Meet The $29 Million Founder Creating The Future of Education

The education system is broken, but Tade Oyerinde is on a mission to save it with his startup Campus. He raised tens of millions from Sam Altman, Dr. Shaquille O'Neal, and many others. This is his multi-billion dollar plan.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Met this professor at UCLA.

(00:01):
I get into his office to show him the software,and he's got an air mattress off to the side.
What, what's going on?
He's like, oh, yeah, I can't afford to liveanywhere near wood.
I live 5 hours away and I shower in the gym andsleep in my office Monday through Friday.
Like, and I was, like, totally shocked.
And I kind of just got obsessed with thatproblem.
Like, how is this happening.
Today, we're gonna learn how you raised over$29,000,000.

(00:23):
Got Sam Altman as an investor.
And just recently, Doctor Shaquille O'Neal, inthat journey.
But before we do, I think early context here ispretty important.
What would be the earliest thing I would haveto know about you to understand who you are all
that you've accomplished.
It's a great question.
Thanks for having me.
It's gonna be a fun conversation.
I think probably the thing my entire life I'vebeen told is the most interesting thing about

(00:49):
me is that I'm an identical twin.
So, met my brother in the amniotic sack, and Ihave a older sister who's, like, really, really
clever.
So my parents ended up deciding to homeschoolthe 3 of us that's probably played a a big
impact.
I was sort of born and raised in Atlanta, toNigerian American parents, And, yeah,

(01:10):
homeschooled until high school and, had a lotof fun.
I loved growing up.
It was pretty awesome.
And, and, yeah, I think that's, you know,that's probably where it all started.
How did homeschooling work?
I mean, your mom was getting a PhD at at thesame time as you were learning from home.
What was that process?
Shockingly, believe it or not, it was literallyonly 4 hours of school a day.

(01:32):
Like, we did we did school, like, from 10 to 2and had the rest of the day.
So it was pretty great.
I mean, I think until I hit puberty, I lovedit.
I think when you're you know, when you'rereally young, you're just curious.
You wanna explore things that you care about,and I think that's the best thing in
homeschool.
There's, like, structured learning, but thenthere's so much that if you're like really

(01:57):
getting into a subject, you don't have to likemove on to the next you know, subject and
switch from math to, like, you know, social,social studies just because the bell rings.
Like, you can kinda go deeper and and followyour curiosities.
So I I enjoyed it a lot.
I think my siblings did as well.
And then when you hit puberty, it's like, okay.
You like girls, and now you wanna meet people.
And it's like, hey, I'm always sitting acrosswith my brother.

(02:18):
And my sister all day.
It's, you know, it's unideal.
So so I loved it until, probably, like, 11.
And then I think around 11 started activelylobbying my parents to for us to go to school
outside.
And then I think you you
ended up going to high school, and yougraduated high school early at at 16.

(02:41):
Right?
So what was that transition from beinghomeschooled to then going into the public
education system.
Yeah.
It's just sort of my sister, you know, sort oflike the perfect child, and you're always
trying my brother and I are always trying tokeep up with her.
And she just, like, 1 summer in middle school,just decided to keep the summer on and just
like try and do an entire grade, of work, in inthe summer.

(03:06):
And then she did it And then when my brotherand I hit, age twelve, we tried to do the same
thing and then and we did it.
So, like, that's how, he ended up getting aheadAnd, yeah, the transition was interesting.
There was, like, for it was, like, 1st, like,generally exciting.
You know, we'd watched all these dizzy channel,like, depictions of high school, these 80
movie, 80 movies, I'm like, high school, andthen you get in there, and it's like, where

(03:30):
people actually bully people.
Like, that's, like, like, Wait.
Is this a joke?
Like, he's like, new wait.
This kid's actually getting, like, it was justbizarre.
And so there was this, like, kind of like Ikind of felt like I was on the outside looking
in, like, watching, you know, have these humansinteract.
And I was always curious about these socialdynamics.

(03:51):
That was fun.
And then, you know, a couple years to adjust.
And then, you know, by the junior year, it waspretty, I think, pretty in the flow of things.
When you were in high school, is theresomething that you realized?
Like, hey.
There's something I need to change here?
Or is there anything you noticed about theeducation system then, or was that later on a
discovery?
I was not thinking about education in highschool.

(04:11):
I actually started flying early.
I came across a program called ACAP, OBAP ACAP.
It's a combination of a partnership betweenDelta and the organization of black airline
pilots.
Now they've renamed it.
The organization of Black aerospaceProfessionals.
But anyway, they had, like, a summer programwhere you can fly and start flying school, like

(04:35):
flight school.
For, like, and they paid for it.
It was all it was all, paid for by Delta.
And so I actually started flying aircraft, whenI was 12, and, enjoy that program.
And so that, like, that was a big focus ofmine.
And then my brother and I had started a coupleof internet businesses.
And that was probably like my second priority.

(04:55):
And then, you know, in high school, 1st 2years, I didn't really get that into the the
sort of social scene that much.
And then during a year, you know, playedfootball and and started doing some of that
stuff.
So I think, actually, it started to playfootball sophomore year, but But, yeah, I think
I I think, wasn't too concerned with education,like, from that level at the time.

(05:16):
I was I was really thinking about aviation andand like, our our businesses and then and then,
school third.
I don't think I even started learning at adrive until just a couple of years ago.
You're already flying planes at 12.
What did your parents or people around youthink about, you know, you going up into the
air at just twelve years old?
My dad's perspective, in particular, on, like,young people and their ability to do things is,

(05:41):
like, like, treat them like adults.
And, like, try and, you know, try and developthem as quickly as possible.
He'd read in a paper in the paper about a girlwhose father had a heart attack.
She was, like, 10 or 11 while he was drivingand, like, the girl saved his life by, like,
getting into the driver's seat and driving himto the hospital in the emergency room and

(06:03):
because she he'd taught her how to drivealready.
And so he he taught us how to drive when wewere, like, 10 or 11, and he taught us, of
course, he taught us how to drive stick becausehe thought a man needs to know how to drive
sick.
He also taught my sister, of course.
And, so, yeah, they're really excited about it.
And I think my mother may have been slightlyconcerned, but they were really excited.
And I get so you were a wanted to be a pilot.

(06:26):
What transitioned out of being a pilot to thenbecoming an entrepreneur, what what created
that movement?
It's so lame when I think back to how much ofmy, like, decisions that I made from age
sixteen to twenty were, like, influenced byfilm, but I watched the Aviator with Leonardo
Caprio about Howard Hughes got really excitedabout Howard Hughes went really deep.

(06:52):
Know, down into Howard Hughes.
Are you familiar with Howard Hughes?
Sound name sounds familiar.
He was, like, a brilliant, like, reallyinteresting character.
So he is responsible for a lot of Hollywood'sdevelopment, but he's also responsible for,
pretty much the sort of accelerating the adventof the jet Madan.
And so he's a eccentric billionaire who, youknow, built and designed aircraft for the US

(07:18):
during World War 2, but and then also took alot of his money and then platted into, you
know, buying.
He bought Transworld Airways competed with, youknow, with, Pan Am Airways, which was run by
one trip at the time.
And, anyway, he just, like, had this reallyinteresting life that was centered around
aviation, but a lot also other things.
And and I kind of wanted to model my life offof him.

(07:38):
He ended up you know, sort of going insanebefore he, you know, before he passed it, not
that part, but, like, you know, the theentrepreneurial stuff is where I I was really
inspired And, and then it just sort of occurredto me that being a pilot, which is what I
wanted to be originally, wasn't going to leadme to, like, having that kind of an on aviation
and that you actually had to be more of anentrepreneur.

(07:59):
You actually had to have the resources toinvest and, like, simple things he did, like,
like, like buying an airline was like a reallyrisky thing to do.
Like, people forget, but, like, flying, like,at the time, I forget the exact numbers, but
let's say 15% of Americans would even get on aplane.
Like, they're like, these things are fallingout of the sky.
Like, this is way too dangerous, way too risky.

(08:20):
And so it's like a huge bet that this is gonnaget safer over time.
And then a big part of what made it safer wasJets which really made it easier for us to fly
above the clouds, which means fly above theweather, which means a much smoother ride.
And so, like, anyway, he he he was just like,you know, this, like, super passionate believer
in this industry and sort of will it into anexistence.

(08:41):
I think almost everyone, I don't know, thenumbers say probably 90 plus percent of people
are totally comfortable flying, and and that'slargely thanks to him.
So anyway, I was inspired by him.
Wanna sort of model, things off of him.
And so while I continue to fly for fun, on theside, I was like, okay.
Let me actually learn how these aircraft workand, and learn how to design them.
So I decided to study aerospace Engineering.

(09:03):
And then, and I'd always sort of doneentrepreneurship entrepreneurial things just,
just, you know, since homeschool days.
And as an undergrad, so when you're studyingareas Aerospace Engineering is actually when
you launched, one of your first or firstcompany what was that company and and what were
you doing at the time?
I watched the social network.
It was actually like a, like, an impactful filmfor Madan.

(09:26):
And, Yeah.
I was just like drinking with my buddies atLeeds, my my flatmate Patrick, and my brother
Tosh, my twin brother who's setting at Oxfordat the time had came up to visit us and, like,
we just finished the film.
I'm just thinking, like, wow.
Like, what can we do that is similar to this?
And, you know, I think the way that Zuckerberghad figured out how to increase the quality and

(09:53):
the, like, legitimacy of the social networkFacebook by using real identity.
I thought that, you know, I just sort offixated on that.
And I was like, okay.
Well, what can we do?
What other kinds of interesting things can youdo, if you have real identity online.
And he used, dotedu emails as like this proxyfor verified identity.
To seed Facebook's initial growth.

(10:13):
And I thought, wait, like, how else, like, whatother analogs can we can we use that same
mechanism against.
And so the two ideas were one was Craigslist.
So, like, classifieds online shopping, like,you know, sort of peer to peer online shopping.
You know, I bought some things on Craigslistand actually sold some things on Craigslist.
It was just so sketchy.
Like, I remember delivering, our family's Chinacabinet, to someone who'd bought it off

(10:40):
Craigslist and I drove into the middle ofnowhere, Georgia, and it was just like, I'm
like, am I gonna get murdered?
Like, it's like, confederate flags everywhere.
I'm like, what's going on?
And and so, it was, you know, that was, youknow, it was a bit tricky.
And, you know, the people ended up being supernice and lovely.
But, like, generally speaking, I think, youknow, I I thought if there was verified
identity, Classifies could be could be safer.

(11:02):
And so we actually originally started assomething we called it glee post, glee post,
and it was supposed to be like a classifiedswith verified identity.
So you had to have a dotedu email.
Challenges marketplaces are so difficult tokick start because you need supply and demand.
So it's like, we got, you know, interestingpeople to the site, but then there's not enough
things to buy and so then they kind of left.
And, and we did a bunch of different things totry and try and kick start it.

(11:27):
But to try and get more demand on the site.
Again, another another night drinking at least.
There was a lot of drinking we we, we were justusing chat roulette.
Do you remember did you ever use chat roulette?
You're probably probably before your time.
Yeah.
Chat roulette.
Do you know what it is?
I know what it is, but I have not used it.
Yeah.
Yeah.

(11:47):
So, yeah, you basically go to chat with dotcomand you put get put in a random sort of zoom
call.
It wasn't using zoom, but, like, video callwith a stranger on the internet.
And it was I went viral when I was inundergrad.
And, So we thought, well, if we if we requiredpeople to use their actual, identity by, you

(12:09):
know, verifying their university affiliatedemail, then people would behave better.
And so that was the idea we called itUniverlette Madan the idea was to make that go
viral and then funnel traffic to to theclassifieds glee post, but it just took off.
You knew what?
It went totally viral.
I forget what percentage of people in the,like, undergrads in the UK use it probably like

(12:29):
20 or 30% in the 1st, like, month or so.
You know, we we grew it at the time of friend,who lived in our our dorm at Leeds, started the
lab Bible.
Do you know what the lab Bible is?
Yeah.
It's kinda like the OG bar school sports.
They're publicly traded like half a$1,000,000,000 company now.
But anyway, he he started in, so he helped uskicked started and and then, it was going viral

(12:52):
and then Uni Gillette got posted on the ladBible.
It took off.
And, and, yeah, and then investors reached out.
Like, hey, you want you want a half a$1,000,000 to go, you know, make this thing the
next thing?
And I'm like, yeah, I'll go be the the blacksuck.
Let's go make this happen.
And, So and signing up dropping out to go buildUnilete.
What led to that initial spike in users andthat viral growth in the beginning?

(13:18):
Playing in the mud is is what I call it.
Back then, Facebook was so exploitable.
So they had a they had a so they had a featurewhere you do you remember Facebook pages?
Did you even did you even use Facebook?
Didn't even start using it until, like, a yearago for advertising purposes.

(13:38):
But So they have pages and then they haveaccounts, or they are they had?
I don't even know if they still have pages.
But at the time, you could start a Facebookaccount, and then you could, like, ask or send
a bunch of friend requests so we'd wrote ascript to just send friend requests to tens of
thousands of people.
And then if you send enough friend friendrequests, you know, 10% of the people are if

(13:58):
you make the the, like, the profile image, likean attractive woman, like, like, 10 or 15% of
people are just gonna accept it, and you can befriends.
And then you could trans you could transformyour your your account into a page.
And so that's what we did.
So we just, like, create all these Facebookaccounts, send thousands of phone requests, get
thousands of friends.
And then when you transform your account into apage, all of those friends would be likes.

(14:22):
And so whenever you post from your page,everyone who's liked your page would see it.
And so we had, like, hundreds of these pages,that we grew this way, and then they would all
post sequentially, like, like these screenshotsof things happening on uni Roulette.
And again, it'd be like some guy at Oxford, youknow, like, you know, in the like square

(14:43):
talking to some girl from like, you know,Princeton and like something funny is happening
and then we would just post them at the sametime and then it'd go viral and sort trend,
Facebook used to have a trending topics, like,like, like Twitter, and then it sort of just
went viral.
How did you manage all those accounts?
Was it all manually, or did you have some sortof automation
we tried to automate it, but a lot a lot of itwas manual.

(15:03):
And then the lad bible guys, they really nailedthe Madan.
And so we worked with them to, like,syndicated, and their page just got to millions
of likes really quickly.
And then so we we did, you know, partnershipswith them and and they they helped us grow it.
Got it.
So investors come up.
I don't think I've ever talked about thispublicly, but, this was like the kind of, yeah,
this is, you know, back of the day, it was likeexploit exploit exploit exploit and you could

(15:27):
actually get viral growth.
So right after that, you drop out of uni.
Investors come up to you.
They're offering $500,000 to invest in yourcompany.
What's next?
Yeah.
So, we we actually didn't drop out originallyuntil after, the investors invested.

(15:48):
They were led by a group, a a guy called DougScott, who made a bunch of money in the in the
nineties by buying all these domain names andand, you know, doing interesting things with
traffic.
Also playing in the mud But, yeah, like, Iremember, like, after about maybe a week after
they invested, he found out we were still inschool.
He was like, dude, you gotta have skin in thegame.
You gotta go full time.
We're giving the money back.

(16:09):
And so decided to take a leave of absencenaively assuming, okay, you know, we'd go back.
But in hindsight, my buddy, Patrick, and andand I never never went back.
So moved to London, open office, hard, youknow, a handful of people and, you know, trying
to make it like work.
Like, the whole thing was written in Flash,which, again, is another another technology.

(16:32):
You're probably not familiar with.
Actually, that one I am, because you had toplay, I think any early version of a video
game, you had to get Adobe Flash.
Exactly.
That's right.
And so, it just sucked and, like, there's sobuggy and the servers even the back end wasn't,
like, structurally ready for the load becauseit was, like, super, like, spiky.
So we tried to rebuild it.

(16:53):
But, like, 6 to 9 months in, all the growthfell off a cliff.
It was like Clubhouse.
Like, before I I I remember watching thishappen with Clubhouse and I go, I know how the
story ends.
It was just like the kind of thing everyonewants to try, like, once or twice.
And then it's you know, it's a fad.
It's over, and they move on to the next thing.
And it wasn't something that provided long termsustaining, value.

(17:16):
So Yeah.
That's what happened.
Do you have a regret dropping out of collegeearly on?
No.
No.
Why not?
I mean, I I I sort of I was actually prettythoughtful about making that decision.
And, I just made the choice.
I was like, which thing would I rather regret?
Like, dropping out or, or, you know, when I'mforty and I see someone else took my idea and,

(17:37):
like, made it into, like, this huge worldchanging thing, and knowing that I could have
been that guy.
And and I and I sort of made that call.
So I've had no anxiety about that decisionsince my mother made me a different story, but,
yet.
I think it's a it's a big thing to makedecisions on what you will regret the least.
I I think that's a that's a key takeaway there.
I mean, you mentioned it was built off flash,but and do as a fad, but why did it ultimately

(18:04):
end up failing it and going into the ground?
I mean,
I think it's a liquidity thing.
Like, you know, there's probably something oflike a 6 second or 8 8 second rule when people
are, you know, opening their phones or theircomputers and they're using a social app.
They need to see something interesting, likelike that dopamine hit.

(18:26):
It just has to come consistently.
And it's one thing when you're like looking fortweets or images That's easy because people can
post 100 of them, but people don't have all dayto be just waiting on uni roulette to meet
someone interesting.
And so the the the liquidity problem was justso, you know, so so challenging.
We did all types of things to to try and solveit, but anyway, ended up shutting down the

(18:49):
company.
At this time, but but before we do that, we'dactually move to move to California, because
we, you know, try to raise an additional roundof funding in the UK, and it's just harder than
raising the states.
And, so we moved to California.
My brother, Tosh and and Patrick, you know, weall moved and basically pivoted the company to

(19:10):
being a consulting firm, basically trying tobuild mobile apps for universities.
At the time, it's like 20, you know, it's like2013 2014, every university just, like, thought
they needed to be in the app store.
They didn't know exactly what the apps neededto do, but they they knew that they needed
their logo, their app in in an app store toplay for.
So we just built apps, simple apps for for theuniversities, and that's kinda how it got

(19:33):
really deep on on, on higher education softwarelike Edtech.
And how did you get these universities asclients?
Would you go up to them and say, hey.
I know the the app stores popping off.
You guys should have an app.
Or It was really hard.
I mean, like, they're just, like, very slowmoving.
They make decisions based on committees.
Most of the time.
And so we got a bunch of pilots.

(19:54):
We got a couple paying, but in the end, Iactually learned I don't like enterprise sales
with universities.
The sales cycle's just too long, and it's tootoo challenging to get to a yes.
And so we what we actually ended up doing wasshutting down the company.
It wasn't successful.
You know, my buddy, Patrick, went to work atone of our friend's companies that was doing

(20:16):
better.
And then my brother, Tasha, moved back toEngland, to sort of sort of, start his own.
He's a real estate developer now.
So he started his project back in Madan.
And I moved forward with, an idea I had hadsince I was homeschooled, which was a much
better system for online learning.

(20:37):
So when you're online learning, when you'rewhen you're homeschooled in the nineties, you
spend most of your time learning online.
You know, digital textbooks, you know, sort ofe learning tools, you know, encyclopedia on
online that you're you're researching with.
And, we had we were part of a homeschool group.
We're at other homeschooled peers.
And, anyway, I I just had, like, thisperspective run.

(21:00):
What if you could build Skype is what Icompared it to you at the time, but, like,
specifically for online learning use cases.
And, in 2016 now, you know, slack is taking offin the workplace, discord's taking off for,
like, social and, you know, gaming.
And then Zoom was was you're starting to hearabout Zoom, so I was like, man, someone should
build something just like this, but for highered.

(21:22):
So like an online communication platform foronline learning and and and, in universities.
So I started it, the second company calledShamus Wire and, just to build to build exactly
that.
And we got you know, this was pretty great.
I was able to meet, the folks that runBloomberg Ventures and the guy who runs it,
this guy called a guy called Roy Behat, and heactually taught at Berkeley as a part time gig.

(21:47):
And he was like, yeah, I'd love to use this.
So let's fund it and, and sort of off to theraces with company number 2.
There's actually one story when I wasresearching for the show that kinda struck me
as pretty memorable is that you went todirectly to faculty and met a UCLA professor in
2018 whose story shocked you.
What was the story?

(22:08):
Yeah.
So, you know, now we're we're, you know, we'vebuilt the tech I don't wanna sell to the
universities because I have PTSD.
So I wanna go directly to the faculty and getthem to, you know, adopt the software.
And, yeah, I I met this professor at UCLA.
I get into his office to show him the software,and he's got an air mattress off to the side.
I'm like, like, what's going on?
He's like, oh, yeah.

(22:28):
I can't afford to live anywhere near Westwood.
I'm an adjunct professor.
You know, and, you know, and and, I live 5hours away and I shower in the gym and sleep in
my office Monday through Friday.
Like, and I was, like, totally shocked.
And he was so chill about it.
And he was like, yeah, this is, like, fairlynormal.
Like, a lot of my guys from grad school aredoing similar things.

(22:49):
And I thought adjunct professors was like,Michelle Obama or James Comey wants to give
back.
So the, you know, moonlight teaching a classicGeorgetown.
I thought that was, like, what most adjunctswere.
And it turns out actually, no, most adjuncts,the average adjunct makes less than $50 a year.
And, you know, they're usually a somewhatimpoverished PhD recent grad.

(23:17):
Who is hoping to get a 10 year track, teachingjob, but again, those have just become so hard
to come by.
So today, more than 55% of professors today inthe US, even at top universities like Columbia
or UCLA are adjuncts.
And, and so, you know, I was, like, shocked todiscover that and and I kinda just got up
assessed with that problem?
Like, how is this happening?

(23:38):
You know, again, from the outside, if you're ifyou're not too familiar with the nuance in the
space, it's like, tuition costs have done thisin Higher Ed that you're about to find out.
You go to school.
Tuitions like doing that.
And and yet the faculty who are teaching theselarge 100 level 200 level freshmen sophomore
classes generally are adjuncts and aregenerally underpaid.

(23:59):
Like, super low, Madan.
And so so I got obsessed with that problem.
And then the second thing I discovered by goingdirectly to faculty and and serving, them with
campus wire was what I call the the thecommunity college completion crisis.
And so, you know, our country, we spent a lotof time talking about how do you make college

(24:20):
more accessible, but we don't talk as muchabout how do you help people who go to and
enroll in a community college.
How do you make them more successful?
How do you help them actually graduate?
It's about only 30% of people who go tocommunity college will get a associate's degree
and about 16% who will ever get a bachelor'sdegree.
The vast majority, even though they they comethere with the intention of pursuing about 80

(24:42):
82% are coming to pursue a bachelor's degree.
That's why they're going to community collegeto transfer into a 4 year.
The vast majority never will.
And so why is that?
Well, it's it's super complex.
There's a lot of factors.
I think generally speaking, if you're going tocommunity college, you're disproportionately
likely to be the 1st year family to go toschool.

(25:02):
You're just proportionally likely to be workingat least 20 hours a week.
Many of them are working actually 40 hours aweek.
And yeah, you just basically have a morecomplex life.
It's not it's not a country club, you know, forthe young ambitious eighteen year olds that,
like, leads was or, you know, wherever youprobably end up going to school might be.
It's like, It's like, hey, I actually wannalearn and I wanna get a degree so that I can go

(25:26):
and, you know, market that credential in themarketplace and get a great career.
It's like it's it's really focused on that, butthese young people generally are having much
more complex, you know, living situations thatmake it more difficult for them to, like, say,
hey.
School is the only thing that really matters.
You know, I didn't work when I was undergrad.
I had my side businesses, and I saw my company,but, like, I never I didn't have to, like, go

(25:48):
and, like, you know, work at Walmart, you know,like, so it's 24 hours a week.
Most of these young people are.
And so they need more support.
They need guidance, even just navigating theFAFSA.
Like, how do you get if you haven't figured itout, you're about to find out.
How?
Yeah.
That was what we're going through, like, just acouple months ago.
Yeah.
Like, how do you even apply for financial aid?
You know, university has got all this, youknow, unique, you know, sort of sort of, arcane

(26:15):
you know, nomenclature, like, what is a 100level course?
Or it's a 2 inch level course?
And what are credits and cost per credit?
I mean, it's just it's almost set up.
It can feel to to to if you're the 1st yearfamily to, you know, go through this like it's
set up to be complex.
To keep you out.
And that's how a lot of these students feel.
And so in any case, the vast majority of themnever graduate, and almost an almost done if

(26:37):
I'm only 16%, we'll ever get a bachelor'sdegree.
And and yet we know that if you earn abachelor's degree, you'll you'll earn over the
course of your career about a $1,000,000 more.
If you get an associate's degree, you're gonnaearn about half a $1,000,000 more compared to
someone with just a high school diploma.
And so it's really important that we figure outhow to get people access to these degrees.
And so big idea that I couldn't get out of myhead was, you know, what would it look like to

(27:00):
give everybody in America access to theseamazing teachers, like, you know, these 100
level, 200 level instructors, these adjunctprofessors at these top 50 universities.
And, and, and so that was, you know, it was abig idea.
Like, like, let's let's figure out how to giveeverybody access.
And so, yeah, you know, decided you know, tobuild on top of campus wire and to use campus

(27:27):
wire rather than trying to sell it as softwareplatform, make it free.
So we made it completely free, but let's justLet's go and find a community college and then
let's try and do community college differentand make it better, more accessible, provide
more supports to students so that they actuallygraduate.
And then upgrade the faculty by givingeverybody access to these professors who, you

(27:47):
know, are super inspirational, who most peoplenever think they have access to.
Do you think it's set up complexly or or or tobe a complex system intentionally?
Because I guess if it is more complex, it givesa perception that there's greater value that's
being provided to the student?
No.
You know, one of the things I learned studyingaerospace Engineering, you know, you're doing

(28:08):
all these projects.
You're trying to design these things.
And it's like sometimes when a bunch of smartpeople get together and try and do something,
they just make it way too freaking complex.
And I think Like, that there's nowhere thatthat is more true than in higher ed.
It's like a very old system.
It's just become more complex over time.
It's like when you write a piece of code andthen you keep, like, a Frankenstein's monster

(28:29):
just, like, appending new things onto, like,the code base over time.
It becomes a monster, and I think higher ed ina lot of ways has just you know, with of of no,
like, of no, like, sort of intentional decisionjust sort of evolved into this really complex
beast and part of what I think higher needs todo to be more accessible is to just simplify,

(28:52):
abstract away a lot of that complexity andprovide young people with, like, a simple
interface to, like, engage with higher ed, andthat's that's part of what we try to do at
campus.
It's also been really inefficient Shamuseducation system in a way because In an
interview, I remember you shared that the UKhas 200 universities to manage, two million
people a year while the US has to 20,000,000students, but don't but 4000 colleges and

(29:17):
universities.
Why?
What's causing this gap in efficiency?
Well, yeah.
So, I mean, you just do the math for half asefficient.
Because every additional institution is anadditional provost of this, Dean of that,
Chancellor of this, etcetera, etcetera.
And that's, you know, that's just more, youknow, you know, employee count.
All those salaries have to pay all thosebenefits.

(29:37):
And then that, you know, drops down to thetuition bottom line and tuition, you know,
continues to rise.
As for exactly how we evolved in this way, youknow, I think it's It's quite interesting.
On one hand, you know, we do have the the sortof number one education system in the world,
and I think the Brits are the only ones thatreally compare and we do great research.

(30:03):
And, and and we do a lot of a lot of thingsreally, really well.
But Higher Ed has become as one of my favoritewriters, Clayton Christensen likes to say, a
bundle of services.
And so It's not really an education systemanymore in the traditional sense alone.
Sorry to interrupt this episode, but I have aquick 5 second favor to ask you.

(30:26):
If you're enjoying this episode, we'd love it.
If you subscribe down below, helps the channelmore than you can imagine.
Thank you very much.
And back to the interview.
It does so much more.
If you think about our traditional universitytoday, yes.
Okay.
You teach people.
So it's an educational institution.
You also create new knowledge which throughresearch.
So, you know, research.
Then you have a minor league sports team.

(30:49):
It's like semi pro sports.
In the US.
Like, it's not it's not how it works in the UK.
These massive stadiums, I think the higheststate state employees in, like, 31 states, is,
like, the state football coach.
Like, more than the governor or more than him.
It's, like, the state football coach.
Like, so, you know, he's minor league sportsteam.

(31:11):
Country club for, you know, you know, upperMadan class and affluent young people.
No Shamus.
That's totally reasonable, but it's That's whatit is.
A dating app.
You know, you remember my mom was like, I hopeyou find a wife in college.
And and you can you could say with the with theendowment to hedge fund.
So so, like, so, so it's like, I think, I thinkwhen when it's become this sprawling bundle of

(31:38):
services, it's it's it's it's difficult tofocus and refocus continually on, okay.
Well, what are we actually here to do?
Now I do think community colleges do a slightlybetter job at focusing on just education.
You know, generally there's no residents, likethere's no dorms, you know, you sort of live at
home, you go and you go and take your classes,you go home, the challenge with community

(32:02):
colleges, you know, beyond the completion isthey also have, like, to serve so many
disparate constituents.
It's like, Who does the community collegeserve?
Is it the students first, or is it the facultyunions first, or is it the local community
first, you know, what's the hierarchy ofservice?

(32:22):
And, you know, the community college leadersare doing their best to try and manage these
disparate interest groups with disparate needs,that are sometimes at odds.
And so for example, you know, if you're afaculty member, if you're a fa a part of a
faculty union, sometimes, you know, yourobjective is to maximize teaching opportunities
and wages for faculty, reasonable, totallyreasonable objective to have from their

(32:46):
perspective.
But what that means is in many cases, we'veseen these contracts where you know, the
faculty union will mandate that if there's asingle student who wants to take a class, the
university or the community college has tooffer the course And so it's like one kid in
basket weaving, you know, learning from, youknow, learning from a professor and a TA.
And it's like, if you just do the math, like,professor salary for one student, it doesn't it

(33:10):
doesn't really make sense.
You should really have a a threshold, like,where you need 20 students or 30 whatever the,
you know, the threshold is minimum to run acourse.
And so when you have these inefficiencies of,you know, one student in a class in many cases
at most of these institutions, Well, yeah, youyou have to raise your tuition or rely heavily
on state funding as most of these institutionshave to.

(33:31):
You don't actually have a balanced budget in inmost cases without without these subsidies.
And so overall, I think what what we saw wasthere's need for someone to come in take over
an institution and then simplify, simplify,simplify, use technology to improve the student
experience, provide wraparound supports.

(33:54):
So we were actually inspired by, here in NewYork, the Cuny Cuny's ASAP program, which
actually figured out how to get to 51%graduation rates at at the community college
level, and then to really bring in theseamazing faculty And so with campus, that's what
you get.
You get live online instructions.
It's not like the mooks, the Coursera, and allthat stuff where it's like you're watching a
professor, but professor prerecorded thelecture 20 years ago.

(34:17):
Like, you're actually meeting face to face withthese Princeton and these UCLA and these NYU
faculty for 3 hours every week.
With your classmates and TA's, knock out your1st, you know, 1st 2 years of college, get your
associate's degree, and then we help youtransfer into a 4 year university to complete
your disagree.
And the coolest thing about it all is that, 90%of our of our online students pay nothing out

(34:40):
of pocket for tuition.
Because, the government has what are calledPell Grants, which fully cover our if you get a
full Pell Grant fully cover our tuition costs.
So our students vastly didn't pay nothing.
And for those who can afford, for example, alaptop or those types of resources to learn
online, what do you guys do on your end?
Yeah.
Well, so we we've done the math.

(35:01):
We've figured out we can actually, you know, ifyou lower your tuition to the Pell Grant level,
you still have enough enough, revenue withwhich you can actually provide, not just the
student support services in terms supportcoaching and the mental health resources and
the tutoring, but we actually give everystudent a laptop and about a third of our
students.
We provide their, their, an LTE enabledlaptops.

(35:23):
They have free Wi Fi on the go.
And for the professors that are currentlyenrolled or or involved in campus, what's your
pitch to them?
How do you get, like, tie to your Princetonprofessors to say, hey.
I want you to also teach at at communitycollege.
What's that pitch?
It varies.
I think a lot of faculty, the best faculty aremission driven.

(35:43):
And whilst they love teaching students likeyou, you know, bright, you know, are gonna be
successful no matter what kind of, you know,young people, I think a lot of them do wanna do
the sort of hand to hand combat combat of,like, you know, working with students who might
be the 1st in their family to go to college.
Where they can really make a huge impact on thetrajectory of their lives.
And then, you know, for rest of them, I think,you know, it's, you know, it's like

(36:07):
compensation.
It's like they want especially post COVIDremote teaching opportunities.
So, you know, the the the generally ourfaculty, they continue teaching at their home
institution, prints in NYU, whatever it is.
But then they also moonlight and teach with us.
And so, we pay them generally double the thenational wage in the national average wage for

(36:27):
adjunct faculty about $8000 per class.
And, and so they love it.
They could teach, you know, it's just if you dothe math, you could teach you know, we're on
the quarter quarter academic system.
So four quarters a year instead of 2 semesters.
And, you know, the faculty, you know, you couldteach about, you know, 3 classes you know, a
quarter, you know, 4 quarters a year, you'remaking $96 a year.

(36:50):
It's like it's like real that's real money.
And how is your graduation rate compared tothose of, like, the average community college?
Yeah.
I mean, so far, we're, you know, it's stillearly days.
Our first cohort will complete, in April.
So in just about 60 days, and, it's gonna beit's gonna be higher than the the national
average.
Looking like it's gonna be about 40% for thisvery first cohort of fully online students,

(37:14):
but, the whole institution as
a whole, we're doing about 60%.
Got it.
And so you're having a long term impact onthese students' lives in their careers.
What is the long term goal that you wanna havewith campus?
Yeah.
I mean, I think look, don't get me on asoapbox, but our country has to figure out how

(37:36):
to make it possible for everyone no matter theconditions of your birth, whether you're born
poor, middle income or or affluent, to getaccess to the skills and education and, like,
credentials that you need to, like, go andcompete and and get a great, you know, career
going and and and and sort of you know,contribute society in a productive way and in

(37:57):
exchange, get to live a life that's worthliving and exciting.
And, I think, you know, I hope that not only dowe serve a bunch of students over time at
scale, but I hope that we also create a newmodel for, you know, other community colleges
and other institutions to replicate.
Where they go, hey, oh, Shamus is doing things,you know, you know, this way and look at the
results.

(38:17):
Like, how can we adapt what we're doing to beas effective.
And I think that's, you know, that'll be theholy grail.
And what are some of the things that you guysare doing to help skill that impact in the
business?
Scale is, I think, the next chapter right now,we're still, like, we're still, like, pouring
concrete.
Yep.
You know, we're still, like, really trying tomake sure that we have our our student support

(38:39):
model.
Right?
There's a lot of nuance, a lot of softwareneeds to be built to automate back office
things.
And then a lot of nuance still has to be workedthrough around who are the right humans.
So for every, that are gonna serve ourstudents.
So we have the faculty only the TAs and theclasses, but then outside of class, we also
have support coaches.
So for every stew every 50 students enroll, wehave a support coach.

(39:01):
Who's there to, like, essentially play the rolemy mother played for me when I was an
undergrad, like, you know, logging in, makingsure I'm going to class, making sure I'm
getting my assignments in, Madan it's likethere's a lot of unanswered questions we're
still thinking through and experimenting with,like, around, like, around, like, who's the
right support coach?
Like, is it is it, you know, if you're,Hispanic, you know, 1st gen, do you wanna

(39:24):
support coach who's, like, similar to you andwho can point and be like, hey.
I know exactly what you're going through.
Or does that not matter?
Do you want someone who's, like, recent grad,like, just out of college, who's a near peer,
or do you want someone who's older and wiser,and, like, you're gonna whose advice you're
gonna take more seriously.
Like, we're still, like, working out, you know,these nuances on the model, before we're ready

(39:45):
to scale, but I think long term, I mean,10,000,000 kids go to community college
approximately every year.
And, it's one of the depending on where she'slook out between 8 and 10,000,000, but it's one
of the most important, I think, aspects of ourhigher education system.
So it's really important to us.
You've had a lot of success so far.
There's a long ways to go, but I think for eachincremental success, there's always some sort

(40:09):
of bad event that that generally happens tohelp to help you learn.
You reshared an article on LinkedIn number ofyears ago that you had your share fair, of
events that seemed really bad at first, butended up being an overall net positive.
What was something that seemed really bad inthe moment, but ended up being a positive?
I shared an article in LinkedIn?

(40:29):
Resared.
I reshared.
Yeah.
I barely I barely used that.
8 or 9 years ago.
So I've I've so curious what this article is.
Like, sort of some downsides that have, youknow, that have come look, I mean, there's so
much, like, choosing to start a company islike, okay.
You're you're signing up for hardcore, pain,choosing to start a company that it's working

(40:54):
across 2 different industries Silicon ValleyAnd Higher Education It's like almost insane.
Because you have to run 2 different sort ofmean, you know, from 2 different operating
systems in your brain at the same time.
Like, I have to be able to understand how do Italk to, you know, our creditors and, you know,

(41:14):
politicians and regulators who are writing therules of the road and and how do I make sure
that we're compliant with them and we'reengaging with them but I also have to, you
know, be able to go and talk to these, youknow, VCs and investors and go hardcore.
Like, yeah, look at the opportunity here.
It's just like, is just like super hard,especially when you're whenever you're doing
anything in, like, health care or education ortransportation, like, you're you're fucking

(41:39):
with the core operating system of this country.
Like, you have to take it extremely seriously.
It's not just like an app, like uni roulette,where Oopsie.
We're down tonight.
Like, no big deal.
You can't meet people online.
It's like, no.
No.
No.
No.
Every single student matters.
Every single interaction with the studentmatters.
You know, it's like, how do you ensureexcellence, operational excellence at every
touch point?
And so it's it's really tough.

(42:01):
I have so many things that have broken and gonewrong.
I mean, buying a college was extremelydifficult.
First, you have to find an institution whosemission aligns with what you wanna do.
You're not allowed to to take an institutionthat's like a Catholic you know, you know,
nunnery, or seminary, and then, like, turn itinto a community college that's gonna serve,

(42:23):
you know, serve the the nation you have toenter, there's, like, a very small number of
institutions that you can even engage with,like, less, like, literally less, like, a
single digit number.
So I had to, like, fly around the country and,like, meet the owners of these institutions
and, you know, interview them and have theminterview me and then try and convince the ones
that I thought were mission aligned, that weought to work with them.

(42:46):
Yeah.
I I think probably one of the hardest thingsI've had to do, we we went I spent 18 months
with, with the family that owned aninstitution.
We actually signed a term sheet and, to buy theinstitution, and I, went really down that road.
And there were so many red flags along the way,like the owners were not at all excited about

(43:10):
what we were trying to do, and I think it's,like, really freaking exciting, like, making
high quality education access accessible toeverybody and it for the lowest, you know,
income, quartile in this country completelyfree.
Like, that's like really cool.
0 interest, from these from these owners.
In any way, I told our investors, we got SamMadan to invest, we got Jason Cichon to invest,

(43:31):
we got the Boomer Ventures folks, likeeveryone's excited, Madan then the day before
so we actually signed the actual agreement toacquire the college.
And then the day before, literally, the daybefore was like a movie.
We were about to submit the the deal to theregulators to approve it.
The Department of Education opens aninvestigation into the school.

(43:51):
And, turns out they had been, less thancompetent in administering some of the
department the department's health, their,their, COVID relief funding and programs.
And I'm not gonna, you know, speak too muchabout what, you know, what actually they may or
may not from doings, but, like, it it tankedthe deal completely because I'm not gonna

(44:15):
inherit a shit pile, you know, that was thatwas, you know, improperly running and Madan
maybe maybe there's even off seasons there.
And so, yeah, and, like, mind you, there's,like, there's, like, 3 or 4 other schools.
It's not like there's, like, a 100.
And I spent 18 months on this, and I told theinvestors, Madan deal.

(44:35):
Term sheet done, agreement done, andeverything.
Thank god, you know, our our council, a guycalled Charlie Rose, and his team, Mike Texan,
Charlie Wells was actually the former generalcounsel for the Department of Education.
He's like a mentor to me.
He'd said, you have to have a clause where youcan terminate in case this happens.
And so thank god.

(44:56):
Thank you, Charlie.
We, you know, we had that clause since we justterminated the deal.
But after 18 months of work, I did nothing butthis and fundraising for, like, 18 months.
I hadn't written a line of code, like, I'm anengineer.
I didn't get to any engineering work.
It was like, this was all consuming, and it andit com completely collapsed the deal after it
came into work.
So That was, you know, probably the hardestsetback we had to overcome.

(45:19):
I was still so bullish on this model.
Everyone should be able to get a debt freedegree that's high quality and world class
education.
So I was not gonna quit, and I kinda just wentinto the zone.
I didn't even take one day to, like, reset.
And then the funniest thing happens, so it'smidnight.
And so we'd actually hired a banker to help usmanage these conversations.

(45:41):
And there was one school that just constantlyignored our banker.
Why was that?
They just weren't interested in talking to thebanker.
I I don't know.
I guess they don't like they don't like hislook.
They don't like his email.
I don't know what it is.
They just ignored us for 18 months, you know,and we'd stop reaching out at, you know, so
like and I just opened up the the spreadsheetthat the banker put together with the, like,

(46:03):
handful of schools that would work, and I justcopied the email for the owner of the school,
and I just wrote him a cold email at, like, 1AM, like, in a cheer mode of, like, panic,
adrenaline's running.
I'm like, I know I'm not sleeping tonight, andI send them the email.
And I just like, hey, like, hey, look, youyou've got an amazing institution.
You guys have done amazing work, respect yourguys because the the the current owner's

(46:25):
grandfather was the founder.
I was like, I'd love to just talk to you aboutwhat I think, you know, our country needs and
how we can play a role the future of highereducation.
He gets back to me, like, within an hour.
And I'm on a plane, you know, like, the nextweek to Sacramento to meet them.
And, and, the rest of history, we ended up, youknow, we ended up, you know, acquiring the

(46:46):
college called MTI College.
And the owner, and he was only the partialowner, his 4 aunts who were all in their
seventies owned the rest of the school and soreally tricky trying to get them to understand
what we were trying to do and why they shouldgive their father's life work to us to to to be
good stewards of it in the future.
But the owner was, like, super passionate aboutit from day 1.

(47:08):
Like, I remember having lunch with him at thisrestaurant.
It was kinda empty.
It's still, like, post it's, like, right postpandemic.
Like, most people are afraid to even meet inperson, and it's, like, just us in the
restaurant, and, like, he's getting excited.
He starts interrupting me a little bit.
Like, he's like, yeah.
We can do this.
We can do that.
And he's like, you know, eventually he's like,hey.
I'd I'd love to do this.
I'll help you convince my aunts that we shouldsell but only if I can be a part of building

(47:30):
this with you.
And, like, I'm like, man, this is the opposite,the diametrical opposite of what it was like
working with the other institution.
And so, you know, things work out in weird waysand we got it approved by the regulators and,
you know, the rest is history but, and he's,you know, he's our president now.
His name's Michael Zimmerman.
He's a a great partner.
And he really believes in the vision that he'shelping us execute it forward.

(47:51):
So sometimes the worst things that happen toyou can can turn out to be some of the most
positive because I am fairly certain if we'dmove forward with that other institution we
would have found all kinds of things, all kindsof skeletons that we would have inherited, all
kinds of challenges.
So things, things work out into is.
My mother, you know, it helps have a prayingmother.

(48:11):
And I guess to buy a school, I'm sure it costsa ton of money Did you finance it from the
money from the investors?
And if so, how did it feel to put that much ofyour raised capital on the line?
Extremely risky.
Yeah.
We financed it.
You know, thank god for Jason Citron and SamAltman and those guys who really it's funny.

(48:33):
Like, sometimes you think, oh, if I ask for a$1,000,000, it might be easier than raising 20.
Not when not when you're dealing at that level.
Like, these guys are like, generally onlyinterested in doing things that are, like, big
and, like, you know, huge swings.
Yeah.
Go bigger to home.
They're, like, okay, I don't care if you'regonna sell company for $50,000,000 or
$100,000,000 or even a $1,000,000,000.

(48:53):
It's like, I don't get out of bed for that.
Like and, So fortunately, you know, that'snever been my challenge.
Like, I've always been ambitious and, like,trying to take the big swing and you know, it's
just how my parents brainwashed us to be.
And, so, yeah, I was lucky to meet meet thoseguys.
I'd known Jason for years.

(49:13):
But I met Sam, around the time of the pandemic,I think in 20, early 2020.
And, anyway, it turned out, you know, Madan hada unusual higher education experience.
I actually went to a for profit college calledFull Sale University, you know, learned video
game design for his bachelor's degree and like,really understood that there are ways in which

(49:36):
the sort of Silicon Valley model could actuallyimprove higher education and then Sam actually
spent some time at a community college beforegoing to Stanford, which a lot of people don't
know.
And so he he was just like, yeah.
I've been looking for this.
Like, let's do it.
And so, anyway, yeah, we raised the money.
It felt like the craziest risk, to, you know,spend a majority of the capital that we'd raise
at that time.
Like, I don't wanna say the exact number of thevast majority of the capital.

(49:58):
To to, you know, to acquire this institution.
But it was a great school.
Honestly, I felt so much more comfortablebuying the second school than I did the than
than I did when you're evaluating the first.
It was a really well warrant well well runinstitution, and the people there really cared
about helping students like they had greatoutcomes, 60% graduation rate, which is unheard
of, in general, in the 2 year and, degree incertificate space, but especially for profits.

(50:24):
Most for profit colleges, unfortunately, theyjust they don't perform well, and they have
lower performance than the nonprofits.
These guys for the opposite So I I knew that wewere getting a very valuable institution that
would serve as a solid foundation for us toexecute our model within.
And then the fact that Michael, we call him MZ,was Michael Zimmerman, was willing to stay on

(50:45):
board and actually, like, you know, bepresident I was like, yeah, let's do it.
And today, what's the biggest challenge youguys are facing and and the thing that, I
guess, keeps you up at night?
It's definitely graduation rates.
Look, long term, the only thing that reallymatters to our success is can we successfully
be alchemists?

(51:06):
Can we take in students at any, you know,eventually any condition put them through these
processes that transform them, transform theirperspective, their confidence, their knowledge,
their community, their ability, and then andthen send them out into the world either to
Foria University, which most of them want totransfer into or into a job, and where they go

(51:30):
on and do good things.
I'm like, that's really, really hard.
The students generally don't have the luxury ofmaking higher education and getting their
degree, the number one thing in their life.
Like, my parents to their credit were alwaysclear.
Like, yeah, you have these side businesses.
You have these projects.
Yeah.
You're doing flight school.
You know, piano lessons, sex, lessons, all theSchool is your focus.

(51:54):
Yeah.
Same here.
School is your focus.
My dad was the type in particular.
He was like, you get a 91.
He's like, what happened to the other 9marbles?
Like, you dropped 9 marbles.
Like, that's why he loved to say that.
You'd drop, like, every semester you start witha 100 marbles, try not to drop any.
Was his was his thing.
And so, you know, a lot of community somecommunity college students do have, you know,

(52:16):
similar, ability to focus on education and makeit the priority, but I'd say the majority do
not.
And so how do you help them understand where doyou wanna be in 5 years?
And then so, like, visualize that.
That's, like, honestly, like, a third of the athird of the job is helping them visualize
where they wanna be in 5 years.

(52:37):
Most young people today have no idea, noearthly idea, and so we have to take them
through an exercise of helping them visualizean optimistic exciting possibility for where
they're gonna be in 5 years.
And then step 2 is we have to help themunderstand how getting a degree is for most of
these visions a great step that will make thatvision closer to reality.

(52:57):
And then step 3 is figuring out how to helpthem understand how campus is one of the best
ways to pursue a degree.
And if you do that, you get the bin from theenroll.
And then you have to, like, figure out how toconstantly remind them.
Okay.
Your car broke down and your job's an ass youknow, like, your job's, like, you know, sucks
and your boss is an asshole and like, ah,you're freaking out.

(53:19):
Take a break from school?
What they wanna do.
Like, there's like a video game.
You see, like, 2 options.
Like, you know, like, an RPG, like, take abreak from school or keep, you know, keep, you
know, enjoying the suck.
Like, and it's like, okay, take a break fromschool is what they always wanna do.
You have to go, no.
No.
No.
No.
Hey.
You know, shameless or, you know, whatever.
Where do you wanna be in 5 years?
Now it's taking a break from school, is thatgonna get you closer to or farther from where

(53:42):
you want to be in 5 years?
And it's like, you're right.
Farther from.
Okay.
And then I can how do you constantly do thatover and over and over and over again?
You'd be shocked.
We had students with 4.0 GPA's 99% attendancerate.
Something bad happens in their life.
And I'm not talking about, like, losing a aloved one bad.
I'm talking about, like, you know, stillsignificant, but, like, something, you know, a

(54:03):
lower something, you know, the drama, you know,that their they they broke up with their
boyfriend or their, you know, best friend, youknow, moved away and, now they're now they
wanna drop out of school.
And it's like, So how do you scale a system ofpeople with these support coaches who build a
relationship with our students and constantlyreengage them and constantly remind them of

(54:24):
what their 5 year goal is and and, you know,keep them on track.
That's what keeps you up at night.
It's extremely hard to do.
No one's really done it before.
You know, the elite universities have so muchrespect for them.
My sisters are Harvard Grand, my brothers inOxford, Madan, these institutions they're
they're creating human knowledge that areamazing.
They're educating people, but you know whatthey're not doing?

(54:46):
They're not doing alchemy.
They're already taking in the best people.
And it's kind of like, don't screw it up.
Don't screw them up.
Like, our job is actually let's take in, youknow, base metals and let's transform them into
gold.
Like, let's take in these people at whereverthey are, and maybe they got b average in high

(55:09):
school, wherever they are, you know, some ofthem got a average of course, but, like, maybe
they have complexities at home, like, and thenlet's turn them into, like, into this, like,
aspirational vision of themselves.
And so it's, like, really tough.
And for students to visualize that 5 year longterm goal.
How do you get students to visualize that?
I'm sure that's probably pretty difficult.
So hard.
We're experimenting.
You know, it's, you know, obviously, you haveto have a conversation.

(55:32):
So we do intake conversations between a supportcoach and, and a student.
And, you know, you can't just ask a student.
Where do you wanna be in 5 years?
Because almost none of them have a clue, wherethey wanna be in 5 years.
And so you really have to sort of drive into,like, what are the things they care about?
You know, okay.
You you want financial independence.

(55:53):
Okay?
You wanna pay your parents back for all thesacrifices they gave you.
Like, is it they made to give you a decentlife, you know, maybe you're you've got a chip
on your shoulder because your girlfriendcheated on you at the homecoming dance like
mine did.
Wow.
That was that was in high school.
And you wanna, like, you know, make the worldbetter and prove that you can, you know, be,
you know, be impactful.

(56:14):
So, you know, we really, you know, figure outwhat motivates them and then and then help
them.
You know, what are the what what motivatesthem?
You know, what are they good at?
Know, what are they passionate about and thentry and, you know, visualize something together
based on those inputs?
We like to end with one closing question whichis if you could if I slid you over a phone and
you could call your eighteen year old self,would you call?

(56:36):
And if so, what would you say?
Would I call?
Yeah.
I'd call.
And, what would I say?
I'd just say spend more time with your family.
Would be my number one thing.
I do I do think, you know, I have this uniqueability.

(56:57):
I've discovered it's relatively unique to likejust zone all the way in and, like, kind of
obsess and go deep.
And that's kind of what the last 12 years of mylife has been since I took a leave of absence
from college.
And I think it's great.
I've learned a ton and, we wouldn't, you know,like, the organization wouldn't be where it is
today without that level of obsession.

(57:17):
But I do think, yeah, you know, sometimesthere's diminishing returns being in the office
till 2 AM.
And, like, it's, like, go go, like, hang outwith your family.
Like, don't miss these events and, you know,play a more active role there.
So that's probably what I would wanna tell myeighteen year old 18 months off.
Yeah.
Awesome.
Well, thank you very much, Tyne, for taking thetime to join the show.
It was a great conversation.

(57:37):
And for everyone listening, if you subscribedown to below in the episode description, go
check it out.
And we'll have a link to campus CDOs down thereas well.