Cathy Ackerman: Welcome to Sweet Tea and Strategy, a podcast by Ackermann Marketing and PR featuring business and community leaders throughout Tennessee talking about issues and trends of importance to our state and beyond, and sharing some of their very best sweet tea recipes and maybe some tea-sipping stories. I'm Cathy Ackerman and I'm very pleased to welcome Dr. Philip Oldham, President of Tennessee Tech University to our podcast today. Before we talk about Tennessee Tech though, I would love to spend just a minute or two hearing any sweet tea stories that you might want to share Dr. Oldham. Did you grow up on sweet tea, acquire a later-in-life taste for it, or maybe even not like it in spite of being here in the South?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Oh no, I am a Southern boy. If I get cut, I bleed sweet tea.
Cathy Ackerman: There you go.
Dr. Philip Oldham: And I am the sweet tea maker at my house. I don’t know, I must make a gallon a day because everybody goes through it.
Cathy Ackerman: Wow! So you’re a true aficionado of sweet tea and you even make it and your family loves it.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, you gotta sweeten it while it’s still warm, that’s the trick.
Cathy Ackerman: That’s—we keep hearing that that’s the real trick to the best sweet tea, but anyway, thanks for sharing that with us.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well I’ll give you another one real quick. My background, I’m a chemist, so I taught chemistry for a long time and that’s the way I used to teach my students about solubility because in the South you can use sweet tea as a good example because everybody drank it. So I told them you can't sweeten it while it's cold because the sugar is not as soluble when it's cold as when it's hot. So they understood that concept real quick.
Cathy Ackerman: That’s—we need to teach more chemistry like that, maybe kids would be even more interested in it if it was related to food.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, I think you’re right.
Cathy Ackerman: Okay well thanks for indulging us on that little topic. I'd like to turn now to the more serious topic of higher education and first tell us your most important priorities and challenges in overseeing and directing the activities of over—I think it’s over 10,000 university students now. And maybe approach your answer to the question initially from an overall normalized standpoint and then from a pandemic-specific standpoint because I think we really cannot ignore the fairly drastic changes that higher education is having to face right now as we speak.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, well thank you, that’s a great question and there’s a lot of layers to that obviously. But let me just start from, you know, under normal circumstances higher education today is so vitally important. We know that the bulk of new jobs being created require extended education. So graduates with a Bachelor's degree or more of higher education have a much better career potential in the future than those that don't, career earnings are significantly higher. And for the most part, it doesn't matter much what you study, interestingly enough. College graduates just on general do a lot better, tend to live longer, they make more money, their quality of life is better. So it's vitally important, probably more important now than ever to continue education.
Dr. Philip Oldham: But you know, what you hear so much in the media today is how relevant is it? Does it really lead to a good job, a good career? We know the cost of higher education, particularly private higher education, is unapproachable for some in our society and that's sad. So one thing that we try to do here at Tennessee Tech is to ensure that it's approachable, it's affordable for anybody. Anybody that has the ability and interest in pursuing higher education, we want to make it available to them.
Dr. Philip Oldham: So, you know, accessibility is a big part of what we do at Tennessee Tech. It’s very important for higher education in general to be accessible and affordable and not to saddle graduates with a lifetime of student loan debt in order to achieve it. So the value proposition is very important, but it also, you know, it needs to lead to something tangible. And so, you know, the matching or the lining up of academic programs with career opportunities becomes even more important because of the investment that's being made by students and their families.
Dr. Philip Oldham: So I think in general you see higher education beginning to do a much better job of that and trying to align academic programs with career opportunities and to ensure that students, graduates, have maximum flexibility in their careers because we also know that, for example, the average college graduate today is expected to change careers about eight times in their life. So what they're studying in college and even what they're doing maybe the first four or five years out of college is probably not what they're going to be doing five years later, ten years later, or certainly by the time they’re at retirement age. So they've got to be agile, they've got to be flexible and we need to help prepare them for that kind of life.
Dr. Philip Oldham: So you know, that's really what we do to a large extent. Now under these circumstances with the COVID-19 pandemic, it makes all that probably just much more enhanced and much more challenging in some ways. To try to do all that while at the same time maximizing flexibility in course offering so that students can engage either in person or online as necessary depending on their personal circumstances and health conditions. So, you know, giving options, using technology to the fullest extent to maximize those opportunities and the flexibility.
Dr. Philip Oldham: But it's a challenge, we feel good about it right now. We have about a third of our courses are fully online, about a third are pretty traditional in person and then that middle third is sort of hybrid, it's got some online and some in person. And the students that are on campus—we have most all of our 10,000 students on campus right now—and they're all really doing a great job practicing social distancing and wearing face masks and keeping their hands washed and all the things that you would expect under these conditions. So we're really proud of them and we’re proud of the effort the faculty and support staff have done to prepare the campus for this kind of situation.
Cathy Ackerman: You know, I was asked several years ago when I was giving a talk to students in the marketing communication area to address the topic of whether they needed to have a degree in that particular discipline to come to work for a company like ours. And the answer that I gave was a resounding no. I mean they need to know the basic things that we do for our clients all day every day and much of that we can teach on the spot. But what I really look for, what we really look for in hiring college graduates, are people who can think strategically and who have the ability to be flexible and to not be fearful of going into new challenging areas and activities that they've never done before. So I think that’s one of the most valuable things that higher education teaches students is just how to sort of move forward in the world and be a contributor to that world in whatever career they choose. And knowing that people do change seven or eight times sometimes in the course of their career, figuring out how that critical thinking skill can take the things that they've learned into maybe totally different career options for them later I think is very important, so I’m tracking completely with what you’re saying there.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, I think you’re right. We use as a motto here at Tennessee Tech because we're the Golden Eagles, that's our mascot—
Cathy Ackerman: What a great mascot!
Dr. Philip Oldham: So we kind of play off of that and we talk about our graduates and our students being bold, fearless, and confident, just like the eagle. Now we’ve added to it, particularly in this situation, to be kind. Kindness is so important, it doesn't really matter how smart you are or how good you are, kindness probably gets you further than anything in this world. So that's what we teach and that's what we try to live by.
Cathy Ackerman: So in terms of your communications strategies these days and your challenges in particular during COVID-19, do you find yourself communicating more than you ever have before with students and I guess with their parents as well who may be concerned about safety on campus and issues like that? What are you doing in particular to try to communicate or over-communicate or make sure that people feel comfortable with the route that you’re taking knowing that it’s probably going to change between now and the end of the year?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, it’s taking an already difficult environment to communicate in to an even higher level of difficulty quite honestly. College campuses are possibly one of the most difficult communities to communicate with because it's so spread out, it's so diverse. Everybody’s smart, it’s not a question of intelligence, but they're all busy and they're all engaged and so they're not necessarily paying attention all the time to every little thing and they get inundated with information. And so they're pretty good at filtering out things that they're not interested in at the moment.
Dr. Philip Oldham: And so communication is extremely difficult and I can assure you my background as a chemist did not prepare me for that part of the responsibilities of this job. And your multi-audiences are probably difficult as well, you’re probably hearing more from parents than you used to hear from parents and needing to—
Dr. Philip Oldham: Absolutely. And every audience hears it a little differently. You could say the same thing to different audiences and they take it totally different. So I don't know that you can over-communicate, I just don't think that's possible. Now a lot of times I feel like I am because I find myself repeating the same message over and over again and I think surely somebody's getting bored with hearing this because I'm getting bored saying it, but I just don't think it's possible.
Dr. Philip Oldham: And so we try to use multiple venues, multiple avenues of communication, different ways of written communication. I’ve probably produced more video messages in the last few months than I have in the rest of my career put together. Because I think in this environment in particular, although sometimes things in writing are very powerful, in this environment I think people want to hear it sort of from the horse's mouth so to speak. They want to hear it directly from me. And they want to see you while you’re talking, they want to see how you’re feeling.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Absolutely. There's so much nonverbal communication that takes place, so the tone and body language can make a big difference. But being honest and forthright and earnest, sincere, those are all very important aspects of this overall communication.
Cathy Ackerman: Right, and being consistent too. I mean I think within a changing world where things are pivoting so quickly in some areas, it’s good to have a consistent voice who comes back to your basic principles and your basic driving forces and just—
Dr. Philip Oldham: And right now this current situation makes that even more challenging because the environment keeps moving a little bit. And so the message you might have today may need to change even by tomorrow or the next day and so how do you communicate and keep everybody up to date without losing some credibility in the process? It's a challenge.
Cathy Ackerman: I think you really hit the nail on the head from a communications challenge standpoint. Let me go back to something you said a few minutes ago in terms of your comparatively low student debt. What enables you to be able to do that?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well there’s several factors, some of which we have some control over and some quite honestly we're just fortunate because we don't have that much control over it. The things we have control over are one, keeping the cost down. So to try to keep tuition increases at a minimum and certainly maximize value at the same time because it is a value proposition. We could theoretically reduce cost to zero, but nobody would want a degree from a university like that because it wouldn't be worth anything. And so it's all about maximizing the value proposition and making sure that the quality is worth more in the end than the cost upfront.
Dr. Philip Oldham: So that's the area we try to be in, so controlling cost, having students graduate with career opportunities that pays off for students. But those are the things we have some control over. The things we don't really have any control over but we're blessed is that we tend to attract students at Tennessee Tech that have really good intrinsic value systems in place. They seem to know the value of a dollar, they don't take on unnecessary student debt. They really focus in general on what they want to get out of college and they try to do it as quickly as possible so they don't linger.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Our four and five-year graduation rates continue to go up. One of the biggest ways to reduce cost, in fact probably the biggest way to reduce cost of an education, is to graduate sooner. So for every semester that we reduce the time to a degree, that's at least $10,000 worth of savings to the student. And so it is substantial. So we do everything we can to expedite the process so that students can graduate as quickly as possible and move on to other parts of their lives.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Some of that we can control, the parts about how much they could actually be qualified to take on more student loan debt than they do, but they choose to, I think, to some extent with good counseling on our part but also with a good sense of values that they bring with them to the campus that says, "I'm not going to take on any additional debt because I’d just have to pay it back later and I want to graduate with the least amount possible." So it's really a pretty good environment here for that right now.
Cathy Ackerman: Well and it sounds like a lot of it has to do with appropriate matching of the type of student to the type of education that is found at Tennessee Tech. I know that you have a very enviable retention rate in terms of your student population, so is there anything you’re doing there that goes beyond what we’ve just talked about that keeps students there for the duration?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well there's a lot that goes into decisions students make to stay in school or to leave school. There's certainly academic reasons students drop out, there's financial reasons, there's personal family-related reasons. And so, depending on what your situation is on your campus at the time, it can vary on how you approach that.
Dr. Philip Oldham: But one of the simplest and most dramatic things that we've done here at Tennessee Tech—and we've implemented on other campuses where I've been—is simply encouraging freshmen to go to class. It's that simple. Students that miss at least no more than two classes in the first six weeks of the fall semester are at risk of lower grades, lost scholarships and dropping out of school. It's very dramatic.
Dr. Philip Oldham: So we have a very simple program where we try to identify students early on that are dropping off in class attendance and we just try to do a very simple intervention. It's nothing very dramatic, but just a quick approach to those students reminding them how important it is to go to class and generally speaking, you can expect about half of those contacted will change that behavior and be retained at a higher level and have higher grades and better scholarships, they graduate on time and it's really that simple: go to class.
Cathy Ackerman: Wow, that’s very interesting. So with the higher education ecosystem, if you will, now populated with almost every size and shape of institution—public, private, religiously affiliated, specialty area focused, online, virtual, etc.—how would you describe Tennessee Tech’s place within that sort of ever-growing, ever-changing landscape of higher education?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, that’s a really good question too. Higher education is a very competitive marketplace, that’s another way of saying what you just commented on. It’s very diverse, there are different institutions. So we're really blessed, particularly here in the United States, that students have a lot of options. They can choose a private school, they can choose a public institution—large, small, medium. They can pick the environment they want to go to.
Dr. Philip Oldham: For the most part it’s a free market, so students largely vote with their feet, they go to the campus that they're attracted to. And I often tell students that universities have personalities a lot like people do and so you want to find one that matches your personality, that is a good fit for you. So in terms of Tennessee Tech, I realize I'm biased, but I think Tennessee Tech's personality as a campus fits a lot of students.
Dr. Philip Oldham: We have a unique personality that is warm, friendly, welcoming. Size-wise, I like to say that we're big enough to be meaningful, but small enough to be personal. And so it feels good to a lot of students. Now, I'm not so biased or naive to think that it's the best fit for everybody, it's not, but we think it's a great fit for a lot of students.
Cathy Ackerman: You’re hitting on some things that seem simple but they are really very intuitive but a lot of people overlook. I mean in the world of marketing, you have to know your customer, you have to know the most likely person to resonate with your message and buy your product or service, and it sounds like you all have done a great job of that matchmaking and giving students an opportunity when they set foot on your campus to experience who you really are. So that’s great.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, part of that is—we like to say that Tennessee Tech is real. We provide a real education for real people who want a real career. And so it's tangible, it's practical, it's very approachable and comfortable, and I think that's the niche we want to be in.
Cathy Ackerman: And you’re very highly ranked consistently I think for your engineering and business programs. Are there some things you’re doing there that are particularly noteworthy that you want to mention?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well both of those programs, and many others on campus, are very innovative, they're cutting-edge, we've got outstanding faculty in all these disciplines. You’re probably most known for our engineering programs, it's the largest college on campus and we have almost 3,000 students in engineering. We produce about 25% of the engineers for the state of Tennessee annually.
Cathy Ackerman: Really?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Yeah, so it's sort of our signature group of programs. But as you indicated, we've got significant programs with high reputations in business, in nursing, in education, in arts and sciences, really across the board. In fact, one of our best programs—it’s fairly small relatively—but it’s an outstanding program and that’s in art and music. So we have a College of Fine Arts that I would say rivals what you would find at any large major university.
Cathy Ackerman: Well what—where do you think Tennessee Tech—what do you think the future of higher education and adapting to the world that we live in, whether it's technology-driven or more online education, new subject matter maybe that we haven't even heard of that we’ll be teaching in five years? How do you look into the future and envision what Tennessee Tech will be like in about five years?
Dr. Philip Oldham: You know, I think we'll be larger, not a lot, but we'll be larger than we are now enrollment-wise. We will be recognized to a greater extent for the scholarly product, the publications, the research that's produced from the campus that is very tangible, that makes a difference in people's lives. I think that will grow and change over the next few years as well.
Cathy Ackerman: I know that you personally have been pretty involved in local and regional economic development efforts in your area. What do you believe is a university’s proper role, if you will, and even responsibility to its surrounding community?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well, I think particularly for a public university, you've got to grow and make a difference where you're planted. That's where it starts. I mean, we have aspirations of being nationally recognized in all of our disciplines, but it starts where we live, and that's in this case it's here in Cookeville, Putnam County, the Upper Cumberland, really we have an obligation to the entire state of Tennessee as well.
Dr. Philip Oldham: But we really gotta impact the local environment to the fullest extent and as we do that and we get better at that, then that national reputation grows as well. So I think it starts here. But how you do that predominantly, particularly in the world today, is it's all about talent. You know, what drives economies today is not tax breaks, it's not financial incentives, it's not even land or buildings. All those things are important, but the great differentiator is talent, the availability of talent.
Dr. Philip Oldham: And universities like Tennessee Tech are the manufacturing facility for talent. We have the talent, we produce the talent, we identify and develop talent and so future economic growth has to have that kind of lifeline. So really by connecting with job makers, job creators, whatever the area is, and showcasing how they are able to access that amount and quality of talent is key for economic development of the region and the state.
Cathy Ackerman: Absolutely. So Dr. Oldham, as we start to wrap things up today, is there anything you want to talk about that we have not mentioned that you’d like for people to know about the college or about your vision?
Dr. Philip Oldham: Well, I think we've hit on most everything. One thing I'll just follow up on what we just discussed in terms of local impact. We initiated a Grand Challenge for the campus over the last couple of years. And that's a big problem, big set of problems that some campuses have decided to take on to marshal resources and interest on campus from students and faculty to try to solve some real problems.
Dr. Philip Oldham: In our case, we identified the rural communities as the focus. So we launched what we call Rural Reimagined. And we talk a lot about Gen R, Generation R for Generation Rural. What is the future of rural America, particularly here in Middle Tennessee, going to look like? And how do you address the various challenges in rural communities—whether it's economic challenges or educational barriers or healthcare, childcare? You can go down the long list: transportation, any number of things.
Dr. Philip Oldham: And we have expertise and interest and quite honestly some sweat equity that we can invest in these rural communities to help address some of these challenges. Not to go into these communities and solve the problems unilaterally, but to work with them to identify what their vision is and what we could do to help them reach that vision. So that’s exciting, we've got a lot of students involved and engaged in that and it's continuing to grow and take on a life of its own.
Cathy Ackerman: Boy, what a fabulous program and what great real-world experience that you’re giving to your students. We thank you so much for joining us on Sweet Tea and Strategy. We appreciate your time and your dedication to what you’re doing to help students prepare for their life journey. So thank you again, Dr. Oldham, for being with us on Sweet Tea and Strategy.
Dr. Philip Oldham: Thank you. Wings up!