In this episode we have a special group with us from the Sturm Collaboration Campus in Castle Rock, Colorado: Jill Garber, the Director of the CSU Collaboration Campuses; Dr. Stephanie Fuji, the President of Arapahoe Community College; and Danny Winsor, the Assistant Superintendent of Douglas County Schools. We explore the Big Blur and how they have brought individuals, partners, and education institutions together to do what's best for students.
Some Questions I Ask:
In This Episode, You Will Learn:
Quotes:
“If you truly, truly want to blur the lines between K through 12, post-secondary education, and the world of work, you have to have partnerships in which folks are willing to do work that's messy.”
“It's important to seek the input of industry, involve them in the process, and have relationships with them … and to also have wraparound services for students — things like advising, career counseling, and especially transfer admissions. Our internal minutiae can make it weird for students sometimes and impact their success.”
Stay in touch with:
D. Winsor:
Douglas County School District
Dr. Fujii:
Arapahoe Community College
J. Garber:
Colorado State University
Email
Resources Mentioned:
The 74 Million Survey
Stay in touch with Sarah Williamson:
Free Case Study Guide
SWPR GROUP Website
LinkedIn
Stay in touch with Chad Bolser:
LinkedIn
About "The Secret to Transformational Leadership," which Sarah co-authored with Dr. Quintin Shepherd:
Transformational Leadership Secret website
Purchase the print or ebook
In this episode we have a special group with us from the Sturm Collaboration Campus in Castle Rock, Colorado: Jill Garber, the Director of the CSU Collaboration Campuses; Dr. Stephanie Fuji, the President of Arapahoe Community College; and Danny Winsor, the Assistant Superintendent of Douglas County Schools. We explore the Big Blur and how they have brought individuals, partners, and education institutions together to do what's best for students.
Some Questions I Ask:
In This Episode, You Will Learn:
Quotes:
“If you truly, truly want to blur the lines between K through 12, post-secondary education, and the world of work, you have to have partnerships in which folks are willing to do work that's messy.”
“It's important to seek the input of industry, involve them in the process, and have relationships with them … and to also have wraparound services for students — things like advising, career counseling, and especially transfer admissions. Our internal minutiae can make it weird for students sometimes and impact their success.”
Stay in touch with:
D. Winsor:
Douglas County School District
Dr. Fujii:
Arapahoe Community College
J. Garber:
Colorado State University
Email
Resources Mentioned:
The 74 Million Survey
Stay in touch with Sarah Williamson:
Free Case Study Guide
SWPR GROUP Website
LinkedIn
Stay in touch with Chad Bolser:
LinkedIn
About "The Secret to Transformational Leadership," which Sarah co-authored with Dr. Quintin Shepherd:
Transformational Leadership Secret website
Purchase the print or ebook
Hello and Welcome to Build Momentum, a Podcast where we explore thought leadership and education. I'm Sarah Williamson, the founder of SW PR group.
Chad Bolser:And I'm Chad Bolser, Chancellor Ivy Tech Community College in Richmond, Indiana. This season, we will launch a series exploring global workforce development and K 12 school districts and the leaders who are bringing this work to light.
Sarah Williamson:We hear from CTE directors, superintendents and thought leaders on the topic of workforce development, how it shifted throughout the last several years, who is employing strategies that are making an impact and how they're sharing those stories with the broader education community. We explore how to leverage key partners, your constituents and the media to authentically impact your organization and the leaders who champion them. We can't wait to get started. So let's dive in. And today's episode, we have a special group with us from the stem collaboration campus in Castle Rock, Colorado. We have Jill Garber, the Director of the CSU center at the SAM collaboration campus, Dr. Stephanie Fujii, the president of Arapahoe Community College, and Danny Windsor, the Assistant Superintendent of Douglas County Schools, but so wonderful to have you all with us today. Welcome.
Jill Garber:Thank you.
Danny Winsor:Thank you.
Sarah Williamson:Jill since we approached you about the interview. First, I would love to just talk with you about how this initiative and collaboration came together and how you're able to make this a reality for students in Castle Rock. Tell us more about it.
Jill Garber:Sure, context is always helpful, right? Really, I think a lot of credit goes to the community where the the campus is nested in, we have great community leaders who had a really strong vision. And I think that was really centered around creating a local talent pipeline in this community, the ability to attract primary employers, and to kind of become more of a standalone community. At the time we started discussions, around 80% of our residents collected a paycheck outside of the town limits. And so I really think they had a vision. ACC was already a partner in the community, obviously, the school district was and so you know, ACC was approached of like, hey, you know, would you like to make a more permanent footprint here, Dr. Fujii, you can talk more about that too, if you want to later, but really, you know, expanding that presence and becoming the main operator of the building. And then the school district and CSU were kind of invited along to the party, so to speak. So we came together under the building that ACC is built, or co located. I think that's an important element to our work that that we're all under one roof trying to do the thing. And then really looking at from a CSU perspective, how do we come to the party with the last two years of degree completion? And how do we build those pathways from the high school into the community college and then CSU in a very intentional way that I think was an is co-created with our community and industry partners that are here.
Chad Bolser:Well, it's great to meet all of you on the call today. And but my first question is for Danny, I, I'd love to understand the problem that you were looking to solve when you embarked on this partnership. And how have you seen the K 12 Public private partnerships and engagement evolve over the past few years?
Danny Winsor:, I appreciate the question, Chad and Sir, thanks for having us on. We appreciate it. You know, I think a big part that we really wanted to begin engaging was really not necessarily looking at the problem. But really looking at the opportunity to be quite honest with you. I think there are a lot of opportunities, I think when we think about developing communities, school districts, and really be quite honestly, how do we really talk about Douglas County as a whole, and really all the stakeholders that are involved in developing the economic development, I think of that community and the investment and really, probably our greatest asset that we have and greatest resource, and that's our students in our system. And so really what we wanted to spend a significant time on and we started looking about partnerships is how did we make sure that we weren't just graduating students, we're very fortunate to have one of the highest if not the highest graduation rates that we have in the state of Colorado. However, our success can't just be measured by graduation rates, it really had to be about investing students success not only within the K 12 system, but really when they left us and a big part in Douglas County, which I think is fairly unique is about 70% of our kids, when they leave us actually returned to Douglas County. And so when we really started thinking about the investment in Douglas County, when we invested in our students, it was a reinvestment, the economic development of Douglas County as well. And so that partnership for us was really how do we make sure that one, we're really partnered, I think, with our industry partners with higher education to say, Hey, what is really needed for our students to be successful and successful can't just be that they applied and they're going to college. So that idea of material can't matriculation and persistency, they have students that are successfully matriculating from year one, year two, etc, as well as entering the industry field was something we really wanted to spend time on. And so how did we start that journey? A whole lot? Earlier, we knew students when they had had off to four years schools we have about 80% of our kids head off to the four year schools in Douglas County was it wasn't just about sending them it was again that persistency. And when you start seeing students change majors from three to nine times, and the money that's attached to that depart for us is how do we do our part of starting that journey earlier, allowing our students to access pathways and really to be quite honest, we find a way to tap into their passion at a much earlier age, rather than sending them off and saying, Gosh, we hope you're going to be successful. We wanted to make sure hope wasn't our plan. But our plan was really about having a strategic process of developing stackable pathways for students to explore passions from a variety of areas, and really having folks like Jill and Stephanie, who really were willing to really break down those barriers. So one thing I've really appreciated with both Jill and Stephanie is is we didn't live in the confines sometimes that were before us. It was really around how do we create new pathways and open up the community college system for our students to access pathway programming. So it's developing industry credentialing, transcripted credit, and we really had a chance to see a significant growth in Douglas County as a matter of fact, about five years ago bit students saving about $1.3 $1.4 million in concurrent enrollment credit to now this year, we're projected to be well over $6 million for our students. And so we've seen significant growth, we had 48,000 student requests and current technical education, and concurrent enrollment in our system, which is huge, and a lot that has to do with is with articulated pathways and partnerships. And so it takes great folks like our elected officials or community partners, and really with our higher education partners willing to articulate that K 12. Higher Ed blur that experience, I think, for our students when it comes to higher ed side of things as well.
Sarah Williamson:That's so impressive, Danny Yes, speaking of the big blur, Dr. Fujii, I would love to talk with you more about that we just had the pleasure of having Joe Vargas on our podcast from Jobs for the Future, talking about the big blur. And I'd love to hear from you how that looks in action.
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:So one of things that I think is interesting is a lot of people like to talk about the big blur, but doing the big blur is hard. And so part of if you truly, truly want to blur the lines between you know, K through 12, post secondary education, the world of work, what that means is you have to have partnerships in which folks are willing to do work that's messy, you know, and what I mean by that is we tend to be very siloed. In education, I would offer up particularly in higher education, I think we're very traditional, Danny can speak to the degrees in which K through 12. But I've worked in this field for a long, long time. And the challenge of partnership is because everybody wants to keep doing what they do. When you talk about big blur. What that means is bringing individuals, bringing partners, bringing NTC's together to say, Let's blow it up and do what is in the best interest of our learners, not what's in the best interest for the institution. But what's in the best interest for our learners. And so what I find really exciting about what we are doing, particularly at the STURM collaboration campus is that was intentionally designed to be a collaboration campus. And that means from the very, very beginning, we knew we needed and wanted to have Douglas County School District be not just a tenant in the building, but we wanted them to be a partner in the building and helping us to define the work to think about the space, to think about and to invest in the outcomes. Same things with Colorado State University, we wanted them to be a partner with us. And so therefore, that means we all come together and being very intentional and building the pipeline that is going to best serve our learners, our community members, we've also invited and we also house in the STURM collaboration campus, our local community workforce board, because again, they're integral partners in terms of helping us to identify how can we best improve the social and economic mobility for our community members, we have the Small Business Development Center housed at the STURM collaboration campus. So talking about the Big Blur is very aspirational, to actualize it in space. That means sometimes we all have to get together and talk about well, what's happening here, what's happening here, who's doing this, who's doing that, it requires a significant investment and time and energy yet to really do it and do it well is an incredible thing because you see what happens for our students. So you're able to see students that move smoothly, they're not having to jump through the unnecessary hoops that we create an education for someone that graduate from high school to apply and be admitted to the community college, to apply and be admitted to the university, to go out into the job of work. If we can blend all of that together, which requires some extra work and energy on us as partners but what we find is the outcomes are better for our students. And so to actually make that happen, that's what I really am so very proud of and that would not have actualized if we didn't have Douglas County School District so intentionally invest, Colorado State so intentionally invest and then what is amazing, we have the STURM collaboration campus but I'm gonna do a shout out to Dallas County School District and their legacy campus. There is a legacy Career and Technical educational campus. And what what they did is when they built that campus, they once again, invited partnerships. So it's not an afterthought like, oh, yeah, we probably should have this CPE credit, it was a matter of saying, what are we going to do right here right now. And so when we think about the future, at our Castle Rock Campus, we want to bring again, what are the entities that have been such exceptional partners like Colorado State, like Douglas County School District, so that we can continue to blur those lines even more, and then being able to work with business and industry, we've done that really well with our cybersecurity program with Colorado State University, and with a number of business and industry companies. So our students are able to graduate, they have the high school diploma, they inaudible. They're on their way with the baccalaureate and they're working, you know, for Lockheed Martin. That's what happened. And so that's what's really exciting to be a part to not just to talk about how cool this would be. But to see it in action is an amazing and rewarding experience as well.
Chad Bolser:Dr. Fujii, you are speaking our language here on this podcast. And I know that there will be so many folks listening to this that will want to replicate that. And so that leads me to my next question, Danny, how do you think other K 12 school districts and regions can reimagine their strategic, higher education, institutional partnerships with industry employers in a way that translates to relevant experience for students? And how have these stackable pathways lead to impactful results for your community?
Danny Winsor:Yeah, great question. I mean, as you can see, I'm incredibly lucky to get to partner with some incredible leaders that are on this call. And there's a touch of passion as you can hear about this work. And so you know, something that I think I've lived by I think, as an educational leader is really around the statement is your systems are perfectly in alignment with the results that you're getting. And I think a lot about that idea that our systems can't be in conflict with the outcomes that we want. And what we've been able to do to have larger entities such as Rapids Community College, Colorado, state, Douglas County Schools, really to have intentionally aligned outcomes that really are around at the benefits of students and really at the benefit of our community is something we really wanted to spend a specific amount of time. And that's why I think the collaboration campus really became something that was, as you heard from Jill was really spouted out from our economic development team and really having a leader such as Arapahoe Community College, come to the plate and take the risk. And I think a lot of times when you talk about great things, risk is usually involved. And I think what for us is we can very much play it safe and utilize traditional models of just simply, you know, stamping out students, but that was not who we are as Douglas County. It's not who we are Arapahoe Community College at Colorado State. It's about trying to find ways to make sure what we're trying to work towards that we had systems that were in alignment with that. And so I think a big part about reimagining is one being very clear about what our outcomes are. And our outcomes need to be about the impact on the student and the impact on the community about how do we develop that talent pipeline for our students to have articulate pathways to feel success, there's nothing better when you see a student that is socially emotionally confident and feel like they can do anything, everything with currency around transcripted credit, industry credentialing, terminal degrees that really allow them to then have access to opportunities and hope. And I think that was the part that we wanted to spend time on is how did we make sure that was living and breathing within our systems, and really making sure that when a student entered Douglas County Schools, they knew what those pathways look like. And then we partnered and utilized Colorado talent pipeline reports to say, what is the industry needing from us? This wasn't about the school district defining that this is what we think is best for you. But having higher ed the talent, the EDCs talent pipeline reports to inform us about what those needs are. And then how do we make sure we develop pathways that students can start, you know, as early as ninth grade, but to be quite honest, it starts in middle school about students finding their passions and about finance it gosh, is this available to me and looking at Douglas County School District are about 855 square miles as a district. And so when you think about that's about two thirds the size of Rhode Island, and so it's a pretty big school district, to say the least. And so for us, how did we make sure that a student's passion was going to be limited based off what zip code they were in, and we wanted to make sure no matter where you're at that a student had access to stackable pathways that led to very clear entry points here at the legacy campus which Dr. Fujii talked about as we wanted to make sure that higher ed's we're very fortunate to have Douglas County School District, Arapahoe Community College, University of Colorado are all partners in this process. And then having our CSU partners and ACC collaboration campus having higher ed K 12 industry living in the same facilities and we've had a chance to see students access pathways and one of the parts that we had to do as a system and as we talked about hard things we had to do. We've been talking for 1718 years about aligning Bell schedules the way She'll probably feel me Twitch a little bit, I think get a system of getting high schools, the line Bell schedules to create access to programming no matter where you're at. And knowing that, you know, when you talk about public education funding, it's been a challenge for us. And so how did we leverage systems to not take away program because we didn't have funding to do that. And so we have over 2000 students accessing CTE dual enrollment, CTE programs, across just our high schools. And that's not even inclusive of STURM collaboration, campus or legacy. And that was really due to aligning and creating access to those programs. We'll have over 600 students accessing our legacy campus, we'll have over a couple 100 students who are going to be accessing our Sturm collaboration, campus and pathways like CNA, and aviation, building controls, mechatronics, etc, that our students are walking away. And we have advisory partners that are sitting at the table ready to hire our kids and develop apprenticeships, pre apprenticeships, work based learning experiences for them to enter the field, be credentialed to have those experiences, continue their higher education as needed, or maybe even have the industry pay for their higher education experience at the same time. And so to reinvent and re establish what this should be about, it's got to first start with are your systems and align with your outcomes? And do you have clear outcomes that there's a commitment amongst multiple entities to achieve but it takes great leaders who are willing to do this, and this is where I really want to lean into. Stephanie has been an incredible leader in this particular process with the community college system has really led this work at a really high level, Jill, and I have been a part of this conversation, I won't give it away. But a really long time will say in partnering in some of this work as well. But it takes people willing to step outside themselves in their system to think about the betterment of students, and the willingness to take the other foot to two feet out there to align their systems as well, to allow those things to happen.
Sarah Williamson:So incredible what you've built. Thank you for sharing that. I appreciate that. And I love that you touched on the funding aspect. Because I think a lot of times people think, well, we don't have the funding, and you created solutions for that. So very impressive. So Jill, I'd love to ask how are you seeing the rise of work based programs at STURM lead to future work experiences in internships in the field? And do you have advice for other higher ed Institutes that are looking to implement similar programs?
Jill Garber:You know, I think one thing I might have mentioned earlier, I know my colleagues have on this call. But I would say that work based learning is just kind of a pillar of the canvas here something that we committed to from the very getgo, something that we thought would fulfill the mission and the outcomes of our community and our partners, but also something that we felt kind of set us apart. What makes us different, what is different about what we're doing here? So there's intentionality around that. And yes, there's a lot of growth in that to kind of backup. I mean, we're just kind of getting started, the building just opened in 2019. So I don't want to sit here in these conversations and sound like we've got the playbook for that. Because I think it's a work in progress. I don't think it's something where we all kind of sit here and go, Oh, you know, we've arrived at our destination. And we don't have any more obstacles or outcomes before us when we do so. But some advice, a couple of things stand out to me to kind of build upon what Stephanie and Danny have said, I think relationships are really important in this work. And so when you're talking about work based learning opportunities for our students, that's about identifying industry needs. We did that before the building was even built. So we did a lot of work. In particular, ACC did focus groups. And we talked with industry and worked with our EDC partners to determine what are the pathways were the buckets we're looking to fill. My joke is, you know, we're not offering you know, underwater basket weaving hear that. So we weren't doing like this push strategy on our community, we were listening from the get go. And we co created and defined those programs with our partners. So I think it's important to seek the input of industry, involve them in the process, and have relationships with them not just something that you sign that ends up going in a drawer like yes, we'll do an internship. I think it's important to also have wraparound services for students and things like advising, career counseling, especially transfer admissions, that some of our internal minutiae that can kind of make it weird for students sometimes and impact their success. And then I think lastly, in addition to relationships, I see the devil in the details and a lot of this stuff. And so, you know, one of them, like Danny pointed out quite a bell schedule sounds like really simple, but it's not. One of the things that we did, I mean, you know, coffee conversation, right? And people hear that and they're like, Oh, that's so simple. Oh, no, it's like moving them out. And one of the things that we did that I think is so simple is at CSU. We aligned our scheduling of classes right behind ACC. So our cybersecurity program, ACC offers those classes on Tuesday and Thursday. CSU falls in line with that and it's just a simple thing, but it allows a student to continue in their path of work, okay? They don't have to guess what their schedule is going to be. They don't have to guess with their employer, what days they can work. And that's something that, you know, a little detail, but we've really, you know, committed to that. And I think it's showing success. And then I think also making mindful connections for students with these opportunities. You know, back in my day, it was like, Sure, you can do an internship, go find one. Yeah. And it's like, wait a minute, you know, I don't have a lot of connections, I don't even know where to begin. And so I think that is another detail that comes again, with those really good staff members and employees who are committed to making sure that students are connected in that way. Yeah. And so I think that's all I would say about that one.
Chad Bolser:Dr. Fujii, it's awesome to hear folks talk about community college and community college work, and the really great things you're doing. And I think from being around leaders who think like this and have that sort of impact, they're always thinking about the future. So I'm gonna ask you a two part question here. One is just between you and I, the community college folks, nobody else is listening, because this will not be a difficult one at all. And the second is about the future. So how do you think we can reimagine higher education so that it's not a private good, but a public good? And then what's next for STURM 2.0? And what are your plans, but that philosophic question about how can we reimagine higher education that's just between you and I?
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:So one of the things that I think is interesting when we hear all this narrative around how folks are losing faith in higher education, I would offer, folks are not losing faith and learning, but they're losing faith in our ability to articulate on what is the yield. And so students and learners spend a lot of time and energy going to school for what purpose. And so that's what I think is folks don't understand. And I would offer this up, we're Community College. Community is my middle name, I have no desire to move it, we offer Baccalaureate degrees, we do lots of projects. But I take great pride in being the community's college because that's where I'm held accountable to. So all the work that Jill just described, CSU also recognizes their involvement, their engagement with the community. Douglas County School District recognizes how important the community is, because we all see ourselves, our success, our viability, our sustainability, is dependent upon our ability, and to actually deliver on the outcomes that the community needs. And so part of what I think is interesting is people don't understand all the work that Jill, did they understand all the work that Danny did. They don't understand all the work we did. So part of what I would offer up is that we need to actively engage in challenging the narrative, in the sense that it's a shift. It's not about is it a public good is a private good? My question is, do you want to see your community more economically viable? Do you want to see your community have greater social and economic mobility? Because if you say yes, and I tell you, I could deliver on that, in partnership with all these other great educational institutions, and business and industry is collaborate with them. Why would you say no? So I guess part of what I think when we talk about reimagining blow it up. Now, people don't like it when I say that, but if it's just between you and me, Chad, blow it up. Because if we allow ourselves to be continued to be defined by our current circumstances, we just keep doing the same thing. Remember before COVID, Oh, you can't teach chemistry online? Oh, no, you can't teach English composition in, you know, eight weeks? Oh, guess what, we now know inaudible. You know. And so part of what I think it is, is it's not about recovery. It's about transformation. So I'm going to offer up, let's blow it up. Let's focus on outcomes. Because that's a good thing. People want outcomes, you know, and so we always have continuous work to be able to do in that one. So that's the way I would offer that question. But when I blow it up, and I'll finish this up, I blow it up with really smart people who are invested who are gonna spend the time energy. So that's why my school district, you know, my good colleague, Danny is here, my good friend, Jill is here. You know, we invite business industry where we want them engage with us at the very beginning, because blowing it up is not as it's defined by me, but defined by what's in the best interest for the community, as measured by social and economic mobility. I can't be everything to everyone. Neither can the school district, neither can the university. So we really need to focus but that's the way I would recommend that we go off that run when I think about STURM 2, and what we want to be able to build out there. We want to be able to replicate the good work that's happened At STURM, our first building, but we're really looking at, you know, there's a huge need in our state for aerospace. And what does that mean? And what does that look like? Because industry tells us it's not just engineering. There's a whole other space. So then we start with, we started playing around to the idea, we invited Douglas County to come early in and start thinking about what does this mean business and industry? What does it mean, Colorado State University is an incredible partner for us. We want to continue to be able to build upon that. And so again, it'll be continuing to say what does business and industry telling us what they need? Right now, it's really looking at aerospace, because we don't have I would offer up in the state of Colorado is strong pipeline to meet that business and industry needs. I'm very confident that when I think about the folks that I've worked so well with and the college has worked so well with, in our building of the collaboration campus, we would want to be able to replicate that, you know, we already has, as Jill mentioned, the importance of the relationships, Danny talked about the importance of leadership, if I already have my secret sauce there. And I'm very confident we can have that with business and industry, because they've demonstrated that. Our legislators are incredibly supportive. They want to invest in our work. The community wants to invest in this work. So I really think that we will continue to build upon that also really looking at how do students learn now? Not how did I learn a bazillion years ago when I was in school because that's not the same. And so I would say, what is Douglas County learning? What is Colorado State learning? How can we all build upon that and leverage collective resources? Because we know technology is a great way to go. Apprenticeship is wonderful. However, it's a very difficult model. Business Industry loves it, but it comes at a price tag. So how do we incentivize that non credit business industry loves non credit, however, I don't get paid for non credit, you know, non credit is right now kind of volunteer that I know, I can't say we're not going to do it, because it's not financially sustainable model. But if I visit with my partners, if I visit with business during my visit with community, we can really think about how do we continue to build upon work based learning, because we know that's what works. We know focusing on outcomes. We know that works. We know corded schedules, we know that works. 80% of my students attend part time I have a large percentage of CTE students, why would I not just build upon that. And so those are some of the ideas that we're playing around with, and really wanting that space, to continue to be a site for Castle Rock, to be able to come and participate and engage for other entities, nonprofits to also be able to come and engage. And so we're really excited thinking about what might be possible and what we might be able to collectively build and continue to blur the lines on.
Chad Bolser:I know that when Sarah put that question down, and it was for me, and as soon as this recording started, I knew I was gonna have to get my notebook out and start writing down quotes that I promised that I will use probably tomorrow. That was awesome.
Sarah Williamson:It was incredible. But I also want to say, Danny, I do think I got that question from your response to the JFS video, and you know, I did, because you mentioned that. So I want to give you credit for that you actually were the impetus for that question. So thank you, Danny. But that was incredible. Here's my question to all of you, Danny, Jill and Dr. Fujii, how are you sharing this incredible venture that you've gone on together? I'd love to know how other communities can learn about it, how you're elevating the thought leadership of the people behind this, obviously, this podcast was created for thought leadership and education. I do PR, so I'm very interested to understand how you've done been able to share this.
Jill Garber:I'll go really quick. I'll give you just a couple of really quick examples. Sarah, one of them. I think that has kind of spread out. We're learning best practices in the work that we do here. And one of the things that CSU and the Board of Governors have been mindful of is the attention that's needed and some of our rural parts of Colorado. And so we're really taking those best practices out to some of our more rural community colleges and starting partnership with them and having conversations and that's, you know, really allowing us to deliver on our land grant mission that we have for the state of Colorado. But those things that we've learned from ACC and from Douglas County, we're able to now go to other people and say, Sure, I mean, like let's do this. And our partners have been really open about that. I think the second Quick example is what CSU Pueblo is doing in partnership with Pikes Peak State College and Colorado Springs where they've literally replicated this model. They have classrooms, they're they're co located, they moved out of a space that they had in Colorado Springs and said no, let's have a party together and let's make this happened and the majority of those best practices are really coming around what we have learned that STURMS. So I think it's one thing to like, tell people about what you're doing. But I think it's another thing to really share your best practices. And when they made that move with Pikes Peak, ACC came to the table and said, Here's what we did on our end. I mean, what a great partner, you know, so they're elevating the system and saying, This is how we did this with the CSU. And again, we're happy to air our dirty laundry too, and say, oh, goodness, don't do this, or geez, do that, you know. And so those are just a couple examples that come to mind for me about sharing the work and trying to help other people get there and just elevate all the boats that wants.
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:I can jump in real fast is that I think partly we have hosted a number of organizations entities throughout nationally, enter STURM collaboration Canvas, we invite folks come on and check us out, you know, when Jobs for the Future was a win, we were able to host them on our STURMcollaboration campus. You know, Danny and Douglas Kenny came Jill and CSU was there, you know, we always value and are honored to be able to host and like Jill said, share the dirty laundry, because it's messy, you know, it's very is trying to do a joint application, oh, my gosh, you would have thought that Admissions and Records people lost their mind, you know. And so we tried to do quite a bit of that work trying to be able to share nationally about how to be able to do that. But then also, again, a lot of the best practices that are happening at STURM, it's bringing it back to my little tin campus, which is a little bit of a larger campus. And that's the traditional campus, that's the campus has been here for 58 years, you know, and so it's much easier to start when it's brand new. But when you're trying to shift the ship, on a more traditional institution, it's a bit challenging. But I'm very encouraged. And what's exciting is that we have a different school district at the Littleton campus, but they're very excited, because the school districts play together really, really well. And they're like, Oh, we want to be able to do this. Can we work with you on this and that, and that's a really special community, I think for where we all are, and the South Denver Metro area. It's a very, very special community that is more invested in collaboration than in competition, and really leveraging what our limited resources. And so I think, for us wanting be able to share as much as we can, I would venture said we probably could do some writing and some publications and things like that. But we're running around doing the work. So that creates a little harder right now. But I think trying to replicate best practices, trying to share with others anytime place we can but like I said, anybody wants to come visit us in STURM, please feel free. And my partners are really good about joining, you know, they come all I got to do is give them a little cup coffee, and they're very, very good. And so we love hosting folks and being able to share.
Danny Winsor:Yeah, couldn't agree more with Jill. And definitely, I think, you know, a big part when I think about getting messaging out, it really comes down to is I sure hope our students are the ones that are helping us get the message out and knowing that they're being successful. Those success stories of students getting articulated pathways jumping into industry, seeing them immediately feel success, because they felt like they had ownership in their experience. And I think you get a student to own their experience, the likelihood of them being successful looks 90 Different if you set up a really articulated pathway for them to feel successful. We know though, that ability for students to feel success starts with the amazing work of what our teachers are doing what our counselors are doing what our principals are doing. Our Navigators are doing excetera to make sure students are aware of what this work is, we want to make sure we're building complementary pathways. This isn't about trying to take away opportunities from certain schools, certain programs, but this is about developing culinary pathways that really doesn't become a battle for dollars battle for students. This is really about articulating building off the strong foundations. We know, we're very proud of the district to be the highest performing academic school district in Denver Metro area. And that came off the amazing work of our teachers. And we know that is because our students own it. We have incredible families that partner with us in this particular work. And so that messaging in my opinion, I sure hope is getting out from our students. We also know that we want to make sure that we're doing a great job of partnering with other districts, I think, as Stephanie said is, you know, from a community college system to school district side of things to higher ed is we do want to partner and share those best practices because we know for the greater good if we can help our students have that success. We're invested in that we know we've learned of rents from our neighboring school district RAS have done some great work around this and are willing to share and we want to make sure we're doing the same thing. We also know we want to make sure we're getting out there and national level we've had a chance to build present at a fairly and some different events as well at a regional and national level to be able to share some of the articulated base work that we're doing. But we really want to make sure that we're spending that time to really dedicate ourselves to make sure our students are feeling the success more than anything and I think that is really I think what our hope is, is our students are the best storytellers of their experience, how do we make sure we provide the experience, so when they're telling their story, they're gonna have this feeling of like, I did this, I created my future. And I want to reinvest back in my community
Chad Bolser:That is so good. And appreciate your answers all of your answers on this, this is another question for all of you. What are you most hopeful when you consider the future of work for our students?
Jill Garber:You know, I think just simply stated, for me, I'm excited about lifelong learning. I think, you know, something that I see changing is that, again, it's not this destination where you get this piece of paper and you're done. I mean, our students are going to have to be resilient, they're going to have to pivot, they're going to have to change. But I think that's exciting. And so I think it's not just always going to be about a degree or credential, I think it's going to be a variety of things. And it's going to be something that is, that remains a big part of our lives, and not just something where, oh, we got here, and we're done. And so I think lifelong learning is going to be something that's exciting to watch for this generation of students.
Danny Winsor:You know, I think about kind of the work side of things, I think, in the sense of what we're preparing our kids for. I mean, I really do think the old narrative around getting kids to graduate and head off into work that we had, that was our definition of success. And when kids graduated, what success was from high school and college, that was the only means of defining success. I think one of the challenges that we have ahead of us around understanding this idea of world of work is really understanding that what do our families define as success? What do our schools define as success? What is higher ed define as success? What is industry defining success, and having some messaging that a student doesn't feel less than in wherever they lend up? And I think a lot of times whether it was from a community college system, saying if students set a, you know, at a graduation ceremony or or a ceremony they have at their high school, saying, I'm going to the community college like that is a huge opportunity, when you think about changing legislation around a sense and tapping into things that are so vitally important for our students to have a leg up for their future. I mean, when we think about national student debt rates being at 1.5 to $1.8 trillion, why are we not spending the time to make sure that we're talking about the successful pathways each student can take? And I think the biggest time is we talk about all students, I'd love to change that narratives as each student because each student has their own journey. How do we make sure when we define success for them, that may be community college that may be four year that may be workforce, but we want to make sure there's credential is certified to have success and see a future in pathway for themselves? And that is one of the most important things that we can do is how do we start that journey from day one? And how do we know our students, I can tell you from the 62,000 students we have here in Douglas County, we are committed to know each and every one of those students by guarantee Stephanie knows the exact same way. That's what it feels like at Arapahoe Community College. Same thing with CSU is we want to know our students and have individual conversations with them and set them up their journey to be successful. That idea of what workforce is that means we need to partner with our higher ed with industry, etc, to make sure that we're providing those on ramps and off ramps for kids to have access to those programming. And how do we make sure that doesn't stop, or at least start in my opinion, when you hand the diploma, it's got to be starting Much, much early in that process. And I think that's what I've appreciated so much about this partnership is there's an accountability we have to each and every one of our students, because we want to make sure their success isn't justice doesn't stop when they turn 18 and graduate from Douglas County Schools is we want to make sure their success that promise starts when they're four or five years old, when they enter this system to make sure they know they're going to be known, seen, valued and found in our system, and they're going to be successful as they move forward.
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:I think it's interesting, we think about what is the world of work going to meet mean for the generations to come. And so I think back to my own experience, you know, my family immigrated here, you know, it was very, you worked. So then you would be able to live, you know, and what is interesting, and what then happening is then you are living to work. You know, we spend so much time at work. And I look at my children who graduated from college, both of them one went to the community college, one went straight to the university. And both of them are already while my daughter graduated and doesn't didn't know what kind of career she wanted. So she's going to explore, you know, and so she's working to get figured out. My son graduated, went medially and to being a teacher, and he's not sure if that's what he wants to do. They this next generation folks are changing careers more often. However, I think what we have an opportunity to do is when we talk about focusing on outcomes when we're talking about credentialing and completion, folks think we're talking all about CTE and then they'll say we don't care about the liberal arts Nananananana. It's not one or the other. It's contextualizing and so the article that Sarah shared with us, it's about relevancy. Its relevancy. Students don't want to take college ads, because they're like, When am I ever going to use this? I'm like, well, at some point, you're gonna have to figure out some math. And this is talking about teaching you how to think through problem solving, to critically analyze, to be able to understand it, you have options. But if you don't know how to think things through, we think about technology, we think about AI, is this gonna replace jobs? No, but if you don't know how to use it, your job will be replaced by somebody who does know how to use it. So that's kind of a reframing in terms of what the world of work and and what learning is going to look like for our students. So it's not either or, but it's being intentional. It's being purposeful. It's saying, We want you to be able to have a ray of opportunities, we know you're going to work in a lot of different fields. But we want to give you a better foundation with something that you can, like I said, a credential, a degree, something that you can always fall back on. But also understanding that our future generations are looking at, they're not going to come to work like we do in education, we'd love to have a fall semester in the spring semester, we're not leveraging summer, because the rest of the world is reaching summer. And so what we've discovered is do people need to be in the office 40 hours a week, or 50 hours a week, we learned during COVID People can remote work just fine. In some ways, they might have been a little more productive. It might gotten a little odd because they weren't hanging out with people. But what we've learned is we say okay, so what does our workplace look like? And so I think, partly what I would offer up is, I want to make sure our students and our communities are well prepared to continually learn and grow. Because as Danny said, each person's path is going to be different. And we want to make sure they're equipped with as many options as possible. But that means they got to be able to be good thinkers, we got to empower them to have autonomy, to engage in their communities, to be able to have greater awareness of what they want what I love about giving students exposure to CTE programs, students learn what they like, and what they don't like, and much more concrete ways. And that, again, that's knowledge. That's not just going to equip them for the next workplace for the next career field for the next occupation. Every time they get work based learning experience, that environment, what do they like? What are they not, it equips them with knowledge, that's going to be to better prepare them so that we then they will be empowered to make really good choices for themselves and for their families and for their communities. And that's, that is the commodity that we really want to be able to leverage and education. And I think that's what we want. And that's what our business and industry employers tell us they want to so I get excited. When I think what it's going to be I don't know exactly what it's going to be. But it's fun to think about the possibilities.
Sarah Williamson:This is so exciting. Thank you so much, Dr. Fujii and everyone else. Dr. Fujii, you just mentioned an article in the 74 million. It's about students feeling a lack of purpose in the classroom. And we'll include that in our show notes. But really fascinating. This is very much needed. And I hope everyone who listens to this is able to potentially replicate it in their communities. That's the goal. Right? Thank you, Danny. Thank you, Jill.
Danny Winsor:Thank you.
Sarah Williamson:Okay, where can our listeners find you and connect with you? If that's okay, yes, absolutely.
Danny Winsor:So you they can reach me Douglas County Schools, Douglas County School District and Castro Colorado. And so if they want to go to dcsdk12.org. My contact information is there, I can send it to the show my email address. So if anybody's wanting to something, you're more than welcome to to share that as well. But feel free to reach out if there's anything we can do to support.
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:For me, I think I'm easy to find if you can spell Arapahoe unlike the Indian community that we are named after we actually have an E at the end of our day. And Fujii is very easy to find because there's not a lot of us. But Stephanie Fujii or if you go to Arapahoe Community College in Colorado and look for Fujii think I'm the only one around this that I know of and so would love to hear from folks and again, anytime that we can help we always value that tremendously paying it forward.
Jill Garber:That Oh yeah, a lot of our information for Colorado State and the work that we do here is actually again co located on the website for ACC under this term collaboration campus. You can find out more about some of the other programs that I mentioned at Colorado State colostate.edu. And I can be found at jill.garber@colotate.edu. Happy to hear from anyone who's listening thing,
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:And we're good. We'll help each other. We'll help people find each other because we're good. You know, we all work real hard to stay in contact and visit and share.
Sarah Williamson:Thank you so much, everyone. Appreciate this. This has been a great episode.
Chad Bolser:Thank you so much. This was awesome.
Sarah Williamson:Thanks, Jen.
Dr. Stephanie Fujii:Appreciate the opportunity take care.
Danny Winsor:Thanks. Bye bye.
Chad Bolser:Thanks for joining us for the Build Momentum podcast today. If you enjoyed listening, we would love to hear your feedback, and would be grateful if you would leave us a review.
Sarah Williamson:This helps us to share these powerful stories with even more people. If you liked what you heard, we would be honored if you could share this episode with someone in your network. We look forward to seeing you next time on Build Momentum.