In late July I spent four and a half days with my fellow Aspen Fellows (fellow Fellows for short) at Stanford University. For those who don’t know, the Aspen Presidential Fellowship is a leadership development program for community college leaders who want to support transformational change in their current or future roles. It is a joint effort of the Aspen Institute and Stanford University’s Educational Leadership Initiative.
Let me just say that my fellow Fellows are a remarkable bunch. They are uniformly bright and brilliant and energetic and thoughtful and passionate about the work of community colleges. Our work changes the trajectory of our students’ lives, and my fellow Fellows believe in thinking creatively and strategically about how we can best do that work. It was a pleasure to spend 12 hours a day with these folks, and I look forward to our November convening in Virginia.
At the end of our time in Stanford, we were asked to think about the key “big ideas” that would stay with us. That is a tall order, because there were ideas aplenty. We heard from Tom Erlich, former dean of Stanford Law School, former president of Indiana University, author, educator, and very nice man. We heard from Baba Shiv in the Stanford Graduate School of Business and an expert in neuroeconomics (yes, neuroeconomics). We heard from J. D. Schramm in the Graduate School of Business with deep expertise in communication. We heard from Karen Stout, President and CEO of Achieving the Dream and former community college president. In fact, we heard from a variety of current and former community college presidents, and each had immense wisdom to impart.
It was rich and thought-provoking (and exhausting). Here are a few of the ideas that I’m pondering.
- “Completion is not enough.”
- “Love the one [student].”
- “Encourage bold vision.”
- “Understanding is better than knowledge.”
- “We must build trust in the classroom, in part by decentering the self.”
- “Combine joy and purpose – that lets you do your best work.”
- “‘Presidency’ is a verb.”
- “Teaching and learning: Center it. Celebrate it.”
- “Create institutions that are equitable by design. The architecture of the institution must have equity embedded in it.”
- “Focus on best practitioners rather than best practices.”
I could list a dozen more things that I’m pondering, but I’ll stop there. I invite you to ponder the phrase or idea that catches your attention. And I’ll let you know how my Aspen journey continues in the next few weeks.