Dr. Laura Dowling
Hi, everyone, we're here at the WHERS UniRanks Summit. Our topic of discussion is the Creation of transparent universities through the power of leadership. The primary purpose of a university education is to acquire the skills necessary and knowledge for a chosen career and become fully prepared for the real world of work.

Universities are failing to deliver at great financial burden to the student consumer and increasing dissatisfaction of industry employers who claim that graduates lack the basic skills necessary in multiple areas, critical thinking and problem solving, self-management, leadership, resilience and stress tolerance, interpersonal skills, intercultural and diversity fluency, and communicating effectively verbally and in writing.

Simply put, the higher education business model, and in many instances pedagogy for a social network economy is outdated and not delivering value to the student or, industry consumers. The recent Pandemic highlighted the antiquated models, resulting in disruption, in higher education.

Higher Education faces intense competition from Massive Open Online Courses, such as Udemy, Coursera, edX, who deliver unlimited and open access for geographically dispersed and diverse participants via the web. Some key features include interactive experiences and community interactions among students, professors, and guest lectures from industry, via social media platforms with rapid assessment and feedback.

High quality education is being delivered at a fraction of the cost, of a traditional university degree. Many of these programs are accredited. We've seen top tier universities such as MIT and Yale, partnering with Massive Open Online Course companies to offer certifications. Education innovation, these are transforming the higher education space. To transform higher education to meet demand will require stakeholder collaboration and transparent leadership.

Transparent leadership means leading with openness and honesty. Transparent leaders keep stakeholders in the loop, share information freely, and nurture open communications. In the university setting, stakeholders are many and include individuals and groups, with an interest or, concern in education at the university. The scope of these stakeholders is wide and includes university leadership and administration, students, parents, alumni, donors, accrediting agencies, government and many more.

Holding universities accountable for their ability to deliver value by ranking universities on, how well they are delivering value is the obvious first step in transparency. To do this, we need innovation on how we rank universities. If I could, at this point, turn it over to my learned colleagues, for some perspective and opinion, I'm just going to go around the Zoom Room. Bruce, your first, please shares some feedback and provides some commentary.

Bruce Mackh
Good morning and I appreciate this opportunity to speak. I study this on a daily basis and I would like to speak to several things. One, we need to be more student-ready than students are perhaps college-ready or ready for higher education. Meeting students where they're at, making certain that we have first year seminar experience programs. Making certain that we're teaching our students how to college? Teaching them the unspoken curriculum perhaps, even what office hours are or, where their financial aid office is?

We also have to be aware that we're dealing with a new group of students these days. Worldwide we're seeing a different demographic. We need to be prepared for them and their needs as well, with areas of diversity and intersectionality, and identity. We need to make sure that we are ready as leaders, as faculty and as staff to meet our students, and to welcome them into our institutions.

Students have to take a chance on us before they know whether or, not that they belong here. They're financially obligating themselves or, they're making life choices that obligate themselves in ways that, we can't even imagine, in order to join in the psychological contract and the social contract of higher education. I would like to say something about leadership here for a moment.

I would like to say that leadership needs to hold everybody accountable, including itself for key performance indicators and outcomes, and objectives for higher education. Otherwise, the promise of higher education is not realized, and people will leave without a credential, and they'll leave without qualification. Many times, they struggle to get back and complete that education. How do we hold people accountable?

We have mission visions and values. We have objectives and outcomes, and we have our job descriptions. Leaders need to hold themselves accountable and then they need to hold those that they're responsible for accountable to make certain that, a student who is recruited, who is admitted, who is counseled on which classes to take? Who enters a classroom for teaching and learning? Who must be mentored, so that there is connection, and there is rapport. There is persistence and there is retention, and there is Completion.

We have to really think to ourselves that we have to dedicate ourselves to 100% completion rate. We may not get there but if we're dedicated to a 100% completion rate, and we understand what it takes systematically or, systemically, in order to make that happen, we will raise our graduation rates. We'll then of course, be favored with better rankings at our institutions, and will serve the purpose of higher education for our student’s success and their sustainability.

Dr. Laura
Excellent Bruce, I love everything that you said and you're really focusing on student journey. Right, from where do I go? What's my best fit throughout the college experience? Currently, we don't have any tools that really do a good job at providing visibility, on which universities do better and which universities don't do so well. Very powerful stuff. Rita.

Dr. Rita Kakati-Shah
Hi, thank you so much for this forum for having me here. Just to give you a little bit of background, I started myself at King's College London and I now serve on the advisory council of King's Business School. Other than my work I do, which is running a platform for empowering women and minorities. I do a lot of work with universities.

One thing that I've found is that disconnect, that we're talking about today, about student readiness, and the outside world is. If I think about it from a student's perspective, I spend a lot of time with the student clubs. For example, you have the student experienced that they learn what they get examined on? What they submit course work on?

If you've asked in this room today, unless you have a career in academia, which is maybe, a little bit redundant for today, but genuinely, the audience watching today. If you think about what you learnt, as a student, as an undergraduate, as a post-graduate and the relevance of that to whatever role you do, later on, whether it's in the corporate world, whether it's in the non-profit world, if it's policymaking, think of that relevance.

If you actually, do like a post-graduation survey, there wasn't that much relevance. There was something completely different. Things like that, how can we make people actually ready for the real world out there.

We don't know what direction people's careers take. Even the word Career is redundant in a way because when we all started, a career was something you did for life.

In my parent generation, it's still very much the case you retired with that career that you graduated with. I studied in the UK. You choose what you're studying at university, at age of 16 and then that sticks with you. I now live in the US, I'm in New York. Then you major in something, and you can flip and flop. I'm really like wow, this is actually great. But there are institutions around the world and students come across from all over the world where you don't always get this facet.

You think about the differences, where the country they come from, and the fact that career in itself, you're preparing them for a career but you're not, because you remember this day and age people do change things. Staying in a job for 18 months is wow, that's actually pretty good these days. It's totally fine now, to even have a resume that has different facets, as long as you're passionate, and you show something and you're going to make change later on.

Even the courses on resume preparedness career strategy. I would always question that as well, and the relevance to later on. I would also take advantage more on these clubs that the students have because most academics, students have these clubs, because that is actually very relevant. Where you get outside speakers, you get role models, former alumna, an alumni coming in to chat about their journeys, really focus on that journey as well, and figure out the practicalities. Put more role-playing in, to create that bridge, where there's a currently disconnect there.

Dr. Laura
Yes, excellent stuff and we do have a session on the gap between higher Ed and corporate. I've had one leg in Corporate for 25 years and the other leg in Curriculum Course Design and Adjunct Instruction. There's a definite gap. What I see the skills that I mentioned early on, if you look at those skills, for which we have a gap are necessary elementary skills for any degree, and that would ready students in any discipline, for the real world of work.

On the university side, we're just not delivering. I love that you talked about career, which was another session that we talked about the failure to help student’s first job out and journey through their career in this rapidly changing, where the average tenure at a job is two years. Rita you're right. It's not 20-25 years at the same company. It's a totally transform the environment, got to do a better job with those. Connor's now interesting because Connor is a current student and we invited Connor to get his perspective on this. Then we have Dr. Leslie. Connor,

Connor Watson
Yes, absolutely, hi everybody. Again, thank you for letting me join today. Everything that's been said is spot on and when we're talking about stakeholders in university. The fact of the matter is students are the most important stakeholder. Without students, there's no university. There's nothing happening. There's no reason for that building or, that campus to exist without students being there.

In the year of 2022, as Dr. Laura had mentioned, with the height of this Pandemic, the antiquated models of higher education have really been shown. The skeletons have been shown out from the closet and it's become more prevalent that students need to have voices in the universities. They need to have direct say in what's happening at their university.

We're just talking about job retention, the career in the workforce of only two years, but then we're talking about students choosing an institution for four years. Some even six years, if they're doing a Doctor Program or, Master's Program at that institution. It's not as easy for the students to just cut and run, and say, after two years, I don't like this anymore. Then what do they do? They have to restart over again at different institution.

When we're talking about this transparency and the stakeholder voices, something I'm really grateful at my institution, I'm a Junior Politics student at Ithaca College located in Ithaca, New York, in the United States. One of the great things about the institution is our student Governance Council. Where we have a board of elected students who are there to be a voice for students when it comes to talking to senior leadership team and people with power across our campus.

It's a really great opportunity to have these leaders from across campus come and sit down, and meet the students where they are, and listen to what the students are genuinely concerned about, because the fact of the matter is, the provost or, the president of the institution sitting in their office is not going to know, what the issue is, that the student is facing when they're down in the Student Union. That's just not how it's going to work and that's just the truth, unfortunately.

Then another thing too that Rita had touched on and thinking about experiences at university, and how we carry them and the impact they have. Another thing about this antiquated model is that, when well-rounded student is mentioned nowadays or, has been mentioned it usually means someone who has dabbled in every subject area, someone who can do the natural sciences and the liberal sciences, and everything in between. But that's not the well-rounded student anymore.

The well-rounded student is the student showing up as their whole selves, in their clubs, in their organizations, at their volunteer opportunities across campus, because if students aren't learning these necessary skills of teamwork and team building, and self-reliance and individuality outside of the classroom, I think that's a really large part of this disconnect that we're seeing, when students leave academia and get into the workforce. Students need to have the space to learn themselves in university.

That doesn't just mean what subject interests them? You can change your major 55 times if you have to figure out what you like. But that isn't necessarily what's going to add to the whole person, to everything that the student is. That's what they're carrying with them into the workforce. I mean, yes, I'm sure that they're carrying some of their class content their course content that they've learned, and ways of learning, and ways of doing things. But ultimately, that social interaction whole physiological being aspect of the student is, what's going to carry them into the workforce?

That's where I think that the transparency of stakeholders between universities is super important, because then students need to be able to voice to their leadership, what they expect from this institution. What do they expect from this institution that they're making this devoted commitment to? And how can they get the most for their money? Because frankly, the cost of higher education doesn't look its going down anytime soon.

That's not just the financial cost, that’s the mental costs, the emotional costs, and everything in between. I'm really glad that this conversation is happening. I think that this transparency between universities and stakeholders is something that has not been talked about enough yet. I'm hopeful that as terrible as this Pandemic has been across the world, I hope for higher education that this is just the beginning of a longer conversation. Thank you.

Dr. Laura
Beautiful Connor and obviously, the student consumer is the obvious key stakeholder who can provide grassroots insights, on what's going on at the university based on their experience in real time, so that leadership can adjust and adapt. I want to share two examples of what Connor just spoke about. Students approached me all the time, where the student was totally disempowered.

One, student approached me because she was stressed out taking a Physics class. She shared with me that 60% of the students were failing. Obviously, I said, ok, what have you tried so far? She said, we started at the bottom, and we have reached out to everybody up that chain, including the university's president, and we're told nothing could be done. That we were basically, put your big girl pants on and muddle through it, and figure it out.

I suggested perhaps, you could take that class over the summer somewhere else and transfer it in, program does not allow that, ok. If 60% of the students are failing a course, and the students have no outlet or, no voice and can't make any changes, what are we doing here? Another student, one of the varsity baseball players approached me during time to register for classes for next semester, ok.

He was stressed out, depression on medication, asked me for some guidance on, what he should do? He was Majoring in Sports Management. I said, JT, what's the problem? He goes. I have to take three accounting classes, and two Economics classes. I said, for Sports Management? He thought about and said oh, teaching opportunity, so I said, JD, I want you to look at some competitive programs locally, and see how stacks up against it are?

He did that research and came back with me. The program that he was in was wildly different. Students need through this student government council, to be able to let leadership know, what is going on at the grassroots? Where we are not delivering? What problems we're encountering that we aren't able to overcome ourselves? And they need to be empowered through this Student Governance Council, to be able to do something about it.

Totally love that Connor and a lot of universities do not have that. Again absolutely, emphatically necessary, and no under industry, would this be allowed to happen because the consumer would be publishing everything or, out on social media and the business would need to respond. I'm getting off the soapbox.

Dr. Michael Leslie
I find this conversation quite interesting. I think one of the things that is left out of this conversation is, the stakeholders who are not students. The faculties are a large stakeholder in this conversation and also the administration. I'm not completely convinced at all, that the interests of the administration and of the faculty are aligned with those of the students. I’m at a Land Grant University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida.

The aspiration of the university is to be, in the top 10 of the public universities. I think, we're depending on who's doing the ranking. We might be in the top 10 public universities but here's the point, we are modeling ourselves in our aspiration after the elite universities in the country.

Now, the elite universities, their job is to prepare a select group of people, to take on roles in government, in industry and perhaps, in the public sector, to actually make sure that they meet the elite standards, which The Harvard's, The Penn's and the Yale's and not the needs actually, of what I would call the general population.

When you mentioned that fact 50% of the students are flunking out of a Physics class, I think that's by design, there are not enough opportunities for people with, for example, with Nuclear Physics, for all of them to graduate and go into Nuclear Physics. The structure of the Cohort people who are successful, their products of elite universities, they're the ones that get to say, they're gatekeepers. They're not interested in having, everyone joins them.

They want a specific type of person that fits a specific type of profile, to be able to join their ranks. What I'm saying here is that we like to think. I was one of those people. I've been in academia for over 40 years. We'd think that we’re serving the general population and the needs of students when in fact, we're not. We're not dedicated to that. I'm going to take this a step further, when you talk about it, I think you mentioned it, Dr. Laura and perhaps, you test them, is also Connor. Students have a set of interest that is not aligned with the interests of the faculty.

You see, that's why, that conversation is very difficult to have. We're talking about, oh, we need to fill us. We have to maintain the class. Shall I put it this way we have to have our required courses filled in our curriculum, that the faculty can teach those courses? We also need to have a certain enrollment number, so that the State Legislature will grant us funding to continue to teach those courses. I mean, it's not set. It's not designed to serve students.

Now, I'm open to a conversation about how to shift that and I'll conclude with this for the moment. I think that there's a conversation that we don't have about, what the being of a university is? What the being of a faculty member is? The ethos of many institutions, the being of that institution is, not about the students. It's about the prestige of the university. It's about job security for the faculty. It's about job security for the administrators.

It's about the politics of funding from, if you're in the states upon for support institution, from the legislature and if you're in a private institution, it's the private donors who have a great say in, what is going to be taught in those classes? I think the fundamental question is, who are we being as a university? Who are we being as faculty?

Who are we being as administrators? Is there a match or, obviously, just there's a mismatch between that being, and the people that are now coming into the universities that have a very different outlook on, what a university experiences is supposed to be all about? I'll stop there, right, for the moment.

Dr. Laura
I love Dr. Leslie, that you are talking about being and I love that you are opening up the conversation to additional conversations, ok, because that's important. Not every student is going to fit Harvard or, Yale or, University of Penn. All right, but we have tons of students to educate at all different levels.
And to ask me to believe that this is not possible in higher Ed. is, ludicrous.

Okay, we're going to travel to the moon. We know, there're probably 11-12 time space continuums and we says no, every time we sneeze, and they're never wrong. It is absolutely possible to deliver better value. I think you're 100% right that it starts through conversations, right. Who are we being as university for what type of student? And then, how do we develop relationships with those students, for who we are, right? There's this relationship between the student and the university.

It's a global issue and the world is flat now. It's that important, not to mention the competition and of course, the Pandemic, just really, as Connor says, just skeletons are out of the closet. Now, interestingly enough, I'm going to contend that in no under other industry, would this be acceptable. Ok, take air flight.

If you had a 250 passenger plane a day, crashing, the world would be up in arms and we would be required to do something about it. If a Heart Surgeon say, success rate was 30 or, 40%, he would no longer be doing heart surgery. I think it's very important that these issues, that we're talking about, need visibility and quickly. Ok, so much important stuff. Go ahead,

Dr. Michael
Just to follow on to that Dr. Laura, and it said something to do with Bruce mentioned earlier. I think if we all agree that universities could better serve students. I mean, that's we're all agreed on that. The point is what are the key performance indicators for university? At mine, its publications, right and publications in very abstruse journals, right.

Dr. Laura
Yes.

Dr. Michael
It's also of whether or, not the universe is rated in some, and I guess, we're coming back to the core of our conversation here. US News and World Report's thinks that this is a good university for students to attend. I mean, it could be any other rating organization that has the prestige or, grants prestige to that university. Many of those ranking groups and organizations students, and what students need are probably, close to the bottom of the list on their ranking system, right.

I think that's where the conversation and I know that's why we're here today, that means to be focused. What are the indicators that should be used? And then, how can we get university administrators and faculty members to align with that new set of indicators? Why would they want to adopt them?

University Ranking System
Dr. Laura
I can't even believe you said that Dr. Leslie because we had a session yesterday on the impact of student voices and I talked about university ranking system, because I've been investigating it. One popular university ranking system measures nine broad areas. Here they are

1. Graduation and retention rates. We all know this ranking system.
2. Graduation rate performance.
3. Graduate indebtedness.
4. Social mobility, which really means Pell graduation grant rates.
5. Faculty resources, class size, faculty compensation percent of faculty with terminal degree, percent of full-time faculty.
6. Expert opinion, whatever that is.
7. Financial resources.
8. Student excellence, which means high school standing in the top 10 or, 25%
9. Alumni giving.

Now understand, these are important factors, but they don't paint a fair or accurate picture. The university rankings are what parents and students. One of the tools that they go to which university is, best for my child and it does not include--- go ahead Rita, jump in.

Dr. Rita
I just wanted to add to that because this is actually really great conversation. What I'm hearing now, this is a very US-centric conversation. In the UK, it's slightly differently. The measurements are different in India and Singapore, in the different countries. They're very different ranking systems. In the business school that I'm associated with, again, it's very different.

It's about, what are the salaries that your graduates, get later on and they're ranked that way. You have different newspapers, the Financial Times of different financial publications that rank on that. A conversation that has been, had at this very moment across different business goals are, why are we only ranking by salary later on as an example given, that a lot of these people end up as entrepreneurs. Later on, they end up doing something else.

Yet, there is not a single rating scale that exclusively looks at the impact in the world. It's all based upon the different factors that you've mentioned, Laura. Some of what you've mentioned Michael but also the financial things as well. It's about, what is that impact?

When you're not that big, you don't have a salary. You start with nothing again and a lot of it these days is about impact. What is the impact that students are having on the world? Universities now, at the end we're conduits universal, conduit to help the students meet, make the mark in the world become that next generation change makers, and impact is very much part of that.

When you look at firms out there, you look at CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility. You look at ESG, you look at different facets of the United Nations Development Goals out there, and you talk about climate change and agenda quality, education for things like that.

Yet these things aren't happening. What is the impact that is going on? I think I go back to talking about student clubs again, because that is one way that some of the students’ clubs certainly, in the institutions again, out of the US that I deal with, can really feel the footing because it's a holistic approach as Connor mentioned. It's not just what happens in the classroom, it's not just what happens in an exam. It's holistic.

There's a lot of focus on what happens just in between closed doors or, in a hybrid situation if folks are doing that. But what is happening outside that, social interaction that students going through. What is happening outside campus that is very much part of the formative experience, that goes into the students. It's the same with faculty and staff as well. It's not just what happens there.

A lot of people just think, oh, faculty, they're there to teach. Teaching is a tiny part of actually what happens. Your market, you'd build up curriculum, you're looking at all of these different policies that are constantly been laid out, and you have to follow them.

Your students are coming even from overseas. What are the different cultural nuances, the environmental restrictions, you have to look at, as well. There's so much more involved as well in this process that I wanted to bring up, that it's not just a disconnect on. What are we using to rate? I would even question the ratings themselves and what needs to be done there.

Dr. Laura
Thank you, Rita, for saying that because the whole idea of Bruce, I just want to jump in here real quick. The whole idea of this summit is, for Global International Cooperation, so that we can do a better job for our global community. Bruce, go ahead.

Bruce
I've had the very unique opportunity to travel widely and overseas as well. I have to say that when we come out of these conferences, it's discovered that we're all talking primarily about the same things. Our system isn't broken. It was designed this way. We have legacy systems that were not designed for current student populations and real-world demands.

You were talking about alumni outcomes, Rita, and impact, and I agree wholeheartedly, that the rating systems themselves have to be questioned. Dr. Leslie, you were talking about, how we hold again faculty and leadership accountable, and how we have to think about, what innovations are necessary in order to meet the demands of our real world? Now, even as we're hopefully emerging from the Pandemic.

I wholeheartedly agree with, would you go to a surgeon who only was 30 to 40% Successful? Of course, you would not. Now, tradition of course, allows for belonging but I think what we need to do is, to make sure that what we do is, we redefined that belonging. We can maintain our most valued traditions, but we must allow for change, and we must allow for innovation.

Dr. Laura
I love that you said that Bruce, because I am the poster child for higher Ed. honest to God. I love it. Loved my university experience, from undergraduate through PhD and I've spent my entire life as a student, as a professor, and most of the time as both. We do value these traditions, but we really need to do a better job, and we need to share across the globe, understand.

I teach a lot of international students and they come with different skill sets, and I learned from them in the classroom. How did you figure that out so quickly? Oh, this is how we learned it in India. Why can't we share across the globe? This summit is providing an amazing opportunity for us to do that. I see another group right here that should be meeting on a regular basis to talk about these things, and push this thinking, and conversation out into the larger world, so that some productive action can be taken. Connor?

Connor
Yes, just hearing what's been said. What I am hearing, what's going through my mind is, the numbers are not cutting it anymore. Numbers are not telling a holistic story for students. They are not telling a holistic story for the administration. Numbers do not mean anything at this point. If you ever noticed every time, that college application time rolls around for a university. Everybody wants to hear the stories of the current students to help bring new students there.

Then as soon as the new students are there, the story stop, and it goes right back to the numbers. Stories are what are bringing people here. The holistic approach is what’s bringing students to institutions, and that holistic approach is what needs to continue. Students as stakeholders that importance doesn't end once they graduate. We're forgetting to mention the importance of the alumni stakeholders and all of this also.

Dr. Leslie had mentioned in a private institution, alumni are some of your greatest stakeholders financially, when it comes to trying to make sure you have funding and frankly, after serving on an alumni board as a student member, I have not found one alumni who was really concerned with the numbers. Who was concerned with the same numbers that the US News and World Report or, any other publication was worried about?

The alumnus is concerned about the student experience and the stories of the students, and the holistic student experience. That is a hopeful indicator that we need to move toward that. It needs to be more holistic. The numbers are not cutting it anymore, because the numbers are not telling the stories anymore, and the numbers are not what are impressing people anymore. Rita had mentioned, with the Financial Times salaries aren't telling you anything.

I could have been probably, the worst student in the business school and I ended up getting a wonderful job. Somehow, my salary says that I'm doing great but the entrepreneur, who was top of her class, isn't making as much as me. But when you hear our stories, you would say that individual is probably more successful than I was. The holistic approach is what needs to be happening that transparency is hopefully, going to open up a world into that holistic approach.

Dr. Laura
Beautiful Connor and that's back to you Dr. Leslie, that is being, wholeness, right.

Dr. Michael
Yes, Connor said something that I think, Rita also said something about, how we move to a, say non-quantitative assessment, or at least include non-quantitative factors in our assessment, but I've also had the privilege of teaching at various universities abroad, several in Africa. One of the things that noticed, it stands out to me is, that there is a concern for birth students, wanting to be at a university that's going to guarantee them a higher salary.

I mean, that's why they're going to the university. They were the one to include. They want to improve the quality of their life financially, right. Many of them come from homes or, situations in which they don't have those resources. I mean, contrary, as Rita said, the American experience is not the world experience. But I want to engage this if I could, with you Rita and perhaps Connor, there is something to be said for the university providing you access to a higher standard of living.

How do you demonstrate that to prospective students when their parents are there? They're paying money to have their kids go to these places. How do you get a university? Give you a concrete example. I taught at the University of Zambia. For three years in the University of Yaoundé in Cameroon for two years and I would say, based on my experience there, that if you told students that this universe is not going to guarantee them, a higher level of income, would be a non-starter, all right.

If you tell them that, oh, when you leave here, you're going to become an entrepreneur, and have to start from zero again, that would be a non-starter conversation too. I just want to understand how we get the university itself. Let me add this third piece, the university administration, and the faculty themselves are positioning themselves, as this is a place where if you come here, you're going to become a high paid lawyer, or you're going to become a high paid engineer.

I just want to understand how we make this saleable, this new set of KPIs, to universities in many countries that are attempting to market themselves as a place where students are going to have access to a higher financial quality of life.

Dr. Laura
That's great. Go ahead Rita.

Dr. Rita
Dr. Leslie mentioned my name on that. I just wanted to quickly add that. Actually, I taught in Zambia as well, to the girls of Kalingalinga in a school there, and one thing that I noticed, they do a lot of work with women, in particular youth, is that above and beyond thinking about later on, what they might earn to sustain and look after their families? It's that feeling of empowerment.

What do they get out of it? What is that? How do they feel even empowered, to get an education later on? That was the first thing that I noticed, depending on which part of the world. Some of the folks that I also speak to, as well in rural areas, in India as well, very similar, it's even the state before that they're not looking to get an education, to necessarily earn more later on.

They're looking to get an education to be something, to discover, to get out of this. I can't do methodology or, this mode of thinking, and I found this to be really true. It's not just the goals for everyone to find out, what am I going to do later on? Don't also forget that what we've talked about today. We're talking about some of the high-flying careers. My dad wanted me to be a doctor.

I actually studied medicine for a couple of years. I didn't become a doctor. I ended up as an entrepreneur, but I ended up being one in my own right. That's the point, you get musicians, you get historians, you get folks that end up being authors later on. Those aren't necessarily high pay jobs straight away. You're doing it to learn. You're doing it to educate yourself. Education is much more than financial, right.

What is the purpose of education? To learn, to transfer the knowledge if you are a good teacher, what you're trying to do is, make the person your student better than you. You want to impart everything, and you want them to think, and do something more than what you're doing. That's why go back to impact, what is the impact you're having on society later on? Yes, depending on where you are in the world.

There were certain folks I said, yes, we must go with this prestige involved. But how do you define the prestige? I would also argue that prestige isn't just what you're earning later on. It's about what is the impact you're making on the world. What are you doing with your life? How are you helping other people? What are you doing later on? Universities as well have areas where they show that impact as well.

I know, as a student, I went to King's College London, but I could have gone to so many others. One of the factors that made me decide wasn't about oh, will I earn more money? I had no clue that I was going to go into investment banking. No clue. When I started off, I was 16. I got educated in the UK. You don't get to major there and switch degrees. No, you're stuck with it at the age of 16, what you've chosen.

You're going to study at the age of 18 and you're going to stick with it. You change your mind. You’re going to wait another two years, to start again from scratch. That's the reality of education outside the US, in a lot of countries around the world. I wasn't thinking what I am going to later on. Maybe, my parents were but maybe not. They wanted me to be a doctor in the UK, doesn't hurt that much.

For me, it was very important. I wanted to get holistic experience. What is the student experience? Where are my friends going as well? What is the nightlife like? What are the clubs like? As a student, you're thinking of much more than that. That's what I would say in terms of, addressing part of your question.

That's what Students University thinking more and more of now, as an active alumna myself. Several different academic facilities, I do the same thing. It's what the student experience, as Connor mentioned, and helping if people want to go into different careers. How can we help them knowing that people are probably going to change careers several times along the way?

Dr. Laura
Beautiful, very important. Who's chiming in here? Was that Bruce?

Connor
That was me, it's Connor.

Dr. Laura
Oh, Connor,

Connor
I just wanted to add on to that, too. I think that goes back Dr. Leslie, to the conversations around the prestige of the institution. If we're just choosing institutions based on prestige, if anyone's familiar with Ithaca New York, Ithaca College is on one hill and Cornell University is on the other Hill. I've spoken to many Cornell University students who seem absolutely miserable, but they're there because of the prestige of the institution.

Frankly, when it comes to worrying about salaries and things, I've talked to lots of different business owners, and hiring managers regarding their hiring process. You can always teach individuals hard skills. You can teach individuals how to calculate in Microsoft Excel? And you can teach them how to invest in finance and do payroll, but you can't teach an individual how to understand themselves and how to have the emotional intelligence to be an enjoyable co-worker in the workforce?

I think that goes back to that gap that Dr. Laura and Bruce were mentioning earlier, regarding academia and corporate. If you're just in it for the financial game, which I don't blame anybody, I understand that we're in a world right now, where finances are at the top of a lot of young people's minds, including myself. Frankly, I would rather be hired because I have self-awareness and understanding of myself, and a holistic approach to my work, rather than the skills I can bring, and then not have any real room for advancement, or learning anymore.

When thinking about choosing University, I was someone who didn't choose based off of financial skills, at all the careers that have been on my mind, have not been high in financial, but they've been high in, what I believe, would be beneficial to me as a whole individual.

I think that there has to be room, Dr. Leslie mentioned, for both of those to be included in understanding, what institution you're choosing, but ultimately, I guess, the nut of what I'm trying to say is, that I don't believe that the prestige of the institution, the prestige of the classes, the prestige of the faculty members, and how many publications they have is, what's going to lead, to higher salaries for these individuals.
I believe that having this holistic approach and this holistic experience, and understand them, so that they're better able to know what they want and better able to know how they learn going into the workforce. I think that's what with the higher salaries, rather than just having a degree from an Ivy League.

Dr. Laura
Good, Bruce.

Bruce
I think maybe what we're looking at is Enigmatology, puzzling and the theories of puzzles. I mean, we've talked about how certainly we want a decent student experience. There is intrinsic value to an education. There's instrumental value to an education. We know for instance, and I'm not certain that this applies worldwide, but the Gallup Purdue survey, where a great majority of students are coming into higher education for.

To earn a credential and then to make us this successful sustainable life thereafter, but Connor, I absolutely, echo what you're saying. A whole person is going to be a greater global citizen and a greater global contributor. Maybe what we're looking at is Enigmatology here. We just need to put the puzzle together and then maybe, longitudinally study that impact.

Dr. Laura
I love that, Bruce. We've all been, most of us here through education and some of us for long term. We're taught how to figure these puzzles out. What we need are passionate, smart people in a room and the power to figure this out. This has been an amazing session. I'm so honored to be associated with all of you on this call and I hope we can keep in touch afterward. Let me know, how I can help you?