June 4, 2024 • 36 mins
Prepare to unlock the future of higher education as we sit down with Dr. Michael Crow, President of Arizona State University, at the 14th ASU+GSV Summit. Discover how pioneering technologies, especially artificial intelligence, are revolutionizing the learning landscape. With two decades at the helm of ASU, Dr. Crow shares his insights on democratizing education and using tech to expand classroom boundaries. Whether you're an educator, student, or tech enthusiast, this conversation is packed with transformative ideas and forward-thinking strategies.
Ever wondered why our higher education system feels out of sync with today's needs? We tackle the systemic barriers stifling creativity and innovation within academia. Dr. Crow debunks the myth that innovation is a solo act, highlighting the critical role of collaboration. We challenge the entrenched elitism in American higher education and advocate for diverse institutions that prioritize learner outcomes over inputs. If you’re passionate about education reform, this segment offers a thought-provoking critique and vision for inclusive, impactful change.
Finally, we journey through history to draw lessons that can shape the future of learning. From the resilience of figures like Frederick Douglass to the educational power of YouTube, we explore unconventional pathways to knowledge. Dr. Crow discusses how informal learning platforms can be structured into formal educational systems, sharing personal stories that underscore the practical applications of these resources. Tune in to understand how historical perspectives and modern technology can converge to create a robust, adaptive, and inclusive educational framework.
Interested in sponsoring The Rant? Email me at eloy@4leggedmedia.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Hi, this is Eloy Ortiz-Oakley, and welcome back
to the Rent, the podcast wherewe pull back the curtain and
break down the people, thepolicies and the politics of a
higher education system.
Earlier this spring, I had achance to spend time at the ASU
GSV Summit, the 14th ASU GSVSummit, held in San Diego.
(00:30):
As I've mentioned in previousepisodes, the ASU GSV Summit is
an amazing, amazing event.
You see people of allbackgrounds, technologies, any
technology you can think of, andthis year was no different.
As a matter of fact, there wastechnologies coming out of
everybody's ears at thisconference.
(00:50):
The sponsors, arizona StateUniversity and GSV Ventures, did
an amazing job of bringing over8,000 people together to talk
about the latest educationtechnologies and, in particular,
what's going on with AI ineducation.
So it was an amazing event andwhile I was there, I had a
(01:11):
chance to run into a lot ofgreat friends, some really
interesting leaders, and I hadthe chance to sit down with
several really great leaders.
So in this episode, I get tosit down and talk with Dr
Michael Crow, president ofArizona State University.
Michael needs no introduction,but Michael is an amazing leader
(01:33):
, now serving over 20 years asthe president of a major
research university and one ofAmerica's most innovative
universities, really providing agreat model of what it means to
be a new American universityand democratizing education for
people from all backgrounds.
So it's a pleasure to sit downwith him.
(01:55):
We had a chance to talk aboutwhat's going on at the ASU GSV
conference, the technologiesthat are on display, in
particular, the technologiesthat ASU is harnessing in their
own backyards, bringing morepeople to the classroom through
some of their amazingtechnologies.
We also talk about his time atASU, his leadership, what he
(02:17):
attributes his longevity to, andalso some words of wisdom for
future leaders or currentleaders trying to navigate this
crazy environment that we livein today.
So it was a great conversationI hope you enjoyed.
But before we jump into that, Ido want to take a moment to
thank our sponsors.
It is because of our sponsorsthat I'm able to go to the ASU
(02:40):
GSV Summit and sit down and haveconversations like the one I'm
about to have with Michael Crow,as well as others other great
leaders that we'll have infuture podcasts, like Laura
Ibsen from Ellucian or PaulLeBlanc from Southern New
Hampshire University.
Our sponsors really provide usthe opportunity to do these
kinds of things and to bringthese leaders to you.
(03:02):
So please join me in helping methank REAP Education.
Reap is doing amazing work athelping institutions and states
and regions across the countryre-engage with lost learners
learners who have some collegebut no credential.
Of course, arizona StateUniversity is one of our
(03:24):
sponsors and I want to thankthem for their amazing support.
Open Classrooms Open Classroomsis bringing online
apprenticeship models to peoplethroughout the country.
Ellucian Ellucian is bringingtheir technology solutions to
colleges and universities acrossthe country and helping them
become more streamlined andcreate a better student
(03:45):
experience.
Alliant InternationalUniversity Alliant is providing
some amazing graduate-levelprograms to professionals
throughout the country, helpingthem get engaged with the
workforce and doing an amazingjob of keeping the costs low for
those graduate students.
Southern New HampshireUniversity Southern New
Hampshire is doing amazing workat innovating to reach more
(04:09):
learners throughout this country.
Education Strategy Group ESGESG is providing solutions to
institutions, to states, tocities and regions throughout
the country, helping them createa closer relationship between
education and the workforce.
I also want to thank BrandEd.
(04:30):
Branded is providing someunique education experiences
with some of America's mosticonic brands.
Academic Partnerships isproviding solutions to colleges
and universities throughout thecountry, helping them create and
grow online programs so thatthey can reach more learners.
And College Futures Foundationto colleges and universities
throughout the country, helpingthem create and grow online
programs so that they can reachmore learners.
And College Futures Foundation.
College Futures Foundation is aprivate foundation here in
(04:52):
California ensuring thatunderserved learners here in
California have access toeconomic mobility through the
lever of great post-secondaryexperiences.
So I want to thank all of oursponsors for making the rant
possible.
If you're interested inbecoming a sponsor, feel free
and shoot me a note at Eloy atfourleggedmediacom.
(05:14):
I'll put that email address inthe comment section of this
podcast.
So with that backdrop, pleasejoin me in my conversation with
Dr Michael Crow, president ofArizona State University.
Enjoy the interview, michael.
Welcome to the RENT Podcast.
Happy to be here.
So we're here in San Diego atASU GSV another GSV summit.
(05:39):
This is the 14th year of thesummit.
Hard to believe that much timehas gone by.
Is the 14th year of the summit?
Hard to believe that much timehas gone by?
What has surprised you?
What have been some of yourbiggest surprises over the years
as you come to the summits yearafter year?
And what's different about thissummit than some of those early
summits?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah.
So the surprise is how we'vebeen able to get over 150
technologies partner withcompanies.
We've been able to get over 150technologies partner with
companies.
The level of intensity of theprocess of finding ways to move
technologies around at thissummit has just been really
fantastic.
And then for this year, I meanI think we've got this air show
(06:17):
thing going on which is aboutartificial intelligence and how
all of that's coming along, andso that's new and big.
We think we'll have 10,000,15,000 more people just go to
that air show in the.
San.
Diego convention center runningparallel with us.
So we're very excited aboutthat.
I think you know is is, I think, this year I mean, it's also
just the nature of this being asustained thing for such a long
(06:41):
time Right that that this is along haul thing.
So learning technologies andeducational technologies are
going to end up being, like allother kinds of technologies,
ubiquitous and continuous intheir evolution.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
There is certainly a lot of technology on display
here Year after year.
Just what surprises me is howmuch more technology in just one
year.
I mean, if you think about thismoment in time last year it was
the major announcement wasChatGPT available to the masses?
And here we are, a year laterand there's several large
(07:17):
language models and ChatGPT andmany competitors and everybody's
using it, and so it's justamazing.
So one of the technologiesthat's on display here is
something you're very familiarwith Dreamscape Learn, so big
display.
They're inviting lots of peopleto try it out.
It's a virtual reality tool.
(07:37):
Asu is the pioneer in usingthis learning technology.
What should education leadersknow about this technology and
how is it benefiting learners atASU?
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Yeah.
So the best way to think aboutthis is you got to ask yourself
why does so many people thatwant to be STEM majors stop?
Once they start so about half.
Why does so many people morewant to be STEM majors than get
into it?
Because they're scared off bythe way things are being taught.
It's because we're not able toteach complex subjects like
(08:10):
college level biology orchemistry or calculus in ways
that most people can learn itand, sadly, the people that are
teaching it think that that'sbecause they have some kind of
deficit.
What we've come to realize isthat it's not a deficit problem
that we have, it's aninstructional problem that we
have.
So almost everything that welearn, we learn also by
(08:30):
experiencing something exceptthese abstract courses.
So if you're reading somethingin advanced English literature,
you can at least read the wordsand you can have emotional
connection to the emotionalimage that's being put in front
of you.
When you're learning some formsof biology you don't have that.
So dreamscape learn is amechanism by which we find
storytellers, technologists,biologists, pedagogists and
(08:53):
others.
We brought all these peopletogether and they've created a
story in which you're learningbiology, you're learning to be a
scientist, not by runningbeakers in a lab, but by doing
science to solve something thatyou're emotionally connected to.
We're using a virtual realityenvironment to do that.
So we've had more than 20,000people go through this learning
experience in their lab forintroductory biology, for
(09:16):
science majors and non-sciencemajors Unbelievable learning
outcomes.
So now we're off to the raceswith biology.
Now we're back in the trenchesbuilding chemistry.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding a planetary observatory
.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding astronomy.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding art history.
So we have, like the Eye ofSophia, this unbelievable
building in Istanbul, turkey.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Yeah, I got to see it on the demo.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
Yeah which has been a church and a mosque, and et
cetera, et cetera.
So we have just an unbelievabletool to enhance learning
outcomes.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
You mentioned the art history demonstration.
I got a chance to witness itwhen I was in Tempe not too long
ago, visiting the campus, andit was just amazing to me how
the models of the artwork areright in front of your face and
you can see it in 3D.
You can spin it around, you cansee all angles.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
You can move up and down.
You can move up and down.
You can be in even with some ofthe spiritual projections that
people wanted this language andthis art to project.
You can be there with thelighting to see what was
intended.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah, no, I think it's amazing.
The technology has come a longway and obviously VR is not
something that just a handful ofpeople use.
It's becoming ubiquitous, andso I think it's a great way to
expose learners who don't haveaccess to those kinds of labs,
those kinds of classrooms.
A lot of students get a chanceto go abroad and visit those,
(10:50):
but most don't.
But most don't, so how do youget them?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
there, yeah.
So not only that, but it alsochanges the learning itself.
You can read every book thatyou ever want to read about the
evolution of the early church orthe evolution of the transition
in Turkey from Christianity toIslam, but until you see this
building not just by standing onthe floor and looking around,
but being embedded in thebuilding and flying around the
(11:15):
building and you becomeemotionally attached to that.
But the other thing is it'smore than just seeing things.
You're an actual scientistsolving a problem.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Right, right.
No, I think you guys aredefinitely onto something and I
know a lot of people are seeingdreamscape in action here at ASU
GSV Summit, so hopefully highered leaders can take a look at
this technology and think abouthow they can incorporate it Well
, I mean I think what it's donefor us is.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
what we've seen is that in the biology we're seeing
up to a 40% learning outcomeenhancement, as measured in the
lab, and then two grade levelsimprovement in the course itself
, and then many people who havedifficulty really getting into
science they've just overcomethat.
It's viewed by this learninggeneration as hands-on.
(12:03):
It's viewed as emotionallyengaging.
It's viewed as what we calleducation through exploration.
You become an actual explorer,solving these problems.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
We just hit a little bit on ASU itself.
You yourself, you're in whatyour 22nd year Right as
president of Arizona StateUniversity.
It seems like just yesterdayyou got there, but it's been 22
years.
That's a long tenure for anypresident, particularly a top
(12:35):
tier research universitypresident.
What do you attribute yourlongevity and your success to?
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Well, I mean, I think that what we have at ASU is a
culture trying to do something.
So we're trying to build what wecall the new American
university model, and that's auniversity that's very, very
accessible, yet also veryresearch intensive or very high
level of competitive excellenceon the part of our faculty.
And I think that once thefaculty saw that objective and
(13:06):
became connected to thatobjective and then were
empowered to be designers forthat objective, then that gave
an opportunity for leadership tobe focused on something other
than the normal fights that goon within academia.
And that is so.
We have arguments and we havediscussions and we have debates,
but it's not about that stuff.
It's about, well, how do weachieve more retention, how do
(13:29):
we educate more people, how dowe help produce more English
majors or more STEM majors fromevery family background?
How do we do those things?
And so I think that longevityis a function of that, the
purpose, the purpose, and Ithink also you know the kind of
(13:49):
approach.
This would surprise some people, but we're in a very very
creative modality.
We don't lead by some managementtextbook or management you know
we lead by design objectives,so how can we design and build
something that's better and alot of people get behind that?
They just want to be behindthat.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Well, it's interesting.
You mentioned the creativityaspect, and that's certainly
something I've noticed from yourteam, who I've had a chance to
interact with.
Many folks in your team.
They're all driven by thefreedom to create, the freedom
to think, the freedom toinnovate, and that's certainly
something that we teach in ourcolleges and universities.
We encourage our learners toinnovate, to think differently,
(14:31):
yet our own internal processesin higher education fail to
allow for that kind ofcreativity.
What do you think is adisconnect?
Speaker 3 (14:39):
The disconnect is that we think that innovation is
the intellectual creativity ofa single individual only, and so
we focus on that.
So can we think that innovationis the intellectual creativity
of a single individual only, andso we focus on that.
So can we help that facultymember to be creative or that
student to be creative, and theydon't realize that in fact you
don't want to limit creativityin any way.
You want to be creativelyevolving new kinds of ways to
teach, new ways to organizeknowledge, new knowledge to
(15:02):
produce, and not justreductionistic scientific
knowledge, but whole new ways tothink about.
New knowledge to produce, andnot just reductionistic
scientific knowledge, but wholenew ways to think about really
complex things.
And so what happens ininstitutions is that there's no
focus on the outcome of theentire institution to the extent
that they worry about it, theway that you would worry about
trying to make something moreefficient.
So if you had a hospital andyou had high death rates in your
(15:25):
hospital, you'd do everythingyou possibly could.
If you have a university andyou have high non-graduation
rates, people think the studentsare just and so there's no
responsibility.
So universities, because theydon't take responsibility, and
they also I don't know what theword is for this, but there's
sort of a little cheesiness tothis where, basically, if you
(15:47):
can admit only students who arehighly qualified in the
particular way that a universityteaches, and then you teach
them and they do very well, youcall that a success and that is
a success, but it's a verylimited success.
Right.
So, with a person like that, youprobably should have found some
whole other way to give them awhole new set of perspectives,
not just further iterations oftheir existing learning
(16:08):
perspective, and then that alsomeans then that you're not
admitting all the other types oflearners and all the other
types of intelligence, and so wehave insufficient social
measurement and socialaccountability for what these
universities are doing, and wejust need a lot more of that.
And all of that then requiresinnovation.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Well, I tell you, this has been a pet peeve of
mine for years.
I've ranted about it on thispodcast, I've ranted about it in
front of legislatures, in frontof everybody I can talk to.
But I mean, you look at thenews today and the news over the
last week.
The psyche in America is stilldominated by the most rejective
(16:49):
universities in this country,the most expensive, the places
where there's only opportunityfor the few and the fortunate.
We live here in California, inmy day job, we're doing economic
mobility and return oninvestment analysis and, of
course, if you just took the rawnumbers, places like Stanford
(17:12):
come to the top, but they allowso few students in that it makes
very little economic dent inthe state of California.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
So we have allowed ourselves to become lazy, and so
Stanford is a great university.
Its undergraduate school is anelite honors college.
Well, there's a fantastichonors college at lots of public
universities also.
Only at Stanford.
They don't have otherundergraduate students beyond
the honors college.
But at a public university youdo.
Now in California some of thepublics have become Honors
(17:46):
Colleges.
That's fine, so long as that'swhat they're seen as If those
are seen as something other thanan Honors College.
It's just a place for intensivelearning by people who are
interested in and conducive tothat kind of intensive learning.
Not everyone is, and that's notthe only way to become college
capable or to become collegeeducated.
There's lots of ways to becomecollege educated, but what we've
(18:09):
done is we.
I have this thing like we'venever thrown off the mantle of
our British heritage in thedesign of the United States
higher education institutions,and that is that, at the end of
the day, the institutions are,in fact, elitist in their
orientation, and that isunfortunate.
That's unbelievably unfortunateand we just keep.
(18:30):
There's no bad players.
It's not like a malicious thing, it's a cultural thing.
So we don't realize that weshould have 30 different types
of fantastic colleges.
We should have people going tothe community colleges
throughout their entire life,coming back to the university.
We should have honors collegeslike Stanford and Berkeley.
We should have honors collegesat Cal State, northridge.
(18:51):
We should have all these placesfor all these different types
of learners and to think somehowthat and if you look back
through history, yeah, thosehonors college kids go on to do
certain things, but they're notthe people that go on to do
everything, to make everythinghappen, far from it.
So what we have are differentkinds of learners, just like we
need, to be capable of doingdifferent kinds of things, just
like we need.
(19:12):
And we shouldn't have ahierarchy that is derivative of
inputs.
We should have a hierarchyderivative of outputs and
impacts, and if we weremeasuring things fairly, we
would do a lot more of that.
We would measure, like, well,who produced all the people that
are running this nuclear powerplant over here?
(19:32):
Right?
And so it's an unfortunatevestige of our British and
Northwestern European heritagethat we, but particularly
British, that we have becomereally focused on success
through scarcity and successthrough exclusion.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Yeah, no, I couldn't agree with you more in that sort
of disease that was passed onto us still exists.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
We will win over it in the long run.
But it will never be the casethat there aren't great honors
colleges for certain kinds oflearners.
Nor should there.
They should always be there.
But when somebody is looking atHarvard University, they should
see Harvard College in HarvardUniversity as this honors
college, surrounded by somefantastic graduate schools, with
a massive medical school andhospital research complex also
(20:23):
attached to that university,serving all these functions.
But they're not serving afunction of educating highly
qualified undergraduate studentswho are not honor students.
They're not performing thatfunction.
So someone else that takes onthat function shouldn't be
denigrated because they take onthat function and they are Well.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
as a matter of fact, they should be valued for what
they do.
They create the greatesteconomic lift for the country.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
And it may be that more investments there would
give the country more netbenefits than other things.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Well, I'll tell you my last rant about my pet peeve
is the one part of our higher edsystem that is definitely not
British is the community collegeRight.
Speaker 3 (21:01):
That's very.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
American, that's very American, created to serve the
needs of all the returning vetsby and large.
But it's interesting how thatBritish mentality, that disease
of wanting to be more elite,creeps into even the community
colleges.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Well, because the leaders of the community
colleges then themselves saywell, well, now we should be
giving bachelor's degrees andmaybe someday we can grow up to
be a university, and then maybewe can become a research
university, as if that's anevolutionary pattern instead of
exactly the word.
So Tom Hanks wrote thisfantastic editorial about being
trained at a community collegeDiablo.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Valley College, exactly Diablo Valley.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
College.
Exactly so.
He attributed all of hissuccess as an actor, beyond his
personal capabilities, to theteachers that he had at that
community college.
And so that community collegejust think of the name it's a
beautiful name the CommunityCollege.
It is the college that iseducation after high school
college.
It is the college that you goto whenever you have something
(22:04):
that you need to know Now.
It can help you to complete adegree.
It can help you to go on to auniversity.
It can help you be trained todo a particular job.
It can be a place where you cango to learn something that you
just want to learn, and it'savailable to everyone.
There's no entry requirementsand there's a very low cost.
And so that institution itselfhas been made much less
(22:28):
culturally important byassigning it to the same social
hierarchy, and that is close toa fatal error.
That is one of the biggestnegative outcomes of this
hierarchy of higher education.
So why wouldn't a communitycollege be a thing that
everybody was connected to insome way at multiple points in
(22:49):
their life, and its transactionswere very simple.
You're moving some new factoriesto San Diego, here where we're
sitting, and so you need totrain up a bunch of people, and
that's where they go.
The military says they needextra training in artificial
intelligence.
Okay, we need five courses inartificial intelligence.
(23:10):
You go to the community collegeand you set up those five
courses.
Or the kid has a job takingcare of a sick parent and they
want to go to the university,but the university costs a lot
of money.
So you can get your firstcouple of years, all your basic
education, at the communitycollege, so you go there, and so
the community college should beviewed as a core level, deep
(23:34):
community asset.
And it gets assigned to, andthen they become obsessed with
attempting to change their ownstatus.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
The mission is great in and of itself.
Just focus on the mission.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
I mean, but for the mission, I wouldn't be here
talking to you.
So the mission is unbelievablyimportant.
It's also a way to solve otherkinds of things.
So not everybody needs to go tocollege, not everybody has to
go to college, but everybody hasto have access to learning,
opportunities to advance theirfamily, take care of their
health, get a new job, go on tocollege or university if they
want to do that.
In fact, we mix up all thesewords, and so I'm glad they're
(24:15):
called community colleges,because they help you then go to
the university if you want to,and then in some ways it's sad
Now it doesn't mean that thesystem isn't working and that
lots of people aren't benefiting.
I mean, our country isunbelievably more educated than
it ever was.
We've achieved more things thananyone could ever imagine.
We've produced millions ofgraduates from the community
(24:35):
colleges with associate'sdegrees and pathways to the
universities.
It has become this unbelievablething in so many ways, but it
is made fun of.
There was a movie maybe it waseven called Community College or
something but there was a moviethat Tom Hanks was in and it
was about community collegestudents and I just found it to
(24:56):
be.
It was a nice movie, but I alsofound it to be sort of
furthering this notion thatsomehow that- it's just sort of
an extension of high school.
Yeah, the goof-offs or somethingwent to community college,
which wasn't the case.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
I guess I'm one of those goof-offs.
So lots of young leaders incolleges and universities today,
you know, bringing their ownperspective on leadership,
bringing their own perspectivefrom their own generations.
Leadership bring their ownperspective from their own
generations and you know many ofthem have gone through a much
different experience thanperhaps you and I went through
(25:32):
when we were coming throughhigher education.
What advice would you have forthem in this environment, given
the need to continue to innovateand continue to push back and
continue to open up access?
in an environment where you knowbetween the political rhetoric
and the rhetoric on the ground.
It's very confusing for voters.
Speaker 3 (25:52):
So to me, I don't think that people I meet people
all the time and they'll tell methat they're, you know, they're
like a dean or a vice president, or they want to become a
leader down the road.
And then I listen to them and Ican tell they don't understand
history.
They don't understand.
So if you don't understandAmerican history, if you don't
understand how we got to wherewe are, all the hills that we've
(26:13):
climbed and all the hills we'vefallen off of and then back up
again, and how we got up towhere we are in this mountain,
if you don't understand what ittook to get there, then you're
not going to be able to figureout how to innovate.
So there's a few books outthere.
There's this one historian,william Manchester.
So he wrote this fabulous bookon the history of the United
States between 1932 and 1972,called the Glory and the Dream.
(26:36):
And when you read that book,which starts in the Depression
and goes all the way to the endof the Vietnam War, or just
about to the end of the VietnamWar, you realize what's actually
involved.
You realize how complicated thecountry really is, how all
these things that we'restruggling with now we've been
struggling with these thingsforever and how much progress
we've made from where we were.
(26:56):
But then also, what's the rootof some of these problems that
we're dealing with?
I'm not talking about justproblems of bigotry or social
biases.
I'm not talking just about that, I'm talking about what does it
take?
What does it take to getthrough the Depression, win
World War II, build the economy,move the country forward,
diversify the, and.
So if you don't understand thatand if you also don't
(27:18):
understand the founding of thecountry, so there's another book
called 1776, which just is oneyear January 1, 1776, december
31, 1776.
Everything that was going onand you just read it and you're
like, oh, my job is simple, myjob is easy.
Or if you read I read a coupleof biographies recently that you
(27:40):
read them and you just realizehow ignorant we all are, Right,
Our teachers didn't really giveus the full thing.
So there's this new biographyon Frederick Douglass Right,
Unbelievable, I mean.
You're just so inspired in justreading it and you become
inspired to be a highereducation leader and you're also
humbled by a guy like Douglass,because so Douglass could only
(28:01):
be taught how to read underpenalty of death by some lady
that took some pity on him andtaught him how to read.
And then he becomes one of thegreatest orators in American
history.
Or I just ask your viewers towatch Daniel Day-Lewis play
Abraham Lincoln in the Lincolnmovie trying to get the 13th
(28:25):
Amendment through Congress,through the House.
Actually, that already passedthe Senate Right.
Just what was involved in that.
And then don't ever complainabout anything you're ever doing
again, and then at the end ofthat he's killed by embittered,
racist assassins, and so,whatever you're worrying about,
just get over it and understandthat all progress is a function
(28:46):
of exactly where we're sittingright now and everything that
was achieved before you.
If you don't understand thoseachievements before you, then
you don't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Yeah, no, there is no history without chaos and
conflict, and it's just, I mean,we're fortunate to have the
opportunity to continue to buildon that history.
Yes, I mean we're fortunate tohave the opportunity to continue
to build on that history, butto act like things are so hard
today we've overcome so muchmore.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
Yes, much more.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Well, look, let me ask you just a few last
questions as we begin to wrap up.
I've always enjoyed yourimpatience with the higher
education horse manure to thoseof us who've been around a few
times, have experienced over theyears.
Based on all of your experienceyour time at Columbia, your
time at ASU if there's one thingthat you could change that
(29:39):
would make higher educationdeliver on the promise that most
people think is part of highereducation, what would that be?
Speaker 3 (29:49):
Move away from all measurements of anything
associated with an input andfocus only on all measurements
of things related to outcomes.
So who did you produce?
What did they do?
How did you impact outcomes?
Did you produce teachers whocould teach better and do better
?
Did you do projects thatactually led to some kind of
outcome?
Did you really take the kidsfrom ultra poor families and
(30:16):
help them to be successful?
Did you really help all thechildren of the immigrants that
are here to move forward withthe American dream?
Did you really give them achance?
And then I want to see it.
I want to see it counted, Iwant to see the impact, I want
to see it measured, and so it'sall of the measurements.
In almost everything else inhospitals they know like dead
alive, cured, not cured, safe,not safe.
(30:37):
We don't measure outputs, wemeasure inputs, and so that's
the one.
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Well, and I spent a little time on a couple of
hospital boards and it's amazinghow much goes into the
postmortem.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
If somebody dies the rounds that they have to figure
out how to the amount of energythat's put in to understand what
could have been donedifferently.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
The learning you have to learn.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So we don't do any of that.
No, and it's the arrogance, andso I call it.
The people don't really likethis, but I think it comes
partly from Plato's logic of thethree types of people.
So there's the philosopherkings like him, you know
one-tenth of 1% who are allsuper geniuses.
And there's the 1% guardiansyou know who are the people who
(31:27):
can happen and get things done,and then everybody else is just
riffraff.
And it turns out that if wejust had a different view and if
we tried to understand to everykid, why did you drop out?
Every kid interviewed, everykid understood.
Every kid has a spider webattached to them so that once
they show up at the communitycollege or at the university,
they're connected.
So, yeah, you got to go awayfor a couple of years because
(31:49):
things aren't going your way, oremotionally having issues, or
your family's having some sortof crisis, no problem.
Why is everything forced to bedone on a certain why?
Can't we have a way in whichwe're focused on our success and
the measurement of that success?
Speaker 2 (32:05):
Right and allow for multiple methods of learning.
If somebody cannot be in aclassroom, how do we bring the
classroom to them?
How do we bring the learning tothem?
If they can't be there at 5o'clock in the afternoon?
They can only start studying at11 o'clock in the evening.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Yes, or why not be accepting?
So go back to the person Imentioned earlier.
Go back to Abraham Lincoln.
So Abraham Lincoln was usingconcepts of Euclidean geometry
to understand, solving forunknowns in the design of his
implementation, of his strategyfor the reconstruction of the
United States, and so he nevertook geometry.
(32:44):
And so how do we?
He just read books.
So how do we help people tounderstand what they've learned
in a contextualized way, insomething other than only a
formal course?
How do we find a way to measurelearning?
How do we so?
(33:05):
Years and years and years ago, Iwas at this museum in Sitka,
alaska, where my life wassignificantly altered by
spending a half a day looking atthese exhibits of these
technologies built by theindigenous folks that lived
along that part of the coast ofAlaska, the southeastern coast.
I'm looking at this kayak andthe kayak's, thousands of years
old as a design.
(33:25):
They don't have any calculusRight, but they had calculus.
They didn't know how tonumerate it Right or parametrize
it, but they had calculus Right.
They built waterproof suitsmade of salmon skins that were
sewn together with a threadingtechnology and a needle
technology that had been built,which was as good as any metal
(33:48):
welding technology that chemistshad later come up with, but no
one gives them any credit forthat Right, and so we don't
understand that all of us, allthrough time I mean people have
been.
You tell me I ask any of yourlisteners you tell me how you
would have figured out 10,000years ago, when there were
jokers sitting around figuringout how to hybridize wheat Right
(34:10):
, hybridize chickpeas Right.
How would you have done that?
Right, there was no book tolearn from, right, but we
somehow have decided thatlearning is this Right and only
this, and that is a huge error.
What we have to do, like we'reworking on a big project now
with some folks YouTube and someother folks, where there's
(34:31):
billions and billions andbillions of videos on YouTube.
Right, there's all these thingsthat you can learn and all
these teachers that are teaching, and you may find your way, and
this is one of the best YouTubechannels, by the way that
you're on.
Yeah great.
So you got all this stuff onYouTube.
How do you take that and bringjust a slight bit of structure
to that and tie that into apossible way to call it possible
(34:56):
way to finishing high school,new ways of learning?
And then how do you come out ofthat with a tradable thing that
you've learned?
And so because the organizedlearners, they just denigrate
all of that.
If you've ever used YouTube,you know like you can whatever
you need to know to solve someproblem.
Someone else has solved it andyou just go there.
(35:16):
That's the first place I go toanytime I have to do something
in the house.
Well, we have, like, this15-year-old Volvo and we were
headed up on a road trip.
And then the battery for thekey thing Right Doesn't work
Right, and so I'm like I have noidea how to fix this and we're
locked out of the car.
So I go to YouTube, you know,and there it is.
There there's exactly thebattery I need to get, and some
(35:38):
guy who I've never met istelling me and I got the battery
, did exactly what he said.
I don't think I could havefigured Well, couldn't even
figure out how to get the thingopen.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
Well, that's how I figured out how to connect these
microphones to this camera todo everything I'm doing here
from YouTube?
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
All right, well, listen, michael.
I know you've got a lot goingon here, so I appreciate you
taking the time and great tohave you here on the rant.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
Yeah, thank you.
All right, all right, thanks.
Hi, this is Eloy Ortiz-Oakley, and welcome back
to the Rent, the podcast wherewe pull back the curtain and
break down the people, thepolicies and the politics of a
higher education system.
Earlier this spring, I had achance to spend time at the ASU
GSV Summit, the 14th ASU GSVSummit, held in San Diego.
(00:30):
As I've mentioned in previousepisodes, the ASU GSV Summit is
an amazing, amazing event.
You see people of allbackgrounds, technologies, any
technology you can think of, andthis year was no different.
As a matter of fact, there wastechnologies coming out of
everybody's ears at thisconference.
(00:50):
The sponsors, arizona StateUniversity and GSV Ventures, did
an amazing job of bringing over8,000 people together to talk
about the latest educationtechnologies and, in particular,
what's going on with AI ineducation.
So it was an amazing event andwhile I was there, I had a
(01:11):
chance to run into a lot ofgreat friends, some really
interesting leaders, and I hadthe chance to sit down with
several really great leaders.
So in this episode, I get tosit down and talk with Dr
Michael Crow, president ofArizona State University.
Michael needs no introduction,but Michael is an amazing leader
(01:33):
, now serving over 20 years asthe president of a major
research university and one ofAmerica's most innovative
universities, really providing agreat model of what it means to
be a new American universityand democratizing education for
people from all backgrounds.
So it's a pleasure to sit downwith him.
(01:55):
We had a chance to talk aboutwhat's going on at the ASU GSV
conference, the technologiesthat are on display, in
particular, the technologiesthat ASU is harnessing in their
own backyards, bringing morepeople to the classroom through
some of their amazingtechnologies.
We also talk about his time atASU, his leadership, what he
(02:17):
attributes his longevity to, andalso some words of wisdom for
future leaders or currentleaders trying to navigate this
crazy environment that we livein today.
So it was a great conversationI hope you enjoyed.
But before we jump into that, Ido want to take a moment to
thank our sponsors.
It is because of our sponsorsthat I'm able to go to the ASU
(02:40):
GSV Summit and sit down and haveconversations like the one I'm
about to have with Michael Crow,as well as others other great
leaders that we'll have infuture podcasts, like Laura
Ibsen from Ellucian or PaulLeBlanc from Southern New
Hampshire University.
Our sponsors really provide usthe opportunity to do these
kinds of things and to bringthese leaders to you.
(03:02):
So please join me in helping methank REAP Education.
Reap is doing amazing work athelping institutions and states
and regions across the countryre-engage with lost learners
learners who have some collegebut no credential.
Of course, arizona StateUniversity is one of our
(03:24):
sponsors and I want to thankthem for their amazing support.
Open Classrooms Open Classroomsis bringing online
apprenticeship models to peoplethroughout the country.
Ellucian Ellucian is bringingtheir technology solutions to
colleges and universities acrossthe country and helping them
become more streamlined andcreate a better student
(03:45):
experience.
Alliant InternationalUniversity Alliant is providing
some amazing graduate-levelprograms to professionals
throughout the country, helpingthem get engaged with the
workforce and doing an amazingjob of keeping the costs low for
those graduate students.
Southern New HampshireUniversity Southern New
Hampshire is doing amazing workat innovating to reach more
(04:09):
learners throughout this country.
Education Strategy Group ESGESG is providing solutions to
institutions, to states, tocities and regions throughout
the country, helping them createa closer relationship between
education and the workforce.
I also want to thank BrandEd.
(04:30):
Branded is providing someunique education experiences
with some of America's mosticonic brands.
Academic Partnerships isproviding solutions to colleges
and universities throughout thecountry, helping them create and
grow online programs so thatthey can reach more learners.
And College Futures Foundationto colleges and universities
throughout the country, helpingthem create and grow online
programs so that they can reachmore learners.
And College Futures Foundation.
College Futures Foundation is aprivate foundation here in
(04:52):
California ensuring thatunderserved learners here in
California have access toeconomic mobility through the
lever of great post-secondaryexperiences.
So I want to thank all of oursponsors for making the rant
possible.
If you're interested inbecoming a sponsor, feel free
and shoot me a note at Eloy atfourleggedmediacom.
(05:14):
I'll put that email address inthe comment section of this
podcast.
So with that backdrop, pleasejoin me in my conversation with
Dr Michael Crow, president ofArizona State University.
Enjoy the interview, michael.
Welcome to the RENT Podcast.
Happy to be here.
So we're here in San Diego atASU GSV another GSV summit.
(05:39):
This is the 14th year of thesummit.
Hard to believe that much timehas gone by.
Is the 14th year of the summit?
Hard to believe that much timehas gone by?
What has surprised you?
What have been some of yourbiggest surprises over the years
as you come to the summits yearafter year?
And what's different about thissummit than some of those early
summits?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah.
So the surprise is how we'vebeen able to get over 150
technologies partner withcompanies.
We've been able to get over 150technologies partner with
companies.
The level of intensity of theprocess of finding ways to move
technologies around at thissummit has just been really
fantastic.
And then for this year, I meanI think we've got this air show
(06:17):
thing going on which is aboutartificial intelligence and how
all of that's coming along, andso that's new and big.
We think we'll have 10,000,15,000 more people just go to
that air show in the.
San.
Diego convention center runningparallel with us.
So we're very excited aboutthat.
I think you know is is, I think, this year I mean, it's also
just the nature of this being asustained thing for such a long
(06:41):
time Right that that this is along haul thing.
So learning technologies andeducational technologies are
going to end up being, like allother kinds of technologies,
ubiquitous and continuous intheir evolution.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
There is certainly a lot of technology on display
here Year after year.
Just what surprises me is howmuch more technology in just one
year.
I mean, if you think about thismoment in time last year it was
the major announcement wasChatGPT available to the masses?
And here we are, a year laterand there's several large
(07:17):
language models and ChatGPT andmany competitors and everybody's
using it, and so it's justamazing.
So one of the technologiesthat's on display here is
something you're very familiarwith Dreamscape Learn, so big
display.
They're inviting lots of peopleto try it out.
It's a virtual reality tool.
(07:37):
Asu is the pioneer in usingthis learning technology.
What should education leadersknow about this technology and
how is it benefiting learners atASU?
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Yeah.
So the best way to think aboutthis is you got to ask yourself
why does so many people thatwant to be STEM majors stop?
Once they start so about half.
Why does so many people morewant to be STEM majors than get
into it?
Because they're scared off bythe way things are being taught.
It's because we're not able toteach complex subjects like
(08:10):
college level biology orchemistry or calculus in ways
that most people can learn itand, sadly, the people that are
teaching it think that that'sbecause they have some kind of
deficit.
What we've come to realize isthat it's not a deficit problem
that we have, it's aninstructional problem that we
have.
So almost everything that welearn, we learn also by
(08:30):
experiencing something exceptthese abstract courses.
So if you're reading somethingin advanced English literature,
you can at least read the wordsand you can have emotional
connection to the emotionalimage that's being put in front
of you.
When you're learning some formsof biology you don't have that.
So dreamscape learn is amechanism by which we find
storytellers, technologists,biologists, pedagogists and
(08:53):
others.
We brought all these peopletogether and they've created a
story in which you're learningbiology, you're learning to be a
scientist, not by runningbeakers in a lab, but by doing
science to solve something thatyou're emotionally connected to.
We're using a virtual realityenvironment to do that.
So we've had more than 20,000people go through this learning
experience in their lab forintroductory biology, for
(09:16):
science majors and non-sciencemajors Unbelievable learning
outcomes.
So now we're off to the raceswith biology.
Now we're back in the trenchesbuilding chemistry.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding a planetary observatory
.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding astronomy.
We're back in the trenchesbuilding art history.
So we have, like the Eye ofSophia, this unbelievable
building in Istanbul, turkey.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Yeah, I got to see it on the demo.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
Yeah which has been a church and a mosque, and et
cetera, et cetera.
So we have just an unbelievabletool to enhance learning
outcomes.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
You mentioned the art history demonstration.
I got a chance to witness itwhen I was in Tempe not too long
ago, visiting the campus, andit was just amazing to me how
the models of the artwork areright in front of your face and
you can see it in 3D.
You can spin it around, you cansee all angles.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
You can move up and down.
You can move up and down.
You can be in even with some ofthe spiritual projections that
people wanted this language andthis art to project.
You can be there with thelighting to see what was
intended.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah, no, I think it's amazing.
The technology has come a longway and obviously VR is not
something that just a handful ofpeople use.
It's becoming ubiquitous, andso I think it's a great way to
expose learners who don't haveaccess to those kinds of labs,
those kinds of classrooms.
A lot of students get a chanceto go abroad and visit those,
(10:50):
but most don't.
But most don't, so how do youget them?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
there, yeah.
So not only that, but it alsochanges the learning itself.
You can read every book thatyou ever want to read about the
evolution of the early church orthe evolution of the transition
in Turkey from Christianity toIslam, but until you see this
building not just by standing onthe floor and looking around,
but being embedded in thebuilding and flying around the
(11:15):
building and you becomeemotionally attached to that.
But the other thing is it'smore than just seeing things.
You're an actual scientistsolving a problem.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Right, right.
No, I think you guys aredefinitely onto something and I
know a lot of people are seeingdreamscape in action here at ASU
GSV Summit, so hopefully highered leaders can take a look at
this technology and think abouthow they can incorporate it Well
, I mean I think what it's donefor us is.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
what we've seen is that in the biology we're seeing
up to a 40% learning outcomeenhancement, as measured in the
lab, and then two grade levelsimprovement in the course itself
, and then many people who havedifficulty really getting into
science they've just overcomethat.
It's viewed by this learninggeneration as hands-on.
(12:03):
It's viewed as emotionallyengaging.
It's viewed as what we calleducation through exploration.
You become an actual explorer,solving these problems.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
We just hit a little bit on ASU itself.
You yourself, you're in whatyour 22nd year Right as
president of Arizona StateUniversity.
It seems like just yesterdayyou got there, but it's been 22
years.
That's a long tenure for anypresident, particularly a top
(12:35):
tier research universitypresident.
What do you attribute yourlongevity and your success to?
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Well, I mean, I think that what we have at ASU is a
culture trying to do something.
So we're trying to build what wecall the new American
university model, and that's auniversity that's very, very
accessible, yet also veryresearch intensive or very high
level of competitive excellenceon the part of our faculty.
And I think that once thefaculty saw that objective and
(13:06):
became connected to thatobjective and then were
empowered to be designers forthat objective, then that gave
an opportunity for leadership tobe focused on something other
than the normal fights that goon within academia.
And that is so.
We have arguments and we havediscussions and we have debates,
but it's not about that stuff.
It's about, well, how do weachieve more retention, how do
(13:29):
we educate more people, how dowe help produce more English
majors or more STEM majors fromevery family background?
How do we do those things?
And so I think that longevityis a function of that, the
purpose, the purpose, and Ithink also you know the kind of
(13:49):
approach.
This would surprise some people, but we're in a very very
creative modality.
We don't lead by some managementtextbook or management you know
we lead by design objectives,so how can we design and build
something that's better and alot of people get behind that?
They just want to be behindthat.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Well, it's interesting.
You mentioned the creativityaspect, and that's certainly
something I've noticed from yourteam, who I've had a chance to
interact with.
Many folks in your team.
They're all driven by thefreedom to create, the freedom
to think, the freedom toinnovate, and that's certainly
something that we teach in ourcolleges and universities.
We encourage our learners toinnovate, to think differently,
(14:31):
yet our own internal processesin higher education fail to
allow for that kind ofcreativity.
What do you think is adisconnect?
Speaker 3 (14:39):
The disconnect is that we think that innovation is
the intellectual creativity ofa single individual only, and so
we focus on that.
So can we think that innovationis the intellectual creativity
of a single individual only, andso we focus on that.
So can we help that facultymember to be creative or that
student to be creative, and theydon't realize that in fact you
don't want to limit creativityin any way.
You want to be creativelyevolving new kinds of ways to
teach, new ways to organizeknowledge, new knowledge to
(15:02):
produce, and not justreductionistic scientific
knowledge, but whole new ways tothink about.
New knowledge to produce, andnot just reductionistic
scientific knowledge, but wholenew ways to think about really
complex things.
And so what happens ininstitutions is that there's no
focus on the outcome of theentire institution to the extent
that they worry about it, theway that you would worry about
trying to make something moreefficient.
So if you had a hospital andyou had high death rates in your
(15:25):
hospital, you'd do everythingyou possibly could.
If you have a university andyou have high non-graduation
rates, people think the studentsare just and so there's no
responsibility.
So universities, because theydon't take responsibility, and
they also I don't know what theword is for this, but there's
sort of a little cheesiness tothis where, basically, if you
(15:47):
can admit only students who arehighly qualified in the
particular way that a universityteaches, and then you teach
them and they do very well, youcall that a success and that is
a success, but it's a verylimited success.
Right.
So, with a person like that, youprobably should have found some
whole other way to give them awhole new set of perspectives,
not just further iterations oftheir existing learning
(16:08):
perspective, and then that alsomeans then that you're not
admitting all the other types oflearners and all the other
types of intelligence, and so wehave insufficient social
measurement and socialaccountability for what these
universities are doing, and wejust need a lot more of that.
And all of that then requiresinnovation.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Well, I tell you, this has been a pet peeve of
mine for years.
I've ranted about it on thispodcast, I've ranted about it in
front of legislatures, in frontof everybody I can talk to.
But I mean, you look at thenews today and the news over the
last week.
The psyche in America is stilldominated by the most rejective
(16:49):
universities in this country,the most expensive, the places
where there's only opportunityfor the few and the fortunate.
We live here in California, inmy day job, we're doing economic
mobility and return oninvestment analysis and, of
course, if you just took the rawnumbers, places like Stanford
(17:12):
come to the top, but they allowso few students in that it makes
very little economic dent inthe state of California.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
So we have allowed ourselves to become lazy, and so
Stanford is a great university.
Its undergraduate school is anelite honors college.
Well, there's a fantastichonors college at lots of public
universities also.
Only at Stanford.
They don't have otherundergraduate students beyond
the honors college.
But at a public university youdo.
Now in California some of thepublics have become Honors
(17:46):
Colleges.
That's fine, so long as that'swhat they're seen as If those
are seen as something other thanan Honors College.
It's just a place for intensivelearning by people who are
interested in and conducive tothat kind of intensive learning.
Not everyone is, and that's notthe only way to become college
capable or to become collegeeducated.
There's lots of ways to becomecollege educated, but what we've
(18:09):
done is we.
I have this thing like we'venever thrown off the mantle of
our British heritage in thedesign of the United States
higher education institutions,and that is that, at the end of
the day, the institutions are,in fact, elitist in their
orientation, and that isunfortunate.
That's unbelievably unfortunateand we just keep.
(18:30):
There's no bad players.
It's not like a malicious thing, it's a cultural thing.
So we don't realize that weshould have 30 different types
of fantastic colleges.
We should have people going tothe community colleges
throughout their entire life,coming back to the university.
We should have honors collegeslike Stanford and Berkeley.
We should have honors collegesat Cal State, northridge.
(18:51):
We should have all these placesfor all these different types
of learners and to think somehowthat and if you look back
through history, yeah, thosehonors college kids go on to do
certain things, but they're notthe people that go on to do
everything, to make everythinghappen, far from it.
So what we have are differentkinds of learners, just like we
need, to be capable of doingdifferent kinds of things, just
like we need.
(19:12):
And we shouldn't have ahierarchy that is derivative of
inputs.
We should have a hierarchyderivative of outputs and
impacts, and if we weremeasuring things fairly, we
would do a lot more of that.
We would measure, like, well,who produced all the people that
are running this nuclear powerplant over here?
(19:32):
Right?
And so it's an unfortunatevestige of our British and
Northwestern European heritagethat we, but particularly
British, that we have becomereally focused on success
through scarcity and successthrough exclusion.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Yeah, no, I couldn't agree with you more in that sort
of disease that was passed onto us still exists.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
We will win over it in the long run.
But it will never be the casethat there aren't great honors
colleges for certain kinds oflearners.
Nor should there.
They should always be there.
But when somebody is looking atHarvard University, they should
see Harvard College in HarvardUniversity as this honors
college, surrounded by somefantastic graduate schools, with
a massive medical school andhospital research complex also
(20:23):
attached to that university,serving all these functions.
But they're not serving afunction of educating highly
qualified undergraduate studentswho are not honor students.
They're not performing thatfunction.
So someone else that takes onthat function shouldn't be
denigrated because they take onthat function and they are Well.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
as a matter of fact, they should be valued for what
they do.
They create the greatesteconomic lift for the country.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
And it may be that more investments there would
give the country more netbenefits than other things.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Well, I'll tell you my last rant about my pet peeve
is the one part of our higher edsystem that is definitely not
British is the community collegeRight.
Speaker 3 (21:01):
That's very.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
American, that's very American, created to serve the
needs of all the returning vetsby and large.
But it's interesting how thatBritish mentality, that disease
of wanting to be more elite,creeps into even the community
colleges.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Well, because the leaders of the community
colleges then themselves saywell, well, now we should be
giving bachelor's degrees andmaybe someday we can grow up to
be a university, and then maybewe can become a research
university, as if that's anevolutionary pattern instead of
exactly the word.
So Tom Hanks wrote thisfantastic editorial about being
trained at a community collegeDiablo.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Valley College, exactly Diablo Valley.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
College.
Exactly so.
He attributed all of hissuccess as an actor, beyond his
personal capabilities, to theteachers that he had at that
community college.
And so that community collegejust think of the name it's a
beautiful name the CommunityCollege.
It is the college that iseducation after high school
college.
It is the college that you goto whenever you have something
(22:04):
that you need to know Now.
It can help you to complete adegree.
It can help you to go on to auniversity.
It can help you be trained todo a particular job.
It can be a place where you cango to learn something that you
just want to learn, and it'savailable to everyone.
There's no entry requirementsand there's a very low cost.
And so that institution itselfhas been made much less
(22:28):
culturally important byassigning it to the same social
hierarchy, and that is close toa fatal error.
That is one of the biggestnegative outcomes of this
hierarchy of higher education.
So why wouldn't a communitycollege be a thing that
everybody was connected to insome way at multiple points in
(22:49):
their life, and its transactionswere very simple.
You're moving some new factoriesto San Diego, here where we're
sitting, and so you need totrain up a bunch of people, and
that's where they go.
The military says they needextra training in artificial
intelligence.
Okay, we need five courses inartificial intelligence.
(23:10):
You go to the community collegeand you set up those five
courses.
Or the kid has a job takingcare of a sick parent and they
want to go to the university,but the university costs a lot
of money.
So you can get your firstcouple of years, all your basic
education, at the communitycollege, so you go there, and so
the community college should beviewed as a core level, deep
(23:34):
community asset.
And it gets assigned to, andthen they become obsessed with
attempting to change their ownstatus.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
The mission is great in and of itself.
Just focus on the mission.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
I mean, but for the mission, I wouldn't be here
talking to you.
So the mission is unbelievablyimportant.
It's also a way to solve otherkinds of things.
So not everybody needs to go tocollege, not everybody has to
go to college, but everybody hasto have access to learning,
opportunities to advance theirfamily, take care of their
health, get a new job, go on tocollege or university if they
want to do that.
In fact, we mix up all thesewords, and so I'm glad they're
(24:15):
called community colleges,because they help you then go to
the university if you want to,and then in some ways it's sad
Now it doesn't mean that thesystem isn't working and that
lots of people aren't benefiting.
I mean, our country isunbelievably more educated than
it ever was.
We've achieved more things thananyone could ever imagine.
We've produced millions ofgraduates from the community
(24:35):
colleges with associate'sdegrees and pathways to the
universities.
It has become this unbelievablething in so many ways, but it
is made fun of.
There was a movie maybe it waseven called Community College or
something but there was a moviethat Tom Hanks was in and it
was about community collegestudents and I just found it to
(24:56):
be.
It was a nice movie, but I alsofound it to be sort of
furthering this notion thatsomehow that- it's just sort of
an extension of high school.
Yeah, the goof-offs or somethingwent to community college,
which wasn't the case.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
I guess I'm one of those goof-offs.
So lots of young leaders incolleges and universities today,
you know, bringing their ownperspective on leadership,
bringing their own perspectivefrom their own generations.
Leadership bring their ownperspective from their own
generations and you know many ofthem have gone through a much
different experience thanperhaps you and I went through
(25:32):
when we were coming throughhigher education.
What advice would you have forthem in this environment, given
the need to continue to innovateand continue to push back and
continue to open up access?
in an environment where you knowbetween the political rhetoric
and the rhetoric on the ground.
It's very confusing for voters.
Speaker 3 (25:52):
So to me, I don't think that people I meet people
all the time and they'll tell methat they're, you know, they're
like a dean or a vice president, or they want to become a
leader down the road.
And then I listen to them and Ican tell they don't understand
history.
They don't understand.
So if you don't understandAmerican history, if you don't
understand how we got to wherewe are, all the hills that we've
(26:13):
climbed and all the hills we'vefallen off of and then back up
again, and how we got up towhere we are in this mountain,
if you don't understand what ittook to get there, then you're
not going to be able to figureout how to innovate.
So there's a few books outthere.
There's this one historian,william Manchester.
So he wrote this fabulous bookon the history of the United
States between 1932 and 1972,called the Glory and the Dream.
(26:36):
And when you read that book,which starts in the Depression
and goes all the way to the endof the Vietnam War, or just
about to the end of the VietnamWar, you realize what's actually
involved.
You realize how complicated thecountry really is, how all
these things that we'restruggling with now we've been
struggling with these thingsforever and how much progress
we've made from where we were.
(26:56):
But then also, what's the rootof some of these problems that
we're dealing with?
I'm not talking about justproblems of bigotry or social
biases.
I'm not talking just about that, I'm talking about what does it
take?
What does it take to getthrough the Depression, win
World War II, build the economy,move the country forward,
diversify the, and.
So if you don't understand thatand if you also don't
(27:18):
understand the founding of thecountry, so there's another book
called 1776, which just is oneyear January 1, 1776, december
31, 1776.
Everything that was going onand you just read it and you're
like, oh, my job is simple, myjob is easy.
Or if you read I read a coupleof biographies recently that you
(27:40):
read them and you just realizehow ignorant we all are, Right,
Our teachers didn't really giveus the full thing.
So there's this new biographyon Frederick Douglass Right,
Unbelievable, I mean.
You're just so inspired in justreading it and you become
inspired to be a highereducation leader and you're also
humbled by a guy like Douglass,because so Douglass could only
(28:01):
be taught how to read underpenalty of death by some lady
that took some pity on him andtaught him how to read.
And then he becomes one of thegreatest orators in American
history.
Or I just ask your viewers towatch Daniel Day-Lewis play
Abraham Lincoln in the Lincolnmovie trying to get the 13th
(28:25):
Amendment through Congress,through the House.
Actually, that already passedthe Senate Right.
Just what was involved in that.
And then don't ever complainabout anything you're ever doing
again, and then at the end ofthat he's killed by embittered,
racist assassins, and so,whatever you're worrying about,
just get over it and understandthat all progress is a function
(28:46):
of exactly where we're sittingright now and everything that
was achieved before you.
If you don't understand thoseachievements before you, then
you don't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Yeah, no, there is no history without chaos and
conflict, and it's just, I mean,we're fortunate to have the
opportunity to continue to buildon that history.
Yes, I mean we're fortunate tohave the opportunity to continue
to build on that history, butto act like things are so hard
today we've overcome so muchmore.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
Yes, much more.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Well, look, let me ask you just a few last
questions as we begin to wrap up.
I've always enjoyed yourimpatience with the higher
education horse manure to thoseof us who've been around a few
times, have experienced over theyears.
Based on all of your experienceyour time at Columbia, your
time at ASU if there's one thingthat you could change that
(29:39):
would make higher educationdeliver on the promise that most
people think is part of highereducation, what would that be?
Speaker 3 (29:49):
Move away from all measurements of anything
associated with an input andfocus only on all measurements
of things related to outcomes.
So who did you produce?
What did they do?
How did you impact outcomes?
Did you produce teachers whocould teach better and do better
?
Did you do projects thatactually led to some kind of
outcome?
Did you really take the kidsfrom ultra poor families and
(30:16):
help them to be successful?
Did you really help all thechildren of the immigrants that
are here to move forward withthe American dream?
Did you really give them achance?
And then I want to see it.
I want to see it counted, Iwant to see the impact, I want
to see it measured, and so it'sall of the measurements.
In almost everything else inhospitals they know like dead
alive, cured, not cured, safe,not safe.
(30:37):
We don't measure outputs, wemeasure inputs, and so that's
the one.
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Well, and I spent a little time on a couple of
hospital boards and it's amazinghow much goes into the
postmortem.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
If somebody dies the rounds that they have to figure
out how to the amount of energythat's put in to understand what
could have been donedifferently.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
The learning you have to learn.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So we don't do any of that.
No, and it's the arrogance, andso I call it.
The people don't really likethis, but I think it comes
partly from Plato's logic of thethree types of people.
So there's the philosopherkings like him, you know
one-tenth of 1% who are allsuper geniuses.
And there's the 1% guardiansyou know who are the people who
(31:27):
can happen and get things done,and then everybody else is just
riffraff.
And it turns out that if wejust had a different view and if
we tried to understand to everykid, why did you drop out?
Every kid interviewed, everykid understood.
Every kid has a spider webattached to them so that once
they show up at the communitycollege or at the university,
they're connected.
So, yeah, you got to go awayfor a couple of years because
(31:49):
things aren't going your way, oremotionally having issues, or
your family's having some sortof crisis, no problem.
Why is everything forced to bedone on a certain why?
Can't we have a way in whichwe're focused on our success and
the measurement of that success?
Speaker 2 (32:05):
Right and allow for multiple methods of learning.
If somebody cannot be in aclassroom, how do we bring the
classroom to them?
How do we bring the learning tothem?
If they can't be there at 5o'clock in the afternoon?
They can only start studying at11 o'clock in the evening.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Yes, or why not be accepting?
So go back to the person Imentioned earlier.
Go back to Abraham Lincoln.
So Abraham Lincoln was usingconcepts of Euclidean geometry
to understand, solving forunknowns in the design of his
implementation, of his strategyfor the reconstruction of the
United States, and so he nevertook geometry.
(32:44):
And so how do we?
He just read books.
So how do we help people tounderstand what they've learned
in a contextualized way, insomething other than only a
formal course?
How do we find a way to measurelearning?
How do we so?
(33:05):
Years and years and years ago, Iwas at this museum in Sitka,
alaska, where my life wassignificantly altered by
spending a half a day looking atthese exhibits of these
technologies built by theindigenous folks that lived
along that part of the coast ofAlaska, the southeastern coast.
I'm looking at this kayak andthe kayak's, thousands of years
old as a design.
(33:25):
They don't have any calculusRight, but they had calculus.
They didn't know how tonumerate it Right or parametrize
it, but they had calculus Right.
They built waterproof suitsmade of salmon skins that were
sewn together with a threadingtechnology and a needle
technology that had been built,which was as good as any metal
(33:48):
welding technology that chemistshad later come up with, but no
one gives them any credit forthat Right, and so we don't
understand that all of us, allthrough time I mean people have
been.
You tell me I ask any of yourlisteners you tell me how you
would have figured out 10,000years ago, when there were
jokers sitting around figuringout how to hybridize wheat Right
(34:10):
, hybridize chickpeas Right.
How would you have done that?
Right, there was no book tolearn from, right, but we
somehow have decided thatlearning is this Right and only
this, and that is a huge error.
What we have to do, like we'reworking on a big project now
with some folks YouTube and someother folks, where there's
(34:31):
billions and billions andbillions of videos on YouTube.
Right, there's all these thingsthat you can learn and all
these teachers that are teaching, and you may find your way, and
this is one of the best YouTubechannels, by the way that
you're on.
Yeah great.
So you got all this stuff onYouTube.
How do you take that and bringjust a slight bit of structure
to that and tie that into apossible way to call it possible
(34:56):
way to finishing high school,new ways of learning?
And then how do you come out ofthat with a tradable thing that
you've learned?
And so because the organizedlearners, they just denigrate
all of that.
If you've ever used YouTube,you know like you can whatever
you need to know to solve someproblem.
Someone else has solved it andyou just go there.
(35:16):
That's the first place I go toanytime I have to do something
in the house.
Well, we have, like, this15-year-old Volvo and we were
headed up on a road trip.
And then the battery for thekey thing Right Doesn't work
Right, and so I'm like I have noidea how to fix this and we're
locked out of the car.
So I go to YouTube, you know,and there it is.
There there's exactly thebattery I need to get, and some
(35:38):
guy who I've never met istelling me and I got the battery
, did exactly what he said.
I don't think I could havefigured Well, couldn't even
figure out how to get the thingopen.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
Well, that's how I figured out how to connect these
microphones to this camera todo everything I'm doing here
from YouTube?
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
All right, well, listen, michael.
I know you've got a lot goingon here, so I appreciate you
taking the time and great tohave you here on the rant.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
Yeah, thank you.
All right, all right, thanks.
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