Episode 14 - Lead Deans

[00:00:04] Speaker A: Welcome to Kendall Speaks. My name is Dr. Brian Stewart and I'm the president of the Kendall campus. And today we have two amazing guests with us. We've been trying to get them on all semester. And we finally have them on. We have our lead dean of faculty for the college and our dean here at the Kendall campus, Dr. Jorge Michael Cuellar. Welcome, sir. [00:00:27] Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you. I'm really excited to be here. [00:00:30] Speaker A: And with him is our lead dean of students for our college, our dean of Student Services, Dr. Kesia Vasquez. Welcome. [00:00:36] Speaker C: Hello. Thank you for the invite. Excited to be here. [00:00:39] Speaker A: Well, we're so happy to have you both here. Let's start with hearing a little bit about your stories. We'll start with ladies first. How about that? Tell us a little bit, Kesia, about your journey to Miami Dade College. You know, things that kind of have gotten you to where you are at this point. [00:00:53] Speaker C: Point. So my journey at Miami Dade College started as a student. After the big economic boom that we had. I, I was doing real estate and mortgages and I couldn't do business anymore. So I decided to go back to school and I, I got a part time job at the college. So I started pursuing it as my associate's degree. I started working in the testing department as an examiner. [00:01:16] Speaker A: I didn't know any of this. [00:01:17] Speaker C: Yeah, that's how I started. And then after that, the rest is history. I continued to pursue my degree in social work at fiu. Master's degree. But I continued growing at the college and my first full time job was I was a mentoring coordinator through Single Stop. And then after that I was the access director at the north campus. I did that for a few years. It was a perfect match as I just finished a master's in social work. It was a perfect match to work with students with disabilities. I got licensed as a clinical social worker and then I got a great opportunity to go back to the Wolfson campus and be the retention director there. I was there for about seven, eight years. Then I went back to the north campus as the new student center director for about a year or two. And then I'm here at the Kendall campus, the biggest and best and the best campus in our institution. And as we like to call ourselves a Titanic. Right. But the journey at the college has been one of the best. I'm a first gen kid. I was born out of two Cuban parents that came in 1980 during the Mariel boat lift era. My parents got divorced. My mother raised me as a single parent. So I had the first all the things first gen kids go through. My mom didn't know what a college application was or how to complete a FAFSA application. I also was raised Jehovah's Witness, and so higher ed is not something that's promoted within while you're growing up. So I. I kind of forged my path and along my path, I've met angels along that path, and it's been here at the college. So I've been very blessed. Like President Georgette Perez was my first boss at the college. And then you see Dr. Harrison as. [00:03:00] Speaker A: Well, and look at where they both are. [00:03:02] Speaker C: Exactly. And I've been very fortunate to have strong women in leadership roles to really mentor me and shepherd my way through. So, yeah, that's my story in a nutshell. But my story looks a lot like the students here at the college, so I definitely bleed blue. I know the student experience through and through. Cause I experienced it. And I'm glad that I didn't leave and pursue another career, that I got to stay here and pay it forward. [00:03:26] Speaker A: So that's awesome. We'll talk a little bit about the amazing team that you've put together. Also, I quickly want to. You just graduated from a very important program that I thought you might mention real quick. [00:03:37] Speaker C: Sure. I was very fortunate to be given the opportunity to be part of Leadership Miami Cohort 46. My team did an amazing project with his house, which is a nonprofit for foster that provides housing for foster youth. And these foster youth wanted an outdoor gym. So my team, we got together, we fundraised over, I think, $60,000. We were able to create this beautiful park for the kids. And we were just excited to reach the goal because the cool thing about this experience is they put you in a group and you have to figure out a lot of people don't know about fundraising or how to work with nonprofits and how to do contracts. So we got together, we kind of learned, went through the process, and, you know, group work is always tough. Right. But we made it through. We had some hiccups along the way, which is part of the experience. Right. But we met the deadline, and the best experience was when we did the ribbon cutting. Then you see all the kids come into the park, and they were so excited because I guess we kind of cater to what they wanted and they asked for. So. [00:04:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:38] Speaker C: Thank you for bringing that up. That's something that we did this year, and I was unexpected, and I'm glad that I went through the program. [00:04:45] Speaker A: Thank you for sharing that with us. Next we're going to turn to the other part of our dynamic duo. And I do mean these two are dynamic duos. And you're going to see how well they work together as we go through today. But Dean Cuellar, talk a little bit about your journey to the Kendall campus because I know you've had a similar journey at a few places here. [00:05:00] Speaker B: Yes, in my case, I got here from Cuba in the 90s, leaving my parents, my sister, everybody behind. So Miami Dade College was home for me. You know, it's where I found, you know, my sanity, if you want to call it something, friends, my social environment. So I started as a student and also working in the EAP lab at the Inter American now Padron campus. And then from there, you know, I had the same thing as Dean Vasquez. I had a lot of mentors through all the ways within the college and also a network of people that we were working together. And you know, right now, like Eric Domenici, he was in the library there, learning resources. He was just, you know, one of the people there, librarians, Bisoso, Dr. Bisoso, which is now the registrar of the college, he was an advisor. So a lot of people that we grew up together there inside of the Intra American now patron campus. And you know, that shaped my career as well because I started also tutoring the side, a little bit of mathematics, helping students in the access department. [00:06:04] Speaker A: Not a bad discipline to be good. [00:06:06] Speaker C: At, by the way. [00:06:06] Speaker B: So, and that's the background that I have from, from Cuba. I went to different competitions and all that in mathematics when I was in high school and middle school. So I started tutoring mathematics and I decided that that was my passion, believe it or not, this is something that maybe you don't know. Mercy Macrina, she started at that time at an Inter American campus and I was helping her with students in the access department. So I know her for like years, 20, 26 years. And then, you know, after that I stay in the college through different grants that I was part of. I was called also to the Kendall campus in 2001 to manage the Mathematics and Science Study Center. And then I went through the transition of going through, okay, I love mathematics, I'm going to pursue mathematics so that I can at least teach it. But I love administration. And the reason why is because I noticed that there I could touch more, I can influence more in terms of changes or things that I wanted to see implemented so that more students see what Miami Dade College is and basically is giving back to the institution that gave me so much. It gave me a Life, it gave me a profession. That's why I did my master's and my doctoral degree in leadership and management in higher education. So I, I wanted to go completely into that route. I also taught mathematics here at the Canada campus for that. It was close to 15 years. I've been Title V grant manager of $2.6 million grant. I also was a chair at the west campus for a little bit. So I abandoned Kendall campus for a little bit and then I came back as an associate dean and then now as a dean of faculty. So it has been a full circle for me in that regard because I have prepared myself to this moment. And the way that I prepare was with those professional, different positions that I was part of, I tried to absorb as much as possible so that when I'm now in this position, I know what it takes in order for me to move the entire team forward and at least provide a vision that is not heavy, top down. It's a vision that I understand the work that each of the, the stakeholders that I have working in my team, they have to go through. So that gives me also that empathy because it is not unknown for me what a chair goes through, what a lab manager goes through, what a grant director goes through, what a professor goes through. So those experiences kind of like molded to the type of person that I am today. [00:08:36] Speaker A: Gotta ask you, favorite math course to teach. [00:08:40] Speaker B: My favorite one. [00:08:42] Speaker C: The Math Nerds Geeking out. [00:08:45] Speaker B: Believe it or not, I was really sad when I saw the demise of developmental education. I really enjoy developmental education because when you teaching calculus class or you teaching one of those courses, students already come with a foundation, or at least you expect that they come with a foundation. You're getting students that are so afraid of the subject, they're so afraid of even getting into a classroom and knowing how to do the things that they have to do in order for them to be successful and to take them their hands and move them along and helping them not only in mathematics, but also how to become a better student, how to take notes, how to create those cohorts together. And it's something that I really enjoyed a lot. And as a side note, I was called to University of Miami a while back because they were having issues with the first course that they had, the entry level. And they told me, well, we need somebody that really, you know, manages this. And I was with them for 12 years. Really good success with a lot of students that, you know, were coming at a fourth, fifth, sixth grader level, mathematics. I'm bringing them up to the college level. So yes, in upper level mathematics you enjoy because you have a lot of things that you can do in terms of applications. But that lower level mathematics really was rewarding for me and that's what is important. [00:10:05] Speaker C: So guess what? [00:10:07] Speaker A: What? [00:10:07] Speaker C: I'm a deved math. Guess what course I started with 18 beginning algebra M80,0002002. I started with that math. [00:10:18] Speaker B: Wow. [00:10:19] Speaker C: And I went all the way through statistics and then I, you know my doctoral program we did but so I don't know if you knew that, but I'm a deved kid. Yeah. [00:10:27] Speaker A: Well, to your point, I like teaching those classes as well. Because you can see the light come on. [00:10:31] Speaker B: Yep. [00:10:32] Speaker A: And you don't get to see that often in the other and you when you see it come on, it makes a big difference. I had a student once was in arithmetic, ended up getting her masters in math and those kind of stories. [00:10:42] Speaker C: Well, you know why? Because it's a second chance at learning math because you technically learned it at grade school but you really didn't absorb the concept. So here is kind of like you're redeeming yourself and you're, you're like oh my God. I, you know, your self esteem is not that low because you feel like man, I play so low. I'm not gonna, I'm like not worthy. You know. But I did does build your self esteem after you pass every dem. [00:11:02] Speaker B: And many of the things that I saw in that regard was a lot of students coming in at an actual level in mathematics. They knew how to mimic things but they didn't know the why you do things. So that together with history of mathematics. I used to do a lot of history mathematics in my classes. Some people told me are you crazy? And I was like no, you need to help them understand that a mathematics has been humanities endeavor is not an alien that came down and provided a lot of books and now students are going to be afraid of that. So it was to bring, bring in that humanity of what mathematics is. So. [00:11:34] Speaker A: Well, that's great. Let's. Let's move on. Let's talk a little bit about what attracted both of you to your respective areas. Mike, talk a little bit about what attracted you to be in academic affairs. [00:11:45] Speaker B: I think that what attracted me the most is working with so many different constituents to create a product that the students are proud of and the students learn and they move to the next level. Academic affairs as. Let's call it as a living organism, if you want to call it, or as a system it comprises of so many elements. And you always have to be ahead of the curve in terms of the curriculum development, in terms of what courses you're offering the students, what type of pathways the students they need to do in order for them to complete these new programs. You need to be connected to the community and the workforce as well, because at the end you want these students to graduate and be able to get those skills needed for them to find a job and also, you know, support their families and support their futures as well. So academic affairs gives you that place in which you can play with these things and sometimes have fun as well. But it's a system. That's the way that I see it. It's like a living organism that you have to look at every single part and you cannot disregard any of them. Working with faculty, to me is I would say one of the main reasons why, because the talent, you know, to see the innovation, to see the day to day things that they do in order for them to advance the students. The, you know, the discussions that I have with them over coffee of, you know, the passion that they have when they talk about this subject and the things that they want to do and being able to provide, you know, at least an av. Know answers or a solution or at least some sort of support to what they do every single day in the classroom, to me, doesn't have a price. [00:13:23] Speaker A: Thank you for that. Kesia, tell us what attracted you to student affairs, if you will. [00:13:27] Speaker C: So student affairs is very ingrained in who I am. My foundation is social work. So what we do in student services is case management, social work work. So it's. We meet students needs and we meet them where they're at. We're there to bridge all these gaps that they come in with and we get to help them and their immediate family. So the work that we do there is just life changing. And it's very aligned with like my core values and ethics. So that's why I gravitated to student service. It's kind of like it's natural for me. [00:13:58] Speaker A: Right? [00:13:59] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:13:59] Speaker A: Very good. Dean Cuellar, talk a little bit about some of the significant challenges and opportunities you see in higher education here at the Kendall campus. [00:14:07] Speaker B: In terms of challenges and this is in higher education in general, is that the cultural and generational shifts that you've seen, how we connect every single day to the needs of the new generations, and how do we as scholars study these new generations to understand what is necessary in order for us to connect with them and engage them so that they. They stay the course and they see the value of higher education. And I think that that's another one, another of those challenges, which is the value of what we provide in higher education. How do we continue telling the students a story of the day to day of the things that we do in order for them to understand that this is necessary for them to accomplish their dreams? You know, and part of that education, part of that is, is what I see as a challenge. Opportunities, Laura. Many of them, I think that one of the biggest opportunities, how the college provides a platform for faculty to grow, for faculty to innovate, for faculty to have a voice in the curriculum development, to have a voice in the classroom, to have a voice in the materials, to have a voice in every single thing that has to do with academics in terms of innovation, that participation in the forums that are provided to them, in terms of the President Innovation Fund, being part of ciol, in the training that is being done to all the faculty, affording the opportunity to go to different conferences, to present and also to bring back information. And believe it or not, once, you know, once we go to those conferences, we get in touch with what we do and we understand that in many, many, many cases, we're ahead of the curve. The opportunities are immense in that regard. [00:15:48] Speaker A: Thank you for that. Let's talk a little bit about our faculty who are so vital and critical to what we do. How do we equip them to handle the diversity of our students? And then also how do we contribute to their overall experience and quality of student we turn out? Talk about that, if you would. [00:16:04] Speaker B: I think that like I said before, the expertise is there, the teaching and the methodology is there. But like everything in life, you need to have that constant professional development. So giving them a voice in what type of professional development they want to see it is important. Why? Because it is more inclusive, it is more tailored to their needs, rather than just following some trends that you see nationwide. But they don't adapt to our reality and our culture and our context. So I think that it's important for us to do that also that mentorship, mentorship that we have had throughout the years where you have more experience, faculty mentoring the new faculties in the departments, giving them, you know, the tools in order for them to be successful. Because at the end, we're all here for the students and we want to see the next person next to us succeed, because that's how we succeed as a team as well. So I think that it's important that, like I said before, that professional development, the mentorship, and also to give them the tools in terms of, you know, when it's possible, the funding or at least the space in order for them to continue improving the teaching and learning and the practices in the classroom. And I think that here at Kendall, we do a really good job at that, because as you can see, in every single forum that we have college wide, our faculty is always there spearheading many of the interventions and the programs that we have. So that comes from their expertise together with the environment that you providing something that is rich for them to flourish and for them to create. And that's something that I enjoy, which is giving them that is, you know, giving them that and just letting them do their thing. And that's important. [00:17:44] Speaker A: It's obvious the way you answered that question, that you enjoy doing that. Dean Vasquez, if I could turn to you now and talk about some of our student support activities. You know, one of the things that I've really been impressed with at the Kendall campus is how we work together. And I've been at places that that's not always the case, but I really feel like you kind of the glue in a lot of areas that really support faculty. So talk about some of those services that your team provides. [00:18:06] Speaker C: Sure. So we, as many of you know about single SOPs, single SOPS serves as kind of like a social service type of department for the college. So single SOP is where we send our students when they're in their most vulnerable points. Right. So single SOP does like a needs assessment to see which resources should be connected to the students. So they provide resources like referral to the food pantry. We try to assist students with cash assistance, applying for food stamps, bus passes as well. And we also have mental health services here for students at no cost. And if students need to extend their time with their therapist, we could do that. We have a crisis line. And. And we also have emergency funds for students to have a big emergency, like their car broke down, their laptop broke, their rent is due, their water bill's due. We have funds to support our students there. But I do want to highlight that our faculty are phenomenal in referring students to these services. I have personally known faculty that walk over our students either to my office or to the Single Stop office. So I think that the synergy that we have here at Kendall and the partnership that we have with academics has been perfect because everybody's aware of the resources and they're able to refer our students to the appropriate resources. So that's just to name a few. [00:19:21] Speaker A: Also, spend a minute Talking about your counselor advising services because that's a whole nother arm to what your team does. [00:19:28] Speaker C: So we do have one of the biggest academic advisement departments at the college. As we know, we serve the most students at the college. My advisors are phenomenal. I know when I got here three years ago, we did a lot of work together to turn this ship around. We were, you know, post pandemic, we were struggling with enrollment and the team, they were ready. Now we do assignments. All students are assigned an advisor. They use the platforms to monitor our students. We do mid semester check ins, we create workshops. We have resource fairs for students. We monitor them very closely because we know who is the student that comes here to mdc. So my advisors are continuously getting trained as we continue to help them upskill as well. We also help with the career part as well because they do academic advising. But we also connect students to MDC Works, for example, to make sure that our students are ready for the opportunity to get an internship that aligns with their pathway. Or sometimes we encourage them to do internships so they could know that this is the pathway that they want to go to and we could the right pathway for right and right. And then we could later talk a little bit about the micro internship. That's something else that we collaborated with with and through MDC Works, our students get resume building, the interviewing skills. We help them build their LinkedIn profile. We let them, we help them get like a headshot done, a professional headshot. So my team is doing pretty well as you may know. Our numbers are not, you know, they're pretty impressive. But we have the best team, truly. [00:20:56] Speaker A: Let's move to collaboration. I think that's a good one to talk about next. You know, we have a lot of, we have our athletes, we have our honors students, we have our presidential scholars, and all these different groups on campus talk a little bit about how you collaborate with the different departments, the academic team, the faculty to help keep student success on the forefront. [00:21:16] Speaker C: We can start with our athletes. When I got here, we really didn't have a flow or a system put into place, better said to support our athletes. So now all athletes are assigned an advisor. Coaches are very much part of their academic advising because each semester they they're in season or not in season. We want to make sure that their schedule supports their practice time, their away games and all that sort. So our our advisors assigned work collaboratively with our coaches and our AD our athletic director as well to make sure that our students are in the right courses. They have the resources that they're needed. I know that we work together with Academic affairs to make sure that these students get the additional tutoring that they may need as well. And we monitor them very closely because we do. We do want to make sure that these stars that represent us so well outside of Miami are supported and are given all the resources that they need to be successful. And that's just one group. We monitor many groups. As you shared, we have a lot of scholarship groups. We have our American Dream Scholars. We have our Presidential Scholars, our Rising Scholars. But something that we've done collaboratively has been tool enrollment. I think when Mike and I rose to the deanship together, we had about 700 students in our dual enrollment program. [00:22:30] Speaker B: That's right. [00:22:31] Speaker C: So a lot of our students in our feeder schools were not really taking advantage of this great opportunity. So we got together and we created a plan. And that took for me and Mike to really come to an understanding that we have to push our teams more than ever. And we had to have a lot of uncomfortable conversations and also provide support to our teams. But from 760 now to over 3,600 students taking advantage of this opportunity. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And we set some goals that we felt at the time were unrealistic, but we kind of exceeded these goals. But if Mike and I would have not been on the same wavelength, that wouldn't have happened. And then people, when they see these numbers. And we also recognize our teams because they're the ones that did the work. They also feel very proud of this work that. That we kind of charged them with. And then also, we do have our KLA program, which is a program that caters to neurodivergent students. That's something else that we started that we're like, okay, we're gonna go and we'll build the plane as we go. And Mike and I got together and collaborated, and Mike identified great faculty for this certificate program. We chose the students, and it was like growing pains through our first cohort. And now we're going into our second and getting ready to recruit for our third. But we came together and. And we were collaborating. And something that's really neat about, like, this is nationwide Academic Institute of Service. There's always, like, two houses. We don't run our areas. And I'll let Mike talk a little bit about we don't run our areas. That way there's no red tape. Our teams could talk to each other. They don't need to be including us and everything, because we trust Our teams, and we're like a big family, right? And so because we've had set that tone, that's why Kendall has been so successful in the last few years, because of that synergy. And I'll let Mike if he wants to know. [00:24:18] Speaker B: It's. Everything that you said is correct, and I think that you touched on something really important. Two things. One, how from the way that we, you and I interact to each other and the way that we collaborate and the type of partnership that we have, that permeates down because that creates an expectation for everybody else. The second thing is also in terms of how you build your own team. And Kesia said before that her team is amazing. She has been able to build that team. Same thing happens in academic affairs. We have a team that we complement each other in everything that we do. I have my associate dean. She's really, really strong in processes and everything that has to do with student services, everything that has to do with helping the students go through that career path. And I have my data guru, which is Roger, and he provides that data that we need in order for us to be able to pivot and recognize patterns. And that's something else that we have shared with student services in order for them to be able to consume the data. Because throughout the years, we used to have the cmr. Now we have power bi that is easier for us to read. But before that, we had that cmr, which was a long, long Excel, having that extra layer of document that gives you those pivot tables in order for you to really analyze the data that is in front of you and be able to know when you have to open more classes, know when you have to add more seats or cancel here or cancel there or respond to some of the needs that student services are experiencing when they're enrolling students. You cannot do that if you have two sides. It has to be one core. And the most important thing, that every single conversation, every single meeting, every single collaboration that we have, we put the student at the center. And the moment that you put that in the center, everything else, egos, everything else has to go out of the window. And also because we both were students. So we know the transformational power that we have, and we know the responsibility. I don't take it for granted every single time that I come and I park my car here. I know that there are thousands and thousands of lives that depends on us, and that's the way that we take it. I think that since we walk the walk, we were students. We know the things that we are responsible for that. Give us that extra motivation to work together towards giving that same opportunity and affording that same opportunity to other students like us. [00:26:44] Speaker A: For those in our audience, you can tell the passion in this conversation today. And those that have been listening to us know this is our 15th podcast today and it's how awesome it is to end with our deans because. Because you've heard many of their leaders and people that work with them in previous podcasts and I'd be remiss if I didn't go back on something that I may have brushed over. Both of these two individuals are lead deans, and it's important that our audience knows what that means. Dean Cuellar is the lead dean for all academic faculty at the college, and that's eight campuses. Dean Vasquez is the same thing with the student services. So you two are both be commended for your leadership because it's not only Kendall you're leading, but you're leading Miami Dade College. And that's an awesome responsibility and we appreciate what you guys have done to that. [00:27:28] Speaker C: Thank you. [00:27:29] Speaker A: A few more questions here. Cassie, let's talk a little bit about supporting students. How does your team support students with career development and job placement? And this might be a good place to bring in micro internships. And Mike can jump in here too. [00:27:43] Speaker C: So like I mentioned before, we know that our students change pathways, you know, in the beginning of their educational career at the college. So one of the things that we ensure, back in the day, we would hype. We were hyper focused on making sure students get all the core classes out of the way in the first term. And now we've kind of shifted gears because students need to get a little taste of what pathway they're getting into. So we're being more intentional with their first and second semester and putting some fun classes that are kind of geared to what they're going to want to study. But in addition to that, we have a great collaboration with MDC Works, like I mentioned before, which is our career services area at the college. And they have this repository of internship and job placement opportunities. We have a coordinator assigned to all the campuses and they prep our students. They look over their resume, their cover letters, they do interviewing skills, role plays again, LinkedIn pages. We also, during advisement week, we have like different workshops for students that they get to meet different industry people, folks to kind of explore other opportunities that are out there in the community or also have more conscious around the pathway that they have chosen. And we continue to have our career fairs throughout the Entire year. So the build up to career fair will be these workshops that get you ready to, to get place at an internship or. But something that I haven't mentioned yet. We have a career closet. So a lot of our students don't have the clothing for an interview. Right. So our students get to choose an outfit, a complete outfit from head to toe for an internship. It's beautiful. I like to say that it's like our Mariah Carey closet students get to try on and all the clothing there is brand new. We've gotten donations from different stores but we, our latest donation was from our Commissioner Regalado's office that she donated over $5,000. We're going to follow up on that opportunity for next year as well. [00:29:33] Speaker A: And I think we may need to bring her in for a podcast. [00:29:36] Speaker C: I think that's a great idea. I think that's. And I think she'll be more than willing to do that. So that's just in a nutshell what we're doing in regards to career services. And I know we continue to be more creative. Something that we're looking at is doing like more like hyper focus career first, like more like around data and technology and maybe one more hone into business and have more career industry people tied to that. So that's the next level of career planning that we're doing. [00:30:02] Speaker A: Very good. [00:30:03] Speaker C: Thank you. [00:30:03] Speaker A: So let me ask you a couple more questions for both of you and just jump in here whoever wants to go tell me about a success story you'd like to highlight that maybe shows the synergy between your two areas. [00:30:15] Speaker B: I think that the, the biggest one of all is our enrollment. The way that we have strategically been able to increase enrollment. You know, the, the collaboration between student services and academic affairs in terms of responding to the needs of the students. Not only from the college wide perspective, but also, you know, attending to our local population. One of the campuses like the traditional campus that don't have nursing, that have the most in person classes and that's because our students are asking to be engaged on campus. And the trend prior to that was well, open more all the modalities because you're going to be losing enrollment. But, but we stay of course because we listen to our students. And the only way that you can do that is if you are with the troops in the ground. And that's something that both of us do a lot. So every single day that we open that power bi and we see those numbers, I feel pride for our teams, for the things that we've been able to accomplish, we turn the chip around, if you want to call it something. So besides that, all of the programmatic things that we have had in of terms terms of the micro internship collaboration, the KLA and some of these things, they might seem in terms of volume, not that big as the enrollment, but those are points of pride. Why? Because it gives you a blueprint for us to now create other things. We expanded the micro internship now to technology. How can we start expanding that to address and have more students come in and take advantage of those things? And it takes a village because you need to get the buy in from many constituents, including the faculty, in order for them to be able to embed those experiences in the classroom with the students. So I'm gonna let you mention some other ones. [00:32:04] Speaker C: Thank you. Mike. One of the things that we really had to do is post pandemic, who is the Kendall student? It has changed and we all had to pivot and recognize that the Kendall student has changed and how can we meet them where they're at? And some of the things that we did. Now we have a virtual hub. So if students are working right, they could just jump into a virtual hub and they could get served rather quickly. We also have our solutions center that has over 13 individuals making phone calls. Yes, enrollment is the end game, but it's triage. So sometimes as soon as you with financial aid, sometimes as soon as just needs emergency aid. So we're calling students where they're at. Students that cannot drive in. Right. Sometimes. And depending on the date and time, they can't make it. So we're meeting them where they're at and we had to make those changes. And also like Mike said, like they these stakeholders in our campus, we had to kind of like, let's look at our numbers. They're dwindling. Why are they dwindling? We had to have hard conversations. But what was not happening is people were not included in the process. So we had to include the people that are boots and ground doing the work and include them in the process, hear their feedback and educate them or where we're at. So when we started doing that, the shift came naturally. And now I feel like Mike and I think you may agree with me, we're a machine that's just working on its own. And now we're just. Now we're at a point where we're going to start just looking at future big projects instead of like we're just building the machine. I think we're done building. And now it's just like maintaining and continuing to grow. [00:33:33] Speaker B: And if I can add to that, is creating that momentum. One of the things that we have seen through all the years, and I think that is endemic to higher education in general, is projects that they have a beginning and an end. Then after that, nobody knows what is happening, where is that? And we used to do this, and we don't do it anymore. And what happened with this program, that was amazing. What, what Kesha was referring to is creating momentum. But that is sustainable, something that we can look back and see that still is working the way that we put it together. So that, like you said, we can concentrate now on that vision of the future. You know, everything rooted in that mission that we have before and on the practices that we already have in our teams. But then now we can actually concentrate on creating that vision. What is it that we're going to be in the next five years? So, and also the, the way that we consume data is important for that, because before, data was just something that was consumed at a level, and then the action was permeated down. Now, actions are still permeated, but they're permeated together with a rationale. And the rational is the data. And the data doesn't lie. You know, it tells you where you need to pivot, where you have to pinpoint. So creating that data culture inside of the campus has been transformational as well. And I think that it has helped us tremendously. [00:34:55] Speaker A: Thank you for those remarks. One last question is to the major leaders at the Kendall campus. What advice would you give students who are thinking about coming to Kendall campus? What, what are some of the tips or reasons that they ought to enroll here? [00:35:09] Speaker C: I really do think that you'll have the college experience you're seeking here at the Kendall campus, the life that exists here all day, every day. You have students all over campus. We have great student organizations that are so active, that are so centered in service. Our learning common area is beautiful. There's private spaces for studying. We have a bunch of departments that are here to support students from all of our tutoring labs. If you need additional help during the semester you're struggling, you have my office, you have single stop that could provide support for you and your family. So to come here is to really feel supported. And I hate to say handheld, but just a little bit of handholding in the beginning, it's great because then we're going to let you go. You're going to just fly away. But I think you'll really have the true college experience here at Kendall Campus. [00:36:00] Speaker A: Very Good. [00:36:01] Speaker B: I think that you nail it when you said that it's going to help students. Because one of the things that we do here when I talk to academic personnel and faculty and students is what happens that is beyond the curriculum, beyond the syllabus, beyond the classroom as well. And the connections that we make with what they're learning in the class and the experiences that we give them, giving them outside, what creates that value. And for that reason, many of the transfer students that we have from our Kendall campus, they exist, excel at the next level. Why? Because they don't only get that, you know, academic, they don't only learn how to fly, but they also understand how to be a college student, how to study, how to create those groups. We help them creating connections, connections that sometimes they go beyond our doors and they transfer to the next level. So, you know, why coming here, we have world renowned faculty as well, we have a lot of experiences and we allow students think big and think small because if they want to venture into microbiology, if they want to venture into, you know, organic chemistry, anything that they want to venture in that realm that is really small, they can do it here. Because we have state of the art facilities. So a lot of facilities that they will have in the next level, they have it here already. So once that they move to that next level, they are more prepared or better prepared than any other student that perhaps did that in a simulation rather than having those hands on activities. So we're in that regard a more traditional campus with innovation, which is the perfect sauce, if you want to call it something, in order for us to prepare these students to the next level and the faculty, like I said before, having faculties that are engaged at the campus level, engaged with the clubs, with the student life, engaging our day to day events that we have, that allows students to create those connections, connections that are also lifelong connection because they can come back and get, you know, letter of recommendation. They can see, well, this professor is actually love this place. So it's something that I should do so that modeling is important as well. [00:38:09] Speaker A: Great answers. Thank you both. We like to end our killer Speaks podcast by turning the microphone around on me. So our students started this tradition in our first episode. So I would like to give you guys an opportunity to put me on the spot if you'd like or. [00:38:24] Speaker C: What was your first impression when you got to Kendall? [00:38:27] Speaker A: Well, the first impression might have occurred in Orlando when I sat at a table with you two, but that's not the question. [00:38:33] Speaker C: We bamboozled you and you were, you were Literally bamboozled. [00:38:37] Speaker B: You were sitting in the middle. Yes, both of us. [00:38:40] Speaker A: Exactly. Exactly. You know, the thing that when I had the opportunity to come here, so many people gave me advice about Kendall. And a lot of it really wasn't true, how big it was. And it is big. But it's been such a great opportunity to be available and to meet people and to get to know people that it's not been what people think. I think people see this Kendall campus as this big machine that's unwieldy, and it is at times, we all three would agree with that, but I really think it's so well run with so much talent on this campus that they don't need somebody for me to tinker with it. They just need someone to pull everything together. But my first impressions were so excited. I came on a Saturday and got my badge and spent about two and a half hours walking the campus, going in rooms that I probably wasn't supposed to go into, and just the excitement. Seeing our fine arts area, seeing our gym, seeing our podcast room, every place that I went into. And I just think the one thing I think people don't realize about this place is we really are a full service college. We have everything from student services to academics to athletics to places for students to hang out. And I think that that's the one thing I would like to see going forward, is people to realize how great Kendall is, because I think people take us for granted. [00:39:59] Speaker C: I think they get intimidated. How big we are. [00:40:02] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we are big. But there's also that personal touch. [00:40:07] Speaker C: But there's a lot of heart here. [00:40:08] Speaker A: Absolutely. [00:40:09] Speaker C: A lot of heart. Yeah. [00:40:10] Speaker B: My question, what's next for Kendall campus under your leadership? [00:40:16] Speaker A: Great question. I still have some work to do. Meeting faculty, you know, that's one of the things that we've started on that I want to continue to do. Every time I turn around, I see the amazing faculty that we have, and I really want to continue in the spring semester to having those meetings, because that's helped you and I form what the next academic version is going to look like. I want to continue to work with you, Cassie, on numbers. You know, I think retention is a big thing. We didn't talk about that too much today, but that's one of the things you brought to the table, Mike. But I think the three of us have to be just the best team ever, because I see us getting back to the numbers that I heard 10 years ago and whatever, and. But I don't want to just get back to the numbers. I want to get back to the quality. We have so many great students. We have so many students that end up all these great places that you alluded to. The one thing that I think we need to do is to bring those past graduates back to make them a part of our campus. Because when I'm in the community, four out of five people come up to me and say, hey, you're at the Kendall campus. I went to the Kendall campus. [00:41:18] Speaker C: So reconnecting the alumni, that's a really big feature. [00:41:22] Speaker A: Future goal. But the first goal, I would say is academics. You know, I want to continue to learn our faculty, to learn how you and I can help them to help themselves and help our students. [00:41:33] Speaker B: And, and I think that is important because you mentioned retention. Retention is going to be in the enrollment of the future. And when you look at how many students nationwide after first, second semester, first year, they drop off. They drop off. [00:41:48] Speaker A: It's low hanging fruit because they're there. [00:41:49] Speaker B: We already have it here. [00:41:50] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:41:51] Speaker B: So that, you know, the enrollment coming in from our high school. Yes. Is important. That's something that is happening every single year. But once that they come in, how would it keep them here? How do we find those stress points, those exit points, and try to mitigate those so that they stay and they complete with us? So I agree with you about that retention. [00:42:12] Speaker A: Well, this is. I couldn't think of a better way to end season one of Kendall Speaks. With having you two here, it's been a great, great podcast. Thank you for what you both do. And we're going to continue to do great things. I know. As the semester goes forward, I want to thank everyone for being here for Kendyl Speaks today. I want to thank Christina Saenz, our head writer, Paul Klein, our executive producer, and Alex Bello, our producer today, for making today work so well. Goodbye for now. [00:42:47] Speaker B: Sa.