College Degree? 83% Never Use It in Their Job (Full)

Alex: 00:00:00

[thoughtful] Welcome to Solving America’s Problems.

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[serious] Jeremy Hritz spent seven years as a high school principal, racked

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up five college degrees—including a doctorate—and walked away with a mountain

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of debt… only to leave education entirely and become a full-time stock trader

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who says, straight up, he isn’t using a single one of those degrees today.

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[leaning in] Across the table, Rob Wallace—Virginia Tech and Johns Hopkins

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electrical engineering grad—built a company that trains thousands in solar

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installation across seven states and abroad, yet the highest-paid people

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he hires never set foot on a college campus and clear six figures straight

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out of a thirteen-week program.

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[low, deliberate] Jerremy and Dave dig into the $1.7 trillion question

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nobody wants to ask out loud: if the people inside the system admit it’s

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this broken, why are we still pushing every kid through the same door?

jerremynewsome: 00:00:58

Dave, what are we doing today?

jerremynewsome: 00:01:00

My man,

Dave Conley: 00:01:01

In this episode of Solving America's Problems,

Dave Conley: 00:01:04

we're asking a question millions of families are grappling with.

Dave Conley: 00:01:08

Is college worth the cost?

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For decades, a degree was seen as the surest path to success.

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But rising costs and shifting career opportunities have left many wondering

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if there's a better way forward.

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We'll explore college, careers, and the road not taken, looking for how

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education is evolving and the value of alternative paths and what it

Dave Conley: 00:01:28

all means for the next generation.

Dave Conley: 00:01:30

And that's this week on Solving America's Problems.

Dave Conley: 00:01:33

Is college worth the cost?

Dave Conley: 00:01:34

With Rob Wallace and Jeremy Ritz.

jerremynewsome: 00:01:38

Listeners from around the world.

jerremynewsome: 00:01:40

Welcome back to solving America's problems.

jerremynewsome: 00:01:45

I am Jeremy Alexander Newsome, and as always, I'm joined by my

jerremynewsome: 00:01:48

incredible co host, Dave Conley.

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Today, we're tackling a topic that impacts millions of families

jerremynewsome: 00:01:54

across this beautiful country.

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The value of higher education.

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So essentially, is college still worth it in a world where

jerremynewsome: 00:02:04

student debt has ballooned to?

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Ready for this?

jerremynewsome: 00:02:08

1. 7 trillion and more than half of the graduates end up in jobs that does not

jerremynewsome: 00:02:14

even require a degree or use the degree that they paid all that money for.

jerremynewsome: 00:02:19

So in this episode, we're breaking it down.

jerremynewsome: 00:02:22

We're going to hear some personal stories from two amazing guests, Rob

jerremynewsome: 00:02:26

Wallace and Jeremy Ritz both have seen the academics and they work close

jerremynewsome: 00:02:32

up and they're going to be sharing their insights on how education

jerremynewsome: 00:02:36

and work either intersect or don't.

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Together, we're going to explore big questions like is the traditional college

jerremynewsome: 00:02:42

path still the best route to success?

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What alternatives are out there?

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And how can we reimagine education for the next generation?

jerremynewsome: 00:02:52

Rob, Jeremy, welcome to the show.

jerremynewsome: 00:02:54

It's great to have my guys here.

Robert Wallace: 00:02:57

for having us.

jerremynewsome: 00:02:58

Of course.

jerremynewsome: 00:02:59

So both of you have a lot of experience in this.

jerremynewsome: 00:03:03

If you don't mind, just hit me with a quick background on you.

jerremynewsome: 00:03:09

As it relates to college, let's go with Jeremy Ritz and then Robert

jerremynewsome: 00:03:12

first 60 seconds to both of you.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:15

First of all, thanks for having me on Dave and Jeremy.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:17

So my background former high school principal was in that role for seven

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:21

years before that assistant principal, before that high school English teacher.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:25

And I have five college degrees.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:28

So a bachelor's degree in English from Penn state.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:31

I have three, three master's degrees, liberal arts, which I know that I

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:36

saw some of the statistics here.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:38

We're going to talk about school leadership and special education.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:41

I also have my doctorate in innovation and leadership.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:44

My ultimate goal was to become a superintendent of schools, but now I

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:48

am a trader of the market, so I'm not even in what I went to school for.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:03:53

So that's my background.

jerremynewsome: 00:03:55

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:03:55

Beautiful take Wallace hit me.

Robert Wallace: 00:03:58

Yeah, man.

Robert Wallace: 00:03:58

A little bit different background, but also not in my field.

Robert Wallace: 00:04:01

Undergrad from Virginia tech, electrical engineering masters, Johns Hopkins,

Robert Wallace: 00:04:05

electrical engineering, got into solar Freddie Gray rise happened

Robert Wallace: 00:04:09

in Baltimore, started a workforce development and training program for

Robert Wallace: 00:04:13

folks who didn't have access to college.

Robert Wallace: 00:04:15

And now we have schools across seven states, three countries training, Folks

Robert Wallace: 00:04:19

on the technical skills to build and construct and maintain solar farms.

Robert Wallace: 00:04:24

So totally different field than where I started.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:27

But still using a little bit of the

jerremynewsome: 00:04:28

education that you had for sure.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:29

And I know we all do education is really the cornerstone of my entire campaign.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:36

Whereas if we can change the educational system, we change our future.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:39

We create so many more opportunities and so much more awareness.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:42

And that's really the discussion that we're going to have today.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:44

So as I mentioned just a moment ago college debt in America is over 1.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:48

7 trillion, which with the total debt of the country, At around 36 to 37 trillion,

jerremynewsome: 00:04:54

depending on when people are hearing this, it goes up like a trillion a quarter.

jerremynewsome: 00:04:59

It's wild.

jerremynewsome: 00:05:00

Half of the graduates ending up in jobs that don't even require a degree

jerremynewsome: 00:05:04

or use the degree that they have.

jerremynewsome: 00:05:07

So let's go with Rob.

jerremynewsome: 00:05:09

Based on your experiences, Is the system broken or is it misunderstood?

Robert Wallace: 00:05:16

This is a tough one, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:05:17

So I was thinking about this earlier before this call, because one of the

Robert Wallace: 00:05:21

things there's two different perspectives.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:23

One is from where college fits in the ecosystem, but I also think

Robert Wallace: 00:05:28

there's a difference being a minority versus being not minority, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:05:32

And so what I was taught.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:34

Back when I was younger was that you have to have a college degree to be able

Robert Wallace: 00:05:38

to even compete and on global scale.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:41

So both my parents went to UPenn, both of them engineers.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:44

All my siblings are all engineers.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:46

And we were taught if you want to compete, you got to go to play the game.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:49

You got that education.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:50

The challenging part for me is a lot of my counterparts, especially when

Robert Wallace: 00:05:53

I was doing solar development in that sector, did not have the same education.

Robert Wallace: 00:05:57

And we were still either at the same level or they exceeded me in

Robert Wallace: 00:06:01

income starting out in the industry.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:02

And so as I look back, I say really, did education really help me get

Robert Wallace: 00:06:07

to the level where they were able to get some without education?

Robert Wallace: 00:06:11

And so we look at it and say, I think what education does to a lot of, for

Robert Wallace: 00:06:14

a lot of folks is give them access.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:16

And that's why I think it's especially powerful for the black

Robert Wallace: 00:06:20

and brown communities because some of these rooms you can't even

Robert Wallace: 00:06:22

get into if I have an education.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:24

And I don't believe that's consistent back then across every group.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:28

But I do think it's shifting now.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:30

This generation now is a little different.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:32

And so we got a lot of different CEOs and executives with totally

Robert Wallace: 00:06:35

different backgrounds, some with education and some without.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:38

Look, full stop.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:39

The richest and wealthiest people I know did not go to college.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:43

That's an interesting fact, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:06:45

Whether it be folks that are African American who are now athletes or in the

Robert Wallace: 00:06:51

recording industry or so on and so forth, or sport players, a lot of folks didn't.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:55

And it's a challenge that we're facing.

Robert Wallace: 00:06:58

I will tell you this from my perspective, in the inner cities, Where the option

Robert Wallace: 00:07:02

is only drugs or F or athletics.

Robert Wallace: 00:07:05

If you're not an athlete, you have to go back to technical trades in order

Robert Wallace: 00:07:09

to get them out and give them skills, carpentry, electrical plumbing, because

Robert Wallace: 00:07:14

that's the thing that's never going to go away without AI or anything else.

Robert Wallace: 00:07:17

That piece of will never go away.

Robert Wallace: 00:07:19

That's my thoughts.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:20

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:20

I think I love that you brought the technical schools

jerremynewsome: 00:07:22

and technical components.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:23

We will definitely be touching on that and the future of this episode because.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:27

I think we all understand the importance of it.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:29

And I think you're a hundred percent correct.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:31

Those are skills that are never going to go away.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:33

And people that learn how to interact with that are going to

jerremynewsome: 00:07:36

be even better suited for creating jobs in the future and creating

jerremynewsome: 00:07:41

the infrastructure of this country.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:43

Jeremy, you've got a ton of degrees and leadership experience.

jerremynewsome: 00:07:49

Looking back, was the cost and time invested in education worth it for you?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:07:55

That's a difficult question to answer because I think.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:07:58

There are some parts of it that I look back on and it was worth it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:03

Some of the intangible things that I was able to pull from, dedicating

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:06

that effort to achieving the degree, what I learned along the way.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:10

But then, you're looking at your bill at the end of that because

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:13

I did have to take student loans.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:15

Nobody in my family had gone to college prior to, to me.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:19

So I had to take all that on and, as a young adult looking at, This

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:24

number that I owed to pay for my education was a bit daunting and,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:30

the question about whether or not the system's broken or just misunderstood.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:35

I wouldn't say that it's broken.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:37

I would just say that it's outdated.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:39

And I think one of the things, at least from my perspective, that I especially

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:43

saw as a high school principal is that there aren't choices for kids or for

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:48

young adults, it's, and this is what I was taught is that college is the only

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:52

way that you're going to be successful.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:55

And now.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:08:57

In terms of what I do just from trading and an entrepreneurial perspective, that's

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:02

inaccurate, but that's the narrative that we force on kids to say, Hey, all

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:06

right if you don't go to college you can't succeed in this world, but you can.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:10

There, there are so many different pathways and avenues.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:13

And I think part of what needs to be changed is just.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:16

Just our perspectives and how we pitch it to our community our citizens,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:22

that there are several different ways to be successful in this

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:25

world and college is one of them.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:27

And that's great.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:27

If you want to go that way, but Hey, you have these five or six different

Jeremy Hritz: 00:09:31

pathways that you can take and be just as successful and fulfilled.

jerremynewsome: 00:09:35

Yeah you mentioned an interesting word there, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:09:37

The thing that you said, the balance was daunting because my version of

jerremynewsome: 00:09:44

this world, I'm really trying to figure out ultimately, maybe even this

jerremynewsome: 00:09:47

podcast and future episodes, but how do we make the general educational

jerremynewsome: 00:09:54

experience in college debt free?

jerremynewsome: 00:09:57

Essentially, how can we require it where it's not such a humongous

jerremynewsome: 00:10:03

financial risk to go to college?

jerremynewsome: 00:10:05

Because all of us on this podcast did, including myself, believe it or

jerremynewsome: 00:10:10

not, I have a bachelor's degree from the University of Florida, go Gators.

jerremynewsome: 00:10:16

And the fact, I did, I got financial loans.

jerremynewsome: 00:10:20

I had a job during my college tenure.

jerremynewsome: 00:10:24

So I still worked full time and went to school full time and was able

jerremynewsome: 00:10:28

to pay off my student loans and my financial aid before I graduated or

jerremynewsome: 00:10:34

right around the time I graduated.

jerremynewsome: 00:10:36

But the unique piece of that is, I think there has to be some level at some stage

jerremynewsome: 00:10:42

of a solution that we can talk about in the future of this exact episode

jerremynewsome: 00:10:47

where it's like, how can we solve that where college students do not have debt?

jerremynewsome: 00:10:54

What does that look like?

jerremynewsome: 00:10:55

Because right now I'm viewing colleges as more of a business, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:10:59

They're a really good business and they're trying to make a lot of

jerremynewsome: 00:11:01

revenue and they're using the students.

jerremynewsome: 00:11:03

As revenue generators.

jerremynewsome: 00:11:06

So with that question or that statement being asked, the question that I'll

jerremynewsome: 00:11:09

throw out to Jeremy and then to Rob, do you think that most students really

jerremynewsome: 00:11:14

understand the financial risk of college?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:18

mean, if I just go back in time and think of myself and I'll

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:21

bring it to current day and the current student population, I didn't have a clue.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:27

I was just like, all right, I'm supposed to go to college.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:28

I'm going to go to college.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:29

Yeah, it costs some money.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:30

I have grants.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:32

I'll take out some loans, whatever.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:34

I didn't know any better, but my parents didn't know any better.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:37

To educate me.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:38

So I think the student population is only going to be as informed as their parents

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:45

are or their family that they're around or their extended family, their friends.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:50

And I think my experience as a principal, it's not a stretch to go out on a limb

Jeremy Hritz: 00:11:55

to say that There probably isn't a great awareness unless you come from a family

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:01

where college is part of your culture.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:04

There's not a great awareness of what it costs and what the impact

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:07

of that is once you graduate.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:10

And there, that should be included in what's taught in schools.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:15

On the periphery, it's taught or it's offered through your counseling offices,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:18

but it's not part of the curriculum.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:20

So really kids are going into it blindly.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:24

The majority of them, because.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:27

Not everybody has that type of family.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:12:29

I know I didn't.

jerremynewsome: 00:12:31

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:12:31

So what about you, Rob?

jerremynewsome: 00:12:32

To that point, did your parents who both were extremely successful in

jerremynewsome: 00:12:36

their educational career and just their careers in general, did you think

jerremynewsome: 00:12:39

Did they have conversations with you about the financial risks of college?

jerremynewsome: 00:12:42

Did they help you understand that from a number standpoint?

Robert Wallace: 00:12:46

Yeah, so that was, that's a tough one, Jeremy.

Robert Wallace: 00:12:48

Not tough, but interesting, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:12:49

Because it's unique.

Robert Wallace: 00:12:50

Our conversation with my parents was, as your parent, our responsibility is to make

Robert Wallace: 00:12:56

sure you get out of college with no debt.

Robert Wallace: 00:12:58

So my parents made sure that all my siblings got out of

Robert Wallace: 00:13:02

college with no debt because they knew the impact it would have.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:05

On us after college trying to grow in different sectors.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:08

However, as part of that, it was interesting because they said, but you

Robert Wallace: 00:13:12

have to study something that will be able to support you and your family and justify

Robert Wallace: 00:13:17

the costs for us to pay for school.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:20

So for example, we couldn't go and do not to psychology or anything else, but

Robert Wallace: 00:13:24

if you can't spend a hundred thousand dollars or whatever on a tuition

Robert Wallace: 00:13:27

and you get a job making 50 or 40, You'll never, it doesn't make sense.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:32

Not a good investment.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:33

So part of their structure was we'll invest in you, but you have to invest in

Robert Wallace: 00:13:38

something that will be able to take care of you and your family going forward.

jerremynewsome: 00:13:40

But were you allowed to say no to that?

jerremynewsome: 00:13:42

Could you have said, nah, I don't wanna go to college.

jerremynewsome: 00:13:44

Keep your money, give me the money that you would spend on

jerremynewsome: 00:13:46

that, and let me do X, Y, z,

Robert Wallace: 00:13:49

No, it was not optional.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:51

So here's what's funny, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:13:52

So I'm the oldest of five, five kids.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:55

The first four of us, it was not optional.

Robert Wallace: 00:13:58

My sister came along and it became optional.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:01

So she was the one that was able to pick what she wants to do in life.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:04

And this is 16 years after me.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:06

And so I think they began to see even regardless of that

Robert Wallace: 00:14:10

piece, everyone turned out fine.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:11

But if you look at our pedigree, my next younger brother went

Robert Wallace: 00:14:14

to Georgia tech and Stanford.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:16

One of my brothers is in medical field and one of them went to tuck and Dartmouth

Robert Wallace: 00:14:20

school and my sister went to Amherst and part of the agreement was like you said

Robert Wallace: 00:14:24

that there'd be no college that, however, I can remember having conversations.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:28

Cause my parents also helped a lot of my cousins.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:31

And one of the challenging things was my parents said, look, we're

Robert Wallace: 00:14:35

going to help you get into college, but here's the risk, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:14:38

This is what it costs you.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:40

These are the, is the impact it has after you get out.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:43

And this will be part of your ongoing debt for X amount of years.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:47

And if you're okay with that, fine, we'll help you.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:49

If not, maybe you should consider.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:51

Barber school.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:52

Maybe you should become a mechanic.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:53

Maybe you should go to one of these technical trades where you can get up

Robert Wallace: 00:14:57

to a career faster and with less debt.

Robert Wallace: 00:14:59

So we've had both conversations, but our path is a little bit different.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:03

Sure.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:04

But I love that.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:06

I love the fact that they were.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:08

Aware of the numbers, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:15:10

You said it's a good investment.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:11

I think that's a fantastic way to consider it because, myself and Jeremy

jerremynewsome: 00:15:16

Ritz being full time market interactors, like we are pretty adapt to the, Hey,

jerremynewsome: 00:15:21

if you spend whatever 500, 000 on a position, that's a large sum of capital.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:27

If you can get back 560, 000.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:30

Have a 60, 000 return on 500, 000 investment and your,

jerremynewsome: 00:15:34

what was your risk, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:15:36

And if your risk was 10, 000, you made 60, 000, it's a good

jerremynewsome: 00:15:39

return on your investment.

jerremynewsome: 00:15:41

So it from that perspective, I think is really unique because if A lot

jerremynewsome: 00:15:46

of parents sit down today and say to themselves, am I prepared, willing,

jerremynewsome: 00:15:51

able, and capable to actually pay for my child to go to college, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:15:57

What that does in my mind is it sets a standard.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:00

And if parents have that standard going forward and they say, all right, if you

jerremynewsome: 00:16:05

do go to college, we will cover the costs.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:08

If you do not go to college, here's a different routes for you, which I got

jerremynewsome: 00:16:13

to have a great question coming up now.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:16

I think just being aware of as parents, hey, this is and should be a standard.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:23

What that does is when you raise your standards, it raises your quality of life.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:25

It raises the questions that you have to ask, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:16:28

Because, oh my gosh, now we have to pay an extra 100, 000.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:31

From our income for our two or three children every year for three years

jerremynewsome: 00:16:36

when they get into college, how can I create more value in the marketplace

jerremynewsome: 00:16:39

to be worth that amount of money?

jerremynewsome: 00:16:40

That's a different question that has to be asked.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:42

So I'm just going to throw this up for whoever wants it.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:44

What's a better route, full stop, technical college or

jerremynewsome: 00:16:50

a four year degree college.

Robert Wallace: 00:16:52

When you say better, Jeremy, what do you mean?

Robert Wallace: 00:16:55

Define better for me.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:58

Better success.

jerremynewsome: 00:16:59

Everyone who goes through it will get jobs.

jerremynewsome: 00:17:01

They will have less debt.

jerremynewsome: 00:17:02

They will be more primed and set up for the future for

jerremynewsome: 00:17:05

the success for their family.

Dave Conley: 00:17:07

Choices.

Dave Conley: 00:17:08

I'd put it as choices.

Dave Conley: 00:17:10

Like that, that somebody has more choices in their life.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:15

Oh, it's challenging.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:17

Because there's certain folks who don't have choices right now, and they need

Robert Wallace: 00:17:22

to stop the bleed now, meaning in the next 12 months, they need to create

Robert Wallace: 00:17:26

some kind of income or have a skill so they can stabilize because not to

Robert Wallace: 00:17:30

bleed where they can have simple health care access to food, safe communities.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:36

And there's a piece that says after that, then you can begin to think about what

Robert Wallace: 00:17:40

success looks like and so on and so forth.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:41

So if I were to, if I were to look at the per dollar return, I would

Robert Wallace: 00:17:45

say technical school right now.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:46

I would say if I look at what our carpenters, and I built

Robert Wallace: 00:17:50

a lot of solar farms, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:17:51

And so looking at what I pay our master electricians, 125 to 150 an hour.

Robert Wallace: 00:17:57

To come on a site and connect our laborers to that, do the installation.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:02

If you use prevailing wage, $52 an hour.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:05

I got 18-year-old kids after coming through our program, 13 weeks, making

Robert Wallace: 00:18:09

$52 an hour plus time and a half.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:12

So not saying that's like the cap they're their pinnacle.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:15

They want to get to, 20 years from now.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:18

But in terms of resources now and stopping the bleed and stabilizing

Robert Wallace: 00:18:21

family now, I believe the technical skills, the technical schools are

Robert Wallace: 00:18:25

the best return on investment.

Robert Wallace: 00:18:27

At this junction,

jerremynewsome: 00:18:28

All right, Rich, let's hear your point of

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:29

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:30

So I actually just want to piggyback off what Rob said.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:32

And I agree with Rob, but here's the thing.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:35

And this is something that we fought against in my school is

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:40

technical schools are stigmatized.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:42

If you decide to go the route of vocational technical school

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:46

you're seen as a, a techie.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:49

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:49

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:50

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:50

Like you

jerremynewsome: 00:18:50

make it.

jerremynewsome: 00:18:51

Not

Robert Wallace: 00:18:51

do anything else,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:53

But you're throwing out those figures there that these

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:55

kids are making in these professions, these are good professions.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:18:59

This is great work.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:19:00

And they don't realize that it's stigmatized for whatever reason.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:19:05

But there's tremendous reward there.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:19:07

Whereas if you go the route of college depending on what your

Jeremy Hritz: 00:19:10

degree is in, you're not guaranteed that same type of outcome.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:19:17

So I would have to agree that, the the trades are powerful.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:22

Can I add something there, Jeremy?

Robert Wallace: 00:19:25

And I think part of the challenge is that people don't

Robert Wallace: 00:19:27

look at trees and sexy, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:19:29

With social media, my mind was social media has done.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:32

It's showing people like, Oh, you can get rich quick.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:34

If you do this and this and this, and it lives like this.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:36

But if you ever noticed, they don't highlight the plumbers, the carpenters,

Robert Wallace: 00:19:40

the folks who, and I know some of the most successful people I know

Robert Wallace: 00:19:44

work with builders, home builders, church builders, home builders.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:48

And this was all based off of carpentry and hand skills.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:50

So right now, though, we don't see the young people don't see the sexy.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:54

They want to get into tech.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:55

They want to get into something that's online.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:58

Bye.

Robert Wallace: 00:19:58

And they're not looking at these hands on skills that no one can ever take from you.

Robert Wallace: 00:20:02

So regardless of where you go, what country, whatever happens to your

Robert Wallace: 00:20:05

background, you can always build something when you have a technical skill that

Robert Wallace: 00:20:09

you can leverage anywhere in the world,

jerremynewsome: 00:20:11

Correct.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:12

What I heard you saying really, Rob, is speed and efficiency.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:16

If you want to go and create a different lifestyle for your family, if you need

jerremynewsome: 00:20:23

to create more income for you and your children let's say in the next year, and

jerremynewsome: 00:20:30

I would argue that there's a humongous.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:33

Group of our population who would probably fit that category.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:37

Technical college is the route to go.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:39

And to Jeremy's point, if we make it less, less weak or pathetic to

jerremynewsome: 00:20:47

go, it's not like a second choice.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:49

If we find a way.

jerremynewsome: 00:20:51

As a country or as a social media populace to highlight, highlight the power and

jerremynewsome: 00:20:57

the the proficiency of technical college, the pervasive way for that to generate

jerremynewsome: 00:21:05

and help provide not only more jobs, but higher paying jobs now, because you

jerremynewsome: 00:21:11

have to ask the question, we all know that artificial intelligence is coming.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:16

We all know that.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:17

A lot of people thought it was going to take the McDonald's worker job, the very

jerremynewsome: 00:21:21

front end low level, burger flipping job.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:25

Like we thought that was the ones that AI was going to take immediately.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:29

But what we've seen happen is it starts to also take a lot of the creative jobs,

jerremynewsome: 00:21:35

very fast video makers, photographs.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:39

specialists, bookkeepers, sometimes even lawyers, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:21:44

AI going to be some really big shifts there.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:48

And it reminds me of when we started going from an agrarian culture where,

jerremynewsome: 00:21:53

you know, 99 percent of the world, not to mention 99 percent of the U.

jerremynewsome: 00:21:57

S., but 99 percent of the world was focused on how can we create food?

jerremynewsome: 00:22:01

That was the industry.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:03

And once you started once the cotton gin gets created and a few other powerful

jerremynewsome: 00:22:07

inventions, then you start to speed up the need or the lack of people that

jerremynewsome: 00:22:13

actually work in the fields that actually go out and create food for our country.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:19

That was a huge shift.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:21

Which is one of the things, one of the aspects that caused the dust bowl

jerremynewsome: 00:22:24

and the great depression, because you had so many people that were jobless.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:27

And I say so many people, by the way, it's about 25 percent in

jerremynewsome: 00:22:30

the great depression was the pot was the amount of unemployment.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:33

So we still had one out of every four was unemployed, but three

jerremynewsome: 00:22:36

out of every four were employed.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:38

And that's also a big thing to keep in mind as we had this huge

jerremynewsome: 00:22:42

shift technology technologically.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:44

But I think the big piece that a lot of people are overlooking.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:48

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:49

Is the value, the cost of tuition.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:53

So let's just ask this question.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:54

Just want to have fun with it.

jerremynewsome: 00:22:56

Jeremy, how do you think, or why do you think, or could we decrease

jerremynewsome: 00:23:02

the cost of higher education so that it gives people either better

jerremynewsome: 00:23:07

value or at least keeps up with.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:10

how much the living wage is in the country.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:13

That's a great question.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:14

And I'm so sorry, guys, I'm having a little issue here on my computer.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:18

Let me

jerremynewsome: 00:23:19

That's okay.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:20

Took care of that.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:21

Wow.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:22

That's.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:23

That's a banger of a question.

Robert Wallace: 00:23:24

it

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:25

you come back to me on that?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:26

Let me let me, I need to think on that one, man.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:29

Think on it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:30

and I actually was thinking about that last night.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:23:32

But come back to me.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:34

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:34

I'm gonna come back to you, Wallace.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:36

How do we lower the cost of higher education?

jerremynewsome: 00:23:39

Because that's the other piece with technical schools, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:23:41

Technical schools are less expensive than higher education as well.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:46

So not only are they faster, But they cost supremely less money.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:51

It's staggering.

jerremynewsome: 00:23:52

80 percent less than a four year degree.

Robert Wallace: 00:23:56

I think there's a company out of New York that I work with called

Robert Wallace: 00:23:58

FedCap and I think they got it right.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:00

And what they have created was what's called stackable credentials.

jerremynewsome: 00:24:05

Okay.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:06

So you would start with an entry level credential that covers

Robert Wallace: 00:24:08

your basic life skills, balancing a checkbook, safety, stuff like that.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:14

And then you can add basic construction, everything from hand

Robert Wallace: 00:24:19

tools, power tools, you name it.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:21

Then you can layer off.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:22

It's called a bridgeway program.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:23

Then you can bridge off into.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:25

Electrical, you can bridge off into other technical skills.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:28

You can bridge off into plumbing.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:31

Then after that, you can add another layer where you become a journeyman.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:34

Then you can add another layer, you become a master.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:37

And my point is each layer equates to a different layer of wealth,

Robert Wallace: 00:24:42

which allows you to pay down some of the costs as you build versus going

Robert Wallace: 00:24:48

through four years of, 50, 000 a year, which I paid my door tuition.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:53

So on and so forth.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:53

You have 200, 000 by the time you get out making no income.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:56

And so I think what it does, two things.

Robert Wallace: 00:24:58

One, it builds the the success of the student and that it gives

Robert Wallace: 00:25:02

them time to mature in terms of what direction they want to go.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:05

Number two, they can also adjust to the market conditions, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:25:08

So something else is becoming hot.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:10

AI started.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:11

So this.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:11

This software program might not be the route now, let's look this way.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:15

And then the last piece is they can make money as they go.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:17

If they need to work two years to save some more money before they go to

Robert Wallace: 00:25:21

next level, fine, but at least they're not capped out at some total income.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:25

So I like the stackable credential approach.

Robert Wallace: 00:25:27

And I think if we look at that, that it'll be an easier way to minimize the cost, but

Robert Wallace: 00:25:32

also reach the same academic and financial levels that they're looking to get to.

jerremynewsome: 00:25:38

Okay.

jerremynewsome: 00:25:38

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:25:38

One of my, one of my takes, which is actually in a way happening,

jerremynewsome: 00:25:42

and this is a big, probably like system wide change or shift.

jerremynewsome: 00:25:48

And again, maybe this will spur your thoughts Ritz, but one of my big ideas

jerremynewsome: 00:25:52

that I had at some point was The people that need long, longer, larger education

jerremynewsome: 00:26:01

packages shouldn't go into debt for those.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:05

Case in point, doctors.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:08

Doctors, potentially some engineers, potentially some

jerremynewsome: 00:26:12

architects, or individuals that have to go eight years plus.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:18

So not a choice, but they have to in order to really become proficient.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:23

So how would you do that would be a question, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:26:25

Because that's really the ultimate people that I probably at this point, from a

jerremynewsome: 00:26:29

career standpoint, care the most about decreasing the cost is our doctors.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:35

Because doctors have to go, they have to go, they can't go to a

jerremynewsome: 00:26:39

technical college and become a doctor.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:41

You can't do that in a year.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:43

So you have to go six, eight, 12 years in the college system

jerremynewsome: 00:26:46

to learn at a higher level.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:48

And that's going to put you into a lot of debt.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:50

And then if they're in a lot of debt, they have tons of stress.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:52

They're already working 12, 18 hour days.

jerremynewsome: 00:26:55

You have not only medical insurance, you have to pay for malpractice insurance,

jerremynewsome: 00:26:59

so many different aspects that there's a lot of stress on our doctors.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:02

And therefore a lot of people don't want that profession anymore.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:05

And that's not going to be good for the country if we have no doctors.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:08

So what if gentlemen, we do not allow those careers or certain careers,

jerremynewsome: 00:27:16

let's just call it the medical field to pursue to pursue any debt

jerremynewsome: 00:27:19

obligations as they go through their educational career, the people that

jerremynewsome: 00:27:23

are not allowed to get scholarships.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:26

Ready for this one would be business and finance and entrepreneurship.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:30

If you go to a college, which I did to get a finance degree, which I did and

jerremynewsome: 00:27:35

was able to apply for some scholarships, trying to get a finance degree from a

jerremynewsome: 00:27:40

top 10 business college in the country.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:42

Now, if you think if you're going to go to finance, the goal is to make

jerremynewsome: 00:27:47

as much money as possible to help as little people as possible, ultimately.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:51

What do you need?

jerremynewsome: 00:27:51

What do you need a scholarship for like you should you're the ones that

jerremynewsome: 00:27:54

should be making as much like you don't need to pay less money for college.

jerremynewsome: 00:27:58

So if you're going to get a liberal arts degree, if you're going to get a

jerremynewsome: 00:28:02

business degree, an entrepreneurship degree, colleges should just

jerremynewsome: 00:28:07

disallow from scholarships from those particular careers, taking

jerremynewsome: 00:28:10

that money and doing what being able to apply it towards the doctorate

jerremynewsome: 00:28:14

or the longer term degree needers.

jerremynewsome: 00:28:18

Thoughts on that Ritz?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:20

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:20

I think that makes a lot of sense because you're prioritizing those professions

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:26

that are making the greatest contribution to society which is important.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:31

And you're right, finance or business.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:33

There's not a lot of.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:35

Philanthropy in the beginning, maybe toward the end there

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:38

Coming back to what you asked me.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:41

How do we make college cheaper?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:42

I had an epiphany here.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:45

What's the one thing that young adults don't have a lot of?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:49

Money.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:51

What do they have a lot of?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:53

Energy productivity.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:55

And so this kind of ties into something we were attempting to do my final

Jeremy Hritz: 00:28:59

years as principal, which is where we were trying to create internships

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:04

or onsite work based opportunities.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:09

And so the best way to learn a profession or to learn a trade

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:14

or a skill is to actually do it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:16

You can sit in a classroom all you want, but until you're thrown in

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:19

the fire and you're forced to learn it, you're not going to learn it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:22

So maybe a model can be created to where, Hey we can help you pay for

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:29

your college by having a role to contribute to this business, this

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:33

corporation, this company, this college.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:36

And I know we have some of that out there that exists now, but if you would

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:40

amplify it and scale it up, maybe that wipes out 50 percent of the tuition

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:46

because you're adding value to the college or to the business connections

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:53

that they have in the community.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:54

And so it's a, it's an indirect way to get around.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:57

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:58

Hey.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:29:59

I don't have the money to pay for the tuition, but I have the effort

Jeremy Hritz: 00:30:02

that I can give you my time, my value to help your business, your

Jeremy Hritz: 00:30:06

organization, the college grow.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:30:08

So that could be a creative solution and it benefits the student because

Jeremy Hritz: 00:30:13

they're getting on site training.

jerremynewsome: 00:30:15

I like that take.

jerremynewsome: 00:30:17

What do you think, Robert Wallace?

Robert Wallace: 00:30:19

I like your idea.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:21

I do.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:21

I don't Jay.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:21

I'm honestly because I think that the doctors when they come out, they're making

Robert Wallace: 00:30:25

so much money that's why they do the eight years so they can make the million dollars

Robert Wallace: 00:30:29

or 2 million a year and salary to do.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:31

So I think there has to be some type.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:33

Let me say this.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:34

My counter would be if we're going to do it for the doctors.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:37

We got to do it for teachers.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:39

Because I believe they're just as valuable

Robert Wallace: 00:30:41

As the doctors are in terms of the overall ecosystem of the United

jerremynewsome: 00:30:44

Sure.

jerremynewsome: 00:30:45

Totally.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:45

would have to stabilize it.

Robert Wallace: 00:30:47

Maybe, and maybe that's your point, is that for all those critical functions,

Robert Wallace: 00:30:51

police, military the teachers, we would have to do the same thing

Robert Wallace: 00:30:55

across all those sectors, I think,

jerremynewsome: 00:30:57

Yeah, agreed.

jerremynewsome: 00:30:58

Agreed.

jerremynewsome: 00:30:59

It really, it's just precisely my man.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:00

This is, it's really a discussion or awareness of, can we start

jerremynewsome: 00:31:03

shifting where the money to, from these colleges go to, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:31:08

Where does it go to and who needs it the most?

jerremynewsome: 00:31:10

Because if you are throwing out scholarships, just willy nilly.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:16

And you're having all this capital that doesn't need to be spent on individuals

jerremynewsome: 00:31:22

that probably Aka would never use it not to bring out Belmont too strongly,

jerremynewsome: 00:31:27

but Belmont is a college in Asheville, Tennessee that is one of the largest

jerremynewsome: 00:31:33

private colleges in the country.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:34

The Dean of Belmont is the second highest paid Dean in the country.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:39

And the tuition there can range anywhere between 125, 000 a year

jerremynewsome: 00:31:44

to a quarter million a year.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:46

And the majority of the students there, they get degrees in like

jerremynewsome: 00:31:51

commercial flute playing or commercial saxophone or audio engineering.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:58

And there's a lot of.

jerremynewsome: 00:31:59

Students, they're going through Belmont every year that are going

jerremynewsome: 00:32:02

into crazy amounts of debt that again, maybe would or would not have to, but

jerremynewsome: 00:32:07

specifically, there's also a lot of them that are getting scholarships

jerremynewsome: 00:32:11

again, that probably shouldn't.

jerremynewsome: 00:32:13

It's if you have the wherewithal to be understanding of the cost of this

jerremynewsome: 00:32:18

degree, to your point, Rob, the cost of the degree and how much are you

jerremynewsome: 00:32:21

going to make as a commercial floutist.

jerremynewsome: 00:32:24

40, 000 a year max for 99.

jerremynewsome: 00:32:29

9999999 percent is it worth going to that particular college and spending

jerremynewsome: 00:32:35

that particular amount of money?

jerremynewsome: 00:32:36

Probably not, but there does need, in my opinion, there, there really does need

jerremynewsome: 00:32:40

to be a conversation about this, which is why I'm glad that we're having it.

jerremynewsome: 00:32:45

And I think ultimately being aware that there needs to be some level of change

jerremynewsome: 00:32:51

because the amount of students that always argue or fuss or get upset about

jerremynewsome: 00:32:57

the amount of student loan debt, even though they may or may not have been

jerremynewsome: 00:33:01

aware of it, to Jeremy's point earlier, and to then your point, Rob, like a

jerremynewsome: 00:33:04

doctor, you have the best of the best, the top 1 percent in the world probably

jerremynewsome: 00:33:08

would make a million dollars as a salary.

jerremynewsome: 00:33:11

The vast majority of doctors after.

jerremynewsome: 00:33:14

Eight years, 10 year working is probably somewhere between

jerremynewsome: 00:33:17

200 and 350, 000 on average.

jerremynewsome: 00:33:20

Even that, having to outpace the amount of debt because debt's not something

jerremynewsome: 00:33:24

that can be wrote off as bankruptcy.

jerremynewsome: 00:33:26

There's a lot there.

jerremynewsome: 00:33:27

There's a lot there.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:28

Jay, back to your point real quick before we move on.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:31

There's another interesting model that we should consider,

Robert Wallace: 00:33:33

which is the online model.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:35

Because if you see what happened after Kobe, a lot of the brick

Robert Wallace: 00:33:38

and mortar institutions went away.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:41

Cost came down across some of the schools because now there's no room in

Robert Wallace: 00:33:44

board because you're studying virtually.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:46

But the number of the students enrolling went up.

Robert Wallace: 00:33:49

If you look at New Hampshire University, which offers a degree of all kind of

Robert Wallace: 00:33:53

degrees online, Their tuition cost is a fraction of what you would pay to go

Robert Wallace: 00:33:57

to a brick and mortar school and their enrollment rates have gone up 600%.

Robert Wallace: 00:34:03

I believe it is.

Robert Wallace: 00:34:04

And so I wonder how that affects your model in terms of bringing the cost down,

Robert Wallace: 00:34:08

but still being able to offer degrees in certain sectors, but minimizing the

Robert Wallace: 00:34:13

cost because now part of is virtual.

Robert Wallace: 00:34:15

And maybe your last two years are in person, or maybe, there's one semester

Robert Wallace: 00:34:19

every one month, every quarter you go.

Robert Wallace: 00:34:22

And do that part in person

jerremynewsome: 00:34:25

go for it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:26

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:26

So looking at this from a different perspective but to Rob's point and talking

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:32

about educators, 100%, I agree that, if we're going to do this for doctors,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:38

we have to do it for educators as well.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:39

But I think that this.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:42

This pokes at a deeper conversation that needs to be had about

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:45

what we value as a country.

Robert Wallace: 00:34:48

a side.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:49

Yes.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:49

And we talked before about, the stigma associated with technical schools.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:54

There's a stigma associated with education.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:34:56

If you're a teacher, if you're a principal you're looked at as, Oh, or what's

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:00

the quote, those that can't do teach.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:04

But when we think about it, maybe this is a, And I don't know how

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:08

this could be done, but through research, how do we quantify which

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:12

professions create the greatest impact?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:16

On our

jerremynewsome: 00:35:17

Society.

jerremynewsome: 00:35:18

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:19

And then from there you have an equation.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:22

We, you make it mathematical that somehow influences how much support or help is

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:29

provided going for those professions, because online school is great and I

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:34

do believe there's a place for it, but the human connection that comes through

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:38

teaching those relationships, I'm sure all of us can think of somebody.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:42

Who if it wasn't for that person who taught us something that we wouldn't

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:47

have achieved what we have so you know that's really what comes to

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:51

me and thinking about that deeply

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:53

. jerremynewsome: No.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:53

So that's a great perspective, is essentially figuring out a

Jeremy Hritz: 00:35:56

quantification model for which values we need to focus on the most.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:01

And I think that word has come up a lot in past podcasts as our listeners will

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:05

know specifically one with the debt.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:08

Of the nations right now we're focusing on student debt and

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:11

educational debt But from a debt of the nation that word came up a bunch.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:16

What are we spending money on shows our truest values?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:20

And for you bringing that word up, Ritz, of saying we need to focus

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:25

on teachers I think is one of my favorite topics because as you being

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:31

a teacher in the, in your past life, essentially, and seeing the struggle

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:35

and the wildly unequal pay structure.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:39

for spending so much time and so much energy and being a

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:42

cornerstone of this country.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:45

I do think 100 percent that teachers need not only either more pay on the back end

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:51

or less expenses on the front end, because that's a profession that a lot of people

Jeremy Hritz: 00:36:57

love to overlook as being extremely.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:01

Valuable to this nation because every one of us that has children, where

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:07

do we put them right during the week?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:09

Who's spending time with them during the week?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:10

It's like teachers are

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:12

And Jeremy can I add something

jerremynewsome: 00:37:13

Please.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:15

The impact of a great teacher on a child

Robert Wallace: 00:37:20

Priceless.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:21

It's priceless.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:22

And here's the thing.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:23

If you're putting shitty teachers, just to be candid, in front of kids,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:29

and I've seen them, they're out there, they exist, you're hurting kids.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:34

And not to go on a tangent to Promote teachers getting paid more, but

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:41

great teachers don't want to teach anymore because it's financially,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:45

they can't provide for their families.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:46

And a lot of people will make the argument.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:48

It's only a 10 month, a year job.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:51

They have the summers off great teachers.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:53

The job doesn't stop at two 45 or three o'clock.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:57

Your great teachers are making connections with parents.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:37:59

They're calling home.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:01

They're making sure that they have food that they have a jacket.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:05

They're preparing materials.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:07

They're all in for these kids and those people are special and the

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:14

impact that they can have on the life of a child and influencing the

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:19

trajectory of their quality of life.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:21

You can't put a price tag on it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:23

If you want to create the greatest country ever or the, our best state of

Jeremy Hritz: 00:38:30

existence ever, that's what it takes.

jerremynewsome: 00:38:32

Yep, it does.

jerremynewsome: 00:38:33

And that was a vision that I've had for a while.

jerremynewsome: 00:38:35

I think some of our previous episodes talk about how do we

jerremynewsome: 00:38:37

change the educational system.

jerremynewsome: 00:38:39

Changing the educational system really does look like putting the best teachers

jerremynewsome: 00:38:43

in front of the students the most.

jerremynewsome: 00:38:45

It doesn't matter if it's a blend of virtual and also definitely in person,

jerremynewsome: 00:38:50

but if you have, and I'm just going to pick a person that's taught me a lot,

jerremynewsome: 00:38:53

although I wouldn't specifically say he's a teacher, but let's just say Tony Robbins

jerremynewsome: 00:38:56

has the ability to be in front of 12, 000 people physically with another 20, 000

jerremynewsome: 00:39:04

people online over a week, just one week.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:08

giving them for 12 hours a day, extremely intense, very immersive learning

jerremynewsome: 00:39:14

experiences to help the individuals, the grown individuals, and also

jerremynewsome: 00:39:18

kids be aware of how to change their internal composition, how to change

jerremynewsome: 00:39:23

their physical and emotional states.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:25

But let's just imagine for you, Jeremy, again, I would

jerremynewsome: 00:39:28

call you an incredible teacher.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:29

Both you and I love teaching at our core and you've heard me

jerremynewsome: 00:39:34

say it a million times, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:39:34

If a high school history teacher can make 600, 000 a year, travel the

jerremynewsome: 00:39:38

world, live wherever they want to live and do whatever they want to do.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:41

And so important to the world, I'd probably be a high school

jerremynewsome: 00:39:43

history teacher right now.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:45

But to that point, There are certain his teachers like John Green who

jerremynewsome: 00:39:49

did just that, where he's like, all right I can't do this in person, so

jerremynewsome: 00:39:53

I'm going to create YouTube channels and pour in on a massive scale.

jerremynewsome: 00:39:59

So ironically, the answer to the question I asked earlier, which was

jerremynewsome: 00:40:03

like, how can we decrease some of the costs of some of these schools

jerremynewsome: 00:40:05

really would be get better teachers.

jerremynewsome: 00:40:09

Decrease the cost of the amount of teachers that we currently have, who

jerremynewsome: 00:40:12

are not amazing, who are not reaching certain standards, who are not pouring

jerremynewsome: 00:40:16

in their heart and soul into becoming an amazing teacher, and then take the

jerremynewsome: 00:40:20

ones who are just absolutely terrific and find ways to put them on a larger

jerremynewsome: 00:40:24

pedestal so they can impact and influence more case in point, Jordan Peterson,

jerremynewsome: 00:40:29

going from a teacher that no one knew about, except the people in class to now

jerremynewsome: 00:40:34

being able to impact millions of people every single month, what's your take on

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:39

yeah, again, amplifying, bringing up your best

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:42

teachers and putting your resources

jerremynewsome: 00:40:45

To support them.

jerremynewsome: 00:40:46

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:46

support them.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:47

I think that makes so much sense.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:49

And just the flip side of that too, just to paint a just the other side here to

Jeremy Hritz: 00:40:54

consider is, For every great teacher that you have and not to focus on the

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:00

negative, but you have your bad teachers who the good teachers look at and say,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:05

all right this person right at two 45, they're walking right out, out the door.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:08

They're not doing a damn thing in home.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:09

They're not calling home to the parents.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:11

They're not doing anything.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:12

And they're getting paid the same that I am.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:14

And if you're going to start doing things to reward your teachers who are

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:19

succeeding at a high level, then you also have to take into account the teacher's

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:22

unions who protect these shitheads.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:25

That's the other part of it.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:27

As we're talking about solving these problems that exist in public

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:30

education, I know this is more, your high school, middle school,

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:33

elementary, but you can do that.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:36

But there has to be something to that into account and

Jeremy Hritz: 00:41:41

overcome that obstacle as well.

jerremynewsome: 00:41:44

Rob, let's hear your take on that.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:47

I agree with what Rich said.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:49

I think that it is important that you be able to levelize, but that's

Robert Wallace: 00:41:53

the same across any industry.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:54

You got shitheads that are doctors.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:56

Some are good.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:57

Some are bad.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:57

You got the same thing.

Robert Wallace: 00:41:58

They're engineers, CEOs, you name it.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:01

So I think what you're saying though, is because the education piece is so critical

Robert Wallace: 00:42:05

to our success, we should put extra focus on making sure that we're pouring into our

Robert Wallace: 00:42:09

kids in a way that will build the country.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:12

One of the epiphanies or ideas I had as part of this conversation

Robert Wallace: 00:42:16

was, how do we flip it a little bit?

Robert Wallace: 00:42:18

Is there a world where we not only reduce the cost, But we also have some

Robert Wallace: 00:42:23

type of federal subsidy, maybe reduce tax bracket or tax taxable income for

Robert Wallace: 00:42:27

those to those who decide to be teachers or those who go in the fields that are

Robert Wallace: 00:42:32

more critical for our infrastructure.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:33

Maybe they get a, maybe they pay 10 percent versus the 38 percent

Robert Wallace: 00:42:37

or whatever that number is.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:39

So we can make up.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:40

The Delta, but not just maybe not increasing their salaries, but also

Robert Wallace: 00:42:45

reducing some of their debt or costs.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:47

And that's something we can control as a nation because the folks who make

Robert Wallace: 00:42:50

it more cool to pay into the bucket.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:52

Great.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:52

The folks who are making less, but are critical, we reduce

Robert Wallace: 00:42:56

their tax taxable income.

Robert Wallace: 00:42:58

So they pay less in taxes, which means they keep more money.

Robert Wallace: 00:43:01

And now we help stabilize the ship a little bit.

Robert Wallace: 00:43:03

That could be something that we can consider.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:05

it is, that's a, that's an interesting proposition

jerremynewsome: 00:43:08

because, one of my things that I love a flat tax system personally.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:12

I really do.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:13

I think it's like you, you gotta pay.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:14

And believe it or not, when I had a ginormous panel of entrepreneurs

jerremynewsome: 00:43:19

talking about America's debt.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:20

I proposed a flat tax and they're all like, yeah, it makes sense.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:24

Whereas like you, you can't not for the double negatives lovers of the world.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:30

You not do it.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:31

Like you have to pay, we all know as entrepreneurs, you have ways to skirt

jerremynewsome: 00:43:35

around the tax code with the IRS and buy depreciation and pay less taxes.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:41

No.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:41

You pay this amount as an individual, a corporation, an S corp, a SQL, you

jerremynewsome: 00:43:46

pay this amount of taxes, high five.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:48

Thanks for playing the game.

jerremynewsome: 00:43:50

And to your point, how awesome would it be as like, all right, if you are

jerremynewsome: 00:43:54

registered as a teacher, if that is your profession, if you list that as

jerremynewsome: 00:43:59

a. Your primary focus for income and for creation, you could pay less taxes.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:04

I think that's a really unique idea.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:06

I

Jeremy Hritz: 00:44:08

That comes back again to discussions about what we value

Jeremy Hritz: 00:44:12

because that has to be, everybody would have to be on board with that and

Jeremy Hritz: 00:44:17

agree with those greater principles so that it can then funnel down into the

Jeremy Hritz: 00:44:22

practicality component, the brass tacks.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:26

mean, it's, the big thing is also that the reason this

jerremynewsome: 00:44:30

is so important for my listeners is 85 percent of student loan borrowers.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:37

are delaying home ownership.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:40

So if you have this ginormous debt if you are a student loan situation, and

jerremynewsome: 00:44:45

that's something we can talk about now too, is how do we just essentially

jerremynewsome: 00:44:50

for those who have debt now, is there something that we should do?

jerremynewsome: 00:44:52

We know that Biden at least attempted to do something with it.

jerremynewsome: 00:44:55

Which was if you have student loan over a certain amount and over a certain

jerremynewsome: 00:45:00

age that everyone across the board got like a 10, 000 reduction, 85 percent

jerremynewsome: 00:45:06

of those who have student loans are simply not going to pay or buy a home.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:13

Now they're going to continue to rent and then random statistic, 33 percent

jerremynewsome: 00:45:18

of those who have student loan debt and we're also Hispanic, they delay marriage.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:25

And that same statistic, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:45:27

37 percent of Hispanic borrowers are also delaying having children.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:31

So if you can see this and that's just one one economic statistic where

jerremynewsome: 00:45:36

it's like the people that are in debt, you all know how much debt sucks.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:42

And the pressure and the stress that brings on, and then you know

jerremynewsome: 00:45:46

that you don't want to add to it.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:48

So then getting additional degrees decreases, and then getting married,

jerremynewsome: 00:45:52

having children decreases, and buying homes decrease because it's just debt on

jerremynewsome: 00:45:55

top of debt on top of debt on top of debt.

jerremynewsome: 00:45:57

Is there a world where the majority of college kids could graduate something

jerremynewsome: 00:46:06

without Any real debt, or can we make it where it is less targeted and less

jerremynewsome: 00:46:16

focused where you can potentially file bankruptcy if you have too much debt?

jerremynewsome: 00:46:21

Should that be a possibility?

jerremynewsome: 00:46:24

Should it be a possibility where The debt structure is created

jerremynewsome: 00:46:27

where it's not as egregious.

jerremynewsome: 00:46:30

It's not as amateur immortalized where it's really just

jerremynewsome: 00:46:34

battling against the end user.

jerremynewsome: 00:46:36

And there's so many things that we have to address and we have to really

jerremynewsome: 00:46:38

take up on here because ultimately.

jerremynewsome: 00:46:40

If we can start getting down to the real core issue, which is if you go

jerremynewsome: 00:46:45

to college, regardless of your current career, and you're getting a four year

jerremynewsome: 00:46:49

degree, the likelihood that you're going to go into debt is over 90%.

jerremynewsome: 00:46:54

And if you're going into debt, that's going to create a cause, a

jerremynewsome: 00:46:57

huge financial strain continually going forward in the future.

jerremynewsome: 00:47:01

And we can say that universities are experiencing more debt for or raising

jerremynewsome: 00:47:06

their prices for a large sum of Reasons.

jerremynewsome: 00:47:09

So I'm asked a systemic question, Robert, if every college went away in

jerremynewsome: 00:47:15

the nation right now, the major main colleges, if they just were closed and

jerremynewsome: 00:47:19

could no longer operate, where would the children go and what impact do

jerremynewsome: 00:47:24

you think would have on the nation?

Robert Wallace: 00:47:26

Great question.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:27

It's a great question.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:28

I think you would see a lot more homeschooling, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:47:30

So you'd have individuals where the parents, whatever sector they're in,

Robert Wallace: 00:47:34

they begin to pull more into their children to get them prepared either

Robert Wallace: 00:47:37

for that sector, because they know it.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:39

I still go back to the technical schools because you're always going

Robert Wallace: 00:47:43

to have infrastructure challenges, whether it be fixing your water

Robert Wallace: 00:47:46

heater, whether it be building a home, whether it be generating electricity.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:50

There's a whole, there's so many technical hands on pieces

Robert Wallace: 00:47:53

that would have to take place.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:55

But I think you would see a lot more homeschooling, man.

Robert Wallace: 00:47:57

It's like you, you would just like, for example, if you and your kids you'd be

Robert Wallace: 00:48:01

pouring into them on how to do trades, to invest in real estate, all the things

Robert Wallace: 00:48:06

that took you 20 years to learn, you would package it up and try and teach

Robert Wallace: 00:48:09

to them in four years or two years.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:11

And then give them the resources to actually go take advantage of

Robert Wallace: 00:48:13

it so they can build from there.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:15

And I think it would also make more families responsible for

Robert Wallace: 00:48:18

educating their kids, man.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:20

So we should do two things.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:21

One, make you think twice about having kids.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:23

To make sure there's something that you can do and you can invest in.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:26

But two, you're going to pick careers and or sectors that you

Robert Wallace: 00:48:29

know that your kids can have a sustainable life after you're gone.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:33

And so I think you would see both of those kind of shift across

Robert Wallace: 00:48:35

the country if that was the case.

Robert Wallace: 00:48:37

But that's a great question.

jerremynewsome: 00:48:39

Yeah, just an interesting one to pose.

jerremynewsome: 00:48:41

What's your thoughts, Ritz?

jerremynewsome: 00:48:42

Colleges go away tomorrow.

jerremynewsome: 00:48:43

What happens?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:48:44

So the first thing that jumped into my mind was YouTube.

jerremynewsome: 00:48:47

Yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:48:48

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:48:49

you can learn anything and everything on YouTube and, going along

Jeremy Hritz: 00:48:55

with what Rob said, the homeschooling, there would just be more ownership and

Jeremy Hritz: 00:48:59

responsibilities that families would have to take for their children, which

Jeremy Hritz: 00:49:04

there's going to be a family strain there.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:49:08

To take on that responsibility.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:49:10

Because that's not something that's part of the common practice.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:49:13

I think there would be some unintended consequences that we would have

Jeremy Hritz: 00:49:17

to manage that way, but yeah, just, Taking that responsibility.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:24

We would change the standard of the American families.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:27

That's for sure.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:28

Yep.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:29

Dave, I know you had a question.

Dave Conley: 00:49:31

All right, I want you to put on your like American

Dave Conley: 00:49:33

taxpayer hat on a moment.

Robert Wallace: 00:49:35

Yeah, I'll put it on.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:37

There you go.

jerremynewsome: 00:49:38

Rob said that Rob has a hat now.

Dave Conley: 00:49:40

I don't think we'd even be having much of a question

Dave Conley: 00:49:43

or much of a discussion here if college wasn't so expensive.

Dave Conley: 00:49:48

We'd be like yeah, whatever.

Dave Conley: 00:49:50

And in most countries, almost all of them, it's not that expensive.

Dave Conley: 00:49:55

So the inflation of this thing, it's gone up 196 percent outpacing regular

Dave Conley: 00:50:02

inflation in the last 20 years.

Dave Conley: 00:50:05

Average cost for bachelors is 50k.

Dave Conley: 00:50:09

a year.

Dave Conley: 00:50:11

That means that there's plenty of degrees that are a lot more expensive than that.

Dave Conley: 00:50:16

And that's just for bachelors.

Dave Conley: 00:50:17

If you go for an advanced degree, look out.

Dave Conley: 00:50:20

And then average debt for bachelors is 32K.

Dave Conley: 00:50:25

So I think inflation is the question.

Dave Conley: 00:50:27

And I think that comes from where inflation comes from, which is

Dave Conley: 00:50:32

too much money in the system.

Dave Conley: 00:50:35

This is coming from being able to get these huge loans.

Dave Conley: 00:50:41

Like, why are we letting Anybody who's 18 years old to

Dave Conley: 00:50:47

take out these enormous loans.

Dave Conley: 00:50:49

The other place that this comes from is research grants from the government.

Dave Conley: 00:50:54

So it seems to me that here are some two, two of the policy issues.

Dave Conley: 00:51:00

One is.

Dave Conley: 00:51:02

We can cancel all this debt that's already been floated and

Dave Conley: 00:51:06

or we could cancel all loans and grants What would you say to that?

Robert Wallace: 00:51:12

Or we could also reduce or to your points, I call subsidy loans

Robert Wallace: 00:51:18

and grants that will help offset the cost.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:20

I'm going to correlate it to the solar industry is the industry.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:23

So what I've noticed is the more subsidy we have on the federal level,

Robert Wallace: 00:51:28

the higher the subsidy, the higher the price to construct goes up.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:32

The lower the subsidy, we had this magical way of figuring it out so that

Robert Wallace: 00:51:37

it works with the number that we had.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:39

And I think we could apply that same thing across the school loans.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:42

Like for them, if you know you're going to get the Pell Grant and other grants

Robert Wallace: 00:51:46

and your overall cost will shrink by, let's call it 7, 000 on average.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:50

I think the school will say, okay, we can charge 7, 000 more because we

Robert Wallace: 00:51:54

know we're going to get that piece.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:55

And then now we can still cover our costs.

Robert Wallace: 00:51:57

I've seen it in the solar industry where with the inflation Reduction Act and

Robert Wallace: 00:52:03

the ITC, if we can give a 50 percent tax credit, you would think that savings

Robert Wallace: 00:52:07

passes on to the end user, where we give them a 50 percent savings on energy cost.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:12

It doesn't.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:13

It just causes the price of construction to go up and development

Robert Wallace: 00:52:16

fees Profitability to go up, but that end value to the user is the

Robert Wallace: 00:52:21

same, even with all the subsidies.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:23

And so what I'm looking forward to in this new generation, starting

Robert Wallace: 00:52:27

January is stabilizing the market.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:29

I don't think we need all these subsidies.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:31

I think if you pull them back.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:33

It'll stabilize the cost, which means now you're paying for value.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:36

And I think that same thing can be applied to the education system, is

Robert Wallace: 00:52:40

that if it should create enough value where it can stand on its own two

Robert Wallace: 00:52:43

feet, not be as expensive as it is right now, but cover the cost, right?

Robert Wallace: 00:52:47

The cost of the cost.

Robert Wallace: 00:52:49

And I think that's something we could look at as a nation.

Dave Conley: 00:52:51

Oh, wait.

Dave Conley: 00:52:51

Okay.

Dave Conley: 00:52:52

Let's talk about this cost is the cost I get it But you know going up

Dave Conley: 00:52:56

196 percent right having these things being like 50 50 50, 000 a year.

Dave Conley: 00:53:02

That money is not going to professors.

Dave Conley: 00:53:05

I know plenty of professors and they are in poverty.

Dave Conley: 00:53:08

Harvard's endowment is 50 billion dollars.

Dave Conley: 00:53:12

Why anybody is paying for tuition as Harvard is beyond me.

Dave Conley: 00:53:18

So like

jerremynewsome: 00:53:19

It

Jeremy Hritz: 00:53:19

I throw it?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:53:20

Yeah.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:20

And I'm agreeing with you, Dave.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:22

When I say for clarity I'm saying exactly what you're saying is

Robert Wallace: 00:53:24

that, the cost is the hard cost.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:26

The cost should be the cost for the teachers, eight hours a day cost for

Robert Wallace: 00:53:30

the facility, electrical bill and the vendor facility and the cost of food.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:35

That's what I'm saying.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:35

So if you look at I'm agreeing with you and the cost should be the fixed

Robert Wallace: 00:53:40

actual cost to operate, not all the additional benefits of the subsidies

Robert Wallace: 00:53:44

Raise subsidy and then say, okay, now student pay more.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:47

I know you're getting 10 grand free.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:49

So I'm going to increase tuition by 10 grand.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:51

That's I'm so I'm agreeing with you.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:52

There's been a clarify that point.

Robert Wallace: 00:53:53

But

Jeremy Hritz: 00:53:55

so what about having controls and checks and balances in place?

Jeremy Hritz: 00:53:58

And what I mean by that is okay.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:02

50, 000 a year for a bachelor's degree, a hundred thousand dollars

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:05

a year, whatever, over four years.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:07

Great.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:07

You can charge that.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:09

However, we want to see the return on investment for your graduate in

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:15

the equivalent of this amount or percentage of what they are paying in.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:19

Okay.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:20

If that is not met, there is some sort of government control, some sort of

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:24

sanction that penalizes that institution or university, because what accountability

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:29

is there for these institutions of higher learning, their graduates are actually

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:35

achieving or earning at the level of what the institution is earning at.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:42

Now that's a level of accountability.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:54:43

Would they be willing to put their money where their mouth is?

Robert Wallace: 00:54:47

you create I'm not going to call it segregation, but I'm going to

Robert Wallace: 00:54:50

call it back to what's a good investment.

Robert Wallace: 00:54:52

If I know I'm accountable for this person and their ability to create wealth after

Robert Wallace: 00:54:57

college, I'm going to start scrutinizing SATs more, PSATs more, your family

Robert Wallace: 00:55:01

pedigree, probably your credit score and see, okay, is this person like.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:07

Even if they get a degree, can I place them?

Robert Wallace: 00:55:09

We look at, we see this in the technical side in our SOAR training.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:12

We do a TAE test when they first come in and see if they

Robert Wallace: 00:55:14

understand basic math and English.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:16

Then we go through a one on one test to make sure that they are,

Robert Wallace: 00:55:19

the individual themselves can learn.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:21

Then we have them do a sample hands on piece to see, are you scared of heights?

Robert Wallace: 00:55:25

Can you use power tools?

Robert Wallace: 00:55:26

And to your point, it costs us 17, 000 per student to train them.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:31

But I know they're going to get out and make it 60, 000 a year if

Robert Wallace: 00:55:34

they can't complete the course.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:36

And so we spent a lot of time on the beginning side, weeding out.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:40

Those folks who may not cut it so that we can get that return on investment.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:44

And I think if we did that, the same thing would apply to colleges

Robert Wallace: 00:55:47

now, where you start looking at other factors to see if the person

Robert Wallace: 00:55:50

would be able to cover their end.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:52

Otherwise, there would be some costs.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:55

So I think it's a great idea.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:56

I'm just trying to think how you would.

Robert Wallace: 00:55:58

How you can roll that out and make sure it's apples to apples across the board.

Robert Wallace: 00:56:02

Do you know what I mean?

jerremynewsome: 00:56:04

Yeah, but it doesn't have to be apples.

jerremynewsome: 00:56:05

Apples don't necessarily, you can have certain colleges that are hard to get

jerremynewsome: 00:56:07

into that scrutinize their students more that make it more of a challenge,

jerremynewsome: 00:56:11

just any, anything else, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:56:13

Like you have the NBA and you have other leagues, you have professional baseball

jerremynewsome: 00:56:16

and you have minor league baseball.

jerremynewsome: 00:56:18

There, there can certainly be.

jerremynewsome: 00:56:20

Standards that are are more geared towards those that have

jerremynewsome: 00:56:24

better learning capacities, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:56:28

You said, you mentioned SATs and credit scores.

jerremynewsome: 00:56:29

I don't think that has to be terrifying.

jerremynewsome: 00:56:31

We don't have to be afraid of those that have the awareness Or the

jerremynewsome: 00:56:36

capacity or the mental bandwidth to score higher or to do better either.

Robert Wallace: 00:56:41

comes down to upbringing now.

Robert Wallace: 00:56:42

So if you didn't have access to good schools as a youth, cause you lived

Robert Wallace: 00:56:45

in a Baltimore city, now you have no shot at getting into a good school.

Robert Wallace: 00:56:49

And so I think if we want to take that approach, we have to take it all the

Robert Wallace: 00:56:52

way back to like sixth grade and kind of really rebuild those pieces to make

Robert Wallace: 00:56:56

sure that when they get to college level, they're ready to compete.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:00

Exactly.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:01

And back to my point, because the thing is, every single time every discussion

jerremynewsome: 00:57:07

that we have and that we will continue to have in solving America's problems, always

jerremynewsome: 00:57:12

is going to come back to better education.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:14

Better schools, better education.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:16

Like it always comes back to that.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:18

You said sixth grade, but that's middle school.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:20

Like how important is it for us as a nation?

jerremynewsome: 00:57:23

Rich, you mentioned value.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:25

Is it time for us to start valuing our children at the number one value system?

jerremynewsome: 00:57:33

Yes.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:34

Where I, yeah.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:35

So where I was like, that has to be, if that can become at some point,

jerremynewsome: 00:57:38

the forefront Or a campaign or for our awareness as a country where

jerremynewsome: 00:57:43

it's this is what we need to do.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:45

We need to change what we're being taught, who is teaching it, how it's being taught,

jerremynewsome: 00:57:52

where it's being taught making sure our schools are extremely safe and doing that.

jerremynewsome: 00:57:57

across the board, right?

jerremynewsome: 00:57:58

An inner city school in Baltimore, to your point, Rob, should have almost the

jerremynewsome: 00:58:03

exact same, if not even the same standard of a school in the suburbans of Atlanta

jerremynewsome: 00:58:09

or Nashville, Tennessee, because it's like the government and the local state

jerremynewsome: 00:58:15

cares so much that it's protected, that it's cared for, that it's provided for,

jerremynewsome: 00:58:21

that we spread out Awarenesses and wealth and help and teachers and infrastructure

jerremynewsome: 00:58:30

that makes it situationally easy.

jerremynewsome: 00:58:33

So that the best of the best can be in the schools that need it to be the best

jerremynewsome: 00:58:36

of the best and you have the best of the best in schools that have easier access

jerremynewsome: 00:58:39

as well because they have access to more wealth and more awareness at home.

jerremynewsome: 00:58:45

So yes, and yes, to your point, Rob, I totally agree.

jerremynewsome: 00:58:47

Quick question.

jerremynewsome: 00:58:49

I think this will be fun for their listeners who may be in

jerremynewsome: 00:58:52

financial debt or student loan debt at this exact moment in time.

jerremynewsome: 00:58:56

Dave Colling mentioned, should we just wipe it all away?

jerremynewsome: 00:58:59

I'm actually a huge advocate of no on that personally because I do believe

jerremynewsome: 00:59:04

that debt and income and wealth is second grade math repeated consistently.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:09

So we do have to sit down and learn how that this problem happens.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:13

And so just instead of.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:14

Fixing the problem because it's here.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:16

We changed the problem at the root core and that root core probably

jerremynewsome: 00:59:20

stems from the awareness of debt.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:21

So Jeremy, this is going to be a question that's going to be

jerremynewsome: 00:59:23

potentially directed towards just you.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:27

Tell me how much debt did you have and how the heck did you get out of it?

jerremynewsome: 00:59:34

150 grand.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:35

And trump, Biden, or Obama didn't wave a wand for you.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:40

How did you get out of that much debt?

jerremynewsome: 00:59:42

You got kids, bro.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:43

You got a wife.

jerremynewsome: 00:59:44

You got a house.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:59:45

yeah, there's this beautiful thing called the stock

Jeremy Hritz: 00:59:48

market it has blessed me abundantly and continues to bless me abundantly.

Jeremy Hritz: 00:59:53

And had it not been for that, my last year As high school principal, I made

Jeremy Hritz: 00:59:58

157, 000, which was a great salary.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:01

I thought it was great.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:02

And my goal superintendent, I'm going to make, 200, 250, 280, maybe max out

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:07

at 300, but this other world that exists in trading and investing, those numbers.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:15

Don't scratch the surface of what is available.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:18

So the markets made it able for me to, take care of that.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:24

And then some, so

jerremynewsome: 01:00:26

But how though?

jerremynewsome: 01:00:27

How'd you do it?

jerremynewsome: 01:00:28

So there's a stock market okay.

jerremynewsome: 01:00:30

But how though?

jerremynewsome: 01:00:30

You just looked at it and made more

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:32

No.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:32

Obviously you're part of that personal story with me and teaching me the

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:36

ropes of how to trade the markets, but studying and learning and really giving.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:42

Giving myself an education outside of what I learned through courses, through

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:47

coaching you and just studying and becoming obsessed with it and practicing

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:52

back trading, paper trading, and being in the market and exposed to the risk,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:00:58

even though you can lose, you protect your downside, but when you have that

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:03

opportunity sometimes you're going to have these incredible moments.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:08

And I had an incredible moment.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:10

I haven't, I had some this year, but none like this one where, you

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:13

make a half a million dollars on a trade and life changes forever.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:18

Sure.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:18

So walk me through then the very, very first interaction that you have

jerremynewsome: 01:01:21

with the stock market as again this, for the listeners out there, this can

jerremynewsome: 01:01:26

be, should be, is a tool for you to understand wealth and understand money

jerremynewsome: 01:01:33

expansion in currency expansion, because the smartest people in the world.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:38

Still find the stock market mysterious.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:40

And that's what my professional was for 15 years.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:43

So what was the very first interaction that you had with the stock market?

jerremynewsome: 01:01:47

Rich, the very, very first one.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:49

What did it look like?

jerremynewsome: 01:01:50

Walk us through that picture.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:51

So was it, was this just buying a stock and just

Jeremy Hritz: 01:01:55

holding it or like actual trading?

jerremynewsome: 01:01:57

Either one.

jerremynewsome: 01:01:58

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:06

school principal at the time.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:08

The reason why I left education was because as high school principal,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:11

you're working 60, 70 hours a week.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:12

You're gone at nights.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:13

I have three young kids.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:14

I wanted to prioritize my family.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:16

So something had to change.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:18

And so starting to learn trading, I had the the Robin Hood app on

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:23

my phone, which is just a broker.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:25

I took a trade on Snapchat in my office as high school principal.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:29

I had a little bit of downtime.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:30

This was a day trade and I made 284 in five minutes.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:36

I saw this happen right on my phone, five minutes.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:39

And I made about 396 a day.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:43

When you break it down as principal, I called my wife.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:45

I said, I'm done.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:47

Like this is it.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:48

I, and I'm not, there's no way this is stupid.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:02:52

And so you just, you there's fear around the markets because everybody says

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:00

that the market's going to go to zero.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:01

You can lose all your money.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:02

And that's true if you're an idiot and you're a gambler and

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:05

you don't protect your risk.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:07

But what is available every single day, even on weekends, if you're a crypto

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:12

trader, even on the, in the evenings, if you're a futures trader it's incredible,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:18

and so we need to, in talking about education, we need to make sure that our

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:23

constituents, our population understands how this works, because there's enough.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:29

Out there for everyone.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:30

And then some and it truly is life changing.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:03:34

It

jerremynewsome: 01:03:35

Yeah, absolutely.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:36

100 percent agree.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:37

So I'm gonna walk people through it, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:03:38

So Jeremy gets an app on a phone, which is free.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:42

It's called Robin hood.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:44

It's free application to cost 0.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:47

You download this application for 0.

jerremynewsome: 01:03:49

He's sitting there behind his principal desk and opens up Robin hood, transfers

jerremynewsome: 01:03:55

some cash that he had saved from his checking account in the Robin hood

jerremynewsome: 01:04:00

and places a trade on Robin hood.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:03

Guess how much that trade costs.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:05

0 and purchases a stock of a company that he knows uses and probably

jerremynewsome: 01:04:11

every single one of his students interacts with on a daily basis.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:16

So his whole job as principal is to get kids off of Snapchat.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:20

That was his job as a principal.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:22

So he goes, all right, why is everyone using this thing?

jerremynewsome: 01:04:25

If everyone's using it, what's the stock price probably going to do?

jerremynewsome: 01:04:30

Every single person that I'm teaching uses it.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:32

It's probably going to go higher.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:33

So he buys some Snapchat shares.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:36

The stock goes up a little bit that day, sells it, makes almost 300 bucks in that

jerremynewsome: 01:04:40

five minute trade, fascinating to see.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:43

But what the reason I want to bring that up is because every single

jerremynewsome: 01:04:47

person who's listening has the ability and has access to do that.

jerremynewsome: 01:04:51

It doesn't matter if you're black, brown, what skin color you got, or if

jerremynewsome: 01:04:54

you are a felon, if you have gotten out of prison, if you have gotten out

jerremynewsome: 01:04:59

of jail, the stock market does not care if you're a Jehovah's witness, a

jerremynewsome: 01:05:03

Catholic, a Protestant, or a Mormon.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:05

It is welcoming you with open arms to increase your wealth and

jerremynewsome: 01:05:11

or force you to study it because you can lose a bunch of money.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:18

I've done it.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:19

It has happened, but it's not because the market did something that I was

jerremynewsome: 01:05:24

unaware of it because I simply had not taken time or energy to truly

jerremynewsome: 01:05:29

study and understand the downsides, the upsides and the math behind it.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:34

So I know Dave has a question, but I want to share all that with you.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:36

Whereas after Jeremy starts interacting with.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:40

A free application.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:41

Every single person listening to this podcast can use to start

jerremynewsome: 01:05:45

with 12 and you start with 12 and take a trade, make a dollar a day.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:51

Obviously this doesn't change your economics at all, but what it does

jerremynewsome: 01:05:55

do is it starts telling your brain.

jerremynewsome: 01:05:57

Wait a minute me, I deserve to make more money.

jerremynewsome: 01:06:01

I deserve to be more wealthy.

jerremynewsome: 01:06:02

I just took money and made it bigger, pressing buttons and using

jerremynewsome: 01:06:06

my mind, thinking and growing rich.

jerremynewsome: 01:06:09

It starts to expand the opportunities of what's really available.

jerremynewsome: 01:06:13

So Dave, go ahead.

Dave Conley: 01:06:15

So what's working about college?

Dave Conley: 01:06:17

We're pumping out Nobel prizes.

Dave Conley: 01:06:20

We're creating an enormous amount of wealth in America.

Dave Conley: 01:06:24

America is like the leader in global innovation.

Dave Conley: 01:06:28

What's working?

jerremynewsome: 01:06:30

Start with Rob.

jerremynewsome: 01:06:31

Rob, what's working in college?

jerremynewsome: 01:06:32

You have brothers that are just absolutely crushing it.

Robert Wallace: 01:06:36

I think one of the biggest Pieces of them attending

Robert Wallace: 01:06:40

the schools they went to is the network of people they met, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:06:44

So beyond just the education they got, their circle of friends come from an

Robert Wallace: 01:06:49

influential group now who not only learn to think together, but also

Robert Wallace: 01:06:53

maintain relationships after school.

Robert Wallace: 01:06:55

And a lot of those deals and wealth they created was through those

Robert Wallace: 01:06:58

relationships after they got out.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:00

So beyond just learning how to think in school, the networking, That

Robert Wallace: 01:07:05

came through that school is now what's also helped sustain them.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:08

So I think that part is huge, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:07:10

Cause if you go to Stanford business school, you're probably going to be

Robert Wallace: 01:07:13

in a room with 20 something other CEOs who of which two are going to

Robert Wallace: 01:07:17

hit blockbusters of which you could get a small piece by just being in a

Robert Wallace: 01:07:20

room and investing at the right time.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:22

And a lot of those decisions happen in that room.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:24

So I do think that part is working.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:26

I also think.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:28

That that the educational pieces that we've seen across the country has helped

Robert Wallace: 01:07:32

stabilize, how we look at help equalize.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:35

I'm sorry.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:35

I should say a lot of the sexism and racism and other isms we see across the

Robert Wallace: 01:07:39

country I think education is the key to breaking a lot of those things Because

Robert Wallace: 01:07:44

creating wealth whether it be education through Whether it be through trading,

Robert Wallace: 01:07:48

it helps stabilize a lot of those things.

Robert Wallace: 01:07:50

So I think those pieces are working.

jerremynewsome: 01:07:52

Which brings me back to, I said, Tony Robbins earlier,

jerremynewsome: 01:07:55

he taught me something a long time ago that proximity is power and

jerremynewsome: 01:07:59

your network is your net worth.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:01

So if you're bringing amazing men and women together and a a close or close

jerremynewsome: 01:08:07

facility, AKA a classroom, a lunch room, and you are in Stanford, you're

jerremynewsome: 01:08:14

in UCLA, you were in university of Florida, you're in Miami Dade, you're

jerremynewsome: 01:08:18

in these places where information.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:22

Innovation is brewing.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:23

What Dave mentioned earlier, the technology that is being created inside

jerremynewsome: 01:08:30

our college systems through these think tanks, through these masterminds,

jerremynewsome: 01:08:35

through these student led unions.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:37

We're talking DoorDash, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:08:40

We're talking Uber Eats, we're talking Uber, Airbnb.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:43

There's a lot of these companies that get spurred off by individuals

jerremynewsome: 01:08:47

being together, building something, creating something, open table.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:52

It's a large list.

jerremynewsome: 01:08:54

That has become innovated companies that have been created

jerremynewsome: 01:08:57

ideas that have been created.

jerremynewsome: 01:09:00

What's working in college, Ritz?

jerremynewsome: 01:09:01

You

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:03

So I would have to agree with Rob, just the networking

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:06

the social component the alumni groups, as a Penn state graduate,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:10

I know that's massive in terms of, graduates taking advantage of that.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:15

I also think there is.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:18

A component of soft skills that are developed during that time,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:22

because in high school, you're following a bell schedule.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:26

You have adults guiding you along the way, whereas in college, you

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:29

become really, it's your first taste of true responsibility where.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:33

You have to manage yourself.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:35

Do you have to manage your time?

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:36

You have to manage your schedule.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:38

You can't go getting sloshed on a Tuesday night and then wake up

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:40

and take an exam the next day.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:42

Although that's debatable, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:09:45

You can,

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:46

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:46

You can't, you

jerremynewsome: 01:09:47

laughed.

jerremynewsome: 01:09:48

All four of us laugh because all four of us did that.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:51

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:53

So I think there's an element of that.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:55

And then I think as well, just the social element where you're

Jeremy Hritz: 01:09:58

bringing young people together that are similar stages of their lives.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:02

They're learning how to interact relationships with each other.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:06

So I think there's power and benefit of that, but I think what you're

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:10

seeing here, the one thing that's absent from all the benefits that we

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:14

talked about is the true learning.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:16

The more learning that we're talking about here is more social or the

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:22

altruistic, communal components.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:24

It's not so much the academics, really calls into question.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:30

It's an outdated system.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:31

It needs updated.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:10:32

It's almost obsolete.

jerremynewsome: 01:10:35

Cause you're, you bring me back in Ritz, you bring me

jerremynewsome: 01:10:37

back in with a statement like that, because then I would just simply say,

jerremynewsome: 01:10:41

can we create our own units like that?

jerremynewsome: 01:10:44

Can we create our own systems and our own groups and our own masterminds and

jerremynewsome: 01:10:48

our own think tanks, totally outside of college, where you start building

jerremynewsome: 01:10:53

companies, corporations, ideas.

jerremynewsome: 01:10:55

opportunities without college, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:10:59

Because again, is it really the ultimate academics?

jerremynewsome: 01:11:02

Wow, Professor Jones taught me this thing that I had no idea.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:05

And I took that thing and then made more money with it or grew my net worth

jerremynewsome: 01:11:09

with it or help my family with it.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:11

Or was it Oh man, Professor Jones is really cool.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:14

And he introduced me to Stephanie and I ended up creating this really awesome

jerremynewsome: 01:11:18

web application because she taught me how to go on YouTube and study and research.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:25

It is, man, it is a little bit of an outdated system because YouTube

jerremynewsome: 01:11:29

University is a very real thing.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:31

Jordan Peterson, who taught at Harvard, who taught at Toronto College.

jerremynewsome: 01:11:37

Is building and has built his own online college for the academics for the people

jerremynewsome: 01:11:42

who want to learn But he also puts together these groups and these small

jerremynewsome: 01:11:45

mentorships and these masterminds so that people can do just that Where education

jerremynewsome: 01:11:50

can be free And experiences can cost money

Jeremy Hritz: 01:11:55

I think education for whatever reason

Jeremy Hritz: 01:11:59

is very resistant to change.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:02

Especially at the K through 12 level.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:05

I'm sure it's probably just the same at the collegiate level, but they're

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:10

the old heads that are protecting the cannon and don't want to let go.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:17

And I think COVID forced some of that innovation to occur and

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:22

to, really, we learned that.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:24

It wasn't perfect, right?

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:26

I saw some of the after effects of that in our students, but

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:30

you can make, you can change it.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:33

It just, there has to be a collective agreement that, hey, it's time.

jerremynewsome: 01:12:38

Come on.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:39

We've got to break it down.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:12:40

It, that's what has to happen.

jerremynewsome: 01:12:43

Dave, help our listeners and myself put on a tinfoil hat.

Dave Conley: 01:12:47

I never take mine off.

jerremynewsome: 01:12:48

Is this whole thing systemic?

jerremynewsome: 01:12:51

Is it starting from some place?

jerremynewsome: 01:12:53

Some family, some corporation that's really trying to keep the populace

jerremynewsome: 01:13:00

dumb broke and working for a living.

Dave Conley: 01:13:03

No I think it's been tradition.

Dave Conley: 01:13:04

We started this conversation with it was the pathway.

Dave Conley: 01:13:08

for prosperity.

Dave Conley: 01:13:09

And that was true for my my, not quite my dad's generation.

Dave Conley: 01:13:13

They were just talking about that, that he was a bit older.

Dave Conley: 01:13:15

So it was my mother.

Dave Conley: 01:13:16

So almost no one got college degrees.

Dave Conley: 01:13:19

And then it was like, okay, now if you get a college degree, you are guaranteed

Dave Conley: 01:13:24

a solid middle class, upper middle class, And then that went away because

Dave Conley: 01:13:30

with so much money in the system, so many options, so many different things,

Dave Conley: 01:13:36

not a lot of guidance, I think, on, where people can spend their time and

Dave Conley: 01:13:41

their money and also devaluing other options Going and doing gap years, or

Dave Conley: 01:13:47

going into the military, or going into service or trade schools, or all of the

Dave Conley: 01:13:52

other options, and then elevating those.

Dave Conley: 01:13:54

I think we've created a laptop class, which has some

Dave Conley: 01:13:58

value, but not all the value.

Dave Conley: 01:14:00

I think this is just.

Dave Conley: 01:14:02

This was grown from a lot of different things that said this

Dave Conley: 01:14:06

is the American dream and that was being sold really a bill of goods.

Dave Conley: 01:14:11

It's not true today.

Dave Conley: 01:14:12

And so we have to redefine what this America dream is.

jerremynewsome: 01:14:16

Gotta redefine it.

jerremynewsome: 01:14:17

Robert, where do you think that red redefinition, where does it begin?

Robert Wallace: 01:14:22

Think it begins in the homes.

Robert Wallace: 01:14:25

But I also think it begins with the opportunities we got to look at where

Robert Wallace: 01:14:29

we're where this opportunity for growth in this country and where the country

Robert Wallace: 01:14:33

is going so we can begin to prepare the next generation of folks for that.

Robert Wallace: 01:14:37

And I think if we streamline that process and which means educating folks at a young

Robert Wallace: 01:14:42

age in terms of what the opportunities on where they can go, I think we can fix it.

Robert Wallace: 01:14:46

But going back to your first comment, one of your comments, Jay, is it

Robert Wallace: 01:14:50

starts like when they're elementary school, like middle school, it

Robert Wallace: 01:14:53

doesn't start like in high school.

Robert Wallace: 01:14:56

And so we're really going to have to cut the pipe, cut the hose,

Robert Wallace: 01:14:59

tie a knot in it for those folks who like, I'm going to say nice.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:02

We're going to be on there.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:02

All right.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:02

Sorry, too late.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:04

And then you're going to have to go all the way back down and begin to rebuild

Robert Wallace: 01:15:06

that process starting at elementary school, and it's a painful process.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:10

And so we may not see the benefits of it right now, but I think if we

Robert Wallace: 01:15:14

can begin to right the ship now, 10, 15, 20 years from now, the

Robert Wallace: 01:15:18

conversation is totally different.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:20

At that point,

jerremynewsome: 01:15:22

love that.

jerremynewsome: 01:15:23

Alright, then, since we're still listening to your perfect voice,

jerremynewsome: 01:15:26

Robert, what's one lesson that you would want a high school senior?

jerremynewsome: 01:15:31

Which you have one or approaching, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:15:35

What's one lesson you would want a high school senior or their parents

jerremynewsome: 01:15:38

to take from this conversation?

Robert Wallace: 01:15:40

think it's so important to look at both sides of the coin.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:44

There's a certain sector that says education is key, but you have to do

Robert Wallace: 01:15:49

a real assessment of your student.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:52

And their strengths and see what's the best path for them.

Robert Wallace: 01:15:56

And I think that changes per person per household because what's good

Robert Wallace: 01:16:00

for my son Zion, for example, who's interlocking art boarding school.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:05

He wants to go into theater, totally different sector.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:08

When I was young, that wasn't an option to go to theater.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:11

My parents said, you're going to be an engineer or you're

Robert Wallace: 01:16:12

not going to do anything.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:14

And so giving him that flexibility is totally different

Robert Wallace: 01:16:16

than where we were back then.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:18

But back to your point, Jay, two things, two words of advice, one,

Robert Wallace: 01:16:22

and this is, I don't want to take it too spiritual, but as a parent,

Robert Wallace: 01:16:25

what your kids dreams are, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:16:27

And each child has a purpose.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:29

God given purpose as opposed to achieving their lives.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:31

It's our responsibility as parents to help prepare them for whatever that purpose is.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:36

The challenge is that the kids don't see it yet.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:39

The parents may know what it is, but the kids that, that, that

Robert Wallace: 01:16:42

relaying that mission is challenging.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:45

So as a student, I would say, listen to your parents.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:48

They're trying to help and guide you.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:50

They see things differently than you see at the moment.

Robert Wallace: 01:16:52

And as a parent, I would say, it's our responsibility to do the research,

Robert Wallace: 01:16:57

And where the future is 10, 20 years from now, so that our child's prepared

Robert Wallace: 01:17:01

to take full advantage of that when they get out of school, otherwise

Robert Wallace: 01:17:04

we'll set them up for failure.

Robert Wallace: 01:17:05

And so I, that would be my advice to both the student and the parent.

Dave Conley: 01:17:16

I'm going to guess that would cost somewhere between half a million and

Dave Conley: 01:17:20

three quarters of a million, maybe even a million dollars to get all of those.

Dave Conley: 01:17:25

I heard you guys say, Hey, the benefit.

Dave Conley: 01:17:28

Benefits have been networking, changing minds, soft skills, some opportunities.

Dave Conley: 01:17:35

So would you do this again?

Dave Conley: 01:17:36

Would you go back and do all those degrees?

jerremynewsome: 01:17:39

Not me.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:40

I only have one.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:40

From a degree point, I'm the bottom, I'm the lowest tiered person here.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:46

I wouldn't know.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:47

I think college was an absolute waste of my time.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:50

And the thing that it gave me was a direction of what not to do.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:54

I didn't really meet anyone in my college that I currently talk to these days.

jerremynewsome: 01:17:58

I had no professors that were incredible that I still communicate

jerremynewsome: 01:18:01

with that changed my life.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:02

I think overall, it gave me more to do, aka probably kept me out of a little

jerremynewsome: 01:18:09

bit more, less trouble, but not really.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:12

I still try to find my way into plenty of trouble.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:15

And again, for me, college, personally, that's the reason that I want to continue.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:21

To do this where I'm focused so heavily on changing the educational system because

jerremynewsome: 01:18:25

I think the educational system failed me.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:26

Meaning how far along would I be?

jerremynewsome: 01:18:29

How much would I know?

jerremynewsome: 01:18:29

How much could I have poured into the world and even a bigger capacity

jerremynewsome: 01:18:34

if I had known and had been taught what I got taught in my late

jerremynewsome: 01:18:39

twenties by mentors, by books, and by online motivational personalities.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:44

Versus college professors, school professors, high school,

jerremynewsome: 01:18:47

high school teachers, education system failed me dramatically.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:51

And to the point of, I had to do most of it myself.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:53

And I had to do a lot of it where, when I got out, I didn't know what I did.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:57

I didn't know what I took.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:58

I didn't know why I took it.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:59

I didn't know the point of it.

jerremynewsome: 01:18:59

I didn't know the value of it.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:00

In fact, I actually went to my boss at the time.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:03

His name was Tom.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:05

After I graduated, I was like, bro, I got my degree.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:08

He was like, cool, congrats.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:09

And pat me on the shoulder and started walking away.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:12

And I was like hold on.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:13

Do we have a meeting about this now?

jerremynewsome: 01:19:15

At what point do I get a raise?

jerremynewsome: 01:19:17

And he literally laughed in my face.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:20

He laughed, he was like, what are you talking about?

jerremynewsome: 01:19:23

I just got a business degree and I was working at Nationwide Insurance

jerremynewsome: 01:19:27

and I did not get a pay raise.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:29

Again, this is not a slap to Nationwide, it's a slap to degrees

jerremynewsome: 01:19:33

are relatively worthless, I think.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:36

And this is a made up statistic, totally off my head, has no

jerremynewsome: 01:19:39

relevancy and no research.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:41

87 percent of all degrees are worthless and you can probably get everything

jerremynewsome: 01:19:45

that you need on line through YouTube University, through networking, through

jerremynewsome: 01:19:50

books, through mentorships, without ever paying a single dime for college.

jerremynewsome: 01:19:54

Ritz, what's your thanks?

jerremynewsome: 01:19:55

Would you do this again?

Jeremy Hritz: 01:19:56

So I, I gotta say the past is the path and I wouldn't change

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:01

anything cause I'm here today and who's to say, had I not done that, I wouldn't

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:06

have met the people who were in my life.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:08

I wouldn't have met.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:08

You wouldn't have, interacted with the markets.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:12

However, I will say that had I had a some insight into what my

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:18

future was and what was coming.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:20

Hell no.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:21

I know because it was expensive and honestly, I'm not using, I'm not using my

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:27

degrees now the soft skills the leadership elements of that the organization.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:33

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:33

But yeah I'm a trader and investor.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:37

I'm not, supervising and evaluating teachers.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:39

I'm not so I'm giving, I'm speaking out of both sides of my mouth here.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:43

Yes.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:20:44

No.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:45

Yes.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:46

I love that quote.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:47

Actually.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:47

I think it's amazing.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:48

The path, the past is the path.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:51

And I regret nothing.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:52

I'm just to that point.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:53

Wouldn't do it again.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:53

Knowing what I know.

jerremynewsome: 01:20:54

And me having kids, me having three boys presently where it's I'm not going

jerremynewsome: 01:20:58

to have them go to college at all.

jerremynewsome: 01:21:00

In fact, I'll do everything I can to not get them to go to college trade schools.

jerremynewsome: 01:21:04

Yeah, absolutely.

jerremynewsome: 01:21:04

High five.

jerremynewsome: 01:21:05

Totally.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:06

And if I could do it all over again, I would be, I'd be

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:09

studying the markets at 12 years old or 10 years old, eight years old.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:12

And that's it be like rain man.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:15

When I look at a

jerremynewsome: 01:21:16

yes, dude, before I go, before we go to Rob Jeremy, is

jerremynewsome: 01:21:20

there a point in your life financially where you go, all right, I got the

jerremynewsome: 01:21:25

money now, let me go back into the school system and figure out a way

jerremynewsome: 01:21:30

to change this from the inside out.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:32

Yeah.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:33

I think that's one thing that's, Probably missing right now because that

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:38

was such a huge part of what I did.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:40

It was helping kids and families and I do it a little bit now through

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:43

trading, teaching people how to trade.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:45

But yeah that, that will happen at some point.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:49

Cause I want to be a part of changing how we teach kids and the

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:55

opportunities that we give kids.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:21:58

So that'll definitely be something that I will do.

jerremynewsome: 01:22:03

Love it.

jerremynewsome: 01:22:04

Love it.

jerremynewsome: 01:22:04

Rob, we know that you love college.

jerremynewsome: 01:22:06

Would you do it again?

Robert Wallace: 01:22:07

I'm sitting here and thinking, I remember my, one of my two

Robert Wallace: 01:22:10

main reasons for going to school was number one, to get away from my parents.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:14

And so I don't care where I was going.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:16

I went and got the house.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:17

So that was cool.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:19

And I think Jeremy, it matters for me.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:21

If you were to ask me if I would, was 18 now, would I go?

Robert Wallace: 01:22:27

No, because like to your point, everything is online.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:30

Everything is, you have access to things.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:33

You have access to resources, but totally different though, than when it was.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:37

46 now.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:38

So 28 years ago, when internet was not in the place where it is now,

Robert Wallace: 01:22:42

you didn't have access to as much.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:44

And the only thing you saw was what was in your, at your community.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:49

I grew up in Columbia, Maryland, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:22:50

The most diverse.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:51

County, probably in the world or in the country.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:54

And so my friends were Asian black, they called their mom, and so on and so forth.

Robert Wallace: 01:22:57

I didn't really give an idea of culture and of the country until

Robert Wallace: 01:23:00

I went to Virginia tech, which is totally different background and

Robert Wallace: 01:23:03

total segregation around that piece.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:06

And if I look at the experiences I had, It really did prepare me for the real world.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:12

And I don't, I think if I did not have that and stayed at home, especially if

Robert Wallace: 01:23:17

my parents weren't investing in me, like we're talking about doing in terms of the

Robert Wallace: 01:23:21

training and mentorship, it would have been really challenging for me to hit

Robert Wallace: 01:23:24

the real world and be taken seriously.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:27

The second thing that came out of it was, but this is all from

Robert Wallace: 01:23:29

a position of no debt, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:23:30

So I came out of no debt, which is like, why would you not go?

Robert Wallace: 01:23:32

It's a party.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:33

You learn it's everything's paid for.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:35

It's great.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:35

It's great.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:35

The other piece, though, was that if I look back over my life, there

Robert Wallace: 01:23:39

were a lot of doors that were opened.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:41

Because of my background and because that door was opened, I was able to get

Robert Wallace: 01:23:46

in and then show that, yes, I am sharp.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:48

I am smart.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:49

So on and so forth.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:50

And I'm not sure what those same doors would have opened.

Robert Wallace: 01:23:52

If I say I'm a electrical engineer from Virginia tech, there's a certain

Robert Wallace: 01:23:55

amount of access you get just from completing that process, right?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:00

And so my job interview for my first job, we didn't even talk about.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:05

We talked about parties, because he was a Virginia Tech alumni.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:08

He stayed in the same dorm Niall stayed in.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:10

We talked about the throwing the Coke machine down the elevator shaft,

Robert Wallace: 01:24:13

which everyone does every year.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:14

And that was my interview, which got me into Northrop Grumman.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:17

And if you were to pull those experiences out, would I be where I am now?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:22

Probably not.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:23

Was it worth it?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:24

It was worth it for me, because it didn't cost me anything.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:26

But would it be worth it for someone back then?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:29

I don't know, man.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:29

It went a long way for me.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:31

Even getting my first loans, my first business.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:33

They say what's your occupation?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:35

Electrical engineer.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:35

Oh worst case, you'll make 150, 000 a year for the rest of your life.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:38

We'll give you this 100, 000 loan to start your first business.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:42

Versus if I said I was a psychologist, they might have said,

Robert Wallace: 01:24:45

no, we're not giving you this loan.

Robert Wallace: 01:24:46

And so how much did that actually played into where I am now?

Robert Wallace: 01:24:49

I don't know, but it did give me some access and through some doors

Robert Wallace: 01:24:52

that I don't think I would have been able to get through without it.

jerremynewsome: 01:24:55

Yeah valid.

jerremynewsome: 01:24:56

And again, I think over time that can or might or could shift depending

jerremynewsome: 01:25:01

on what, again, the country's value.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:04

Because at the same level, if you said, Hey, I created a startup incubator,

jerremynewsome: 01:25:07

never went to college and I got 4 million asset under management to

jerremynewsome: 01:25:10

go ahead and build an energy fund.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:13

Do you still get in the door?

Robert Wallace: 01:25:15

Correct.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:15

the answer is probably maybe not.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:17

And again, it's absolutely going to change who you connect with and

jerremynewsome: 01:25:20

how you connect with them for sure.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:21

And what you talk about, you're absolutely right.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:22

But it's going to be like the value system of if you go into

jerremynewsome: 01:25:26

any job interview now, could you look, could you be looked at more?

jerremynewsome: 01:25:30

If you go, Hey, I built on, I built an online community.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:33

I have 25, 000 followers on XYZ platform.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:37

I have three or four online businesses I've launched that

jerremynewsome: 01:25:41

have each done a million dollars.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:42

I want to come into this organization and do the same at a bigger scale, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:25:46

That's on the job training, essentially, maybe not on the job training, but it's

jerremynewsome: 01:25:50

a example that you've already done the work that you've done the building.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:53

Cause that's really, and I own a business, you own a business, Jeremy

jerremynewsome: 01:25:57

owns a business, Dave owns a business.

jerremynewsome: 01:25:58

We all know businesses.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:00

When we are hiring people, that's what we want to see is have

jerremynewsome: 01:26:04

you gotten kicked in the face.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:06

through some adversity and did you quit and cry about it?

jerremynewsome: 01:26:10

Or did you say, I'm going to figure this

Robert Wallace: 01:26:12

threw it.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:13

And did you work on completing the task that was

jerremynewsome: 01:26:17

given to you no matter the obstacle?

jerremynewsome: 01:26:19

And that's really what employers are looking for.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:22

Dave, You have to do it all over again.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:25

Go back through college.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:26

Everything you had was worth it.

jerremynewsome: 01:26:27

Would you do

Dave Conley: 01:26:30

answers.

Dave Conley: 01:26:31

I would have gone, I got into a good, a really good state school.

Dave Conley: 01:26:35

And like Robert, I just needed to get away from my parents.

Dave Conley: 01:26:38

I needed to get off the East Coast.

Dave Conley: 01:26:40

He grew up in Columbia.

Dave Conley: 01:26:41

I grew up in Falls Church.

Dave Conley: 01:26:42

I gotta, I know, I just had to get out of the Washington DC bubble for sure.

Dave Conley: 01:26:48

But saying that I got into a good state school, I was really immature.

Dave Conley: 01:26:51

And I was coming from a really small all boys school and being dropped

Dave Conley: 01:26:59

into one of the largest schools on the planet and known party school.

Dave Conley: 01:27:05

No matter how good that school was, I lost my mind.

Dave Conley: 01:27:09

And so I would have applied to a really good school.

Dave Conley: 01:27:15

Like a really top tier school to get that networking and to get that world

Dave Conley: 01:27:21

and to be around those folks and really explore in a much more structured

Dave Conley: 01:27:26

way, maybe a smaller school or just a really high end Ivy League school.

Dave Conley: 01:27:31

And if I couldn't get into those to get that maturity that I needed, it

Dave Conley: 01:27:37

would have been a couple of gap years or a gap year or going into service or

Dave Conley: 01:27:43

getting an internship or getting a job with the knowledge that I would learn

Dave Conley: 01:27:47

something there and proceed from there.

Dave Conley: 01:27:50

I'd either go back and go get a degree a little bit later, and military

Dave Conley: 01:27:54

would have been really good for me.

Dave Conley: 01:27:55

It would have given me a lot of discipline.

Dave Conley: 01:27:57

So I, it would have been.

Dave Conley: 01:27:58

Go to the best and best school I could get into and a high end

Dave Conley: 01:28:02

school or a couple of gap years and then figure it out from there.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:06

Yeah, I'll take squad listeners from all around the world.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:13

Thank you so much for being a part of solving America's problems.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:17

Is college truly worth it?

jerremynewsome: 01:28:20

The answer here in this podcast is probably not, but there'll be

jerremynewsome: 01:28:27

certain situations where it could be.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:29

But what is beautiful is when this country gets together as a consensus and we

jerremynewsome: 01:28:34

start realizing that our number one value in this country needs to be education,

jerremynewsome: 01:28:39

it needs to be safety of our children.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:41

It needs to be the expansion and the beauty and the grace and the

jerremynewsome: 01:28:45

spirituality and the abundance of.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:49

our family unit intertwined in through our colleges and through our schools

jerremynewsome: 01:28:54

and then through the educational system.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:56

We start making the changes there.

jerremynewsome: 01:28:58

We all know that the ripple effects will be monumental.

jerremynewsome: 01:29:01

Robert Wallace, Jeremy Ritz.

jerremynewsome: 01:29:02

Thank you so much for joining us today.

jerremynewsome: 01:29:05

On this episode of solving America's problems.

Robert Wallace: 01:29:08

Appreciate it.

Robert Wallace: 01:29:09

Thank you.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:29:10

Thanks, Dave.

Jeremy Hritz: 01:29:11

Thanks, Jeremy.

jerremynewsome: 01:29:12

All right, Dave, man, two remarkable American citizens who

jerremynewsome: 01:29:17

have gone through the educational system in out backwards through it and

jerremynewsome: 01:29:22

sideways, what did you learn in this episode of solving America's problems?

Dave Conley: 01:29:28

I think okay, one, this is not to be king of the obvious,

Dave Conley: 01:29:31

but this is a clear problem, right?

Dave Conley: 01:29:33

Nobody's standing up and saying, hey, this is working great.

Dave Conley: 01:29:37

For our students and for America, and it's, I don't think it's failing

Dave Conley: 01:29:40

because there's a lot of benefits to, how people get into the workplace,

Dave Conley: 01:29:44

how people get through college and it's not working real well.

Dave Conley: 01:29:49

The other thing I learned is college absolutely doesn't work.

Dave Conley: 01:29:52

Does matter.

Dave Conley: 01:29:53

College degrees matter.

Dave Conley: 01:29:55

And as long as they're at the right schools, as long as it's the right

Dave Conley: 01:30:00

degrees, and then outside of that you're taking a much bigger gamble.

Dave Conley: 01:30:04

And what we're not doing as a society, as Americans we're not, There are a lot

Dave Conley: 01:30:11

of other paths, and we are not elevating those, either in our consciousness

Dave Conley: 01:30:17

we're not elevating them as far as prestige goes, and value goes, and there

Dave Conley: 01:30:23

are so many other paths, other than going to a college degree, or going

Dave Conley: 01:30:27

to get a college degree right away.

Dave Conley: 01:30:29

that are critical, and that, I think is, that's where the rubber hits the road.

Dave Conley: 01:30:35

What about you?

jerremynewsome: 01:30:37

Man.

jerremynewsome: 01:30:37

One of my takeaways is that.

jerremynewsome: 01:30:39

There's obviously really unique and different perspectives from a

jerremynewsome: 01:30:43

race standpoint, from an economic standpoint, from a family household

jerremynewsome: 01:30:47

standpoint, there's obviously going to be a lot of things to consider.

jerremynewsome: 01:30:51

But one of the points that I really loved the most is.

jerremynewsome: 01:30:56

That it is changeable and that every single person that we bring this up

jerremynewsome: 01:31:01

to your point, they are aware of this.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:02

Yeah, it's not going awesome.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:04

And there's definitely some type of radical change that needs to happen.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:08

Both of our guests really elaborate to the fact that.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:11

Yeah, it's not perfect.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:12

And it's probably far from perfect.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:14

And to speak on that for just a moment, like numerically, the average federal

jerremynewsome: 01:31:19

loan debt per borrower is 37, 853.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:25

The total average loan debt, including private loans is just north of 40, 000.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:31

Student loan debt has grown by 52 percent since 2013, and then 16

jerremynewsome: 01:31:37

percent of the American adults have outstanding undergraduate student debt.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:42

16%! Dude, that's really high.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:46

And then factoring in the tuition and fees have increased 192

jerremynewsome: 01:31:50

percent faster than inflation.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:52

So there has to be some issue there.

jerremynewsome: 01:31:55

And then the fact that you bring up the general populace of this

jerremynewsome: 01:31:59

country and you ask a college student, are you using your degree?

jerremynewsome: 01:32:04

83 percent say no.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:06

And that is probably pretty astronomical too.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:09

So you're going to college, you're paying for college, you're getting a degree.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:13

And you still don't use it in the job force and it's not necessary.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:17

I shared my own personal example of that too.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:19

And then ultimately having the awareness, having the notion that there needs

jerremynewsome: 01:32:27

to be some level of distinction or separation of who gets the money.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:33

Who gets scholarships having both Robert and Jeremy be like, yeah, I think

jerremynewsome: 01:32:38

that's a unique perspective, right?

jerremynewsome: 01:32:39

Being able to assist them systematize or create some level of industries or

jerremynewsome: 01:32:45

sectors of our job force that should get a reprieve from student loans.

jerremynewsome: 01:32:51

or that should at least get some type of lesser impact on the front

jerremynewsome: 01:32:55

or the back end was was a point and was a policy that was pretty widely

jerremynewsome: 01:33:00

accepted in our conversation as well.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:02

So what I'm learning is that it's an incredible opportunity right now to

jerremynewsome: 01:33:07

get a groundswell of people to come together and go, all right, it all is

jerremynewsome: 01:33:12

going to stem to education once again.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:16

And this is a component of education.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:19

It is something that we can broadly bring to the forefront

jerremynewsome: 01:33:23

that, Hey, this is a problem.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:25

Hey, we can make a change.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:27

Yes, we are having some success, but that's very similar to, in my

jerremynewsome: 01:33:33

opinion having a U. S. basketball team after they win a series say

jerremynewsome: 01:33:39

that they're world champions.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:41

When they beat everyone in the U. S. It's are we competing with ourselves?

jerremynewsome: 01:33:46

And it's I feel like we are.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:47

And because if we start comparing ourselves to other countries, we are

jerremynewsome: 01:33:52

losing in 96 percent of every, in any category that we would deem beneficial.

jerremynewsome: 01:33:59

So to that point, and to your point that you said, there's a

jerremynewsome: 01:34:02

lot of countries that are far less expensive than the U. S. And that are

jerremynewsome: 01:34:07

getting potentially better results.

jerremynewsome: 01:34:09

So it is a problem.

jerremynewsome: 01:34:11

That's what I've learned.

jerremynewsome: 01:34:12

I've learned that we are on the right track to solving it.

jerremynewsome: 01:34:15

We are bringing on amazing guests.

jerremynewsome: 01:34:16

We have incredible guests coming forward and putting their names down

jerremynewsome: 01:34:20

to be on this podcast so that they too can begin to solve America's problems.