In this episode of Standing Tall, host Randy Lindquist sits down with Dr. John Selmon, President of Muskegon Community College, to explore his leadership journey and the transformative impact of community colleges. From his early days as an ELITE wrestler to leading a pivotal institution, Dr. Selmon shares invaluable lessons on discipline, focus, and removing barriers for students. He dives into MCC’s innovative Jayhawk Hub, which addresses food insecurity, transportation challenges, and mental health needs by leveraging partnerships with local organizations. Dr. Selmon emphasizes the importance of staying relevant in a rapidly changing world, embracing technologies like AI, and engaging the community to support student success. Through his leadership philosophy of collaboration, inclusivity, and forward-thinking, Dr. Selmon offers insights that resonate with leaders in education and beyond.
Dr. Selmon's Leadership Journey:
• From elite college wrestler to higher education leader across three states.
• Early leadership experiences as a wrestling team captain shaped his focus on accountability and teamwork.
The Role of Community Colleges:
• Gateway to higher education and career advancement.
• MCC’s impact on economic mobility and talent development.
• The importance of affordability, accessibility, and community relevance.
• Removing Barriers to Student Success:
• The creation of the Jayhawk Hub to address non-academic challenges like food insecurity and transportation.
• Partnership with 26 community organizations to provide resources without duplication of effort.
• Outcomes: Increased retention and persistence for students receiving support.
Adapting to Change:
• Staying relevant with advancements like AI and fostering professional development for staff.
• Viewing challenges like AI as opportunities for innovation, akin to the introduction of calculators or the internet.
Leadership Lessons:
• The importance of mentorship at every stage of life and career.
• Strategic planning as a collaborative and fluid process that drives long-term success.
• Empowering leaders by encouraging ownership and personal goal-setting, including mental health priorities.
Importance of Marketing:
• Telling student success stories through billboards, podcasts (The J Talk), and other platforms.
• Highlighting programs like nursing and athletics to attract students and showcase impact.
Key Takeaways for Leaders:
1. Leverage Early Leadership Opportunities: Skills developed in small roles can lay the foundation for larger leadership responsibilities.
2. Focus on Removing Barriers: Addressing non-academic challenges enables students to focus on learning and achieve success.
3. Collaborate Strategically: Engage community partners to maximize impact and avoid duplicating efforts.
4. Stay Relevant: Embrace emerging technologies and foster adaptability within your team.
5. Plan with Flexibility: Combine long-term vision with short-term action steps, involving stakeholders to build ownership.
Learn More About Muskegon Community College
Connect with Dr. Selmon on LinkedIn
Connect with Randy Lindquist on LinkedIn
Welcome back to another episode of standing tall. Voices in leadership. I'm your host. Randy Lindquist, superintendent of the Muskegon area ISD, and I'm excited to have you join us for episode three. Today's guest is someone who's been at the forefront of shaping the future for students in higher education, Dr John Selman, president of Muskegon Community College. Dr Selmon has been an incredible advocate for student success, creating pathways and providing vital support to help students thrive in their post secondary journeys. In today's rapidly changing world, ensuring that students have the resources they need to succeed beyond high school is more important than ever. We'll be diving into Dr selmons leadership approach in discussing how he's fostering a culture of support at Muskegon Community College, the strategies he's implemented to remove barriers for students, and the importance of creating an environment where every student can reach their potential, this episode will be packed with valuable insights you won't want to miss. So wherever you're tuning in from, get ready to be informed, inspired and connected. Let's stand tall. We choose to go to the moon. You can't do it alone. Team, Team. Embracing change. There is no courage without vulnerability. Being brave. Attitude. Reflect leadership. Captain. Can you rumble with vulnerability? But because they are hard, can you stay in tough things, or do you tap out? I have a dream, learning how to get back up and keep moving forward, learning how to rise. Let's stand up. Well, welcome. Dr Selmon, oh, thank you. Glad to be here. So we want to start with just you sharing a little bit about your leadership journey to become leadership journey to becoming the president of Muskegon Community College. Tell us how you got to where you are today. Well, a lot of work, a lot of work through the years. I when I graduated from college at the University of Nebraska, I worked in the high school for one year, and then I got into higher ed at the Grand Rapids Community College. Worked there for a number of years, and went on to Davenport college for about four or five years. And Davenport was a part of a larger system, and on Detroit side, Detroit College of Business. So I got involved over there with Detroit College of Business as dean and campus deans and vice president Group Vice President. So did a lot of growing in higher education, then went on to Kennesaw State University in the Atlanta area. Finished up my doctorate at that time and got more involved in the community college track at that point, came back to Lake Michigan College. Worked there for a few years in leadership roles, and then 2011 came to me skiing community colleges, Vice President and his Provos and Dennis president. So, lot of different opportunities, lot of growth, lot of pains. Yeah, yeah, you've had a lot of experience in the post secondary world for sure, two year, four year, public, private, three states. So I've been around that's great. Well, many people might not know, but you were an elite college wrestler, right? You won a junior college national championship. I believe all American, Big 10, Russ, Big Eight, I'm sorry, sorry, yeah. Now Big 10, yes, well, now the big 18, I think it's bigger than 10 for sure. You wrestled in an Olympic qualifier. I believe World Championships. Okay, that's just impressive. So I'm curious of what lessons in leadership do you take away from the wrestling mat? Well, it lot of us about discipline and focus, intense focus, paying attention to details, some humility. There. I gotta understand how to lose and be for sure. Yeah. But it also creates an opportunity improve and grow without accountability, those types of things that are invaluable to leadership. I think that over the years, you just continue to develop those skills, but it's about remaining focus and and just the other thing about wrestling is the individual accountability, but it's still a collective account, still responsible for doing your part with the team. Yeah, so, yeah, I can tell that's molded you into the leader you are today. A little bit that's really did, did define some of your leadership style, I believe. And but it started so early, and I was thinking about leadership by when you talk to me about this, and in middle school, I was team captain and the wrestling team and and then all I went on to high school is team captains. Well, what I didn't know was that I wasn't formally being trained in leadership, but I was still leading. Oh, absolutely. So you you start develop those skills. And then later on, after college, I would focus on leadership styles and understanding what what all that meant. But early on, yeah, in my career, I was leading, and didn't place it in that way. To think about it like that. But now, when I reflect, I'm pretty sure, to me, that's part of the beauty of athletics or any extracurricular activities for school as you're growing up is that leadership piece. You have the opportunity to really lead in groups of people, which I think is pretty critical to defining someone. So tell us about community colleges. Why are they so important to Why is MCC so important to our community here? But even more so, how are community colleges, or why they so important to the state and even the nation. Well, it's access to higher education in terms of four year degrees. So it's that gateway. It's also a gateway to career programs, but it's really important because of the economic mobility that it provides for individuals, and it's also for Talent Development. So it's talent development in community college, when you go into your program, then you can continue your education, you know, to a four year bachelor degree program. And so all that stuff is available, but it's affordable, good quality education. And here at Muskegon Community Colleges, this will be, it's 98 years right now, and it'll be 100 years in two years. So it's been around for quite some time. Yeah, but helping develop, helping to grow this community, being relevant and responsive to employment and training needs here in this community, and just we hire, we have about 450 full and part time employees too. So we have about, I think probably, about a $48 million operating budget. So it's a lot, ya know, and it's a huge economic impact here, yeah, and there's so many different pathways too. It's not simply a gateway to a four year degree, but there's a pathway for improving some skills. There's a pathway for getting other certifications, even if you're already employed. So you offer so many different pathways for people to advance in their careers. It's pretty critical to a local community and economy. Yeah, continuing education, well, you've had the, I'll say, distinct honor of joining our superintendents at our monthly meetings here in musking County, right? Yes, you see what K 12 leaders go through, and some of the trials and jubilations they deal with. But what similar similarities do you see between K 12 leadership and post secondary leadership? Well, the visionary part you look after, look and lead an organization, and large organizations, I might add. And so there's a lot of similarities there we pay attention to state, federal policies, rules, regulations. Gotta watch the money, you know, and so that's another piece there. But just and leading people, leading an organization, leading an initiative, and it's, it's bigger than even the job to itself, because you like you say, you collaborate, you work to make a difference in the community in which you live, and so you make a living, make a life, make a contribution in this community. And it's a lot of ways to do that, but, but so there's a lot of is taxing on you, your body, your mind, because it's intense sometimes, yeah, but it's the political aspects of it, community aspects of leading, and so I just and I enjoy it, and we have fun in it, but it's a big responsibility. It is. Oh, we appreciate you being there too and getting your perspective from a post secondary. Great piece. Yeah, great of individuals. So so I know that you've been pretty focused on lots of things for students that are not necessarily academic related. And I'm curious as to why you think schools need to provide things outside of that academic learning. There's lots of things that students need these days, but why it's so important to you to provide those things outside of academics? Well, it helps students succeed. At Muskegon Community College, our biggest responsibility is to help students succeed. In order to do that, we have to remove barriers and enhance support services to students so that they're free to focus on learning. So when we talk about barriers, such as transportation, food insecurity issues, mental health issues, all these things that happen outside of the classroom but impact the classroom. And so what we've done, we have what we call the Jayhawk hub, and that hub is a system of support. And then those things I just talked about, those barriers, we address those barriers in the hub, but we, we, we do that collectively with a community partner. So for example, if there is a barrier like food insecurity, well, we worked with Muskegon rescue mission. They provide pantry, food, pantry, stuff and clothing for students. So we join them, and we partner, and we have about 26 partners, community. Wow. Themselves, and just in this variety of different things that we we do and we partner with, but it's important to partner, because you can't do this work alone. But my goal is that we're not going to duplicate the advertiser. We're not going to Muskegon rescue mission. Does this work for the community, then we partner with them. That's great, and we tell them that our students can be their clients, and our students can also be their future employees at some point. And so we try to look at, how does this all work together? Because what's in it for our partners as well. So but we have 26 community partners, and we're strong right now. We work with just about every agency in town, and so what a great example of collaboration. And also, I like your idea of don't reinvent the wheel. Someone else is already doing this. How do we bring them in to help our students? Yeah, yeah. So what have you seen the impact of that hub? Then you've talked about a couple of specific resources. But what kind of impact have you seen from that hub? The students that come for food come for transportation, but they return, persist and graduate, and not necessarily at higher rates. But we could have lost those students because a car repair of $100 could take a student out no low income and don't have the means and so. But the impact, we can't say that our hub has caused this, but we know that. We track it. We know the student that comes for food comes for transportation or some other services, and we then see if they remain in school that semester and continue the next semester and return the next fall. And so we're seeing a lot of that's happening now. We just assumed that we might have lost those students because they had a barrier to Yeah, and you've removed that barrier so they can continue to go to school, so they're free to focus on learning. That's a whole big thing. Is that we, because the students say, Well, I I need transportation, I need food. Okay, we got that covered. We got this covered. Now what you're free to focus on learning. Yeah, I love that. I love that phrase, free to focus on learning. That's awesome. So this is the fastest changing time in history, and we see things happening through AI and other technologies that are just changing what we do each and every day, and it's rapidly changing, right? So how are you ensuring that MCC is adapting to those changes and kind of preparing for the future? Well, we have faculty, right, and deans and vice presidents that help with this work. So I don't do all this work alone. But the thing is that and our focus this year is on advancing Teaching and Learning excellence, and so in the ways we do that is through professional development. We just had a trends conference. It was the occupational deans, and they just had a conference here in Muskegon last Friday, I spoke as part of a panel and but it's about relevancy, staying relevant and responsive to the workforce, training, development needs. And you may recall, like, with AI, you just mentioned AI so and people are like, you know, there's extremes about AI right now, absolutely. But we, if you remember years ago, in the 70s, early 70s, calculators came along, and then in 8083, or so, the internet came along, noise about it. That's not going to work. It's going to destroy education. And then 2024, AI comes along, and now we're having those same conversations, but AI is here to stay. We have to look at ways that we can use AI and advanced learning versus running from it. So yeah, and staying relevant is key, right? Yeah, but you got to be relevant and responsive to, and they're going to be other AIS, they're going to be other internet, right? And as educators, we have to be responsive to those things, embrace it and use it in a way that it can be helpful. Yeah, to individuals, yeah, I'm glad you're having those conversations with the staff. Staff is all around this, and we're talking about it on a regular basis, and it's just critically important that we are because we're talking about the students that we have today will be tomorrow's workforce. Yes, yes, be the workforce. Yeah, right. Well, this podcast is built on Isaac Newton's quote about standing on the shoulders of giants. In other words, you know, who's impacted you in a big way, right? So I'm curious as to whose shoulders you've stood on as you've kind of advanced your leadership style and the work that you do well, a mentors and and I want to say mentors. I've had lots of mentors at every level, when I was in high school, mentors when I was in college, mentors in the workplace, mentors, Dr Jim Mendola probably is this has the most influence on me. He when I was working for Detroit College of Business, I was the one of the vice presidents for him. He says, I want you to get your doctorate, he said, and I want you to do it now. You. And, and so he encouraged me to do that. He's, if I can do it, you can do it. And so he encouraged me to take the next step in my career. And, and I'll never forget that it was, it was a the timing was right. Just said, Yeah, to do this. Yeah, I did it. I look back and reflect, and now I'm glad I did do it. Yeah. And so, but there is, mentorship is important. Somebody has to help you understand what it looks like along the way. And I tell a lot of young professionals, and sometimes kids, they look at you and they see me as President or Provost or something like that, and they just think that it's one leap. You can just take a step and leap and do this. And I said, Hey, let me help you understand what it looks like along the way, because there's some things you had to take. It's a journey, right? It just doesn't just happen, yeah, and so, but that so to me, that's that's an important aspect of leadership, is finding a mentor at every step of the way, yeah, yep. And it's no matter what position they're in, yep, and people don't think they're mentors, but many times it's somebody's not even late because I got mentors that don't work in the profession. I got mentors that, yeah, absolutely, but it's just you know, somebody to talk to, somebody to help you understand, to put things together and help you down to the next level. A true mentor is very, very important to you, personally as well as professionally. I think, yeah, great. So leaders like yourself have to switch between a long term vision planning and short term execution of plans, which can be really, really exhausting, I think about the scope that you have as President of the Community College in our community, and must be exhausting that switch between long term vision and short term execution. So what advice would you give to leaders about how to do this kind of back and forth? Well, that long term piece, along with that short term got to do it now, execution piece. Well, you strategic thinking. Obviously you got to think out. You got to think three, five years out, maybe 10 sometimes, and so. But we do this as an organization. We come together and we talk about our strategic vision and and then we then drill down to the things you got to get done now, to get there and so, and we have professionals help us with that. And when I say professionals, we have somebody come in to help with our strategic planning process as we go through that, because we had, I think, 180 community members that were involved with our strategic planning and so, but that's how you get your work done. And we develop a plan, and we manage to the plan. We're in a strategic plan right now, in year three, four of our plan, and we're managing to the plan. And obviously those plans are fluid, right? Things could change along the way. You might have missed the mark somewhere. So we have monthly reviews of our plan. We provide information to our board of trustees on updates on a regular basis. And so we don't let the plan sit. And that's another thing you can't do, is a lot of strategic plans on shelf, on the shelf, collecting dust, right? Yeah, collecting dust. And so ours regular engagement with our strategic plan, yeah, and so, but that's like I said, that that's how we get our work done. And so we managed to a plan. We developed plan. Managed to once that plan is done, then we reflect what worked, what didn't, and then what's next. Yeah, we'll do going forward. You mentioned vision, that long term piece, which is pretty critical, how do you empower kind of the leadership below you to work towards that vision? How do you empower your leaders that are working with you to kind of get towards that vision that you have as as the well, we they're part of the plan, so they're part of developing the plan, so they own it. Oh yeah. So you got to create that ownership. And so people, when we talk about a plan or strategic direction, like when we talk about right now, our focus area is access, equity and excellence, and so we talk about goals related to that. At the end of the day, each of my Cabinet members has to develop goals around that plan, and I allow them the flexibility and freedom to do that, keeping the larger pitching in mind, how do we continue to create, create access in this community? Yeah, how do we pay attention to equity, and how do we talk about excellence? Yeah, this community and so they there's ways that we do that, and I let people become a little bit more creative in the ways that they want to get some of that done. I love that I part of my foundation is Rick DeForest vision of tight, loose leadership, right? I have certain expectations, but you can figure out a ways you want to work to get to those expectations and meet those you're saying the same thing. Help them set goals and then let them create their own ways of reaching those goals and reaching that future vision you have. And I also focus on personal goals too. And one of the things. I had all my direct reports do this year was I wanted a goal around, how are they protecting their mental health? Oh, nice. And so they're creative in how they do it, but the goal is, how are you protecting it? And so, you know, people come out with different ideas, you know, making them think about that's pretty critical, because otherwise they just work, work, work, right? And to meet those demands and so, but yeah, so that it is helpful, and you allow some creativity, because people have to be a part of but the main thing is it's inclusive, and that's collaborative, and it's we go back and forth with it. But the reality is that the people have to be a part of division if they're not. I mean, who's gonna own it? Love that. You gotta own it. Yeah? Love that. And they all have a piece of it. You mentioned mental health in that conversation there. How do you how do you take care of your own mental health? Kind of I'm wondering what your the hardest season of your leadership journey has been, and how you've gone, gotten through that to make sure you stay mentally well and strong, and what you do, well, golfing is one way. Okay, yeah, do I golf? We have a golf course as a part of our campus, and so I play in a league over there, and I get involved. And then I golf throughout the winter months too, as well. But golf is one of those things that really helps me just wind down. I wind up in different ways. I have a lot of strokes. Yes, exactly. That's still different. But I want to get your mind off the business stuff, doesn't it? Get you away from that and so. And I am competitive, so I'd like to win, and then I participate in a lot of different sporting activities. I try to get to some college football games, college basketball games, get to some of the pro games and stuff like that. Take some vacation. Went through Bahamas not long ago, and then throughout the year, I travel a bit. My wife and I, and so it's really that's nice. You can get away a little bit. Yeah, that's great. Unlike a neighborhood school like we have in K 12 that every student just has to go to because that's their neighborhood school, colleges have to actively market themselves to keep up their enrollment. That's a constant for you. I think so. Why is it crucial for schools to market themselves and what have you learned as effective strategies to make MCC a place students really want to attend. Well, you have to mark it, like you said, it's competitive. You know, our students don't have to come to Muskegon Community College. They have to want to come there. So we look at our programs, we look at our services, we look at our facilities. All those things are important. But the biggest thing is these stories that about student and student success that we tell time and time again, on the billboards, on the radio and in the marketing space, we tell these stories about students that are being successful, because that's what we want students to come here and be successful. If you want to come to Muskegon Community College and go to work, you can after you leave your program, or you want to come to Muskegon Community College and transfer to a senior institution, you can do that as well. Our career programs are highly successful, like our nursing on the nursing test, the qualifying test for nurse the first take. You know, the last few times our students have taken a test, they tested out 100% and so we tell those type of stories, and it's a lot of success right now. And we have what we call now the J talk, and that's our podcast. And so we have a lot of stories that will be told about students being successful and the impact that the college is having on this community. So yeah, too often the news is filled with the bad stuff, right? And we don't get a chance to tell our great, positive stories of great things happening on our campuses every day. So connecting the community to those wonderful, positive stories is pretty critical to saying, Hey, this is a great place for you to come and have an impact in your future life. Yeah, we have our athletic program, a strong athletic program. We have 18 sports, the most any community college Michigan. And so because that's an experience, that's a journey, and that's what we provide a variety of experiences. But our faculty are strong, well educated. Some are practitioners that work in the industry and teach as well, but we feel good about, you know, what we have and what we offer the community in terms of our faculty and our staff, and like I said, our facilities, our programs, our services, yeah, we feel awesome. So for you, marketing is really telling those successful stories of what, yep, impact kids got to tell the MCC Yeah, somebody has to see themselves in one of those stories. Yeah, for sure, yeah. So we've been blessed in Muskegon County with the Muskegon promise. You've been on the board of the promise since the get go, I believe, and that gives our local students the opportunity for free education at Muskegon Community College or Baker college. So how has the promise impacted MCC and even more so than maybe the broader community here in Muskegon County? Well, we talked about access and access to higher education, and that's one of our focus areas. So it's access for students to get into higher ed at no cost and what and huge benefit. So promise is strong. It's a lot of communities don't have promise, right? And so students that come on a Promise Scholarship tend to continue, persist and graduate at rates higher than in other groups of Dukes and so, but it's about access. They talk about moving, removing barriers before, right? That takes tuition could be a barrier for some that you were moving with that promise, yep, and so, and that I couldn't, you couldn't ask for a better program. Yeah, we're fortunate Muskegon county to have that, and we had some visionary leaders that started that, and some visionary community leaders that helped us fund it, start to get us going, and now we're in a great place. It's very strong, yep. And Dr nesberry was on before I was so he was, I think, one of the initial folks that was with the promise, and then I've been on the last three years or so. But like I said, it's a strong program. Communities would die for to have the promise, and some that don't have that and and so they talk about it. I'm around with, with the state, at the state level, across the state, and people are talking about promise. How's that working? Yeah, good, yeah. Good deal. It's going well, yeah. And our students are benefiting from we have large numbers of students enrolling. It's another story. Muskegon County has to tell more that of a great things happening here in terms of that barrier removal for students to get to that post secondary level. Yeah, super. So looking forward, what are your hopes for the future of Miss Keegan Community College? What do you see the role of the community college evolving in the next maybe five to 10 years? What's the future look like, advancing the talent development, advancing economic mobility, you know, making sure that we provide opportunities for individuals and that that things are relevant and that we we don't want to be irrelevant, okay, so we want to be relevant going forward, and responsive to the needs, because we don't know what some of the needs are. We don't know what some know what some of the jobs are that will be coming, but we want to be poised and ready for those and do advancing Teaching and Learning excellence. Our faculty are well prepared now, and they will be well prepared in the future, our staff in terms of support services. So I would like think that we would be a player in this community. It's been almost 100 years now, and that what we're doing right now is positioning ourselves for the next 100 years. We have a facilities plan that we're working on right now. We have a economic impact study that we're doing, and this is about telling the story we talked about marketing a little bit ago. It's about telling our story. So that's what, yeah. And one of the things that I always think about, am I spending enough time on the future? It's one of the things I think about all the time, because it's important, because yesterday is already happened right before. So it's about forward thinking. It's one of the characteristics of a leader, is forward thinking, looking ahead and preparing for that, and not dwelling on the past, maybe using that to inform you, but thinking about and looking at the future going forward. Yeah, you have to. And so I'm excited, though, I think I'm excited about the things that the college can provide for this community in terms of employing individuals and training and development and just being a good community partner. Yeah, well, Dr salmon, I think the future is pretty bright with you at the helm at Muskegon Community College, and I appreciate your your future thinking that's that's really awesome. We're going to end today's podcast like we do with all these now with some rapid fire questions, maybe not necessarily leadership based, or just some rapid you gotta respond to what I ask you and see what you're thinking, what's in the head of yours. Okay. Okay. You ready? Yeah, try all right. Favorite TV show as a kid, the favorite TV show as a kid, I used to watch dark shadows, oh, and every episode I'd watch that you like the mystery stuff, huh? And Barnabas Colin used to watch that a lot. That's great, quite a bit. How about favorite club in your golf bag? The driver? Oh, you like to hit along? Yeah, like long when I hit it as a straight that's another story. Do you prefer to text or talk? Talk, talk, yeah, make a phone call, right? Have a conversation with somebody. Yes, yeah, here's a big one. Are you a Swifty? Uh, no, I saw a little pause there. I don't know, maybe where, maybe deep down you are, I don't know. I'm aware of it. In the shower. You might sing some of her songs. I don't know. Let's see. Yeah, I'm aware of her and other folks. But, you know, my kids are more into that. Okay, yeah, gotcha, gotcha. How about in. Visibility or super strength as a power. What you'd rather have? Invisibility? Yeah, just hide and lay low. DC, here's a good one. Let's see reaction to this. Is it wrong for a vegetarian to eat animal crackers? I dollars, so you Okay, either way I eat. But I mean, just just saying it, yeah, animal practice, you got to think about it. All right. How about this? Is Die Hard, a Christmas movie. This is a big debate. Now, Die Hard, the movie. Is there a Christmas movie or not? I didn't watch Die Hard. Oh, really. Oh, you have to watch it. So one of my all time favorites is I heard, oh yes, I don't know, is it? What is it? I would say yes, because I bring it out during Christmas time. Watch it every year. So it's to me, yes, but it's a very hot debate, so I watch Rudolph the Red Nosed. Oh, well, that's definitely Christmas. Yeah, would you rather time travel to the past or the future? The future? Okay, yeah, past or Yeah. You want to see what it's going to be like out there, huh? I'd rather go forward. All right? And lastly, what's the best leadership advice you have ever received the best advice I've ever received, received leadership Read, read, read, to stay in touch with what's going on, and read, because you can diversify yourself through reading, learning a lot of little, a lot, running a little of a lot. Yeah, right. I got so so read, read, read, and so I there's stuff that I read related to athletics, to higher education, and just some good books, you know, every now and then you read, but a lot of us around leadership, but, yeah, it's helped me grow and develop, yeah, and it helps with my thinking. I think that's great advice. Well, Dr, summoned again. Thank you for joining us today. It's today. It's been a pleasure. You're a great leader in our community, and we are fortunate to have you at MCC so thank you for the time. Okay, thank you. It's great to be here and heading straight down the fairway. I'm gonna try. All right, take care. Yeah, all right, let's bring in producer Ben just for a quick takeaway session on what we heard from Dr John Selma to MCC the great president there, who is doing wonderful things for students in our community. What'd you take away from that? Ben, a ton man. He's that he was chalk pack of, or packed full of. He was full of some amazing takeaways, for sure. I thought the coolest thing was thinking when he was unpacking his journey to it like he's the president of the biggest college around here, and he talked about it all started being a middle school wrestler, and he's like, you don't realize it at the time, but that experience of leading then is what propelled him to see himself as a leader now. So it would just be like, don't discount those opportunities for leadership, however small they seem that you give to kids. You never know if that is the catalyst for somebody taking off. You know, yeah. And the fact that he took away so many leadership lessons from wrestling was pretty cool to hear about. Like that was him being a leader in many different ways that you know, applies to him today, which is pretty cool, I think, yeah, man. And the cool part also of like, just that mantra of take away any barrier to students succeeding and hearing that that doesn't that's not just for a kindergartener or a second grader that it's happening at the college, and that needs to be all of our roles, like, take away any barrier that is stopping a kid from hitting success. You know, yeah, and not reinventing the wheel, right? But using community resources, community partners to provide those resources, to remove ops codes you don't do it yourself. Engage those around you that maybe already have solutions to those problems so they can help totally. Man also loved as soon as we hit stop on the recording, you guys wrestled and you beat him, it was I have a long wingspan, though, it kind of probably helps a little bit. Yeah, for sure. I don't think I stand a chance against him in a wrestling match, for sure. Well, I hope you enjoyed that episode and learned a lot from Dr Salman. Until you listen again, keep standing tall. You