Welcome to busted pencils fully let it education talk educated educators talking education Dr. Johnny Lupinacci here Chairman of the board Jacob classes in session This time Tim is an excused absence.
I was just listening to the wonderful home room that I missed I'll admit Jacob.
I had to call in an absence because
Even though I'm a math teacher and I'm pretty good at doing my add-in and subtractions, my basic operations in math, adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing.
Jacob, when you sent me the times for our recording for homeroom, you'd think I'd have it etched into my calendar, but I didn't.
And then I didn't do my math because I was sitting in Spokane Chief's Veteran Memorial Arena.
watching the Spokane Chiefs do their very best against the Medicine Hat Tigers.
That's right.
It was a Western Hockey League championship final, which, by the way, Medicine Hat won the series, great series played by both teams.
But I was enjoying the close hockey game, Jacob.
And I glanced down at my phone and saw the times and didn't do the math because, of course, I didn't read all the words in the text, even as professors get.
Sometimes a little bit lazy with things, man.
So I admit, Johnny, have to read the full question.
All right.
Yeah, it could have been, it could have been an unexcused absence, but I called in an excuse, uh, but I, I'm here today to fully admit I didn't convert the time zone changes and, uh, being out here in Washington and the Pacific time zone didn't subtract three hours.
And so you guys hopped on.
And I was in another meeting with an amazing doctoral student who's doing some great work around math anxiety.
It could be a topic for a whole nother show.
In fact, we've had some math anxiety experts on the show a few times to talk about what is math anxiety and how does it work.
And Tim loves that topic because he himself admits to having had and maybe even still carrying with him some strong math anxiety.
But I digress, Jacob, because great homeroom this week.
And you all talked about higher education.
In fact, he talked about a system near and dear to my heart, because Washington State University, where I'm at, has a very similar structure system statewide as Penn State.
And you all were talking about Penn State and homeroom.
And I was absent.
But I'm back, class in session today.
Tim is absent.
So the mainstay is you, Jacob.
You are the man.
You are the anchor of the show right now.
So what's going on with Penn State?
Well, Johnny, as we were talking about on Monday, the situation with Penn State is
they're
thinking about closing seven of their satellite campuses.
Is that how you would describe them sort of satellite campuses of the main campus in Happy Valley?
You know, I don't know exactly their preferred nomenclature.
But the language in the system I am in is we call them our urban campuses because
The unique structure that Washington State University has and similar to Penn State is my understanding as I talk to colleagues that are at the various campuses in the Penn State system is that it is one university with different locations throughout the state.
And that happy value is the mothership, which if it's similar as I understand to be Washington State Pullman.
Washington State University Cougars.
Go Cougs is in Pullman, Washington.
That's the mothership.
But there is a Spokane campus with a health science and health equity focus.
And there is a Tri-Cities campus.
There is a Vancouver, Washington campus.
There is an Everett campus.
There are campuses throughout our state.
And they are all part of...
Washington State University and we call them our urban campuses because satellite kind of sounds like like less than and and on paper and really an experience.
It shouldn't be less than and they aren't and that's a really that's a really interesting different model than might be familiar to folks listening safe from Wisconsin.
There are many great University of Wisconsin throughout the state same in Michigan like the University of Michigan Flint University of Michigan Dearborn.
University of Michigan Ann Arbor.
These are great schools, but they function a little bit different leadership wise.
They have their own budgets, they have their own, you know, leaders they don't necessarily report.
They're like in the family, but not under the same head of household.
Yeah.
And for
people who heard us on Monday, that's something Tim really wanted to emphasize is that unlike Wisconsin, where I went to say University of Wisconsin Parkside, that's kind of its own school.
whereas in the Penn State system, and as you're saying in the Washington State system, it's not different schools.
They're just different campuses for the same overall school structure.
Is that right?
Yeah, exactly.
Like for example, I'm in the College of Education, right?
And across our colleges throughout those campuses, my colleagues are located throughout the state.
When we have like meetings, we're all together.
We either meet at a central location physically a couple times a year, or by the modern wonders of technology, like you and I, Jacob are experiencing right now, and I'm actually going to talk a little bit about today in relationship to this.
We meet on Zoom or on Skype or on Teams or one of the weapons of choice available to us in 2025.
But Jacob, this is, you know, you were going there at home room, but hey, it's home room.
It's the beginning of the week.
And now we're in class and session.
So I'm going to get, I'm going to get into the weeds a little bit on this and back out.
Actually, I'm going to go out of the weeds.
I'm going to go up into the sky and take the kind of 10,000 foot view on the, the topic of like, Hey, everybody in education right now is under what I'll call budget stress.
And it's a big moment.
There are a lot of top down.
initiatives being imposed from the federal government.
We've talked about that on the show to states and that in fact is impacting both our K-12 system budgets and and our higher ed budgets with our state allocated budgets.
Like we really do a lot of close work in public universities with the state legislators just like our K-12 schools and superintendents do with the with the legislation.
We've had great shows on that here.
Um, with the Wisconsin public education network, right?
Remember Heather was on talking about that, you know, so Wisconsin folks are familiar, especially our listener out there listening to civic media radio is familiar with, you know, the, the important public support for budgets that go to K12 and a higher education.
And so, you know, I'm going to take the 10,000 foot view, Jacob, today and talk a little bit about.
some of the trends hitting higher education right now that are impetus for things like calling to a vote, the potential closures or downsizing of universities.
And I don't know the details of what's happening in Penn State.
And I can report from Washington State that our campuses are all doing strong.
And in fact, given these trends, I'll talk about it in a moment.
Um, we're positioned to embrace the call to action.
And that's what I'm going to frame it a little bit more optimistically from the 10,000 foot view, Jacob.
There's a little, there's a little, I want to call it.
I'll tell a little story, little metaphor here.
Um, I don't know how you might call it like a fable, right?
Or like a story with a, with a little lesson embedded into it.
Former guest of the show.
In fact, we should get him on again.
Great guy.
Don Jacobs.
Four Arrows.
Four Arrows is a phenomenal scholar and educational leader.
And he does a lot of research on how we might do education differently.
In fact, how school leaders could really think differently about education.
And Four Arrows taught me a lesson.
He's a mentor of mine.
And we were in a writing workshop together about 10 years ago.
And we've done some similar work over the years.
So Jacob, you know those times where you kind of get to meet?
in person with someone you really look up to like I'd read four arrows work I had heard him present on some things and and there were some connections between our work primarily around thinking about you know schools as you know connected to both social and environmental justice and thinking broadly about how we understand the world and some of the nerd stuff that we do but I was in a writing workshop and he was my mentor a mentor assigned to me you know we were talking about
Particularly higher education and schooling and you know the kinds of things we talk about here on on busted pencils Jacob you me and Tim and all our listeners and great guests and For four arrows reminded me he said sometimes you have to be the bird And I'm thinking what what do you mean be the bird?
Mm-hmm.
All right, and he said well Johnny The bird can't always be in the air Sometimes the birds got a land
And the bird is either in the trees or in the bushes or in the weeds.
Sometimes we've got to get into the on the ground details.
But when we're deep in those weeds and trees, we can only see so far around us.
And it's really important because that's where we might feed, that's where we might rest.
The bird lands.
But the bird also flies up above the trees and takes a 10,000 foot view.
Now, I arbitrarily assigned 10,000.
I can't remember the number that Four Arrow shared with me.
And I'm just grabbing a random number, because people listening might be like, 10,000 feet, John.
I don't know, kind of bird flies at 10,000 feet.
What
are you,
a
condor?
Yeah, right?
I'm just saying it goes up above the tree line.
It takes a higher point of view and sees the forest.
It sees the lay of the land.
And so I think it's really important.
Sometimes we're down in the weeds.
That's an important place to be.
The bushes, the trees, the thick things.
And sometimes we've got to fly up above it, right?
So we're going to be the bird today.
And I'm going to get out of the weeds a little bit and be sort of, I'm going to phrase these aspects as some optimism.
You know, Jacob, I'm a glass half full kind of guy.
We know this from all the kind of beef and I do with Tim.
We tease each other quite a bit here on Busted Pencils.
It's how we show our love, right?
I know listener, you can get down with that.
It's like, you know, we're out on the porch having a couple of, couple of sodas and we're giving each other the business.
That's what I like to call it, right?
Ribbon one another, giving each other the business.
It's how we show the love.
I believe that's a Midwest thing.
That's a family thing, right?
So.
I'm going to say, you know, I'm going to take the 10,000 foot optimistic view because I think higher ed is positioned like our K-12 schools to be in a large moment of change.
And I think change is sometimes uncomfortable, but it's a good thing.
And it's long overdue in education, especially when we talk about we've been doing things the same way for far too long.
And it's sort of created and contributed to some problems that we all might agree exist.
Right?
Like, so inequalities and access and debt and different stuff like that, that's coming to head is long overdue.
So I'm going to take the 10,000 foot view, Jacob, and outline a few things.
And I'll tell you what, I'll even pitch a proposal.
I bet you on a broadcast coming up because busted pencils.
We got a broadcast every Saturday afternoon.
It's one of my favorite things.
Teacher time with Tim and Johnny and chairman of the board, Jacob.
I propose.
that I'll outline some areas and then we'll get Tim on and Tim and I will go at these areas and talk about them in the weeds.
So I'm going to identify him from high up above.
I'll be the bird.
I'll fly high.
Jacob, I like that you told me, Johnny, be a condor today.
Yeah.
And I'm going to be a condor and I'm going to, I'm going to do that fun bird of prey thing where like they kind of, I for YouTube folks, you can see my arms are out.
But this is kind of sore.
and take the 10,000 foot.
That's what I'm calling it.
I should probably consult with my science knowledge to make sure, you know, I'll I will do some research before our broadcast.
Jacob on what is the actual flight level?
Yeah, of a bird or a condor, but but I think we I'm I'm I'm getting to the point here.
Folks, you know, I'm going big.
So let me outline some areas impacting higher education that I feel are contributing
to some of these situations where universities are talking about downsizing around budget cutting and around change, because I think change is a good thing.
And I want to make sure that we talk about it on the ground as a positive thing, and not only as like budget and austerity.
Like, if we frame it all as negative, remember I'll say this all the time, Jacob, words make a difference.
If we phrase it all as cuts and bad stuff.
And it's framed in like an aura of austerity.
I don't think the change is gonna be as impactful and as graceful as maybe it should be.
And given the context that the change is being imposed, I think the least we could do is find some joy and some hope in it.
And so I'm gonna kind of position some of the trends I see as that.
The first, Jacob,
We are long overdue for innovation and academic programming.
And I know when Tim hears this, he's going to be elated because this is what my guy specializes in, in academic programming innovations.
Right.
I think we can say pretty definitively now that reports out of what's happening in higher ed.
We know that our students in the demographic you all talked about on in homeroom on Monday, Jacob are saying we really need more
direct pathways to careers, right?
We need to make sure, when I say academic program innovation, that as leaders, I would say it like this, Jacob, if you're making decisions in higher education, you are a learner, leading learners.
Maybe that could be the title for Saturday's broadcast, learners, leading learners.
That's a phrase that I've leaned on over the years.
but if you're a learner leading learner out there or you're somebody in college or thinking about going to college or just care about public education, you've been hearing and if not, I'm welcoming you to the conversation that we need to think about our academic programs as being designed to provide stronger career aligned returns on investment.
I.e.
if I'm paying to go to school,
I need to know kind of pretty close to what that outcome is going to be and where I'm going to work and what that kind of potential salary might look like.
Absolutely.
I think that's a good way of saying it.
And most institutions are doing that.
And if they're not doing that, that may be where some of these trims and things are changing is saying like, hey, we got to figure out how to provide programs.
that are very career aligned and strong returns on investments, right?
Which might mean interdisciplinarity in degrees.
It might mean some things that sometimes we talk about as micro credentials or as certificates, because maybe I need some particular skill sets to be really competitive and effective in industry.
And we should be able to kind of package those programs together that way.
The other thing we know, Jacob, is that
College students broadly are what we might have in the past called non-traditional students.
And I think that term at the 10,000 foot view on the condor, I think that term goes away.
And we start to think of all students as non-traditional and as historically they were labeled because what we're learning is that all students learn really differently and that a lot of our students are really interested in hybrid formats.
and in compressed academic terms, you know, anywhere from one to 12 weeks.
So accelerated programs are gaining popularity, Jacob.
And with that is the pressure to make things go quicker.
But we got to find that balance.
Remember, we're learners leading learners.
We can't say, well, let's let's get our certificate, our degree program into three months.
That's probably impossible.
to ensure quality and compact something into that short of time.
Particularly
ensuring quality in the period of time.
Like
you
said, yeah, you know, you want to make it quick, but you don't want to sacrifice how good the degree is, you know, you don't want to sacrifice what you're learning.
That
makes perfect sense.
Exactly.
And so we're finding that sweet spot.
So that's part of the optimism is being engaged in those conversations of being learners, leading learners, figuring out is what's the appropriate amount of time?
to get the skills necessary to be career aligned, strong returns on investments.
Let's figure that out together and let's get there and let's offer that in a way that's accessible and that has broadly the largest amount of participants possible.
Also thinking about maintaining that high quality, right?
So it's not unlimited enrollment, but is it accessible and is it, is it.
the right length of time to get those necessary skills.
So I'll group that under academic program innovations.
The other area, Jacob, and you all talked about it in the homeroom a little bit is college access and financial aid.
That's related to that sort of like, what's my return on investment?
Well, we talked about declining enrollment.
One, there's just a lesser amount of young people, you know, turning college age because, you know.
Yeah, we're having less babies in our country.
But the other context of that is that less students are inclined to just go to college.
And aligned with that is we're in a moment of big change in terms of how we fund college tuition.
And so things like FAFSA or the way to do
to figure out your federal student aid has all been in limbo, I'd say in large part for the last year.
Lots of students who typically would be enrolling were unable to access FASFA early enough to sort of get the information they need to budget whether or not it's a good return on investment.
So we're kind of figuring out the kinks in terms of how is college funded.
And so, and remember we're, I don't want to declare it, I think it's
sort of common knowledge, we're in a moment of economic, maybe we should say it's a recession time, you know, at least, at least I'll put it this way.
My neighbors and I are feeling the pinch.
Yeah.
And you listen, we're out there, you're probably feeling the pinch too.
Inflations, tariffs, things that are being talked about.
Everyone's a little more closely concerned about what things cost and college costs a significant amount of money.
So funding is a big thing.
So we're in a moment of considering how college access and financial aid and funding is figured out.
That's related to the financial realities, right?
Is that we need to think about funding differently than we've ever thought about it.
It's been pretty sort of steady, either tuition or taxpayer dollars.
And yes, some of these larger institutions deal with external fundings and grants and things to help not only keep the lights on, but keep quality programming going.
But everything in this context related to that last point I was talking about is what I'll call a financial reality.
We have to say, OK, I'm at the 10,000-foot view on being the bird, and the forest is on fire.
So I can't ignore the fact that we are in that sort of financial moment.
There are some strong financial realities.
But what are some of the fun things to talk about, Jacob?
And remember, I'm outlining this invitation today in class to our broadcast, to be a learner leading learner with us this weekend on our broadcast.
Tim and I'll dive into it.
But Tim talked about this a bit in homeroom.
There is an evolution of student demographics.
We got to understand who our students are.
I talked about it in that first point about innovative academic programming.
We also got to understand that we want what I called all students to be participating in this.
Historically, we'd call those non-traditional students included.
I think we toss out that term non-traditional and we start thinking about what really are the things that retain and recruit students.
So how do we get them interested in these innovative programs?
and how do we retain students through to career?
How do we support them?
So different ideas around academic support systems about our ability to mentor human connection with students, but also we've talked about on the show.
Again, I know my guy Tim's going to be excited about this.
What technology can offer?
In terms of are there things that AI bring to this and certain more recent technologies bring to our innovative academic program that helps support an evolving student demographic?
In essence, ditching that non-traditional label and just thinking about students broadly.
There are some amazing technologies I think that make this doable for so many institutions and I think that's part of the fun of being a learner, a leading learner.
is finding out what are some of those ways that we can support the evolution of our students.
The other thing, Jacob, I'm going to end on, is I think all of this, and I'm pitching it, we are learners leading learners.
That's my brand refocus.
But I think we're in a big moment of rebranding.
What are our strengths as institutions?
What is it that sets our compass?
What's our uniqueness?
What's our brand?
We're in a rebranding moment.
I know that sounds incredibly neoliberal or incredibly market driven.
But this is important.
We are in a moment where like, tell me about what makes you so special.
Yeah, whatever your institution is, if you're a learner leading learner out there, I bet you're at an amazing place to become something fill in that blank.
It's like playing learners leading learners, mad libs fill in the blank.
put in a noun, add some unique adjectives.
Let's rebrand together uniquely.
Whatever you're part of, whether it's your district or it's your institution of higher ed, I believe from the 10,000 foot view, Jacob, that in order to address that the forest is on fire, we got to rebrand.
We got to say, okay, here is the amazing description of why you might be super successful
studying, fill in the blank, whatever it is, at fill in the blank, whatever that university is, or whatever that institution of higher ed, or whatever district or school you're at, it's a moment to ask ourselves, who are we?
What is it we specialize in?
And what's that special flavor?
Like, what's our, you know, I love sports, Jacob, so I'll come back around to it.
You and I got to talk about how coaches can learn from teachers and teachers can learn from coaches.
But every year,
I kind of sit down with my team and my core members of the team, both the athletes, the other coaches, all the support folks.
And I say, who are we?
Who do we want to be?
How do we describe ourselves?
And we boil that down to a unifying phrase.
And we put that phrase up in our locker room, and we put it up in our offices, and we carry it around with us.
We print it on shirts.
In a sense, we brand where we want to see ourselves going, helps us stay mission-driven.
I believe this moment, Jacob, is a clarion call for learners leading learners to brand themselves, not so they can make money, not to marketize it, although that's a financial reality of things, but so that they can have an identity, because if we're identity lists, we're incredibly vulnerable.
to that negative stuff Jacob, I was bringing up at the beginning.
Yeah.
To that, oh man, this is bad.
The economy is turning down.
We have, you know, higher ed collapse.
We start using the language of, of like, even if my team is going to be in a rebuild year, we're not going to brand ourselves as well as us.
You know, we might go play well this weekend.
No, that's not going to be our mission.
Yeah.
You know, I think last year ours was get better every time we get on the ice.
Like, boom, like, hey, that's our, that's our brand.
No matter where we're at, every time we get on the ice, we're going to get a little better.
Right.
So thinking about what our brand is.
So I want to emphasize those things.
I'll restate them because I'm inviting you listener.
If you liked this class in session, join Tim and I and Jacob, of course, for our broadcast this Saturday, we're teacher talk time.
We get together on the weekend and yeah, I'm gonna say, Tim, what do you think about these things?
One, academic program innovations.
Two, college access, financial aid.
Three, the financial reality of the context we're in.
And four, students supports the evolution of the student, ditching the non-traditional label and just addressing
Who are our students?
How do we think about that broadly?
And all of that under the umbrella of, what's our brand?
Who are we?
Brand focused strength, right?
And I'm gonna say, Jacob, I'm a learner leading learners.
I'm proud to be that.
I'm also an educated educator talking education here with you listener on civic media.
So Jacob, class was in session and now it's time.
for the moment of Zen.
The reward for participating in a movement for social justice is not the prospect of future victory.
It is the exhilaration of standing together with other people, of taking risks together, enjoying small triumphs, and enduring disheartening setbacks together.
Thanks for listening to Busted Pencil's class in session.
You can always grab great podcasts like this one.
Just search Busted Pencils on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and of course, you can always find us on the Civic Media website or at bustedpencils.com.
Hey, and don't forget, you can find us throughout the week every Monday, Wednesday, Friday with homerooms, classes and sessions, and always loads of fun to wrap up the work week on Fridays with hurdles and home runs.
And listen up, pencil busters.
I said it in the show today, but I'm going to say it again.
You can always catch busted pencils at 3 p.m.
Central Time across all the civic media network stations for one hour of your favorite of who color scholars, Tim and Johnny, and keep busting pencils.