Steven Gentile On Higher Education In TN
Steven Gentile is the Executive Director of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission (THEC) and teaches education policy at Vanderbilt University. THEC plays a crucial role in advocating for an increase in the number of Tennesseans who obtain postsecondary credentials. In this episode, Stephen discusses the decision of whether to attend college, the benefits of choosing a technical degree, financial aid and grants, and THEC's future plans.
About Steven Gentile
Dr. Steven Gentile is the Executive Director at the Tennessee Higher Education Commission (THEC). He progressed from Assistant Director of Fiscal Policy to Chief Policy and Strategy Officer. Previously, he was the Assistant Dean of Admission and Financial Aid at Davidson College.
Steven also teaches education policy at Vanderbilt University, engaging in course design, lectures, and student development. His research includes examining the effects of Tennessee Promise, federal PLUS loan regulations on HBCU enrollment, and lottery earmarks on funding stability.
He holds a Doctor of Education in Higher Education Leadership and Policy (2019) and a Master of Education (2014) from Vanderbilt University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Davidson College (2006). Steven is also an alumnus of Leadership Tennessee NEXT and other leadership programs. He and his wife, Solvig, enjoy raising their children in East Nashville.
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Spencer 00:06
Steven Gentile, welcome to Signature Required.
Steven Gentile 00:08
Well, thank you. Thanks so much for being here today.
Spencer 00:10
You are the executive director for the Tennessee Higher Education Commission. I have abbreviated as T hack on here,
Steven Gentile 00:19
And that's how we do it as well. T hack. And what the heck is T hacking? Common question we have.
Spencer 00:25
You took the joke before I could even get, like, eight seconds in. I need to rerun this.
Multiple Speakers 00:30
Yeah, that was classic dad joke
Steven Gentile 00:33
What the heck is Tx?
Carli 00:37
This podcast is full of dad jokes, beginning to end. I'm super here for it. So just keep it coming, yeah.
Spencer 00:42
So feed us the question. Then you took my line of what the heck is T heck, but I will be okay, because you're entitled to that as executive director. So for our listeners, what do you do?
Steven Gentile 00:55
Yeah, so I serve as the executive director of the higher ed commission. And the higher ed Commission, the Tennessee Higher Education Commission serves as the state's coordinating body for higher education, and we think coordinating body, we're talking about coordinating on higher ed policy on behalf of the state. So we are a state agency. My commission, my board, is made up of appointed members from the administration as well as the General Assembly, and we are there to represent the needs of the state to institutions. The state needs us to weigh in on the valued credentials. In this way, are we producing high demand, high demand credentials for the jobs that are out there, and then vice versa, to communicate to the state, the administration, the General Assembly, name the stakeholder. This is what our institutions are in need of right now to make sure they're meeting the needs that you have. This is the budget that we think is most efficient for them, or the tuition ranges that we think is going to provide both affordability, but also the money for those institutions to run, and we also authorize every single academic program that occurs in the state, be it public, nonprofit, proprietary. We have a system in place to make sure that the programs that are being offered by state authorized institutions. And again, that's just not public institutions, but private and nonprofit that they are, they're doing so in good faith and that they're providing good programs for the students that are in them as well.
Spencer 02:28
Good Yeah, lot to unpack in that, for sure, and I have a lot of questions around higher ed in general. It's a remarkable time to be talking about education, higher education. Culturally, there's a lot going on with higher education, but maybe before we capture into any of that, Tennessee has a historical reputation of being a remarkably undereducated state. A lot of the statistics that you look at Tennessee doesn't rank in the places that most of us would love to see Tennessee rank. So could you give us just the governor gives a State of the State Address once a year and says, All right, here's everything, kind of the State of the Union, except in Tennessee style. Could you give us a little bit of a state of higher education as it relates to Tennessee. And then I'll start to unpack some of the things that you just talked
Steven Gentile 03:26
Absolutely, absolutely so another arm of what we do at the higher ed commission, and as a part of the Tennessee Student Assistance Corporation, part of our our commission is to authorize financial aid as well and distribute all financial aid, all lottery scholarships, all need based aid, the Tennessee Promise, which is the state's tuition free program for community college students and technical college students. And Tennessee reconnect one state of the state is that we lead the nation in providing access to higher education via financial aid. And that's something that came about in the early 2010s after hope had been established, the scholarship had been established for some time. We went into other directions, with need based aid, and again, with Tennessee Promise. It was the country's first tuition free financial aid program for students. That was here in Tennessee. It's here in Tennessee. Wow, yeah. Now many other states have followed, but it came from very fiscally prudent, fiscally conservative background where we had the money to make that happen, we saved on lottery dollars every year, and that built up to become an endowment that we have now to run that program. So it's not operating on new operating dollars coming from taxes, it's from the lottery scholarship, fulfilling an endowment, but to strategically deploy that in a way that helps lower the cost burden to our students has been a large driving force in the increase of our attainment here in Tennessee, as more and more students are attaining the credentials, the certificates, the associate degrees, and then going on, transferring on to get their back. For degrees, it's been phenomenal. A study I was a part of showed how greatly debt was reduced for students going through Tennessee Promise Program, the burdens that are placed on them are much lower. Now that's been one pillar in that atmosphere. We also about 2010, the Complete College Tennessee act greatly transformed higher ed policy in Tennessee, and also led the nation therein as well, where we have what's called the outcomes based funding formula, where we fund institutions all their operating dollars is solely done through the outcomes based funding formula, as institutions perform well, produce more graduates, more job placements, more research dollars, as they do well, compared to their prior performance, they're likelier to get more appropriation. So we've geared institutions into putting the money where the mouth is. They've always been for completion. We have two now we're funding that. So, long story short, graduation rates have been increasing at our institutions. Completion initiatives have been put into place as well. We've seen some great transformation, but we're not done yet. This past session, I told the House Finance Committee and the Senate Education Committee that for too long we have been talking about six year graduation rates. How many students are graduating within six years? That is a very common measurement, as used by all states. The federal government uses it. The federal government defines that, but we need to be talking about on time completion. How many students are graduating in four years? If you started off at a university full time, you probably expect to graduate on time. We have a long way to go there. Fewer than half of our students are graduating on time within a four year environment that again, that number has been increasing, but we need to focus more on that. And the same is true with our community college sector allowing to say to institutions, what do you need from the state to add capacity to help you support students graduate on time. What's getting in your way? What's getting in the way of the students? That's where my mind is right now, a lot.
Carli 07:08
Are you seeing that number be the same? You say for four year degrees, they're not graduating on time. Are you seeing that also for certification programs, associates degrees, you said community colleges. But you're seeing it across the board,
Steven Gentile 07:21
Across the board, across the board, and it's not a problem at all unique to Tennessee at all. Like I said that focus on the six year graduation rate. All states will tell you their six year graduation rate, but yeah, whether you're starting off at a two year college or a four year university, if you're starting off again, that measure that I have is for full time students. They start off full time, but then life happens. Maybe they're coming straight out of high school and they don't have a job, or they don't need a job, and they're taking a full load, then they drop down to fewer credits to be able to manage a job as well. Now in higher education, we've been talking about this a lot, but now we need to really investigate it further if they need to have a job. How can we make higher education even more flexible to their needs? What courses are we offering? When are we offering them? What's getting in their way? But again, yes, at every higher education level that is a persistent problem.
Carli 08:13
We have a rule that is no dumb question. So I just have to ask, I think the biggest brand I see out there for flexible learning, right? You would say is like a University of Phoenix. You see these online? I mean, it sounds like I could be a University of Phoenix student here today based on their branding, and it's everywhere and pervasive. Do we have something like that in the state of Tennessee? And what is it?
Steven Gentile 08:36
We have a number of options that get there the Tennessee Board of Regents, which oversees our community colleges and technical colleges. They have online programs that are meant to be that flexible institutions have as well, but the system of TBR is overarching. UT has been moving that direction the last couple of years, and perhaps be helpful to have some links to share with you on that about some programs that they are about, an opportunity that they are walking into right now that would allow for those more targeted investments, in partnership, actually, with the Arizona State University, to be able to provide Arizona State University does a really good job of providing online programming for students across the nation. And UT is is working on providing something similar to students here in Tennessee. So there is an option here, and I'm a believer that a way to lower the cost burden of higher education is find a way to reach more students, and a cost effective way online has that capacity. There are a lot of structural costs associated with online that can make it cost prohibitive to enter into that. But ideally in the long run, you produce programs that will make it cost effective to be able to have these online programs. Makes sense.
Spencer 09:57
One of the culturally. Prevailing themes right now is that college is not for everybody. And if you said that 10 years ago, I think it would have been frowned upon in a lot of ways, that people would have said, well, your life outcome if you don't go to college is going to be really poor. And now it's shifting to where people are saying college isn't for everybody. There's a focus on real skills, and like my background in the transportation world, if you have a class, a CDL, you can make on your first day of employment, 120 grand day one, and it's up from there, yeah? And there's a lot of people that look at coming out with a degree, whether they have debt or not, and contrast it with being a plumber and saying, AI isn't going to replace this right? Somebody's got to turn this wrench. So for someone in your role, how do you look at that cultural shift that is happening right now?
Steven Gentile 11:08
Yeah, and I'd say this is something that we were also grappling with 10 years ago as well, and we are consistent. And I'd say by we, I mean my colleagues, myself, and our peers at our institutions, and saying, the question is, is college for everybody? People tend to think of the traditional four year format and identify, like you said, plumbing, maybe apprenticeship opportunities for them. I'm a big believer that some sort of post secondary training is necessary, and what does that look like? Does it come from a university for a bachelor's program for many the jobs in high demand it does absolutely but not all the work that our TCATS, again, the technical colleges of Applied Technology, and the community colleges and offering certificates where they're coming on for six months or less than a year, to Put them into programs like Plumbing as well. We thoroughly believe that the options that the state has to allow that to be a tuition free program for our students is an option that most students should be exploring. What I'm concerned about is you do have graduates from high school who maybe they need to tinker and tool up on very targeted skills because they've already been doing a lot in high school with dual enrollment, for instance, which we have substantial amounts of programming here in higher ed, for which I can talk about more later, dual enrollment, or other practices they've done in high school where maybe they don't need a full college program afterwards, but they need something. Can we help provide that? What I'm most concerned about, however, is the pervasiveness of that message. And students graduating from high school saying, well, here I don't need college, but they also don't have any other direction. They don't know how to get that one extra skill for the job. We have advised tn counselors in high schools specifically to help students figure that out. We believe that our TCATS, community colleges, universities provide great options, but if that's not for you, what are you going to do after you graduate high school to have a successful life? We want to help you make a connection to that.
Spencer 13:14
And I think that's well said, and contrast to say it's permissible that a four year degree may not be right for you, but what also is exceedingly unlikely to be okay is to come out of high school with no skill and no plan for what you're gonna do next. So in your when people hear higher education, I think by default, people think four year degree that's right, yeah, but your purview is Yes, over the four year degree side, but also equally as much over the technical schools and the plumbers and every type of welder that's under your jurisdiction, right?
Steven Gentile 13:58
That's right, correct?
Spencer 14:00
Got it, Steven, one thing that we do, it's the most favorite thing that Carly and I do on the program, is a section called No Dumb Questions. Okay, so every time we bring on really smart guests that are experts in their space, I mean, clearly you have lived this and climbed to a very high level. So a lot of the questions that we've always wanted to ask somebody in the world of education particularly, you're like, well, not only are they more experienced, but they're also smart because they're in the world of teaching, that there's just an awkwardness around asking questions. So we have a series of different questions that probably a lot of listeners, if given the permission, would just say, Hey, can I ask you this? Because I don't understand it. Yeah, so we each have a couple that we're going to ask you. So Carly, you want to lead us out of the gate with a you started on
Steven Gentile 14:50
we started an assumption that I'm very smart. I have many people who tell you not, that's not the case. So I love this
Carli 14:56
Parenthood. Life is very humbling for exactly right? Yeah, I guess my question, because we've had a few acronyms and we've talked about different types of degrees. Can you walk through for listeners? For me, when I was pushed to go to college, it's like you are going to get your bachelor's degree, and then you should probably go get your master's degree, because you're a woman that wants to work and have kids, and you should probably do that as fast as you can if you want any chance at anything, that was kind of the push I got right. But now we're talking about technical degrees and associates degrees and community college transferring to bachelor. Can you help us understand the whole framework, a little bit of, what are these different certifications? So there's a bachelor's associates certification for plumbers, welders. What are the different levels of institution and types of certifications or degrees. Yeah, yeah.
Steven Gentile 15:47
And I could spend a long time talking about this, but I'll try to be as brief as possible there. When I think about the community colleges and TCATs, I think of associate degrees and then certificates that are, we say pre bachelors, or anything that happens before you actually get a four year degree. Some of these are short term certificates, so a year or less, which I've already talked about a little bit here. Others might be a long term certificate of one to two year program that requires more disciplinary focus as well. But typically, they are targeted towards meeting an immediate workforce? Need I get this short term certificate I am able to go out and apply that to.
Carli 16:28
Can you give me examples? Because I feel like you probably have 107 and I can think of maybe two,
Steven Gentile 16:32
Yeah, and I will definitely correct myself after this as well. But phlebotomy, drawing blood, you mentioned plumbing, machinery, anything that happens? Again? At our Technical College of Applied Technology, there are many different programs, from childcare to cosmetology to the hands on robotics, machinery classes. There, again, they're they're specifically geared towards an acute workforce identification with associate degrees. You've got applied associate degrees that are like what I just said for the certificates, but require more training that could be in a nursing field, for instance, or healthcare field in general. And then you'll have associate degrees that are more general studies in nature, that provide the first 60 credit hours for what you would need to transfer onto a university and to get a bachelor's degree. And then you go on to university, and we have four year degrees. There some post bachelor certificates, which will you can get in less than a year, to help refine a need for a workforce, and then master's and doctorate. The trick is identifying for students the pathway to a successful career later on. And success could be defined by many ways, but essentially that what you're learning here is applicable to the real world philosophy major, oftentimes considered a what is this major for? What do they do? Well, actually, in the workforce, it shows to have a very strong power to it, oftentimes that is partnered with a law degree or some other master's degree that can draw from that, our our desire, our strategies to help identify for students. Yeah, if you go this direction, you'll then maybe you do need to go on to graduate school, get your master's degree, and in that sense, it will be worthwhile to go that path of identifying that worthwhile path, whether it's a six month certificate or a long doctoral journey.
Carli 18:34
Okay, and then you had mentioned earlier that you're trying to meet these needs. So our doctors are saying we need phlebotomists please make more programs. Are they literally just calling your office? How do you know what programs you even need to plant?
Steven Gentile 18:50
Yeah, we have a couple of ways of doing it. We have a structural process for it where we partner with the Department of Labor, workforce and development, ECD, the economic and community development and Department of Education, we have a report that we put out together yearly. It's called the supply and demand report, and there we're looking at a whole robust area of data that we have at the state that identifies job openings, identifies the critical needs across the state and all the workforce development areas, what are we seeing that are popping up as showing in the data that we have as supply needs? And, of course, our technical colleges, they have local workforce boards as well, where they get more of a qualitative input, and they're required to have these workforce development boards that they consult with and that help guide the programs that they have with their TCAT to say, well, actually, we do need more phlebotomists or that area over here, you guys have a wait list because those students don't have as many job opportunities, and that helps inform what you provide going forward,
Carli 19:51
And that keeps in my head thinking about, I'm just a bill on Cathy
Steven Gentile 19:58
House Rock is always.
Carli 20:00
Schoolhouse Rock. I want, like the Schoolhouse Rock rap, please. You don't have to wrap, I promise you rap now, yeah, that that was actually why we brought you.
Steven Gentile 20:06
Okay, good. So you know me so well, yes,
Carli 20:09
Yes, clearly. But I kind of want the Schoolhouse Rock version of, how do you get okay, there's this new field. So we have aI happening with new technology coming into play all the time, from start to finish. How long does it take to plant a new program? Do you start? Do you have special relationships with different institutions, from small to large, that you try to incubate something so then you can serve another population?
Steven Gentile 20:36
How does that go from a patient in our recent past, we have been more of a vetting of programs. An institution comes to us with a program, and we walk them through. First of all, we put that program out on a public display on a website, and let all institutions know this institution is proposing this program. To what extent does this overlap with you, not from necessarily a competitive standpoint, but more of can you tell us from your perspective and what you're doing, and tell the institution, what are the realities of putting this program up? So it goes through that process. We bring in outside experts outside of Tennessee, and as well to kick the tires on it too. It goes in front of the institutions board, and then ultimately in front of our commission for approval. We've actually gone through a rethinking of that whole process, in part pushed by the institutions for the fields of AI, taking over a year to go through our process was way too long, and now we've developed a process to be able to vet those programs within three to six months, if the institutions are going through the process at deliberate speed on their part too. So try to be more responsive to the workforce needs. I spent the first eight months of my executive director tenure working on that with our colleagues at the institutions and with my staff as well. But we also heard from institutions. Hey, be really helpful. If you can help us project needs as well. And we do that through the supply demand report that is looking more at what are the real world needs right now, but can we look around the corner 10 years down the road to say what would be good to start working on right now, or exploring opportunities to make that happen through outside services for that purpose?
Carli 22:16
Okay, last question you were talking about, you have these counselors in schools that are helping. So is that similar to a guidance counselor role? And I guess my other question would be, there are so many students that feels very high touch. How are you guys replicating that?
Steven Gentile 22:33
That's a great question. So we have what we call advise tn. We have over 30 high school counselors across the state of Tennessee college counselors. They're at they're funded by the state, and they are at high schools that have lower college going rates. We place them there, and they are there to solely talk about not just college, but post secondary to the conversation we had earlier about post secondary training. What are the options that are out there for you? And we're not the only ones who are doing something like this. We have the nice Walker foundation out east, the Ayers Foundation, which is primarily out west, where they have similar models too. And yet the need to your point, is much larger than what we're all providing right now. And so we're trying to figure out ways to help capitalize and expand on our services and partnership and then working with each other to make that happen. But the purpose is like they go there and they are not traditional guidance counselors, because a lot of guidance counselors are helping students get through high school, just make it through all the challenges that are there. These college advisors are there to help them think afterwards and what you need to do. What's out there? Post, I used to be an admission counselor for a college my alma mater, Davidson College, and when I would travel to wealthier school districts, they had staff like that already, college counselors, public and private, college counselors who were there to just talk about college. That's not necessarily true at a lot of high schools that are under resourced, so we help provide that. That's great.
Spencer 24:05
I'm learning about T heck for the first time today, and in the intro, hearing all of the different responsibilities that you outlined, and I'm convinced that was probably 5% of the full range of responsibility my series of dumb questions, I think, starts there that most people, when they hear of a governmental arm or organization with a lot of responsibility, it scares them immediately to just feel like, oh my gosh, this is going to be fuel full of bureaucracy and red tape. So when you think about all of the different things that T heck does, if you had to identify one or two or three things that you do best, and then maybe one or two things to say, this is something we struggle with, but we're trying to do better at Yeah, could you give me a couple. Of those on either end of the bell curve.
Steven Gentile 25:02
Absolutely, I think what we do really well is we have robust financial aid in that we serve and connect with, say, financial aid counselors across the state that there's been a series of FAFSA issues this past six months. FAFSA being the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. Thank you. What the heck is FAFSA Free Application for Federal Student Aid? The rollout of a new application has caused lots of issues across the country. So to be able to get through the noise and and collectively with our institutions and with high school guidance counselors help students navigate, we have the arm for that, and have done, I'd say, a really substantial, great job in doing so. Data. We collect lots of data. No institution in Tennessee has the data that we have. We're able to see high school seniors where they go after they leave high school, and track them to the state of Washington through data capacity that we have track them from a TCAT onto a university here in Tennessee or elsewhere. So to be able to tell the story and identify those metrics is a strength of ours, and we're also trying to become even better at doing that. A big, a big thing that I am putting a lot of my time and attention into is identifying the handful of items that we as higher education can speak into with one voice. That is traditionally the role of a coordinating body, as I said earlier, to speak to the state of the institutional needs. That's something that I am committed to, even doing more so. So to your point of, what can we be better at? That's it. We have eight different governing boards in Tennessee, of our public institutions. You have the University of Tennessee system. You have the Tennessee Board of Regents, which is over our community colleges and our technical colleges. And we have six universities that each have their own governing board. That's a lot of parties, a lot. It's a lot and collectively working with the administrations and leadership on a handful of issues, perceptions of higher ed, on time completion, the value of higher education. That's what I'm leaning into right now, specifically so that in upcoming general assembly sessions and conversations with the governor and the administration, we can better explain, I can better explain and advocate for those needs.
Spencer 27:24
One of the things that I picked out from the list of responsibilities that you indicated was the approval rights for new types of degrees and things that universities want to offer. And that's a huge amount of authority and responsibility. And responsibility? Yeah, so first, can you just help clarify what the intention of that is, beyond just a public university, but at private universities and organizations like, what's the rationale for that level of authority? And maybe, secondly, what's your enforcement mechanism? If someone says, I ain't doing it, and we're teaching this, regardless of whether you approve it or not, I'm sure there's an enforcement mechanism. But just help me understand that too.
Steven Gentile 28:15
Yeah, absolutely. So I'll start with the latter part, and that is authority, authorization of new programs and new institutions, a proprietary institution that comes to serve pretty much any business that offers a service in Tennessee or any state typically has a state agency does making sure okay you guys are meeting certain conditions. And that's what we are for the state of Tennessee, no different from name a body that to look into whether different services are being provided as advertised. So consumer protection element of it, and if an institution goes crossways with that, then there's the equivalent of pulling your authority to be able to offer that here in the state of Tennessee, that's one aspect of it, but to like why we were we were created to begin with, back in the 1960s 1967 It was when t heck was founded, and that's when a lot of states had started to create coordinating bodies as well. Is recognizing just not to police what institutions can do, but in Sure, since we're putting state funding towards it, that certain programs that may serve fewer students don't become duplicative across the state, healthy competition is wonderful, absolutely, and we always have an eye toward that. But to make sure that as the state is putting its resources towards entities that are not just ramping up their own resources and competition that's not going anywhere with those students. So that's what we have an eye towards. Why I went to earlier, when a new public program comes to us, we put out on our website for everyone to weigh in, to start poking holes in it, to identify how can this. Sure that it's the strongest that's available for what this program puts forward. That's the intent of it, and what we need to do, and this is important, as you recognized already, is making sure that we just don't create red tape for the sake of having red tape. There's a line that you can cross to be too intense about that, a good tire check to make sure that these programs are, are not just, are not just science experiments, and like, maybe over a decade or two, they'll get it right for the students. We want students who go into it to know that they're going to come out with a credential that's valuable. That's the service that we provide on the front end for them. But again, we need to make sure that it's not taking over a year for an academic program to get set up. That's a quick review, a quick shore this up, strengthen this program, get you on a road in three to six months with the two.
Spencer 30:55
Thank you for answering a series of dumb questions and just things that we want to find out. I'd love to learn a little more about your personal story. So in the same spirit of just, how does this whole thing work, can you talk about how big T heck, just structurally is, how did you get your role? Were you elected? Were you appointed? How long do you hold the role? Just kind of walk us through the X's and O's,
Steven Gentile 31:20
Yeah. So the higher ed Commission has roughly 150 people who work for us, okay, and so wonderful colleagues, some of the best in the state and best in the field. On that, I started working there 2013 It was January. 2013 as an intern, I was a graduate student at Vanderbilt, and before I became a graduate student, I worked in the admission field, enrollment management at a small college, and I thought I'd be going back to that after I finished my graduate program in higher ed administration, but I discovered while at Vanderbilt that there's this whole world of state level policy where you can make decisions that affect 250,000 students on helping them get through and make college more affordable. And affordability was always my big interest. I had an economics background. I worked in financial aid. I wanted to make college more accessible and more successful for students. So I discovered of the great, innovative practices at the higher ed commission. Got an internship there, was offered a full time job the next semester as a fiscal policy analyst, before I finished my degree, and then gradually, over 12 years, I moved up into research roles, policy roles, general policy roles, and on to executive director. And I was appointed by the Commission, and in a public review process that took place back in November for that how long is the term? There is no term length, so we'll see how long that term term lasts. We there's been some who've served for 17 years, others for a few years. It just depends on the realities of the day.
Spencer 33:04
Who was your predecessor and what was the transition like?
Steven Gentile 33:07
So I've had the My immediate predecessor was Dr Emily house. She was the My immediate full time predecessor. Then we had an interim and Bob Smith. Emily house is a really good friend of mine. She's now on faculty at Vanderbilt and and she knew early on that she wanted to be an executive director of a place like like T heck, and her passion for it was just fully strong and that that was very much influential on me. My immediate predecessor is a former chancellor of UT Martin, and was also a mentor of mine in the leadership sphere too. And so to get to be able to learn from him over time has been really helpful, too. And so yeah, I've now been in this position full time as non interim for about eight months.
Spencer 33:58
Got it so appointed by the governor, appointed by the Commission?
Steven Gentile 34:01
By the Commission, yes, okay, and the commission is itself appointed by the governor and the General Assembly.
Spencer 34:09
There's a little bit of a political element to your position as well, in that, I imagine the types of things that you want to accomplish, you've got to work with the legislature and ensure that they're on board for the types of initiatives that you're kind of seeing and having a vision for. So maybe talk about the magic wand of if you could accomplish and do a couple things that maybe were independent of how it lands politically here or there, but if you really had free reign to accomplish a couple aspects in Tennessee, I'd love to know what those were.
Steven Gentile 34:49
Okay, yeah, and you are correct about the politics, big P politics, small p politics, institutional politics that weigh into that as well. Alma Mater. Cetera and and while I see my role as serving as a voice for all of higher education, really, what I spend a lot of my time in doing is speaking to our stakeholders as legislators, the administration, to identify what it is that they're seeing. What are they perceiving from higher ed, yeah, that they want to address and they need to address, and I've got a whole, a whole portfolio of options and policy ideas that we can work with to address it. Number one, in my mind right now, is addressing the perception of higher education, the value of higher education. And I think that goes beyond just talking about, is it worth it, or will I get a good job. The data shows when you complete that degree, your life is probably going to be much better than if you did not do that. But what is also driving the conversation about maybe not higher education, something that I'm leaning more into right now is and UT Knoxville has done a fantastic job in doing this I have so some of our other institutions is going back into the civic learning aspect of higher education, the dialog building of really tough issues on campuses that's traditionally not a space that T heck has been involved in, and we all need to be intensely involved in but when I talk about with a legislator who says, you know, my big frustration with higher ed, so if I go to that campus, I can't even have a conversation with a student on some dicey topics. And I don't think that's pervasive across higher education, but it's certainly a perception.
Spencer 36:38
Are they worried that they're going to be shouted down or, okay, yeah,
Steven Gentile 36:42
Um, they're not necessarily worried that they've seen that happen before, um, and and higher education. I loved higher education because that's a place where you can be involved passionately and big ideas and learn and be pushed and pulled on your prior thoughts on any topic, and learn and grow from it, and I know that's still happening in higher education, but it's not what makes the news, and those one off engagements that a legislator might have will certainly paint that picture even darker for them. So I've been working with a multi state collaborative made up of number of individuals like myself and exploring this. And we're coming from red states. We're coming from blue states, which is, how do we make sure that those dialog that we we think is very important in higher education continues? And like I said earlier, UT Knoxville has done a really good job at this with the Baker Center, which is now a college on the campus. And I have a favorite podcast of mine that you may have heard as well called you may be right, yeah, with Governor Haslam and Governor Bredesen, governors from different political parties coming together and having conversations like this with experts on those dicey topic areas. And that's why I love about higher education, is that that's the type of conversations that students should be involved in. And again, are, but how do we make sure that we can better paint that picture and ensure that's happening across our campuses? So it's it's more starting that conversation and identifying the places in Tennessee where that's working very well, and to and to pull at it and see okay, what is applicable across higher education in Tennessee, to put a better spotlight and to strengthen that at our campuses. And then, two, I've mentioned this already, but any initiatives that we can do to increase the graduation on time completion of our students, to move away from a six year graduation rate talk and conversation to a four year and identify the true challenges to making that happen, because I think that would go a long way towards the perception of higher education. We can lower the cost burden of colleges and universities, and we in Tennessee have done a great job at doing that, but if you need to stay another year in college, that means you've got foregone income that you're not getting, and tuition as well. That's building on top of that. So address the conversations about on time completion, to provide that support to our institutions, to have more flexible scheduling, to have more Completion grant opportunities, to have even more effective financial aid. That's what my my area of focus will continue to be on. So I am open to any policy ideas and options that will go towards that direction if we could all work together on it.
Spencer 39:25
We talked some about the limiting factors that pushes someone from four to six years or beyond. Yeah, and just so I can help best understand the problem, the first one that I hear loud and clear is that there are financial limitations and barriers that a student gets in and just can't go four years without income, or the income that they're able to get while being a full time student just does not cut it any longer, and they've got to make a change. So I think I clearly hear that. First problem, and maybe you would assign that to be the majority of the reason why people go from four to six years or longer. What are some other ones, with specificity, that you see as major disruptors that push someone from four to six years or beyond,
Steven Gentile 40:22
The biggest area, and we've made some substantial changes already. Here is on when students transfer from one universe, from one institution to another, say, going from a community college to a university in Tennessee, we have the Tennessee Transfer Pathways, and there are over 70 Tennessee Transfer Pathways where institutions sign on to say if a student, and these are statutory bound, if a student graduates with this Tennessee transfer pathway and Associate Degree from community college, we will accept that into our institution as their general education, I see so that should provide a streamlined they're here for two years. They're there for two years that they're out. However, over the 15 years that we've had these we have what we call the asterisks pop up where we had upwards of 232 asterisks across the 70 programs that would say, well, actually, at this university, you need to take this course up here, and that course won't count. And so that's you've got to be mindful if you're going to come here. And the accumulation of those asterisks have really bogged down what could be and is a very successful opportunity for students, and so we are. We are convening institutions now in an ongoing five year review to take that 232 asterisks down to zero in the first few months this. This takes working very intensively with faculty and department chairs to you know, these are programs that they have purview over and their role and and getting them to remove those asterisks in the first six months, we're down now to about 200 asterisks, and we're churning through them. But that to your question, those barriers that we put up, even when we have the tendency transfer pathway system, we still put up these barriers, probably for what we think are good reasons at first, but in the grand scheme, are not. How can we chip that away, that red tape away to help them get through faster?
Carli 42:31
How do Okay, back to stupid questions. How do people even learn about these transfer opportunities? I mean, is it published somewhere? I'm just thinking how hard it was to look through the course catalog when we were in college and try to pick what was going to work, and if it changed my major, this is going to be a disaster. Yeah. And then you're looking across the state at all these different institutions and trying to criss cross applesauce on Earth. Does somebody even navigate,
Steven Gentile 43:00
Yeah, and again, in higher education, we make it difficult to navigate and and to have, like we said earlier, like college advisors at the high school, a similar support system at the colleges, what we call the wraparound support, uh, completion coaches, has been one that our community colleges have been leaning into, and our universities or our one stop shop at our universities, where you can go to one source on campus and have all your registrar, financial aid, academic advising, all that stuff happening in one spot. Because in the past, it would be like you've got to go over here for this, over there, for this, over there. We don't even know if they're in right now. You know, it's never been great. And so bringing more transparency into those advising services is a big way of doing it. But the issue you run into, like I said earlier, with the Tennessee Transfer Pathways, is you get those advisors to say, Yeah, but look at how many asterisks are a part of this. This could be a little difficult. We recommend going a different direction. So the support systems are there just making sure that what they can point to are effective and efficient? That's where a lot of our work has to go to. But again, to your point, that takes the student an institution to be proactive and and to seek out that that help and support to we're starting to put that on its head, whether it's through nonprofit organizations or institutions, to seek those students out specifically, and to not rely on email. Students aren't reading email to really meet them where they are, whether it's an orientation or in the classroom, you name it, to get that information across to them,
Carli 44:35
I'd need you to, like, draw me a picture. Here is your candy land map. That's right, and here's how you this many spaces, yeah, yeah. Board game would be a board game.
Steven Gentile 44:45
Where the dice is, like, all the same numbers, so that they don't have to guess, like, like, hope and pray, you know, like, just move forward.
Carli 44:50
I love this idea. Yeah.
Steven Gentile 44:51
I mean, that's exactly right. Like, anything that's anytime you start inserting choice that doesn't need to be there, like, she. Your major, choose what life you want to have. Don't have to choose about how to puzzle piece your credits together to get to 120 credit hours. Once you do that, you're going to start to see students drop out and and the choice paralysis that can start to creep in, where they're just they're at a loss for what to do, because there's so much choice that they have to make, streamline those choices so that they're really making the choices about what's best for their life. What life do they want to have? And we'll make it work for you from the point forward. Okay,
Carli 45:30
I've had this question for a long time. When you're thinking, yeah, philosophically, you said philosophy is good, right? When you think philosophically about what I want my life to look like, yeah, you know. And then you come from maybe a culture of people saying, you go to college, you go to school. Do you think the reason a lot of people aren't getting more technical degrees, even if it would take them to the lifestyle they want, is a perception problem, or that communities or families aren't encouraging it is that part of the issue here, yeah, and you see, like a heart change in what we think is successful for our kids.
Steven Gentile 46:07
I think there's a there's a number of points to go down with that. One to explore. One is, you know, what's around you. When I went to college and I I was not a first generation student, I had a mom and a dad and a stepdad, and all of them had college education of some sort, but yet, what I saw were doctors and lawyers. I didn't really see engineers in my life that I knew of. I was from a rural town in western North Carolina, and I wanted to be a band teacher for a long time, because I was in band, and that was a profession I knew. And so part of it is not knowing what else is out there and what it means to have a good technical job and what's the pathway to do. So another issue is that oftentimes we do hear college isn't for everybody, but a lot of times, the people who are saying that are going to be darn sure their student, their kid, goes to a four year college and do what they did when they were in university, because they know that's the surest bet and major, you can figure that out later. I hope it just is worthwhile to you. I think it's changing the perception of those who do have a long lineage of going to college, going to university, specifically to also look out there and see what's available at a technical college and community college, because you might get into your third year at a university doing what everyone around you is doing and realize that's not the pathway for you, but for lack of better options or guidance, that's where you are. And so that takes a lot of work in high school I mentioned earlier, dual enrollment and haven't really brought that out much already. The State of Tennessee has greatly intensified its focus on dual enrollment. We have dual enrollment grants that my my agency gives out to high school students. Can you define dual enrollment? Dual Enrollment is being dually enrolled in high school, both in high school and in a college of some sort, and so you're getting credit that's going towards your high school degree, and you're getting credit that goes towards a college certificate or a program. Typically, these are happening in one of two places. They're happening at a college or university, and there's just an arrangement with the high school that credit will transfer over, or they're actually happening at a high school and there is a properly trained teacher or professor who's coming to the to that high school to teach college level curriculum. And the General Assembly and the administration have greatly increased the offerings of dual enrollment grant so that students can start off in ninth grade now going to a technical college, a TCAT to work on a vocational certificate that can set them up well for immediately when they graduate from high school by the end of that time.
Carli 48:54
That's really interested in that we have a daughter that has some different learning differences, and so she works so hard, and she does really well, but school is just always going to take longer for her. It's always gonna be more challenging, but she is actually a prolific Baker. This kid's 11, and can bake bread, make fresh pasta that she is truly gifted with her hands in the kitchen, and so we as parents have been raking our head of we want to give her the best. But I love what you're saying about dual enrollment. Would that go towards something like culinary school, that she could dual enroll in high school and maybe do summer classes where she would get some credits
Steven Gentile 49:31
And things absolutely and she can do them during the academic year too. I mean, these are taking the place of your high school classes starting in ninth grade. Starting in ninth grade. It depends on the school district whether they opt into that, but the state we've made it available to to all Tennesseans if they're gonna becomes an arrangement between the high school district and and the community college curriculum to make them happen. But yeah, and I'd say Tennessee Board of Regents have done a really good job of there's actually, I have a six year old and eight year old and. And a few years ago, TBR came out with a coloring book to put into daycares and preschools to show like, what type of jobs you can get to by going to a TCAT and enrolling in culinary enrolling in machinery, you name it. And, yeah, I can see how that might come across as like, is that really helpful? And I've seen kids gather around this play, this coloring book, The daycare and learning about new professions and where you can do really, do
Carli 50:29
I want to be when I Oh, absolutely, yeah. And I've got one that wants to be a vet, and I am not gifted in veterinary skills, yeah, sciences were not my gifting. And so I'm out there Googling, what does it take to become a veterinarian, like, how could she do summer work that could prepare her to know if she wants to do that? And so I love what you're saying, because I have no idea,
Steven Gentile 50:52
Yeah, and she's so fortunate to have you to do that. And not everyone necessarily has a parent who's got the time or the resources to even start to even realizing early on, Hmm, maybe I need to be thinking about something different here and now. I had, I had a financial aid director I used to work for, and he always had the question, How early should you start talking about financial aid to parents? And his response was, Lamaze class, you know, like as early as possible. But that's true about your career planning and your college planning and and when you've got a six year old who might see the world a little bit differently, my six year old likes to create things, whether it's a dish to eat or going to Lowe's and tinkering on with some tools there, or he wants to have a little craft area in The house too, like he just likes creating things. How can we channel that into something that makes sense, so that when they get to ninth grade or 12th grade, maybe it's not a four year experience that they need to have, but it's something else, and we can start that conversation now.
Spencer 51:56
Last question I've got for you, and this may be picking a problem that you just don't have time to pick. But with that lead in Carly and I hire a lot of people, and sometimes we see people come with degrees that just make us shake our head of saying that is seriously, not a four year or two year degree, like you can't be serious. What's the real degree? And that is the real degree, and I won't name it specifically, but we all know the types of degrees that we're talking about. So is that in your headspace, part of your responsibility, that as much as you approve different ones, at times, you may remove them or have some type of guardianship to ensure that when they do graduate, they don't graduate with a degree that is so inapplicable to serving them in real life that, yes, perhaps they graduated, but gosh, it's as if they didn't.
Steven Gentile 53:00
Right, right? Yeah, that's a really good question. And our in our approval process, that is certainly a part of the the the equation. And we require our institutions to tell us and to tell our commission and the outside experts, how's that diploma, that degree, going to serve them afterwards? What's the workforce demand? And our commission is really eager. These are both lay members and constitutional officers for the state. They will drill into that question exactly what's coming after work. For them, you asked us, do we, as a board, as a commission, terminate programs? Essentially, that's the language we would use. We don't have terminating authority. And honestly, the governing boards that are in charge of the finances of institutions, they care a lot about that stuff. So what we do is we produce a low performing report, like, how many graduates are being produced by programs? What are the low performing we put that out there, and we speak to it as well, and it's a resource for our governing boards and our presidents to use when they're making those decisions on what works, what doesn't work. But also think, let's say for a program that we don't have control over, and it does. It's a head scratcher. It's incumbent on the institution if they offer those to say this degree as it stands alone is really best, as I mentioned earlier, to give you the critical thinking skills you need to go onto a graduate program that better refines towards maybe it's a law degree, maybe it's something that does require extra graduate education, but alone in the vacuum, it might be difficult for you To explain what the value is and and it's incumbent on the institutions to help institutions equip them to make that as valuable as possible.
Spencer 54:49
That's a great answer. And I also can understand the spirit of saying, You know what, Spencer, that's a great problem to have to have, but let's just post first focus on getting them like through. School to begin with, so I can appreciate both sides of that for sure, yeah. And I think my main takeaway from today is I just reflect on it is the very word higher education is something that is so much broader than typical college. Yeah, and Carly talked about this a little bit earlier, is that there's a little bit of a stigma and a heart posture around higher education that historically has been somewhat to the exclusion of really important technical schools community colleges giving people the real skill sets that they can really succeed and have awesome like six figure paying jobs in demand. And I just really appreciate in how you've gone through this to address and spend so much time focusing on each of the different aspects, because they each are incredibly valuable. And I kind of feel that's where our society is calling out when they say, not everybody should go to college. It's not people saying, hey, let's have kids graduate high school and have no skills, and just hope they make it because college didn't work, and that's not the message. And I'm really glad to see the blending of that in kind of how intentional you are about working with schools of each caliber inside of the state and focusing on that on time graduation. Yeah, that is a great missional mindset to say, let's get them in and get them through and out into the real world.
Steven Gentile 56:49
Yeah, it gets me up every day. Start thinking through that. And I just want to thank you guys for having me here today to speak to it as well.
Carli 56:56
But we can't let you go yet, because there is a Hulk hand, oh, the over my right shoulder that has been like, what is what is happening? We're about to come out. Tell me what I need to know. Yeah,
Steven Gentile 57:10
So I brought that in today because I do think of it as quite whimsical, but the baseline of it, where it comes from, is fun, too. I've been at TEAC now for, like I said earlier, for about 12 years, and it's been a long time, and I've developed a lot of great relationships there with my colleagues and staff and friends and mentors. But early on, when I was an analyst, like the way I was connecting with some other staff, there were some great personalities there. We just give each other like fist bumps all the time and and that gradually changed into, like, uh, us through dog pounds, like pound and like death Go fetch or like a snail, like a whole bunch of just got bigger and bigger and bigger. And when one of my colleagues left, she gave two of us, one two whole cans, one for me and one for Herbert brown to take as well, and it's just a reminder of, you know, we're doing great things, having big conversations about higher education, but to develop those, those friendships with the people that you're working next to, you know, bring the whole candid and just have fun with each other.
Carli 58:14
I love that. I feel like your Halloween party would be a lot of, Oh, absolutely.
Steven Gentile 58:17
Yeah, that's right, yeah.
Carli 58:18
I expect pictures.
Steven Gentile 58:21
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely,
Spencer 58:22
Thank you for being here.
