Let's Talk UNLV

0:00:00
Alright, welcome to another segment of Let's Talk UNRV. On KUNV, you will co-host Keith, and we have a stand-in for Renee. We have the competent Danielle with us. Danielle, welcome to co-hosting this show. I know you're not new to doing podcasts. You're probably a better expert than we are. We're just winging it over here on the UNLV side. I definitely do not feel like it, but thank you. All right. Well, Danielle, what's been happening? What have you been up to over the holiday break?

0:00:34
So thankfully for me, I got to reunite with a lot of my family in San Diego for the first time in two years, given the pandemic. So that was definitely the highlight of my break. Well, that can be good and bad.

0:00:47
I got to connect with some people I didn't necessarily look forward to connecting with again. I couldn't use the pandemic as excuse anymore. They were like, hey, we're all vaccinated. The family's getting together. Let's do something. So you're stuck. Yeah, I was stuck. But, you know, we had we had a good time and, you know, I got to unplug from work. Spent too much money on Christmas gifts for the family, the wife and kids. But it was they had great Christmases and so did I. And, you know, now you got to deal with taking down Christmas lights and my family's big on decorating. So I mean, we got like four Christmas trees in the house and decorations on the banisters, the stairs. So it was insane. Our whole garage is Christmas stuff.

0:01:28
Yeah, well, that sounds like it was fun during the Christmas time.

0:01:30
Yeah, yeah, fun. Not fun taking things down. And the kids, you know, they totally are disinterested in Christmas after they open their gifts. You know, at least during the Christmas, you can say, hey, help me put some stuff up and they'll help with that. But once Christmas is up, all the adults are on their own. But hey, you know, now that we're back to back to work and making that transition back into office, you know, one of the things that I'm always interested in is learning about graduate school. And I know you being a graduate student yourself at UNRV, this segment may be of particular interest to you and you know your different peer groups. So we have the pleasure having Dr. Kate Corgan who's the Vice Provost for Graduate Education and the Dean of the Graduate College with us today. Kate, welcome to the show.

0:02:14
Hello there, nice to chat with you Keith and Danielle. Pleasure to be here.

0:02:19
Well Kate, just to throw you a softball question, could you just maybe talk to us about how long you've been at UNRV, how you got to UNLV, and transitioning to the role that

0:02:28
you're in now. Sure, you got it, and Happy New Year to all of you. So I'm a bit of a dinosaur around here. I came to UNLV in 1995. I was actually ABD, still finishing up my dissertation. I went on the job market, and one of the offers I got was from UNLV, which of course I accepted happily. And so I began as an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology. I have been here ever since and you know like so many people I thought I would come out to Las Vegas and spend a couple of years and then move on and you know I fell in love with this university and our students and this community and it's been just nothing nothing short of a pleasure and a real adventure being part of this growing campus in the last 20 plus years. In 2006, I was tapped to come up and work in the Graduate College as an Associate Dean. I sort of reluctantly did that. It wasn't something I had planned on, but I seized the opportunity and I've been in the Graduate College ever since. And I've been Dean of the Graduate College now for about three years.

0:03:37
Now, Kate, it's not often that I run into someone on UNLV that's been here longer than I have. So yeah I do want to

0:03:43
point out that I was about 10 years old when I came. Same here I was still in

0:03:48
potty training yet. So Dr. Corgan I noticed your background is in sociology so I had my undergrad in sociology and a common question I would get is,

0:04:04
what are you gonna do with that?

0:04:05
What are you gonna do with that? And I think there's a ton of ways you could implement your sociology degree in different sectors of work. So I was wondering how you implemented that into the grad college here.

0:04:18
Oh, what a terrific question, and how cool, Danielle. I did not know that you were an undergrad social major. That's awesome. Yeah, I completely agree with you. The sociology is one of those degrees that gives you a wide array of skills, and then it's up to you to take those skills and apply them in whichever area you decide to pursue. For me, it was to be a sociology professor and to do research and teach, and I absolutely loved that. That was sort of my first career path, and I'm certainly still on that, but at the same time, moving into administration at the university was a sort of different way to flex my sociology. And so when I started, it wasn't a path I had planned and so I was a little unsure if it would be for me, if I'd enjoy it, if I'd be good at it. And I'll leave the good at it part to other people to assess, but I found that I really enjoyed it because it allowed me to take my sociology and sort of put it to use every day. And so one of the things I tell people is I love my job because every day is different and every day you face, you know, honestly, new challenges, right? New opportunities to build a new program or fix an existing program or change a process or a procedure that makes things better for our students. So I feel like administration is a kind of activist position where you can create social change and do good, even though it's often sort of quiet and behind the scenes. And I love that. And for me, that is the clearest connection to my sociology.

0:05:47
Okay, see, I'm already filling out a number. I have two sociology majors.

0:05:52
We're a tough crowd.

0:05:53
It's never too late.

0:05:54
Kate, could you talk a little bit for our listeners just to give them an overview of all the functions that happen within the graduate school at a high level?

0:06:05
Yeah, sure. So lots of people have no idea what the graduate college is, and that's OK. So if you're one of those folks, I'll try and make it quick and simple to understand. And so basically, the graduate college is the college that coordinates and oversees and helps manage all graduate education on campus. So whether we're talking about graduate certificates, any sort of post-bachelor, graduate coursework, any sort of advanced degree. Our work is collaborative, so we don't do anything just by ourselves, but instead we work with our more than 185 different graduate certificates and programs, their faculty, their staff, and their students, who do everything from support recruitment efforts and communicate with prospective students to manage the online application and the admissions process. We work with students throughout their life cycle to document their milestones, you know, the requirements they have to do along their way from admission to graduation. We do degree checks and we actually confer all graduate degrees out of the college. And then we do all the supplemental things that graduate students and graduate programs need. So on the academic affairs side, we work with the graduate council on campus to manage the graduate curriculum, new courses, course changes, new programs and certificates, program changes to keep them fresh and cutting edge, that sort of thing. So not anyone can teach graduate courses or mentor graduate students. You have to have certain credentials. So we make sure folks have those credentials and the right people are, you know, delivering our graduate education to our students. We handle the graduate assistantship program on campus. We have about 1,040 GAs at this point. That's grown a lot in recent years. We do graduate scholarships, fellowships, various funding programs. We have something called the Graduate Academy that does leadership, professional, and career development for students, both undergraduate and the pipeline to grad school and to graduate students. So, yeah, it's sort of a cradle to grave operation over here to support all things graduate education on campus.

0:08:10
And I think that even even though we work together on a lot of different initiatives, some of the things that you describe were things that I didn't even know were happening in the graduate college. So I'm sure our listeners are very informed by what you share. And I really enjoyed hearing you saying about how you take a collaborative and a cooperative approach and how you approach achieving the goals of the of the Graduate College. You see, Danielle, you you you benefited from all those processes.

0:08:37
Yeah, I'm definitely thankful for you in the Graduate College because I would not be receiving the funding. Some of the funding I have right now during my first graduate experience. I'm also new to you and I'll be. And it's been amazing. But to switch gears, could you speak a little bit about how the transition was for you in the grad college during the pandemic?

0:09:01
Sure, yeah, that's a great question. Like everyone, you know, we were as surprised as everyone else that one day we were hearing about, you know, this, you know, this global COVID event that was starting to happen. And the next day, everyone was sort of packing up their computers and shifting to at-home work. But I have to say two things. One is I'm so immensely grateful to the tremendous team we have in the Graduate College. And my colleagues here were so professional and so calm and so focused on their mission that we really didn't miss a beat. People packed up their computers, moved home, and we immediately started working on the second thing I want to focus on, which is nobody lost sight of the fact that as hard as this was on us, it was orders of magnitude more complicated and difficult for our faculty and for our students especially. So being displaced during the pandemic as a student or a faculty member who's trying to work with students and support their success in classrooms that are now virtual, like that was all even harder. And so our job was to try and figure out how we could remove barriers. And so that's what we tried to do and we did that in a variety of ways. Our grad academy, for example, within I would say seven to ten days had shifted all of our workshops and programs to virtual, 100%. So nobody missed out on anything they would have done in person, they just shifted to virtual. And what we found is students love it. And so now we continue to offer everything and will continue to offer everything both virtual and hybrid for students. We just made dozens and dozens and dozens of changes to processes very, very quickly to remove barriers. And, you know, frankly, that's something we've had to continue doing throughout the pandemic, as there were twists and turns and, you know, all the unexpected

0:10:58
things that arose. And then, Kay, could you maybe clarify what's the relationship between the graduate college and the individual college in terms of admitting students into graduate programs?

0:11:11
Yes, absolutely.

0:11:13
So it's entirely collaborative. So the Graduate College actually is the only office that can admit students and provide offer letters to students. And so what we do is students apply through our online application in what's called the GradRebel gateway. 100% of our processes and forms are electronic and digital now. So that was easy during the pandemic. We didn't have to worry about paper. And so students apply, and then we review their applications for the minimum university credentials, and the departments review the student applications for their departmental and programmatic requirements. And then the departments make their admissions decisions and recommend them to us. And then we confirm that the students met the minimum requirements, and we go ahead and extend the offers to students. And so all of that is done electronically so that the department can see all the letters and access and communicate with their students easily. And so we're just sort of the infrastructure and the backbone for those operations.

0:12:18
And then, Kay, could you also share with us, I know you say you've been in this role officially for, I think, three years now, or going on three years, could you talk a little bit about some of the changes that you've made that you're most proud of as the dean?

0:12:33
Yeah, I was interim dean for about six years before I became dean. So I've been in a sort of continuum. Right. And so we've created in the Graduate College with our team here. You know, we are a very service-oriented unit and we are both an administrative and an academic unit, but the core unifier is to provide outstanding service. And so when I started as interim dean, we had a, you know, a team retreat and my team came up with a motto that we hold to this day and that's 100% solutions. And so our goal, every employee here, every member of our team, students, you know, full-time, whatever, is to provide 100% solutions to anyone who reaches out to us for assistance on anything related to graduate education. And though you might not love the answer we give you, it'll be the right answer and we'll be able to explain why that's the answer, right? And so service undergirds everything we do. But it's not enough, right? That's a basic foundation. On top of that, we've really committed ourselves to creating a culture of inclusion and, frankly, of kindness and empathy. Graduate school is hard. And everybody who's been through it has some scars and some war stories. And we certainly don't relish that part of the experience, but we recognize that it's a reality. Being a grad student is a big job, right? And so, we really try to approach both our faculty and our programs, but especially our students with kindness, empathy, understanding, and to find ways to support them. And so, we've done things like build the grad academy. And so, we have a dozen different programs for different types of students and experiences. We offer four different free certification programs. We are now offering online digital badges. We provide financial wellness and leadership training and research training and teaching training, lots of different areas, all free to our students. That involves more than 60 workshops a year, five major research events. So it's a huge enterprise, but it's all set to build graduate community, right? To make, to create a space virtually and physically on campus where grad students and the work that they do feel included and important and valued and seen. And then on the financial side, I'm really proud of some of the changes we've made. So we have something that we established called the Emergency Retention Grants Program. That program is to provide sort of quick financial help to graduate students who have a financial emergency, some sort of unexpected burden that is interfering with their experience as a grad student. And so our idea was if we could give them a quick infusion of cash to solve this one-time financial problem, it might help them get over that hurdle and we could retain them as students so that they could earn their degree and achieve their goal. And that program has grown 323% in the last year and a half over COVID. Because of course the need has expanded. So we've been able to meet that need and I just got some data last week or so that shows that we're retaining something like 96% of the students who get these emergency retention grants. So the most at risk financially, you know, at need students, which is awesome, right? Because if you can retain a student and graduate them, you've changed their life, their family tree, their career trajectory, it's a win. And so we love that. And then the last thing I'll say is GAs, graduate assistants, you know, we've grown that program tremendously in the last six years. We now offer a hundred percent tuition to our GAs. This year, we were able to offer 100% of their health insurance covered to every GA on campus. And we were able to increase stipends a few years back, and we're working on doing that again, hopefully, here in the near future.

0:16:42
Now, Kate, if you were in the studio, you'd be grinning from ear to ear. Danielle is smiling, and she's nodding saying, yes, I'm the beneficiary of all those, all that effort. So making life great for me as a first first semester graduate student.

0:16:59
Yeah, I definitely reap the benefits of a lot of the things you just mentioned. So I'm glad a lot of other students get to hear about that and potentially use that in their graduate experience. And I noticed you mentioned that a lot like we could come to you guys for anything. So the first thing that came to my mind was books. Do you guys have better resources for us to find cheaper books or helps with funding for books because that could be very difficult.

0:17:29
Yeah, that's a great question.

0:17:31
So no, we don't currently have anything that helps provide funding for textbooks or other sort of, you know, required academic materials. But it's the kind of thing that, you know, if we hear it, we can start having those conversations. So honestly, you're the first person who's asked me about that. You know, I'd be happy to have that conversation, probably with the GPSA. So we work very closely with the Graduate and Professional Student Association. They're tremendous. And so together we can do more. A wise colleague taught me that recently. And so together we can do more. I mean, GPSA and grad college, you know, we have a great relationship with President Nicole Thomas and her leadership team. And so I think on the book front, Danielle, you know, that's a conversation I can circle around and have with GPSA to see if we can put our heads together and look at some models that maybe other universities have in place and see what we could build here to meet that need. So we like to, you know, we like to be innovative, but we also like to not reinvent the wheel. So if other universities are doing cool things that benefit their students, you know, we're not above begging and borrowing and stealing those models to implement here. And where we don't have good models, we're always happy to put a team together to create one. So, if books are a need, we can get on it.

0:18:57
Well, I mean, you guys are doing a lot, so I figured I would just try, but that seems to be the one thing. And there was another thing that came to mind as well, which is if I were to want to switch

0:19:08
my focus and my program, how would you guys help with that? Yeah, great question. So you know it is not atypical and this is a really important message to students. It's not atypical to change your mind, right, or to get in a program or start working with a mentor and decide, ooh, I think I want to go a different direction, right? And so students worry a lot about whether they can do that and the answer is yes, right? You're here to find the program that suits you and we want to help you, you know, get in that program, get in that track of study, and earn the degree and get the expertise you want and need to do whatever you want to do after grad school. So yes, that's totally fine. How do we help you? So a couple different ways. If it's a question of just changing your sub plan or your track or concentration within your program, we're likely to, you know, explain those options to you, connect you with the right folks in your own department who specialize in those areas and then help you switch over. And it's super easy to change your concentration or your sub plan within your degree program. If you really feel like you should be in a different graduate program, we can help you with that too. We can introduce you to the folks in the other program that you are interested in. We can, you know, make sure that that program is going to deliver the experience that you're hoping for and then if you decide to switch we can work with you to get a new application in and to get through that process as quickly and easily as possible to move you over to the desired degree. So yeah we're poised and ready to help with those kinds of things and we even have a non-academic advisor here in the grad college who consults with students all the time, every day, about questions, concerns, problems that you might face that you need some extra guidance on. Like, how does this policy work? Or could I get an exception to this? Or I have a concern about something in my program. Can I talk to somebody objective, confidentially? So we provide those kinds of non-academic consulting services to help students find themselves in situations where they're not sure if they're in exactly the right place.

0:21:19
And then we know that UNRV is a minority-serving institution, also Hispanic-serving institution. We have both those designations. Could you speak to how having those designations has influenced your approach and how you go about managing the graduate college, making it more inclusive, accessible for those populations, or how it has maybe created new collaborative or partnership opportunities in the graduate college?

0:21:46
Yeah, I love that question. Thanks for that, Keith. So I think, you know, being an MSI university and an R1 institution is a tremendously exciting place to be because there aren't a lot of universities like us, right? So there aren't a large number of R1s around the country who are major research universities, who are urban, who are diverse, who are, you know, in the top three to five most diverse in the country, like we consistently are. And so it gives us this great opportunity to do things here. We've got a Petri dish of sorts, where if we can make things work here to be more diverse, more inclusive, more equitable, more just, to open the pipeline to more students into grad school, then we can move the ticker nationally, right? And so I think we have a great opportunity. So what have we done? So a couple of things. We know that faculty across the country at UNLV and well beyond are not as diverse as our students, and that there's a major need to diversify faculty profiles, right, everywhere, which means we need more diverse graduate students. By having more diverse grad students, they become leaders in every field, including faculty and academia. And so diversifying the pathway into grad school, I happen to think, is one of our moral imperatives here. If you're at UNLV and you're in the business of, you know, of education and especially grad education, how can we have such a diverse undergraduate student population and not be opening that pipeline for our diverse first-gen, you know, incredible undergraduate student population into grad school? Whether it's here or whether it's other universities. Personally, I don't care. I just want our undergrads to learn about the extended pathway beyond earning their bachelor's degree. And for those who are interested, I want to provide them an infrastructure of support to be mentored as undergrads to do what they need to do to be strong and successful applicants and then to transition into graduate school in a successful way. And so what we did three years ago is we built a new program called the Grad Advantage Program and this is a program for undergrads. We've had approximately 400 undergrads go through this program already. It's a year-long program. We give them a scholarship for participating and during that year they learn about grad school, they learn what they need to do to be strong applicants, and we help socialize them into what to expect in grad school so that their transition, once they get there, is easier and more successful. And these students in GradAdvantage get their scholarship, but they also have a grad student mentor assigned to them so that they actually work hands-on with the grad students here. And they get to sort of have that informal, near-peer mentorship experience. So GradAdvantage is one way that we're trying to diversify and open that pipeline from undergrad into grad to change the face of future leaders, both on campus and in other industries. Right. So that's one big thing that we're doing that I particularly love.

0:25:05
Well, Kate, we will get you out on one final question and which will be we'll give you the last word. Is there anything that you would like to share that we didn't ask or that you think would be imperative for our listeners to be informed about?

0:25:21
Well, that's a big, broad one. I guess I would say that we've got some things coming up that are worth watching for. Right. So in this spring semester, we're going to be unveiling some new things to support students, including things like life cycle messaging. So this has been a big project we've been working on during COVID. And what we've realized is we keep hearing from students that, you know, we send them emails and messages and their GradRebel gateway, but they don't really pay attention because a lot of them frankly don't apply to them at that moment when they're received. And so we've decided to create a new model called life cycle messaging, and we're using our Salesforce system that we have built called Lifecycle Messaging, and we're using our Salesforce system that we have built to support the graduate community here to send out messaging to students based on whether they're early, mid, or late career in a master's program, or early, mid, late career in a doctoral program, so that the messaging students will start getting effective later this spring and 100% by next fall, will be targeted to the type of program they're in and whether they're early, mid or late in that program. And the idea again is just to deliver the information and the resources to students when they need it, so that if they get a message from us, they know that it's pretty likely that it's relevant to them in their context and situation. And we're hoping that this will help students, you know, connect with resources around campus more easily and get the support they need to be successful. So we're pretty excited about the Lifecycle Messaging Project and its impact on student

0:27:02
success.

0:27:03
So I'll toss that out there. It's just a quick peek at one of a number of projects that are going to be unveiled this spring.

0:27:11
All right. Any words of wisdom for aspiring graduate students? Believe in yourself. I know it sounds

0:27:17
cheesy, but you know the imposter syndrome is real and we know that people you know are are held back from from pursuing their dreams and and achieving their goals because they think grad school isn't for them and I'm here to say it's just not true. Tap into the network that's here on campus. Reach out to us in the Graduate College. We are here to support students, whether you're a prospective student, a current student, or an alum, believe in yourself, you've got this, you can do this, and there's a team of us who are here every day to work with you and help you overcome any barriers that you might feel like you're facing. So you're not alone in this.

0:27:58
Thank you so much, Dr. Corrigan. This has been awesome, and I could speak as a graduate student and as a graduate assistant that the work you guys are doing really does make a difference. So we appreciate you and on that note, Dr. Rogers and I are going to go over some of our takeaways. My biggest takeaway is just how open you guys are to feedback and all the collaboration that goes into the things you guys decide to focus on. So it's good to know that you guys are open hearing feedback. I'm looking forward to seeing some help with book resources.

0:28:32
I know Kate making me think about reconsider going back to graduate school for something. All these resources and help. And one of the thing that really resonated with me was just culture. I think culture is really looking at culture, making sure that it was from a point of compassion, kindness, collaboration, because, you know, that's where it starts. And once you have that to really focus on the students needs and those soft skills that students have, you that's where the barriers become issued for student challenges become for students. So then also just hearing about the emergency and one time financial assistance program that really helps students who are facing those financial difficulties be able to get those resources and not have to stop out to work and then try to re-engage in school has really made a difference. I think it's evidenced by what she said about 96% of those

0:29:29
students are retained and complete. Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of KUNV Let's Talk UNLV. For my co-host Keith, I'm Renee. Tune in next week, Wednesday at 12, on KUNV 91.5 Jazz and More. Tune in next week, Wednesday at 12, on KUNV 91.5 Jazz and More.

0:29:47
That's a wrap.

Transcribed with Cockatoo