your continued participation in the Higher Education Webinar Series. 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No sooner had Jeremiah's lockdown experience come to an end when Shanghai announced plans to shut down the entire city as cases of the Omicron variant skyrocketed. Now entering its third week, Shanghai's historic citywide lockdown has imposed unprecedented restrictions and sacrifices on its 25 million people.Among the hapless homebound residents was our longtime friend and colleague, Andrew Field, who – unfortunately for him -- had plenty of free time to talk with us about his experiences during these turbulent few weeks. Andrew reports from the nearby suburb of Kunshan on the mood of residents in and around Shanghai (spoiler: it's foul), the administrative and policy fiascos of the city government, and his ways of coping during the shutdown (Andrew has left us a special musical treat at the end of the episode).Andrew Field is Associate Professor of Chinese History at Duke Kunshan University and the author of three books, including Shanghai's Dancing World: Cabaret Culture and Urban Politics 1919-1954. Andy is also a documentary filmmaker, having produced several films exploring China's underground rock scene and the world of Shanghai jazz. We've wanted to get Andrew on the podcast for some time and will definitely invite him back on soon to discuss other topics – hopefully maskless and in the same room. Andrew Field's blog Shanghai Sojournshttp://shanghaisojourns.net/ Shanghai's Dancing World: Cabaret Culture and Urban Politics 1919-1954http://cup.columbia.edu/book/shanghais-dancing-world/9789629964481 Shanghai Nightscapes: A Nocturnal Biography of a Global City (with James Farrer)https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo20298865.html Mu Shiying: China's Lost Modernisthttps://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/M/bo37857676.html  

Ali and I decided we needed to have a "Covid lockdown in Shanghai" episode since we are all stuck at home, dividing our time between work, food hunting, and waiting in line for PCR tests. Where are we headed? We're joined by Professor Andrew Field, a Professor of History at Duke Kunshan University and our returning champion, a friend of the podcast, Richard Brubaker, Founder of sustainability consultancy, Collective Responsibility. 1. Shanghai under lockdown overview: From "Zero Covid" to "Dynamic Zero" 2. Living Under Covid: Shanghai vs. the Suburbs 3. Shanghai's Older Population Under Threat 4. Switching Gears Given the Logistical Nightmare 5. From High Tech Health Apps to Decorative Phone Stickers 6. Hard Tactics vs. Self-Management: Which works better? 7. Shanghai's Emotional Weather Report: Locals & Foreigners 8. Painting into a corner with never dry paint: keeping the economy going 9. What's next? Can we hold out for another lockdown level? 10. Communication under Covid: by neighborhood via WeChat 11. China's lack of healthcare infrastructure for a pandemic 12. A/B Test With Andrew: It's Lu Xun and Coach K

Patrick Dennis Duddy, director of the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies and senior visiting scholar at Duke University, leads a conversation on democracy in Latin America. This meeting is part of the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Project on the Future of Democracy. FASKIANOS: Welcome to today's session of the Winter/Spring 2022 CFR Academic Webinar Series. I'm Irina Faskianos, vice president of the National Program and Outreach at CFR. Today's discussion is on the record, and the video and transcript will be available on our website, CFR.org/academic. As always, CFR takes no institutional positions on matters of policy. We're delighted to have Patrick Dennis Duddy with us today to talk about democracy in Latin America. Ambassador Patrick Duddy is the director of Duke University's Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies and teaches in both Duke's Fuqua School of Business and Sanford School of Public Policy. From 2007 to 2010, he served as the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela under both the Bush and Obama administrations. Prior to his assignment to Venezuela, Ambassador Duddy served as deputy assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, and he's also held positions at embassies in Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Paraguay, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, and Panama, and has worked closely with Haiti. So it is my pleasure to have him with us today. He has served nearly three decades in the Foreign Service. He's taught at the National War College, lectured at the State Department's Foreign Service Institute, and is a member of CFR. So, Ambassador Duddy, you bring all of your experience to this conversation to talk about this very small question of the state of democracy in Latin America and what U.S. policy should be. It's a broad topic, but I'm going to turn it over to you to give us your insight and analysis. DUDDY: Well, good afternoon, or morning, to all of those who have tuned in, and, Irina, thank you to you and the other folks at the Council for giving me this opportunity. I thought I would begin with a brief introduction, partially rooted in my own experience in the region, and then leave as much time as possible for questions. To start with, let us remember that President Biden held a Democracy Summit in early December, and in opening that summit he emphasized that for the current American administration, in particular, the defense of democracy is, I believe he said, a defining challenge, going ahead. Now, I, certainly, subscribe to that assertion, and I'd also like to start by reminding folks how far the region has come in recent decades. I flew down to Chile during the Pinochet regime to join the embassy in the very early 1980s, and I recall that the Braniff Airlines flight that took me to Santiago, essentially, stopped in every burg and dorf with an airport from Miami to Santiago. It used to be called the milk run. And in virtually every country in which we landed there was a military dictatorship and human rights were honored more in the breach than in fact. Things have really changed quite substantially since then, and during much of the '80s we saw a pretty constant move in the direction of democracy and somewhat later in the '80s also, in many parts of Latin America, an embrace of a market-oriented economic policy. There was some slippage even in the early part of the new millennium. But, nevertheless, the millennium opened on 9-11-2001 with the signature in Lima, Peru, of the Inter-American Democratic Charter. Secretary Powell was, in fact, in Lima for the signing of that agreement, which was endorsed by every country in the region except Cuba. This was a major step forward for a region that had been synonymous with strongman politics, military government, and repression. The slippage since then has been significant and, indeed, as recently as a year or two ago during the pandemic the Institute for Democracy and Electoral Management or Electoral Administration—I believe it's called IDEA—noted that across much of the region, publics were losing faith in democracy as the preferred form of government. I would say, rather more pointedly, of real significance in recent years has been the deterioration of democracy in a series of countries and the inability of the rest of the hemisphere to do anything about it, notwithstanding the fact that the hemisphere as a whole had indicated that full participation in the inter-American system required democratic governance and respect for human rights. Venezuela now is pretty unapologetically an authoritarian government. So is Nicaragua, and there has been real slippage in a number of other countries in the region as well. I think it would be appropriate to ask, given the progress made from, say, the early '80s through the year 2000, what accounts for this, and I would say there are a number of key factors. By and large, I would note, the factors are internal. That is to say they derive from circumstances within the region and are not necessarily a consequence of external subversion. Poverty, inequality, crony capitalism in some cases, criminality, drug trafficking—these things continue to bedevil a range of countries within the region. Endemic corruption is something that individual countries have struggled with and, by and large, been unsuccessful in significantly reducing. In effect, governability, as a general heading, probably explains or is the heading under which we should investigate just why it is that some publics have lost faith in democracy. You know, we've had several really interesting elections lately. Let's set aside just for the moment the reality that, particularly since 2013, Venezuela has deteriorated dramatically in virtually every respect—politically, economically—in terms of, you know, quality of life indicators, et cetera, as has Nicaragua, and look, for instance, at Peru. Peru has held a free, fair—recently held a free, fair election, one that brought a significant change to the government in that the new president, a teacher, is a figure on the left. Now, I don't think we, collectively or hemisphere, there's, certainly, no problem with that. But what accounts for the fact that a place like Peru has seen wild swings between figures of the left and of the right, and has most recently, notwithstanding a decade of mostly sustained significant macroeconomic growth, why have they embraced a figure who so—at least in his campaign so profoundly challenged the existing system? I would argue it's because macroeconomic growth was not accompanied by microeconomic change—that, basically, the poor remained poor and the gap between rich and poor was, largely, undiminished. Arguably, much the same thing has happened recently in Chile, the country which was for decades the yardstick by which the quality of democracy everywhere else in the hemisphere was frequently judged. The new president or the president—I guess he's just taken office here—president-elect in Chile is a young political activist of the left who has, in the past, articulated an enthusiasm for figures like Hugo Chavez or even Fidel Castro, and now, as the elected president, has begun to use a more moderate rhetoric. But, again, the country which, arguably, has had the greatest success in reducing poverty has, nevertheless, seen a dramatic swing away from a more conventional political figure to someone who is advocating radical change and the country is on the verge of—and in the process of revising its constitution. How do we explain that? I think in both cases it has to do with frustration of the electorate with the ability of the conventional systemic parties, we might say, to deliver significant improvement to the quality of life and a significant reduction of both poverty and income inequality, and I note that income inequality persists even when at times poverty has been reduced and is a particularly difficult problem to resolve. Now, we've also seen, just to cite a third example, just recently this past weekend an election in Costa Rica, which was well administered and the results of which have been accepted unquestionably by virtually all of the political figures, and I point to Costa Rica, in part, because I've spent a good deal of time there. I've witnessed elections on the ground. But what is the reality? The reality is over decades, indeed, certainly, beginning in the late '40s during the administration of the first “Pepe” Figueres, the country has been successful in delivering quality services to the public. As a result, though, notwithstanding the fact that there have been changes, there's been no serious deterioration in the country's embrace of democracy or its enthusiasm for its own political institutions. This makes it not entirely unique but very closely unique in the Central American context. A number of other things that I'd like to just leave with you or suggest that we should consider today. So we—throughout much of Latin America we're seeing sort of plausibly well-administered elections but we are seeing often sort of dramatic challenges, sometimes to political institutions but often to economic policy, and those challenges have resulted in tremendous pendulum swings in terms of public policy from one administration to the next, which, at times, has undermined stability and limited the attractiveness of the region for foreign direct investment. Beyond that, though, we're also seeing a kind of fracturing of the region. In 2001, when the Inter-American Democratic Charter was embraced—was signed in Lima—an event that would have, perhaps, attracted a good deal more attention had other things not happened on that very same day—much of the region, I think, we would understand, was, largely, on the same page politically and even to some degree economically, and much of the region embraced the idea of—I'm sorry, I'm losing my signal here—much of the region embraced a deeper and productive relationship with the United States. The situation in Venezuela, which has generated over—right around 6 million refugees—it's the largest refugee problem in the world after Syria—has, to some degree, highlighted some of the changes with respect to democracy. The first—and I'm going to end very shortly, Irina, and give folks an opportunity to ask questions—the first is the frustration and the inability of the region to enforce, you know, its own mandates, its own requirement that democracy be—and democratic governance and respect for human rights be a condition for participation in the inter-American system. And further to that, what we've seen is a breakup of the one larger group of countries in the region which had been attempting to encourage the return to democracy in Venezuela, known as the Lima Group. So what we've seen is that the commitment to democracy as a hemispheric reality has, to some degree, eroded. At the same time, we are increasingly seeing the region as a theater for big power competition. You know, it was only within the last few days that President Fernández, for instance, of Argentina traveled to meet with both the Russian leadership and the Chinese. This is not inherently problematical but it probably does underscore the degree to which the United States is not the only major power active in the region. We may still have the largest investment stock in the region, but China is now the largest trading partner for Brazil, for Chile, for Peru, the largest creditor for Venezuela. I haven't yet touched on Central America and that's a particularly difficult set of problems. But what I would note is while we, in the United States, are wrestling with a range of issues, from refugees to drug trafficking, we are also simultaneously trying to deepen our trade relationships with the region, relationships which are already very important to the United States. And, unfortunately, our political influence in the region, I believe, has become diluted over time by inattention at certain moments and because of the rise or the introduction of new and different players, players who are frequently not particularly interested in local political systems much less democracy, per se. So, if I may, I'll stop there. As Irina has pointed out, I served extensively around the region for thirty years and I'd be happy to try and answer questions on virtually any of the countries, certainly, those in which I have served. FASKIANOS: So I'm going to go first to Babak Salimitari. If you could unmute yourself and give us your affiliation, Babak. Q: Good morning, Ambassador. My name is Babak. I am a third-year student at UCI and my question—you mentioned the far-left leaders who have gained a lot of traction and power in different parts of Latin America. Another guy that comes to mind is the socialist in Honduras. But, simultaneously, you've also seen a drift to the far right with presidents like President AMLO—you have President Bolsonaro—all who are, basically, the opposite of the people in Honduras and, I'd say, Chile. So what is—these are countries that—I know they're very different from one another, but the problems that they face like poverty, income inequality, I guess, drug trafficking, they exist there and they also exist there. Why have these two different sort of polarities—political polarities arose—arisen, arose— DUDDY: Risen. (Laughs.) Q: —in these countries? DUDDY: That's a great question. I would note, first of all, I don't see President Lόpez Obrador of Mexico as a leader of the right. He is, certainly—he, largely, comes from the left, in many respects, and is, essentially, a populist, and I would say populism rather than sort of a right/left orientation is often a key consideration. Returning to my earlier comment in that what I see is popular frustration with governments around the region, often, President Bolsonaro was elected in the—in a period in which public support for government institutions in Brazil, particularly, the traditional political parties, was at an especially low level, right. There had been a number of major corruption scandals and his candidacy appeared to be—to some, at least—to offer a kind of tonic to the problems which had beset the earlier governments from the Workers' Party. He, clearly, is a figure of the right but I think the key thing is he represented change. I think, you know, my own experience is that while some leaders in Latin America draw their policy prescriptions from a particular ideology, the voters, essentially, are looking at very practical considerations. Has the government in power been able to deliver on its promises? Has life gotten better or worse? President Piñera in Chile was a figure of the right, widely viewed as a conservative pro-market figure. The PT in Brazil—the Workers' Party—came from the left. Both were succeeded by figures from the other end of the political spectrum and I think it was more a matter of frustration than ideology. I hope that answers your question. FASKIANOS: I'm going to take the next written question from Terron Adlam, who's an undergraduate student at Delaware State University. Essentially, can you discuss the relationship between climate change and the future of democracy in Latin America? DUDDY: Well, that's just a small matter but it's an important one, actually. The fact is that especially in certain places climate change appears to be spurring migration and poverty, and there are people here at Duke—some of my colleagues—and elsewhere around the country looking very specifically at the links between, especially, drought and other forms of climate change, the, you know, recovery from hurricanes, et cetera, and instability, unemployment, decline in the quality of services. Overburdened countries, for instance, in Central America have sometimes not recovered from one hurricane before another one hits, and this has effects internally but it has also tended to complicate and possibly accelerate the movement of populations from affected areas to other areas. Sometimes that migration is internal and sometimes it's cross-border. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to go next to a raised hand, Arnold Vela. If you—there you go. Q: Good afternoon, Ambassador Duddy. DUDDY: Good afternoon. Q: I'm Arnold Vela. I served in the Foreign Service for a couple of years and I'm now retired teaching government at Northwest Vista College. I think you put your finger on a very important point, which is that of the economic inequality and poverty that exists in Latin America, and, you know, with that being the case, I think Shannon O'Neil makes a good case about focusing on economic policy. And I was wondering what your thoughts were on ways in which we could do that in terms of, for example, foreign development investment, which may be decreasing because of a tendency to look inward for economic development in the United States. But are there other mechanisms, such as through the U.S. Treasury Department, financial ways to cut corruption? And also what about the Inter-American Development Bank? Should it be expanded in its role for not just infrastructure development but for such things as microeconomic development that you mentioned? Thank you. DUDDY: You know, as deputy assistant secretary, I, actually had the economic portfolio for the Western Hemisphere for a couple of years within the State Department. Clearly, trade is important. Foreign direct investment is, I think, critical. One of the things that we need to remember when we talk about foreign direct investment is that, typically, it's private money, right—it's private money—and that means governments and communities need to understand that in order to attract private money they need to establish conditions in which investors can see a reasonable return and in which they can enjoy a reasonable measure of security. That can be very, very difficult in the—Arnold, as you probably will recall, in much of Latin America, for instance, in the energy sector—and Latin America has immense energy resources—but the energy resources are frequently subject to a kind of resource nationalism. And so my experience is that in some parts of Latin America it's difficult to attract the kind of investment that could make a very substantial difference in part because local politics, largely, preclude extending either ownership or profit participation in the development of some resources. The fact that those things were not initially permitted in Mexico led to a constitutional change in order to permit both profit sharing and foreign ownership to some degree of certain resources. Investors need a certain measure of security and that involves, among other things, making sure that there is a reasonable expectation of equal treatment under the law, right. So legal provisions as well as a determination to attract foreign investment. Places like—little places, if you will, like Costa Rica have been very, very successful at attracting foreign investment, in part because they've worked hard to create the conditions necessary to attract private money. I would note—let me just add one further thought, and that is part of the problem in—I think, in some places has been something that we in the United States have often called crony capitalism. We need to make sure that competition for contracts, et cetera, is, in fact, transparent and fair. As for international institutions, there are many in the United States that are sometimes with which the region is unfamiliar like, for instance, the Trade and Development Agency, which promotes, among other things, feasibility studies, and the only condition for assistance from the TDA is that subsequent contracts be fairly and openly competed and that American companies be allowed to compete. So there are resources out there and I, certainly, would endorse a greater concentration on Latin America and I think it can have a real impact. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question—a written question—from Chaney Howard, who is a business major at Howard University. You spoke about the erosion of democratic push in Latin America growth, specifically with the Lima Group. What do you feel would need to happen for a new power to be established or encouraged to help nations band together and improve democratic growth? DUDDY: Well, the Lima Group was—which was organized in 2017 for the express purpose of advocating for the restoration of democracy in Venezuela, fell apart, essentially, as countries began to look more internally, struggling, in particular, with the early economic consequences of the pandemic. Some of you will remember that, particularly, early on, for instance, cruise ships in the Caribbean, essentially, stopped sailing. Well, much of the Caribbean depends absolutely on tourism, right. So the pandemic, effectively, turned people's attention to their own internal challenges. I think that we have good institutions still. But I think that we need to find ways other than just sanctions to encourage support for democracy. The U.S. has been particularly inclined in recent years not to interventionism but to sanctioning other countries. While sometimes—and I've sometimes advocated for sanctions myself, including to the Congress, in very limited circumstances—my sense is that we need to not only be prepared to sanction but also to encourage. We need to have a policy that offers as many carrots as sticks, and we need to be prepared to engage more actively than we have in the last fifteen years on this. Some of these problems date back some time. Now, one particularly important source of development assistance has always been the Millennium Challenge account, and there is a key issue there, which, I think, largely, limits the degree to which the Millennium Challenge Corporation can engage and that is middle income countries aren't eligible for their large assistance programs. I think we should revisit that because while some countries qualify as middle income, when you only calculate per capita income using GDP, countries with serious problems of income inequality as well as poverty are not eligible and I think that we should consider formulae that would allow us to channel more assistance into some of those economies. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Kennedy Himmel, who does not have access to a mic, a student at University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. There seems to be surmounting evidence that suggests that U.S. imperialism has waged both covert warfare and regime change itself in Central American countries through the last century and our current one. The most notable cases was Operation Condor, which peaked during Reagan's administration. You suggested the problems plaguing these countries' embrace of primarily right-wing dictatorships is a product of crony capitalism, poverty, and corruption, which are all internal problems. Do you think some of these problems of these countries are a byproduct of U.S. and Western meddling, economic warfare, the imposition of Western neoliberalism? DUDDY: Well, that's a good question. My own experience in the region dates from the early '80s. I mean, certainly, during the Cold War the United States tended to support virtually any government that we perceived or that insisted that they were resolutely anti-communist. For decades now the U.S. has made support for democracy a pillar of its policies in the region and I think we have, largely, evolved out of the—you know, our earlier, you know, period of either interventionism or, in a sense, sometimes even when we were not entirely—when we were not active we were complicit in that we applied no standard other than anti-communism with the countries we were willing to work with. That was a real problem. I note, by the way, for any who are interested that several years ago—about five years ago now, if I'm not mistaken, Irina—the Foreign Affairs, which is published by the Council on Foreign Relations, ran a series of articles in one issue called “What Really Happened?”, and for those interested in what really happened in Chile during the Allende government, there is a piece in there by a man named Devine, who was actually in the embassy during the coup and was working, as he now acknowledges, for the CIA. So I refer you to that. My sense in recent decades is that the U.S. has, certainly, tried to advance its own interests but has not been in the business of undermining governments, and much of the economic growth which some countries have sustained has derived very directly from the fact that we've negotiated free trade agreements with more countries in Latin America than any other part of the world. I remember very distinctly about five years into the agreement with Chile that the volume of trading both directions—and as a consequence, not just employment, but also kind of gross income—hence, had very substantially increased; you know, more than a hundred percent. The same has been true with Mexico. So, you know, we have a history in the region. I think it is, largely, explained by looking at U.S. policy and understanding that it was—almost everything was refracted through the optic of the Cold War. But, you know, it's now many decades since that was the case. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to go to Elizabeth McDowell, who has a raised hand. Q: Hi. I'm Elizabeth McDowell. I'm a graduate student in public policy at Duke University. Ambassador Duddy, thanks for your talk. I want to ask a question about a potential tradeoff between good governance and— DUDDY: I lost your audio. Please repeat. Q: How's my audio now? OK. My— DUDDY: You'll have to repeat the question. Q: My question is about critical minerals and metals in the region and, essentially, these metals and minerals, including lithium, cobalt, and nickel, copper, others, are essential for clean energy transition, and there are a lot of countries that have instituted new policies in order to gain financially from the stores since these minerals are very prevalent in the region. And my question is do you think that there's a tradeoff between sustainable development and having the minerals that we need at low cost and countries being able to benefit economically from their natural resource stores? DUDDY: Yeah. I'm not quite sure how I would characterize the tradeoffs. But, you know, as I mentioned with respect, for instance, to oil and gas but the same applies to lithium, cobalt, et cetera, in much of Latin America the resources that are below the surface of the Earth belong to the nation, right. They belong to the nation. And in some places—I very vividly remember in Bolivia—there was tremendous resistance at a certain point to the building of a pipeline by a foreign entity which would take Bolivian gas out of the country. And that resistance was rooted in Bolivia's history in the sense that much of the population had—that the country had been exploited for five hundred years and they just didn't trust the developers to make sure that the country shared appropriately in the exploitation of the country's gas resources. Just a few years ago, another—a major company, I think, based in—headquartered in India, opened and then closed a major operation that was going to develop—I think it was also lithium mining—in Bolivia because of difficulties imposed by the government. I understand why those difficulties are imposed in countries which have been exploited but note that the exploitation of many of these resources is capital intensive and in many of these countries is going to require capital from outside the country. And so countries have to find a way to both assure a reasonable level of compensation to the companies as well as income to the country. So that's the challenge, right. That is the challenge. For the time being, in some places the Chinese have been able to not just exploit but have been able to do business, in part, because they have a virtually insatiable appetite for these minerals and as well as for other commodities. But long-term development has to be vertically integrated and that—and I think that's going to take a lot of external money and, again, certain countries are going to have to figure out how to do that when we're talking about resources which, to a very large degree, are viewed as patrimony of the nation. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Leah Parrott, who's a sophomore at NYU. Do you find that globalization itself, the competitive global markets, vying for influence in the region are a cause of the rise in the populist frustration that you have been talking about? DUDDY: Hmm. Interesting question. I suppose it has—you know, there is a connection. Just to give sort of a visceral response, the fact is that there are cultural differences in certain markets and regions of the world. Some countries have—you know, have taken a different approach to the development of their own labor markets as well as trade policy. I would say that, today, the reality is we can't avoid globalization so—and no one country controls it. So countries that have heretofore been unsuccessful in inserting themselves and seeing the same kind of growth that other countries have experienced are going to have to adapt. What we do know from earlier experiences in Latin America is that high tariff barriers are not the way to go, right—that that resulted in weak domestic industries, endemic corruption, and, ultimately, very, very fragile macroeconomic indicators. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to go next to Alberto Najarro, who's a graduate student at Duke Kunshan University. DUDDY: Well. Q: Hi. Good afternoon. Thank you for your time. My question is about El Salvador. I'm from El Salvador, and I'll just provide a brief overview. Since assuming the presidency and, particularly, over the last six months, President Bukele and the National Assembly dominated by Bukele's allies have moved quickly to weaken checks and balances, undermine the rule of law, and co-opt the country's judiciary, consolidating power in the executive. What do you think should be the United States' role, if any, in reversing trends of democratic backsliding in El Salvador? Given the recent events like the abrupt exit of the United States interim ambassador Jean Manes from the country, can the United States continue to engage with El Salvador, particularly, as Bukele strengthens relationship with leaders like Xi Jinping and Erdoğan? DUDDY: Well, first, my recollection is that Ambassador Jean Manes, who, by the way, is an old friend of mine, had returned to El Salvador as chargé, and I'm not sure that the Biden administration has, in fact, nominated a new ambassador yet. I tend to think that it's important to remember that we have embassies in capitals to advance U.S. interests and that when we withdraw those embassies or cease talking to a host government it hurts us as often—as much as it does them. To some degree, what we, I think, collectively, worry about is that Salvador is, essentially, on the path to authoritarianism. I note that Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala, none of those three, along with Nicaragua, were invited to President Biden's Democracy Summit in December, and, you know, it may well be that the U.S. should explore a range of inducements to the government there to restore independence to the judiciary and respect for the separation of powers. I, certainly, think that it is in the interest of the United States but it's also interest—in the interest of the region. That's why the whole region came together in 2001 to sign the Inter-American Democratic Charter. How exactly that should be effected—how we should implement the—you know, the will of the region is something that, I think, that governments should work out collectively because it is my sense that collective action is better than unilateral action. Certainly, the U.S. is not going to intervene, and there are many American companies already active in El Salvador. You know, the region has found the restoration of democracy—defense of democracy, restoration of democracy—a very, very difficult job in recent years and that is in no small measure because—it's not just the United States, it's the rest of the region—even sanctions are only effective if they are broadly respected by other key players. And I'm not always sure that sanctions are the way to go. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take two written questions together since we have so many. The first is from Molly Todd from Virginia Tech. She's a PhD candidate there. When thinking of the U.S. role in democracy promotion in Latin America, how do you account for U.S. support of dictators in the region as well? And then William Weeks at Arizona State University—how much does China's influence encourage authoritarian rule and discourage democracy in Latin America? DUDDY: I'm not sure that—I'll take the last question first. I'm not sure that China's activity in the region discourages democracy but it has permitted certain strongmen figures like Nicolás Maduro to survive by serving as an alternative source of sometimes funding markets for locally produced goods and also the source of technology, et cetera, to the United States and the rest of what is euphemistically called the West, right. So China has, effectively, provided a lifeline. The lifeline, in my experience, is not particularly ideological. Now, you know, Russians in the region frequently seem interested in—to be a little bit flip, in sticking their finger in our eye and reminding the United States that they can project power and influence into the Western Hemisphere just as we can into Eastern Europe and Central Asia. But the Chinese are a little bit different. I think their interests are mostly commercial and they are uninterested in Latin American democracy, generally. So being democratic is not a condition for doing business with China. More generally, I think, I would refer to my earlier response. The U.S., basically, has not been supportive of the strongmen figure(s) who have arisen in Latin America in recent decades. But, you know, the tendency to embrace what many in Latin America call caciques, or strongmen figures—men on horseback—was established in Latin America, right—became evident in Latin America even in the nineteenth century. In the twentieth century, beginning, say, in particular, after World War II, we, definitely, considered things more through the optic of the Cold War, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who recalls that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, at a certain moment in, I think it was 1947, commented on Anastasio Somoza that he was an SOB but, oh, well, he was our SOB. I think that approach to Latin America has long since been shelved. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to go next to Gary Prevost. Q: Ambassador, I share your skepticism about sanctions and I'll just ask a very direct question. It's my belief that the Biden administration is, at the moment, missing real opportunities for dialogue with both Venezuela and Cuba, partly because of this bifurcation of the world into democracy and authoritarianism, something which the Obama administration really avoided and, I think, as a result, gained considerable prestige and understanding in wider Latin America. So I've been very concerned that there are opportunities being missed in both of those cases right now. DUDDY: I'll disagree with you on one part of that, noting that I've already—and, actually, I wrote a piece for the Council several years ago in which I talked about the desirability of finding an off ramp for Venezuela. But I note that the—that many of the sanctions that are—sanctions were imposed on Venezuela, in particular, over a period of time by both Republicans and Democrats, and the problem for the U.S., in particular, with Venezuela is that as the country has become less productive, more authoritarian, they have pushed out 6 million refugees and imposed huge burdens on almost all of the other countries in the subregion. I'm not sure that the U.S. is, at the moment, missing an opportunity there and, for that matter, the changes that were brought into Cuba or to Cuba policy by the Obama administration, which I endorsed, were for the most part left in place by the Trump administration, interestingly enough. There were some changes but they were not as dramatic as many who opposed those—the Obama reforms—often hoped and who wanted to reverse them. So these are both tough nuts to crack. I think that it is at least worth noting that the combination of incompetence, corruption, authoritarianism, in particular, in Venezuela, which has transformed what was at one point the most successful democracy in the region into a basket case or a near basket case, I'm not sure, you know, how we get our arms around that at the moment. But I, certainly, endorse the idea of encouraging dialogue and looking for a formula that would promote the return of democracy. And, again, you know, having lived in Venezuela, I have a sense that many—you know, Venezuelans love their country. Most of those who have left did not do so willingly or, you know, with a happy heart, if you will. These are people who found the circumstances on the ground in the country to be unbearable. Now, how we respond to that challenge, I haven't seen any new thinking on it lately. But, certainly, dialogue is a part of it. Similarly, with Cuba, we have—you know, we saw fifty years of policy that didn't work. So I would hope to, sometime in the near future, see some fresh thinking on how to proceed on that front, too. You know, the difficult thing to get around is that these are not countries which respect human rights, freedom of expression, freedom of the press. They are, in fact, repressive, which is why we have hundreds of thousands of Cuban Americans living in the United States and why we have now millions of Venezuelans living outside their own national borders. It's a real dilemma. I wish I had a solution but I don't. FASKIANOS: We are almost out of time. We have many more written questions and raised hands, and I apologize that we're not going to be able to get to them. But I am going to use my moderator power to ask you the final one. DUDDY: Uh-oh. FASKIANOS: You have served—oh, it's a good one. You've served for most of your career, over thirty years, in U.S. government and now you're teaching. What advice or what would you offer to the students on the call about pursuing a career in the Foreign Service, and what do you say to your students now and the professor, or to your colleagues about how to encourage students to pursue? We saw that it's become less attractive—became less attractive in the Trump administration. It may be up—more on the upswing. But, of course, there is, again, the pay problem and private sector versus public. So what thoughts can you leave us with? DUDDY: Well, first of all, there's—in my personal experiences, there's virtually nothing quite like being an American diplomat abroad. My personal experience is—you know, dates from the '80s. I was actually very briefly an Air Force officer in the early '70s. I think public service is inherently rewarding in ways that often working in the private sector is not, where you can really have an impact on relations between peoples and nations, and I think that's very, very exciting. I come from a family, you know, filled with, you know, lawyers, in particular, in my generation, even in the next, and I know that that can be—that kind of work or work in the private sector, the financial community, whatever, can be very exciting as well. But diplomacy is unique, and one also has the sense of doing something that benefits our own country and, one hopes, the world. At the risk of, once again, being flip, I always felt that I was on the side of the angels. You know, I think we've made many mistakes but that, by and large, our engagement in the countries in which I was working was positive. FASKIANOS: Wonderful. Well, on that note, Ambassador Patrick Duddy, thank you for your service to this country. Thank you very much for sharing your insights with us. I know this is very broad to cover the whole region and we didn't do all the countries justice. DUDDY: And we have yet to—and we have yet to mention Haiti, about which I worry all the time. FASKIANOS: I know. There are so many things to cover. Not enough time, not enough hours in a day. And we appreciate everybody for your time, being with us for your great questions and comments. Again, I apologize for not getting to everybody. But we will just have to have you back. So thank you again. For all of you, our next Academic Webinar will be on Wednesday, February 23, at 1:00 p.m. (ET)with Roger Ferguson, who is at CFR, on the future of capitalism. So, as always, please follow us on Twitter at @CFR_Academic. Go to CFR.org, ForeignAffairs.com, and ThinkGlobalHealth.org for research and analysis on global issues. We will circulate a link to the Foreign Affairs edition that Ambassador Duddy mentioned so that you can take a look at that. And thank you, again, for your time today. We appreciate it. DUDDY: It's been a pleasure. Thank you. (END

Denis F. Simon, senior adviser to the president for China affairs and professor of the practice at Duke University, leads a conversation on the role of joint venture universities in China.   FASKIANOS: Thank you and welcome to CFR's Higher Education Webinar. I am Irina Faskianos, vice president of the National Program and Outreach at CFR. Today's discussion is on the record and the video and transcript will be available on our website, CFR.org/Academic, if you would like to share it with your colleagues. As always, CFR takes no institutional positions on matters of policy. We are delighted to have Denis Simon with us to talk about the role of joint venture universities in China. Dr. Simon is senior advisor to the president for China affairs and professor of the practice at Duke University. From 2015 to 2020, he served as executive vice chancellor at Duke Kunshan University in China. He has more than four decades of experience studying business, competition, innovation, and technology strategy in China, and is fluent in Mandarin Chinese. He served as senior advisor on China and global affairs at Arizona State University, vice provost for international affairs at the University of Oregon, and professor of international affairs at Penn State University. He has extensive leadership experience in management consulting and is the author of several books. Dr. Simon, thanks very much for being with us today. I thought we could begin by having you give us an overview of joint venture universities in China. What has the last two years in U.S.-Sino relations and COVID-19 meant for joint venture universities and their long-term goals? SIMON: Great. Well, thank you, Irina. I really am happy your team was able to arrange this. And I can't think of a more important subject right now. The president of Duke University, Vincent Price, has called our joint venture a beacon of light in the midst of the turbulence in U.S.-China relations. And so, this is a rather appropriate time for us to take stock at where this venture is and where it may be going. So let me just give an overview, talk a little bit about what joint ventures are, how they operate, and some of the challenges of operating them, and some of the effects of the last, as you said, two years, with the tensions growing in U.S.-China relations. Well, I think the first thing to recognize is that while there are over two thousand joint venture projects and initiatives involving foreign schools and universities, there are really only ten joint venture universities. These are campuses authorized to give two degrees—a Chinese degree and a foreign degree. The last one that was approved is Julliard, from the United States. So there are four U.S. joint ventures, two from the U.K., one from Russia, one from Israel involving the Technion, and the rest from Hong Kong. And so they're not growing by leaps and bounds. Everyone is taking stock of how they are working. The one from Duke is a liberal arts or a research-oriented university, and I think the same can be said for NYU Shanghai also in the same category. Joint venture universities are legal Chinese entities. This is very important. So, for example, our campus at Duke is not a branch campus. It is a legal Chinese entity. The chancellor must be a Chinese citizen, because they represent the legal authority of the university within the Chinese law, and also the Chinese education system. We are liberal arts oriented. The one involving Russia and Israel are polytechnic. They're more for engineering. Kean University, which is the State University of New York, has a very big business-oriented program. The U.K. programs also have very big programs. So some are liberal arts, like Duke, but others are also polytechnic. So they span the gamut. And finally, these are in many cases engines for economic development. In the cities in which they occur, these universities are sort of like Stanford in Silicon Valley. They're designed to act as a magnet to attract talent, and also to train young people, some of whom hopefully will stay in the region and act as a kind of entrepreneurial vanguard in the future as they go forward.   Now, the reality is that they've been driven by a number of factors common to both the Chinese side and the foreign side. One is just the whole process of campus internationalization. U.S. universities, for example, over the last five to ten years have wanted to expand their global footprint. And setting up a campus in X country, whether it's been in the Middle East or been in China in this case, has been an important part of the statement about how they build out a global university. A second driver has been government regulation. So in China in 2003, the government set in place a series of regulations that allowed joint venture universities to be established. And I think we need to give kudos to the Ministry of Education in China because they had the vision to allow these kinds of universities to be set up. And I think the impact so far has been very positive. And then finally, they're a vehicle for building out what I would call transnational collaborative research. And that is that they're a vehicle for helping to promote collaboration between, let's say, the United States and China in areas involving science and technology, and their very, very important role in that. That's why I said we're not just a liberal arts university, but we are a research-oriented liberal arts university. And I think that NYU Shanghai, Nigbo and Nottingham, et cetera, they all would claim the same space in that regard. Now, why would a city like Kunshan want to have a joint venture university? After all, Kunshan is rather unique. It's one of the wealthiest cities in China, the largest site of Taiwan foreign investment, but it never has had its own university. So somebody in the leadership did, in fact, read the book about Silicon Valley and Stanford. And they decided, I think it was a McKinsey study that helped them make that decision, that they needed to have a university. And the opportunity to work with Duke was there. And it's a little bit a long, complicated story, but we've ended up where we are today with a university which now will embark on the second phase of having a new campus. But this clearly, for Kunshan, has been a magnet for talent, and an effort to help Kunshan transition from a factory to the world economy to a new knowledge economy, consistent where—with where Xi Jinping and the Chinese leadership wants to take China during the current period, and into the future. It also provides a great bridge for connectivity between the high-tech knowledge communities in North Carolina, and particularly around Research Triangle, and the companies in the Kunshan area. And that bridge at some times or others can be very vibrant, and there are people and activity moving across it. And it's also a place where internationalization of Kunshan gets promoted through the visibility of Duke. Every year during my five years, we had 2,000-plus visitors come to our university, both from abroad and from within China, to understand: What do these universities mean and what's going to happen to them? Now, for Duke, a lot of people think it's about the money. They think that these joint venture campuses make a lot of money. And I can tell you, nothing could be further from the truth. This is not about money. This is about, as I mentioned before, internationalization. But it's also about the opportunity for pedagogical innovation. You can imagine that in existing universities there's a lot of baggage, lots of legacy systems. You don't get virgin territory to do curricular reform and to introduce a lot of edgy ideas. Too many vested interests. But within an opportunity like DKU or NYU Shanghai, you get a white piece of paper and you can develop a very innovative, cutting-edge kind of curriculum. And that's exactly what has been done. And so you get a kind of two-way technology transfer, obviously from Duke to DKU, but also interestingly from DKU back to Duke. And the same thing again happens with these other universities as well. And I think that's important. So there's a great deal of benefit that can accrue to Duke simply by having this campus and watching it go through this kind of evolving development of a new curriculum. Now, we must not forget, these ten joint ventures, and particularly in the context of Sino-U.S. relations, are not all that's there. Starting with Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and its relationship with Nanjing University, the United States has had projects like this going on in China. There are joint colleges. So, for example, the University of Pittsburgh and Sichuan University have one in engineering. And similarly, Michigan and Jiao Tong University also have similar kinds of ventures. And these all seem to be working very nicely. And then there's a whole array of two-plus-two programs, three-plus-two programs. All of these are part of a broad landscape of educational engagement that exists between the two countries. It is much more extensive than anyone could have imagined in the late 1970s, when the two countries signed the bilateral agreement. Now, what are some of the things that happen when you manage these joint venture universities? First, let me mention the operational issues that come across. So you probably, you know, ask: How do you find your partner? Well, in a joint venture university, you must have an educational partner. So for Duke, it's Wuhan University. For NYU Shanghai, it's East China Normal University. And for Kean University it's Wenzhou University. And you go through these—finding these partners, and the partners hopefully form a collaborative relationship. But I can tell you one of the problems, just like in all joint ventures in China, is the sleeping in the same bed but with two different dreams phenomenon. Duke came to China to bring a liberal arts education and to serve as a platform for knowledge transfer across the Chinese higher education landscape. Kunshan wanted a Stanford that can provide commercializable knowledge that can turn into new products, new services, and hopefully new businesses. And so they kind of exist in parallel with one another, with the hope that somewhere along the future they will—they will come together. Another issue area is the issue of student recruitment. Student recruitment is very complex in China because of the reliance on the gaokao system. And the gaokao system introduces an element of rigidity. And the idea of crafting a class, which is very common in liberal arts colleges, is almost impossible to do because of the rather rigid and almost inflexible approach one must take to evaluating students, scoring them, and dealing with a whole array of provincial quotas that make X numbers of students available to attend your university versus other universities. And don't forget, these joint venture universities exist in the context of over 2,000 Chinese universities, all of whom are trying to recruit the students. So you get intense involvement not only from the officials in the province level, but also Chinese parents. And the idea of Chinese parents make helicopter parents in the U.S. look like amateur hour. They are very, very involved and very, very active. A third area are home campus issues that we have to think about. And that is that a lot of people have always said to me: Wow, you know, the Chinese side must give you a big headache. And with all due respect to all my dear colleagues and friends, I can say also sometimes I got a headache from the Duke side as well. And I think anyone who sits in these kind of leadership positions must figure out how to balance the interests and the perspectives of the home country campus and the host country campus, and their ability to work together. And there are a lot of issues that come up along the way that make it very, very complex. And in particular, the idea of attracting faculty. Seventy-five percent of our faculty are hired locally. That is, they are in tenure or tenure-track jobs by Duke-Kunshan University. Twenty-five percent must be supplied by Duke. The reason is very simple: The Chinese authorities want to make sure that the quality of the education is no different than what's offered at Duke. And because we have to give two degrees, a Chinese degree and a Duke degree, that Duke degree is not a Duke-B degree, or a Duke-lite degree. It is the same degree that you get at Duke University, signed by the head of the board of trustees, the president, the provost, et cetera, et cetera. So this is a real Duke degree. It's not Duke-lite. The fourth thing I want to mention, which I mentioned before slightly, which is money. These are not inexpensive ventures. And they also are a kind of elite education. And the degree to which they can be replicated over and over again in China is something that remains to be—remains to be seen. We've had a lot of people coming from Congress who have looked at these joint venture universities and said, ah, you're selling out American values and academic freedom or religious freedom, in return for a big payday. And as I said, that's simply just not the case. These joint venture universities are very difficult to run. You must pay faculty according to the global faculty prices. And plus, there are lots of expat benefits that you have to pay to them. The tuition rates that you can charge to Chinese students are set by the provincial authorities. And therefore, in our case, they're about 50 percent less than what international students have to pay. And so already you're in a deficit, technically speaking, because Chinese students are getting a, you know, preferential price. Also, the idea of building up a research capability is not inexpensive, particularly if you're looking at developing a capability in science and engineering. These are, again, very expensive propositions. Now, I don't want to make it seem like it's all hardship. There are lots of rewarding moments. I think, as I said, the pedagogical side is one of those. And also the opportunity to really build true cross-cultural understanding among young people has been very important. Now, let me just make a couple of comments about where we are in terms of the last two years in particular. No one—you know, when our joint venture was formed, and similarly for the other ones which were formed before ours—could have envisioned what was going to happen, particularly in terms of the U.S.-China trade war, the onset of the protests in Hong Kong, and the issues—human rights issues that have to do with Xinjiang, Tibet, et cetera. And also, as everyone knows, COVID also presented some amazing challenges to the campus. We had to, by late January/early February 2020, we evacuated the whole campus when COVID came. And for the last two years, all of the international students have been studying either in their home country or if they've been able to come to the United States, they've been able to study at Duke during this period. And the big question is, when are these international students going to be able to go back? Which of course, that raises the big question about what is the campus like without international students? Our campus has somewhere between 35 to 40 percent international students. NYU Shanghai has 50 percent international students. Those make for very interesting pedagogical challenges, particularly given the fact that the high school experiences of these young people from China versus all countries—you know, we have forty-one different countries represented at DKU—make for a very challenging learning environment and teaching environment. Now, a couple of the issues that really have been exacerbated over the last two years, first of all are visa issues. Delays in being able to get visas or sometimes denial of visas. Another one are the uncertainties about the campus. Many people think that as Sino-U.S. tensions have risen, OK, the Chinese side is going to shut the campus. No, no, no, the U.S. side is going to shut the campus. And there's been the lack of clarity. And this also not only hurts student recruitment sometimes, but it also can hurt faculty recruitment as well—who are also wondering, you know, what's going to happen in the future and what kind of security of their jobs. Most recently we've also had—particularly because some of the policies adopted during the Trump administration—national security issues. So we want to build a research capability. Let's say the city of Kunshan says: We'll support the building of a semiconductor research capability. Duke University has to say no. That technology now is a more tightly controlled technology and it's not clear what we can and can't do. And so some of these kind of initiatives get interrupted, can't go forward. And everyone is very vigilant to make sure that nobody crosses the line in terms of U.S. law. And, of course, watching out for Chinese law as well. So where is this all going? I think these difficulties are going to continue. The most obvious one that everyone talks about is academic freedom, the ability to deal with these complex, controversial issues. I can say very proudly that up until this point, and at least until when I left in June of 2020, we had not had any kind of explicit intervention that stopped us from doing something, per se. We've had the national committee for U.S.-China relations, China town halls for several years. They didn't have one this past year, but we've had it for several years. We have courses on China politics. We have courses on U.S.-China relations, et cetera. So we haven't had that. But we've had to be flexible. Instead of having an open forum about Hong Kong, we created a minicourse to talk about Hong Kong. So those issues are out there. Academic freedom is a real issue that is one of those redline issues. And everyone is a little bit nervous all the time about getting into that. The other thing, of course, is the fluidity in the Chinese environment itself. We know that China continues to witness political changes, further economic reforms. And a lot of the commitments that were made, you know, five years ago, ten years ago, the ability to see them through. DKU is covered by a CEA, a cooperative educational accord, that promises academic freedom in the engagement of the university's work on campus. Now, if you go out and throw a brick through the mayor's window, well, all bets are off. But while you're on campus, you should be able to have, you know, academic freedom. And this is not a political issue. This is an accreditation issue. If the pedagogy and the learning environment were to become distinctly different, the Southern States Accreditation, which accredits the Duke degrees, could not accredit the degree that's coming out of DKU. And so there must not be any kind of significant gap or significant differentiation in order to preserve that issue of academic integrity. Now, finally, I would say—you know, looking now retrospectively, looking back at all of this, I think there's no more important kind of initiative than these universities. Getting young people from all around the world to sit in the same classroom, engage with one another, even become uncomfortable. It's great if they can do that when they're eighteen to twenty-four so hopefully when they're forty-five to fifty, they sit down and deal with these real issues, they can have some degree of understanding and some perspective of why the other side is thinking the way it does. This doesn't happen automatically on these campuses. There's a lot of orchestration and a lot of fostering of activity. But I would just say that he ability and the opportunity to do this makes this, and makes all of these joint ventures, really exciting opportunities that have larger impact than just the campus on which they sit. And let me stop here. Thank you. FASKIANOS: Thank you very much. That was really a terrific overview. And you really brought your experience to the table. Thank you. So let's go to all of you now for your questions, comments. You can either raise your hand by clicking on the “raise hand” icon, or you can type your question in the Q&A box. Please include your affiliation so I can read it. And when I call on you, please unmute yourself and also say who you are and your academic affiliation, so to put it in context. I'm going to go first, raised hand, to James Cousins. There we go. Q: Hi. Yeah, this is Morton Holbrook at Kentucky Wesleyan College, along with James Cousins. FASKIANOS: Great. (Laughs.) Q: And thanks very much, Dr. Simon. A great explanation. Happy to hear about academic freedom. Could I hear a little bit more about, for example, textbook choice? Do you have to submit—do professors have to submit textbook choices to the party secretary, for example? I assume there's a party secretary there. Is there self-censorship by professors who would want to skip over Tiananmen massacre or the Taiwan issue or the South China Sea issue? Thank you. SIMON: OK. Great question. So I'm happy to say that each professor creates their own syllabus, as they would in the United States. We have three big required courses, one of which is China in the world. And it is to look at the impact of the West on China, and China's impact on the West. And in that course, which every student has to take, we discuss very, very sensitive issues, including the Taiwan issue, including Chinese security policy, including South China Sea, et cetera, et cetera. There are some limitations on books that can be imported through the Chinese customs, because those will be controlled at the customs port. But because we have unlimited access through the internet right directly into the Duke library, any book that any instructor would like to have on their syllabus, that book is available to the students. So we do not have to report any of these teaching intentions to the party secretary. In the case of DKU, the party secretary is the chancellor. That just happened when we got a new chancellor a couple years ago. And we also have a deputy party secretary. But for the most part, they do not intervene at all in the academic affairs of the university. And the main reason for this is that the university must remain accredited for giving out both the Duke degree and the Chinese degree. FASKIANOS: Great. I'm going to go next to a written question from Michael Raisinghani, who is an associate professor at Texas Women's University. And two parts. What are some things you would have done differently going forward based on your experience over the last five years? And this is also—camps onto what the prior question was—does China censor the minicourse on Hong Kong? SIMON: So let me take the second one first. The minicourse on Hong Kong was a sort of an in-place innovation. We got a directive from the government indicating that we were to have no public forum to discuss the events in Hong Kong. And we had had two students who were in Hong Kong during the summer, witness to the events that were going on. And they came back to the campus after the summer wanting to basically expose everything that went on in Hong Kong. Now, obviously we wanted this to be a learning opportunity. And so we didn't mind, you know, talking about the media, the press, you know, who's vantage point, et cetera. So we felt that that could be best done within a minicourse. And so we literally, in real time, created an eight-hour minicourse. We had four of our faculty put together teaching about the society and the issues in contemporary Hong Kong. And each of those classes, you know, they discussed, you know, ongoing issues. I can tell you that there were lots of PRC students attending at the beginning of the session. There were fewer by the end. And we can, you know, extrapolate why they may have pulled out. But nobody pulled out because somehow someone was holding a gun to their head and said: You ought not to be here. So, you know, there's a lot of peer pressure about academic freedom issues. And there also is some issues about self-censorship that exist. And we try to deal with them. We try to make the academic environment extremely comfortable for everybody. But I can tell you, look, there's parental pressure. We don't know who the parents are of some of these kids. They may be even party officials. And so we basically, you know, let the kids determine. But we let the kids say: Look, in the classroom, all—everything goes. And I instituted a policy which I would not have changed, and that is that no cellphones in the classroom. No cellphones at major events, without explicit permission of the participants. And that means that in the class you cannot record by video or by audio what's going on in the classroom without special permission of the—of the instructor when that's happening. During my five years, you know, that worked very well. It raised the level of engagement by all students. And I would say people felt much more comfortable. A hundred percent comfortable? No. That wasn't the case. There is still some uneasiness. What would I have done differently? That's kind of a very interesting question. It kind of comes up because I'm writing a book about my experiences. I think maybe, you know, I would have tried to build more bridges with Duke earlier on. I think that Duke's involvement in this was really what the Chinese side bought. And I think that we needed to get more Duke involvement in terms of trying to sell the DKU opportunity to the faculty. I would have become a little bit more proactive in getting them to understand the benefits of spending a semester or two semesters at DKU. I think we—that would have helped to build more political support for the DKU project back on the DKU—back on the Duke campus in the United States. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to go next to raised hand, to Maryalice Mazzara. Q: Hi. Hello to both of you. And, Dr. Simon, great to see you. I'm here at SUNY Office of Global Affairs at SUNY Global Center. And I must say, disclaimer, I had Dr. Simon as a boss, my first boss at SUNY. And he was wonderful. So and I've worked a lot with China, as you know, Denis, from when we started, and continuing on. What would you say you would recommend going forward? So you just had a question about, you know, what would you have done differently in the last five years. For those of us, and all of us on the call, who are interested—very interested in U.S.-China positive relations, what would you recommend that we can do at the academic level? SIMON: So one of the things I think we need to realize is that China's Ministry of Education is extremely committed to not only these joint venture projects, but to international engagement as a whole. During my five years, I had an extensive opportunity to interact with a number of officials from the ministry, not only at the central government level but also at the provincial government level. And despite some of the noise that we hear about China regarding self-reliance and closing the door, I think that understanding that China is open for business. It wants to see more international students come into the country. There are now about close to 500,000 international students. China wants to grow that number. You know, there are about 700,000-plus Chinese students studying abroad, 370,000 of them, or so, in the United States. The ministry is very interested. And I think that we need to basically build bridges that continue to be sustainable over time, so that we continue to engage in the educational sphere with China. And that means that perhaps it's time for the two countries to sit down and revise, update, and reconfigure the education cooperation agreement that was signed back when Deng Xiaoping visited the United States in '78, and then formalized in '79. I think that we need to think about altering the rules of the road going forward so it takes into account that China is no longer a backward, or a higher-education laggard. China how has world-class universities, offering world-class curriculum. Collaboration and research between faculty in the U.S. and faculty in China is extensive. We need to make sure that initiatives, like the China initiative through the Justice Department, doesn't take hold and basically lead to the demise or the decoupling of the two countries. Basically, the bottom line is: Keep going forward. Keep being honest with your Chinese partners and your Chinese colleagues. Let them know some of the challenges that you face. And make them feel committed to playing by the rules of the game. And we have to do the same on our side. And if we can do that, I think that the basis for collaboration is not only there, but the basis for expanded collaboration is very real and can help, hopefully, over the long term overcome some of the difficulties and the tensions that we face because of lack of understanding and lack of trust that currently plagues the relationship. FASKIANOS: Great. The next question is from Emily Weinstein, who is a research fellow at Georgetown University. Curious about issues associated with intellectual property. Since JV universities are Chinese legal entities, in the case of DKU does Duke maintain the IP or is it the independent DKU entity? SIMON: Well, right now let's assume that the faculty member is a permanent member of the DKU faculty. Then that faculty member, in conjunction with the Chinese regulatory environment, would own a piece of that IP. The university doesn't have a technology transfer office, like you would see at Duke in the United States, or Stanford, or NYU, et cetera. And I think that probably no one really can see that there would be, you know, just a lot of new IP coming out of this. But I think that now, given the momentum that's been built up in some of these areas, I think that that is an issue. And I think that that's something that will get decided. But right now, it's a local issue. The only way that would be different is if a faculty member from Duke came over, participated in a research project, and then laid claim. China has a—(inaudible)—kind of law in place. And of course, we know the United States does. That would tend to be the basis for a sharing of the IP. And I think that was the basic notion going forward, that as a joint venture whatever came out of these collaborative research engagements, they would be on a shared IP basis. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Wenchi Yu, who has raised a raised hand. Q: Hi. Thank you. Hi, Denis, good to see you again. A question about—first of all, just a small comment about China still welcoming collaboration internationally at higher ed. I think that's been the case for a couple years. The question now is not so much about their will, but more how, right? So in order to collaborate in a way that neither side compromises our own values and principles, I think that's more of the key question. So I think moving forward if you can just maybe go deeper on this point. How can we really collaborate without, you know, feeling that we're making too much of a compromise? And the second related is, I think what we're seeing in terms of the change of attitude is not just at higher ed level. You and I have talked about K-12 as well. It's also been extremely difficult for international schools as well as online education to even, you know, try to connect students with anything international, whether it's curriculum or, you know, international foreign tutors, educators. So, I mean, do you think, you know, this will impact higher ed? You know, and what is your interpretation of Ministry of Education's attitude? And, you know, how much is what local officials can actually be flexible when it comes to implementation of those bigger policies? SIMON: So I think one of the—one of the challenges I didn't get to mention, but I'll talk about it now, is this issue of homogenization. I think that the Ministry of Education, because of its general approach to curriculum and things of that sort, would like all universities basically to operate very similarly and that there's not a whole bunch of outliers in the system. The special provisions for these joint venture universities are indeed just that, they're very special, they're very unique. And in fact, just like lots of regulation in China, they couldn't cover the entire waterfront of all the operating, all the administrative, and even all the political issues that might come across. And so many of these, the CEA agreement, or the equivalent of that, was signed, you know, are very unique to those nine or ten joint venture universities. And they—as you know, in China just because you sided with Duke doesn't mean that if you're up next you're going to get the same terms and conditions. And I think that right now because of the tensions in the relationship, it would be difficult to actually replicate exactly what Duke, and NYU, and some of the other universities had, particularly because of the very pronounced way academic freedom issues had been—had been dealt with. But I think that each of our universities is very clear about the red lines that exist regarding issues as sensitive, like academic freedom. In other words, there are very few issues that would invite the kind of deliberation about potential withdrawal, but academic freedom is one of those. Religious freedom, in terms of what goes on on the campus is another issue. Again, the campus is sort of like a protected territory in the way an embassy would be, in many ways. And it's not exactly the same. It doesn't have that legal status. But what I'm suggesting here in terms of the operating environment is sort of like that. So up till now, we've been very fortunate that we haven't felt the full brunt, you know, of some of the political tightening that some Chinese universities have experienced. And so we've been pretty—the situation has been pretty good for all of us. But I think that part of the problem is that we were dealing with China in a very asymmetrical, hierarchical kind of manner in the past. And that is that the gap between the two countries was very large in capability, particularly in education and higher education. And therefore, it was from the haves—Europe, the United States, et cetera—to the have-no country. That's no longer the case. And so therefore, that's why I think that in order to get more accommodation from the Chinese side, we have to bring China much more to the table as a co-equal. And as China sits at that table, then we have to secure commitments to say: Look, we commit to doing this when we're in China. You have to commit to doing this, whether it's regarding IP theft, whether it's regarding the censorship of Chinese students in the United States, whether it's all other kinds of things that we know are problems. And at the same time, as many U.S. university leaders have done, we promised to protect our Chinese students, that they don't become the object of attack because we have a kind of anti-China, you know, fervor going through the country, and somehow these students are going to be, you know, experiencing some problems. This is a very difficult period. But I don't see how we can continue to go forward based on a document, or set of documents, that were signed forty-plus years ago. I think we need to begin to consider, both in education and in science and technology, to sign a new agreement that looks at new rules of the game, reflecting the different status of the countries now versus what it was forty years ago. FASKIANOS: I'm going to ask the next question from Qiang Zha from York University in Toronto, Canada. Two questions: A rise in nationalism and patriotism can be observed among Chinese young generations. How is it going to impact the JVs in China? And whether and now the JVs in China impact the country's innovation capacity and performance. SIMON: So it seems that there's two questions there. Let me respond. Professor Cheng Li, who's at Brookings Institution, has just written a very interesting article about this growing patriotism and even anti-Americanism among young Chinese, that I would recommend. And it's a very important article, because I think we had assumed in the past that young Chinese are very global, they're cosmopolitan, they dress the dress, they walk the talk, they listen to the same music. But I think that what's going on in the country especially over the last ten years is an effort to say, look, you know, stop worshiping Western things and start attaching greater value to things Chinese. And I think that that's sort of had an impact. And I think when you go and look at a classroom discussion at a place like DKU, where you have students from forty different countries talking about a common issue, Chinese students tend to band together and be very protective of China. I think that's just a common reaction that they have. Now, in a—as a semester goes on, a few of them will break away a bit from those kind of—you know, that rigidity, and open their minds to alternative ways to thinking about problems and issues, and particularly in terms of Chinese behavior. And I know that I've advised a number of students on projects, papers, et cetera. And I'm almost in awe of the fact of the degree to which they in fact have broken away from the old molds and old stereotypes that they had when they entered the program back in 2018. So this is part of a process that occurs over time. And I think it's something that we have to have some patience about. But I am worried. And I'll just give you an example. You know, a young Chinese student comes to the United States, has their visa. They get to immigration in the United States, and they're turned back all of a sudden and they're forced to go home. No apparent reason, but somebody thinks they're up to no good, or they don't—they weren't from the right, you know, high school, or whatever is the case. We've got to really be careful that we don't start to alienate not only young Chinese—which I think that's a big problem—but also Chinese American faculty and staff who are at our universities, who now feel that they're not trusted or they're under suspicion for doing something wrong. And I know in conversations that I have had with numerous of these people who have talked about should I go back, should I go to a third country? If I'm not in the U.S., should I be in—you know, in Europe? What's a good place for me to go, because I don't feel good—nor does my family feel good—now in the United States. We have created a big problem that's going to have a very negative effect on our talent needs in the 21st century. And that includes young Chinese who would come to the United States for advanced education and hopefully stay here when they get their doctorates, or whatever degree they came for, and Chinese Americans who are here who have been loyal, who have been hardworking, who now feel that somehow they are not trusted any longer. And we're in a big dilemma right now at this point in time. And I think that my experience at this JV university says, look, as I said, it doesn't happen naturally that there's a kumbaya moment that everyone gets together and hugs and is on the same wavelength. There's a lot of intense discussion among these young people that we must recognize. But hopefully, through the process of being put together and making friends and building trust, they can begin to open their minds for different perspectives and different ideas. And I think that if DKU, or NYU Shanghai, or these other campuses are going to be successful, they must continue to push in that direction. Not to close the door, pull the shades down, and simply hide. But they must be open. And one of the things at DKU, all of our events, open—are open. Our China town halls, we invited officials from Suzhou and Kunshan to come and listen to whether it was Henry Kissinger or somebody else who was—Ray Dalio, who was on, or Fareed Zakaria. They're all the same thing, we invited people to come to listen and to have an open mind to these kind of events. So I think that we are a beacon of light in the midst of a turbulence. I think President Price's comment is very apropos to what this represents. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take two written questions. The first is from Peggy Blumenthal, who is senior counselor to the president at the Institute of International Education. Do you see a difference in the kinds of Chinese students who enroll in Duke-Kushan versus those who applied to study in Duke in North Carolina? Are they less from elite political families and less wealthy families? And do you have any students from Taiwan or Hong Kong? And then a second question from GianMario Besana, who's at DePaul University, the associate provost for global engagement. How is faculty governance handled? Are faculty teaching at the JV tenured as Duke faculty? SIMON: OK. So, yes, we have students from Taiwan. And we don't always get students from Hong Kong, but we're open to having students from Hong Kong. So there is no limit. The only thing is, and I'll mention this, that all Chinese students, PRC students, must have a quote/unquote “political” course. And that course has been revised sharply by our partner at Wuhan University to make it much more of a Chinese history and culture course. The students from Taiwan must take that course. Now, they don't want to take it and they reject the idea of taking it, but that's a requirement. And so they do take it. But I can assure you, the one that we have is much softer than some of the things that go on at other Chinese Universities. In terms of the caliber of the students, one thing is very clear. As the reputation of places like DKU and NYU Shanghai, et cetera, have grown, the differentiation between who applies to the U.S. campus and who applies to the DKU campus, that differentiation is getting smaller and smaller. And the reason is very simple: we cannot have a two-track system if we're giving a Duke degree to the students graduating at DKU, and the same thing for NYU Shanghai. We must have near equivalency. And we have a very strong requirement in terms of English language capability. We don't trust, frankly, TOEFL. And we don't trust, you know, some of the other mechanism. We now deploy specialized versions of language testing so we can ensure that the quality of the language is strong enough so at the beginning of the engagement on campus, when they matriculate, they are able to hit the ground running. And that helps a great deal. In terms of faculty governance, the faculty in place, you know, at DKU, as far as I know, are able to—in effect, they meet as a faculty. There's an academic affairs committee. We have a vice chancellor for academic affairs who oversees the faculty engagement, in effect. And the faculty do have a fairly loud voice when there are certain things that they don't like. There's a Chinese tax policy is changing. That's going to have a big impact on their compensation. They've made their concerns well known to the leadership. If they don't like a curriculum that is being, you know, put in place and they want to change it, they will advocate, you know, to redo some of the curriculum that has been done, and also alter the requirements. So their voice is heard loudly and strongly. But it's through the vice chancellor for academic affairs to the executive vice chancellor of the campus. It doesn't necessarily go through the chancellor. And I don't mean to suggest that there's full compartmentation of the Chinese side. But there are certain things in which we closely operate together and joint decision making. And then there are things in which basically, at least up to my time, the engagement was a little lighter on the academic side and more intense on the operational side. And I think that that was the model that we had hoped to sustain from the beginning. FASKIANOS: Great. I'm going to take the next question from David Moore from Broward College in Florida. Do you know of any issues the Chinese have with required courses at Duke in U.S. history or U.S. government/political science? And just to give context, he writes, Florida has recently imposed a new required test in civic literacy, which has questions related to the U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, and major Supreme Court cases. Next year students in China will need to take this test in order to graduate. Are you aware of any such requirements imposed by other states? SIMON: So I'm not aware right now that North Carolina, for example, has this kind of requirement. But I can tell you that we do teach courses about American government, American society, American culture. In other words, American studies gets a full, you know, treatment, if that's what your major is or that's something that you choose to study. Now, like many places, even on a U.S. campus, except from what you've just told me, I mean, you could go through an entire university education without doing American studies whatsoever. But I think from what I'm hearing from you, that's not going to be the case in Florida now. (Laughs.) We don't—we haven't had that problem. The only requirement, as I said, is on the Chinese side, that Chinese students must have this one course on Chinese history and culture, and they also must have military service. They do this short-term summer military training that they must go through. And I've gone to the graduation. It's a—it's kind of fascinating to watch it. But, you know, it's something that's for bonding purposes. And, you know, that makes China different. Remember, this is not an island existing, you know, in the middle of in the entire China. In some ways, the campus and the fact that we're in China become part of the same reality. It is not the case—you know, we can't be an island unto ourselves. That's when I think real problems would occur. I think the more that we can integrate and understand what's going on in the larger societal context, it's important for our students, particularly the international students who come. And the international students are such a critical element because they represent an alternative perspective on the world that they bring into the classroom, as does our international faculty bring new ideas into the classroom. And those are what basically can open up the minds of our Chinese students. We're not here to make Chinese students think like Americans. We're here to raise global awareness. That's all we want to do. We want to give them alternatives and options and different perspectives on the world, and then let them make up their mind. Let them decide what's the right, or wrong, or comfortable way to think about an issue, and then feel that on this campus and then, you know, further on in their lives, they have the power and they have the capacity to think for themselves. And that's why—just one point I want to make—critical thinking is such an important part of our pedagogy. How to think critically and independently about issues and express yourself in a lucid fashion are part of what we call seven animating features that we want with each of our graduates. And another one is something called rooted globalism. And that is the ability to understand your own roots, but also the ability to understand the roots of others, and bring that to bear as you begin to look at a problem like: Why do these two countries have different views on climate change? Or why do they think different—so differently about handling pandemics, or handling even things like facial recognition and video surveillance? We have one professor who studies this, and he and I have had many numerous conversations about how to involve Chinese students in these discussions, so they don't feel intimidated, but get exposed to these kinds of debates that are going on. Now issues like what's the future of AI, in which we're looking at moral, ethical issues that face societies—all societies, not just American or Chinese society—and how do these get worked out? These are what the opportunities are that we can accomplish in these kind of joint venture environments. FASKIANOS: A next question from Lauren Sinclair. I'm administrator and faculty at NYU Shanghai. I'm very interested in the notion of pedagogical reciprocity and cross-cultural exchange. Do you see any evidence that this is occurring? Do you have qualitative or quantitative measures through institutional or student-level surveys? SIMON: So this occurs—this kind of what I call knowledge transfer occurs because we do have, as I mentioned, 25 percent of the faculty on the campus at any time are Duke or Duke-affiliated faculty. So when we are doing things on the campus at DKU, there are Duke faculty who are exposed to these experiences, they get to hear the students' presentations, et cetera, et cetera. They're part of the discussions about the curriculum. And I can tell you that the Duke curriculum and the DKU curriculum are different in many respects, ours being much more highly interdisciplinary, for example. And we have a project called Signature Work. When our students do this, they get a chance to spend—under normal situation, not COVID—but a semester at Duke. And during that semester at Duke, that also serves as a vehicle for the students to bring with them the things that they've learned, and the way that they've learned them. And we also have vehicles for our faculty in certain cases to spend time at Duke as well. And one best example I have to give you is the COVID experience. DKU was online by March of 2020. With the help of Duke's educational technology people we started delivering curriculum to our students in March, April, May, so that they could finish their semester. Quickly, by time June rolled around, Duke, as well as all sorts of U.S. universities, were faced with the dilemma of how to go online. The experience of DKU in handling the online delivery to students who were located all over the world, and the Duke need to be prepared to do that, had great benefit to Duke when it tried to implement its own online programs. That experience was very positive. The synergies captured from that were very positive. And I think that this serves as a reminder that knowledge and information can go in both directions. You mentioned cross-cultural. And again, I think the more faculty we can get to come and have an experience in China, and that they bring back with them the learning that's occurred, we've seen that now get transported back to Duke, and delivered in Duke classrooms based on the experience that they've had in China. FASKIANOS: Well, this has been a fantastic hour. Thank you very much. We are at the end of our time. It came, alas, too quickly, and I could not get to all the questions. So my apologies. But we will send around the link to this webinar, the transcript, and other resources that Dr. Simon has mentioned. So, Denis, thank you very much for doing this. We really appreciate it. SIMON: My pleasure. And thank you for having me. FASKIANOS: And we will be having our next Higher Education webinar in January 2022. So this is the last one for this year. And we will send an invitation under separate cover. As always, I encourage you to follow @CFR_Academic on Twitter and visit CFR.org, ForeignAffairs.com, and ThinkGlobalHealth.org for more resources. I'm wishing you all luck with your finals, grading, all of that, wonderful things that you have to do as faulty and as academics. And hope you enjoy the holidays. And of course, stay well and stay safe. And we look forward to reconvening in the new year. (END)

On June 13 a new TV channel launched in the UK called GB News, dubbed by many as the UK's answer to America's Fox News. In an increasingly polarised political environment, is increasingly biased media all we can expect? Is this simply an honest acceptance of the fact that all journalists are biased, that, like all of us, they occupy non-neutral perspectives onto the world of politics? Or is this giving up too quickly on the value of impartiality, when it comes to news coverage? Is there in fact a way for journalists to give us “just the facts”, free of value-judgements and prejudices?  And do worries of journalistic bias conceal some of the bigger problems with our media landscape, and make us draw false equivalences between news organisations that embody very different journalistic standards? Joe Mazor is a Senior Lecturer in Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Duke Kunshan University and a visitor at the LSE's Centre for philosophy of the natural and social sciences. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2009 and was then a postdoctoral fellow at Princeton's Center for Human Values and at Stanford's Center for Ethics in Society. He is the author of a two part blog post for the LSE called Media Impartiality: What When and Why and Media Impartiality: How on which this conversation is based. Mazor has a very interesting and original proposal for how to achieve media impartiality, inspired by the adversarial trial model, so make sure you listen to the second part of our conversation when we come to discuss it.  This podcast is created in partnership with The Philosopher, the UK's longest running public philosophy journal: https://www.thephilosopher1923.org Artwork by Nick HallidayMusic by Rowan Mcilvride 

Vitamin B6 deficiency enhances the noradrenergic system, leading to behavioral deficits Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science, May 27, 2021 Schizophrenia is a heterogeneous psychiatric disorder characterized by positive symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions, negative symptoms such as apathy and lack of emotion, and cognitive impairment. We have reported that VB6 (pyridoxal) levels in peripheral blood of a subpopulation of patients with schizophrenia is significantly lower than that of healthy controls. More than 35% of patients with schizophrenia have low levels of VB6 (clinically defined as male: < 6 ng/ml, female: < 4 ng/ml). VB6 level is inversely proportional to severity score on the positive and negative symptom scale (PANSS), suggesting that VB6 deficiency might contribute to the development of schizophrenia symptoms. In fact, a recent review has shown the decreased VB6 in patients with schizophrenia as the most convincing evidence in peripheral biomarkers for major mental disorders. Additionally, we recently reported that high-dose VB6 (pyridoxamine) was effective in alleviating psychotic symptoms, particularly the PANSS negative and general subscales, in a subset of patients with schizophrenia. Although a link between lower VB6 level and schizophrenia is widely hypothesized, the mechanism behind this remains poorly understood. VB6 is not synthesized de novo in humans, but is primarily obtained from foods. In the present study, to clarify the relationship between VB6 deficiency and schizophrenia, we generated VB6-deficient (VB6(-)) mice through feeding with a VB6-lacking diet as a mouse model for the subpopulation of schizophrenia patients with VB6 deficiency. After feeding for 4 weeks, plasma VB6 level in VB6(-) mice decreased to 3% of that in control mice. The VB6(-) mice showed social deficits and cognitive impairment. Furthermore, the VB6(-) mice showed a marked increase in 3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenylglycol (MHPG) in the brain, suggesting enhanced NA metabolism in VB6(-) mice. We confirmed the increased NA release in the prefrontal cortex and the striatum of VB6(-) mice through in vivo microdialysis. These findings suggest that the activities of NAergic neuronal systems are enhanced in VB6(-) mice. Furthermore, VB6 supplementation directly into the brain using an osmotic pump ameliorated the hyperactivation of the NAergic system and behavioral abnormalities. indicating that the enhanced NA turnover and the behavioral deficits shown in the VB6(-) mice are attributed to VB6 deficiency in the central nervous system. In addition, the ?2A adrenergic receptor agonist guanfacine also improved the hyperactivated NAergic system in the frontal cortex and behavioral disorders. These results show that the behavioral deficits in VB6(-) mice may be caused by an enhancement of NAergic signaling. Schizophrenic patients with VB6 deficiency, who account for more than 35% of all patients, present with relatively severe clinical symptoms and treatment resistance. Our findings suggest that a new therapeutic strategy targeting the NAergic system might be effective for these patients. They will also provide evidence based on pathophysiology for a new therapeutic strategy called "VB6 treatment for schizophrenia," which we are currently conducting clinical research on.     Families with a child with ADHD can benefit from mindfulness training Radboud University Medical Center (Netherlands), May 27, 2021 Children with ADHD are generally treated with medication and/or behavioral treatments. However, medication-alone is insufficient in a quarter to a third of the children. For that reason, the scientists investigated whether a mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) would have a positive effect on children who did not respond sufficiently to other ADHD treatments. MBIs can elicit positive effects on psychological symptoms and behavior of children and parents.  In the study, two groups of children between the ages of eight and sixteen were compared. One group received only regular care (CAU, care-as-usual), and the other group also received MYmind, the mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) with at least one parent. They did this training for a period of eight weeks. A striking result was that parents especially benefited from this training. There was an increase in mindful parenting, self-compassion and an improvement in mental health among the parents. These effects were still visible six months after the end of the training. In the children, there were some effects on ADHD symptoms, anxiety, and autistic traits, but effects were small. Yet, a subgroup appeared to benefit: One in three children reliably improved on self-control following MYmind, whereas only one in ten improved when following only regular care. Professor of Environmental Sensitivity in Health and psychologist Corina Greven of Radboudumc, the Donders Institute and Karakter says that usual interventions for children with ADHD typically do not target mental health of parents, although they often struggle with parenting stress, anxiety or own ADHD symptoms. "While effects in children were small, we still found effects in the parents. Interviewing families , our team also discovered that many families reported important improvements in family relationships and insight in and acceptance of ADHD. We need to go broader than just looking at whether an intervention reduces symptoms, and include additional outcomes that families find important." The study was conducted in collaboration with the Radboud Center for Mindfulness.     Sweet cherry anthocyanins support liver health Zhei-Jang University (China), June 1, 2021 Anthocyanins from sweet cherries may protect against diet-induced liver steatosis, or excessive amounts of fat in the liver’s tissue, says a new study with rats.  The study , published in the journal Nutrition, built upon the abundant existing literature on the beneficial role anthocyanins have as an antioxidative, anti-inflammatory, and anti-hyperlipidemic component. Specifically, the cyanidin-3-glucoside variant “[has] been reported to ameliorate hepatic steatosis and adipose inflammation,” the researchers wrote. The condition known as liver steatosis is a common non-alcoholic fatty liver disease usually treated with drugs, but according to the researchers, some drug used for treatment “are usually accompanied by some adverse effect.” For 15 weeks, the researchers investigated the effects of sweet cherry anthocyanin supplementation have on alleviating high-fat diet-induced liver steatosis in rodents to explore the possibility of a none-drug treatment for the liver condition. Preparing the mice and the sweet cherry anthocyanins The sweet cherry anthocyanin was extracted and pulverized, with one mg of the anthocyanin measured to contain amounts of cyanidine-3-rutinoside and pelargonidin-3-rutinoside, among other things. Thirty male rodents were used for the study. The animals were housed five per cage and randomly divided into three groups: 10 rodents fed a low-fat diet, 10 rodents fed a high-fat diet, and 10 rodents fed a high-fat diet supplemented with sweet cherry anthocyanins. The supplementation was given in liquid form at 200 mg/kg orally at the same time daily for 15 weeks, and the body weights and food intakes were monitored weekly. Observations The mice were sacrificed at week 15 after a half-day fast. Blood samples were collected and livers collected, rinsed with cold saline, and then weighed. An automatic biochemistry analyser was used to measure total cholesterol, triacylglycerol, alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol. They found that at week 15, mice fed a high-fat diet supplemented with sweet cherry anthocyanins “displayed a significant reduction in body weight, liver weight, and liver index” compared to the mice that were only given a high-fat diet without supplementation. They also found the serum levels for tricylglycerol, total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol in high-fat diet mice to be substantially higher than those fed a low-fat diet, but the group supplemented with the anthocyanin resulted in a significant reduction in these serum parameters.” According to the researchers, the results demonstrated how sweet cherry anthocyanins may be developed into a supplement to “protect from high-fat diet-induced hepatic steatosis in mice,”leading to a suggested potential for the anthocyanin’s application in the “treatment of hepatic steatosis and other obesity related metabolic disorders.”     Healthy lifestyle linked to better cognition for oldest adults -- regardless of genetic risk New study suggests importance of maintaining healthy lifestyle even after age 80 Duke University & Kunshan University (China), June 1, 2021 A new analysis of adults aged 80 years and older shows that a healthier lifestyle is associated with a lower risk of cognitive impairment, and that this link does not depend on whether a person carries a particular form of the gene APOE. Xurui Jin of Duke Kunshan University in Jiangsu, China, and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS Medicine. The APOE gene comes in several different forms, and people with a form known as APOE ε4 have an increased risk of cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease. Previous research has also linked cognitive function to lifestyle factors, such as smoking, exercise, and diet. However, it has been unclear whether the benefits of a healthy lifestyle are affected by APOE ε4, particularly for adults over 80 years of age. To clarify the relationship between APOE ε4 and lifestyle, Jin and colleagues examined data from 6,160 adults aged 80 or older who had participated in a larger, ongoing study known as the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey. The researchers statistically analyzed the data to investigate links between APOE ε4, lifestyle, and cognition. They also accounted for sociodemographics and other factors that could impact cognition. The analysis confirmed that participants with healthy lifestyles or intermediately healthy lifestyles were significantly less likely to have cognitive impairment than those with an unhealthy lifestyle, by 55 and 28 percent, respectively. In addition, participants with APOE ε4 were 17 percent more likely to have cognitive impairment than those with other forms of APOE. A previous study suggested that in individuals at low and intermediate genetic risk, favorable lifestyle profiles are related to a lower risk of dementia compared to unfavorable profiles. But these protective associations were not found in those at high genetic risk. However, the investigation showed the link between lifestyle and cognitive impairment did not vary significantly based on APOE ε4 status which represented the genetic dementia risk. This suggests that maintaining a healthier lifestyle could be important for maintaining cognitive function in adults over 80 years of age, regardless of genetic risk.  This cross-sectional study emphasized the importance of a healthy lifestyle on cognitive health. While further research will be needed to validate these findings among different population, this study could help inform efforts to boost cognitive function for the oldest of adults. In the next step, the team will explore this association using the AD polygenetic risk score (AD-PRS) and explore the interactive relationship between AD-PRS and lifestyle on cognition with the longitudinal data.     Study shows BPA exposure below regulatory levels can impact brain development University of Calgary (Canada) June 1, 2021   BPA disrupts development of the mouse brain sleep centre (outlined), image on right. The change can impact behaviour. The control image on the left ("CON") shows sleep centre without BPA. Credit: Kurrasch lab, published in Science Advances Humans are exposed to a bath of chemicals every day. They are in the beds where we sleep, the cars that we drive and the kitchens we use to feed our families. With thousands of chemicals floating around in our environment, exposure to any number is practically unavoidable. Through the work of researchers like Dr. Deborah Kurrasch, Ph.D., the implications of many of these chemicals are being thoroughly explored. "Manufacturers follow standards set by regulatory bodies, it's not up to the manufacturers to prove the chemicals in consumer products are safe," says Kurrasch, a researcher in the University of Calgary's Hotchkiss Brain Institute (HBI) and Alberta Children's Research Institute at the Cumming School of Medicine. "Scientists play a critical role and do the meticulous work of determining where the risks lie." Kurrasch's research over the past decade has focused on a chemical that is broadly recognizable: Bisphenol A, also known as BPA. This chemical is commonly found in plastics, canned food linings, and even thermal receipts. Studies from Kurrasch's lab contribute to the collective research that shows the harms of exposure to this industrial compound. The latest study out of Kurrasch's lab, published in Science Advances, suggests that continued vigilance is needed. A postdoctoral researcher in her lab, Dr. Dinu Nesan, Ph.D., examined the impact of low levels of BPA exposure to pregnant mice and the brain development of their offspring. "Our goal was to model BPA levels equivalent to what pregnant women and developing babies are typically exposed to," says Kurrasch. "We purposefully did not use a high dose. In fact, our doses were 11-times and nearly 25-times lower than those deemed safe by Health Canada and the FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration), respectively. Even at these low levels, we saw effects on prenatal brain development in the mice." Using this BPA exposure model, Nesan found striking changes to the brain region responsible for driving circadian rhythms, the suprachiasmatic nucleus, located in the hypothalamus. When prenatally exposed to these low levels of BPA, the suprachiasmatic nucleus failed to develop properly. This change can have implications for sleep, activity levels, and other behaviors. "Previously we showed embryonic exposure to low-dose BPA can affect the timing of when neurons develop in zebrafish, but it was unclear whether a similar effect would be observed in a mammalian model with more similarities to humans," says Nesan, first author on the study. When neurons develop, they rely on proper signals to guide them. If neurons develop too early, the cues they experience are different, which can lead to developmental errors such as migrating to the wrong location, becoming the wrong type of neuron, or forming inappropriate connections. These errors can lead to altered behaviors later in life. "Our study shows that in pregnant mice, prenatal exposure to BPA affects the timing of neuron development in the fetal brain, which has lasting effects on behaviors. Offspring that are exposed to BPA during gestation are awake longer and exhibit hyperactivity. The prenatal BPA exposure seems to change the brain's circadian cues, causing the animals to have elevated energy levels and spend less time resting," says Nesan. The researchers are hopeful their findings will add continued pressure on regulatory bodies to keep revisiting their determinations around safe levels of BPA. "We think there's an incredible abundance of data showing BPA exposure guidelines are not yet at the appropriate level, which includes even the EU (European Union) who is leading on this front, but their 'safe' levels are still twice the dose we used in our study" says Kurrasch, "We hope our research serves as a reminder that low dose BPA is still capable of causing changes that are measurable and significant." Her message of how to interpret this research is simple: Limit your exposure to BPA the best you can.  Maintain smart practices with plastics in your kitchen, for example not heating them, and using glass or stainless steel when possible. This research was conducted in collaboration with Dr. Michael Antle, Ph.D., professor of psychology and member of the HBI.   Selenium plus CoQ10 intake associated with reductions in D-dimer and cardiovascular mortality Linköping University (Sweden), June 2, 2021 Findings from a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, published on April 17, 2021 in the journal Nutrients,revealed a reduction in D-dimer levels among older Swedish men and women who received selenium and coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), as well as a lower risk of mortality from cardiovascular disease in individuals having higher D-dimer levels at baseline.  Coenzyme Q10 is an antioxidant involved in the mitochondria’s production of energy. It has been estimated that the body’s production of CoQ10 at the age of 80 years is approximately half that of someone who is 20 years old.  Selenium is a trace element necessary for normal function of human cells. Dietary intake of this mineral may be insufficient in areas of the world that have low soil selenium levels. Selenium also is necessary for the function of many antioxidant enzymes, including one which recycles CoQ10, and has anti-inflammatory activity. D-dimer is a fragment of degraded fibrin and is commonly used to assess for the presence or degradation of potentially dangerous blood clots (venous thromboembolism or pulmonary embolism). It also reflects the activity of peripheral artery disease and has been shown to be associated with endothelial dysfunction and inflammation even in the absence of thromboembolism. The current investigation included 213 men and women aged 70 to 88 years who did not have conditions known to influence D-dimer concentrations (e.g., atrial fibrillation, malignancies). Participants received a placebo or 200 micrograms selenium plus 200 milligrams CoQ10 daily for four years.  Blood samples collected from the subjects upon enrollment in the trial and at 48 months were analyzed for levels of D-dimer. Although D-dimer levels were not significantly different between groups at the beginning of the trial, it was noted to be significantly associated with age. At 48 months, a significantly lower level of D-dimer was found among those who received selenium and CoQ10 in comparison with the placebo, which was maintained after adjustment for co-variates that might influence D-dimer (such as C-reactive protein).  When participants with D-dimer levels that were above the median of all participants at baseline were analyzed, an association was found between intake of selenium and CoQ10 and a lower risk of cardiovascular mortality. Among those whose D-dimer levels were higher than 0.21 mg/L at the beginning of the study, one person among 53 who received selenium and CoQ10 died during a median 4.9-year follow-up period compared to 8 of the 52 who received a placebo. Mortality from all causes was also lower in the selenium and CoQ10 group; however, the reduction failed to reach statistical significance. This group also reported a larger study, which didn’t exclude individuals having conditions known to increase D-dimer, finding that in the older Swedish citizens the combination of selenium and CoQ10 significantly increased heart systolic function, lowered NT-proBNP (which is elevated during heart failure) and decreased risk of cardiovascular mortality, defined as death from myocardial infarctions, cerebrovascular lesions, cardiac arrythmias, heart failure or aortic aneurysms.1 “[Intake of] selenium and coenzyme Q10 in a group of elderly low in selenium and coenzyme Q10 prevented an increase in D-dimer and reduced the risk of cardiovascular mortality in comparison with the placebo group,” concluded first author Urban Alehagen and his colleagues. “The obtained results also illustrate important associations between inflammation, endothelial function and cardiovascular risk.”     Effect of Korean Red Ginseng on Cognitive Function and Quantitative EEG in Alzheimer Patients Seoul Medical Center  (Korea) June 1, 2021 Researchers detail new data in Neurodegenerative Diseases. According to news reporting originating in Seoul, South Korea  research stated, "Korean red ginseng (KRG) has a nootropic effect. This study assessed the efficacy of KRG on cognitive function and quantitative electroencephalography (EEG) in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD)." The news reporters obtained a quote from the research from Seoul Medical Center, "Fourteen patients with AD (mean age, 74.93 years; 11 women and 3 men) were recruited and treated with KRG (4.5 g per day) for 12 weeks. Cognitive function was assessed by the Korean Mini-Mental State Examination (K-MMSE) and the Frontal Assessment Battery (FAB). EEG performed before and after treatment were analyzed with quantitative spectral analysis. The FAB score improved significantly after 12 weeks of treatment. In the relative power spectrum analysis performed according to responsiveness, alpha power increased significantly in the right temporal area of the responders. The increments of relative alpha power in the right temporal, parietal, and occipital areas were significantly higher in the responders than the nonresponders." According to the news reporters, the research concluded: "This study indicates the efficacy of KRG on frontal lobe function in AD, related to increasing relative alpha power."

This episode is sponsored by Davwill Consulting. Emotional agility? Yep, it's needed more now than ever. Let's chat! Click HereBlair Sheppard joined PwC in 2012 as Global Leader, Strategy and Leadership. Blair leads the team that is responsible for articulating PwC's global strategy across 158 countries and the development of the current and next generation of PwC leaders. He is also Professor Emeritus and Dean Emeritus of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business.Blair spent the majority of his career at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University. During his tenure, Blair held several roles, including Associate Dean for Executive Education, during which Fuqua created one of the world's first blended degrees, the Global Executive MBA, and founding CEO and Chairman of Duke Corporate Education, which was rated as the world's top provider of custom executive education for nine years in a row. As Dean, Blair was also the primary architect of Duke Kunshan University in China, which opened in 2014. Blair has advised more than 100 companies and governments in the areas of leadership, corporate strategy, organizational relationships and design, and has published more than 50 books and articles. His most recent publications, A crisis of legitimacy and Adapting to a new world in strategy+business magazine, focus on the most acute global challenges facing the world today, including those of the post-COVID-19 landscape. And his book Ten years to midnight: four global crises and their strategic solutions was published in August 2020.Blair is a regular speaker at high-caliber international forums including the Global Solutions Summit, the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, and Slush.Blair is an international advisory board member at the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO and at the University of Oman.Blair received his Doctorate in social psychology from the University of Illinois in 1980 and Masters from the University of Western Ontario (London, Ontario) in 1977.The world has 10 years to solve its urgent challenges or it will be too late. In his new book, TEN YEARS TO MIDNIGHT: Four Urgent Global Crises and Their Strategic Solutions (August 4, 2020; Berret-Koehler), Blair Sheppard sets out why that timeline is so crucial, what the most urgent challenges are and the key elements of a solution. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit debcrowe.substack.com

Blair Sheppard joined PwC in 2012 as Global Leader, Strategy and Leadership. Blair leads the team that is responsible for articulating PwC's global strategy across 158 countries and the development of the current and next generation of PwC leaders. He is also Professor Emeritus and Dean Emeritus of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. Blair spent the majority of his career at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University. During his tenure, Blair held several roles, including Associate Dean for Executive Education, during which Fuqua created one of the world's first blended degrees, the Global Executive MBA, and founding CEO and Chairman of Duke Corporate Education, which was rated as the world's top provider of custom executive education for nine years in a row. As Dean, Blair was also the primary architect of Duke Kunshan University in China, which opened in 2014. Blair has advised more than 100 companies and governments in the areas of leadership, corporate strategy, organizational relationships and design, and has published more than 50 books and articles. His most recent publications, A crisis of legitimacy and Adapting to a new world in strategy+business magazine, focus on the most acute global challenges facing the world today, including those of the post-COVID-19 landscape. And his book Ten years to midnight: four global crises and their strategic solutions will be published in August 2020. Blair is a regular speaker at high-caliber international forums including the Global Solutions Summit, the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, and Slush. Blair is an international advisory board member at the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO and at the University of Oman. I'm very thrilled and excited to welcome Blair to today's Go4Leadership Podcast.

The fair-weather fan gets a lot of contempt from the die-hards. Kyle Fruh, assistant professor of philosophy at Duke Kunshan University, wonders if these fans have it right after all. Kyle Fruh is an assistant professor of philosophy at Duke Kunshan University. Dr. Fruh’s current research focuses on the nature of promises and promissory obligation, […]

In this episode, Dr. Thomas Buchheit sheds light on who are good candidates for regenerative therapies, when and where to go for such therapies, and what the various types of regen therapies there are and how they work. Check out these slides that are referenced in the interview, "What do PRP, Stem Cells, and other Regenerative Therapies Really do?" Who is Dr. Buchheit? He is Director of The Regenerative Pain Therapies Program at Duke (DukeRPTP.org). He has practiced pain management and musculoskeletal medicine for the past 20 years and has published multiple papers clarifying the underlying biochemical and inflammatory mechanisms that drive chronic pain. He previously served as Division Chief for Pain Medicine in the Duke Department of Anesthesiology prior to focusing full time on the study and development of regenerative therapies for patients with osteoarthritis. He co-founded The Regenerative Pain Therapies Program in 2018 with Dr. William Maixner with the goal of moving beyond symptom management to address the underlying causes of degenerative conditions. The objective of the Program is to develop and deploy biologically-based interventions to improve long-term joint health by changing disease course. Dr. Buchheit is currently involved with researchers in the United States and Europe, investigating the foundational immune mechanisms of pain relief with PRP, autologous conditioned serum, and stem cells, and has lectured extensively on these topics. He has mentored with Dr. Peter Wehling and is currently one of the few clinical sites in the US to offer the Autologous Conditioned Serum Program from Düsseldorf, Germany. 3 Selected Publications: 1. Buchheit T, Huh Y, Maixner W, Cheng J, Ji RR. Neuroimmune modulation of pain and regenerative pain medicine. J Clin Invest. 2020. Epub 2020/04/07. doi:10.1172/JCI134439. PubMed PMID: 32250346. 2. Buchheit T. Future therapies and the expanding role for diagnostic ultrasound. Curr Opin Anaesthesiol. 2016 Oct;29(5):582–3. PMID: 27455044 3. Yin C, Buchheit TE, Park JJ. Acupuncture for chronic pain: an update and critical overview. Curr Opin Anaesthesiol. Oct, 2017;30(5):583-592. PMID: 28719458 Complete List of Published Work in MyBibliography: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/thomas.buchheit.1/bibliography/public/ Recent Presentations: Translational Pain Research Symposium, Duke Kunshan University and Fudan University, Kunshan China. June 21-23, 2017. Nerve Injury and Amputation: Phenotypes, Novel Markers, and Prevention. American Pain Society Annual Meeting, Milwaukee, WI. April 3-6, 2019. Applications for Regenerative Therapies: Is the Hype Justified? World Institute of Pain World Congress, Rome Italy (Virtual). August 26-29. Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine: Reconciling basic science, translational application, and clinical outcomes. Pain Society of the Carolinas Annual Meeting, Asheville, NC (Virtual) September 18-19, 2020. Regenerative Medicine American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine Annual Pain Medicine Meeting. November 19- 21, 2020. Las Vegas, Nevada (Virtual). Regenerative Medicine Lecture. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/painless-pain-management/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/painless-pain-management/support

Blair Sheppard is Head of Global Strategy and Leadership for PwC, a global network of firms delivering world-class assurance, tax, and consulting services for businesses. He is also the author of the new book, Ten Years to Midnight: Four Urgent Global Crises and Their Strategic Solutions, which came out on August 4th.    Prior to PwC, Blair spent the majority of his career as a professor at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University. During his time there he also served as Founding CEO and Chairman of Duke Corporate Education and as Dean of the school. As Dean, Blair was the primary architect of Duke Kunshan University which opened in 2014.    Blair was the first recipient of faculty of the year at Fuqua, he received the Business Person of the Year award for Education in 2011 by Triangle Business Journal, and the Eminent Scholar Award from the Institute of Finance at Frankfurt University in 2007.    The concept behind Blair’s book, Ten Years to Midnight, started with a conversation he had with his boss at the time at PwC. They were discussing the fact that a lot of things in the world were looking dark and gray and they wanted to figure out what the major issues were and what causes were behind them. So they set out to interview people in around 60 countries around the world. They interviewed people from all walks of life--government leaders, heads of business, cab drivers, individuals in coffee shops, etc... And what they found was the whole world was worried about the exact same things.    So Blair and his team started to research these major issues and what they found was that there are four major crises the world as a whole is facing right now and we have about 10 years to fix them before it is too late.    The crisis of prosperity As Blair and his team were researching for the book, one thing they found is that due to economic disparity in the world and people put at a disadvantage because of that, a lot of parents feel that their children will be worse off than they are.    Blair says, “Think about 50% of the retirees in the United States are going to retire with basically no savings, kids graduating from college with a trillion and a half in debt, with a huge tax obligation we just created for them, right. And then people have a job and a mortgage and the kid in school who are likely to lose that job right and have to transition. That group is now collectively saying I'm really worried about the future. And when people stop believing in the future, they stopped dreaming, creating, developing, so we call that sort of a crisis of prosperity.”   The crisis of technology Another key element we are facing right now is disruption from technology. There are great things that come with advances in technology--medical advances, improved quality of life, availability of valuable information, etc… But there are also negative impacts as well.    One example Blair points out is social media. While the creators of social media intended their platforms for good, there are negative things that come from it, like increasing suicide rates. Technology also allowed us to create the Industrial Revolution which has brought about an improved quality of life in some aspects, but it has also harmed our environment.    Aside from these examples there are other growing unintended consequences of ubiquitous technology that we have to fix.    The crisis of institutional legitimacy As it is growing clearer by the day, people around the world have lost trust in our institutions. We don’t trust the police force, we don’t trust the tax systems, we don’t trust our education systems, we don’t trust our governments.    Blair says, “this is the one that worries me the most, by the way, because as soon as you stop trusting the institutions that make our life work, it's sort of like a fish not trusting water. It just doesn't work.”   The crisis of leadership The three previous crises combine to produce this fourth crisis, which is mainly caused by polarization. A lot of times when people lose hope and feel that things are getting worse they blame the people in power. There is just a sheer inability to lead when the world is so fractured and polarized. In order to lead effectively leaders need people to trust them.      About all four of the crises, Blair says, “The worry we have is that they're all pretty serious right now. But if we don't get our arms around them in a decade, they become really ugly, all four of them, all a sudden become really ugly.” So what can we do to start addressing these problems?   Conquering the four crises In his book, Blair says that what we really need in order to address these issues is new types of leaders to rework our institutions, culture, and our way of thinking. We need leaders who have ingenuity, vision, innovation, energy, focus, and empathy.    With the prosperity crisis we need to step back and figure out how to get everyone on a level playing field. Lack of access to technology shouldn’t hinder people around the world. But right now there are a lot of people being left behind in the world. And globalization stops working when you have enough places and people in the world that fall behind.    As Blair shares, “While we're focusing on being global competitors, we also have to help create thriving local communities. While we're measuring GDP, we have to look at economic dispersion, how well the whole economy is doing, how well everyone's doing, and other measures of social well-being, not just financial. And while we're driving technology, we've got to say, have we thought about the unintended consequences of the thing we're building? It's sort of like the way we do drug development, right, which is-- does it really do what it says, and what are the side effects?”   In regards to the technology crisis, Blair says one thing we have to be mindful of is how technology is impacting work. Will there be more jobs or less jobs in the future? Just like in the Industrial Revolution, the transition will be hard, but what problems can we think through ahead of time?    There is also a lot to figure out around AI. It can violate privacy and put control in too few hands as well as make decisions that we can’t understand. How can we make sure that we keep it in check? Jobs, AI at scale, and technology making us dumber are all serious negative side effects of technology that we have to navigate as we continue advancing forward.    When thinking about the technology crisis as individuals it is important to be aware of disruptions that are happening in your industry and be prepared to move if you see signs your job could be eliminated. Be curious and keep on learning new skills and surround yourself with people who are different than you are. Don’t just associate with people who work in your department, branch out and spend time with people in different roles, industries, and parts of the world.    When addressing the leadership crisis it is important for leaders to understand the main underlying causes of this crisis, which are polarization and distrust in leaders. So they need to find ways to help people come together, to find solutions or compromises and they need to rebuild trust with employees, customers, and communities. It is also crucial that leaders know what the purpose of the company is. Because if you want to innovate inside of your organization you have to know what matters at the core of your business, otherwise it is easy to get lost.    Blair’s advice for leaders who want to build trust is to be consistent, know what your values are and stay true to them. And in every decision you make, be transparent about what you are doing and explain what you are doing and why. Be very self reflective and self aware and know the impact you are having on people.    Climate change and small business creation Along with the four major crises, there are also other issues that are so urgent we can’t wait for them to be fixed. Two of those issues that Blair points out are climate change and creating small business at scale really fast.    So why should leaders and organizations care about these two issues? With climate change it will impact everyone eventually, including your organization. But if we wait to be personally affected by it, it may be too late. It is also most likely that organizations will be forced to go net zero soon with new policies. So why wait to be forced into it.    But this will impact your business eventually. Blair says, “There are physical risks associated with climate. So let's imagine you hold real estate in downtown Miami and the first floor is underwater. You kind of care about it now. Right? Let's imagine you're in California and your property sits in front of a mudslide, let's imagine you own timber, and it's under fire. And so every business in the world has physical risks associated with climate, and every year they're going to get worse.”   As for small business creation, a lot of small businesses have been impacted by current events. And every organization, whether they realize it or not, depends on small businesses to thrive. Small business, for a lot of companies, is the first step in the supply chain. So you depend on it. But the owners of these small businesses are also customers of larger companies and if they don’t come back, your revenue stream is going to go down. Small business is a crucial part of our economy. So every leader should be concerned about these two more urgent issues.    What can leaders do now? Blair gives a few tips that any leader out there can implement now to start making change. Part one: Look at the direct implications of climate risk on your company and figure out what you can do to get to net zero Take a look at your organization and assess your ability to compete in a platform based world Figure out if you are prepared for the pressures toward localization that we’re going to see Part two: Look at yourself and your leadership team. Are you ready for the three points above and have you invested in those things?  Make sure you have a diverse team with people who are different than you are Part three: Pick a place (a city, a town, a village, etc...) you care about and make it better   “If you are working on making something in the world that's physical geography better. It will force you to think about all the things you're not thinking about today that are important for your business. And then when someone comes back and says you're the bad guy, you're not. Because you're actually working the issue. And so it has two positive benefits you actually are helping. And so if I go back to your question, you know, one of our leaders who said, I'm going to worry about Black Lives Matters and diversity. And they did it before it was a big issue. And I think that taught a lot to us as a firm. And it actually puts us in a position where we're kind of on the right side of the balance sheet when people start judging how you're doing. And everyone should do that. But really make it better. Don't fake it. Right? Go after it.”

HAPPY MONDAY!! This week, we have our first ever guest, Queena! Queena is a rising junior at Duke Kunshan University. We tackle topics like figuring out our own cultural identity as Chinese Americans and finding people that we can connect with in college! Have a topic you want us to talk about? Follow us on Instagram: @passthebobapodcast (Intro Music from Epidemic Sound: Ooyy - Thunderbird)

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hasidic leader R. Nachman of Braslav (1772–1810) has held a place in the Jewish popular imagination for more than two centuries. Some see him as the (self-proclaimed) Messiah, others as the forerunner of modern Jewish literature. Existing studies struggle between these dueling readings, largely ignoring questions of aesthetics and politics in his work. Permanent Beginning: R. Nachman of Braslav and Jewish Literary Modernity (SUNY Press, 2020) lays out a new paradigm for understanding R. Nachman’s thought and writing, and, with them, the beginnings of Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis examines the connections between imperial modernization processes in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth century and the emergence of “modern literature” in the storytelling of R. Nachman. Reading his tales and teachings alongside the social, legal, and intellectual history of the time, the book’s guiding question is literary: How does R. Nachman represent this changing environment in his writing? Lewis paints a nuanced and fascinating portrait of a literary thinker and creative genius at the very moment his world was evolving unrecognizably. He argues compellingly that R. Nachman’s narrative response to his changing world was a major point of departure for Jewish literary modernity. Yitzhak Lewis is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University, China. Dr. Yakir Englander is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at: Yakir1212englander@gmail.com   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re talking with Denis Simon, Executive Vice Chancellor at US-Sino joint university Duke Kunshan University. We discuss how DKU handled China's sudden lockdown in February and the school's switch to remote learning. We also chat about how DKU is preparing for the fall semester while China's borders remain closed, stopping many students and faculty from returning to campus, and what the outlook for US-Sino joint universities looks like during an uncertain time. 

Today my guest is Mark Greeven, Professor of Innovation and Strategy at IMD. I’m going to begin by commenting on the amazing timing of my interview with Mark, just last week. In our conversation, his first-hand insight into the culture and strategies of Chinese business as they experienced the COVID-19 crisis, are absolutely relevant for us, as leaders, as we are now experiencing the same in the USA. In our conversation, Mark explains why China, the people and their organizations were able to react so quickly to a sudden and immediate crisis. Why they seemed so much more prepared with a huge population of 1.4 billion – even within the healthcare system, and how did they mobilize exponential technologies so quickly? Before joining IMD, Mark also held faculty positions in China and The Netherlands, and currently serves as a a research associate at China’s National Institute for Innovation Management, Center for China and Globalization, Center for Global R&D and Innovation, and the US-China Innovation Research Center at Duke Kunshan University. With a decade of experience in research, teaching and consulting in China, Mark has learned how to organize innovation in a turbulent world; and through collaboration with innovative Chinese companies and entrepreneurial multinationals, has explored novel ways of organizing, accelerating corporate innovation, and designing business ecosystems to thrive on uncertainty. Mark’s latest book, Pioneers, Hidden Champions, Change Makers and Underdogs: Lessons from China’s Innovators, was published in 2019; and in 2017, he was named on the “2017 Thinkers50 Radar list of 30 next generation business thinkers”, an annual ranking that the Financial Times deemed the “Oscars of Management Thinking”. Listen to this novel interview as Mark and I discuss business ecosystems and how we need to do things together, as a leader, individually, and as a company. Mark will share with us his predictions for the outcome and lasting impact of turbulent events, which don’t all happen to be bad. The consequences will reveal that resilience during these uncertain times will set apart the more successful leaders from the less successful leaders. Here are some of things that you will learn in this podcast episode: How did Chinese companies respond so quickly to the COVID-19 virus? What allows Chinese companies to be so agile and reactive to change? How can strategy be a form of fear? How can strategy be more like, ‘strategy on the spot’ to make things happen fast? Strategy for a changing world | Deliberate vs. Non-deliberate or emerging Why is this particular event not a big deal to Chinese leaders and what can we learn from them? What are some practical ways business leaders can create a more reactive execution capability? Why does Single Threaded Leadership blast through the ceiling of complexity? How can a small company who has grown into a larger organization still maintain an intrapreneurial spirit and mindset? Books Published: Pioneers, Hidden Champions, Change Makers and Underdogs: Lessons from China’s Innovators, by Mark J. Greeven, George S. Yip, and Wei Wei. (The MIT Press, 2019) Business ecosystems in China: Alibaba and competing Baidu, Tencent, Xiaomi and LeEco, by Mark J. Greeven and Wei Wei. (Routledge, 2018). Awards: Named on the “2017 Thinkers50 Radar list of 30 next generation business thinkers”, an annual ranking that the Financial Times deemed the “Oscars of Management Thinking”

In this episode Runya Liu, an undergraduate at Duke Kunshan University, and I talk with Paul Scharre, Senior Fellow and Director of the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, on his book Army of None: Lethal Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War.

In this episode Hsien-Yao Chee and Leo Barbara, undergraduates at Duke Kunshan University, interview Philip Brey, Professor of Philosophy of Technology at the University of Twente, on Artificial Intelligence and Surveillance technologies.

In this episode Anika Kuchukova, an undergraduate at Duke Kunshan University, and I interview Azim Shariff, an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, on the Moral Machine Experiment and autonomous vehicles.

In this episode Bella Jia, an undergraduate at Duke Kunshan University, and I interview Robert Seamans, an Associate Professor of Management and Organizations in New York University’s Stern School of Business, on Artificial Intelligence and the Economy.

What if we could turn smog into diamonds? This seemingly far-fetched idea is actually not so far from reality: a Dutch designer recently installed a tower in one of Beijing's most well-known art districts which does exactly that. While the installation is more art than long-term pollution solution, what if the growing movement of pollution-focused art in China could influence policy and the way that environmental issues are regulated, thus posing scalable impacts? We sit down with Dr. Kathinka Fürst, assistant adjunct professor of environmental policy at Duke Kunshan University, to discuss her recent research on smog art in China. Dr. Fürst sheds light on how artists are confronting pollution challenges with creativity and innovation, as well as the role that art could potentially play by impacting policy. She also touches on her previous research on environmental civil society in China as a pollution regulator. You can read more about Dr. Fürst's work on her webpage: https://dukekunshan.edu.cn/en/environment/faculty/kathinka-f%C3%BCrst-phd.

In conversation with NCUSCR President Stephen Orlins, former AIIB General Counsel Natalie Lichtenstein discusses the process behind drafting the bank's charter.    Natalie Lichtenstein is a U.S. lawyer who has specialized in legal issues at international financial institutions, and legal development in China, since the 1970s. She was the inaugural general counsel of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the principal drafter of the AIIB Charter. Her work for AIIB drew on her 30-year legal career at the World Bank, where she advised on lending operations in China and other countries for 20 years. During her last decade there, she served in senior positions, specializing in institutional governance issues and reforms. As a young lawyer at the U.S. Treasury Department, she worked on international financial institution matters and normalization of U.S.-China relations. Ms. Lichtenstein has taught Chinese law in the U.S. since the 1980s, and has consulted on Chinese legal development projects. She is an adjunct professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a member of the advisory board of the Duke-Kunshan University. In addition to her book on the AIIB, she is the author of numerous articles in professional journals. She received her AB summa cum laudein East Asian Studies and JD from Harvard University.

In 2014, China announced the creation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), an ambitious multilateral project aimed at fostering economic development throughout Asia. The AIIB, to be led by China, raised concerns for policymakers in Washington: would AIIB undermine the existing global financial infrastructure and lead to a lowering of standards? Yet, in a dramatic setback for the United States, nearly 60 nations ultimately announced their intentions to join AIIB in 2015, including close allies such as the U.K., Germany, France, Korea, Australia and Israel. In the two years following the bank’s official launch in January 2016, AIIB has emerged as a regional powerhouse, financing numerous diverse projects throughout Asia. AIIB now commands an impressive capital holding which rivals that of the Asian Development Bank, and a AAA credit rating on par with that of the World Bank. Amid growing economic tensions between the United States and China, the AIIB has remained largely unknown to the American public. In a new book, A Comparative Guide to the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, former AIIB General Counsel Natalie Lichtenstein draws upon her role as an architect of the AIIB charter to provide an in-depth analysis of the bank’s operations, and how the bank compares to other development banks. Ms. Lichtenstein discussed her book and the future of the AIIB with the National Committee on May 2nd in New York City.   Natalie Lichtenstein is a U.S. lawyer who has specialized in legal issues at international financial institutions, and legal development in China, since the 1970s. She was the inaugural general counsel of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the principal drafter of the AIIB Charter. Her work for AIIB drew on her 30-year legal career at the World Bank, where she advised on lending operations in China and other countries for 20 years. During her last decade there, she served in senior positions, specializing in institutional governance issues and reforms. As a young lawyer at the U.S. Treasury Department, she worked on international financial institution matters and normalization of U.S.-China relations. Ms. Lichtenstein has taught Chinese law in the U.S. since the 1980s, and has consulted on Chinese legal development projects. She is an adjunct professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a member of the advisory board of the Duke-Kunshan University. In addition to her book on the AIIB, she is the author of numerous articles in professional journals. She received her AB summa cum laude in East Asian Studies and JD from Harvard University.

This is Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing. Here is the news. China is planning an overhaul of the Communist Youth League to reinforce youth belief in the Communist Party of China and pump vigor into the cause of national rejuvenation. The Party Central Committee has published a document outlining plans for the reform. The league committees will be downsized, with more staff assigned to the grassroots level to serve the youth, with bureaucratic procedures streamlined. Positions in the League should be filled by talented Party members and League workers who "understand and love young people". The document said League delegates should pay more attention to the opinions of Party members and ordinary young people. It should also take responsibility for serving and protecting teenagers' lawful rights. The League was founded in 1922, the following year after the founding of the Party. It was designed to be a bridge linking youth with the Party and a talent reserve for the Party. As of last year, the League had around 88 million members and almost 4 million organizations across the country. There have been worries that the league has lost its connection with young people and formed undesirable work styles, including formalism and a focus on entertainment. This is Special English. The journal Nature Biotechnology has said it will investigate criticisms of what was thought to be a breakthrough gene-editing technique developed by Chinese scientist Han Chunyu. The journal published Han's research findings online in May. But a scientist from Australia has said his lab was not able to replicate Han's results. Forty-two-year-old Han is a geneticist at Hebei University of Science and Technology. He rose to prominence with the publication of his cutting-edge gene editing technique known as NgAgo, and was perceived as a contender for a Nobel Prize. The journal said it had been contacted by several researchers who said they had not been able to reproduce Han's published results. The journal said it takes seriously any concerns raised about any paper, and considers them carefully, adding that it is now following an established process to investigate the issues. Han was quoted in a Beijing-based newspaper as saying that he will repeat the experiment and share his original data if the journal requests. Before NgAgo, efforts and investments were directed heavily towards the widely recognized genome-editing technique known as CRSPR. It allows researchers to clip a specific DNA sequence and replace it with a new one, offering the potential to cure diseases caused by faulty genes. The NgAgo technique for editing DNA was initially believed to surpass CRISPR in precision and efficiency. You are listening to Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing. A new guideline says China must shut down outmoded facilities, consolidate production and reduce pollution to increase the competitiveness of its petrochemical industry. According to the guideline issued by the State Council, China's cabinet, the development of the petrochemical industry is hindered by overcapacity along with security and environmental constraints. Foreign companies are to be allowed to participate in mergers and acquisitions in the sector. Seven planned coastal petrochemical production bases will be built to consolidate the sector. By 2020, energy consumption per 10,000 yuan of output, roughly 1,500 U.S. dollars, will be cut by 8 percent from the 2015 level, with cuts in carbon dioxide emissions and water consumption of 10 percent and 14 percent, respectively. This is Special English. A new judicial interpretation has been issued by the top court to regulate online judicial auctions. The Regulations on Online Auctions for Judicial Sales were mapped out by the Supreme People's Court, and will take effect on Jan 1 next year. A law enforcement official from the Supreme People's Court said online auctions will lower the cost of judicial sales and allow people from anywhere to take part. They are expected to help increase transparency of law enforcement and better protect creditors' interests. Each e-auction organized by a court requires a deposit, even in auctions for small items, which is different to the practice in auction houses. The regulations stipulate that the deposit should not exceed 20 percent of the starting bidding price and each online auction is required to last at least 24 hours to better enable all parties to take part. More than 1,400 courts have organized online auctions since 2010, when such practices were allowed for judicial sales. Deals worth more than 150 billion yuan, roughly 23 billion U.S. dollars, have been reached. You're listening to Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing. An 8-year-old boy from central China's Hunan Province has sued three hospitals, seeking compensation after being infected with AIDS. The boy was confirmed HIV positive in July last year. He received treatment in the hospitals for serious traffic accident injuries obtained in 2014. His HIV screening tests were negative before the initial treatment which included a blood transfusion. The local health authority says it is difficult to determine the exact source of the infection. During a period of 18 months following the traffic accident, the child was hospitalized eight times in three different hospitals in the local area, the provincial capital Changsha and Shanghai. He also spent considerable time outside the hospitals, which makes ascertaining the precise source of the infection difficult. In addition to the three hospitals, the co-defendants also include a blood supplier organization and a biological produt company. This is Special English. Chinese experts are expected to arrive in Abidjan, the capital of Cote d'Ivoire to reinforce agricultural cooperation between the two countries, and help modernize the agricultural sector of the African country. In September, China will send 30 agricultural experts with different expertise to evaluate national needs in domains including cocoa, cashew nuts, rice, pineapples and mangoes. Cote d'Ivoire's agricultural ministry said in a statement that five Cote d'Ivoire villages will benefit from the program dubbed "one village, one company". It was initiated by China to increase incomes for farmers. The project will be carried out in 100 African villages. China currently provides support for Cote d'Ivoire's agricultural sector through a hydro-agricultural project, 180 km south of Abidjan. The project is for rice farming. You're listening to Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing. You can access the program by logging on to newsplusradio.cn. You can also find us on our Apple Podcast. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let us know by e-mailing us at mansuyingyu@cri.com.cn. That's mansuyingyu@cri.com.cn. Now the news continues. When China opened its arms to international universities, foreign educators saw the jointly founded institutions as transforming Chinese higher education. Denis Simon is an executive vice-chancellor of Duke University's campus in Kunshan in eastern China. Simon says the idea of allowing seven foreign universities to have campuses in China is something people wouldn't have thought would happen 20 years ago. He says the number will soon grow to nine. Simon told China Daily that he sees it as a watershed moment in Chinese higher education. Located in Kunshan in Jiangsu province, Duke Kunshan University was jointly founded in 2013 by two prestigious universities, Duke University in the United States and China's Wuhan University. It was designed as a new model to advance China's higher learning system. Simon said Duke came specifically to deliver a liberal arts education to China, and to provide an innovative educational platform. Since 2004, the Chinese government has approved the establishment of independent Sino-foreign universities across the country in the hope that these joint-ventures will help to facilitate the transfer of international educational experiences and import advanced management, teaching methods as well as curriculum systems. Duke Kunshan received its first class in 2014 and currently offers four master's programs, namely global health, environmental policy, medical physics and management studies. In addition, there's an undergraduate program called the Global Learning Semester. The campus has seen its first graduates in global health and medical physics. Its management program has already had graduates for two years. This is Special English. After its successful Shanghai debut, the stage drama, "Three Body Problem", has begun its performance in Beijing. The drama is based on Chinese author Liu Cixin's first book of a trilogy entitled "Remembrance of Earth's Past", also known as the "Three Body Problem". The story features human's first but frustrating contact with an alien civilization. It won the Hugo Award for Best Novel last year. Along with the storyline of ups and downs, the drama invites multimedia technology to showcase magnificent 3D scenes, bringing audience a visual feast. The scene of "three suns" particularly impressed many viewers. Audience members saw flaring suns being swept from the stage into the auditorium. In fact, the "suns" were controlled by several unmanned aerial vehicles, with motion trails calculated accurately. The lighting is another highlight. Hundreds of beams went around back and forth or were projected on semitransparent curtains, creating a vivid 3D world. The director of the show Liu Fangqi says this is a new form of drama combined with stage art and special-effects in a theater with great surround sound. It might be the best way for science fiction novels to be showcased on stage. You're listening to Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing. Fifteen people from seven countries in the European Union have finally wrapped up their tour of China. Members of the group were winners of an EU-wide contest where they had to submit articles, pictures, videos and paintings on the theme of China-EU friendship. The event was jointly sponsored by the Confucius Institute and the Mission of China to the EU. The winners include a former ambassador to China and a corporate consultant, as well as an artist and a college student. They visited museums and traveled to communities and villages in Beijing and northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. During their trip, they learned about China's economic and social development. They also witnessed local governments' poverty relief efforts. This is Special English. The number of tourists from the Chinese mainland visiting Taiwan decreased by 12 percent in May and June, compared with the same period last year. Nevertheless, the mainland has remained the largest source of visitors in Taiwan so far this year. More than 2 million visitors from the Chinese mainland visited the island in the first half of the year, accounting for almost 40 percent of all visitors to Taiwan. Despite the marked drop in May and June, visitor numbers still grew by 3 percent in the first six month. However, tourism experts in Taiwan worried that the number of mainland tourists will continue to drop in the months to come. Taiwan-based Ezfly International Travel says people in the tourism industry want a change. Around 90 percent of the company's clients are from the mainland. The company says the number of mainland tourists began to decline sharply after Taiwan's new leader took office in May. This is Special English. A new song has become popular among Internet users in China, who feel it is a vivid description of their lives as workaholics who always work overtime. The song is entitled My Body is Hollowed Out. （全文见周六微信。）

This is NEWS Plus Special English. I'm Yun Feng in Beijing. Here is the news. A top economic planner says although China has made great efforts in cutting emissions and energy use, it still faces serious challenges due to its development pattern and poor technology. Some areas and departments have paid inadequate attention to the issue, and the development pattern is still extensive, rather than intensive. Xu Shaoshi, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, says in addition, China needs a stronger policy mechanism. The official has filed a report to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the top legislature. The report says that energy consumption and carbon dioxide emission per unit of GDP last year has dropped by around 10 percent from the level of 2010. But this is still far from the targets. China's target for emission cuts and energy savings for the period between 2011 and 2015 is that energy consumption per unit of GDP should drop 16 percent and carbon dioxide emission should drop by 17 percent from the level of 2010. This is NEWS Plus Special English. Duke Kunshan University, a Sino-American joint venture university in east China's Jiangsu Province, will officially open in August. The university, in the city of Kunshan, was jointly created by U.S.-based Duke University and Wuhan University in Hubei Province in central China. Duke Kunshan University plans to enroll the first 100 students, including 50 Chinese, offering master's degree programs in global health, medical physics and management studies. Graduates will be granted degrees from Duke University. In addition, the university will also provide non-degree courses for undergraduate students. Those who complete the program will receive Duke University course credit that can be transferred to other degree-granting institutions. Top Chinese universities, including Peking University and Tsinghua University in Beijing and Fudan University in Shanghai, have signed agreements with Duke Kunshan to select excellent undergraduates to attend the non-degree program. Some of them have already received certificates of admission. Chinese students will need to pay 240,000 yuan, or about 39,000 U.S. dollars for a graduate degree from the university. Although the cost is lower than studying overseas, it is still big sum of money for most Chinese families. You are listening to NEWS Plus Special English. I'm Yun Feng in Beijing. While many Chinese parents send their children to schools overseas under the pressure of an exam-oriented educational system in the country, a growing number of foreigners are discovering the merits of Chinese education. Despite high tuition fees and complicated admission procedures, Aron Ma, a Chinese-American from New York, has decided to send his two granddaughters to a kindergarten in Beijing in order to learn Chinese. Ma says as Chinese descendants, children should be able to speak their mother tongue. Ma says China is undergoing a historical transformation that can provide opportunities to people around the world. Similarly, Wang, a former visiting professor at Yale University who holds a U.S. green card, came back to China with his family three years ago. His six-year-old son finished kindergarten in Shanghai, and has entered a primary school in Beijing. Wang said traditional Chinese education fosters discipline and a sense of collectivism; and he fears his child would become self-indulgent under Western education, which emphasizes freedom and individualism. 完整文稿请登录以下网址： http://english.cri.cn/7146/2014/04/25/2582s823812.htm