So comfortable. All righty, this is Emma Van der 90 with Kylie Cochran and
Dean Allen on Friday, January 11, 2019. It is 12:46 p.m. and this is for
the Barrett Oral History Project. So, can you kind of describe, like, your
personal history with Barrett for me, like, kind of like when you stepped
on for Barrett, what that has been like? Well, I started Working for
Barrett in June of 2017.
So I'm in here a little more than a year and a half um. But my association
with this operation um goes back quite a ways earlier than that. Actually
long before Barret was even
really so um. I, I, um. have been a professor at Cronkite School and that
was one of the one of the schools that was one of the first. Incorporate
with the honors program. That was in 1988 and I started at Cronkite three
years later in 1991. So I was one of the Really one of the very first
people. From the academic side, from the unit side that had an association
with what was then the honors.
So that kind of that kind of describes it during the the the preceding. I
guess that would have been 27 years that I taught at Gronk. I had honors.
All through that period.
So like, I guess my biggest question is kind of like what prompted the
switch, like when, when you became the dean in 2017, like, why didn't you
stay working at Cronkite? Like why did you choose to become a dean now? Um
, mainly I was looking for I guess you could say a new challenge. What I
was doing at Cronkite, I was directing the PhD program. And I launched
that program in 2011 and I did it, I did it for six years and um We turned
out some really good scholars over there, some really good doctoral
students, um, but it, it kind of was a situation where Cronkite is, is not
really a, a, it's more of a professional program. So there were some
things that that I was kind of looking to move past and so I was uh happy
with the opportunity to to come over here, um. And um
Just thinking about that, one of the things um that also Kind of inspired
me to to. I want to change. I'm still actually on the faculty of Cronkite
and I still teach an honors course. Yeah, you're teaching something about
fake news or politics or something mass and I had first class last night,
um. The thing I was also doing, I was, I was kind of in a an odd situation
where I was teaching PhD classes and recruiting PhD students and going
through all of them. The mechanics of getting them doctoral degrees
working with the graduate college while at the same time I still was
teaching at undergraduate skills courses and I taught a course in Cronkite
called television news reporting.
52 straight semesters. I taught that course every semester since I began
at the Crocket of ASU in 1991, every single semester until the spring of
2017 when I came over here, the uh that the that spring as I prior coming
over, that was the last of those reporting classes that I taught and um.
It was, it was nice to have that, that string, but I was not disappointed
in that class. It's a long, very long run. You wanted something different.
No, I see that, um. So, I think you kind of touched on this. So you said
like uh for a dean, you've only been a dean for about a year now, um but
you said you started working like with Barrett and kind of the program
like back in '88 you said? 91.
Yeah, that's true, um. If you want, I can go into that a little bit like
um when the honors college first started. So again, it started in 1988
and um It I I arrived in 1991 in the third year, and um where it was
located on the Tempe campus was right across from the Cronkite School,
right across from the Ser Hall in a facility called McClintock Hall and
there was.
It's, yeah, I don't know, it seemed big at the time, but all the dorms
were in there and it was like. Kind of a courtyard type area, probably I
don't know, I think when I first came there might have been 500. Totals
there something like that
and um again like I said Cronkite, the Cronkite School. Partially because
of the proximity of it was immediately picked to begin the process of
starting the honors program. What that what that really entails.
Um, I Cooperation from the units, cooperation from the deans and the
directors of the different colleges and schools. Who can in turn
communicate. Encouragement to their faculty and I think one of the things
One of the The challenges at first was Doing that because if you're
familiar with Bear, you know that that that we pretty much exist on our
good looks. now there's a budget, but um But, but largely my job is to go
around to the colleges downtown and get support from Important people
faculty to get them to volunteer to help with yeah, I mean, we, we don't
pay to
To students, we don't,
we don't pay faculty to do honor sessions. We don't pay faculty to do
honors contracts. Um, so all of that is volunteered by Essentially that
and if you don't If you don't get a buy in on it. A big body. You don't
have an honors college. This is one of the things I think this facet
is often overlooked.
By the bear and monkeys, I think they, they tend to take for granted the
fact that faculty, deans and directors, staff at the different departments
and schools and colleges are gonna come rushing.
To help there, yeah, let me give up 20 hours so I can do an honors. I mean
, it just doesn't work like that. Anyway, at the beginning there were all
sorts of problems with that. Um, the dean at the time was Ted Humphries.
He was the founding dean of Barrett, and I think quickly developed a sense
that that there was a big need for public relations. It was a big need for.
Him to get out and glad and all of the different people even down to the
lowest lecture level or he wasn't gonna have support to do the honors
college. So over time he got really good at that. There would be We would
have lunches, receptions, numerous times I saw him at at Stauffer Hall
just hanging out so people would know him and that was really a crucial
thing and eventually the honors college expanded to all of the other. Yeah
, I mean, they were big, they were big in the humanities, um. And
eventually got really big in the sciences which attempting humanities are
kind of in the middle of the campus and the sciences that were around
around university and um. But those were kind of strange times because it
it at Cronkite and I'm sure the other other units. There was a lot of
handwringing about whether What what you get out of this. If you're a
faculty, you volunteer your time, what's the reward and eventually those
those discussions. Go to the right people and they were able to
communicate. So how would you answer that? like
like when people ask you that question of like, what is the importance of
Barrett
like how would you answer that question? Well, it's The most promising
students at ASU. The the thing that I, I try to sell here is The chance to
teach inspired students. You're not gonna get that in run of the mill ASU
student body. And for the most part, faculty respond to that faculty, they
don't want to. Be in a being in a class that's that's a drag, you know,
it's a dish rag. I mean they don't want that. You want to go into a class
it's lively and it's and and and and
and, yeah, and kids learn in my experience in teaching. Especially 52
semesters of that TV reporting class, I would say.
There were 20 people, 20 students in the, I would say maybe 33 out of the
20 were really into it. So that's, that's the thing you can sell, that's
what Ted Humphries. Was able to convey a lot and there would be
demonstrations of work, there would be the equivalent of the um honor
symposiums that we do. And um another big thing that happened in those
early days, um, the president of ASU. was a person named Lanie. He was
very well what that building is named after ASU OK just made that connection
and interestingly enough, I got to know him briefly. Because, um, starting
in the late 1990s, I was in the university. I eventually served in the
university Senate for 15 years and became the president of the downtown.
But during the first meeting, um, The first meeting I went to and this
this sort of continues, but they have your name. Your names are on on.
Tamp cars, big tents, and they were. All it was they were set up in
alphabetical order. That was the way they did it. So I was the first one.
My name was Edie, and next to me was Gladdy Cool at the very bar. And so I
occasionally got to talk to him. He didn't come to Harry, but he was, he
was extremely well respected and I think deserves a lot of credit for
getting the honors college going.
Just like with his inspiration and like with connecting with people, yeah
, yeah, and so I guess I assume you moved down here with Barrett and with
Cronkite when Cronkite moved from Tempe to to downtown.
We remained at Tempe at Stauffer Hall until 2008.
And um
And There were actually it was actually about 2 years of build up to where
we were still at Staer Hall, but everybody was getting ready to move. And
um
at the point where that happened. The relationship with my unit Cronkite
and what was actually then the Barrett Honors College was in high gear.
The location of the Barrett Honors College. They had moved it from a
Clintock Hall just south down. I guess that would be for Mall, whatever
that mall is that's on to its current location now. They moved it. No, no
, it was moved to I think it was Hall. It's in the um by the dorms and
that's by,
by it's in the southwest corner of the camp. And that location was again
very close to Cronkite. We had a lot of honors students in Cronkite and um.
And, and that was, that was a really good location. It was really upgrade
from McClintock. And so that was in 2008,
we moved down here at the same time when Barrett moved from that location
at best to where it is now southeast corner. And with all that going on,
there was kind of a drop off and there was not initially a downtown
Barrett office um.
I can't really recall where this where there they had a very small office
where they were they were doing some contact with nursing and um You know
, it's now the watch college. It was in Cronkite. They were doing that. Um
, but it was very, it was, it was a pimple to begin with
and um. And and questions were at Cronkite, we just moved, this was a
brand new building in 2008 and questions were asked about that, you know,
what's, what's Barrett, what You know, we had this great relationship at
Tempe, and now they've scattered to one place, and we've scattered here.
So I think it took a little while to build to build that back up, and I
think Mark Jacobs.
Deserves tremendous credit for putting the money, the resources together
and and campaigning to have this downtown.
When would you say it kind of kicked into high gear, like when you were
like, yes, Downtown parrot is now a strong.
There is is still feeling here that it's not completely kicked in the high
even, even now, um. I think it is, we have 700 Barrett students downtown,
which is which is not bad. But um, I think probably.
When this facility opened, when we opened, that was, I think in 2011, and
we had a home. I think that was kind of the moment that it was, it was
coming the roots and the growing exactly
um but I think there's there's, you know, still a lot of challenges
getting it getting it
to where it needs to be. Largely what we have the challenge here of having.
6 very different colleges that um
As far as honors programs go, they're all different, they all have
different needs. Um, what we've been trying to do is, is, is Address some
of those some of those differences and spread. Spread our wings further.
But it's, it's, it's very different. I, I was at a leadership meeting at
Tempe just today for 2 hours. All we did is sit there and talk about, talk
about Tempe, building a student success center. Where's the money coming
from? Temping,
and it's kind of hard, I think. That can be, which is more of a
traditional setting with humanity and for them to understand how unique.
Downtown campuses, yes.
They do understand that they're Things that things that need to be
addressed globally.
That we're doing Yeah
I guess that kind of bleeds into one of my questions I was going to ask
like, what do you think is like unique about the downtown campus, like
having a Barrett campus here that is very different from Tempe, like, this
can be something good, something that you wish would change.
The definition downtown campus is unique because it's it's it's the only
component of ASU so. In the midst of the very center of the big city with
all the Things that that go on good and bad and um And if you go around
and talk to the deans of the colleges, they will all to that point that
it's it's unique because there's there's tall buildings and there's
restaurants and there's a very different culture right
all of the The downtown relate to that. Greatly relate to that. And so
what what we've tried to do is Here are programs down here to expose the
students and nursing and. Public affairs, criminology, all, all of the all
of the units we serve. To love the downtown area, to get out. Experiences
that um That we're not second class MP that we have. You may not have a
Vista del Soul here, but we have um other things that make it. Make it
better. So we extensively work on that to bring awareness to the,
um, you know, I'm sure you've seen our facility at Taylor Place and so we
we try to sell a view of the downtown area from that that those windows on
the south, um, and, and build that up as a, as a, as a big thing. You
don't need to be. Mhm and that's that's a big part of what.
Yeah, I, I completely agree with that. I know for me the like cultural
awareness of being in a city was a huge part of why I chose to be downtown
and inside of Bart too, um. I think you kind of touched on this a little
bit, saying like that you came to um Like being a part of the move from
Tempe to downtown, but did you create or were you part of any like special
Barrett programs or initiatives that we should know of? Well, As a family
person, all you really do is Share on our species. Do honors sections or
honors courses and do honors contracts. Those are about the only things as
a faculty person. Um, the, the one part of that was, um, Haven't done a
lot of, quite a few of those. I was. Invited to a lot of the Barrett thank
you lunches that we have, um. I can remember the symposium that Barrett
did at the post office before they remodeled it and um. And so I was
involved in that initiative. Um, but I, I really didn't get into be
initiatives until I actually got. Gotcha.
Can you tell us about your favorite honors thesis project that you worked
on as a chair? Oh wow, there were, there were so many, um.
One of the ones, one of the things that we, we have tried to do downtown
as well is, is get away from the mall of The traditional Shakespeare
Beowulf honors thesis and let people be more creative in what they're
doing. So that Naturally lend itself to Cronkite and um so I, I supervised
a few documentaries and um.
One of the ones that I remembered it was, it was um
What it was about, it was a documentary look at food deserts in downtown,
and there were not the the the idea was is that um Downtown there's no
grocery stores around here and people are really suffering and um you know
so this student really brought that home and I, I reacted to that, not
because the the topic was It was sensational. It was great, but it was
done with high production values. They took time to do it. It could have
been on PBS and so I, I remembered that. I mean there's another one a
documentary, I remember where the student did. A tour of pollution at For
a study documentary on pollution at the national parks and so part of it
was at the Grand Canyon, another part of it, I think they went to Zion. It
was really. Really
I it must be really cool to like still oversee other species, but also
like get your love of like Cronkite and like overseeing that like through
ert too. Yeah, yeah, that's that's definitely true and we encourage that.
One of the things we actually did. Last year when I start, we were able
to get a Poster board thing. Installed at Cronkite. If you're ever over
there on the 2nd floor, yeah, over by the PR lab, is that true?
Yeah, I seen it worked we worked hard on that. In fact, here's part of it
I was. Talking about how like what Barrett is like with Cronkite and like
showing some of the different projects. I've I've taken a look. The
purpose of that was to show the Cronkite students um that they don't have
to do traditional research
on and and we tried to illustrate that with pictures of the students and
and another thing, how they can use their honors experience to get jobs.
One of the panels. showed about 6 fair graduates that had gone on and
gotten.
Yeah, no, I, I've looked at that. I think it's like super cool. Like I
remember like saying like, oh, this person did this one project and now
they're working in like LA and that's so incredible. You wouldn't believe
that.
Yeah, gosh, but no, I, I think that's really cool because like 1 in 4 kids
in Cronkite are Barrett, right? It's something like that. Yeah. I remember
reading that and I was like, that's insane like to just be a part of a
school that It is so enriched already with honors kids and like that
energy is just infectious, like being around other honors kids who want to
try really hard that it just bleeds into other kids, whether they're an
honor student or not, um, especially for something as necessary as
journalism today is a great place to have honor students, um. Yeah, so now
I'm kind of more moving into questions that are more focused in on your
job necessarily than like history. Um, so, like, I guess maybe the like
moving down could be the answer to this, but could you describe like a
monumental memory or achievement that you've witnessed so far that you're
like really proud of in terms of downtown.
I would have to say.
The thing that I Thus far have been most Pleased about It was last year at
our awards, our spring awards, the Dean's scholar. And I didn't pick up.
It's just named the Dean scholar for downtown was a Older student who is
actually I think probably the oldest of all Barrett students from um the
School of Public Affairs up in the Watts College, um. This was a big, a
big thing for us because what, what, what one of the main things we need
to do downtown is to tap into the non-traditional students that um are not
the 18 to 22 year old students. The, the College of Public Service, the
Watts College has 7000 students and about. From what I've been told, 40%
of them are non-traditional students, either older students who have come
back to college or transfer students and started the community colleges
and they're here. Anyway, this guy, John Field. Um, I got to know him. I
sort of reached out to him because We needed to do something to get into
the non-traditional students. It was all 18 to 22 year olds, so he gave me
some ideas we had. Then it turns out he he was a super student and lo and
behold the end of the year, he gets this. Dean's award and um. The people
at public service were really happy to see that the dean. The Dean of the
College of Public Service congratulated him. It was in their social media
. I think they did a video on him, um, and, and it was obvious that, you
know, it's no offense to you guys if, if you are in the traditional
category, but you know, every one of those awards has gone to a
traditional studio and this was like a first and um. It it was sort of a
small thing. It was just one award, but it's, it's stands out. It shows
that if we communicate, we
communicate downtown that we're not that we're open that we're on the bus.
Um, and we want non-traditional, we want the single, single parent, um,
people who are struggling through. Through Programs downtown, um. You know
The person that came from a community college is up from the bootstraps.
Usually they will come. Downtown they're usually in the College of Public
, the military, I mean we have a huge. A huge military.
Enrollment in some of the the units upstairs in in public service, um, so
we are happy to be able to signal that we're open for business.
That the things they're doing can be honorable honorable as anything.
Do you know how many current non-traditional students are in the Barrett
program?
Uh, it's hard to count. Tempe actually has. A person involved in that that
that can give you that information, I think. We have in the in in the
watch probably.
30 to 40 non-traditional students, which is naturally not bad. That's a
compared to their total 7000 student enrollment, but um. But at least
we're trying to get and and. And
And as a result of that student winning that award and getting the
publicity, I think it's it's helped.
Yeah, no, I, I think that's a really cool um story to share. I'm gonna
switch gears a little bit. Maybe you don't oversee this as much as I may
have thought, but um, I know something unique to the downtown campus, at
least I believe, is Camp B town, um, that we do in the summer. Like, do
you oversee that or is that more? I don't,
but I know you've attended.
So what, what like, what have you enjoyed, like what do you like seeing
there? Like why do you think like it's important that we keep doing it?
Well, I mean, it's it's. The most unusual thing to start off the school
year. By getting on a bus and going out to some just a location with all
of the fellow. There and um I don't know if you if you've been to Been to
these, but um.
It's kind of amazing to me how much cohesiveness is developed. Um, if, if
I was an incoming Barrett student getting on a bus, going to a retreat
location and then being asked to do skits and dances and things, I would
be very self-conscious of that. I would be, I, I probably would push back
on that a little. But if you've been to these, you know that the students
all come together. I mean, nobody's sitting off at the side by themselves
at all. They're all doing group stuff, um. And um I think the credit to
Kira and Kelsey Dean,
her assistant getting that together and coming up with events and games
and different things that brings all the people, all the people together.
I know, I, I think back to that in August and then I found out that you
were watching all of our like lip sync battles and I was like, oh gosh,
like this is embarrassing.
Were you the one? Yeah, yeah, I took videos. That's good to know. I posted
them on Facebook.
Oh gosh I thought that most of those lip syncs were very well. There was
one that I thought was kind of sad, but the other, all the other ones were
very entertaining. I mean they were excellent. Well, that's good to hear.
I'm glad that you enjoyed it. I know we both enjoyed. I rolled they did
it to the music of Jingle Bell and,
and at the end, one of the students the splits and she fell backwards and
I got it perfectly on video because I was right there, right there at the
front table,
and I put that on social media. They censored out the music because there
was a copyright thing, but the rest of it was on there. I got a lot of
comments saying that. Guess I will need to be looking at some social media
soon in the near future. Um, OK, so now moving back to a couple, um, other
like serious questions, um. Oh, there's one question that I did want to
ask before some other questions. Uh, I heard that Barrett is getting a new
location downtown, that the Barrett suite is moving. Do you mind
elaborating on that? I mean, it's For historical interview, this is like
futuristic. I don't know how this is gonna be looked back upon. Well, it's
still interesting. It's showing how Barrett is evolving and changing. Well
, sure, I mean immersed in and um. So, as you may know, this, this, this
suite is not big enough for our total operation, and we suffer, I think,
from Not the most beautiful location. We're happy to be here. I actually
really like it here. I have a Cronkite. I have my office at Cronkite. It's
, it overlooks Taylor Place. It's the most beautiful thing. I have windows
and I can open the door and then the whole pan around. And uh here I don't
, I don't have anything like that, and yet I find it more comfortable here
in the. I don't know what what it is, but nevertheless, it's not big
enough and um so last year and After I started um.
It seemed to me that we needed to have a discussion on how we were gonna
expand. So all of the staff and faculty here took part in meetings in
which we talked about what we would need. To make this a really Good place
with complete facilities and and I got a a floor plan. And we worked the
floor. It was a floor plan of the suite, and you could see how much square
footage was there for each one. They said, Well, if the current lunchroom
or break room has 100 square feet, it doesn't even have that, but we
really need one that's 200 square feet. So they were coming up with
figures we compiled all that. And the idea was we had heard reports that
congressman
Ruben Gallego, yeah, he was gonna move. To a different office was gonna
vacate that. Office and we had our report in there to claim it. Um Because
we had the floor plan of his office too and we we work anyway, um, that
never happened. We were waiting and waiting and so we went into last
summer with no
changes, yeah. OK, then during the summer, um. As it ended actually, there
was, we've had problems finding classrooms here. There's huge space
shortage, so a couple of our classes didn't have classrooms, so we went to
the space coordinators at Tempe. To again explain this to them and get us
some classrooms and then in the process of that we communicated that we
needed office space to To make a long story short, the the head space
person at Tempe, um, floated the idea that we might be able to take over
an area on the 3rd floor of the Arizona on the uh North end of the Arizona
and so um our business manager Eric Later I don't know if you know her,
but so she and I sort of teamed up. She, she being at Tempe had access to
the space and so finally I got the floor plan and this is the, I mean this.
And um so we started to talk and um Then, and then it was going back. No,
you can't. Yes, you might. Yeah, we'll think about it. I mean, it was
going back and forth all fall about this Arizon. Then right as the
semester ended, he made a tentative commitment to allowing us to have
basically it's what we're getting our office there's offices up here.
There's a kitchen over here with and um
some bigger yeah event type spaces and then there's a big area here on the
south that fronts windows. So the first time we will have windows we'll
actually have light coming in here and so we're, we're getting that. We
tried to get these classrooms, but they wouldn't give them to us, but
we're getting.
So you'll have everything but those two classrooms. At first we were not,
that's all we were going to get the classroom and the adjoining space
because they wanted to resolve this issue of us constantly.
Needing classroom space. They basically the whole impetus for this was
don't darken our door. We don't want to talk about this anymore. We have
this classroom. And we won't worry about it anymore. But then, um, in a
discussion last week, this actually kind of broke last week when Erica and
I met with the architect. It was actually last Friday, and then there was
some switching around and the idea was we would not get these classrooms,
we would get. The area around the classrooms and we would still try to
teach our classes in various rooms in Houston, um, but as a result of that
, we got all of this other space. It's about This suite is about 2700
square feet. This space here, which we can't
We're not going to be able to get all of it permanently. It's about 4000
square feet and
The the issue right now is, um, who's gonna go down there. And I think um
All, all of the staff here wants to move down there and I'm, I'm not sure
that's gonna work because we still need to have this location here. I'm
going to remain here. Our 4 faculty are going to remain here. How we're
going to divide, I don't know. This is sort of a sticky issue. I was just
curious about, yeah, yeah, but we're, it looks obvious that it's it's
gonna have at least some of our people will move down there, students.
We'll come in, um, into this area. This is actually an open area for all
students, but we will have our people. That's where they will go for
advising. Um, here is gonna move there and do students nervous stuff out
of there and um. What
At first I wasn't sure if people really wanted to do this. There was a
chance we could have bail, but we had a meeting, another meeting last week.
Here a really sway. The people who want to do this, she's really pumped
about this and she sees this as our chance to have something really nice
downtown that Barrett right now doesn't really have. And um well, no,
that's like great news. Yeah, yeah, having a bigger space is just gonna
encourage more people to come and visit the suite. Yeah, yeah, but right
now the thing is we don't, she, we don't have a thing here that we can
show off very well. I mean, we remodel our entryway out there. The year
before last, and it looks nice, but we don't have a Vistavi type thing
that That says this is really cool. That's that's what we're hoping this
could evolve into. What time frames? I think we're gonna be in there.
That some of our people may be moving over there before that, but. We'll
probably do the launch.
What, what side is it on the Arizona I don't know if you're, it's like you
walk in and then it's like the one with the elevator that you walk in it's
on that side,
you know where the resilience,
that's that's we're right I think I had a class in here yeah, yeah.
So now, sorry, that's a little bit of a tangent. I was just curious about
it. Um, so now I'm just going to move into some like opinion kind of
reflection based questions. So um this is very vague, but more like why is
Barrett important to you? Like what do you enjoy about this job? Like why
, like, are you excited to work for Barrett on a day to day basis? I think
the thing that That really makes this rewarding is the people are very
close, meaning The managers and administrators. I think the staff here. It
is closed. I don't have a total hands-on grip of all the activities that
go on here among the staff, but when I go to Tempe for an event. Um, A a
lecture.
All those kind of things for the commencement, it's really a family sort
of thing. It's, it's very, very cohesive and um and you feel good about
that. I think, um, throughout ASU there's a a feeling confident feeling
that you're kind of on your own. Um, I know a Cronkite. They've never had.
Close fact. They've never had a camaraderie. Um, I can't during all the
time I went, I was at Cronkite 27 years. I think I went to 3 parties, 4
parties in the whole time. People just went their separate ways, and I
think that's what is typical ASU in a lot of ways that there may be the
only place that's not like that, um. counting the events, I mean, I
probably went to 20 different party type social things last year alone.
And so that's really a motivating, motivating thing. Um, and then I think
working with the students. It it's still a big thrill. Um, I had my first
class, my first honors class last night. And um It's in politics and media.
You never know what's gonna happen on the first night of class, and they
were getting into the shut down they were getting into the subject matter , whereas in teaching
skills course over there, it's like you could be 6 weeks into it to pick
up right.
So those social part of it, the students, and I really like the people too
, the the staff and the fact they're. Doing their own thing in a lot of
ways, but I think there's a lot of respect among each other.
One of the things that happened last.
At the end of last year during the Barrett, um, faculty staff awards,
Kierra got the Employee of the Year, big, huge, big, huge thing, and this
was at an event over at Tempe and um. The lakes area, I don't know if you
know where that is. There's a it's kind of the south of campus, um. And so
we're out there, there's like it's like a boat, they're giving boat rides
and things, and then there was like a deck on top of the dock. After Marc
Jacobs announced that Kira had got the award, everybody from downtown went
over to this deck and took pictures with her. You never see that, yeah, I
mean you never see.
And do you think it's even like a closer knit at downtown specifically
just because downtown is smaller than Tempe? I think it is. I I really
can't judge, but I, I would guess that it is. Because we have um all
together, all together we have 6 staff and 4 faculty, so there's only 10
people together.
Yeah, I think, I think the downtown campus for Barrett is very special. Um
, other questions I have, uh, what in your mind makes Barrett different
than any other honors colleges? I know there are lots of honors colleges
at different places around um the nation, and I know lots of honors
colleges around the nation look to Barrett to model theirs. So what do you
have to say about that? Kind of hard. I went to, I represented Barrett at
the Arizona Honors Council last fall at a meeting at NAU and NAU had just
put up their honors. They had just had, we had the meeting there. I got to
know. The honors people from the other universities as well as the
community colleges. Just Relating to that. It, it, it just seems like bear
has a stronger Leadership force, it has, you know, Better numbers, really
good, good enrollment numbers, but um. It just seemed to me that The
problems they were talking about these other people were talking about
just seemed irrelevant to me. I mean, we, one of the issues that the UFA
person kept talking about was trying to get faculty to volunteer to do
honors what we were talking about before and um just. Huge exchange of
ideas of how you could do that problems and all that, um, I don't think
Barry really has that problem and we, we need to keep at it in court
faculty, but
I mean it was like they were from a different planet. They're talking
about things that that really don't concern me and various people, and I
think that owes a lot to Marc Jacobs. He's an excellent, excellent.
Excellent team. I mean, it is so different working for him compared to
working for Chris Calley. It is like
two completely different people. They're both good, but Mark has more of a
funny way of. Humor, humor, humorous way and also the um The past Vicete
Peggy Nelson, who retired. Last Mark and Peggy were freaking frack. I mean
, they were, they, you never saw one without the other. They, you know, I
saw some great arguments between my husband and wife in a way, but But it
was always productive. I mean they They were both both sharp and uh. She
was excellent. She, she is almost as much as Mark became the symbol of
there and together. They brought us up above all these problems.
NU was talking about you was talking about. Um, and as for other honors
colleges in other parts of the country, I don't vaguely know, but I think
it would probably be the same thing just. So we're just kind of above.
Some of the problems. Come into play
you're doing. Yeah, I would completely agree. Like, I, I look at
definitely like hearing about my friends across the nation attending their
honors colleges, and at least the way I look at Barrett is seeing it as
like um This one where like leadership is already in place that like even
on different campuses like it's stood tall. Yeah um
yeah, and so I guess now my last questions would kind of be anchored
towards more how you see the future of Barrett, um, maybe more
specifically for downtown, like what do you think, where do you think
Barrett Downtown is going? Like, do you think it's going to get bigger?
Like, are there any new programs that you think will be put in place
besides obviously the new Well, yeah, we. I think there's gonna be a a a
lot of new things on the horizon, um. With regard to our office. I, I
really see this as a temporary thing. What's On my mind, if not radar, is
The certainty that they're gonna have to build another building downtown,
the residential type building, um,
Because largely because of the Thunderbird and I'm hoping that we move
into a unified office space in that location. This is gonna be hell having
half of us here and half of us at the Arizona. So what we need is one
unified. All under one roof office that at some point is certain to happen
it can't. If they do build another building, are
Reasoning for being in it can't be denied. Everybody else,
all the other colleges have their own buildings. We have, I think, been
short shifted. That's one of the reasons why the people are helping us
because they have their own facility and we don't, now the time has come
for them to give us. Total priority on a
West and Polly have their their own separate building? Not really, but.
But um The West air office is the Taj Mahal. The day of God. So much in
there that it's, it's because West is a much older campus. It used to be
independent, but um.
West isn't gonna need, they're not that big. And Pauly
They're also not that. Um, But we
We need our own unified office. OK, so that, that is something that I, I'm
certain will unfold at some point. OK. Meanwhile, another big change is
gonna be the move of Thunderbird, the building or the, the building of the
Thunderbird, the move of Thunderbird Global Management College from the
West Valley. To here downtown and um They do not have undergraduate
students, but they have extensive cooperative programs with Undergraduate
students that can help them and um So we are gonna have an alliance with
them to the, yeah, yeah. I've gone to their place and um where they're
based at right now is at that tall building in the Arizona Center. Um, But
um. I think in the fall they're gonna break ground on the new Thunderbird
building which is gonna be next to the law school. That's gonna completely
change the dynamic of that that part of the downtown campus because you're
gonna get extension to sort of towards the south. So we're gonna, we're
gonna be aligning with them and doing.
Doing stuff, doing stuff. Um, And then Another thing that That I think is
gonna expand in large is our relationship with the College of Health
Solutions, um.
They have a lot of interest in Barrett downtown. They, they have a dean
there that started about the same time I started here, and it turned out I
, I know her father her late father, he was one of my teachers. And um so
this Dean at Health Solutions is kind of feisty, but I've, I've gotten
along, you know, we've got, obviously we have a connection and so we've
talked and she has some really great ideas of how we can Get into her
program and help her help her. Helper program and that is, as you know, a
growing area, the health. Area downtown that's, that's a big hitter. So
I'm actually gonna be meeting with, I think their assistant next week and
we're gonna start plowing through some ideas on how we can offer honors
courses over there, how we can build up. Our enrollment of Barrett
students there. One of the things about health solutions. That um it's one
of the things you you learn as you as you work in this job a little bit,
but Um, Health solutions used to be part of nursing. It broke away a
couple of years ago with the idea it would be pre-med school for ASU. What
has happened instead is they have kept pre-med programs at temping. And
We downtown we're competing with those tempe pre-med students. So College
of Health Solutions and Behr, we have a common interest in Wanting to
build up our dealings with the health solutions. So they will come
downtown and not go. Not go to camping. So that's gonna be. An important
thing are bolstering relations with. With health solutions we have total
Grace with very close and then obviously you work for journalism, so yeah
, and um
and so I came I came from journalism. Um, And um And again we're going to
continue our effort to get into the Watts. They've been really at at first
they were a major detractor there. Um, they were really bothered by our
concentration on 18 to 24 year old students and basically ignoring their
40% non-traditional students and so one of the first things I did was
schedule meetings with them to find out. About that, so we're continuing
to build our relationship with with them. They're the they're the biggest
by far the biggest college on the downtown campus 7000 students. They have
4 schools, each as big as the Cronkite School. It's huge and um. And so we
want to stay on our good, good side and expand to get more people like
John Field win these awards, um. And uh it's that part of what we're gonna
do in the future is gonna be slow. That's not gonna be an overnight.
Overnight change, but we were very, very happy and we hope maybe we can
get a piece of this action when the Watts College began last October. And
it was a big announcement. It was probably the biggest announcement of the
year downtown, and it was held right out there in the, in the new lobby
and um I was privileged to have been invited as one of the special guests
by Jonathan Capell and um the the bottom line, they got a $30 million
endowment, third biggest in ASU history. So we're hoping to stay. Close to
them, part of what they, what they're gonna do in the future, part of
their direction. This money came from a husband and wife who grew up in
Maryvale, and they're very interested in using ASU resources to revitalize
Maryvale. So Jonathan has talked to Nicola Foot, our vice team. They are
gonna talk, continue to talk about how they can have an initiative in
their Maryvale that can really. Get us a lot of public services. So those
are, those are kind of the changes I'm seeing down the road, I'm not sure
any new classes we should be on the lookout for? We're working on it. We
are, we are having a problem right now with enrollment in honors courses
and um trying to figure out why that is. We have some honors courses
taught by our faculty. They've got 3 students this semester, and we, we, I
had to cancel a bunch last year because of low. Once we figure out how to
get students into honors classes, we'll probably launch a lot. There's a
lot of interest among the faculty in teaching honors classes, special
topics honors.
Yeah, OK, um, so I, I that's pretty much the end of my questions. I guess
my last overarching question would be like, do you have any other last
comments that you'd want to say on record about Barrett, about just your
time here? The only thing I would come back to is I think it's important
for the people to understand the history of it, that it, it, it grew in
stages. It, it, it was not a foregone conclusion that ASU was gonna have
an honors college. I think you you really kind of taught me to talk to old
timers like me you can remember back to the beginning of what it was
really like, um. And again it was not a foregone conclusion. There was a
lot of challenge, a lot of stress. People like Ted Humphries initially had
to endure going around begging faculty to be. Just because he saw the
prospect of like what an honors college could offer students yeah
yeah and
and There there were some tough days in the beginning, but but they they
stayed the course, they got through, um, people were rallying around them
and
Another big turning point was when they established 10 years ago the
location on the southeast. camps that was a big thing that shot there up
to the statue
and that was uh. That was Mark Mark Jacobs and Peggy pretty much heading
that up
and not to and also not to not to overlook by any means, but the Barrett's
Craig and Barbara Barrett when they endowed Barrett, I think that was in
2002. Um, actually before Mark
that was also a very big, very big now had a name. Yeah,
up until then it was just the honors.
Mhm. And now that they have like funded it now, it was this very like
notable thing. It's like, oh, that's Barrett, it's not just an honors
college, it's Barrett. And so the history is very important.
The student wants to appreciate what They're in what what. What they're
about. The history largely reflects that.
Well, yeah, I think that's all my questions. Kylie. Do you have anything
to add? OK, nice of you folks to come in. I'm sorry that I had to.