A Presidential Pulse Check

Erin Hennessy 

Hello and welcome to the Trusted Voices Podcast. I’m Erin Hennessy, alongside Teresa Valerio Parrot, and in each episode, we discuss the latest news and biggest issues facing higher education leaders through a communications lens. For these conversations, we’re often joined by a guest who shares their own experiences and perspectives, but we also make time for one-on-one conversations about what we’re seeing, hearing, and thinking. Trusted Voices is produced by Volt, the go-to news source for higher ed leaders and decision makers. Remember to visit Volt at voltedu.com and subscribe to Trusted Voices on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you never miss an episode.

Hi.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Hi! I know that you are someplace special. Tell us where you are!

Erin Hennessy 

I am in a place where I got nine hours of sleep last night, so look out. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Wow.

Erin Hennessy 

I also took a nap yesterday. I’m feeling great. I am just upstairs from the conference center at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Washington, DC, because I am attending the ACE Experience, which will forever live in my heart as the ACE Annual Meeting, which is what we called it when I worked there.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I still type it out that way and then I backspace and fix it.

Erin Hennessy

Exactly. Delete, delete, delete. And I feel like I’m channeling you when I say being at this meeting is like being at a combination college reunion and wedding reception. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yes!

Erin Hennessy

I have hugged more people in the last, I don’t know, 18 hours than I have in ages. And it is just an absolute delight to be here and to be in these rooms and to see all of these people that I have known and loved for ages, talking about the ACE staff, and then all of these new friends that I’ve collected over my nearly 14 years at TVP Communications. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Aww. I love it.

Erin Hennessy

I think the math is wrong on that, but yes, so I’m here at the ACE Experience. We’re gonna talk a little bit about it. We’ll link in the show notes to the agenda if anybody wants to see what’s going on this year at the meeting. But I literally just walked out of a session hosted by Sara Custer, the editor in chief of Inside Higher Ed, which previews the president’s annual president’s survey, which is going to drop in a couple of weeks. I think she said it was March 11th or 12th. And there’s some good data in there, a little bit of which she shared. So I’m going to share this real time with you, Teresa Parrot, but also with our listeners. And as usual, there are a couple of data points that made me go, yep, that makes total sense. And a couple that made me say, oh, what? I’m excited, also excited that the panel was phenomenal. And I am just, I really do feel like you, I’m coming out of this session buzzing a great deal. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

That’s awesome! Well, and here’s what I’ll say. There are a couple of things. 

Erin Hennessy

Say it. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

One is we are just on the brink of round two of conference season. So please, if you want to know where we’re going to be and where we’re speaking and we’re attending and where you can connect with us, please go to our website, tvpcommunications.com because we’re updating what that looks like. So Erin’s glow I will have in a week and a half when I am at a PRSA CHE. So that’s counselors to higher education. And we will be each, maybe it’s oscillating is not the right word, but that’s what’s coming to mind, oscillating during conference season in attendance and participation. So please go to our website, see where we are, come say hi to us, because I think what you’re hearing from Erin is you all give us energy and you remind us why we’re doing this.

Erin Hennessy

Yes. So, yes, please. One, two, there’s more. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

So that’s one, wait, the second one! Probably the next time we talk…there’s always more.

Erin Hennessy

There’s always more.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Probably the next time we talk, the survey will have come out. And if you’ve listened to this podcast over the years, you will remember that this is one of our favorite things. And two years ago, yeah, two years ago, my charted color-coded version of this report was a little out of control. So I can’t wait to get the paper report and to go to town. So please come back because we’ll talk about it today, but I bet we’ll talk about it again. And with that, tell us about a little bit about what you heard.

Erin Hennessy

Yes. Okay, so keeping in mind that again, not everything was shared. They’re keeping a little bit of the sizzle for next week. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Of course.

Erin Hennessy 

Just to frame this because I know this is where you always rightly push our clients and other people to focus. This is the 2026 survey. It is done in partnership with Hanover Research. Our N for today is 430 two-year, four-year institution presidents, nearly all public and private nonprofit. And this was in the field between December and January. So just think about where we were in December and January.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Okay. And do you know what the number of community college presidents was versus four years?

Erin Hennessy

I don’t because we haven’t seen the cross tabs. We’ll see the cross tabs when the full thing comes out. But again, Sarah was trying to move through a lot of information in a very small, very hot room. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yes, this was the beyond 30,000 foot level.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, exactly. So things that are not surprising. Presidents rate financial volatility and political interference as the fastest growing risks. Mmm duh. 45% for financial volatility, 43% for political interference, which I thought might have been…

Teresa Valerio Parrot

That’s low.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, might’ve been a little bit higher, but private nonprofit leaders are especially concerned about finances, of course, and public institution presidents are more worried about political interference, of course. 71% of public, doctoral university presidents cite political interference as their fastest growing risk. So when you again dig down into those crass tabs, makes a little bit more sense or the numbers end up a little bit closer to where we would think, right?

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yeah. And I would say, wish, so I understand this is December-January, but as we talked about in January, the political involvement for private institutions is something that I’m covering very closely. We’ll be talking about that more in a bit. And I worry. Well, let me, I won’t say I worry because I’m an optimist. I would love to have that rerun, which isn’t possible, but have it rerun at the end of this legislative season across the country, because I think those numbers would be different.

Erin Hennessy 

Agreed. I think that’s a very incisive statement from you, my boss, who controls my salary and my continued employment. And we don’t have time to go through every single data point, so I’m necessarily pulling up the stuff that is interesting to me, and you will have the opportunity with your color-coded, et cetera, et cetera, to do the same. One of the trends that I’m interested in throughout this is AI and how presidents are thinking about it, how presidents are, let’s be honest, we got to move beyond the thinking and into the doing, how presidents are planning and working with their campus communities around AI. When they asked respondents to look ahead to 2030, presidents predicted that AI and cost pressures will have the greatest impact on higher education.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

For a very different reason. But keep going.

Erin Hennessy

48% for AI, 45% for cost pressures, and obviously private nonprofit presidents really leaned into that cost pressures more than the AI.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

So as you know, I’m very versed in AI. I have done research. I have access to it, but I choose not to use it because we get paid to use our brains. And that is very important to me that my thoughts are my own. My ideas are my own. I don’t know where all of my searches and my interaction go. And I want for my intellectual capital to be my own. So for that reason, very well versed, know the potential, all of those things. Also, wary of it, but where I worry for higher education is actually something I was going to raise.  If you all don’t know about Einstein, I highly encourage you to look into it. It is an AI service.

Erin Hennessy

He’s the guy with the crazy hair. Oh…

Teresa Valerio Parrot

He is, it’s a little bit like my hair today, but he is. So it is a service, an AI service where students can use Einstein as a intermediary, I would say, in Canvas to do their assignments for them. And one of the options when you are using Einstein is, I would like to do this assignment for myself. I would like to post on this conversation in Canvas myself. So you actually have to actively go in and turn off.

Erin Hennessy

Turn it off. What was Canvas thinking?

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Turn it off if you want to do so. I talked to a dean this week and I was like, so how’s this impacting your institution? And he said they are now thinking about instituting oral exams. That’s where we are. Not because they don’t want for students to know how to use AI or what that can look like, but instead students aren’t learning, they aren’t participating, they aren’t reading because you can just plug in the entire syllabus and Canvas interface into Einstein and it will do the work for you.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, here we go. It’s the return of the blue book. You and I both sat exams and wrote them longhand. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yes, yeah, and had cramps and you were looking to see how fast could you write? Yeah.

Erin Hennessy

I have to scribble this whole page out because I read the question wrong. Yeah. Interesting. OK, so just keep AI in the back of your little brain box as we move through some of these other things. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

My brain box, not its brain box.

Erin Hennessy

Correct. Back off, Einstein. Another interesting point, I don’t think we need to spend too much time on it, but institutions are very much shifting away from 10 year strategic plans. Three and five are doing three to five. Three to five are doing three to five. 60% of respondents are planning. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Nice, is that 6-7, 6-7?

Erin Hennessy

Somewhere my nephew cringes and he doesn’t know why. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I’m trying to make it go away. You’re welcome, everybody who is tired of 6-7.

Erin Hennessy

Okay. So 60% of respondents are doing three to five year strategic plans, which I think we’ve seen ourselves in our own work with institutions, but an additional 22% are just planning one to three years. And I think when folks started shifting that way, we sort of went, is it even worth, because those are a lot of work. Is that even worth it? But I think those folks are the smart ones. You know, at this point.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Well, yes and no. So again, what is our N? I’m combative today. Wow. I even had…

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, and with me, which I don’t enjoy.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

I’m not combative, you’re just giving survey data. So here’s what I would say. I feel like I’ve seen so many one-year strategic plans that aren’t strategic, they’re tactical plans. I have seen some really strong three-year plans that get annual iterations or updates. Those I can buy into, but I feel like only looking as far as the end of your nose means that you are missing out on so much opportunity, so much collaboration, and you really are just trying to survive. And my thought right now is higher education needs to move away from just surviving and we need to go back to wanting to thrive, wanting to be innovative, wanting to be strategic. And right now we’re just not there.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, and I will say, to do a strategic plan well in the eyes of your community requires a lot of convenings and conversations and how you can pull that off in one year and have it…

Like you finish it, then you start it, right? We start the plan in January. We finally get it blessed by everybody in June. And then we got to go right back into the cycle. So it kind of feels like the election cycle in the House of Representatives. You get elected, you immediately have to start running again.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yes, yes. And to that point, I think that’s a critical point, Erin, is that if you have just a year to year plan and there isn’t the connective tissue continuity, whatever you want to call it from year to year…

Erin Hennessy

Exactly. Yep.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

…then I worry, are you incorporating feedback? And do you have enough data points and impact points that you truly can apply it to that next year? And you’re not just jumping from plan to plan and that really doesn’t provide you with continuity of community or the reality of leadership.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, and it doesn’t give you any time to assess what you did last year and to see if it worked or not. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Right, Yeah, that’s the data point issue. Yeah. What else do you have?

Erin Hennessy

So yeah, there’s the, okay, I’m going to keep cracking because there’s a lot here. Another somewhat surprising number to me, a quarter of respondents expect the One Big Beautiful Bill act to significantly impact financial aid operations, enrollment or compliance requirements. That felt low to me.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

That’s really low.

Erin Hennessy

Right? And 25% report major negative impacts thus far to international student enrollment stemming from immigration policies with graduate level institutions most affected. Keeping in mind, the bill passed and we’re still working through implementation on a lot of these things. But I don’t know that it takes that much to sort of look down the pipe and go, this is going to screw us up in some pretty big ways.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I think that latter point gets to my demographic question, right? Because if you’re a community college, you’re not enrolling high numbers of international students. So last year, think half were community college presidents. If you take out half and then you take out your institutions that historically haven’t had high numbers of international students, like regional comprehensive, which their numbers are growing, but you look at really who this impacts the most, I can see where that would net the number that you’re talking about.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

But I do want to go to the first one because I think there was something interesting this past year. And that is that we saw a court ruling about automatic discharge of student loans. And those are to proceed. So that’s something that the administration had been sued on. We’ll have a link in our show notes. And I was going to raise this. And that’s the perfect segue to it. So I think some of what we put into motion in the courts through associations and through institutions, we’re now starting to see the benefit of that, but we need for it to be fully implemented before we can actually say there’s a benefit.

Erin Hennessy 

Right. Right, yes. So some of this, like you said, if we could refield it at a future point in time, we would see some different responses. Interestingly, and this one, I sat in the room, again, 20 minutes ago, half hour ago, and Sara asked the folks who were in this room, and this room was packed and it was so hot, but it was absolutely packed.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Good.

Erin Hennessy 

She asked people in the room, do you think the current federal environment for higher education is forcing changes that may benefit colleges and universities in the long run? 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Hmm, I can see that. I’ll give that one, yeah.

Erin Hennessy 

Oh, 100 percent, very few hands went up in that room, but 21 percent of respondents agreed that yes the current environment.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Only 21%? I’m not asking for compliance in advance because you know I’m a fighter, hashtag, buy our merch, fight for higher ed. But what I would say is, any time that you have somebody raise questions about you or cause introspection or cause you to stop and think, are we doing this the best way that we can, and push back on what you’re doing, there are opportunities there. Granted, I would love a lot pushback, and I would like a lot less of the implementation of that pushback. But there are some real opportunities here if higher education chooses to see it as opportunity.

Erin Hennessy

Yes, and Bill Pink, who was president of Ferris State, who was on the panel, Bill Pink, please come on the podcast. Because I just, I…

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Ha ha! Invitation there.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, I don’t go up to people after panels and I wanted to just go talk to him for hours. But Bill Pink talked about, you know, the sort of old axiom of never…you need to be in a position to take advantage of a crisis. There’s an opportunity in crisis and that’s what higher ed is sort of facing at this moment. But it was just very interesting that in the room people were like, nope. And again, the N, people who self-selected to be in that room, don’t know who they are, but it was just an interesting little moment in time.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I wonder how much of that is tied to association of the change being directly connected to the administration. So instead, if we were to say, we have inflection points for these reasons, such as trust in higher education, right? We can’t stop reflecting on that. We can’t stop reflecting on some of the other feedback that we’re receiving. And we’re creating big campaigns around this.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

If we were to use that same kind of lens for this situation, would we still have that same kind of resistance?

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, yeah, it’s a fair question. Sticking with sort of political pressure and things that have happened in Washington that are impacting our campuses, 79% of respondents said that they maintained or increased student diversity since the 2023 Supreme Court ruling against race conscious admission. Though this falls to 59% among the 8% of colleges that previously considered race in admissions.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

I can see that.

Erin Hennessy

And I read that word for word because I didn’t want to, I didn’t want to screw up the numbers. So that’s interesting, the differential.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yeah, I’ll say, I think that goes back to again, who is our sample? Because again, if you have been thought of as an institution for students who are diverse or underrepresented, where they should look to attend, you were probably able to maintain your numbers. If you were a reach or if you were someplace that you’ve had to work to increase those numbers or maintain them this would be a threat to you. So that number makes absolute sense to me based on who was surveyed.

Erin Hennessy 

Yeah. We’re going to go back to AI for a second, and I promise we’re coming to the end of me reading to you. We’re almost to the bottom. Talking about AI, almost 3 quarters of presidents responding have stood up an institution-wide task force or strategy on AI, and that’s up from 52% last year and 18% in 2024. Makes sense.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Mm-hmm.

Erin Hennessy

Folks are starting to implement the use of AI for administrative processes like scheduling, resource allocation. The folks who said that they are doing that rose from 28% to 47% year over year. Amid this uptake, just 1% of presidents think higher education has been a highly effective voice in important national conversations about AI.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I would extend that to just, I would end the sentence before “in AI.” So reread that but just stop before you get to “in AI,” Erin. Go ahead.

Erin Hennessy 

Yeah, I’ll be interested when we see the full survey instrument to see if there is a question about, and I think there usually is one, how effective higher ed has been talking about higher ed. Because I think that’s one you and I track every year. You know, the good old storytelling versus doing better kind of conversation.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Well, and I think too, the way you framed that, I think we always judge ourselves with how well are we talking about higher ed to higher ed, not how well are we talking about is higher ed talking about higher ed to others. And I think that is still where I would push higher education to be better.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah. Okay. And then here’s the last thing, bringing it home. And then I’m going to give you your like, moments of chills. Here we go.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

It’s getting personal today. Everybody, gird your loins because it gets personal today. Go for it.

Erin Hennessy

Gird ‘em. Presidents and their jobs. 92% of presidents agree that they enjoy being a president. And that’s up three points from last year.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Whoa. In a tough year, it went up. And also, that number feels very high.

Erin Hennessy 

Yes, and 42% hope to stay on the job five or more years, which is somewhat in conflict with the data we saw from the American College President Survey that ACE put out last year, year before. At the same time, 55%, just 55% agree that the modern presidency is a job that one person can reasonably handle.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Huh, is that fear of having a co-president? Because honestly, I think right now where I’m seeing the best leadership teams, it is a team. Not to say that the president isn’t president, but instead the strength and the skills of the team. In previous years, every single member of that cabinet could have been a president and still could.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, yeah, that’s a good question. I don’t know. But let me tell you, Sara sort of wrapped the session up by asking the panelists, what are the best, she asked about the worst parts too, but what’s the best part of the job? What’s the worst part of the job? 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

But it’s a happy podcast today. So let’s talk about the best parts of the job.

Erin Hennessy 

Well, I’m going to give you some of a little bit of both. Marlene Tromp, who’s currently the president of University of Vermont talked about the opportunity to just sit and watch students and alumni and faculty and staff do all of the amazing things they do. And she said that the worst part of the job was when we dehumanize each other. And you and I have talked a lot about this when faculty relations with the president or the administration become difficult and we “other” those people or our students behave in ways that we don’t want and we “other” those people. And I just thought that was so resonant.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

And I’ll flip that also, and when the campus community sees the president only as a title and not as a human.

Erin Hennessy

Exactly, exactly. And she actually gave an example. She previously was president of an institution in Idaho. And she said things got so bad there that people in Idaho started to say that she was lying about being from Wyoming.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

I love Wyoming, P.S. I’ll be there this summer, so if anybody’s gonna be in the Tetons, let me know. 

Erin Hennessy 

Sure.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

But why is that something you would choose to lie about?

Erin Hennessy 

Sure, but like when you so distrust…right? So also on the panel was Yves Salomon-Fernández, who is the president of the Urban College of Boston. And I have already posted her response on my LinkedIn page because it just moved me so much. She said, “this job is my joy and my resistance.”

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Aww. Oh, I love that!

Erin Hennessy

Embroider that on a pillow because that just, I don’t get moved by much. I’m a pretty cynical person, but that was just so meaningful. Bill Pink, again, please come on the podcast, talked about one of his big frustrations being what he calls self-inflicted wounds. When the institution gets in the way of the student and their success and things that just are harder than they should be and why we can’t move quicker to fix those things for our students. And then Brad Mortenson, is the newly minted president of Utah State University. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Very newly minted, congratulations.

Erin Hennessy

I think he said today was day 109. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Wow, time flies because I would have guessed less time. You go, Brad!

Erin Hennessy 

Yeah, right? He talked about the unique pleasure of being able to be the president of his alma mater and walking past on his way to his office every day, he gets to walk past the room where he took his first ever college class as a first generation college student. And so I bring all of this emotional feel good stuff up because I also want to underscore, and granted the meeting just started, there seems to be more fight in the room. There seems to be more determination and energy in the room than a lot of other meetings I’ve been at over the past year. I wasn’t at the ACE meeting last year. I was sort of lurking around the edges and folks seemed really pushed back on their heels. It was early days in the Trump administration. It was actually the day I was there, the day that President Trump removed the Kennedy Center Board and appointed himself the chair of the new board.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

It’s not the Kennedy Center, Erin.

Erin Hennessy

I’m one of those people who still calls the airport here in Washington National Airport. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

So do I. And if I search for it, I’m like, ugh that’s right. 

Erin Hennessy 

Right, right, right. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

It still comes up by the way. I still also call it the Gulf of Mexico, by the way.

Erin Hennessy 

Well, you’ve always been very progressive with your geography. Anyway, all I’m saying is there’s different energy here and it’s exciting. I also want to, and I’m not going to go into a ton of detail because I haven’t really processed it fully yet, but the sessions started this morning with a plenary. It was a conversation between former US Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan and David Pressman, who is the former US Ambassador to Hungary. They recently co-wrote a piece that was in the Washington Post, link is in the show notes, about parallels between Hungary and the US in terms of authoritarian leadership and higher education. And it was a fascinating conversation this morning. Secretary Duncan, Ambassador Pressman, if you would also like to come on the podcast, you can get right in line behind Bill Pink. But it was a really interesting conversation and it really, I think, energized participants in that room talking about resistance, talking about how to continue to serve our missions, serve our students and not give away too much. It was just really interesting. I need to sit with it a little bit longer, but I really recommend folks go and read that piece.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yeah, I read it this morning because you noted for me that you’re going to be talking about it. And I need to do the same thing. I need to kind of pull it apart and sit with it. And I agree that this acquiescing in advance is never going to support the institution. And if people don’t want to think about it that way, I think the better way to frame it is by giving up, are we helping our students? Are we meeting our mission? And we are giving up. You’re giving up some power, you’re giving up some resources, you are giving up political capital to many of your communities. And that, that makes me pause.

Erin Hennessy

Yes. And there were some really interesting questions from presidents in the room talking about how can we better organize and what role can ACE and also AGB play? Because again, governance has a huge role in these conversations. And I was delighted to know that the president of AGB, Ross Mugler was in the room and ACE president Ted Mitchell said, we’re working together on these kinds of efforts because we know someone needs to organize…

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Excellent.

Erin Hennessy

…and we know it is easier when it’s not one lone voice in the woods. It’s a group of people. You know, we saw some early efforts, the AAC&U letter that was put together last year. So it just, feels, it feels different. I’ll be interested to see what I hear in some additional sessions this afternoon and chatter at networking receptions, but folks feel better than they did a year ago. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

That’s good.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah. Not as many hanging heads.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Good, good! Well, and I think last year everybody was shell shocked, right? This is it, we’ve had a year. Where are we now? 

Erin Hennessy

Yep.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

I would encourage people to listen to the episode that we had with Ted Mitchell last May. It was fantastic. And you can hear his fight and his piss and vinegar as he goes in addressing these issues.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, yep.

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Erin Hennessy

So that is my report. I’ll also tell you, in addition to sleeping really well, I had the best Indian food last night for dinner. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Good! I know where you went.

Erin Hennessy

You do know where I went. I went to Rasika. It was so good. Yeah, so I’m excited to see some more people. There are a lot of reporters here. I’m excited to see that. More than I’ve seen in the past. So yeah, I’m excited that we’re back in conference season. Looking forward to conferences in warm places would be nice. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Well you’re freezing and I’m going to go to Atlanta.

Erin Hennessy

Well, that’s warm. I’m going to go to LA in April, so I’m holding on for that. But yeah, that’s the report from here in Washington.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Thank you so much, Erin. So you’ve talked about the meeting that you’re at and that high level overview of the survey and I want to take it personal for a second. So I live in Boulder County and some of you all may not have heard, but in Boulder County, this is a big deal. We are getting the Sundance Festival.

And I am on a nonprofit board here in the metro area called SCFD, which is the Scientific and Cultural Facilities District. So as a way of connecting SCFD and what we do, and also Sundance and also some of our grantees, last week I went to a screening of American Pachuco: The Legend of Luis Valdez. And I wanted to mention that because as I was sitting there watching this movie and growing up, my whole family always called my dad a pachuco. And in a lot of ways, and they talk about this in the film, it’s viewed as a negative term, but what does that really mean? And what is the heritage and the history behind it? So I watched this movie, cried a bit as I thought about my dad who passed away this past November, and was so inspired by the film. 

And so the first thing that I did, of course, is I hopped online to start seeing what scholars have done what work about the Pachuco movement, the Zoot Suit riots, and so many different topics that I knew of, but I didn’t know as much as I wanted to, and I felt could connect me to my dad. So of course, that led me to some amazing academics at some institutions across this country. And I’m starting to see legislation go through some of those states that have these amazing historians and ethnic scholars. The legislatures are now pushing anti-DEI in a way that will reduce the ability of some of these sociologists to talk about what they do and to share my history and feed my curiosity about critical moments in America’s history. And it really resonated based on the conversation that we had last month. talking about what legislatures are doing, seeing what’s getting passed in Florida, seeing what’s getting passed in Iowa, beyond tuition freezes and also continuing education limitations or expansions, but also thinking about when we shut down the ability for scholarship to thrive, we shut down the ability for some people to see themselves in the research and to see themselves in what makes American higher education a gem of the world. So just wanted to share that. That I am a proud child of a pachuco, still doing my research on it.

Erin Hennessy

Can you define, please, what is?

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yes, yes. So if anybody wants to go down these rabbit holes, let me know. And also, American Pachuco is going to start showing on PBS in the next couple of months. I’ll be sure and post about it once it happens. So a Pachuco is someone who is very ingrained in the Mexican-American, Hispanic-American experience. This was somebody who was really in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and it still exists today. Somebody who had pride in their community. A lot of them worked in the fields. My dad picked potatoes in Southern Colorado. It follows also the Cesar Chavez movement, also follows the anti-, it was poised as anti-immigrant, but if it was New Mexico, Arizona, California, and then it spread across the rest of the country, it’s a lot of citizens to be honest. Pushed back on, I would say instead of immigration, it was pushed back on otherness that included the Zoot Suit riot where US members of the Navy and of the Army beat pretty heavily pachucos who were wearing zoot suits and were expressing their pride in their culture. So there are interesting parallels to some of what we’re seeing, but just seeing the pride in heritage was so amazing to see that on screen.

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, that’s wonderful. Well, thanks for sharing that. And nice job tying it in to higher ed and what we talked about.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yes, thank you. Well, and I’ll give one more example. And this was where Luis Valdez was so important to getting people to be part of a movement as he talks about and others talked about. Cesar Chavez was not the best speaker publicly, and he wasn’t someone who knew how to create energy. So they brought Luis in to create these mini plays and these like comic relief sketches to help people understand what they were building towards and what they were fighting against. And it made me think about higher ed as well. If you have a difficult conversation, you don’t always have to use the top person who may not be your best spokesperson, who may be fantastic with people one-on-one, but isn’t the person who can get a movement going. And you don’t have to be serious. Sometimes that humor and that different way of telling a story or singing a song about it or doing something other than just talking at people is how you connect and you get a movement going. Listen up, higher ed.

Erin Hennessy

That’s really what I’ve attempted to do with my humor, Teresa, is change the world.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

You are an American pachuca.

Erin Hennessy 

I am a pachuca. No, I don’t, I don’t think so, but that’s great. I’m glad you’re doing that.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Yeah, so I’m going to add one more to that that ties back to our last episode. In the last episode, I was very curious to see what higher education is going to do about or do with those who are named in the Epstein files. So Jack Stripling has a new piece out in the Chronicle called Unmasking Academe’s Gilded Boys’ Club. And I would say, and what comes next and who else and what else, because this feels like skimming off the top and so far, what I’m seeing, and I don’t know everything, so this is my disclaimer, I’m seeing people be allowed to retire, to leave on their own terms, and to exit, which is a sign of a boys club, rather than higher education taking this on and saying, our values are X. This does not meet our expectations of behavior and of citizenship in our communities and of academia, and bye-bye.

These are very different approaches.

Erin Hennessy 

Yes, and I thought it was interesting, even NPR flagged this morning that in the communications about Larry Summers finally stepping away fully from Harvard.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Retiring. Yeah, but go ahead.

Erin Hennessy 

He said retiring, but then the message that went out to the community said that the university has accepted his resignation. So even in this moment where Larry Summers is finally being held to account fully, the language is very difficult to parse. Well, no.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

I wouldn’t say fully.

Erin Hennessy 

Well, no.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

There are some agreements and departures being negotiated, but that’s, I would say, different than being held accountable fully.

Erin Hennessy

Sure. The point being, the language is muddy. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yes, yes, sorry. 

Erin Hennessy

Yeah. Again, combative with me.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

And the disagreement adds to the trust issue, right? 

Erin Hennessy

Yeah, of course.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

If he says this and you say that, what is the actual truth? Because are we letting somebody just create their own version of what happened and what they’ve decided to do? Or did the institution play a role in making sure that there are accountability standards and expectations for a community when it comes to whatever is in those files.

Erin Hennessy 

Yes, and I will note because we talked about it last time, Bard College has hired a law firm to do an external review of President Botstein’s relationship with Epstein. And here’s how you always know that a place is in the shit. They canceled their fundraising gala for their $1,000 a seat fundraising gala in the last couple of days. So I’m watching that one to see what happens but I will say at the ACE. opening reception last night, there were a lot of conversations around the room about the Epstein files and the impact on higher ed. So, yeah. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

May conversations lead to action.

Erin Hennessy 

Yes, amen and hallelujah.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

So I want to end on a positive note. Again, here we go. First of all, American Pachuco, amazing movie, made me cry. Second is, if you are going to be at PRSA CHE in a week and a half, please let me know. And again, please look to see where else we’re going to be because our schedules are pretty full and I don’t know that either of us is going to be living at home in the next little bit. So come say hello, come be a part of our conversations. We would absolutely love that.

And the second plug that I would have is if Erin mentioned that she is salivating to have you on the podcast, I hope we can reach out and get that to come to fruition because those were some great names, some great positions, and we would love to talk to you some more.

Erin Hennessy

Yes, I’m gonna go back downstairs and talk to some more people until my little introverted heart needs to go hide in a corner. And I’ll probably still be recovering by the time this comes out next week. So be gentle with me, friends. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yes. Oh! One more thing! Can I tell you one more thing? I’m going to post about it. 

Erin Hennessy

Sure.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

It ties to legislatures. I was able to go to the Colorado legislature on Tuesday because SCFD, which I mentioned before, Scientific and Cultural Facility District, we had a proclamation of appreciation from our governor, from the Senate and from the House of Representatives in Colorado. I got to go to the Capitol and be honored. And it was so much fun. So as much as I get grumpy with legislators also, thank you for your hospitality. Because it was great to see democracy in action and it was great to have the legislature recognize the contributions of art, culture and science in our communities.

Erin Hennessy 

And on that note.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Yay! 

Erin Hennessy

I’ll talk to you later.

Teresa Valerio Parrot 

Have a great time at ACE. Safe travels and please stay warm. When I’m in warm Atlanta, I’ll think of you.

Erin Hennessy 

That’s so kind. Bye. 

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Have a great day, Erin. Bye bye.

Erin Hennessy 

You too, Teresa. Bye.

Teresa Valerio Parrot

Thank you for joining us for this episode. You can find links in the show notes to the topics and articles referenced, as well as a copy of the show’s transcript on the Volt website, Voltedu.com. Remember that you can always contact us with feedback, questions, or guest suggestions at trustedvoices@tvpcommunications.com. Follow Trusted Voices wherever you get your podcasts, and be sure to check out Higher Voltage and Campus Docket, the other podcasts on the Volt network. Until next time, thanks to Erin Hennessy, DJ Hauschild, and the Volt team, including Aaron and Maryna, for a great episode. And thank you for listening.