Utilizing Technology to Create Mission-Driven & Equity-Centered Academic Pathways

JOSH BEUTLER: Hello, everybody. Welcome, and welcome back if you just joined us again. We sure hope you’ve enjoyed this and discovered new ways to streamline skills based learning and competency based learning and even experiential learning.

Again, my name is Josh Beutler. I had strategy and business development here at GoReact and I’m now pleased to introduce our closing keynote speaker, Dr. Mordecai Ian Brownlee.

He in 2020, Mr. Brownlee, Dr. Brownlee was featured by EdTech Magazine as one of the 30 most interesting voices in higher education, shaping the conversation around technology and education.

In 2021, Dr. Brownlee was appointed president of Colorado’s Community College of Aurora, becoming one of the youngest college presidents in the country.

A minority serving and Hispanic serving institution, CCA provides instruction for more than 10,000 students throughout it’s 350 square mile service area. In 2022, Doctor Brownlee was featured by Diverse Issues in Higher Education magazine as a new school leader representing the next generation for college presidents.

He’s here today to talk to us about rebounding from a pandemic by promoting new ideas, new technologies, and new systems. And how doing so will help institutions increase relevance and accessibility and to realize the full potential of their missions and visions. Welcome, Dr. Brownlee. We’re excited to hear your perspective and part of the next generation of civic and community leaders. Please take it away.

MORDECAI IAN BROWNLEE: Thank you so much, Josh. And good afternoon, good morning, wherever you are in the world. I’m honored to be with you all on today. A big thank you to GoReact for this opportunity.

We are going to have fun.

I’m seeing that in the chat we’re experiencing some request for closed captioning, so hopefully you can begin to see that at this time. I’m going to continue to watch the chat as well. I hope everyone is well. Honored to be here with you. Bring you greetings from Aurora, Colorado right outside of Denver, Colorado. We have campuses in both Aurora and Denver.

And we’re going to have a good time. I see some Texas folks here. So I just recently moved nine months ago from San Antonio, Texas. So I will tell you right now, you can keep the heat and the humidity.

I don’t miss it. All right.

So today we’re going to talk about utilizing technology to create mission-driven equity-centered academic pathways. And we’re going to have a conversation about really reflecting on what it is that you’re providing from a resourcing standpoint, a student experience standpoint, and how we can utilize technology to truly one, ensure that we have mission alignment, we’ll talk a bit more about that on today, but also utilizing the technology to drive equity centeredness in our approaches to the student experience. We’re going to have fun on today.

Real quick, I see that the chat is flowing. So let’s do something real quick. I’m going to ask for you to do something. I want to ask for you to enter something into the chat for me, but don’t press Enter yet.

So on the count of three, I’m going to give you a chance to then enter, you are going to press Enter at that point, but what I want you to do right now in the chat is tell me how well do you think, your institution or your school, your college, your entity, your nonprofit, how well do you think you all are integrating technology in the driving equity?

Now, don’t press Enter yet. Just type this in the chat and then I will give you the count of three we’ll press Enter. But right now, I want you to just write for me how well do you think your institution or your organization, your school is utilizing technology to drive equity? So enter that right now in the chat for me.

And let’s see. I see 100% Not well, developing, could always improve. Right. Not very, well room for improvement. 7 out of 10. OK. Some folks say, great.

Somebody just said, hello from California. However you’re feeling, thank you so much for interacting with us. So let’s just use this throughout, feel free to use the chat as we go throughout this presentation just to check in with one another, see how we are interpreting and taking from today.

Listen, following this presentation, I would love to stay in contact with you. This is my website, itsdrmordecai.com.

Education technology is my thing. I’ve published, I’m a columnist for EdSurge.

Just had a new piece come out in higher ed technology, just had a new piece come out two days ago. Always blogging, always on social media as well. By all means, I want to continue to interact with you all. So let’s continue the conversation following on today.

This is the statement that I want to center us as we have this conversation. Here’s the statement. “At the center of education is the student.

Everyday we make an investment into their transformation.” Say that again, “At the center of education is the student. Everyday, we make an investment into their transformation.

As I read this, I want you to reflect for one moment. Now, some of you all say you’re doing a great job. You’re using technology to drive equity. Some of you all said, ah. We’ve got opportunity here.

For no matter where you are on the spectrum, can you say–

you don’t have to answer this in the chat. Feel free, unless you want to–

but can you honestly say that everyday, you, your team, your institution is doing a great job of keeping the student at the center of everything you do.

There’s a lot of disruption going on right now in higher education. There’s a lot of disruption going on in society, period. And as educators, we have a responsibility to be able to–

we have a responsibility to ensure that our systems, our entire student approaches or bringing about a transformative power, a transformative change in the lives of those that we serve.

Too often sometimes, we allow for our own either mental barriers or agenda barriers to prevent us from being able to move from step 1 to 2 to really take things to the next level. Student-centeredness, by keeping the student at the center of everything that we do, we are essentially enabling our faculty, our staff, our instructors, our adjuncts, our stakeholders to really ask some hard questions and say, does it make sense today? It may have made sense maybe 20 years ago, maybe 10 years ago, maybe even five years ago, but does it make sense today?

The pandemic and what our students have dealt with–

I just spoke to our student honors society last night at their induction ceremony and just honored them in the space to say, yes, in so many spaces, especially now as you turn on television it seems as though the society as a whole depending on where you’re living–

let me preface this. Where you’re living in the country and I should say the world, there seems to be this movement of, hey. Look we’re past the pandemic. We’re moving on.

That reality holds true for some, but not for all.

But the fact that they bravely took this step to pursue their academic pathway and dreams in the midst of a pandemic is to be honored. Make sure you’re honoring your students in this reality and this bravery that they have shown through this time to pursue their dreams in the midst of a global pandemic.

But everyday, we should make an investment into their transformation. Everyday, we should create new systems that ensure their success. Everyday, we should make sure that we are removing the barriers, we’re calling out the barriers for what they are. And then the question becomes is, how are we going to transform the student experience in a way that’s going to meet the needs of today’s students and the plethora.

I’ll give you a sense of what we have here Community College of Aurora. 64% of our students are students of color. 50% of our students are first generation. 51% of our students will be on what’s called the low socioeconomic scale. 90 countries, over 90 countries represented here at the Community College of Aurora.

We are the most diverse college in the state of Colorado. So that means that we have a lot of responsibilities, a lot of questions we have to ask of ourselves in this space to say, are we meeting the needs of our diverse student communities?

Are we honoring who’s in the seat and their various realities, identities, who they are as an individual? And are we ensuring that we have a student experience that is going to be relevant to who they are?

And doesn’t matter how comfortable we feel with the approach, does it matter to the student? And that’s what we want to focus on today.

Today’s agenda is going to focus on four topics, four pillars. Advancing the institutional mission through equity, embracing the power of holistic student supports, realizing the intersection of technology and equity, and focusing on student success through technology and equity. So let’s get started.

Advancing the institutional mission through equity.

Here’s a question for you. Right now, how many you all know your institution’s, your school, your college, your organization’s mission statement by heart?

You can use the chat and can put that in chat if you know it. But certainly don’t want to put you on the spot if you don’t.

But not everyone does. Right now if I walked up to you and says, hey. Can you tell me what your mission statement is of your institution? I have found when I’ve spoken around the country here in the United States that folks don’t necessarily know it by heart. Mordecai, what does it matter if I knew about heart?

Well, I’m one who truly believes that there should be a direct alignment between who you say you are as an educator and where you serve. Number one, number two, in order to ensure that every day you’re being a part of the transformation in that student’s life, you’ve got to understand what your entity’s mission is and the means in which how they are going to make the transformation. Not everyone shares the same mission.

They may be an overarching mission, I’ll give this case in point, community colleges here in the United States has an overarching mission of open access. However, not everyone is approaching this work the same way. So our institutional mission statements, our vision statement may not be the same as another institution.

What does this matter? Well, let’s look here at the slide.

What is your institution’s mission statement? Do you know it? Do you understand it? Well, if you have a strong understanding of your institutional mission statement, now you have a means of accountability.

I’m still talking about utilizing technology here, but you don’t know how to utilize the technology if you don’t have a sense of what the mission is. The mission is going to guide you in the direction in which how technology should be integrated into the student experience based on your mission statement. The second thing I want you to pay attention to–

maybe some of you all may be on a separate screen have now you’re looking at your organization’s mission statement, your institution’s mission statement.

Well, what I want you to take a look at is can you find the who and the why?

Look at that mission statement, can you find the who you serve and why you serve, maybe the how you serve them?

Some mission statements even go into that. Some mission statements are one sentence long, some are a paragraph I’ve seen.

But it needs to be your guiding star, for as you are now attending today’s conference, and thank you so much for those that have been attending the GoReact conference. Started yesterday, now we’re concluding on today.

But as you’re now looking at the new technologies and the new conversations regarding technologies and the new systems about technology, yes you can have the bright idea, but the question becomes is, how does that bright idea translate into the institutional mission? That’s how we get to impact.

So now let’s take a look at who, the how, the why in that mission statement, if we’re reflecting on that. And then here goes the third question, can you find the equity in your mission statement? Is it present?

In higher education, equity requires institutions to identify structural barriers facing underserved students.

This is where the equity comes in. It’s this understanding that you cannot take a one size fits all approach.

Now, we understand that in the ivory tower of higher education, as we look at the various histories in the foundations of higher education, certainly here in the United States, but I would only imagine we can get into a global perspective on this because certainly we are represented around the world in today’s conversation. But just reflect on the realities about the founding of higher education in your respective country, in your respective communities in which you serve, far too often equity was never a part of the picture.

It wasn’t necessarily about creating spaces for all to thrive, it was for who it was for. So as we talk about this equity conversation, there are some that are ready to move beyond the conversation, not understanding the conversation historically speaking has never gotten started. And so now as we talk about technology, certainly, you have to now think about the digital divide in this space.

As I think about the amount of poverty present in my own communities, this was something that became a significant hardship for us here at the Community College of Aurora on how to address. Well, yes, we had to pivot to a technology space and utilize technology and online services, but not everyone had access, broadband access being the challenge or having proper instruments and tools, laptops to be able to access the instruction.

Perhaps you can answer the question, how is your college addressing these challenges? If you want to interact in the chat right now, we can talk about that a bit. Refer back to that.

The community in which I just served for the past five years, San Antonio, Texas was part of the Alamo College, St Philip’s college system. And one of the realities for those that have ever visited San Antonio, Texas that you may not be aware of, San Antonio, Texas is the most impoverished metropolitan city in the country. It is also here in the United States, it is also the most economically segregated community metropolitan in the country, in the United States.

So as I was seeking to serve my students, and we talk about equity, we talk about technology, we talk about being mission driven, there are some challenges there, because who I serve, how do I serve them? Now, in the midst of the pandemic, and here’s the thing that I think I want for all of us to embrace, hopefully, we’re embracing it.

Let’s not be a part of this movement that’s saying, let’s return back to the way the things were. Well, you can’t.

Times have changed. The taste, the approach, the higher education has shifted. It was already happening, the disruption was already fully underway and engaged, but now the pandemic has sped along this reality.

Now times there were two other realities happening, and I could speak here to the United States. They talk about the 2030 enrollment cliff, the demographic cliff.

For those unaware of this, you can study this, I’ve published on this as well in EdSurge talking about the 2030 cliff. So essentially here in the United States, you think about the youngest baby Boomer generation at the year 2030 turned 65 years old.

What does this mean? This means that as we have an aging society and workforce. There’s two things happening in our educational space here, at least in the United States. Now adult populations are becoming the primary focus in how we approach this work in what had been traditional age spaces. So the whole idea of being a traditional age student is now shifting drastically.

But two, you’re now having scope creep that’s now occurring between the community college space and the four-year graduate space. Why? Because the fight for the demographics on who we educate is now shifting. Then perhaps in the chat you want to put what are some of the demographic realities in your community.

They also refer to this, and this is the part two of this, the great wave. Don’t know what I think about that term, but that’s certainly the term that individuals are utilizing here in the United States in this conversation to speak about the aging demographics in that population. Millennials being the most now prominent generation in the workforce in this space, what does this mean?

Well, you are talking about an entire generation that was inspired by pop culture. So you’re now talking about relevance. This idea of relevance more than ever is prevalent in our society. So as we think about the learning experience, it must remain relevant, which means that every year, every two years, every three years, every five years, you have an entire shifting.

Now, what’s happening in the space and how we approach this, meaning that we cannot approach this work, this institutional mission with a one size fits all. Now more than ever, you can’t. Because you’re now dealing in a space that deals in battles for relevance.

This is not to say that our institutions, that the Academy as a whole hold no relevance. It does, but how we approach the work is now in what’s in question. And we want to utilize technology to create mission-driven, equity-centered academic pathways. And that’s what we’re focusing on today.

For example, I’ve now provided you the mission statement of the community college Aurora if you’re interested. Community college Aurora serves a diverse community by providing high quality instruction and support services to prepare students for transfer and employment. I’m using this as an example because one of the things I really want you to take away today is how to break down, how to pull out, how we’re going to properly resource at our respective institutions, schools, colleges, universities, the work of integrating technology into being mission-driven, equity-centered.

We look at this mission statement and we see here where it’s now calling out who we serve. Here goes the who, diverse communities. I’ve already shared with you who we serve. Over 90 countries represented, 50% of our students being first generation. We’re not even talking about the various identities, the intersection of those identities, we could spend a whole day talking about that, right? But we serve diverse communities.

Well, if we’re now accepting the fact that we serve diverse communities, we can’t approach this with a one size fits all. Now, the question becomes, how do we serve them? Well, we provide high quality instruction. In order to provide that high quality instruction, we have to then use technology.

Technology has to be a part of the conversation. We’ve established this idea of relevance. And in order to remain relevant in today’s approach to higher education, continuous education, you have to have technology to be a part of the conversation. Then around that, we have to talk about high quality support services.

So this is where we get into the interactions of entities like GoReact and the works and what they offer. And these support services, it’s now about where can I pull the resourcing in to have the quality instruction that I say I have to provide.

And then what the ultimate outcome will transfer in employability. Again, I serve at a community college, so transferability to the senior institutions has to be a part of our conversation.

But now as you’re looking at your institutional, your organization, your school, your college, your university’s mission statement, all of these realms have to be in. Look at your strategic plan. I have this conversation all the time around the country about folks saying, well, Mordecai I want to use more technology but I’m getting fought at my institution, go back and look at your strategic plans.

Your strategic plans creates the key towards opening the door to how we resource properly these bright ideas that you’re taking away from today’s conversation. The realization of institutional vision is impossible without strategic thinking, intentionality, being consistent and accountable for mission advancement.

All of these then creates the nebulous for the transformation. It’s beautiful when you think about it.

Here’s some of the things I want you to think about. As we talk about advancing the institutional mission through equity, you have to identify what are some of the structural barriers that are present at your respective institutions and entities.

The college application process, let’s talk about that for a moment.

Technology has to be a part of this conversation. Think about the various languages that are represented and spoken at your respective institutions. Think about the word count on some of these college applications. Think about the English second language communities in which you dwell within.

And if we talk about accessibility and equity, we have to have a conversation on how long does it take to complete some of these college applications, the amount of words used that doesn’t even translate into some of these other languages. We’ve got to talk about that. Financial aid, especially here in the United States, man that’s a hard conversation to have right there alone.

Accessibility, we talked about earlier the request for transcription, but just think about the various needs for our special populations and the means in which how we serve them.

Also think about accessibility with a different lens as well.

I that just had a conversation with a student this morning who has now moved on from the community college system and working on her master’s and she said I showed up to the university and who I needed to speak with wouldn’t be there until September. Accessibility.

Now, do you think if that student is going to have to have a conversation about, does this institution care about me, are they even accessible to meet with me when I need to meet with them? This conversation of relevance got to bring technology into that now because if you think about your own shopping habits, if you will, commercialization here. Just think about this.

I’m an Amazon Prime member, I’m not getting paid by Amazon Prime to say this, but I’m an Amazon Prime member. Whenever I need to buy some shampoo, some soap, some shaving cream, I need to be able to do that beyond the hours of 8:00 to 5:00. However, unfortunately, we approach higher education between the hours of 8:00 to 5:00 like its banker hours.

What are we doing for an entire community of individuals beyond the hours of 5:00 PM? These working adults and parents that won’t even turn on the computer and begin their instruction until the kids are asleep 10:00 PM, can they make contact with anybody at your respective institutions? Certainly, a conversation we’re having here at CCA.

Academic advising, the cost, big barrier. Developmental education, limited course offerings. Are you even offering the classes when I need them?

Lack of support. We talked about that. Mental health.

No. I’m looking at the time here. I got to speed this along, but we can have a whole conversation about mental health wellness in these spaces. Let me just add that to say this, take care of yourselves. Educators, we need you to take care of yourselves.

Poverty, assessment. The reason I brought up assessment, you got to think about these tools that we’ve been using historically to determine a student’s readiness for the college classroom, the educational classroom. But yet if you look at some of the science behind how some of these tests were written and these tools that we were using to properly assess what we weren’t doing it so properly.

And now again, really looking at this one size fits all approach, we can’t do that. How can I say our honor who’s in these instructional seats yet I’m approaching my assessment for their readiness as a one size fits all, let’s keep it moving here.

Embracing the power of holistic student supports. Here’s another conversation we’ve got to have about technology. There are so many ways that you can utilize technology to drive the advancement of your institutional missions and equity centeredness, student centeredness in this approach.

First question I ask you here, how can you revolutionize your service to students? We talked about after the hours of 5:00 PM, big standpoint there. Big topic there because at least here in the United States and think about your own demographics in your respective countries and communities, but you heard me talk about the 2030 wave. So then I already know I’m dealing with a higher volume of adult population of students.

Well, people work, they work but they need support during non-traditional hours. How am I providing those supports? How am I utilizing technology in order to do that? Am I forcing my students to have to come in to a college campus or a school when we are open or am I creating accessibility available during the times where my doors may physically be closed yet I am still open? Ways in which we can integrate technology.

Go back to something I said earlier. Look at your strategic plans, look at your institutional strategic plans. Those objectives have to be powered by goals. Those objectives are driven by goals, those goals are driven by day to day operations. And then you must have a system for holding those day to day operations accountable.

Technology can be infused all through those systems.

How can you second question? How can you innovate your delivery of services? How can you revolutionize your service, your approach, the various modalities?

High flakes are certainly synchronous, asynchronous as we talk about the in-seat experience, but how can you integrate technology into the in-seat experiences? Certainly, online.

I was having this conversation with the GoReact team. Just I think this was last week, we were talking about this. Even in the online space I am so tired of that in order for us to measure how we measure the student interactions in the online spaces, this post by Wednesday, posted two of your fellow classmates by Friday.

I mean truly how can we revolutionize the student interaction experience even in the online spaces. We’ve got to figure out deeper ways in how to create community, belonging. I don’t know how much we’ve had that conversation about belonging in the online educational spaces, but we now have to create those more than ever.

Third question, how can you improve the connectivity of your students? You heard me talk about poverty. We have to figure out how to address the gaps.

Something you could talk about in the chat right now is how is broadband access in your respective communities? I know it is a challenge in ours.

And so we talk about this online space. So one of the things we had to address is accessibility.

Just last month we were approved by our state board here at the Community College of Aurora to make a $2 million infusion into addressing the digital divide at our respective college. We had to. If it wasn’t being addressed, we had to figure out a way to address it or we’re losing an entire population of students and then are we really meeting our responsibilities in meeting the needs of our students in our communities. Something to reflect on and to think about, how are you going to improve connectivity for your students?

Embracing the power of holistic student support.

So now let’s take a moment to reflect on where is there a need for structural change.

Structural change, we have to. Elizabeth, thank you. Technology access varies from school to school. It absolutely does.

There are some spaces that really are great in this space, communities that really acknowledge this. Think about some of the amazing work here in the United States that’s happening out of Arizona, especially in these tribal colleges, something that has to be addressed. But I’m looking at the time, let me keep going here.

Structural change, the need for structural change has to then drive process change.

Those process changes have to drive attitudinal change. How are we thinking about how we’re approaching equity, opportunity?

We have to understand that the students are at the center of this approach. It’s not about us, it’s about who we’re serving.

Student has to be at the center of it. It’s not about what makes us comfortable. Does it make the student comfortable? This isn’t to say then that we’re to have a transactional relationship with the student. That’s not what I’m saying here.

The pathway towards the learning outcomes, the entire experience is one that is sacred, it is to be cherished, but it should be a transformational experience. But in order for it to be a relevant transformational experience, the student has to be at the center of it. This is where we then have our student success breakthrough.

This is where we’re then taking technology, student-centeredness, mission-driven, equity-centeredness. This is where the transformation happens.

For a moment here, let’s talk about realizing the intersection between technology and equity here. I’ve got about 13 minutes with you here. So if you feel me picking up pace here is because I realize I have 13 minutes here with you.

First question, how are you promoting access at your respective entities, your institutions, organizations? How are you promoting access to the student?

This can be done through technology, but you must have the structure, the infrastructure to promote that access, something to think about. Secondly, how are you creating new pathways towards student success. This could be through the new integrations of technology or hard lining the needs. I could think about hot spots here, or let’s think about the academic programs themselves.

Think about the relevance. What industry is saying that they need, how are you meeting those needs and creating new pathways towards success? And then if we talk about student centeredness, we have to then acknowledge the various identities and realities, races, backgrounds, you name it and our respective entities and institutions.

So if we were to acknowledge that and talk about student centeredness, then where are we creating new pathways for career employment and transferability for these students is very possible that they’re coming from backgrounds where no one in their family has ever been exposed to these options before. How can we tell a student to dream big yet they’ve been worrying about a roof over their heads and having food accessible to them on a given basis?

I don’t have time to dream, I’m just trying to stay alive, and now they’re there at your school and your college, your university. Working with your organization, it is your responsibility educators to create new pathways towards success. This is the equity centeredness.

Three, how are you using technology to drive equity? This can be done in the–

it’s about choosing smart technologies that are honoring the student now more than ever, saying that there are multiple ways to get to the learning outcome. It’s not a one size fits all approach now more than ever.

Fourth, how are you aligning strategic planning with resources? Your strategic plan will drive how you resource this work. This is where we can break down what has been perhaps for you those barriers that have been present of you asking your administration to say, we need this, we need that, yet you keep being met with denials and disapproval.

Let’s have a deeper conversation about how we’re now there at bringing ourselves to the table through the strategic planning, making sure that we’re having the statistics of our students there at the forefront. But also, let me tell you something I did. When I was vice president, I would bring the students to my operational unit report out.

I brought the students in front of the college to put a face to it. This is who we’re serving. You can hear me talk about these statistics all day, but I would bring students to tell their stories purposely because we have to humanize what this work is and whose lives we are serving, whose lives we are changing.

I’m here towards the end of my presentation, but I wanted to focus on one major piece, one last piece here. And that is focusing on student success through technology and equity. What I’ve provided for you here is what we call in the community college space, the guided pathway model.

Its a methodology that you can study up on. Certainly here in the United States it’s a big part of the conversations here. Guided pathway model. Where you have student success, but student development is essentially the overarching Ruth. It is the protection, it is the guide to this work that we’re doing.

Don’t lose sense of student development in the midst of today’s time. Don’t do it, don’t do it. Don’t chase relevance to the point where you forget the true pillars, if you will, of student development. We still have a responsibility to develop our students, yet we have an opportunity now to infuse technology now more than ever in what that student development provides.

Students success, being the overarching. Equitable student success being a part of this reality. But we want to clarify the path for students. You heard me talk about how students are coming from all over the world. All these various backgrounds, realities, hardships, all these barriers that they’re having to overcome. They need help clarifying their academic path, their career path.

The idea of having to choose a major just brings fear to their heart because I want to do so much yet I don’t know where to get started.

This is an opportunity where you can through equity mindedness create new pathways by clarifying for them a path.

This is where the whole term, the meta major, and this whole idea movement now that’s happening across the world saying, well, hold on. Let’s stop having a conversation about major now, what is your purpose? What is your value add?

Let’s start there. What is this big idea that you have on what your value add is to society and let’s move into that space. We can then utilize technology to help us shape this conversation about how we’re having curricular experiences that essentially allow students to begin with a broad idea in mind, yet over time as they reach deeper senses of enlightenment, now we can refine the academic pathway towards their transferability or four-year pathway.

We now have a new means and a new end. And then also you can never forget the reality that there may not be someone in the household they have ever had this conversation with them. And that becomes your responsibility how to get on the pathway.

All these various systems that we use in terms of student support to stay on the pathway. You heard me talk about earlier student belonging. Interactions, co-curricular transcripts, creating the experiences outside the classrooms to reinforce what’s happening in the classroom or to further define or refine for the student what their academic pathway should be.

I’ll never forget I took a group of students that told me, this is when I was a director of student life, a group of students that told me that they wanted to work in health care. So I bussed a whole group of students over to the medical center. And I remember they started showing the surgery and some of them saw blood for the first time.

Some of my students passed out, I had to pick them up off the floor, put them back on the bus and say, you know what? Health care might not be for you. Let’s find that pathway that’s going to be for you because if you’re passing out at the sight of the blood, being a nurse may not be it.

But this was their first interaction. They had this idea, I had to put the co-curricular experience in place for them. You can utilize various technologies to be able to expose your students to some of the things that they’ve never been exposed to. That way they can further refine and say, Oh, that’s for me, or, man, I’m really falling in love with this because of this experience that I had.

These technologies that you can use to be able to bridge the mentorship gap for some of your students who need mentorship and ensuring that the students are learning and learning in a way that is relevant, speaks to who they are. I’m telling you right now, if your textbook still has a picture of somebody in bell-bottoms, chances are it may not be relevant. Or until bell-bottoms becomes a thing again.

But my point is that, we’ve really got to take a look at some of these images, these videos, this curriculum that we’re using and let’s refresh it. Let’s integrate more technologies into this space to ensure the relevance. This is where we then get into meeting the heart of who the student is, who the individual is. That way we can resonate with them and then from there we can take them on an entire journey of learning and transformation. But don’t forget the sense of relevance.

Certainly, at the base of that as you see down there, holistic student supports, belonging, identity.

For me community college was transformative. I tested at developmental levels, I failed developmental math.

I really was one of those students that at one point in time I was told, well, college may not be for you. Let’s talk about something else.

It was at work study jobs at my community college that I began to receive mentorship in a way that where I had never received mentorship before that the light bulb began to turn on and I began to have a deeper sense of belonging. And then I felt that I was a part of something bigger than me. That the magic of transformation happened for me. And that became my thing, and that’s where I ended up becoming an educator.

Each and every one of you all, you’re educator for some reason. Never lose sense of what that is.

Let that drive you. Maybe you’ve got to write that down on a post-it note and put it on a window one day, on your mirrors one as you’re getting ready.

We all have our hardships, the challenges that we’re facing economically, from a society standpoint. All these things that can bring about anxiety and fear and concern in our hearts, but we should never lose sense of why we decide to become an educator. Because it is that thing that drives us every day to be a part of the change.

Last thing I’ll leave you with here, embrace the disruption of higher education.

Lean forward toward student centeredness.

Don’t be fearful about the disruption in higher education. You have to lean forward.

Technology is one of those things that can truly bring about a new transformation in your students success metrics at your respective institutions. But it has to be done with intentionality, you heard me talk about this.

Disruption has occurred in so many industries. Think about transportation. Think about shopping.

Shopping, storefronts are closing. I don’t know about in your communities, but certainly here storefronts are closing at drastic rates because folks are shopping online now.

So think about the e-commerce movement, think about transportation, think about energy. The shifts in energy, I’ll never forget here in the United States this had to have been early 2000s, late ’90s when they deregulated energy.

Big conversations, but it created this entire different movement and how we look at energy.

Disruptions.

Housing market, hotel spaces, Airbnb compared to your respective hotels.

Disruption is fully engaged here in higher education, which means now more than ever we have a responsibility as educators to embrace these disruptions and to pursue new relevance. And we have to be there at the table to drive these conversations.

Lean forward, keep students at the center.

Keep them at the center. Who are they? How am I serving them? How am I ensuring their success? Have I created barriers that I didn’t realize I was creating? Am I allowing the narrative that my institution to be driven by what keeps educators comfortable but it creates barriers for students?

We’ve got to change it. We’ve got to change it. It shouldn’t then be us that’s driving the narrative, it should be our students that are driving the narrative. What do they need? Keep them at the center of the work that you’re doing.

I have greatly enjoyed my time with you. I hope that I have continued interactions and engagements with you. This is my website, this is how–

I’m on Twitter everyday, Instagram, Facebook, you name it. If you want to look at some of the videos I’ve done, if you want to look at some of the publishings I’ve made, it’s all there and you can get a sense for how we can stay in contact with one another.

Thank you all so much for your time. Gloria, thank you so much for this opportunity. Josh, I’ve enjoyed being here with you all on today. And so grateful for this time. Thank you all so much.

Thank you, Dr. Brownlee. Thank you so much. I have to share a quick impression as I heard you speak and the clarity with which you’re making these points. The vision that you have from my perspective, from what I can gather comes from that moment that you probably take regularly every day, multiple times a day where you think deeply and even ponder about the individual learner and your faculty and what it means to be able to be and participate in a high quality experience that’s equitable.

Thank you again so much for being here. We love it. We sure appreciate your participation here with us.

Well, we hope you’ve enjoyed this conference. If you like to revisit Dr. Brownlee’s keynote, look for an email from us by the end of April with a link to watch all reaction sessions. Everything that’s been available, on demand.

Later today we’ll be asking everyone who attended reaction to share your experiences in a post event survey and you’ll get to receive that by email as well. Please feel free to fill that out and be as thoughtful as you can. We always want to be improving. The feedback you give us we’ll help us improve obviously for years to come.

From all of us here GoReact, we hope this event provided an opportunity for you to connect with colleagues to learn and perhaps to think a little differently, and even creatively about how video and feedback continue and will continue to transform education.

Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for being here. We look forward to seeing you next year. Take care.