E39: Training for a Post-Pandemic Economy: The Role of America's Community College System

Welcome to Talent Talks. Each month, Human Resources veteran Rick Mayer welcomes America's thought leaders to discuss ways to reinvent America's talent development and education systems. Tune in and discover how we can drive global competitiveness for future generations. Talent Talks is presented by Mayer & Mayer, a wholly owned affiliate of the American Institutes for Research, AIR, dedicated to providing top quality research and technical assistance in helping to solve the complex challenges facing society.

And now your host, Rick Mayer. Well, folks, thanks for joining us for another episode of Talent Talks, the podcast that explores the world of talent development with our nation's most prominent thought leaders on workforce and educational issues. Regular listeners know we've been focused on a series we call America's Comeback from COVID, exploring how to best deal with the challenge of reconnecting Americans to the workforce from long-term unemployment and to educational pathways that have been interrupted by COVID.

We've heard from both national thought leaders and local service delivery professionals about the challenges facing both youth and older workers over a series of discussions spanning multiple episodes. And we've dedicated ourselves to this series to help ensure that we rebound from the pandemic without leaving folks behind and build a talent pipeline of skilled workers to meet the challenge of the future. We've learned a lot in this series, but nothing more important than the need for Americans to be trained and retrained for a post-pandemic economy.

And of course, there's no single institution more central to that goal than America's community college system. So we invited someone to our table today who's in the forefront of the community college's effort to execute successfully. Josh Weiner is founder and executive director of Aspen Institute's College Excellence Program and is focused on preparing the next generation of presidents for our nation's community college system. He's got a front row seat on where colleges need to go and how they need to be led to get there.

And I couldn't think of a better time to hear what he thinks about preparing America's future workforce. So Josh, hey, thanks for joining us and taking the time to be with us today. Welcome to Talent Talks. Thanks so much, Rick.

Great to be with you. Yeah, it's great to have you, Josh. And I'm looking forward to this, I think, really important conversation. So let's start, if we could, but just giving folks some insight into your program.

Everybody's heard of Aspen, but exactly what is the College Excellence Program and your mission? And maybe just give us a brief introduction to what you do there and maybe a little bit about your background, if you would. Oh, sure. So, Rick, the Aspen College Excellence Program was founded 11 years ago, and our goal is to advance the capacity and leadership of colleges so that more students succeed.

Most of our work is with community colleges, about 75% of our work, although we also work with four-year institutions as well. Oh, okay, cool. The idea of the program is not, is really consistent with why you're doing this podcast. We believe that colleges, community colleges included, are conduits to developing the talent that America needs to drive the economy forward, and also to enabling people to do better in their lives.

They are the conduits to social and economic mobility for individuals. And we're particularly interested in those students that have traditionally been excluded from economic opportunity and underscored in higher ed, students of color, lower income students. So we call this the College Excellence Program because there are 4,000 colleges in the country, among them about 1,100 community colleges. Some of them do a better job of equitable talent development and social mobility than others.

And, you know, the question for us really is, quantitatively, who's doing the best work? Who's enabling students to get educated, to get good jobs after they graduate, to have fulfilling careers after they graduate? Who's doing a better job in doing that equitably than others? And how do we replicate those?

Exactly. So that more colleges are delivering on the promise of talent development and social mobility. That's really fundamentally what our program is about. We do it through a variety of means that we'll get into in this podcast.

And we do have a particular focus on leadership. And I just want to say one thing about that. Sure. And that is that among the 4,000 colleges in our country, the biggest distinguishing factor into whether they succeed in the sector that they're in has to do with leadership.

Are the leaders committed to the mission of equitable talent development and social and economic mobility? And do they have the skills to advance their college in a way that's not just about keeping the doors open? It's not just about balanced budgets. It's not just about elite status.

It's not just about making sure that they have solid enrollments. but it's really about fulfilling mission. And that's where our focus mostly lies. What we've learned is that leadership really matters.

We're working hard to find out which colleges are doing the best work and what are the leadership practices that enable colleges to do that. And then we seek to replicate those. You know, an important mission, Josh. And by the way, it occurs to me, it's exactly what we're trying to do more broadly here with this podcast is get the best and the brightest and try to get those ideas spread and replicate and brought to scale.

And that's what you're doing in the leadership mission for the college community. So important. I don't know that anything is any more important right now. So, you know, thanks for that.

That's really helpful. And again, you know, going into this, I confess that not knowing much about that aspect of Aspen's work, but you do serve a mission that is like critically important to America's students, workers, employers too. So again, I'm really happy to have you here and I appreciate your time today. So Josh, over the course of these last Talent Talks podcasts, we've heard people talking more and more about adjusting to a new quote COVID normal, right?

I know COVID has caused enrollments to fall a bit in your world. We've heard from our partners at Strata Education, that in their youth survey, they've heard about kids being worried, anxious, concerned, kind of stuck and not knowing how to re-engage with their educational pathways. We know colleges have been disrupted, having to shift to online from classroom instruction, creating COVID safe environments, and the whole discussion of micro-credentials and pathways that might not always move to bachelor's degrees or even associate's degrees, at least not immediately, right?

We see a host of private online training providers entering this space as well. In short, I guess, Josh, a whole lot of disruption, right? It's, you know, to an outsider, it's confusing, it's hard to digest. I'm just curious, what does all of this mean to you, and maybe more importantly, to the leaders that you're helping to try to develop?

That's a great question, Rick. I think there are a lot of disruptions from COVID that will have an impact on how colleges operate moving forward. There's likely to be more online instruction. I think colleges have realized that they can do online advising, and in fact, in some ways, it's more efficient.

And at the same time, the college leaders that I speak with understand that for many, many students, that in-person, high-touch environment really matters. And getting faculty and advisors back into the building really matters. And by the way, that's a challenge in a lot of places. A lot of folks, myself included, are comfortable working from home.

And also, we're worried about safety. People are worried about safety. So it's a complicated time. But I want to note that even at this complicated time, The colleges that are thriving today in an era of declining enrollment, of the need to shift to online education, of the increased needs that students have who have lost their jobs due to COVID, etc.

Those that are succeeding are doing not new things, brand new things, but building on the strengths that they have. And I want to talk about what that looks like. Interesting. But those colleges that are doing the best providing students non supports the food the internet connectivity the safe spaces they already knew the conditions their students were in They had very strong advising structures where they had really worked hard to understand who their students were and what their needs were So when COVID arrived, they were not surprised with the needs.

They just needed to double down on filling those needs. So I think about a place like Amarillo College or San Antonio College, the most recent winner of the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence, our million dollar prize. Yeah. They already knew that students would need these supports.

And so when COVID hit, they were able to pivot quickly, raise the money needed, dedicate the resources needed to provide for non-academic supports. I'll give you a second example. colleges that were able to effectively move to online instruction wholesale already had worked hard on things like uh on quality matters on trying to make sure that they already had good structures for online instruction yeah even more deeply they had worked with faculty to understand the importance of connecting with students in the classroom they had means for connecting with students by name, for how do you actually instruct in active ways.

They had theories of teaching and learning that extended into online instruction. And faculty were already being trained on those things, both online and in the classroom. So when they had to move online, you know, one of the biggest challenges we've seen is a lot of students have left higher ed, community colleges specifically, because they're not comfortable with online instruction. Well, if you already are good at doing that, the chances that your enrollment go down are diminished.

Or less. Because you already had a theory, you've already trained faculty. And so what I would say is, during this crisis, the enduring practices of understanding who your students are, working to develop faculty capacity and advisor capacity to actually work with students to create a sense of belonging and meet them where they are and advance them, it has been important. And I want to mention one last thing.

Yeah. It has been prize winners. We now have been running this prize for 11 years, and we have eight winners of the college. We just recently looked at the data.

They have seen, some of them have seen an enrollment decline, but that enrollment decline over the last decade and during COVID has been less than half the enrollment decline of other colleges. In other words, the high-performing colleges aren't seeing the same enrollment decline. Now, you have to ask this question, well, why is that? Well, because they deliver value.

Because students understand that if I go to this college, there's not sort of a vague promise that I'm going to get a good job or I'm going to be able to transfer effectively to a four-year school. It's going to happen. They see that students before them have walked that walk. And so even during COVID and even during the period before COVID when enrollment was dropping, for whatever reasons it was dropping, they kept coming to the best community colleges because they knew they were going to get value from that education.

And so what I would say is that in good times and difficult times, that delivering value, knowing who your students are, focusing on teaching and learning and working with faculty, those are the things that will support excellence in the sector, regardless of whether we're in COVID in enrollment declines or during times when things are not as difficult. Yeah. And, you know, and future focused, right? You say those that are, we're already working on these trends, right?

Like online learning, we're able to adapt and move more quickly and therefore deliver better value. Their customers, their teachers, their faculty were not unfamiliar with it. I mean, leadership matters is what I'm hearing and value matters. In fact, I want to talk to you more about this thing, this whole thing of value.

And you put it in a way it was really, really intriguing. When I talked to you last, Josh, we were having this conversation. And when we spoke, you talked about having a 3.0 mindset.

And that really resonated for me. You have a 3.0 mindset, you said, in your development programs. I loved it.

It took a look at our historical focus on access, right? Everybody thinks about, oh, community college in particular, it's all about access, right? That was a historical past, but you're moving beyond that. It looked at the historical level of access, but you move beyond that to a different mindset.

You called this 3.0 mindset. What is the 3.0 mindset, Josh?

And how is it central to what you're doing and the next generation in informing the next generation of community college leaders? Yeah, thanks, Rick. I love that. I just love this.

Tell us about it. Thanks, Rick. So community colleges were created as access institutions in order to provide a lower cost open access without admissions requirements. Opportunity for many students who hadn't gotten that opportunity before to be educated.

Yep. And they were really an amalgam of two different ways of entering higher ed. One, they were junior colleges, which were sort of the colleges meant for transfer and technical colleges, the ones that were on the workforce side. But they've all joined together in what we call community colleges today.

Yep. But the general idea is let's give students low cost open access. And it worked. If you look actually at the 60s, 70s, 80s, we quintupled the number of community colleges.

We quadrupled the number of people enrolled in higher ed in our country. We really became, in the second half of the 20th century, due to Pell Grants and other reasons, we became international leaders in providing access to college education. And community colleges should be very proud of that. Absolutely.

And that's generation 1.0, right? That is 1.0.

And to be clear, 2.0 is not shedding that responsibility. But around the year 2000, I think there was a concerted effort. Nobody had been working on this before, but I think nationally, we started to see national organizations emerge.

The Community College Research Center at Columbia University, the Lumina Foundation, you know, into that, we started to see the Obama administration actually started to have policies around this and investments around this. What I would call 2.0. And 2.

0 was that access without completion is a hollow promise. Right. You can't bring students into your college and see so many failing to complete their degrees. And the reality for community colleges is that, you know, depending on how you count somewhere around 30 or 40 percent of the time of students were finishing a credential.

That's just not that's not OK. You know, students should not arrive expecting to get something that they don't. And to the point of this podcast, the talent our nation needs was being hampered by the inability of colleges to advance students into degrees. And so, you know, really starting at around 2000, this national movement towards completion began and it's accelerated and it's very important.

Students who complete are much more likely to be able to repay their debt. They're much more likely to be able to transfer and get a bachelor's degree. They're much more likely to get a good job than those who start community college and don't finish. So 2.

0 is access plus completion. Again, really important goals that we need to hang on to. And the advances we see, a lot of the prize-winning colleges we see have doubled graduation rates. Again, I think about San Antonio College, the most recent winner of the Aspen Prize.

They've tripled graduation rates. Wow. It's phenomenal work. Very well.

That is phenomenal. Yeah. So, but here's the challenge. Many of the credentials community colleges confer don't finish the job.

Yeah. They either don't prepare students for junior year standing in a major at a university, so they can't efficiently transfer and finish the job. And those credentials, by the way, those junior college credentials I was talking about, Yep. They're not designed to have freestanding labor market value.

They were designed to be transfer degrees. It's only by transferring and getting the bachelor's does the labor market value emerge. And so number one, if you only look at completion, you may not focus on finishing the job in transfer. The second challenge is that many of the workforce credentials that were being delivered didn in fact confer the skills needed for a good job for folks Many of them are in fields like massage therapy cosmetology culinary arts even early childhood education that offer 10 11 an hour jobs And if you committed to the economic mobility of students, you've got to make sure that it's worthwhile for them to come.

Why should a student come to you to get skills for a job that they could get right out of high school. So now with 3.0, it's moving beyond completion. That's exactly right.

So the idea of Community College 3.0 is that colleges and leaders must own their students' post-graduation success. And by doing so, by owning access, owning completion, and owning post-graduation success, community colleges can truly deliver against this idea of economic mobility and talent development. I just want to say one more thing about the importance of 3.

0 to equity, which is really important. If we look, we've done a lot of work with community colleges. And if you look at the enrollments in community colleges and ask who is in the programs that lead to low wage work, who is in the general education associates degrees and never transfers and gets a bachelor's degree, it tends to be black, Hispanic and lower income students. and indigenous students.

It tends to be the students who frankly rely on higher education for making their lives better and their families' lives better. They're the first generation students for whom getting this college education that's going to change their life is as important or more important than for anybody else in our country. So if colleges really are committed to equity, to making sure that students that we've traditionally left on the margins of the economic powerhouse that exists in a lot of communities in our country and the opportunity that exists.

We've got to focus on 3.0. We've got to focus on post-graduation success. Simply focusing on access and completion won't finish the job.

You know, I got to tell you something. So 1.0 is access. 2.

0 is completion, or I think a lot of people would have called that student success. And 3.0 is owning postgraduate success or customer value, right? It is a different mindset, Josh, I think, that you're trying to impart in a future leader that will be, you know, ultimately responsible for how the college system continues to evolve and flourish in this country.

And I just love the articulation of this, this call for a new mindset, this level 3.0 representing better value. I get it. I love it.

So how do we achieve it? You mentioned, because it was San Diego Community College, tripling their graduation. That's astounding to me, frankly. But more broadly, how does it get achieved?

I know you talk about following data. I think I know your attitude about, it isn't only about offering micro credentials. In fact, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I think you think that's part of the solution, but only micro credentials offering rigor and value. I don't want to put words in your mouth.

I love the 3.0. How do we achieve a job? How do we get to the 3.

0? how do we realize this vision? How do colleges get there? Yeah, the good news, Rick, is that we've got great models in the field.

So we did not make this idea up. We've labeled it something, but we know it can be done because it's being done right now. And I'll give you some examples. Cool.

San Antonio College, the one that I just mentioned, that tripled graduation rates, is part of the Alamo College system. And as a chancellor, Mike Flores, who has named ending poverty in his region as the mission of the Alamo colleges. Now, if you're going to end poverty in your region, what San Antonio and the Alamo system tell us is you better make sure students can get a bachelor's degree for some professional jobs. They've done an excellent job of helping students transfer and attain bachelor's degrees.

We see that in the data. We collected data. More than half of their students who transfer go on to get a bachelor's degree efficiently, and the national average is closer to 40%. So we know they're doing much better than others.

And by the way, they have an incredibly diverse population. So they're doing better than others with students who traditionally don't get bachelor's degrees at high rates. So we know it can be done, but it started with Mike Flores, Chancellor Flores, and those who preceded him, Bruce Leslie, owning post-graduation success. He's now said he's going to end poverty, and he's looking really hard at their workforce programs and saying which ones of these actually lead to good jobs and which don't.

There you go. I'll give you another example. Just across the state, also in Texas, San Jacinto College, a finalist for the Aspen Prize, they've looked at their workforce programs and they've said, and by the way, they've significantly improved graduation rates as well. They've looked at their workforce programs and realized that many of the ones being proposed didn't lead to good jobs.

Well, they've established a new rule. The new rule is you will not be approved for a program to be started unless it leads to a family sustaining wage. That is now a rule of the college and everybody knows it. And so, you know, if a new call center comes in or a new retail shop and says, we want you to train people for this new area of work, short-term credentials, long-term credentials, I don't care what it is.

The program approval process at San Jacinto College requires that you show that it will lead to a family sustaining wage shop. By the way, call centers usually don't. So they're going to, they're systemically going to say, no, we're not starting that program. So I think, I think we can see that how it works.

Valencia college in Orlando, Florida is an absolute leader in doing this work has, has literally said, we will not have any short-term program that doesn't lead to at least $15 an hour. And most of them go well above that. They have six week training programs that are industry recognized certifications that are getting students in construction trades and manufacturing to 18 and $20 an hour jobs out of poverty in six to 12 weeks. It's phenomenal work.

But again, it's not how long the program is. No, it's about its rigor and the value it produces, 3.0, right Josh? That's exactly right.

And so we know it can be done in the field. We have some terrific examples. And the question now is, how do we help other leaders who are committed to this become presidents? Those who are in the presidency understand how to enact this, how to do things like that program approval process at San Jacinto or program review processes.

Actually, no, on the ground, in the weeds, how strategically do we move our institution in that direction? Well, I got to tell you, and for the benefit of our listeners, I'm sure they're thinking what I am. And I'm listening to these stories and the president that sets a mission to end poverty in his region. Right.

That this is bold, visionary leadership. And it is a mindset, Josh. Right. And and that stuff, when when you get that from the top of an organization, it begins to trickle down and it's energizing.

It gets people willing to try new things because it opens their minds to new levels of purpose is really what it comes down to. And I think everybody from faculty to janitorial staff can attach themselves emotionally to that kind of a vision. So, again, your work in creating leaders that are visionary and committed to this 3.0 mindset.

I mean, I just think it's I don't know that there's anything more important happening in the educational space today. So it sounds really important to me. I mean, I'm a lay person, but man, this all makes great sense to me and responds to the need of the next generation. So, look, I want to give you a chance to talk a little bit about your programs and how they're organized.

And I know that they're all oversubscribed, meaning there's more people apply than are able to be admitted and served. But I also know you're expanding your offerings to engage with more candidates presently, I believe. I believe you've launched a new president's program, I think you call it, which is endowed, at least in part, by JPMorgan Chase. If you would talk to us about your offerings your programs Josh and talk about costs and funding What do you offer How are your offerings funded And what is the cost for participants to be engaged Yeah, thanks, Rick.

So we, six years ago, started our leadership programs, and we really today now offer them in three different forms. First, we have something called the Rising Presidents Fellowship, and that is for people who aspire to the community college presidency within the next three to five years. And it's an intensive 10-month program that includes three residential sessions and mentorship and work in between. Uh, largely those are vice presidents and deans at community college, but we've had some non-traditional folks.

Uh, there are 40 of those folks each year, competitively chosen, and we charge only $5,000 for that program. It is largely subsidized by terrific foundations, including the Mellon Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, Schusterman, um, and, uh, and others. Um, so, so we're able to heavily subsidize that. Just last year, we started our second program, which is the New President's Fellowship.

That's for 25 presidents in their first five years, wholly funded by JPMorgan Chase. And that is free to participants. They only have to pay for the travel to the two residential sessions. but literally just the airfare.

We cover everything else in that. And again, that is all about leading for a 3.0 college, leading with a 3.0 mindset.

And then the third way we offer support is through our partnerships with states. So we have partnered with Ohio, California, New York, Texas and others to offer training to presidents and boards and senior teams as part of their efforts to advance student success. So really, those are partnerships with chancellor's offices and student success centers that are headquartered in those states. And we offer the training on a partnership basis, on a contract basis.

Yeah. And that's a little more tailored to the particular context. In all of those contexts, Rick, what we're really teaching is the role of the leaders in advancing student success. And it starts with why.

It starts with helping everybody understand why your college exists, where the opportunity is and isn't for your students and in your community, and why change matters so much. Why we have to keep getting better to deliver our promise. It then extends into the what? How do we work internally to reform the institution so that we are actually delivering those things?

And how do we work in the partnership, in that education to workforce ecosystem? How do we work with K-12 to make sure students are better prepared through dual enrollment? How do we work with universities to make sure students are transferring and getting bachelor's degrees? And maybe most importantly, how do we work with employers to make sure that we are delivering the talent they need in ways that provide equitable opportunity to our students?

Well, let me tell you something. You know, I've often been accused of saying we are never going to change this slow again, Josh. And what you're doing there is fostering a mindset in leadership that frankly carries that thought forward. That is to say, you know, we can't rely on what we've done in the past.

It isn't going to be enough for the future. And we can't get comfortable. We've got to continue to push forward and think in future focus. And I'm just so glad we were able to schedule time with you.

We're in, I believe, a very unique time, fashioned in part by COVID, but also being disrupted by the future of work and new tech. And how our educational system responds is probably the most important element of how America will shape our future. And I personally, I feel better knowing folks like you and Aspen are tuned in and helping that response. And I believe a few more folks listening here might agree with that, Josh.

So, you know, if folks listening wanted to learn more about what you're doing, follow your success, connect with you, how would they best do that? Sure. So the Aspen Institute's College Excellence Program has a Web page with all of the resources and you can certainly go there and learn more. We have playbooks on how you improve transfer and workforce and dual enrollment.

We have publications about the Aspen Prize, this deep research project to find the best colleges in the country. And we've got links to our Rising President's Fellowship and New President's Fellowship. So we would encourage you to go to that website and take a look. And then there are ways to contact us directly if you have questions or are interested in being part of the fellowship program.

We've got various links there where you can be in direct contact with the staff. There are about 35 of us in the program, including some former college presidents. Just a terrific group of people who are quite responsive and would be happy to answer questions that anybody has. Well, terrific group of people doing really, really critically important work, Josh.

And I can't tell you how appreciative I am of your time and your talents today. I know you're a real busy guy. You've got very important work to do. And I just hope by us shining a light on what you do, we're able to attract a little bit more attention to your programs because they're really worthwhile and critically important.

And really, on behalf of Mayer and AAR family, I want to thank you for your time today. We really appreciate your partnership on Talent Talks. Well, thanks so much, Rick. And I just want to close with one quick.

Sure. And that is that I am incredibly encouraged when I watch the leaders of colleges coming through our programs. There are now 225 fellows, 93 presidents. And what we're seeing is people who are mission oriented, who are walking the walk.

And when I think about these incredible individuals like Russell Lowry Hart at Amarillo College, like Janet Spriggs at Forsyth Tech in North Carolina, and many others who really are walking the walk and were watching student success improve both in college and after college, this new generation of leaders is going to advance the talent our nation needs. I am so impressed by them. And they give me great hope that at a time in our country, which where there are so many challenges, these are the people who are going to lead communities, our states and our nation to a brighter future.

And so thank you for the opportunity to share their stories and to share this sense of hope that we're on a path to making sure that excellence exists throughout community colleges so that they can do the work that you are so focused on. And thank you for the podcast, focusing on talent and the role community colleges play here today. Let me tell you something. A focus on hope is a great way to end it, Josh, and a really important message for people to hear right now.

I think they need hope and they need to know that there are people out there that are hopeful, but more important, they're action oriented. And again, I thank you for your time and your talent. I wish you the best of luck. You've got critical work to be done.

And we're all happy that you're out there doing it. Thanks again, Josh. Appreciate it. Good to be with you.

Yep. So folks, this is Rick Mayer thanking you for listening today and reminding you that at Talent Talks, we hope to explore, inform, and inspire you because we're all actors in a global war for talent. one where talent is seen as a new global currency, and you are America's talent investment bankers. So we hope we've inspired you to take a risk, make a difference.

We hope you'll dare to be great, break something, and make it better. Try, fail, but fail fast and try again. Thanks again for listening, and have a great day. We'll see you next time on Talent Talks.

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