And now from the Blue Ridge PBS Studios in Roanoke, virginia. It's the Virginians of Interest Podcast, with your hosts Brian Campbell and.

Carthen Curran. Welcome to the Virginians of Interest Podcast. My name is Brian Campbell. I'm here with my co-host, Carthen Curran. I'm particularly excited today to have a special guest, the honorable Chris Peace, who's president of the Council of Independent Colleges in Virginia. Carthen, would you like to kick things off?

Thank you, brian. Welcome, chris, my friend. It's good to have you on. We appreciate you taking time. I think it'd be helpful for our audience, our listeners, to know a little bit about your background, where you grew up, where you went to school and all those good things.

Well, it's good to be with you guys and thank you for the invitation. I actually have described Carthen as the world's most interesting man. I'm not sure if I'm going to be of much interest as a Virginian, but I can tell you that I love Virginia as much as Carthen does, and we're just so blessed to be in the Commonwealth for so many reasons. A lot of that love of Virginia was instilled in me from a young age by my mother. I grew up in the center of the universe and for those of you who don't know where that is, that is a town called Ashland, basically in the center of the state of Virginia. It's home to Randolph-Macon College and it's near Kings, dominion, and it's just a wonderful place to grow up. It's very similar to Andy Griffith. It's a Mayberry-type town and my mother was involved in local politics, was the first woman elected to the Hanover County Board of Supervisors and then later the first woman judge.

I grew up going door-to-door and answering constituent calls, the hotline at the house, and being her quasi-legislative aide.

We would go around the state and tour historic sites and battlefields.

My love of Virginia and of country really begins with having had a wonderful role model in my mother and having a family that had some history in Virginia, up to Loudoun County, in Hillsborough, near Purcellville, and not just another beautiful part of the Commonwealth.

I guess, growing up in Ashland with Randolph-Macon, you need to get out of the big town or the little town and go to the big town for college. So I ended up in Farmville, really getting out there to go to Hamden-Sidney. It's a great rivalry between the South's oldest rivalry for a small college football Hamden-Sidney and Randolph-Macon. I had a wonderful four years there and took a year off and worked some campaigns in the Toddwater area and also as a legislative aide for then-delegate Eric Cantor, went back to law school at University of Richmond and started doing government relations and lobbying work at McGuire Woods before I ran for office. So I was the youngest member of the House of Delegates, at 27 in 2006, and was honored to be re-elected seven times, served 14 years and chaired a committee and was on the Appropriations Committee and Budget Conference. But it's a real joy to now be able to be an advocate for 27 private non-profit colleges, universities and Virginia, including those two that I just named, my alma mater and Randolph-Macon.

So Well, let me back up a little bit before we get into your current gig. You're a pretty young guy to have been in politics as long as you were, and I understand now because of your mother. What was that? How many years? You said 14 years. You served in the legislature.

Yeah, 14 years elected in the House of Delegates and then, you know, I kind of grew up in politics and would do my homework at board of supervisors meetings and learned about local government and that experience caused me very quickly to know that state politics and the macro-level policy was much more interesting.

So, I did not run for local office and I had the opportunity in 2005,. Our state senator was Bill Bowling and he ran for lieutenant governor and the incumbent delegate ran for his Senate seat. And then I ran a special election for the House seat, won by 220 votes, so a real landslide. But you know, my opponent was a very distinguished person who had graduated from the United States Military Academy, was a practicing attorney and married with children. You know I was recently married, no kids, and was, as he called it, a fat cat lobbyist. So it was an interesting campaign. I remember Rob Bell, if you probably know being from Charleston.

Rob Bell came and he did a lot of phone banking for us at the time and I remember him having a very great quote, because my district is very historic, you know, it's the birthplace of Patrick Henry. It is also the citus of Lee's first and last victories Gaines is Mill and Colt Harbor. And so Rob Bell's quote was you know about our result in the election? He said, well, that's what happened the last time someone from West Point came to Colt Harbor. So that's it.

I leave it to Rob to get something obscure like that.

I mean what?

did you like and dislike, before we get into your current job, about being in the legislature? It just seems like so many people stay there for life, so you didn't do that. So I presume there must have been something that drew you to it and then something that drew you away from it.

Like a lot of people who don't leave feet first. You know the voters get to this side. I can go into that a little later. But you know I have always viewed the legislative process very similarly to being on a college campus. You know, if you like the liberal arts and applied liberal arts, it is a place where you can gain a lot of knowledge about a lot of subjects, things that you would never have ever known about. You know I served on a number of committees courts of justice, finance, general laws, technology, appropriations, health also that's a big one and some of those areas I know I have the law background and in politics and I'm a generalist. So when it came to COPN or Scopa, practice issues for nurses and doctors, you know these were things of first impression and so I really enjoyed the stimulation that you got from learning about issues, meeting new people and then seeing the commonwealth from sort of the higher level and how it all fits together, particularly through the budget, so that you know it's extremely invigorating. And that's all the policy side. You know the politics side back in the district I also really felt called to.

I mean, most of my family has been in some sort of public facing service, whether it's public health or social work or law or military. And you know, I really saw the constituent work that we did in the district as being, you know, an extension of that of it's a social work. You know people who have problems say they're mad at Dominion, they're mad at Verizon, they're mad at VDOT or they have an issue with you know a provider of some kind I mean you name it. They would bring their problems to you and you'd have to find out ways to try to address, solve their problem or get them connected to someone who could. And that's really where I saw the term delegate coming into play, because you know, I might not know the answer to your problem but I know someone who does and I can connect you. And so facilitating that and delegating in that manner was extremely rewarding. And you know, I feel like some of the most good we did in 14 years was actually through our constituent services. Great.

Thank you, brian. Chris, before we touch on private higher education, during your time in the house, the governors that you served with who, which one of those did you have the closest relationship with, working relationship with?

That's a great question. It reminds me I think it was Leah Wardrop who was just a great. We've lost a lot of the personalities in the legislature over the last 20 years. There's probably reasons for that. I think social media probably plays a role. Everyone's afraid of their shadow and, just to be real and transparent, but we had some real characters. I started with some really interesting people and colorful people. Leah Wardrop was one from Virginia Beach. He would talk about basically, we're going to be here after the governor's gone.

With all due respect, that famous preface of any legislator when speaking on an issue and addressing someone else. With all due respect, governor, you may have a great idea. It may not be time, I think, that having co-equal branches and reminding governors that they're the head of the executive branch but we're the head of the legislative branch. Together we can find answers to the things, but we don't work for you and we work for the same constituents that elected you. I think that's a very healthy part of perspective of government, state level and federally. Each one of the governors. I started with four governors. They were all just really wonderful. I mean, it didn't matter what partisan affiliation they had. I always found that they were extremely approachable, really wanting to do the right thing from their perspective and for the right reasons. I think we're lucky in that. In terms of Virginia I may have something to do with being a one-term governor state you got to really want to be governor and do it for the right reasons.

It's not a lifetime post and certainly past as prologue. You're not going to be president, at least in the modern era. It's an interesting thing you get your one shot, you get one budget and you need to be ready and be prepared on day one. The ones that I think I really appreciated were those who had had some legislative background, who knew how the legislature worked, who came in with relationships and came in day one with a organized plan and agenda. It wasn't learning on the job.

Bob McDonnell was extremely prepared and really was an effective governor in terms of policy. Tim Kaine, also having been Lieutenant Governor and Mayor, had a unique perspective. Ralph Northam, also having been a legislator, knew how things got done. Terry McAuliffe, being a political but not having had legislative experience, brought a different perspective.

Where, in my view, was that he got people in his cabinet who knew the politics and knew the legislature and he just let them do their thing, while he was all about economic development and being a cheerleader for Virginia and going around the state and the nation, the world, talking about how great Virginia is. He knew his strengths and he played to those. While his cabinet had experience and they were longer in the tooth in terms of Virginia politics. He had some successes. When it comes down to it, if you don't control the legislature, your ability to shape public policy is going to be somewhat limited. In each case, there were opportunities for, say, bob McDonnell with a unified government for two years, or Northam for the unified government for two years, where they were able to really advance a lot of policy. Otherwise it's the old Virginia way.

Before I turn it over to Brian, I just want to say you made, I think, a compelling case. It's not perfect, but I think the one term governorship that the Commonwealth has has worked pretty darn good. I hope we don't amend the constitution sometime in the future to allow a governor to run for reelection. I just think it takes their eye off the ball. If they want to run again, they have that opportunity. But I think the way it is it's worked very well, brian. Yeah.

Well, let's segue a little bit now, but before we even get back into the higher education question. So you're in there for 14 years, you're the chair and a committee. It sounds like you're doing great things. Did you wake up one morning and go I want to have another chapter of something different? Then suddenly you go run all these groups for higher education. How did that transition occur?

It's a great question. I think you've had some conversations with at least one of the first ladies of Virginia and other wonderful women of interest in Virginia. I guess the answer would be my wife had a lot to do with it, but behind every good guy or good man there's a great woman, and so I think that she saw how much I cared about from my earliest years to my own service, making a contribution to Virginia and then not being engaged. I think she probably observed that it was something that was missing. I don't know if I recognized it myself. So we had some pillow talk and some conversations and I always told people she was my most effective lobbyist Anybody who had an issue during those 14 years. You really want to get it done. You should talk to Ashley, but I think she knows me well and better than sometimes I'm able to observe myself, and so she encouraged me to get out there and see what was going on.

Taking a couple of years off was very healthy because I had a straight run and it was at a time with COVID that I could spend a lot of time at home and with the kids and still focus on my law practice. My daughter came to my office with me during the shutdown every day to do her schoolwork on her laptop from the conference room. We had lunch together every day. I mean I count that as a blessing and an opportunity I'll never have again. But at some point, when normal returned, it's like an old athlete you still think you can play. And so I talked to a lot of people I respect. I set up, I made a list of people I should talk to and did a little listening tour, and that was a year ago, a year ago last summer, and that led to adding some lobbying clients to my law office business, and so I was doing some lobbying work this past session for a couple of clients and that was good. It was a joke with people it's like prisoner reentry, so it was good to get back downtown and see some folks.

But a lot of change as well. If you look at the composition of the legislature from when I started in 2006, I mean it's nearly, I would say, 90% turned over, which is amazing. Some people talk about turn limits. We have them in Virginia. You're not. You know, it's a. There is a turn and a revolving door in that respect. But as I was listening to people, they said well, this is an opportunity with wonderful and distinguished legend of private colleges. Robert Lambeth was retiring and I was invited to interview and it worked out. I didn't seek it out and I didn't actually think I was going to get the job, so I was very thankful and it's been a wonderful six months on board.

Well, you've done a great job, if I may say so, since we worked together. My day job is running the Commonwealth Alliance for Rural Colleges, which represents six private rural colleges in Virginia which, chris five of my six are part of the Council of Independent Colleges. Hopefully, get that six one over the line. You know, chris, it's every time you look at the newspaper recently, or the news, the front cover of the New York magazine this past Sunday. The front cover was all about higher education and the tremendous challenges From all sections of higher education or, undercurrently. Can you talk a little bit about some of the challenges in Virginia that private higher ed is facing? And, having been in this role not for a long time though but perhaps you could share some of the things that you believe we can, from a policy perspective, implement to maybe help make that situation better.

Yeah, well, you know we start by saying that there is a higher ed ecosystem and the full spectrum of higher education includes Public and private. You know we educate about a third of the total students in Virginia and we produce Essential workforce, particularly in areas where there's great need and shortage, like teaching and nurses. You know we have programs the only programs, and aviation, for example. We've got some wonderful, innovative and unique opportunities for young people and adult learners upskilling to transition in their employee and create value for the their whole lives. You know there's a great movement that is suggesting that it's better to get the fast food you know credential, you know it's better to just get that you know, quick hit of credential or other degree. Don't graduate with a certain amount of debt and get into workforce as quickly as possible. What is short-sighted about that and that may be good for for certain people, but what's short-sighted is that they're losing earning income over a lifetime and and other opportunities that would come. Being affiliated with one of our colleges and the network that that those institutions provide and offer us support for someone throughout their career and throughout their life. You know we are 27 members and CICV and we have a full range of Sizes and strengths. We have more national institutions that people would know Washington Lee University, richmond, but we also have some or Liberty University. We also have some smaller rural colleges that you know offer an amazing and intimate you know great teacher-student ratio of environment for students. That that really is terrific. You know the private colleges closing in the country I think something around 13 to 15 have in the last three years, thankfully none in Virginia. But our colleges are located in footprint of Virginia statewide, but in areas that might otherwise be higher education deserts, and so we like to talk about how we make a positive economic impact in our communities where we're located in particularly rural Virginia, job opportunities and the workforce opportunities that the colleges provide. So you know we're we're a wonderful part of the economy for the state.

We have some issues that we're advocating for. Tag Obviously number one tuition assistance grant. It goes to every Virginia resident full time student for four years. That's a $5,000 now annually. We'd like to see that grow. We would like to see the program administered more efficiently. It's currently a pay, perform or working to make that automated, bringing in 21st century.

We have seen how more investment on the public side terms of nursing faculty compensation can have a disproportionate or unintended consequence, negative consequence to our private nursing colleges.

So you know we're we're trying just to spread the good news of private colleges to the administration, the legislators, that when they want to do good things for publics, were for that, but also do it in in mind with and have a mind towards how it would impact the private sector. You know, from a political philosophy, you know I would sometimes argue we don't want the public sector competing with the private sector. If there's something that can be done by the private sector, we want to see that happen in a free market. Well, like like healthcare, higher education is not exactly a free market. So we do understand the state's stewardship role and obligation with respect to publics, but we're an equal part of the system at large and we hope that that will begin to be more recognized going forward by this administration and the new legislature. We're going to have 140 new members in January, about 40% turnover in this cycle. So great opportunity to spread that good news.

Chris, let me you know, all three of us work in higher education one way or another. I work at VCU, you guys do your thing with the private schools, but also think that it's critical for us to be honest and transparent. So trust in higher education was at its high right after World War II, when you had all the veterans going back to and literally created this middle class right. But in the last 30 years let's say there's a I'm being critical now the costs have increased exponentially and it's not necessarily because we've been innovative. I mean, universities pretty much look like they did 30 years ago. So so trust is declining in us and for other reasons too. But those are two of the main drivers. What do we do the three of us and the positions we have to begin to get leadership to be more transparent about this escalating cost thing, and what can we do to be more responsive to our customers?

Yeah well, I don't think there's a silver bullet. I'll say that there's no, no panacea. I think some of the fundamentals remain true, and one I alluded to earlier in terms of earning potential over a lifetime. I think as a society, we've unfortunately started to discount the value of just being an educated person, of having well rounded background, of the liberal arts. You know, I remember my grandmother saying you know, if you knew the Bible and Shakespeare, you know, you, you had a, you had a head start on the world, and that's still true. I mean. So I think that what we're seeing is a lot of colleges looking at their academic portfolio and doing an audit and reevaluation of are the courses and programs being offered meeting the needs of the current population that would, that would be serviced, and so there are some adjustments and there are some schools, you know, taking some bold positions in terms of cutting certain programs or limiting certain offerings in degree fields that were, say, more of the humanities, traditional liberal arts, and moving more to the applied liberal arts, and I think that's important. You need to continue to self evaluate and, like any business, if your product is not being purchased, you got to figure out what you're doing with your product. It's not just we need to market it better. We probably need to take some stock and inventory of what we are selling and then still maintain and remain true to sort of your core principles and values.

Costs, you know, I would argue that Private colleges in Virginia are doing more in terms of shared services, cost containment and it's really out of necessity. There's no backstop right. You know, if you don't make your budget, if you can't pay your bills like any business, you're going out of business. There's no state to say here's some extra money after you raise tuition to support operations or to support, you know, tuition mitigation. That doesn't happen for us and so they have to be smart. They've got to run it like a business and pursue shared service. That's why our organization is valuable, because we offer a platform for collaborating on health insurance, on pension, on IT services and others, so that collectively the schools can save money and do some cost containment so that they continue to offer the services to the public and to the students.

So if you look at the data, the debt of a four-year public and private graduate is relatively the same. The last snapshot I saw was, on average, it's about a $2,000 difference, right around $29,000 to $31,000. So when people say private is so expensive vis-à-vis public like, it's really not accurate At the end of the day. There's a lot of institutional aid. There's the TAG grant. We have a higher percentage of Pell students than the publics do. There are promise programs like the Carthens-Amemod or Ferrum that offer free tuition with certain conditions.

You know so it is not. When you look at the student body of private college in Virginia, it is not what even I remember 30 years ago, where at you know to some degree it was for some a finishing school or you know it was the place for the one percenters, if you will. We are egalitarian, we are very middle class, we are first generation, we are diverse. We have two HBCUs, one Hispanic-serving institution. I've been impressed because I took a tour of my first 100 days of all the campuses, met with all the presidents first 100 days and I was struck by how much change has happened in the last 30 years with respect to who we serve and why we do it and the impact on the workforce, and it's really remarkable.

Thank you, chris. The second part of my question. We hear about this is pending demographic cliff, where the age section sector of the population that would be college bound is diminishing for the foreseeable future. How does the Commonwealth compare to other states, in particular the ones in our neighborhood, with regard to that demographic cliff?

So you know this is what is forecast. Thankfully we're not quite there yet. We've actually seen in our inventory and survey of our members that enrollment is up for many of them and for many of them at record levels. I've seen some headlines even Marymount, virginia Union and Marine Henry this is a good class. There was a year it was the year after COVID, I think 21 that most of our schools had tremendous challenges. So 20 was actually surprisingly for most pretty good because a lot of the application enrollment process had already been done when March came around and shut down. So people still kind of carried on with what their plans were. But it was 21 where there was a huge dip.

I was at Randolph-Macon this week and the president was describing that phenomenon where they lost basically a quarter of that year's class, which then becomes a hole in revenue for four years, and so they're rebounding now. I think really across the board is seeing, and online education also has played a major role in really supporting and adding a different revenue stream for our colleges. But the forecast doesn't look great. I've seen some numbers Carthen, where part of the mid-Atlantic, won't be as negatively impacted as, say, the Midwest or the Northeast by the cliff. But you know, and I hate to go on and on, but you know when it reminds me of when I was in caucus, we had a pollster come and the pollster said that 2008, the economic crisis and collapse of the market had a greater negative impact on American psychology, consumer confidence, everything than 9-11.

And that makes some sense because it affected everybody. But when you look at 2008, I mean the enrollment cliff I think you can draw a straight line to 2008. Because if you were a you know, a family that sought the American dream, you thought going to college was just what you did and you had a house, a car, a job, and then maybe lost most of that. Then you rethought what that trajectory would be for your kids, and so what we've actually seen in some statistics is that there are parents who went to college now telling their kids maybe you don't have to go to college, you know, and that's a very interesting phenomenon to try to speak to and persuade otherwise. But this enrollment cliff is, I think, a direct tie to people rethinking their lives in the wake of, you know, major economic crisis. People just don't think we're not going to have a baby. You know, we've got to pay the bills. Very interesting.

Let me. It's you know I mentioned earlier, all three of us work in higher education. All three of us also are either in politics at some point, and so Carthen and I do a lot of work. Even though he's in private schools, I'm in public schools on partnerships, and we talk a lot about why it's so difficult to make partnerships. We did one in pharmaceutical and chemical engineering between his private schools and VCU, and I think everybody thought, you know, we'd done something magical, when the reality of it was, we just had motivation, by knowing one another, to say, hey, what can we do to work together? It was magical. Well, it was magical too, and we're pretty smart. But the other thing that struck me was was just how hard it is, because we then, you know, reached out to some public universities and just that. We tried to convene some people, and the resistance to even convening people was more than I thought.

I'm being very transparent here, because I feel like the other threat to our country and to our economy is workforce. We don't have enough people for any jobs anymore, and if we don't get this fixed, then we could have another economic crisis simply because of productivity. Don't you think there's real opportunities, particularly for schools that may be having some declining enrollment to rethink what it is they do and how they do it and how they might partners with other. I know this is real quick, but even Old Dominion now partners with ILR. You know the Independence Dantalon Group down in Danville for Navy submarine stuff. So there's not you can't float a submarine that far up the river. But they were smart enough to realize that they were much more workforce focused and then you could go back to Old Dominion and finish out your manufacturing engineering degree. Don't you feel that not only is there an opportunity, but it's the right thing to do, to explore more of these partnerships?

Absolutely, and you know I've met with the new Chancellor of the Community College System for that very reason. We have articulation agreements. How can we, you know, get more students coming from two year to finishing at four year? What are they offering that we're offering? Are we duplicating? Are there ways we can provide a better complement of offerings for learners of all ages, lifetime learners, even those seeking to reskill or upskill? You know we had some concern that Community Colleges would start to try to offer four year degrees and I'm happy to say that the Chancellor is not interested in that. So that's good. But we certainly want to partner in what we do with the Community Colleges. I think we can do more on the public private front. I had some meetings with George Mason and their interest Even you know, among our institutions we certainly support collaboration. We could see more of that even in certain areas where there might be a cluster of private colleges that are close together that could do more between their various campuses to support sustainability.

And you know the Constitution, I think is a very important point the Constitution, statute and Attorney General opinions all support the notion that the state may contract with privates for the delivery of services, and so, whether it's the VWIL program at Mary Baldwin. It's a good example of a contractual relationship with the state. State could contract with us on private college nursing and the faculty issue that I raised earlier. So nothing prohibits the state from doing it. Sometimes I think that people use this notion of well, the state can't do business with privates. That's the private, we're the public. But that's actually more of a red herring. That's not actually legal. There is every lawful way that the state can partner. So I'm optimistic about what opportunities are out there for further engagement with the public sector as well.

But Christy, you pointed about the Constitution. I mean there is because, as Brian alluded, the Commonwealth Alliance has this MOU relationship with VCU and a particular academic focus. It is unconstitutional for private colleges in Virginia to receive a direct appropriation from the General Assembly. Is that still the case?

Well, it's sort of the old law school answer. It depends because the appropriation of general funds I go back to my Mary Baldwin VWO example $300,000. That is a direct appropriation but it's done by contract. That's what the language says. So you won't see language in the budget that looks like how they fund publics, where it's a list the VVA gets X dollar, just gives it to them, but what you will see is a dollar and then language that says through contract with the Commonwealth of Virginia, mary Baldwin will provide this service and this is the appropriation. So that is permissible.

So what do you think you mentioned nursing earlier, because I agree the healthcare sector has been decimated. I mean, there's this major, continues to be major shortages there. There's emerging areas like reshoring manufacturing right. In other words, we've got to get the right workforce here. The whole idea of what's happening in Virginia with data centers and artificial intelligence In some ways it's really exciting. But once again, universities culturally and I've worked at them for longer than you guys have we're not known for being nimble and responding quickly to things. So how do you think this is very encouraging having this conversation with me, because I think what you're saying is things that I really agree with. How do you think we can be even more responsive knowing that, just what you said, the place universities look a lot different than they did 30 years ago, thank God. What will universities look like 30 years from now?

Wow, I wish I were Nostradamus. But they're going to continue to evolve and I think probably the place where they're going to evolve most is in how the college or university offers on-campus residential learning. And we have a lot of beautiful campuses, historic campuses. All cost money to maintain, and so Heads and Beds is the convention center. Tourism. Folks would say Heads and Beds is important for maintaining the campuses, but at the same time that is not necessarily where the consumer is going, and so I think it's going to be more of a blend of on-campus for two years. Three, you know, off-campus internships, externships, workplace experiences. You know we've seen a lot of that kind of thing with, like international abroad programs, and I think there's going to be more emphasis on experiential learning off of the campus.

Chris back to. I'm curious. This is kind of a demographic question. Do you have any data of how many of the students that attend our private colleges in Virginia, how many of them are from out of state?

The large percentage we educate. So the numbers that I can share with you. We've got ballpark round numbers 150,000 students total and 20,000 get the TAG grants. That means 27 of the 20,000 of those are full-time four-year on-campus and that kind of gives you some perspective of who's a Virginia resident student and who is from out of state. You know, university of Richmond quoted this week when we took a legislator there that 15% of their student body was Virginian. Good Lord, but that also represented the largest percentage of any state.

So Just describe a little bit, because that's a good segue too, because I know from working with Carthens schools, you know then you've got a pretty big landscape of schools. If you think about it Like you said, you've got what is the Hispanic serving? Which school is that?

Marymount, oh Marymount, oh Marymount.

Okay, I didn't know that so, but you've also got you know when I think of this old prestigious schools like W and L and Richmond. But tell us a little bit about how that makes a challenge that you've got a lot of mouths to feed and there are different types of mouths. How do you go about that? Do you just look for consistency across it or do you try to tailor some of the things you do for the specific schools?

Well, the tag is applicable to all Virginia residents who qualify for your on campus. There has been an issues for the HBCU members, virginia Union and Hampton with the enhanced tag of 7,500. If there are issues raised by an individual institution that can be solved with legislation or budget item, then certainly we'll advocate for that. Online tag is at 50% of the total award and so that negatively impacts you know a handful of our members who have pretty robust online programs that they would like to see that be. You know, 100% award at 5,000, not 2,500. And Averych of the world, for example, or Liberty have very robust programs. So you know I was asked very early on what's your favorite dining hall that you visited or what's your favorite campus, and I said you know, that's a lot like saying who your favorite child is and so I can't. I can't say that?

Who's your favorite child? He has two favorites.

I have two favorites I have a favorite son and I have a favorite daughter.

Well, let me ask. I'm going to ask one last question and I'm going to turn it over to Carthen then we're going to begin to wrap up. You know people used to. When I was in politics in Charlottesville a long time ago and then I went to work at the University of Virginia, they said well, you know, we used to rail on them all the time. You know UVA, and then you go. I said, if you can't beat them, join them. But one of the things that struck me was I thought that and I use political in a very wide sense that I thought that I was going to go do the Lord's work working in higher education and I found that politics to be just as big in politics as in higher ed, as it was in politics, but just not in a partisan way. What is it that you experienced in your job now that you could not have predicted?

What would you help me with that and maybe give a meaning, meaning just you've got into your job there.

You Represent constituents. Now you're still, you're still. You just you still represent people, they're just different kinds of people.

What is it?

about that job that surprised you.

Yeah, well, you know I did that as a lawyer too, so I had clients and then as a legislator, I had constituents and you know I've got 27 Members of a board of directors said I think you're my direct report and the executive committee of six presidents, and you know, I think, what a surprise me is just how hard a job they have. You know, I think the conventional wisdom, or or is the prevailing attitude in the public, is oh, you're a president of a college and university Boy, that's a posh life. Oh yeah, you know you get a mansion to live in and you know you must get paid a lot, and you know there are other people who do the work for you, kind of, maybe you're just a figurehead and you all you have to do is raise money. Well, they certainly have to do a lot of fundraising, but it is not anything close to what that prevailing attitude is in my view. And and having met they are some of the hardest working, talented, smart people that I've met in all of my public affairs and it's a very thankless job often, and they're constant pressures, whether it's Staffing and maintaining, retaining faculty and staff or the enrollment cliff that Carthen mentioned, meeting expectations on fundraising, delivering quality service for students and graduating students, not just enrolling them to get tuition revenue.

There's all the athletic issues out there that you know. There's the ESPN effect. You know you're competing in Virginia against students who want to go to Tennessee, auburn, alabama and Georgia because they see it on TV every Saturday. In the fall it is. It is a very difficult job and a very important job, and so I think that's the thing that has been Most remarkable to me and that they often do a lot with a little and they're creative, and I think our two organizations Carthen really reflect that. You know where. You know we, we do a lot with a little and we provide Support that's needed to help them do their jobs better.

Chris, back to the General Assembly of the 140 members, do you have a Number of how many are graduates of Virginia private colleges?

Yeah well, the current makeup. We're close to 50% that either you know, went to undergrad or graduate, a lot of law school graduates, university of Richmond and Michigan University of Richmond in particular, but it's about 50%. And we did a survey this summer, first time 261 candidate survey, and one of the goals was that was to collect data on you know Does. Do you have a personal connection, whether you attended or whether you have a family member attend or a child attending now? And so it's been good to see that Nearly everyone responding has some connection to a private college, whether they went to it or graduated or their family member, and and it's less than six degrees of separation, as they say.

That's terrific Well that go ahead.

I was just one more follow-up question in that respect. The governor, young Ken, is a private higher ed alum of two institutions. What what's it been like to work with his administration Because of his private higher education experience?

Yeah, well, I tell you, Amy Gidera is a Wonderful choice for Secretary of Education. She's hard-working, she's smart, she's data driven, so I've really enjoyed getting to know her. She's got a full plate, you know, because she's responsible for K-12. There's a recent report this week of the teacher shortages K-12 pipeline. You know she's been an advocate for college lab schools, which many of our colleges are Applying for and have received grants to start. That was actually legislation I carried with Jennifer McClellan back in the McDonald administration and so her team is Talented, as well as secretary of labor, brian Slater, who went to Ferrum and University Richmond. He's doing the workforce transition and we have a role in that advisory group.

So I've seen the governor's administration being very open and welcoming to Partnering with us. I think where we want to see progress made is certainly on some of the policy and budget items that we've put forward and particular tag that has not gone up in the first two years of this administration. So we'd like to see that happen and and I hope that with his positive experience and you know private secondary, private undergraduate and Harvard MBA that you know he knows the value of private education firsthand and and also then would support you know we'll never be parody, will never be 5050 with Publix, but we'll be recognized as a co-equal part of the higher ecosystem in the state. Thank you.

Chris, thank you for your time today.

Yeah, thank you guys. It's been a nice chatting. Thanks for letting me drone on.

We wouldn't know you did. We appreciate it very much. Hope to have you back.

Yeah, thank you for joining us today for the Virginians of Interest podcast. We would like to thank our host, blue Ridge PBS. If you like what you heard today, please like and subscribe to our podcast.

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