- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of Think Tank with Steve Adubato has been provided by Delta Dental of New Jersey.

Everyone deserves a healthy smile.

The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

RWJBarnabas Health.

The North Ward Center.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Moving the region through air, land, rail, and sea.

Choose New Jersey.

The Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey.

Community FoodBank of New Jersey.

And by Prudential Financial.

Promotional support provided by CIANJ, and Commerce Magazine.

And by NJ.Com.

Keeping communities informed and connected.

[MOTIVATIONAL MUSIC] - Hi, I'm Steve Adubato, and we kick off this program with our longtime friend and higher ed partner, Dr. Ali Houshmand, President of Rowan University.

Good to see you, Mr. President.

- Good to see you as well, sir.

Glad to be with you.

- Absolutely; is it not a fact that you are celebrating, as we speak, 10 years as president?

- Yes, sir.

- Does it seem longer or shorter?

- Oh, oh, it's a long, long 10 years.

I was gonna say (hands clapping) it's long 100 years, then I realized that it's not 100.

10 years, yeah, it is, and you know, Steve, being a college president, especially now, because, you know, you are basically the protector of the most precious assets that people can have: their children, and that's an enormous responsibility, and if anything happens to any one of them, of course, is of monumental concern.

You think that you have failed, and so being in this position and worrying about that, worrying about budget, worrying about, you know, people showing up to work, remote work, you know, also some issues that we deal with on a daily basis.

You know, those are the challenges, and it makes us strong, but (chuckles) sometimes exhausted.

(fingers tapping) - You know, one of the things, Ali, and I mention you are one of our higher ed, Rowan's one of our higher ed (clears throat) partners.

Excuse me.

One of the things that I'm struck by is, and I was teasing you about this in a good way before we got on the air, always something new going on, particularly around partnerships, collaboration.

Question: there's a federal workforce training grant that has come to Rowan.

What is it, and why is it so important?

- It is very important because what has happened, Steve, forever, for recent, I would say the past 30 years or so in this country, every single individual have assumed that in order to be successful, you have to go and get a four-year college degree rather than getting a dignified, well-paying job that can sustain you, and as a result, you know, we have got this massive $19 million undergraduates, 11 of whom are, you know, on campuses, and everybody wants to get their baccalaureate degree, and when you go to places like county colleges, where you train electricians and plumbers and HVACs and electricians and all these trades and other crafts that the country desperately needs, we don't do that because people look down at those things, and I think the role of the whole education, including senior universities, including research universities, should be the following: what is my responsibility towards the economy of my country and my state?

And I need to do my very best to be an asset there because my sole responsibility is to train the future of America.

If that is my job, then I have to make sure that who I train fits what the needs are, and I think we need to start in thinking that way.

Come down from that ivory tower.

There's nothing wrong with Rowan to do a PhD in molecular biology and have medical schools and at the same time, work in trades, nothing wrong.

It doesn't insult me, and I think we should get to that attitude.

- It's so interesting you talk about this because there are a lotta people who question, and we did an interview with Gary Vaynerchuk, who is an entrepreneur, and people talk a lot about him, and he's been great guest of ours, and he has questioned it.

Now, I'm a big advocate of higher education.

I've been part of that world.

Our son's about to go to college as we speak.

We have another son in college, but the reason I say that is Gary V, as he's called, was questioning the value, and I'm not gonna get into a philosophical debate about the value of college education, but what you're talking about is changing what that education has been historically, and also along those lines, environmental initiatives that you and the university been involved in.

That is more tied not just to the environment and sustainability, but the jobs and the marketplace of tomorrow.

Talk about it, Dr. Houshmand.

- It's exactly.

Look at the future.

To me, the future of the economy of the world circles around having enough water, having enough energy packaged in the smallest packages possible, and having a reliable healthcare for people to function.

These are the areas that are gonna be growing, and all of them are directly, and the other one, of course, is food production.

All of them directly are done, and they're impacting the environment, and we need to use technology to produce these things in such a way that does not deplete the environment further than it has done because as a citizen by myself, I cannot believe anybody who thinks that environmental issues and concerns are hoax.

I just, it's hard for me to believe that.

- But you hear it, Dr. Houshmand.

How do you deal with that when you hear it?

- Well, you have to do, you have to show example and try, keep on educating and debating in a very civilized and a very nice manner to really convince through example what the situation is, and I think part of it is because, you know, sometimes people tend to get the news from certain source other than from older sources.

I myself really watch everything.

I have no problem watching CNN versus Fox versus this, and reading various newspaper.

- PBS is your favorite.

You've told me this personally.

- Yes, yes, it is.

(Steve laughing) - Just wanna clarify.

(laughs) - Yes, yes.

- I'm sorry, a shameless plug for public broadcasting.

I'm sorry.

Pick up your point, Ali.

- So what I'm saying is that I think we need to start looking at these kinda issues a lot more and look at the areas of environmental concern through the new degree programs that we produce.

Right now, for example, Rowan University is very involved in modern agriculture and food production.

As part of the earth sustainability, we're actually hiring a professor in that area.

We have just already hired a farmer.

We have, I actually am a farmer.

I grew about two acres of land where I grow peppers as well as food, and I box these things, and we delivered it to community, to neighborhood for free over the summer.

Last year, we did 11,000 pounds.

This year, it's gonna be significantly more, but through that, I hired students.

I teach them what it takes to grow food so that they can literally see see it from seed to eat, and when they see this kinda thing and they grow to understand what it takes to grow a pound of tomato and what are the better and more creative way for them to start researching to find a better way so that less water can be used, less energy can be used and produce better yield and more nutrition.

These are the kinda thing that we need to teach our future generation.

- Ali, let me ask you something: when you talk to your colleagues, other university and college presidents, and you talk the way you're speaking right now about the need to evolve, adapt, pivot, innovate, et cetera, et cetera, not just with rhetoric, but in reality, you're doing that.

- Mm-hmm.

- Are they mostly supportive, or are they, "What's up with this guy?"

- Well, they're mix of both.

I mean, I have heard a lot about what's up with this guy, and it's okay, and I don't blame them because, you know, it is kind of out-of-the-box, sometimes crazy ideas that you're talking about.

- It's not in the academy, the so-called academy.

- Exactly, exactly.

It's not in the academy.

- I'm sorry, Ali.

- But I've got many of my colleagues who really are thinking the same kind of issues.

They are very creative.

They worry about this thing.

They'll spend their lives doing this thing, and as a result, they also consider these issues one of the challenges because they see this happening in front of us.

- And you gotta stay relevant.

- We have to.

We have no choice.

In today's world, if you don't stay relevant, you just go away.

It's a fact.

- And it's the same thing too for us in broadcasting, in public broadcasting.

- Exactly.

Exactly.

- Can I get this real quick?

The Sweeney Center for Public Policy, 30 seconds, please.

- It's a public policy that is purely academic.

It's part of the Department of Political Science.

Mr. Sweeney, the only role that he has, he changed that.

- Former Senate President.

Go ahead.

- Advisory committee, yes.

Former Senate President.

He's a chair of an advisory committee.

He has no office on our campus.

He's not on any pay.

The only thing that we do, we're genuinely truly trying to bring bipartisan research through papers that they publish for people to judge.

That's really what I see.

That's what I've committed to, and we wanted to do that three years ago.

We applied for a grant.

We didn't get it, and this has happened right now.

I think we have that opportunity to make something because Rowan has grown in all areas, and I think it's an area that we need to truly become a center of providing good information to policymakers, and that's really what I would like to happen.

- No, so let me also say Rowan was, I believe, sponsored one of the, one of the gubernatorial debates was at Rowan, if I'm not mistaken.

- Yes.

- Put together with our partners, I believe, at public television as well.

Ali Houshmand, Dr. Ali Houshmand is the President of Rowan University, 10 years there.

Ali, thank you so much for joining us and being one of our higher ed partners.

Thank you.

- Thank you, sir.

It was a pleasure.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

- You got it.

Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

To watch more Think Tank with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- We are pleased to be joined by Dr. Sidney Whitman, president of dental lifeline network, New Jersey board.

Good to see you, Dr. Whitman.

- My pleasure.

- Doctor, we've done a fair amount of work around oral health and people say, "Oh you do a lot of stuff on oral health."

But oral health is clearly connected to our overall health.

Help people understand that.

- Well, what happens is, the mouth is the gateway to the rest of your body.

If you're not healthy orally, you're not healthy with the rest of your body.

There's certain relationships between cardiovascular disease, diabetes.

Things like that.

So if people who have good oral health or more likely, there's a better correlation between your cardiac health and you'd do better if you have diabetes and things like that.

It's 'coz they're all inflammatory processes.

- So Dr. Whitman, the impact of COVID on our overall oral health.

A.

Is it fair to say that too many of us put it to the side because of COVID?

There's so many other, can't do oral health.

But A, is that true?

And B, what are the implications of that?

- Well, it's very true.

They put it to the side and then as a result, little problems became big problems.

Also as a result, when the dental offices were closed for a period of about 10 weeks there became a backlog of patients.

And with that, with homeschooling and things like that that had to, you know, remote learning, many staff had to stay home once the offices opened and therefore the officers were not and still are not staffed to the same level they were staffed previously pre-COVID.

And that has, combined with some other things to really exacerbate some deficiencies in our health system.

- Dr. Whitman, donated dental services for New Jersey and Connecticut.

What is it because, and I've read about it.

It's very important particularly for people with disabilities and the elderly, but be more specific.

I'm gonna put up a website so people can find out more ahead.

- Dental lifeline network provides comprehensive care for people who are medically compromised, fragile, permanent disabilities, not able to get the care that they need through the ordinary systems that are available.

And it works quite well in New Jersey.

We've been in it since its inception since approximately 1988.

Believe it or not, we've done more than 26 million dollars worth of free dental care over 9,000 patients.

And it'’s, it'’s...

It's all volunteer.

- Where does the money come from, Dr. Whitman?

Delta Dental has been a significant partner with us.

The state of New Jersey has contributed significant amount of funds.

And the various dental agencies have contributed funds towards this.

I mean, we've actually asked the dental societies in New Jersey dental to pitch in some money so we can keep this program alive and they've all willingly done it.

So we have a lot.

- They have?

- Yeah, absolutely.

- And remind people, Dr. Whitman, who exactly is being helped by this?

- Medically fragile people, people that need comprehensive care, elderly people, people who are with permanent disabilities.

And you know, you think of it mostly as older people, but I'm a pediatric dentist.

That's my background.

I've seen children through this program that have severe disabilities that somehow have fallen through the cracks and they couldn't get the help.

So in many instances, it's life saving.

I mean, I'm involved with patients that needed heart surgery but in order to get the heart surgery they had to be cleared dentally and have any dental infections taken care of before you can have heart surgery.

You know, and so it's, it's a very worthwhile program.

And it's just wonderful.

We have over 600 volunteered dentists in New Jersey who actually see patients.

Absolutely volunteer.

- Put up a website, I'm sorry for interrupting, Dr. Whitman.

If someone who is a dentist or knows of a dentist who they think can be helpful, we'll put up a website.

What do they do?

They just volunteer and then people in their community go to them.

They go to the people.

How does that work?

- Well, we have a, for one of a better term, a clearing house.

We have two people.

Just about full time.

Who they apply for, the potential patients apply for their program.

And these dental coordinators find a dentist in their area that can treat them, that has the ability to treat them, and they make the necessary referrals.

And then they find the dental lab.

That's if it requires a dental laboratory for prosthetic work.

They find the lab that's willing to provide that care for free.

We have over a hundred labs in New Jersey and a few that are outside of New Jersey that actually provide that care.

And the dentist, and we're still, listen, we get over 300 applications a year from potential clients for this program.

There is a waiting list because then that takes a while to coordinate everything.

- Sure.

- But we're doing a pretty good job.

I will say that.

And this is a national organization.

We're the New Jersey component.

- Before I let you go, Doctor.

And you're reminding me, every time I do a a program on or a segment on oral health, it reminds me that I'm scheduled for a checkup and a cleaning, right.

It does.

It really does.

But to that end, people's fear, not all of us, some of us, many of us have a fear of dentist.

Of going to the dentist.

How we doing on that?

I know we only have about 30 seconds left, but how we doing on that?

- Okay, we're doing better than we were.

I will tell you this.

Certainly COVID put some fear in people, but we know that those fears, you're safer in a dental office than you are out in the public for all practical purposes.

We have a better record in the dental offices than you do in your supermarket.

But we start, as a pediatric dentist, we start our patients no later than age one.

And we take that fear away from them.

That's what it is.

We do prevention and programming in such a way that it makes it fun to go to the dentist.

- There he is.

He's Dr. Sidney Whitman.

President of of Dental Lifeline Network, New Jersey board.

Good to see you, Dr. Whitman.

Thanks so much.

- My pleasure.

Thanks.

- Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

To watch more Think Tank with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- We're pleased to be joined by Peter Rosario, who is President and CEO of a great organization in Brick City, north New Jersey.

It is LA Casa de Don Pedro.

You'll see the website up.

Peter, good to see you, my friend.

- Great seeing you again, Steve.

Thank you so much for having us.

- You got it.

While the website is up, tell everyone what La Casa is and why it's so significant, particularly for citizens in and around the city of Newark.

- La Casa is essentially the largest Latinx lead agency in the state of New Jersey, started as a place based CDC in the lower Broadway neighborhood when we had a bunch of a childcare moms join with the community activists named Ramon Rivera.

Found the agency in the wake of the riots, and turbulent times.

- Rebellion of 1967 and as a very young kid in Newark, I remember Ramon and the work that he did.

So again, I'm sorry.

- Yes, yeah, so exactly.

And essentially, basically fighting for the rights of Latinx population then, and obviously with our black brothers, and sisters fighting to make Newark the best place to live.

And that led to us being a multifaceted, you know,one thing I would always say there isn'’t... "There isn't a solution that we don't like to take on, right."

So we do aids work, we do weatherization, we do early childhood education, we do after school enrichment program, we do mental health services, workforce development, Welfare to wrok, those kinds of things.

- And along those lines, Peter, you know that we're doing a series, an ongoing series for several years called Reimagine Childcare and La Casa has been very involved in the childcare situation, and the crisis, if you will, affordable, accessible childcare, as we put up the Reimagined Childcare website, let me ask you.

The impact of COVID on affordable, accessible, quality childcare, Peter Rosario, go ahead.

- In a word, devastating.

I think it can't be understated, we have a crisis in our state, and it's gonna take a whole of government and philanthropy, and the social sector, educational sector to rebuild it.

You know, we are lucky, I hate to say lucky that we're back up to 80% of enrollment and we're probably one of the better ones in the city and in the state.

And I think it's an ongoing situation.

(computer chimes) Wraparound services need to be reinstated, and fully funded to make sure that parents have a full workday not the school day.

We know that for our youngest parents three o'clock is just not enough.

So I think it, you know.

And I would say this, "If you see a childcare worker, you should thank them.

If you have a childcare worker."

I've done this work for 25 years, did it in the heart of 911 in Flushing Queens when things were bad there, but this is the worst year that childcare professionals have had throughout the state in terms of dealing with the issues with our youngest learners in terms of equity, in terms of mental health, in terms of physical health and wellbeing.

So I think we really, you know, I know we always say thank the fire fighter, thank the nurse, I think we gotta put childcare workers in that category.

- Thank the childcare worker professional, yeah.

- Right, thank the childcare worker.

- Hey, Peter, try this.

We've talked a lot about, we're well over two years into this pandemic in the spring and going to the summer of 2022.

So I'm curious, La Casa's been very involved in promoting, advocating vaccines.

What kind of progress have we made?

A, particularly in communities of color?

And B how far behind are we even now?

- That's a great question.

I think two prongs to it.

First, we should celebrate, this is by far the fairest and most equitable access to a vaccine that has ever happened in the history of this country, right.

There was- - And they haven't always been fair and equitable, but go ahead.

- Right.

And that's the whole, right?

I think we need to start with the positives, the headline.

I think La Casa and agencies who had that boots on the ground, the trusted voice, really were the ones who had to build trust in the vaccine, 'cause as we know, people of color, rightfully so, are very skeptical of vaccines.

Our approach was a little bit different at La Casa even for our employees.

And I think if I had to put a stamp on what our success story was, we got to 95% vaccination rate of our staff without threatening to fire people.

We had to put- - How'd you do that, Peter?

How'd you do that?

You didn't make it mandatory, you didn't say we're gonna fire you.

How did you do that?

How'd you encourage and get those high numbers?

- So I had to send out all the official notifications.

Right?

For a headstart.

So I did those but I also followed them up with the, "Hey, we're gonna work with you on this."

We had staff meetings, we had town hall.

I went one on one to meet with people, I can tell you.

I had folks...

I did a raffle that I gave out thousand dollars gift cards to five of our staff, $500 gift cards to thank them.

I could tell you that even after that, I had, you know, one of our staff who's an aunt, said, "I'm a firm, anti-vaxxer.

I do not believe this works, but you've respected us, you've treated us with dignity, you haven't vilified us, so I'm gonna do this because I want to keep my job.

And I believe in what La Casa is doing in terms of balancing the right approach."

Was it perfect?

No, but I think it really...

This is one of those where we measured twice, and cut once in terms of not firing people early on.

And I think it paid off in terms of building trust.

And again, my sentiment to the staff always is, "Our staff, our colleagues are our first customers."

So if we can't do this in a fair fashion with them.

Then how can we expect them to go out in the community and do it fairly?

- Peter, I got about a minute left, so I'm gonna open up the Pandora's box here.

But the issue of immigration, huge issue in our state and our region and our nation, particularly for an organization like La Casa.

For the people you serve, many of them are not legal citizens.

They are just people in need, people in the community.

To what degree has that situation been exacerbated through the pandemic?

- Do I have to say devastating again?

You know, I think it's a recurring theme.

- You're the one doing the work, Peter, not me, you're doing it.

- You know, they're our neighbors, they're our friends, they're our business owners.

We have to get over the vilification of immigrants.

This state, by and large, is one of the richest states in the country, if not the richest.

And it is largely due to the immigrant population, and making sure they feel welcome and on their labor.

So everything we need to do, right the excluded New Jerseyans funds, it needs to be extended, we need to add more money to that, we need to continue learning the lessons we learned in terms of food access, and everything to support families and keep them going.

- I'll let you go on this.

Is it still as challenging as it's always been, or even more so to raise money to keep La Casa going?

I know that we have to do it 24/7 here at the Caucus Education Corporation and in public broadcasting.

Go ahead, no money, no mission, go.

- Yeah.

I think we need the support, the extraordinary support that people extended, generosity for COVID, we need them to keep it going, right.

We were blessed to have new time, one time donors.

We hope they become sustaining donors.

I think if you opened your pocket book a little extra for COVID, keep in mind that if you can keep that in your budget, we need to keep those funds going, because now is the economic pandemic.

That's what's starting now.

- And the people that are disproport-- listen, we've all been affected by COVID.

But the reality is the people that La Casa serves disproportionately affected, it's worse, it just is for a million reasons.

Peter Rosario, President and CEO, La Casa de Don Pedro in Newark, New Jersey.

Good to see you, Peter, talk soon.

- Thank you.

- I'm Steve Adubato, that's Peter.

And thank you so much for watching.

We'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by Delta Dental of New Jersey.

The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

RWJBarnabas Health.

The North Ward Center.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Choose New Jersey.

The Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey.

Community FoodBank of New Jersey.

And by Prudential Financial.

Promotional support provided by CIANJ, and Commerce Magazine.

And by NJ.Com.

- New Jersey's early educators and childcare providers are more than twice as likely to live below the poverty line versus the general workforce.

Reimagine Childcare formed by a coalition in New Jersey is dedicated to improving accessibility, affordability and quality of childcare and re-imagining the way we support these essential providers.

Learn more by visiting ReimagineChildCare.org.