Welcome to Digication Scholars Conversations.
I'm your host, Jeff Yan.
In this episode, you will hear part two of my conversation with Sylvia Spears,
Provost and Vice President for Lifelong Learning at College Unbound . More
links and information about today's conversation can be found on Digication's
Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
For episodes of Digication Scholars Conversations, Can be found on
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I want people to understand who are listening to this, right?
To understand that.
So, so what is in fact, you know, a gathering, a class, a meal?
What, what is that at College Unbound comparing to other places?
Because I think that people still have this idea that going to college looks
a lot like there's some like massive lecture hall and this professor deliver.
Really either, you know, if, if you're watching a movie, you know,
it's Sir Anthony Hopkins having delivered the greatest lecture, you
know, or Morgan Freeman having done it, you know, or that it's something
that's like, okay, super boring.
It's just a bunch of like PowerPoint slides.
It's someone just reading through.
Um, I, I think that people.
I wanted people to just paint a picture of what does that look like?
What's the, what, what is, what does it mean to come to a college unbound class?
How often do you come to this class and why is there a meal beforehand?
And how do you structure all of that?
Cause I know it's very different.
I've been through all these and it's just, it completely changed my mind.
It just blew my mind and changed my mind about higher education, you know?
Yeah.
All students.
As they come into College Unbound, come into a cohort, so a group
of no more than 10 students.
That class is called the Lab, World and Workplace Lab.
And it is the place where students meet once a week.
With a lab faculty member as a facilitator and a guide, and they,
um, most, the vast majority of those classes happen face to face.
So they come, um, we spend time together in community.
There's announcements, there's brags, there's what's happening in the world.
Occasionally a student will get up and Say I'd like to share something
and they share a spoken word piece.
They share a song.
They share that they, their daughter just graduated from, from high school.
Uh, so it's really community based time.
And that breaking bread is not just, Oh, we have to feed people
because they're coming from work.
It's intentional because it sets the tone for a particular way of being together.
It also means that people have a time to pause.
before they transition into, um, into their lab class.
And so people pause, um, and laugh and joke and, um, reconnect
with one another after a week.
And then they go into their, the lab.
And the lab is a place where students make meaning of all of the
other classes that they're having.
And so a typical semester is a, um, uh, a lab for 16 weeks.
And then, um, What we call instructional courses are eight weeks in duration.
And so the instructional courses are delivered synchronously or asynchronously
online, but the lab is the home base.
And in the lab, students are really developing and cultivating
a project that they care about, a community based project.
And the projects can range from somebody who decides they want
to launch a mentoring program for African American males.
Or they want to, um, create an after school program, um, for
students with special needs.
Or they want to do advocacy around housing at the Statehouse.
So the projects come from students interests.
And that is what's cultivated and developed in the course of the lab over
the time that the students are at CU.
To make what the being in class feels like I'll share a little bit about
a course I'm teaching right now.
There's, um, there's one major, Organizational Leadership and Change.
And every student is connected in that major because they're drawn to CU not only
because they want a degree, but because they want to create change in the world.
So one of the required courses is Reframing Failure.
We meet on Thursday evenings online.
It's synchronously, so I get to see their faces, which is great.
And, um, it's very much problem posing, education, and inquiry based.
So, a recent assignment, as an example, was, or discussion, was asking students
to think about Biggest failure they think they've had in their lives, and they, they
do, you know, some folks it was things like dropping out of school, you know,
at 16, or making a mistake that ended them with a period of incarceration,
not intervening with a child that they have that was abusing drugs.
Um, you know, real, real life stuff, hard stuff.
We don't ask them to say those things just because we want them
to be in the depth of despair.
We have that as part of the class so that they can re evaluate why they
think those things were a failure.
Were they really a failure or was it a set of circumstances?
And that some that they couldn't control and some that they couldn't control.
And then we start to unpack.
Where do the messages come from about what's a failure?
You know, someone would say, I didn't go to college.
I could have gone to college and I didn't.
That's a failure.
And I'll say to them, You're in college and you're going
to graduate in two semesters.
Is it still a failure?
And then on their own, they start to develop an understanding of the
many, many things they learned from that failure, the insights that they
gained, the person that they became.
And sometimes they even realize Wait a minute.
Yeah, there were some, um, things that they regret, but
maybe it wasn't a failure.
It was a step on the way to something that was better.
And so, that's just an example of a conversation in a course
called Reframing Failure.
Imagine courses around leadership and change, around, um, organizational
studies and understanding how organizations function.
It's designed to give them all of the skills, knowledge, and expertise,
um, to enact the kind of change they want to see in the world.
It, it's, it's so amazing to hear about these courses and experience.
These are the kind of courses that it feels like.
It feels like a, it feels like a very meaningful, fun, and
worthwhile learning experience.
It does not feel like the kind of things where you go, Oh yeah, I got class.
Oh, I got a paper due tomorrow.
Oh, I got a final.
You know how it is, right?
Yeah.
I think these are the types of things that I can see your student,
and I have seen your students.
They don't just go in, And they're not going in thinking,
Oh, man, I have to do this.
It's more like, I get to do this.
It's a really different, it just come from a really different place.
I also want to talk a little bit about maybe a couple of things
that you had, you had said.
It's about doing the, you know, the labs, they're doing these projects together.
I want to talk about the role of the institution for a moment.
And maybe even somewhat of a.
Well, it's by design, really, but it's also a product of the institution,
the impact of an institution.
I think sometimes we don't talk about that a lot, and we can reframe that, you know,
we can look at it in every institution.
I've been involved in many institutions as well.
What do the communities think of them?
Are they bringing in
knowledge, people, economy, you know, are they bettering the,
the, the community in some ways?
And sometimes they're not.
You had mentioned very early on that at least one of the institutions in
your home state sits on native land,
you know, there.
I'm not, I I, I don't think you were even saying, well, whether the
institution is a good institution.
It's just a very fact that at some point.
A large group of people were displaced because of the institution, right?
But College Unbound doesn't work like that.
In fact, in your very design, your students, you said, we have cohorts, a
class of 10 ish, you know, students in, in each of these groups, and there are many,
many groups, and each student developed, A project based on the passion that
does something to better the community.
So even, even if we take one single cohort,
you would have done 10 things to your community to better that community.
Whether like you said, it's an after school program, whether it's a, I
talked to Jose Rodriguez who started a free Haircut service for kids.
I talked to, um, one of your, one of your alum who I was so amazed by it.
She, she created a, um, swim less free swim lessons for, um, kids who.
don't typically get the privilege to have swim lessons.
So they will lack a major skill, literal survival skill.
Yeah.
Right.
Um, so your students are out there.
Not only are they learning and gaining, gaining skills, by the
way, in, I really, truly believe in deeper, faster, more impactful ways.
They really are better learners.
It's just, it's almost like saying.
Yeah.
It's the more efficient way to learn through that experience.
It's, it beats them reading, you know, 10 books.
It just does because it, you know, they're not thinking about the
theories and what the hypotheticals they have to solve the problem.
Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
Because there are real lives at stake that they have to figure out how to do this.
That's right.
And And, but they are making all these difference in communities, just
as a, you can call it by product.
I think it's by design.
Yeah, it is of your institution, you know, and people are learning at the same time.
I mean, there is so many wins here that I'm just looking at this.
I'm going.
Oh my god, we've, traditionally, we get some wins, but we
get mostly losses, you know?
Yeah, yeah, that's so true.
And the fact that you have to occupy the city and the campus
and building, you know, buildings for classrooms and administration.
College Unbound doesn't do that.
Nope.
Right.
It's amazing.
And the fact that you can do that allows you to be nimble and flexible.
You can go into communities and serve it as they need to.
Yeah.
And deliver the, the, the program, the education in the context of community.
So even now in Rhode Island, um, we make use of the, um, The Met School facilities
We don't have our facilities, which means we don't have all of that overhead.
Our, um, dollars are spent on delivery of the program to students and supporting
those students to be successful.
And we also have, um, Um, two cohorts of people, uh, in Central Falls in Rhode
Island, in Woonsocket in Rhode Island, in Newport in Rhode Island, um, in
Philadelphia, uh, in, uh, Camden, and so where a partnership or a relationship
grows with a Community based organization.
If they say, oh, we've got, you know, folks who are interested in getting their
degree and it seems like a good fit, an organization can say, yeah, and when we
close at five o'clock, the cohort can meet in the, in our conference room.
Then it makes it easier for employees.
They don't have to go anywhere.
They just switch, they get some food, and they begin their evening for class.
So, we're in community and we're of community.
And so what's interesting, there is no, you know, in traditional settings,
there's the town gown relationship.
The college and the community.
We know sometimes those relationships can be really contentious or it can
even be that the college has come in and swooped up land and some people would
say, Oh, they, um, developed an area.
Other people would say they gentrified an area and pushed
out folks in that community.
Uh, another college I worked at just before, um, College Unbound, beautiful
community, beautiful college, expanding college, right on the Boston Common.
Okay, that's great.
Yeah, you know, if you were 18 years old, wouldn't you want to go to a college
where your view is on the Boston Common?
But as the college spread back, it also displaced folks in Chinatown.
And so, That is often the story of colleges, and College
Unbound, uh, intentionally seeks to be in and of community.
If you go to, um, events in the City of Providence that are trying to create a
better city, a better lived experience for the residents of the Providence
area, you'll see on committees, in the audience, um, leading discussions,
advocating for change, Just like a sea of College Unbound students, whether they're
alums or previous students or folks who are alums who now work in City Hall.
They are just in the community and shaping change in, in their circles
that seem to be ever expanding.
And so you're right, there is this, um, kind of magical, you know, You know,
stones in a pond, you know, you throw a stone and the ripples just keep going.
So every cohort, 10 stones, uh, that are creating change in the world.
It's amazing.
Cause I, I, I, I sometimes think that, and in fact, these literal, I
mean, I don't know whether they're competitions or ranking or whatever,
you know, you call them really exist.
Most beautiful campuses in the United States.
Right.
And I, I, I can see how Um, enamored one can be when you step foot on
a campus and it's got, you know, the grand, um, you know, campus.
And I, I don't want to name names because they're really beautiful campus.
And you, you're like, wow, I belong to this,
this
space.
But at the same time, I don't think that, I think that it's.
Crazy that an institution is judged by the square footage that they have.
Yeah.
Right.
As opposed to the impact that have on that community itself.
Right.
So it's almost like this kind of idea of ownership of square footage or whatever.
At some point, I think it was, it was really for a real purpose.
You know, I, you know, we need a place to convene and whatnot.
But.
They became extremely permanent and those things drive one thing, drive another.
Now you have to hire people to do that, to maintain them.
And, and then there's the cost.
And when we think about sort of problems of higher education, I
think cost and affordability is definitely one of the things.
And like what you have just shown and proven to us that you can get an
actual better space, more convenient space for those who actually are
attending this school, um, for.
A fraction of the cost.
By the way, there is cost to what you do.
Yeah.
Because you know what you do?
You spend money on providing meals to them.
You spend money on providing child care for those who
actually come to attend school.
You don't get to go to Dartmouth and come to class and say
like, here, here is my kid.
Can you drop him off for this?
You don't get to do that.
No.
And you should, given that money that you're paying.
Um, and so I think that's, that's a, it's, it's, it's just really, really smart.
I think that you've really done so much of that re imagining higher education that
it really, it's, it's, it's subtle in the smallest details, kind of like what you're
saying, breaking bread isn't just to, yes, on one hand, we want to feed them.
We want them to have the energy to, to, to carry on after a day of work and all that.
But it's also a pause and also a time to reflect and reset.
I just love all these really smart, in a way it seems simple, but like
amazing solutions often seem simple once you've come up with them.
And I think that that's, that's what you've done at College Unbound.
I think it's really amazing.
Um, can I talk a little bit more about this sort of relationship building?
I think that there is a, um, one could also say, Hey, I attended a school.
I had great relationships with my classmates.
A lot of times they develop that relationship, maybe at a fraternity or
in a dorm room, or maybe through clubs, athletics, you know, what have you.
I actually have found that many of them, they do have relationships.
I don't want to say they don't, but the relationship is not very deep when it
comes to the academic side of the house.
So if you took a math class together or writing class together, actually in many
places, and I, this is not the case in all, all places, in fact, we work with
a lot of schools at Digication, very privileged to do so where they, they do
a lot of sharing by the nature of their work, but in many traditional classrooms.
Actually, you don't even know what the next person is
writing in that writing class.
In fact, you're not allowed to share.
You're not encouraged to share.
Sometimes you're not allowed to share, right?
Because it's like, it's, it's like the, you know, like this is my stuff.
This is your stuff.
So actually, No one ever, like, people don't get to learn from each other very
much, and I, I know that that's not the case in all classrooms, you know,
I know that, you know, that's not the case, you know, in fact, that's very
much what I try to help people do as well, you know, using, you know, our, our
platform, but, but at College Unbound, when you talked about this cohort of
people, I want people to realize that In those, you said 16 weeks in the lab?
Mm hmm.
In those 16 weeks, Each person is coming up with these projects and their passion,
and they are telling each other every single week, what their progress is,
what their hurdles are, what's going on, you know, what are the changes, you
know, if they had to change an idea and then they all have each other's back by
giving each other feedback and responses in, in a way that, and I, I love this
because You have 10 students in there.
They are not doing one project.
They're doing one of their own project and nine of the other
people's projects at the same time.
You get invested into them, right?
If someone is doing that after school program, you're not
doing the after school program.
Someone else is doing the after school program and you get to You
thought of something, you'd help them.
You
know someone in a school who might be a good point, a contact person
to start the absence school program.
You make the connections for them, right?
You become each other's support structure.
So when you're talking about relationship is different from that
of People thinking, well, these are my college buddies relationship.
Absolutely.
These are people that you went to do extraordinary work together and you
respect and understand each other, both at an intellectual level, but also at
the, at a very deep, um, sort of the deep respect to the people's core values.
Yeah, absolutely.
That's different in my mind than just saying, you know, It's sort of like
your, you know, um, uh, uh, buddy for going to football games together.
Yeah.
Because the, um, the, the, the kind of personal experience and the academic
experience are are connected, as opposed to, oh, my social and personal life
happens only outside of the classroom.
It's, it's, they're all, they're the same.
People aren't leaving themselves, part of themselves at the
door when they come into lab.
And they're in that lab for 16 weeks of every semester that
they're enrolled at College Unbound.
So they're with those same folks through the whole experience.
And when they graduate.
It's, they talk about each other as extended family.
They're no longer just a peer in a, in a, oh yeah, we went to college.
They are tight and when, you know, somebody from the cohort walks
across the stage at commencement, I don't know who's louder.
Is it the family in the back who's louder or is it that cohort who's just
screaming their heart out and with tears and high fives and hugs and it, it is.
The celebration of one.
is the celebration of the whole.
And so there's something really, really powerful in the relationships
that are formed in the lab.
They are, as you noted, supporting each other, talking about each
other, giving each other feedback.
So there's all of the stuff that's related to the, the learning.
And then They're even kind of giving a hand up when something goes wrong.
So somebody's car breaks down and they, they write to their cohort, uh,
you know, in Snapchat and say, I'm not going to make it to class tonight.
My car is broken.
10 minutes later, somebody is like, hold on.
Nope, we're not doing that.
I'll come get you.
Give me your address.
And next thing you know, that student's in class.
Um, that's how they have each other's backs.
And there's some formal things that we do to, to also support that.
So, based on the project, every student develops a personal learning network.
So, four or five people.
That they believe have wisdom, expertise, experience that's going
to help them with their project.
Somebody that they can, um, be in touch with informally or
formally to advance their project.
So every student has a personal learning network that they've identified.
Which means the, you know, the value of relationships.
in CU's educational model is probably the highest priority.
And it's so consistent with some of the values that we have around learning and
how learning happens, how it happens best is always in, in the context of community.
And so we do a lot to cultivate, um, both spontaneous as well as intentional.
Moments for people to be in relationship with one another.
And that's, that's where the best learning comes from.
So, I mean, I think that at this point, if people are listening to this, at
this point, you're thinking, this is an amazing, beautiful, magical college.
It must cost a hundred-K, twenty-K to attend.
No,
Sylvia, what is, how much, how much does this whole thing cost?
I mean, it's high touch, small classes.
You're providing.
Food and childcare.
How, I mean, and then you were talking about this population of people who may
not, shouldn't have been able to afford college, how there's some, there's an
imbalance here, you know, like how, how much is this thing going to cost them?
Uh, it's, uh, about 10, 000 a year.
10, 000 a year and they have to do it for six years?
No, most students, it's two years.
Two years?
Maybe two and a half at the most.
To get a bachelor's
degree.
Yeah, because many of them have, they're coming with credits or they
have lived experience that is, um, valuable experience that can be
reviewed through portfolio for credit.
And so we take the experience if somebody was a caregiver of an elderly parent and
as part of that process had to understand medicines and all kinds of health
related activities and really can provide evidence of deep learning around health
and well being and, uh, all of that.
They, they may submit a portfolio that reflects on that learning that provides
evidence of that learning and then they actually can receive credit for learning.
So, you can't be somebody who's lived in the world and at your 35,
40 years old and you and not have learned deep skills and knowledge
and so we value that, that knowledge.
And so somebody might come in and they might have 20 credits from community
college, but they might do portfolios and give themselves a bump and then
do the major and then do additional credits so that it's around two years.
Um, there have been a handful of mighty people who have
done it in a year in a summer.
And got their bachelor's degree.
It's, it's amazing.
Just, just to describe to folks, these are people who traditional
college might have failed them.
The society, the community in which they live in may have failed them.
And that they are stuck in a space, in a, in, in, in a, in a, in a phase of their
lives where they literally are stuck.
They, they don't have a way to go and get a degree.
If they could get a degree, they might've gotten a better job.
You know, better pay or better outcome in, you know, the current, you know, the
job and a career, but they couldn't do it.
They couldn't, they couldn't have the ability.
They don't have the ability to go back to school to do it.
Now one could say, well, they could go to community college
and do it and sort of part time.
And so there are actually other opportunities to do
things part time as well.
Right.
But these are schools that are not designed to help people like them.
Actually, that's most people, right?
They're not designed to help most people's real lives.
They're, you know, they're designed for people who are
willing to sacrifice so much.
Of what life really should be, should be for them in order to get that degree.
The sacrifice, the sacrificing sometimes is too much.
Maybe it's in the, in the, in the, you know, um, um, for someone who's,
uh, who has young children, for example, just couldn't do it, right?
So they're stuck in the part of the face of their life where there's no no
possible forward movement in bettering themselves, or at least that's how it
is.
And that they can come to College Unbound, first of all, is much,
much, much less expensive.
But second, is that they could do, they could actually obtain an accredited
4 year bachelor's degree, what's traditionally a 4 year bachelor's degree.
In, in some cases, a year and a bit, but most of the time,
two, two and a half years.
That's incredible.
Yeah.
And that degree is accessible because of how the, the curricular model
is delivered, that it's relevant to the work that they're doing.
So it's not like, Oh, I have to stop doing what I'm doing to go to college.
It actually feeds into the work that they're doing.
So many people, even before they graduate, will be recognized by their
employers and move into other roles.
Um, for some students, they graduate and, um, as soon as they can, show that
diploma, they're promoted, you know, a 15, 000 or 20, 000 bump is, is real.
That's something that can materially change the experience of, of students.
And if you can change the, the experience of a mother who's raising kids on
her own, or a dad who's out there struggling, or somebody who's in a multi
generational household, you can change the trajectory of that entire family.
And so that's why CU is committed to removing barriers, um, and as
many barriers as we can so folks can just do the work that they need
to do, um, to advance their lives and to make change in the world.
And I have to say, There are days when it feels like a really magical
place, especially when you're hanging out with students and the work
behind the scenes to ensure that we don't unintentionally replicate
the stuff that's in higher ed.
The traditional things in higher ed is real work, um, because all of us, whether
we've been higher ed professionals or community, uh, worked in community
organizations, all of us as a staff and faculty have been acculturated, socialized
into a different model of education.
Yeah,
and we're committed to learning from traditional higher
education, but not replicating it.
And so how we're always in the process of becoming, always in the
process of innovating, of asking ourselves, why are we doing this?
Uh, is it going to build relationships?
Is it going to advance equity?
Is it, um, you know, replication just for the sake of replication?
Is it meeting the needs of our students?
Is the student voice actually fundamental to our decision making?
And if it's not, if we answer no to any of those things, then we need to take a pause
before we do anything because we don't want to replicate or to become the very
thing that we're trying to work against.
That's amazing, Sylvia.
I, I was going to ask you, but I think you actually pre answered that question,
which was, you know, if I was, if I'm listening to this, I'm, I'm an admin,
I'm a dean and an administrator.
I'm someone with the power to change, to make significant impact in my
current institution that is not CU, and maybe we suffer from some of
the things that we had talked about.
Mm hmm.
Maybe I didn't even realize we were suffering from it
until you talked about it.
We thought those are good things, but now I realize, oh, hold on a minute.
Um, you know, I, I think that you gave people so much hope, but
also a practical real example, a model, a roadmap to say, Hey, look,
acknowledge some of these things that, that may not be, you know, we
sometimes have metrics in our lives, you know, that, that were given to
us that didn't have a good, they weren't good metrics to begin with.
And yet, because they were the ones given to us, we take that as, you The
effect, and sometimes they're not, and we have to reexamine those things.
And I think all those things that you just talked about give people,
um, maybe a starting point, right?
Yeah.
You think, do you believe that, do you believe that there is.
What is your magic wand?
Not magic wand overnight.
I think magic wand overnight doesn't work.
I think that's just, you know, that's just silly, but magic wand in 30 years, Sylvia,
a 30 year long magic wand, you get to, Do the wand, but it doesn't come true.
It's going to take small parts every day for the next 30 years for it to come true.
What does that magic wand looks like for higher education for you?
Wow.
I love that question.
Um, I think it would look like, um, not that colleges there'd be, um, more CUs or
colleges would look more like CU, but CU.
The model that CU uses would be, um, already a thing of the past because
we would have actually developed the next level of innovation that, that,
um, that the basis of CU in, in 10 years is in colleges already and that
colleges are creating the next iteration of what it means to meet the needs
of students because it's not static.
The needs of students will change.
Barriers will change and how do we ensure that every college, every
community is actually dismantling the things that do not serve students
and building the things that do.
And so, I'm looking for what's the next innovation that springs out of CU and all
of the CU like institutions or all of the CU like communities of practice within
institutions that then actually have a very different landscape for higher ed.
That it all looks different.
And, um, things like Relationship and relevance are embedded
fully in every college, every institution across the country.
And that people actually have access, that they're, that they
are more of community, uh, and less set aside on a hill somewhere.
What a beautiful, beautiful vision.
I can't think of a better time to, to end our conversation, but to leave everyone
here listening, think about that, ponder.
And maybe I don't, we don't usually do this at these conversations, but I think
this is a point for people to think about, well, what, what are some things that
you can do in your community to, if you agree with what Sylvia is saying to, to,
to help that become a reality, because I think that is a beautiful, beautiful,
um, sounds like a magical place to be.
And I think that, you know, if people are willing to.
Put in some work into going towards that goal.
I think I, I really think that is it's, it's, it's a realistic goal, um, that
one could have, it's not magic wand in that it's just potion and pixie dust.
I think it's.
I think that you are, you are starting there and you are doing it.
And I think with, you know, with more people knowing about this, um,
it could really be a reality and I'm so glad to be in the beginning
of these conversations with you.
Only 14 years in, in, in, in, in establishment and, but, but the, but some
of the most amazing discoveries today.
I hope that everyone enjoyed this, um, this conversation with Sylvia.
Thank you, Sylvia, so much for being, um, sharing your insights.
I, I, I love this and I hope that we continue this conversation.
It's been a pleasure.
Take care, Sylvia.
You too.
Coming up next, we'll be chatting with Matthew Street, senior lecturer in
Spanish at the University of Virginia.
Here's a quick preview
and just encourage them to, to start creating with the language, like you
mentioned, like you mentioned earlier.
You know, I want the students to, to be comfortable.
My job there is to kind of gently push students towards things and
encourage them to organize on their own.