CNN distribution of Citi Club forums and Ideastream Public Media are made possible by PNC and the United Black Fund of Greater Cleveland, Inc.. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the City Club of Cleveland, where we are devoted to conversations of consequence that help democracy thrive.

It is Friday, December 1st.

It is World AIDS Day.

I am Ken Schneck, professor of leadership in higher education at Baldwin Wallace University.

And I'm the moderator for today's conversation.

Over the past few years, institutions of higher education have strived to adapt and shift in response to the ever changing environment and requirements of a 21st century classroom.

Students and administrators have grappled with the task of managing the COVID 19 pandemic, mental health concerns and political challenges directed at college faculty and curriculum.

During this time, both Cleveland State University and Cuyahoga Community College have had a change of leadership.

And today, we are fortunate to have those leaders with us here to learn more about their unique approach and perspective to their role, as well as the future of higher education.

And I will introduce them now.

Right on my left.

Dr. Laura Bloomberg was appointed the eighth president of Cleveland State University in 2000 in 2021.

She had previously served at CSU as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs.

She has led multiple initiatives in her time at CSU with the aims of further integrating the CSU campus into the city of Cleveland, as well as focusing on community and personal connection as a critical element of academic success.

Dr. Bloomberg has become an active board member of notable Northeast Ohio groups, including Playhouse Square, where we sit right this second.

And multiple economic development organizations.

Also with us today is Dr. Michael Bastian, president of Cuyahoga Community College, who was appointed as that institution's fifth president in July of 2022.

He is best known.

It's hard to say your best.

You're known for a lot of things, but he's best known for his work with two and four year college leadership teams across the nation, helping them integrate student success initiatives to advance college completion and labor market entry success.

Dr. Bastian is chair of the Black Male CEO Educators Network and a member of the American Association of Community Colleges Board of Directors chairing its Commission on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

If you have a question for our speakers, you can text it to 3305415794.

That's 3305415794.

And City Club staff will try to work it into the second half of our program.

Members and Friends of the City Club of Cleveland please join me in welcoming Dr. Laura Bloomberg and Dr. Michael Bastian.

Okay.

In the last three years, if we flash back three years ago, you both were not in the positions that you currently hold.

You've taken on these huge leadership positions.

Can you talk a little bit about your leadership style and how you take on such a massive transition?

You want me to take that first?

I sure do.

Well, first, thank you for having us here today.

It's Dr. Bastian.

And I have been on panels together several times, and it's always a pleasure.

And I think it's important to point out that our friendship is real and our dedication to partnership is real.

And I think you'll see that come through.

You said some things about me in the introduction that I think reflects my leadership style.

I think that as a as a lifelong educator, it's essential to me that education is a part of a community, not separate from a community.

And so I endeavor every day to think about engaged, learning and partnership with really the great city of Cleveland and the whole region.

There's this I've been thinking a lot about this.

There's this quote from the philosopher, the French philosopher Voltaire.

I used it in my recent state of the university address, and it doesn't speak to my entire leadership philosophy, but it's a large part of what I believe is essential for a higher ed president.

And it is that appreciation is a wonderful thing.

It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.

And when a scholar chooses to step outside of their own research and academic field to lead a universe city, we we make the decision to put our own research on the back burner and teaching on the back burner to amplify, celebrate and share the great skills of all of our colleagues.

So I'm I'm enjoying here today with tables full of colleagues who I hold in the highest regard.

And I feel like a big part of my leadership is to enable and amplify their excellent work.

Thank you, sir.

I always love being and spending time with Laura because she is not only an extraordinary leader, but an extraordinary person.

And we had the opportunity to come into this community.

Recognizing that there's so much opportunity here, so many good things that are happening here.

And I come as a merchant of hope.

My role and my leadership style and the ways in which I think about the work we do is all in service to this idea that hope is not just a feeling that if you can have great goals and plans and take some actions, you actually can lift ideas and you can lift systems and you can lift the quality of life for real people.

And so as I think about all the wonderful people that I have the opportunity to work with and our students, some of them who are here today, I think about how do we inspire and encourage and support and to create the conditions by which folks can lift hope, can stand against despair, can really breathe life into opportunity.

And so my leadership style is all about expanding opportunity and lifting hope.

Thank you.

You can't read inside Higher Ed or the Chronicle of Higher Education.

There's no morning that you can tune into that source and not see colleges that are struggling either with declining enrollments financially.

That dreaded enrollment cliff that keeps us up at night.

We've all been in the classroom.

How would you start?

By grading the health of your institution.

And there can be no grade inflation for this.

I would say we are a solid B-plus.

And I would give you the reasons why I believe we're a solid B-plus or a solid B-plus, because for 60 years, over 1.2 million people have come to receive something that we offered them that could help them grow in their life and their journey and their educational experience that they have 85% of them stay right here in northeast Ohio and contribute.

So.

So in that regard, I think our specific focus on making sure that career exploration, connecting with business and industry, connecting with community based organizations for those reasons and and the ability of our institution to constantly evolve and be nimble and the level of commitment of the folks throughout our system.

We've got about 4000 employees in our system, about 41,000 students.

To see that level of commitment.

I would say a B-plus.

That being said, we want to be an A-plus institution.

And there are things that we have to do to get there.

We have to continue to improve the quality of our programs and services and the ability to navigate what we offer.

We have to continue to grow the ability of our faculty to really be embedded in what's happening now in the world of work, so that as they continue to reimagine the syllabi and the kinds of learning experiences students have, that that can be at the forefront, and you have to fund that.

You know, those you know, you can't just expect people to be inspiring and then don't give them the resources to do that.

So I think that, you know, we're on track.

We have lots of wonderful support from the community of which we very much appreciate.

But we're not where we want to be.

And we know that we have a big vision about how we are a critical connector to the entirety of the community.

So so I think we're feeling good, but we still have miles to go.

So B-plus, I think, is where he likes it.

Okay.

It's probably not the time for me to talk about my philosophy of grading right now.

Yeah, I'd love to.

We will be handing out evaluations at the end for everybody.

Yes.

So I'm going to say, if we were calculating a grade point average, we would be at a B-plus.

There are things that I give us an A for and there are things that I give us a C or possibly lower for and A for, things like our ability to recruit excellent leaders.

We have between the provost who is here today and I, we have hired the vast majority of all of our deans.

And I am so proud of the excellent scholars and leaders that we've been able to recruit to Cleveland, who, like me, are falling in love with this place.

And I just have to do this really quickly.

I will.

I won't.

I'm not going to name everybody at our table.

We have a brand new dean here who starts in January, and that's the new dean of our Levine College of Public Affairs and Education, Jill Gordon, who is here in town today and has joined us.

And we're so excited that she'll be joining us for another day.

I, I give us an A in that regard.

Our future in terms of of scholarship and leadership is is bright.

I give us less than a B-plus, more like a C in areas that are that are holding us back.

And that may be the systems and structures is where we're a young institution.

We were just born in 1964, Cleveland State University.

And sometimes I think some of our I don't know, like our equivalent of software programs, the systems that help us do our work.

I feel like they haven't been updated since about 1964.

And those things when you when you face declining enrollment, those things come with a cost.

And it's not very compelling to talk to a donor about, you know, helping us upgrade our PeopleSoft system.

So those things we struggle with and I give us about a C on average, I think we're doing quite well, but we have a ways to go.

Yeah.

Workforce in economic development.

We hear repeatedly here at City Club in any conversation in Cleveland that those are the the keys to Cleveland's future, to Northeast Ohio's bright future.

Where do you see your institution's role in workforce and economic development?

Sometimes there can be a disconnect between institutions of higher education and specifically that area of workforce and economic development.

How tied in to you think Cleveland State University is to those goals?

We talk about this a lot, both on our campus and then the three institutions that have a very different place in the ecosystem.

In Cleveland, Case Western Tri-C, CSU, I think create collectively a pretty elegant whole when it looks when it comes to things like workforce and economics development.

As a president of a four year graduate school for your institution, that also confers graduate degrees and PhDs and is a research active university.

Sometimes I, I bristle a bit at the at the workforce conversation, but I know I do that at my peril because we all want jobs.

We all want a job when we graduate from a community college or a four year institution.

So I get that.

But the role of a university in a community is broad.

And when I think about workforce, I also think about a well-educated citizenry.

I think about the value of the research that we conducted.

CSU and we are a very research active institution that has I don't I don't know how many patents we have at our faculty have achieved in the last several years, but it is many.

And so we contribute to the workforce in many ways, and we can contribute to the economic development of the region in many ways.

So yes, we want to produce students who graduate with a bachelor's or a master's or a Ph.D. and are ready for the workforce.

But we are driven by creating an educated citizenry that is as committed to a place.

And let me say one other thing about this.

When we talk about economic development and drawing people to our region, we're thinking about we talk a lot about engineers and our ability to be a part of the technological new frontier.

We talk about artificial intelligence, but I can tell you for every person who comes and wants to stay in Cleveland, they also want nice park systems, well-organized cities, well-managed cities, good schools for their children.

And a university has teacher education and produces city planners and has people who are all about urban design.

And that, too, is a fundamental part of our role in the ecosystem that's going to advance the economic well-being of that region.

Thank you.

Certainly, I echo many of the comments that Laura said.

I always say that a strong CSU strengthens Tri-C because we do have a dynamic educational ecosystem in this community.

There are many graduates of CSU that come back to Tri-C because they want to get some of the opportunities that we offer that will advance the good work that they got when they were at CSU.

So there's this thought that the students just transfer from Tri-C into CSU as if there's not this constant back and forth because of the complement of educational opportunities.

We offer.

But we do have a big vision here, and that big vision is that this community, Cleveland, can actually be the career capital of the state of Ohio.

It is clear that we are the cultural capital of this state.

When you look at right here at Playhouse Square and you look at our sports teams and you look at all of the different assets from the museums and the orchestra, jazz, jazz Fest right here in June.

I want to say a solid I did a solid.

That's why I say she's my sister.

We have she's my sister from a different Mr..

But that's positive but but it is those cultural assets that are wonderful what our vision is that this community will be for the state of Ohio, what Boston is for Massachusetts, what Georgia, Atlanta is for Georgia, what Chicago is for Illinois.

That place where wherever you start your journey in Ohio, you come to Cleveland, that you get a solid education, that you learn how to build yourself, whether you're going to work for someone, or are you going to be that entrepreneur and start out here.

The idea is that if you can, to borrow a phrase from my former town, if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

And it is the educational ecosystem that actually prepares people to move the world, to move this part of the country.

And so when we think about the programs, that that is why we are so inextricably tied with business and industry who are informing some of the academic programs that we offer so that we can meet the talent development needs of the region.

That is why we're saying that our entrepreneurial work is important, because we know that more and more particularly, young people don't necessarily want to work for someone, they want to work for themselves.

And that doesn't mean they have the ability to do that right away.

But we have to build the capacity and help them build the ability to diversify all of the vendor suppliers that ultimately move our agenda forward.

So that is the vision.

That's the goal that this community can be the career capital, not the job capital, the career capital where you continue to reinvent yourself, grow and become everything that you were meant to be and being meaningful, contributing citizen who stays here, whose families thrive here and continue to make us strong.

Can I just add something to that?

It's always and this isn't what I was going to add, but it's always a pleasure to sit on the stage with Michael, whose if you can't tell, he's also a pastor.

And I'm like, I just can't bring it like that.

But, you know, the passions there.

One of the things that I believe four year institutions can learn from community colleges and certainly we can learn from Tri-C, is that if we hold firm to the really important core of what we do, which I would say would be teaching, learning, education and shake loose our our commitment to things that don't have to be the way they've always been.

Academic year, credit semester.

When a student starts all of those things, then we are going to be ideally responsive.

So I can talk about how I think that people who are a little critical of higher ed right now could be wrong, but there's a lot we need to change.

And part of that is holding firm to what's most important and letting go of or holding loosely to some of those things that we need to be more flexible about.

And I think that that that Tri-C has done a really remarkable job at doing that.

And I think we have things to learn from that.

And the nice thing is because we spend so much time together and we're in these conversations and we're part of the national conversation as well.

The Carnegie Foundation right now is shaking out whether we should even have the Carnegie.

Our designations, the ideas that we are generating throughout our educational ecosystem is that we don't necessarily have to do things that we've always done because of agrarian factors that don't exactly exist today.

We have to be thinking that, you know, some people are not going to go five years for a two year degree.

And so the reality is, how do we make sure that we give people the kind of educational experience that is quality?

So we should never sacrifice quality.

We should never lower expectations.

We should never actually try to, you know, Michael, waive an educational experience when we need people to have all of what they need.

But at the same time, we don't have to do things the way we've always done them that are producing the current results.

We actually have.

Said in October, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who spoke here at City Club in April, he launched his We are Made to Connect Campus Tour to help combat what is being called the new epidemic gripping college campuses.

I know there are a lot of higher ed professionals here.

Any guesses on the new epidemic that's gripping college campuses?

Loneliness.

Loneliness.

What are you seeing on your campuses and what are you doing to help support the mental health not just of students, but also of faculty and staff who struggle as well?

I'm happy to respond to that.

First first of all, I think it's true, and I think for a long time, you know this you don't need me to tell you the stigma around mental health has not been helpful to us.

And this notion that you can't be a good scholar as a professor or you can't be a good student if you also are grappling with mental health challenges is just not true.

It's just not true.

You know, we can we have to show up with our full selves.

And sometimes that is showing up as somebody who's grappling with depression or anxiety or just a debilitating shyness.

And most certainly a sense of loneliness.

And we have to acknowledge that.

We have to destigmatize it.

Last March, I asked a group of of scholars and leaders on campus to come together and rethink how we think about student affairs and the ways that we support students outside of the classroom.

And I, in my charge letter to that group, I posed a thought experiment.

We don't have these data yet, but I said, what if every student, 100% of the students at CSU, whether they were online, in-person, commuter, residential, all the things undergraduate, graduate.

What if 100% of our students was known well by somebody on campus outside of their professors?

And what if 100% that same broad base of students was engaged in some activity club initiative, something something outside of their classes that they chose?

And what if 100% of those students, if asked, would say, I feel a deep sense of belonging to this place?

What would that look like?

How would we be different?

How would we change?

We're not there yet.

But one of the things that came out of that was the development of a new division that we launched in just in October of this year, the Division of Student Belonging and Success.

And we pulled programs that had been in different places and brought them together in a new way.

I described it.

So if those of you who play games on your on your devices might know this, like if you're looking at a word game like connections on The New York Times and you can hit shuffle and you see things in a different way and different connections, some of you are nodding.

Some of you are going, I have no idea what you're talking about.

So we hit shuffle a little bit on some of these departments and programs and brought people together to say, okay, so let's just really love on our students in a new and different way that acknowledges that you can be a brilliant student and still struggle with loneliness, even in the midst of a, you know, a campus full of people.

And let's figure out how to provide supports.

We also need to struggle now with how much is too much.

You know, how much is like the students going, Oh my God, I got an academic advisor and a success coach and a career coach and care team and oh man, we got it.

We got to recalibrate that.

But we're reorganizing specifically to do that better.

We're in that same space we have undertake a major project of the redesign of the student experience, both the academic, but also more importantly, the nonacademic aspects of the student experience, so that we have a consistent experience at scale so that all students would get what they need and the right proportion of what they need because everyone doesn't need everything and they don't need everything at the same time.

And so it is very important to be committed to understanding the student experience.

But we're also undertaking an examination of the employee experience.

And so we know that the employee experience has elements that we have to pay attention to from the candidacy to their ability to be successful in that first year, their ability to actually rise in the organization and the different things that they're interested in, their professional development, and even as they transition so that we can capture the knowledge and they can leave a positive legacy.

Well, the fact is well-being and their ability to thrive and be fully able to commit to the institution and participate, it means that we have to understand them through the various stages of the employee experience and to address, where appropriate, all of the mental health and the professional development needs of the entirety of the staff.

So we are very committed to redesigning the student experience with well-being as one of the foundational principles.

And upon that success, I think we've too often in higher ed talked about the success and we then talked about wellbeing as a side thing.

I think if you don't have an approach that says you need to know what's going on in the student's life, you need to know if they have a job or are looking for a job.

You need to know if they have enough money to stay in school because if you don't do those three things, you never get to whether they're on their degree path, if they're going to actually stay, are they going to make progress?

So you really have to have that understanding by competent people who can actually do this at scale so that you don't leave people behind.

Well, say something about scholar health.

My goodness.

A wonderful opportunity that we're in.

I did him a solid again.

They're not.

I don't need to be here.

By now.

We need you.

We need you.

But what can you tell us about story?

Well, but just think about it.

What we have together said is that we want to make sure that single parents, while they're going to try to see while they're going to CSU, that they can have the opportunity to have a clean, safe place to live where they can raise their children and that they can have the support so that they can finish this educational experience.

And then after they finish at CSU or Tri-C or Tri-C, then CSU after that, we help them with post placement residence so that they able to continue to build momentum.

This is something that others around the country would love to do, including our friends in Columbus.

Ours is already built across the street there from our metro campus, and that's something we should all be very proud of.

In Cleaves, and that we have committed with our county housing authority to say we're going to make sure that we give single parents the best opportunity to be active participants in the lives of their children, still get great educations and ultimately be fully engaged citizens that will create these opportunities for others down the line.

And I'm so happy to partner in this way.

And it speaks to the power of partnership that we continue to look for ways together to make sure that we reach as many people as we can to help them.

So, scholar house, you if you if you come up community college, what is a community College Avenue or Boulevard Avenue?

Right.

See, I'm from New York.

So everything is an avenue rose but it is right there and the lights are on and we hope to be making sure that families get in there pretty soon.

Nice partnership.

Question Check.

At the start of this fall semester, I, I threw out whatever I had plans for the first day of both of my master's classes in leadership, in higher education and substituted in conversations in both of those courses.

Topics on what I maintain is one of the biggest Supreme Court decisions to ever affect higher education, and that's their ban on affirmative action.

Can you talk a little bit about how your institution is responding to this decision and more generally, the importance of a diverse community?

You want me to take a pause?

There's so much to say about this and try to organize my thoughts a little bit.

I want to recognize Dean Lee Fisher, our dean of the law school, because I think that there's a there's an actual interpretation of the decision that is is a great legal learning opportunity that we have to capture.

The short and sweet answer is and true answer is that Cleveland State University does not have race based admissions.

So one response could be, well, split spot.

That's it.

We don't need to worry about this.

I think that any scholar would need to recognize that the Supreme Court two things.

The Supreme Court overturned 45 years of legal precedent.

And that is a regardless of what you think about it, it is a powerful learning opportunity that we have to capture.

I also think a lot about the fact that part of the decision said that they overturned affirmative action because it it it I don't remember the exact word violated may not be the word but it it was it was in opposition to court tenants of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

It is the law of the land.

Now, the Supreme Court made a decision.

It is the law of the land.

Here's where I regardless of what I think about that, here's where I find some comfort, is that the civil rights Act of 1964.

So we will be recognizing a key anniversary of that in 2024.

Says a lot about civil rights.

It says a lot.

And we can still draw on that law and so many other policies and practices that we have in place to ensure and support a diverse learning environment.

And you asked me or ask us what we thought about the importance of diversity.

Let me speak to that very directly.

Again, regardless of what you think about this Supreme Court decision, we have real evidence to show that any one of us as human beings in a community learn better in community and learn best when we're in a community of people who are different than we are different along dimensions of age, race, religion, political affiliation, gender, because it creates an opportunity that we can't have ourselves.

And that is to see the world or endeavor to see the world through another lens that is a rich learning environment.

And that's the kind of place I want to be in.

So regardless of the fact that Cleveland State doesn't consider race in admissions, we seek to have a diverse learning environment because it is an enriched learning environment.

So it's fundamentally part.

Can you tell?

I feel strongly about this a little bit fundamentally part of what we should be doing as a learning organization.

And I'm in complete agreement.

You know, when I was a law student, I worked at the ACP Legal Defense and Education Fund.

And at that time, in 1996, we were doing research with the Center for Constitutional Rights on dealing with hate crimes laws.

In 1996, not 56, not 46, we were doing desegregation cases in 1996.

I was researching how to define white citizen groups that were burning black churches.

In 1996.

And so we know that there's always this notion of rolling back gains made legally over time.

And so my concern is, as a as a community college president, we are open access institutions.

We take the top 100% every pair.

Remember that we meet students at their level of preparation.

And it's you know, we are that place where diverse perspectives and mindsets are going to be engaged.

And we don't teach people what to think, but really how to engage in the thinking process.

But that being said, what it what concern me about the decision is the fact that this is one strategy, one legal strategy.

What are the other legal strategies that will continue to be advanced that seek to erode the provisions of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments?

And we're seeing that in a multitude of ways that had to lead us up to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and 65.

And so my concern is that the strategies that we are seeing employed in 2023, we have always had to have efforts to try to buttress and address the challenges of our country and the challenges of our time.

Charles Hamilton Houston said to the law students that their job was to be social engineers.

And even though I'm now a retired lawyer, I don't practice anymore.

I still see the work that we do in our colleges as preparing our own students to be social engineers.

Our own students should construct the community and the society that we desire, that they should be prepared in whatever their field of endeavor it is, to actually make the world better and to use education as that ability to do that.

And so while I'm disappointed about the assaults on sort of gains that have been made to deal with still existing challenges in our country, we have to use education as that ability to bring more of our citizens engaged and involved and advancing the cause of freedom and justice and liberty and equality for all.

Q We are about to begin the audience Q&A again.

I'm Ken Schneck, Professor of Leadership in Higher Education at Baldwin, Walden Baldwin Wallace University and moderator.

For today's conversation, we are joined by Dr. Laura Bloomberg, the president of Cleveland State University, and Dr. Michael Bastian, the president of Cuyahoga Community College.

We welcome questions from everyone.

City Club members guests, students and those joining via our live stream at City Club dot org or live on the live radio broadcast at 89.7 WKSU Ideastream Public Media.

If you you'd like to text a question for our speakers, please text it to 3305415794.

That's 3305415794.

And City Club staff will try to work it into the program.

May we have the first question, please?

In fact, we're.

Going to bring in.

One of those texts questions right now to get us started.

All of us in this room understand the impact of higher.

Education and on our lives and communities.

How can we.

Each in our own spheres, counterbalance the.

Growing trend of society doubting the value of a degree or further education?

High School Thank you.

It's interesting, most of the people that are saying we don't need college, have a college degree, want their children to go to college.

And so I think it's is it's interesting when we have folks who say it's not good enough for someone else's child, but it's good enough for my child.

I think the fact is the pathway in our country for higher economic mobility comes through the baccalaureate degree.

Does that mean that every person has to get a baccalaureate degree?

No.

But what it does mean is that you have a greater likelihood in this country to do well if you have a bachelor's degree are beyond.

And the fact is, you can still do quite well with certificates and and, you know, go right into the workforce.

So the point is that we should give people options and we should support those options because they make sense for individuals.

But I don't think the comments of folks who say we don't need to have higher education or we don't need bachelor's degrees or it cost.

We are public institutions.

So we have already thought about the affordability issue.

We are public institutions.

We have already done all that we could to make sure as many people in our local community and beyond who come here get the best opportunity.

So so it's a little easier for those who are in different educational sectors that actually are more expensive and maybe not necessarily as responsive to sort of be point of that.

But it's very difficult to do the same fingerpointing at public institutions.

You know, it's it's always true.

It's always been true that not everybody needs to go to college.

What sociologists who study this know is that when unemployment is very, very low, when the unemployment rate is very, very low, the narrative about whether or not you need to go to college changes.

And when employers aren't able to employ people, the narrative changes.

Maybe you don't need to go to college.

You need to come and work here.

For me, the heartbreaking part of that is that you can almost predict by a person's zip code what kind of message, not by their ability, not by their desire, not by their capacity to be successful, but by their zip code, what kind of message they get about college going.

And that to me is a travesty in a in a democratic society that says, let's all try to create access to what we've called the American dream and so on.

We deny it to some based on assumptions that we have about economics race, whatever it may be, we may be missing out on some remarkable, brilliant minds that will do remarkable things in the future and that's what I want to change.

I would never say everybody needs to go to college, but I would say everybody in a democratic society should have that option on their radar screen.

Educational redlining.

Yes.

Yes, it is very much.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for being here.

I have two questions, but I promise I'll be quick.

The first one.

Many of our teachers are leaving the profession because they don't have the tools to be able to work with students who are experiencing trauma.

And and when you look at the research, trauma causes students to make some real crazy decisions.

When you ask them why they did it, they will seriously and honestly tell you they don't know.

So this first question is, what are you doing to prepare teachers to be able to use trauma informed strategies to, work with the students so that they can keep students in the classroom instead of being suspended for things that trauma controlled them and made them do.

My second question is Senate Bill 83.

Mm hmm.

Never heard of it.

I'm sure it's being called the Higher Education Destruction Act.

And for those of you who don't know, it would really make diversity, inclusion and equity programs illegal.

It would it would ban teachers from talking about justice and race in the classroom.

So the second question is talk about the harm, the danger of Senate Bill 83 to.

I want to start with the teacher education piece of it.

Oh, I.

Bet you do.

And we're out.

Of time, so.

Yeah, we do have a teacher shortage and we have a teacher crisis here.

And that crisis is, you know, the fact that we have not necessarily treated the teaching profession in the ways and valued it in the ways that we need it to.

And and we've done the same thing in policing.

So you wonder why we can't find folks that want to go into law enforcement.

You see how poorly we've talked about those who are in law enforcement because of the actions of some.

The same is true of education.

We ought to be lifting up our teachers and we ought to be figuring out how we support them and give them all of the supports in our institution.

We do have programs for early childhood education and and I know that CSU and other institutions are focused on the teacher preparation, experience and trauma informed training is going to be a part of the work that ultimately has to be provided as professional development for our teachers, because it has even been more clear to us as a result of the pandemic, with the learning loss of the young people and the sort of social, emotional challenges that went through that experience, and now they're making their way through the educational pipeline and they will ultimately get to us.

And so it is important for us to think about it from that lateral perspective.

Senate Bill 83 Quite frankly, from my perspective, our institution values diversity.

We will always value diversity.

We will always find meaningful ways to ensure that the mission of our institution is being fulfilled by all of our actions, our behaviors, and the practices that students feel, experience and expect.

Yes, I agree with all of that.

Quick, just a brief comment about teacher education.

We are working really hard to look at the department's at CSU that focus on teacher education.

Same.

Do we have the right mix?

Do we have the right balance?

Do we need to hit shuffle on that and think about reorganizing them in different ways?

And and I do know and and I will be talking to our government relations person about this sometime soon, that there's a lot of questions about licensure and certification that we just need to kind of run to ground.

What do we need to be advocating for?

It's very much on our radar screen.

Here's what I want to say about Senate Bill 83, because I've been thinking about it a lot.

I believe where we have this great opportunity to find common ground is in a fundamental belief in free speech and the Senate Bill 83, yes, does talk about diversity, equity and inclusion.

It talks about a lot of things.

It is a very large bill.

And in our democracy, we all have the opportunity to question, to ask for changes, to solicit and engage with our elected officials.

And we will continue to do that on Senate Bill 83 or any other bill that impacts higher education.

It is how our democracy is built.

I used to be the dean of a policy school, Hubert Humphrey School of Public Affairs, and in the front courtyard of the building where I worked there is a little sitting area and in the little half wall in the outdoor garden sitting area is a very famous quote by Hubert Humphrey.

So I saw it every day when I walked in and it says Freedom.

And sometimes to read Humphrey the Man, would you interchange freedom and democracy?

Freedom or democracy is hammered out on the anvil of discussion, debate and dissent.

That's where we are.

We are discussing.

We are debating.

And at times we are dissenting.

It is what we do in a free society.

At some point, Senate Bill 83 will or will not pass.

If it passes, it becomes the law of the land and we deal with that at that time.

But all of us have an opportunity to seek to have the best kind of policy we can have.

And when we don't agree, that too is a part of democracy.

So that's where we are with Senate Bill 83.

Parts of it I support and parts of it I do not.

And that's probably true of everyone in this room who is familiar with it.

And that's how we roll as a as a democratic society.

So in the last year, we've seen TAC exponentially increase and its capability is slightly terrifying.

Right.

It can change workforce paradigms, but also it it sort of opens up this realm for personalized education that we've never seen thus far in really human history.

So can you touch on that dichotomy a little bit?

And then how you enable students or parents who would come to you and say, look, I'm planning for or two years ahead, but the workforce might look very different.

So how do you enable them to have confidence that you are setting them up for success, but also enabling your educators to be precise in the way that they're educated?

Well, that has a lot of pieces to it.

That's a wholesome that's another out.

Yeah.

That's a great question.

But let me kind of go to the heart of it.

Education institutions.

Both Tri-C and CSU are constantly thinking about the next.

What's next, what's next?

What's next?

So we're always thinking in terms of the future.

And as you heard Laura talked about, and we are as well, we are starting to retrofit some of the ways in which we educate and the modalities.

I mean, when you if you had asked most colleges prior to the pandemic if they were all going to go online, the majority of people said, we're not doing that.

We don't have faculty members.

I know plenty of faculty members.

I don't even like the computer.

I am not going to actually do that.

But now, you know, once they had once we had to make the shift and we made this shift, some say, well, you know, I don't know if I necessarily want to come back to campus and we need them to come back to campus.

But but my point is still the saying that higher ed in some ways we take a long time to do things, but in other ways we are advanced and we can move nimbly and we can make certain things happen, including the new modalities.

And and that's why it is important for us to stay close to our Board of Visitors.

Both of our institutions have boards of visitors where we hear from people in the field that help to inform our curriculum, that help us to really stay current, so that as think about your young person that's going through the educational pipeline, that when they get to us, we will be ready for them as we continue to move them forward.

We should not be scared of technology.

We should not be afraid.

Listen, the fact is, people say, well, you can't use a calculator that's cheating.

Who doesn't use a calculator?

If they want to get the answers right?

So now in many math classes, they let you use a calculator.

So the fact is we have to understand the ability of the tools.

We have to show folks how to ethically and appropriately use the tools.

And we can't just simply say, oh, this is a bad thing, because at the end of the it's available and we want to make sure that people understand how we can keep them ethically appropriate, but also continue an evolution and our advancement.

You know that that is critical and important because other countries will and we don't want to always lag behind.

We we used to be number one in education in the world.

We don't want to be 12.

And so we've got to recognize that if we unilaterally disarm because new technology and new information and new systems are available and we want to stay purist, we will never move back up into the premier spot of educational leadership in the world.

I'm not going to repeat any of that.

I will add that one of the things that I'm really proud of that's happening at Cleveland State right now and and I know the provost would be pleased that I mentioned this.

But groan, if I get it wrong is that we have really focused on computer science education at the K-12 level and have developed actually the first in the state computer science education program where we have faculty who are affiliated both with our elementary are are our elementary and secondary education program and our College of Engineering Computer Science, and are really working with the the General Assembly to advance computer science education at that level so that by the time students get to college, they have the capacity to really think about our technologically advanced future.

Thank you.

Yes, good afternoon.

It's an honor to be in all of your presence.

This is Desiree Category Mayor.

And first, I want to thank both of you for although you're not a Clevelander, I was born here but reared overseas.

And here you are very right.

And I concur with you.

There is a great deal of opportunity here and when everybody comes together, then we can build our capacity for everybody else as well.

So that's the key of a greater community.

And I thank you for those comments.

However, here's the critique and I hope it's not a critique.

It's a concern.

And coming also from the private sector, not only working in the public sector like you know, tech department is ahead of the game in some areas.

And then the marketing department says, no, we'll sell it right now and the tech says no.

But getting to the concern here is in regards to ten years ago when I was overseas with the State Department and returned, Ohio's pre-K academic performance was about ten years ago.

Number six.

Yes, out of 50 states.

And it matter of fact, follows up with your comments.

Now that Ohio has positioned itself with the Intel Hub and others how do we plan to prepare the workforce other than programing like Project Lead the Way Pace as well as a two year quick career tech pathway, taking into account that China has successfully applied the EU agenda from 2008 and leverage local and global connections.

If we are all referencing to global learners and participants of today.

I'm good at the Laura.

I'm also giving it to Laura.

I wore my CSU green armor today.

I can handle it.

I think it's incumbent on every single person in this room and in this community to care about the education of our children.

I am a university president, but by training, I started my career as an elementary school special ed teacher, and I've been a K-12 principal.

And if we don't get the education of our children right, nothing else matters.

And it's easy to point fingers.

I remember being a president or a principal and listening to our seventh grade teachers saying if the sixth grade teachers had only done this in the sixth year of the fifth grade teachers, they're all our children, folks.

And that at overuse line really is true.

It takes a village.

And when our CMS city schools are struggling or whatever school is struggling, we should all care deeply.

As much as I want people to support CSU and Tri-C, we must support our littlest learners, and that is where we're going to build our success.

It just fundamentally is, and I'm not sure I have much more to add than that.

We can look at what China is doing.

We can be concerned about what's happening in the world.

We need to focus like a laser on what's happening here and and get that right.

And I'll just add this.

We've already begun conversations.

I think what you're seeing even in our discussion today, what you're seeing is a different level of engagement and a level of commitment, not only in the higher education space, but we've had begun conversations with Warren Morgan and see MSD and others.

We really see ourselves as being a part of the solution, not the solution.

We see ourselves as looking at these big ticket items and working with our other partners in the ecosystem to figure out how we take our respective strengths, how we look at the assets of our various institutions and tie them together to improve outcomes both for and I serve on talent development committees for both Team Neo, for also for GCP.

So we're actively engaged in the kinds of conversations that say it's not just going to be the higher education sector that's going to be able to address the issues.

And it's not even just going to be K-12 and it's all of the community based organizations that are involved in education or children's support services.

But it's all of us thinking deeply and strategically and really beginning to say to Cleveland and to Northeast Ohio, we need some higher level goals, we need some higher order, responsive abilities that we coordinate to begin to move the needle.

Because I don't want to be 12th.

You know, I do want to see our community thrive.

And here this is just my opinion.

I'm not going to be a follower on this one.

This is not me.

Since I came to Cleveland, I see a lot of great people doing a lot of great things.

I do not see the level of integration that we need to actually bring, the impact that we need to turn things around.

Forums like this one are made possible thanks to generous support from individuals like all of you, you can learn more about how to become a guardian of free speech at City Club Dawg.

Today's forum is in partnership with McDonald Hopkins and part of the City Club's Education Innovation Series, thanks to support from Nordson the City Club.

Would like to welcome students joining us from Lutheran West High School and M.C.

squared STEM High School.

I love when you are here every single time.

We would also like to welcome guests for the tables hosted by Beyond Breakthrough Bostwick Design Partnership, Cleveland State University College Now Greater Cleveland College of Wooster, Cuyahoga Community College, Metro Health Foundation and PNC.

And taking some personal privilege here.

Also, my colleagues from Baltimore, Wallace University, including President Robert Helm, are sitting right right here in front.

Up next at City Club is a free forum hosted at the Happy Dog and Cleveland's Gordon Square District.

My neighborhood, the City Club of Cleveland's CFO Ahmed Abu Naama and Councilman Life will unpack what's in the city's budget, discuss how it's drafted and what you need to know to move forth as Clevelanders as engaged citizens.

And speaking of engaged citizens, it's the city club's final forum of 2023 will take place on Friday, December 15th.

Author and Professor Manny Teodoro with the University of Wisconsin-Madison will be here to discuss the intersection of Citizens Trust in public utilities, think safe drinking water and Flint, Michigan and the likelihood to participate in civic engagement.

Can strong public infrastructure combat the vicious cycle of distrust that undermines democracy?

You will find out by attending on December 15th.

You can learn about these forums and others at City Club dot org.

And that, my friends, brings us to the end of today's forum.

Thank you once again to Presidents Bloomberg and Bastien and thank you, members and friends of the City Club.

I'm Ken Schneck, and this forum is now adjourned.

For information on upcoming speakers or for podcasts of the City Club.

Go to City Club dot org.

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