I have the top of the hour. So let's begin our session. Welcome everybody. Welcome to the Future Trends Forum. I'm delighted to see you here today. We have a couple of fantastic guests who have written a really, really important book and I'm really looking forward to our conversation. Now I want to introduce this week's guests and I want to do it on a personal note. Not only do I consider the awesome Noah Pickas to be a friend, not only does the other guest have a perfectly spelled first name, but also their topic is something that I just experienced last week. Some of you might recall if you were here that I was leading the program from Qatar in the city of Doha, working in one of these global universities. The topic here is starting up new institutions around the world that have global engagement, global footprint and participate in the whole world of higher education. They have a new book, which I can't recommend enough. The New Global Universities. Out from Princeton University Press and the goal is to take you through eight examples, eight different universities that are startups that and they each have a different plan. They each have a different footprint, a different relationship with other organizations and governments and our goal here is to learn about their research and their own work, what they've discovered through all this. So let me begin by bringing up the great Noah Pickas because Noah has been a guest in the program before and I'm really grateful that he has joined us again. Welcome Noah. Thanks Brian. It's great to be back here to see all of you and of course to be interviewed by Brian and with Brian, spelled the same. It's gonna get pretty uncanny pretty soon. Noah, where are you today? Where have we found you? I am in Durham, North Carolina. Excellent, excellent. Where the weather is no doubt fairly comfortable outside. Fairly comfortable. Yes. Noah, every time we talk to you, you have so many insights and you seem to do as much work as any 10 brilliant academics. I hesitate to ask this question. What are you working on for the next year? What's ahead for you? You're way too kind, but you can share that with my boss anytime. I will. I have probably three different components other than this work Brian and I are doing on this book. One is I'm a Dean at Duke Kunchun University in China for Academic Strategy and we're at the sort of five year mark where it's time to have that transition to the 2.0 version of a new university. So we're crossing that bridge. Brian and I are working together on gathering 40 new universities from around the world beyond the eight that we did to come together in a summit this summer to talk about what they've learned. So those are lessons learned for others who wanna found new universities and also whether there might be lessons for established universities. And then I have my other job at Duke which is focused on issues that we're all dealing with right now, the conflict in the Middle East, free expression and pluralism, teaching excellence. So those are the sort of baskets that I'm working in. Wow, that's still awes me with the sheer amount of work you're doing especially building on the new global universities by expanding the number to 40 and that's terrific. I can't wait to see more of this. Hang on one second though. Let me bring your colleague up on stage while we've got the two of you. So welcome to Vice President Penpris, hello. Hello Brian, how are you? It's nice to be here and it's nice to also see Noah again and actually our book kind of started in a series of these kind of zoom conversations almost like a seminar where Noah and I were kind of teaching each other about all the things that we were learning from our different corners of the earth. Excellent, excellent. Well, I'm glad to bring you back to your roots that way. What, and this is something of the future that we can have video conferencing being in the past. What are you gonna be working on for the next year? What lies ahead for you for the rest of 2024? Yeah, well currently I'm on sabbatical so I'm at a very global but not particularly new university in Cambridge, Massachusetts for the year and I'm studying a future of higher education here with the Harvard Graduate School of Education and in particularly the AI revolution that everyone's looking at and how AI is going to make its way into every part of higher education and how we can kind of get in front of it and manage it in ways that will enhance the human experience of higher education and not put us into some kind of robot-filled dystopia. So I'm very interested in kind of the humanistic aspects of blending high technology and liberal arts and how you can get that fusion so that both complement each other. I'm also doing some traveling. I visited new universities in Malaysia, Hong Kong and I'm going on another trip to India and Bangladesh in late March. Wow, that sounds like a fantastic sabbatical. The combination of being able to take the time to deeply dive into a complex topic like AI and then to also travel at an epic scale. Fantastic. Yeah, it's been really fun and this is a good place to be because there's a lot happening here at Harvard and MIT and everyone's grappling with the AI revolution right now. Yes, yes indeed, yes indeed. Well, welcome to both of you. In fact, let me just make things a little bit a little bit more balanced and let me kick things off. Friends, if you're new to the program, I'm going to ask our guests, our authors a couple of questions about their work. And as we talk, please think about what you'd like to ask them, especially both your curiosity based on what they say but also how their work, how what they describe connects with your own work and your own thinking about higher education's future. The first question I wanted to ask and Brian, I gave you a hint of this earlier is your book looks at eight different universities and they're each different in crucial ways. They're all startups, they're all new. Everything from Olin College of Engineering to Minerva to Ashoka University. And at the end of your book, you have this great, great chapter. For me, it was actually two chapters on lessons learned. And one of the things you point out is that of these eight institutions, seven survived and not gonna survive but have succeeded really well and established themselves with global reputation. And you point out that that's an extraordinary success rate. If you look at business startups, the success rate is the survival rate is usually closer to 40% if not lower. And here you have some triumphs. I'm wondering if you could just quickly tell us what enabled these institutions to do so well and either of you can start. I'll say a word and then turn it over to you, Brian. I would say that this wasn't a careful study where we had 400 schools and we selected them and we basically identified ones that seemed compelling to us. We were not running a study. To me, there were two key features that are a little bit opposite of each other but were incredibly important. On the one hand, none of these institutions would have survived if they were not completely audacious. If they did not have a vision that was compelling that drew faculty and students and donors and governments and others to them and that really promised something that people wanted to commit to and sacrifice for. And at the same time, they exhibited flexibility. They were able to navigate moments when if the founding vision stayed exactly like it was, it would be too brittle. And that combination of sort of gas and brakes, audacity and flexibility really has been the crucial element and it's also an ongoing one they live every day. If I might also jump in, Brian, I really liked your analogy with business and that was a constant thread in our thinking and both the similarities, but I may be more importantly the differences between a new business and a new university. Both are entrepreneurial ventures. Both are working to differentiate themselves in a crowded marketplace. And yet the kinds of strategy that you have in a new university are very, very different to the complexity and the very different numbers and very competing interests amongst stakeholders in your enterprise. And so we saw that the leaders navigate through this incredible complexity with amazing skill. It was quite inspiring and very dramatic too as well. And because they were able to start from scratch, they were really able to differentiate themselves nicely from other offerings either in the world entirely or within their region or their country. So they offered something really unique that no one else was able to provide. Excellent, excellent. Well, that sense of uniqueness, distinctiveness, which we often think about as higher education strategy, what does my college or university do that nobody else does or not in this way or as well? And in that combination, I love that gas or brakes, being able to be audacious and also to be able to pivot and change. We have a really good question in the chat. They just came in from Joyce Ogburn, our good librarian friend. And she asks, is there a point where institutions tend to ossify? No one just raised his hand and put up the front. Five years. Five years. Yeah, I mean you can measure in student life times or, you know, sort of like dog years in a way like new universities have a different time scale. So the first year of the university seems like a decade to those involved in it. And Noah and I were both involved in starting new universities. And then by about year five, as Noah's saying, when you have your first graduates out, it starts to then settle into more or less a desire to achieve steady state, partly due to the exhaustion that everyone has had from this incredibly demanding start-up phase and partly due also to just the need for signaling that stability that both faculty, students, and parents and employers want to see. So there's always tensions in a new university. That's the gas and brakes that Noah's talking about. And the tensions are pushing them two ways simultaneously. They usually try to point somewhere in the middle that allows them to remain innovative but also to achieve stability at about year five. And I would say the really interesting point too is when a university becomes older than the students. Because we find that in our sample and another university looked at around 18 or so years when they're older than their students, you go through a full life cycle of many of the professors and they're starting to get close to retirement age. And there's another point of reckoning where the university really has to figure out whether they're still a new university or not. It might be worth adding here that, so one of our schools for instance that many of you may know, the Olan College of Engineering which is the oldest of the ones we studied started just about 25 years ago. And they've had one president for Rick Miller for a long time and then in recent years or second Gilda Barbino. And we were in a conversation with her just the other day, Brian and I. And on the one hand, Olan has been brilliant in that they have created a culture of continuous improvement. It's not every 15 years we will do a strategic plan or a curriculum review. There was a way in which things they really did like engineers prototype and iterate and change. And it was clear that that was built into the culture of the place. At the same time, as Brian indicated once you become 18, 20, 25 and you have to figure out what are the things that need to stay put and because you need some things to stay put but also how do you renew that kind of innovative spirit? It is very impressive to us the power of the regression to the mean to begin to look like everybody else even when your intention was precisely the opposite. It's a powerful force. Oh. Yeah. We found a fancy word for it in some of the literature, memetic isomorphism but the idea that basically universities copied each other and they do it partly to speak about prestige and actually that everyone wants to look like the fanciest and most prestigious university and partially because at least in an existing university all the pressures are for conforming in terms of being something recognizable to employers and so being different is a real challenge because you have to then demonstrate that your quality makes it worth being different. You have to have that real value that justifies being a little bit at odds with the other types of universities and Poland College definitely made that case as have many of our other students because they are distinctive and for example, the Poland College ranked right alongside MIT as tops in undergraduate and innovative engineering education around the world just recently all within about 20 years from its being formed. Wow. And the other schools too have been graduating Rhodes Scholars, sending people to the top PhD programs. Even the one school that didn't survive in its present form, that's Yale and US College in Singapore, you could submit it if it were a company as being taken over by a larger one. So maybe you could give it as a merger because naturally the numbers of Singapore is taking it over and it's now operating in its endless college. Yeah, yeah. Which is quite a story and you tell this well. Friends, by the way, I'm sorry I didn't mention this. Chris Jensen asked us in the chat, if you haven't had a chance to read the book on the bottom left of the screen, you should see a kind of tan colored box that says the new global universities. If you click that, that should take you to the university press website so you can grab a copy. So the new global universities, Chris, is the title. We have some questions bubbling up there in the chat and please feel free to transfer those over to the Q&A boxes, friends, so I can share them. Or if you wanna ask them out loud, let me know. Put a click the raise hand button so I can bring it up on stage. Again, another question I wanted to ask you to, if I could step back a little bit, is why and how make these global universities I'm asking because we have, in the United States, we have a very different higher education environment than most of the world. We have our private, always financialized, high student debt system of tuition payment. We also have the demographic problem that other countries are struggling with as well. But also, so many nations right now are turning away from globalization. Either sometimes it's explicitly political, sometimes it's an attempt to preserve local traditions, folk ways, ways of knowing.  And of course, we have geopolitical problems, economic problems that are causing difficulties with globalization as a whole. So I guess why and how do these campuses throw themselves into the global ecosystem? No, you wanna start about that? Sure, I'll start and hand over. I think, when Brian and I began this book, we'd actually, our focus, the original title for the book was Start Up You. And the focus was just on new universities. Like a lot of you, we've worked in existing universities and we have that love-hate relationship.  And in particular, the difficulty of bringing about change. And so we were looking at new universities and of course, there was, as there is now, a lot of gloom in, particularly in the US context about all the problems with universities, many of which are true. There are real problems and there are external critics of them and interns. And our focus was increasingly drawn to the fact that so many of the new startup universities were happening all over the world. The sun was shining, particularly universities that were focused on a liberal arts and science education broadly understood. So we weren't looking at somebody who was trying to do, badges and certificates and online degrees. That's a whole nother world, of course. So what we found was that these new universities were all over the world. And in one sense, they weren't global at all. They were often oriented toward driving the regional economy, whether it's Singapore or Vietnam, or it was actually to bring a more innovative education to those regions. And in other times, they were deeply global in the sense that they had students from all over the world, they had faculty from all over the world and they were consciously trying to create a curriculum and a pedagogy that drew on many traditions. So it's a bit of a journey you have to go on to get to the global features. Yeah, if I could jump in. I mean, any university that you start is automatically gonna be global, just like virtue of the fact that it's inheriting faculty and curriculum and ways of academic cultural assumptions that have driven, largely from Europe, American universities have that sort of European kind of orientation. And in this case, adapting it to other countries is a liberal arts, it gives you a chance to import, but also modify and reinvent. And so that was the other part of our title. This is not, in most cases, just an American university plot on a foreign shore, but they are genuinely expressing and reinterpreting the cultures of their region, genuinely having dialogues and thinking for the first time about this moment in their countries as they reach above colonialism and as they really strive toward greater levels of leadership and more advanced fields. And especially in Africa, even though many of those schools, like HSC and National Leadership University, which we write about, they were not particularly global in that they weren't like NYU bringing together 110 countries, but they were pan-African. They had aspirations to really bring together the whole continent and to inspire a new generation of ethical and entrepreneurial leaders, as Patrick Aloua, the founder of this recipe, talks about. So in all cases, I think they were looking to sort of take the local culture and sensibilities and enable the people from the area to reach the greatest heights possible in their lives, leadership, knowledge, work, if you will, but also a deeper sense of what it means to be human and what it means to be Vietnamese, is what it means to be Denean, what it means to be from the Mina region, and not as a Western interpreter would say, but as they themselves would say. And so all these schools have amazing programs that really reflect the cultures that they're rooted in. And this gives rise to actually Noah's invented term, rooted globalism, which I think now you can talk a little bit about if you like, but it's a beautiful way to express a type of globalization that is rooted in a particular context and culture. Please do, please do. Well, I'll just try to, I'll make it brief here. I think that, rooted globalism is, simply if you think of most education being fundamentally national because there are national systems of education. And on the other hand, particularly in the West and then exported elsewhere, the term of art we've all been used to hearing is it's about global citizenship. And both of them seem problematic from an educational perspective in that the connection between your ethnic, your racial, your religious, your whatever national identity is important. Those identities are important. So is an increasingly global dimension and their tensions between the two.  And so we have talked a lot about rooted globalism particularly at Dukunchan University where the tensions are built in. The assumption is as an individual you're gonna be navigating your life at all these different scales and that our governance systems are navigating that. And rather than have an aspiration of here is what the answer looks like it's to understand what those levels and the identities are, where the tensions are and how best you can navigate them. And that seemed to us at least like a more compelling vision than the other ones on offer. Yeah, if I could just jump in one more time. There's a lot to, you asked why Brian. And indeed now there's a lot of centrifugal courses that are flying, making the world kind of fly apart. People retreating into nationalistic little enclaves and rejecting the thought of globalism. And I think because of that these universities I think become all the more important because they are a force for drawing us together and finding ways of crossing culture, understanding and deeply learning from each other. And I think this is an important and even more important notion today as a way of really deeply understanding each other and really working to get a sense of a global community that can work together on some of the really intractable problems that we all face. So I think these schools create leaders that are not just from country acts but do have that more global vision about their mission in life and their purpose. And I think that's another exciting thing about these institutions. Sounds, this is me vigorously agreeing and saying this is fantastic and we need that especially if we're trying to tackle the climate crisis. But let me step out of the way. Let me thank you both for those great answers but then let me also see what the rest of the community would like to inquire about. And again friends, if you're new to the forum or if you're out of practice just click on the very bottom of the screen and either click the raise hand button if you wanna join us on stage. And unfortunately it looks now like you either have to have a beard or be named Brian to be on stage but it's okay. Other, the rest of you are welcome but or click the question mark if you'd like to ask a Q and A question. In fact, we have one of those right now. This is a quick one for you and maybe pointing towards your new project. This is from Hal Hepner in Southwestern University. Any experience of the Universidad de Libertad in Mexico, this school uses many of her project tools. I believe they're in year one or two. Yeah. So yes, I was at Minerva project for just over a year and that's also one of the books though the university not the project is the consulting parent organization. And Brian and I featured the university in the book and the Universidad de Libertad wanted to create something, they wanted an alternative to the traditional institutions in Mexico. I think they had something of an ideological they wanted very much Libertad to emphasize freedom and not government control but they wanted to create a more flexible way for students to get degrees and not just simply bachelor degrees but they wanted to do it in a way that it wasn't what you so often see which is okay, we're going to have here are four certificates and three merit badges and you put them together and we'll call that an education. They wanted to do it in a way where there was an underlying taxonomy to the core ideas that they were teaching and so core principles and concepts and skills were connected across whatever the certificate or badge or degree you were going to get and they're just in their startup phases as you indicated but it's a fascinating example of an institution drawing on one of our universities that we featured and then adapting it to their particular needs and interest in context. Yeah, and this raises an interesting aspect of these universities, even though they're small many of them have as few as 400 students they're having an outsize impact in terms of how they're inspiring other universities. So Minerva has inspired this university in Mexico. Holland has all these different visitors around the world looking at their situation and their approach to engineering education. When I was at Yale and US College in Singapore we had people all over from India, from elsewhere even to Kunchan University looking at our design of the curriculum and getting ideas from it. So it's a really amazing kind of open source flowering of this kind of global arts that's happening and these schools are all learning from each other and as they grow toward maturity and stability and really becoming leading universities I think they can help inspire a lot of other startups giving an example of the fact that they could make it despite all the odds. Excellent, excellent. Well, that's a great question. Did my video just go black? Yeah, you're frozen. Either that or you're very thoughtful right now. I'm super thoughtful. Hang on one second. Let me just refresh my screen. Give me one second here. Anyway, we can keep talking I guess but this is something that Noah you wrote about and we wrote about deciding that we have a pluralist view of impact that these are not schools that have 300,000 students and yet even though they're small because they're producing these amazing leaders in their countries that are so dynamic and because they're sort of models of how to restructure curriculum to rearrange faculty to reinterpret the canon in different parts of the world really have an outsize impact. Yes, I think that what we came to a lot of the conversation particularly in the US has quite understandably been focused on questions of scale because scale is a way to achieve greater access and address equity issues. I spent a lot of time. I see there's some folks from ASU here. One of the most innovative, interesting kinds of places done so many good things. And yet at the same time they're, Brian and I had this sense that the conversation has become too dominated by the question of scale. If you know that you have to scale up to 100 or 200 or 300,000 or you have to be online and have some kind of technological product that you're offering. And our view is that's all important. Sometimes we wonder about the quality of some of those projects but our focus was to turn more on instead of trying to maximize and scale everything we think there's a lot to be learned from a network from an ecology of experimentation and innovation. And so we wanted to hold up examples of that which as Brian has indicated other institutions are not so much becoming, they're not joining forces and amalgamating but they are learning from that and then taking on their own view about what it would do, what would happen locally for them to matter. We find that quite inspiring and it's a more pluralistic ecology. Although there's always the downside which is everybody then reinvents their own thing and there's no mezzo level scale where you actually say, well, what have we learned across these institutions that we would want to replicate in more than one place? But in general, we're pro experimentation and ecologies in how we approach this. Yeah, and it might actually be sort of an American tendency to immediately point to size and scale and numerical measures as a way of engaging the importance of an institution but what we're really impressed by these schools and we selected them for this reason is for the depth and intensity of the education they provide. They're all residential institutions. They all form very tightly knit communities. And so in that way, they're also kind of a different kind of mission from some of the larger online universities. The larger online universities are doing fantastic work and they're pioneering lots of great things but that's not what this book is really about. It's about that really intensive, really interpersonal kind of dialogue-based education that's found in our best liberal arts colleges imagined around the world. So I think Brian has really had trouble connecting over there. Well, why don't we, if, since I think Brian controls the stage, but if there are comments or questions in the chat box that we could pick up on, please feel free. I'm not sure if we're all frozen right now. Yeah, maybe we're all just talking to a frozen world out there. So John has this comment about- It's a good question. Yeah. Sorry, I'm just on. Yeah, so Bill has this question in the chat about on the other end of scale, you've talked about campuses taking on their own view or having an epistemological focus. Do these ideas sustain past a certain size? And at one level, we can't fully answer that. That is some of the schools we look at intend to stay small. Others are, ah, Brian, we're mid-set. Yeah, we were just building questions. So we're making you- Obsolete. Obsolete, yeah, exactly. So- Well, my- Control, get a cool drink. We'll take it. No, we're just trying to fill in for you, Brian. Well, you two are marvelous. My apologies, my Mac Mini has been having some interesting issues of videoconferencing lately. So I've switched to another laptop and it apparently has the approval of one of the cats. Nice. Who is here to say hello. So you're literally hurting cats then, as you mentioned earlier. Every day, it never stops. We have a, would you mind if I dealt into some of the questions that have come up? Please. This is one that is from a wonderful, great student, Vyn, Annelle Albertow. And she asks this classic question, which is, how do you navigate, how do these universities navigate the politics within their community, state, and country? Yes, with great care. No, you wrote a lot about that in one of the chapters. Yeah, so let me just pull out one aspect of that, which is most of these are broadly speaking, liberal arts and sciences institutions. And a number of them are operating in non-democratic or authoritarian settings in the UAE, in Singapore, in Vietnam. And part of the story we tell is how they try to navigate those tensions. On the one hand, you have critics, often from home campuses whose views are, this is destroying liberal education. There's not gonna be any academic freedom. You're teaching students things that they can't possibly practice. In the book, we articulate those views and we articulate the views of many of the founders and leaders of these institutions, who I think take an approach of, they have to be careful about the risks, but it's too easy just to say, well, let's keep things in our nicely tended campuses with flower beds and where we think we have academic freedom, although that's a whole question unto itself. In the West, we need to actually try to do this in places where it is challenging and where it is difficult. And how we navigate that is what you should judge us on. And there's a deeper level question here, which is on the one hand, there's a desire in many parts of the world for an American style liberal arts education, often because it seemed to be a driver of innovation in the economy and technology. But of course, it brings with it a lot of other issues. And the question of whether a Western-based liberal arts approach is fundamentally individualistic, less community-oriented, less collaborative, how it works with not only authoritarian governments, but cultures that have more communal dimensions. So Confucianism is one example in Singapore and in China. You can find it in lots of other places. All I can tell you is we try to tell the story of where we think the risks are and how the people have navigated them, but our own view has been that trying to navigate them is worth doing rather than just writing it off. Yeah, and if I might quote from the book, we're talking about how it's easy to criticize the hard task of advancing intellectual freedom and human creativity in what in the book we call imperfect and fraught circumstances. And the book points out that there's sort of a moral division of labor, and as the book says, in which proponents of unfettered academic freedom defend the garden walls, and in some cases, institution builders are tending the new vines that must grow in more inhospitable terrain. And I thought that was, I mean, I think you wrote it Noah, so I'm gonna give you credit for a very nice sentence. But it's not a perfect situation, but it's a situation where these schools can really play an important role in maybe redefining citizenship in some ways and really opening up conversations that hadn't happened otherwise. And the one example we write about is the way the Vietnam studies course at Fulbright Vietnam took life as a response to the government requiring a Ho Chi Minh thought course. And they actually did it so well that other people from the government and other universities have started to adopt parts of their curriculum. That's so huge for Vietnam. I mean, that's a very very fraught environment. And that was a very inspiring story. Thank you. Thank you both for these answers. And Annel, good to see you. What a great question. We now have a video question coming from our friend, Chris Janssen at Ed Studio. Let me just bring her up on stage. And there she is. Hello, Chris. Hello. Okay, I have to tell you, I got this in my stocking for Christmas. It is emergency mustaches. So I'm so excited that I can break one out because even though I can't put a barrier on it, I'm gonna do it. So, I can sit on stage here with you guys. Welcome. So try to take me seriously here, okay? Very seriously now, very seriously. Yes. Okay, first of all, I already bought your book. I just bought it. Great, great choice. And I'm like so, so excited. My heart's racing, my belly's on fire. I love this fricking topic. I used to be a professor. I'm in New York City, Chris Janssen. I used to be a professor at Fordham in the business school for 12 years, direct of entrepreneurship. And I left three years ago and they created my own campus in virtual reality. I wanted to, I can't wait to talk to you guys. It's the demands of the workplace, the needs of students all the stuff. It's just not happening within the animal. And I'm like, let's engage, you know, emerging technology, whether you want to talk VR or AI, focus on experiential learning. I put this whole consumer program together. And quite frankly, I haven't pivoted after a year because to get people to, as much as there's demand out there for something new, better, different, we're so ingrained with higher ed means going to a college, a four year college and paying a boatload of money and da-da-da-da-da and alma mater this net. And then, but we're, too many people aren't thinking of, well, what's the end result? What, why are you even doing this? Is it supposed to be, you know, you get you ready for a career? So I have a lot of thoughts on that. Grades, how we assess people, are we even listening to industry and giving them students with the skills or in demand? Poof! Kapawi. But anyways, I would love to talk to you guys more about this because there's so much opportunity out there and it really is what's best for the students and preparing them for, you know, fast-paced, fast-changing world that we live in. But I cannot wait to read your book and thank you for doing that. And Brian, great to see you and thank you for hosting this. I'm gonna stop talking, but I really look forward to talking to both of you. I'm so on the same page with you and so event and making some change. So anyway, the end. Oh, oh God. Oh. Can I really respond? Just because I love your energy and the mustache as well, Chris. And I think what you're pointing to is really, we're all in this together. You know, this is a community of people who really see that things can be different and are actually making it different. And in our book, we tell the stories of people who've left secure, comfortable circumstances and at great personal risk and difficulty jumped into this crazy world and they did it because they had that vision and they had that commitment to students. They really believe they deserve better. And we write a lot in the book about how a lot of universities are kind of old and a lot of them may be resting a little bit on their laurels based on their prestige. And one quote that we use from Steven Trakenberg, he says, college is like a vodka of labor less average that people will spend more on if it comes with a brand name because the name signals something about the buyer but not about the product. So the truth is building something that actually substantively is high quality and is different. And I think these schools are all striving for that and almost every case have actually done it. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you, Chris. Yeah, kudos to you guys. This is really awesome. It is. It's also an idea. Thank you. And once again, we have the idea of offering a future transform line of beard supplements for anybody too. The product idea. Yeah, I think it is. There's a branding opportunity. We've had a couple of questions about libraries in this respect. And I wanted to put one up and Noah, you kind of answered one in the chat. And here's one take of this from Elaine Lasta at Albany, Sydney. Did you examine how these concepts of continuous improvement, audacious vision, flexibility, et cetera, affect the libraries of these institutions? What is the role of the library? And then she goes on to say, how does it contrast to R? And I think how does it contrast to everybody else's role? I can think of two things right off. One, Minerva University, which Noah, you would know, but it doesn't have a campus. So it's entirely online with its library, I would imagine. And Yale and US College, where I used to work, they merged the IT and the library together along with the maker space and they had a dean level position managing all of those functions. And so I think in a lot of cases, they've had the freedom to reinvent libraries and construct them in a more modern context and really emphasizing the need for a lot of electronic materials, but also the way that a library is kind of more of a collaborative space and it takes on a lot of other functions in these days more than storing books as its historic function. And so that actually is a big cost saver too for these universities because nowadays you don't need to build a library with a million volumes, which used to be the draw of the college. They would always list how many volumes the library had. Yeah, yeah. I think I'm honor bound to say my wife who I think is on this call is works in the archives. Rubenstein archives here at Duke and we debate this often because I think there's also a trade-off here, which is on the one hand, there are lots of libraries as I'm sure the questioner is part of are reinventing themselves and have become hubs for so many different kinds of things. And at the same time, a lot of the new universities they lack the depth and the archival resources and the ability that we provide to many of our students right there locally. And so, we're not holding up these global institutions or these new universities. They've had to make trade-offs about what they're gonna do that are I think appropriate to their setting and to their financial plan, but it doesn't mean that everything, they are also missing things. And we just need to acknowledge that. And so when students are comparing universities, we all know they can all look the same on the surface, but you look a little deeper and you see some of these differences. And it also is kind of a paradox of a university. They're kind of poised between a curatorial mission to preserve the past and its culture and a future-facing mission to launch students into a very uncertain and changing future. And I think it's safe to say that these schools being newer universities are emphasizing a little more of that future component and a little less of the traditions. And I think there's room for both. And I think one thing we found in this study is that there's a whole diverse taxonomy of universities that have different missions and different strengths, but these ones are definitely looking forward to more than trying to preserve the past. There's a rapid exchange going on in the chat right now with quite a lot about how libraries are already changing and how these might be. But again, it seems to me that what you've identified in this work is glimpses of possible universities to come and that includes definitely the library. We have two questions left. One is a very specific technical question. And one is a grand strategy question. So can we start off with a technical question? Because then you can build on the grand one. And this is one for our good friend, Tom Hames, coming to us from, I believe, from outside of Houston. And he asks, is there a correlation between immigration visa restrictions and universities opening campuses abroad? Was this a driving factor? I mean, absolutely, like for African leadership university, for example, they began in Mauritius, which was a much easier place to get visas than South Africa. And they ended up in Rwanda also. And Singapore being a natural home for lots of different nationalities, same with UAE, it was a natural spot for the global university. So yeah, I think definitely countries that were either already cosmopolitan or seeking to become more so were ripe and good sites for these kinds of universities. That's a great answer. That's a, Tom, as usual, your question puts a finger on the pulse really, really well. That's a very, very important aspect of this. Yeah. There's an interesting book out that I really like, it's called The Geography of Genius. And it talks about like these idea capitals throughout history. And I think that was also part of the ambition of say NYU Abu Dhabi, which is very much wanted to become a talent magnet from around the world. And also Singapore, what really wanted to be a hub of knowledge industries. So I think there's definitely that kind of inspiration driving a lot of these universities. I've heard that from some different stakeholders in Southeast Asia wanting to be a regional hub. Well, thank you for that great answer, Brian. And let me now just step back and ask the larger question, which comes from our good friend, John Hollenbeck, the other end of the US in the capital of winter in Wisconsin. And John asks, what problems were these new universities trying to solve? And what does the facet of being global bring to bear in the solution? Now, you two have been speaking to this question for the past hour in different ways. And I'm wondering what you would add to this. It's a design thinking question, what problem are you trying to solve? And then what makes this, what else does global add to the picture now? So I'll start and hand it over to Brian. I think at one level, they were trying to solve very different things. And global was not necessarily, global was relevant in terms of the ideas they drew on. But it wasn't, as I said, Fulbright University Vietnam was trying to create a new kind of educated, innovative, more liberally trained citizen and worker. That, it's an explicit regional strategy. Whereas Yale and US and NYU Abu Dhabi were basically not only related to the regional strategy, but the global thing they wanted to do is they wanted to create a new incubator for truly a global leadership. Most of our American campuses, the leadership being trained includes some international students, right? But it is still within an American context. And so they were truly more global in their student bodies. Others like Minerva, basically they were incidentally global, which is to say they had a critique of higher education that they believed was just fundamentally flawed, curricular and pedagogically. And they had a technology that they believed enabled them to do better. And then it turned out that you won't be surprised in attracting students. The students were less focused on the pedagogy and the curriculum than by the tagline seven countries in four years. And so the global dimension was part of their strategy to shake up how students learned, but it wasn't, but it was a downstream from their specific larger goals. So there's really not a single answer, I think, across all of these. Lisa, I don't think so, but Brian may disagree. Yeah, and the fun thing about the book, which I think everyone should buy and enjoy is that every one of these founders had a vision. So they definitely were trying to solve a problem. And the one example of all eight, everyone has these stories, but the one I think is particularly dramatic is Patrick Oua, who had a very comfortable life in Microsoft. And then he actually was triggered by the Rwandan genocide, the war in Sudan and the birth of his first child. And when he looked at his eyes of his child, he talks about how he needed to give back to Africa. And he talks about this as his new mission and he realized he'd turned his back on the continent. So now, as he described it, he's thinking about an African renaissance. And he says, and this is one of his quotes, I'm thinking about an Africa that has emerged to be an equal partner in the world polity, economically doing well, culturally doing well, an equal player on the world stage, an Africa that is more interconnected within itself and an Africa where the young people on the continent feel a sense of pride and confidence. And every one of these leaders in all eight chapters have stories like this, where they're really trying to solve very, very deep and very, very heartfelt problems. And I don't think we have time to go into all eight, you're gonna have to read the book. But that's what's so exciting about these leaders is that they're so passionate about their project. It's not an academic project in quotes, it's actually something they feel very deeply. That's a very, very powerful conclusion. I'm wondering which of these eight or perhaps which of the 32 others that you're looking at is the most global, you know, the most non-local, the one that is closest to the closest thing we have to a civilizational university? You know, I don't know what I have on this one. Well, I mean, my answer, I think there are two that presented themselves. I think Yale and US, which Brian helped create, really had the most remarkable, they built the most global core curriculum. So if you just look at that and you say there's a Western core curriculum, what do you do when you include China, India and other countries in that? It really is remarkable. They then ran into the problem, of course, of well, who else are they leaving out as they expanded that? And I think Minerva sought to be the most global in not only in having students go to seven different countries, but their proposition is that there's a set of underlying habits and concepts that across the world are relevant. And so it's less about great books or great traditions and more about a core set of 100 key concepts. Now, you can challenge and question that, but the aspiration was that's what everybody should know everywhere. Yeah, and don't forget NYU Abu Dhabi, which was sometimes called the world's honors college, had 115 nations represented, would admit a student from anywhere on earth and pay all of their expenses and genuinely wanted to bring in the best talent from anywhere. And we tell stories about street kids who heard about the place and got full scholarships and now are working in the government at UAE. Just fantastic stories like that. Well, these stories are what your book tells and this vision is what your book relays. Friends, we are unfortunately out of time. This has been an extraordinary hour. The two of you have showed us an alternative version of higher education that is both inspiring and audacious, fragile and yet still rewarding. Thank you both so much for all of this. Let me ask, how can we keep up with the two of you? Brian, my name's sick. How can we keep up with you in your sabbatical? Should we follow you on LinkedIn? Is that the best way? You can do that. And I also have a blog that I write to less frequently than I should, but it's called BrianPentraise.org and it's sort of a media platform that has lots of posts and other materials related to the book and other projects I work on. Excellent, thank you.  I'm still struggling with social media, but LinkedIn is probably best. That works, that works for all of us. Brian, Noah, thank you so much. This has been an honor and a delight and we're really looking forward to what you do next. Brian, thank you for hosting us. It's great to be back and thanks everybody for sticking with us for the hour. It was great to engage. Thanks everyone, this has really been great and thanks Brian for the opportunity to share this with everyone. A real pleasure, thank you both. Friends, don't go away yet. We need to tell you just to wrap things up. Thank you all for the great questions that have kept everything going. If you'd like to keep talking about this, about Yale National University of Singapore and global universities and all, you can do this actually on the various social media forums. Use the hashtag FTTE to keep up and you can find me here on Twitter, Master Don Threads, Blue Sky and my blog. If you'd like to look into our previous sessions, we'll have talked about international education as well as some of these institutions. Just go to our archive at tinyurl.com slash FTF archive. If you want to look ahead, here are some of the sessions coming up. We've got a whole bunch. Just go to our website forum.futureeducation.us and thank you all again for a terrific hour of conversation. Great questions, great thoughts, wonderful projects. I hope everybody is doing well and please join us next week where we'll talk about our eighth anniversary. Hope you're all well. See you next time. Bye-bye.


All right, welcome back. We're here on General Housing and Military Affairs to hear a bill introduction on H387. H387 was one of a number of bills that came to us last year that are considered within the realm of social equity bills. This is a bill that was originally introduced, the biennium before, and I believe it was assigned to government operations at the time, but we were assigned this bill, this biennium, and so I wanted to be able to introduce it and have a walkthrough, and in this case, to have the introduction of the walkthrough together prior to having stakeholders or other interested folks come in to talk about it and testify to it. So with that, Representative China, are you back? Are you here? Yes, I'm here. Great, well, welcome. Thank you. Welcome back, and please, the microphone is yours. So it's good to see you all again, twice in the same week. Do I have the ability to share a screen? No, I don't. You will in a moment if you wish. Yeah, if not, I can send you the slideshow, but it might be easier if I just do it. Okay, you're good now. I am the co-host now. All right, so let's see. I'm always afraid I'm gonna show people my to-do list, and then they're gonna get vicarious trauma. All right, here we go. So, so HV87 is an act relating to establishing the task force to study and develop preparation proposals for the institution of shadow slavery. So I'll jump right in. So the purpose of the bill is to establish the task force to study and consider a state apology and proposal for reparations for the institution of slavery and make recommendations to the General Assembly on appropriate remedies. So I'm just gonna review some of the findings. There's more detail in the bill that you'll receive during the walkthrough, but the findings we acknowledged that from 1619 to 1865, hold on a second, I'm actually realizing that I have the house healthcare hearing on my phone. So I don't know if you can hear the noise in the background, but I'm leaving that now. So from 1619 to 1865, approximately 4 million Africans, their descendants were enslaved in the United States and the colonies that became the United States. And from 1789 to 1865, the United States, constitutionally and statutorily sanctioned the institution of slavery. And the slavery that flourished in the U.S. constituted an immoral and inhumane deprivation of the lives, liberty, citizens of rights and cultural heritage of Africans and denied Africans the fruits of their own labor. Furthermore, an inquiry into the ongoing effects of the institution of slavery and its legacy of persistent systemic structures of discrimination on living African Americans and society in the United States can be based in a preponderance of academic research, legal documentation, community evidence and culture markers. And following the abolition of slavery, the government at the federal, state and local level continued to perpetuate, condone and often profit from continued practices that brutalized and disadvantaged African Americans. These practices included sharecropping, convict leasing, Jim Crow laws, redlining, unequal education and disproportionate treatment at the hands of the criminal justice system. So as a result of this continued discrimination, African Americans currently suffered debilitating economic, educational and health hardships, including having nearly one million black people incarcerated an unemployment rate more than twice the current white employment rate and an average of less than one sixteenth of the wealth of white families, a disparity that has worsened, not improved over time. So H387 would make a task force to study and develop preparation proposals for any person as a result of the institution of slavery. I'm not gonna read you all the detail on the slide because some of this you'll review in the walkthrough. So just for the sake of, I think some repetition, repetition is good, but there's a fine balance between redundancy and good repetition. So it would look at the institution of slavery. It would look at the de jure and de facto discrimination against free slaves and their descendants from the end of the civil war at a present. And for people who don't know Latin, the jury means sanctioned by the law and de facto means happening otherwise. I mean, that's my best way of saying it. Maybe the lawyer could clarify that. So then it would also ask them to study and develop proposals as a result of the lingering negative effects of the institution of slavery, the use of instructional resources and technologies to deny the inhumanity of slavery and the crime against humanity of people of African descent in Vermont and the US. They would study the role of Northern complicity in the Southern based institution of slavery and the direct benefits to public and private institutions due to slavery. They would, they're being asked to recommend appropriate ways to educate the Vermont public of their findings and to recommend appropriate remedies in consideration of those findings and to submit to the general assembly, the study that they, a study sort of of their work which would have findings and recommendations. So the membership, I don't give a lot of detail here. I would summarize it as it's an 11 member task force appointed by the governor and legislature and minimum four pointy shall represent major civil society and reparations organizations such as the NAACP justice for all black lives matter. Members shall be drawn from diverse backgrounds to represent the interests of communities of color throughout the state have experienced working to implement racial justice reform and to the extent possible represent geographically diverse areas of the state. The duties, they would identify, compile and synthesize the relevant corpus of evidentiary documentation of the institution of slavery that existed within the US and the colonies that became the United States from 1619 through 1865 and some of this is a little redundant from earlier. They would recommend appropriate ways to educate the public. They would recommend appropriate remedies such as an apology, changes in policy and law, reversal of injuries, compensation, rehabilitation, restitution and other reparations. And their report would be due to the general assembly one year from the date of the first meeting according to the way the bill is written at this time. So just a little blurb about the history of slavery in Vermont. There has been some research and there is evidence that slavery persisted in Vermont after the creation of the Vermont Republic. In the Vermont Republic's constitution, slavery was abolished with exceptions and that continued in the Vermont Constitution which was ratified on July 8th. I believe that's the word we use for a constitution approved, ratified, accepted, et cetera on July 8th, 1777. Here's a quote from a seven day story that was taken from a book put out by the Vermont Historical Society in 2014 and the book is called The Problem of Slavery in Early Vermont, 1777 to 1819. And the quote is that among the slaveless holding in Lawless Elite were Vermont Supreme Court judge Stephen Jacob and Levi Allen, described by Whitfield as Ethan's troublesome brother and nearly 60 years after the supposed abolition of slavery in Vermont, Ethan Allen's daughter Lucy Carolyn Hitchcock returned to Burlington from Alabama and possession of two slaves, a mother and child. And Hitchcock continued to enslave this pair for six years in the Queen city. And another quote from an article called disowning slavery gradual emancipation and race in New England, 1780 to 1860, that came out in 1998. The language of the act was sufficiently vague that slaveholding may have persisted without sanction in a few cases for several years. So although Vermont may not have the history of mass slavery that we see in the South that persisted as long, Vermont did have slavery continue in our state, at least up until you see here, 60 years after the supposed abolition which is quite some time and slavery still is allowed in our constitution. So when we talk about systemic racism we recognize that slavery laid the foundation for the systemic racism we see today for the policies, laws, practices that persist. And many of these things have changed and some things haven't. So you can see here some examples and whether or not these happened in Vermont and to what extent would be determined and further understood through the work of this task force. Sharecropping, convict leasing, Jim Crow laws, redlining, unequal education and disproportionate treatment in the criminal justice system. The general assembly has done some work on systemic racism during my time in the legislature at least. And before I'm gonna speak to just my experience so far. So in 2017, we passed Act 54 and it created a task force that acknowledged that racial disparities within the state systems of education, labor and employment, access to housing and healthcare and economic development. It's stated that while slavery has been outlawed in this country for 150 years, the vestiges of it and of Jim Crow remain today in the form of systemic racism. And it concluded everyone has grown up in this country, everyone who has grown up in this country is a beneficiary of a white supremacy culture. We are on a path to reversing this but it will require difficult decisions. And so before I do the final slide I just wanna reflect on that for a minute that it's the first reaction of many people would be like it happened a long time ago. I don't see how I'm benefiting from that but we have to keep in mind that a lot of the development of the United States was based on the backs of slaves that slaves built the White House that slaves slave labor grew products that then came to Vermont and contributed to our economy. So even though we may not have had mass slavery in Vermont we're part of an interconnected economy and that we as a state in some ways benefited from that. And not only that but the national policies, the way that decisions are made at the federal level and then we implement on the state level, et cetera. They all go back to a constitution for our nation and state that treated humans in different ways. And in fact, even considering a human three-fifths of a person when we count them in a census, for example. So there's a lot of, there's a sad but rich history that exists. And as many people know I'm a clinical social worker and one of my areas of specialty is treating trauma. And when we treat trauma it's important to validate and acknowledge the harm that was caused for a person. And it's as a society until we face the truth. And when I say that, this is why study is involved because there's all different stories but if we can collect that and bring it together and present that to the public as a society that acknowledgement of the suffering is an important first step. And your committee has experienced with this with the eugenics apology where you created a space for people to come forward and face a very painful past and you apologized and committed, we committed as a body to making changes moving forward. So similarly here, you have a similar kind of ask which is to have a group, not the committee but a group appointed in a year to create some kind of findings and body of work so that we can tell the truth about what happened and face it and to recommend to us as a general assembly what are some remedies for individuals on the individual level but also on a societal level to address the harm that was caused. So in closing, I'm just gonna show this timeline of dismantling systemic racism in Vermont. So in 2017, we passed Act 54 which acknowledged racial disparities across all systems of state government and that's the report I referred to earlier. Then in Act nine of 2018, we committed to dismantling systemic racism and we hired the racial equity director. In 2018, HR 25 was introduced, many people on this committee were co-sponsors who were around then where we asked the Senate to amend the constitution to ensure that slavery was completely prohibited. We didn't pass the resolution because when we introduced it, colleagues in the Senate expressed a commitment to doing that and so there was no sensing going through all those motions, but it got sort of got the ball rolling. In 2021, we passed, which I think you all, I don't know if there's anyone new on the committee since then but because we've had a few seats turn over but we passed Act 33 which you all probably remember created the Health Equity Advisory Commission which was empowered to address disparities and promote equity in healthcare. We also passed JRH six last session which declared that quote racism constitutes a public health emergency environment quote and it committed to once again eradicating systemic racism. So there's a long record of, well, maybe it's not that long, it's a few years but there's a solid record at this point of our body committing to processes that acknowledge the harm caused by the state and make efforts to address the harms and to make amends. And a piece of that is proposal two which we're gonna be having hearings on, I believe next Wednesday, public hearing next Wednesday at the state house. You saying that makes me cringe a little but yes, in person at the state house, public hearing, JRH six 2021 of 2012, I'm sorry, proposal two, it's a proposal to amend the constitution to ensure that slavery is prohibited to serve as a foundation for addressing systemic racism in our state's laws and institutions. And the next step would be, the logical next step would be to bring in witnesses and hear testimony and consider passing HD 87 which would establish a task force to study and develop reparation proposals for the institution of shadow slavery. So on that note, I'll end just by saying, thanking the racial justice alliance that these initiatives that I just presented, every single one of them, I'm just gonna double check so that I'm correct, every single one of the bills and resolutions that I just presented to you came out of the work of the Racial Justice Alliance. And I think it's important to recognize that because it's a black led organization with other people of color working in the leadership but it's black centered, it's African-American centered and that these suggestions and solutions and policy changes are coming from black leadership. And I just think we need to lift up that point and honor it because part of healing is also sharing power. And you heard us talk about that the other day with seating powers mission. It's not just about changing where we spend money. It's about changing how we share power as a society and empowering people who have been most impacted in telling the truth and coming up with solutions is part of healing as a society from the wounds of our difficult past. So that being said, I appreciate you letting me run through that and I see some questions. So I'm gonna let the chair step in and I'm happy to answer questions and I'm happy to hang around for Tucker Anderson's walkthrough and I'm available as needed. So thank you. Representative Murphy. Thank you so much, Chair Stevens. And thank you, Representative Gina, for your presentation. My comments are really just a request that you actually offer your slide deck to our committee assistant so it can be on our website as a document because it's a wonderful compilation of detail. Thank you. Yep, yes, I planned to do that. So I kind of wait to do that to the last minute because sometimes while I'm sitting in Zoom limbo or on the bench on the uncomfortable bench cramp next to seven lobbyists, I'll change something. So I will email it in when I sign off this call or I could actually email it now. Great, thank you. Representative Gina, this sounds like in your presentation that this is not a truth in reconciliation commission like H96 proposes. This is really a committee that's meant to put together, study the past, come to a point and recommend whether or not anything like a truth in reconciliation commission and apology reparations or what have you would be steps to move forward in the continuing dismantling of systemic racism in the view of this committee. Is that right? I think that's a correct distinction to make that what this task force would do would be extensive research. And if you read, Tucker will go through the details because I didn't want to give a watered down walkthrough. I was trying to kind of do a little bit of the structure and then some historical info. Tucker can get into the details but they are given powers like with subpoena and access to records. So we're really empowering this group to bring in witnesses, to go through documentation and create, it's sort of like creating a like telling the story with evidence and then coming to us with recommendations. Yeah, so it's not like the group is going to make those decisions on their own. If, I think we, as we hear from other witnesses maybe the committee would come to a different conclusion but we started out at this point because this was modeled on federal level legislation that has been brought forward over and over again for many years to look at a national process for reparations. So that's why we went with this approach but it is different than a truth and reconciliation process. Yes. Thank you for the presentation. And again, please share your slide deck with Ron so he can post it on the website. But I appreciate you taking the time off from your work in healthcare to present to us. Tucker, is he still here? There you are. Welcome back. And we're here for a walkthrough of this bill. So please, the microphone is yours. Thank you and good morning for the record. Tucker Anderson, office of legislative council. It has been a little while since I have been back in this committee. So would you like me to share the bill on the screen or would you like me to walk through and you can all track along on your own devices? I think it might be helpful if it were up on the screen. I mean, I know we can all track along but yeah, if you could share it, that would be great. If you're comfortable doing that. I am comfortable doing that. I just have to open it in a separate panel so that we don't inadvertently share any state secrets. That's a joke, right? Can we all see the bill on the screen? Excellent. So a bit of background before jumping into the walkthrough represented, just touched upon it but the contents of the bill that you have in front of you, H387 are based largely as in 98 to 99% on a bill that has been introduced at the federal level by representative Conyers almost every single year since 1989. Much of the findings, the purpose and the structure come from that federal bill that is annually reintroduced with the exception of the structure of the commission which we get into in section two and three of the bill and some Vermont specific context that is built in including some of the language. Starting in section one which covers the findings, declarations and purpose of the bill. It starts in subsection A with some findings concerning the institution of chattel slavery in the United States. Begins by stating that from 1619 to 1865 were approximately four million Africans in their descendants were enslaved in the United States and the colonies. From 1789 through 1865, the United States constitutionally and statutorily sanctioned the institution slavery. The slavery that flourished in the United States constituted an immoral and human deprivation of lives, liberty and citizenship rights and cultural heritage of Africans and denied Africans the fruits of their own labor. Two of these were touched upon representative China's introduction of the bill. The next finding and inquiry into the ongoing effects of the institution of slavery and its legacy of persistent systemic structures on living African-Americans in society in the US can be based in a preponderance of academic research, legal documentation, community evidence and culture markers. This finding is teeing up some of the provisions the representative China touched upon the gathering and occasional inspection of documentary evidence that is available to this task force. Following the abolition of slavery, government at the federal state and local level continued to perpetuate, condone and often profit from the continued practices that brutalized and disadvantaged African-Americans. Again, representative China touched upon this, the practices included sharecropping, convict leasing, Jim Crow laws, redlining unequal education and disproportionate treatment at the hands of the criminal justice system. As a result of both historic and continued discrimination, African-Americans currently suffer some of these debilitating consequences including having nearly 1 million black people incarcerated and unemployment rate, more than twice the current white unemployment rate and an average of less than 1 16 to the wealth of white families, a disparity that has not improved over time. Subsection B contains the purpose of the chapter that establishes this task force. Purpose is first to study and develop reparation proposals for any person as a result of the institution of slavery, including the transatlantic and domestic slave trade that existed from 1565 through 1865 within the colonies that became the United States and the constitutional and statutory support for the institution of slavery by federal and state governments. So those are the two components of that first purpose, which is study and develop reparation proposals for any person as a result of the institution of slavery. Next, the leisure and de facto discrimination against freed slaves and their descendants during that period and Representative China nailed it. Desjure means by law, facto means by fact. So this is calling out both the legal bases for the discrimination and the factual bases for the discrimination. I apologize that my dog is very interested in the context of this legislation. Atlas, move along please. Thank you. Next, the lingering negative effects of the institution of slavery and the discrimination described in subdivisions one and two of this subsection D on living African-Americans and on society in Vermont and the United States. The use of instructional resources and technologies to deny the inhumanity of slavery and the crime against the humanity of people of African descent. The role of Northern complicity in the Southern based institution of slavery and the direct benefits to public and private institutions including institutions of higher education, corporations, religious institutions and other associations. Next purpose, to recommend appropriate ways to educate the Vermont public of the task force's findings, something that representative Sheena touched upon, to recommend appropriate remedies and to submit to the general assembly the study that is pursuing to section two of this act together with any recommendations, which moves us along to the study. Section two, section two establishes the task force and assigns duties. Subsection B, the task force shall perform the following duties. First, to identify, compile and synthesize the body of evidence of the institution of slavery that exists in the United States and the colonies from 1619 through 1865. The task force's documentation and examination shall include the facts related to. So again, these are going to be the factual and evidentiary bases for the study that is submitted. The capture and procurement of Africans, the transport of Africans to the United States and the colonies, including their treatment during transport, the sale and acquisition of Africans as chattel property in interstate and interstate commerce. The treatment of African slaves in the colonies and the United States, including the deprivation of their freedom, exploitation of their labor and the destruction of their culture, language, religion and families. The extensive denial of humanity, sexual abuse and trade of persons as chattel property. The role of federal and state governments in supporting the institution of slavery and constitutional and statutory provisions. Again, getting into the Dejeure bases here, the federal and state laws that have discriminated against African-Americans and their descendants. The other forms of discrimination in the public and private sectors against African-Americans and their descendants. Examples that come up again, redlining education, funding discrepancies and predatory financial practices. And the lingering negative effects of the institution of slavery on living African-Americans and society in the United States. The task force is also required to recommend appropriate ways to educate the Vermont public of their findings and to recommend appropriate remedies and consideration of those findings. In making these recommendations, the task force shall address each of the following components. How the recommendations comport with international standards of remedy for wrongs and injuries caused by the state which shall include reparations and special measures as understood by relevant international protocols. How the state of Vermont will offer a formal apology on behalf of the people of Vermont for the perpetration of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity. How Vermont laws and policies that continue to disproportionately and negatively affect African-Americans as a group and how those that perpetuate the lingering effects both material and psychosocial can be eliminated. How the injuries resulting from matters described within this section too, and of course in the research of the task force can be reversed and provide appropriate policies, programs, projects and recommendations. How any form of compensation to the descendants of enslaved persons should be calculated. What form of compensation should be awarded through what instrumentalities and who should be eligible for that compensation. Finally, how in consideration of the task force's findings, any other forms of rehabilitation or restitution is warranted in what the form and scope of those measures should take. So to sum each of those descriptive criteria, summing that up, once they've investigated the de jure and de facto bases, both for historical slavery and for ongoing institutions of discrimination, how they have recommendations for how to remedy moving forward each of those, which may include reparations. Subsection C ends the section by requiring that the task force submits a written report of its findings and recommendations to the general assembly, not later than the date that is one year after the first meeting of the task force. So they have one year after the task force is brought together to provide this report to the general assembly. Section three, for operations nitty gritty. This is the membership of the task force. The task force shall consist of 11 members that shall be appointed as follows. First, three members will be appointed by the governor, not more than two of whom shall be from one political party. The other eight members shall be appointed by the general assembly, four by the Senate, four by the house. And of course, the powers there are the Senate committee on committees and the speaker of the house. Not more than four of those eight shall be members of the general assembly. And each appointing authority, Senate and house shall appoint not more than two members from the same political party. At minimum four of those eight shall represent major civil society and reparations organizations that have historically championed the cause of repertory justice. Members shall be drawn from diverse backgrounds to represent the interests of communities of color throughout the state, have experience working to implement racial justice reform and to the extent possible represent geographic diversity through the areas of the state. The terms of office for the members shall be for the life of the task force, which is one year after the task force is convened that before it gets submitted and we'll get to it later, but the expiration of the task force follows that. A vacancy in the task force shall not affect the powers of the task force. Someone leaves that isn't going to for some reason dissolve this body and it shall be filled in the same manner as the original appointment. So if a member leaves for some reason and it was a senatorial appointment, the Senate committee on committees gets to appoint for that vacancy. The dates that we're going to get to in this section are no longer relevant, but we will cover them. The governor shall call the first meeting of the task force to occur on before January 1st. We've passed the current date in the bill, but that can be amended. Seven members of the task force shall constitute a quorum. That's seven out of 11, something to keep in mind from a government operations perspective, this affects things such as the ability for final action to be taken by the task force at a given meeting all the way through whether or not a gathering of members constitutes a quorum for purposes of the open meeting law. The task force is given authority to elect their own chair and vice chair from among their membership. So there won't be an appointed chair unlike some other task forces you may have dealt with. Subsection F deals with the compensation of the membership. These are the standard provisions you see for many of your commissions and task forces. There is a separate compensation statute for members of the general assembly when they're not in session. And for other members who are compensated pursuant to 32 BSA section 1010, the limitation on compensation is 20 meetings and the money that will be paid for those per diems in compensation is going to be appropriated directly to the task force. Section four, this deals with some of the powers that Representative Chiena briefly touched upon such as the ability to acquire documentation to subpoena individuals for testimony. So we'll start subsection A dealing with hearings and sessions of the task force for the purposes of carrying out the provisions of this chapter, this bill. The task force and this permissive may hold hearings and sit and act at any time and location in Vermont. They can request the attendance and testimony of witnesses, request the production of evidence and documentation. And they may seek an order from the Civil Division of the Superior Court compelling testimony or compliance with a subpoena. They can ask the judicial branch here to intervene and compel the production of evidence or potentially the appearance and presentation of testimony. The powers of subcommittees and members, any subcommittee or member of the task force may, if it's authorized by the greater body, take any action that the task force is authorized to take pursuant to the section. So the task force can vote to delegate some of their powers and authority to subcommittees or individual members to carry out the purposes of the chapter. The task force may acquire directly from the head of any department agency or instrumentality of the executive branch, information that the task force considers useful and the discharge of its duties. All of those departments and agencies shall cooperate with the task force with respect to that information and furnish it as requested by the task force and to the extent permitted by law. When this information comes to the task force, the task force shall keep that information confidential to the extent that it is confidential or exempt from the Public Records Act. So any exemptions from the PRA, any confidentiality that's related to that information carries to the task force and so would any duties of confidentiality. Section five, we deal with some of the administrative structures around the task force. Task force is permitted to appoint in fixed compensation of personnel as the task force considers appropriate. They will have the administrative technical and legal assistance of the Human Rights Commission. They have some contracting power here. They may procure supply services and property by contract. They may enter into contracts with departments, agencies and instrumentalities of the United States, state agencies or private firms and institutions for the conduct of research or surveys, the preparation of reports and other activities that are necessary for the discharge of their duties that we covered in section three. Section six is the expiration of the task force. The task force shall terminate 30 days after the date on which the report is submitted to the General Assembly. So that would be not later than 30 days, one year after the task force is assembled. Section seven contains the appropriation. $200,000 is appropriated from the General Fund to the Human Rights Commission for the purpose of per diem compensation, reimbursement of expenses and the discharge of duties and powers granted to the task force by this act. And the effective date was July 1st, 2021. And that can be amended so we have retroactive formation of the task force and subsequent expiration. Those are the words on the page. Thank you for taking us through that, Representative Murphy. Thank you, Chair Stevens. I have a question about words on the page. So I think it's appropriate at this time. I'm still trying to figure out when we ask what. But in section four on page 10, under powers, when we get to number three, request the production of, in my mind that means we could be saying you can request that something actually be made as opposed to brought forward. And so is that just me not taking the lawyer view of the definition of production? Yes, production in legalese in the term of art means you send it to me, not necessarily that you create. So we often draw a legal distinction between the creation of a record and the production, pursuant to a subpoena or some sort of formal request. I had a feeling, but I just wanted to verify. Thanks. Representative Blumlee. Thanks, Chair. While we have Representative Chino with us, I had a broader question. We took testimony on H273 earlier and I'm wondering how those two bills are related or aligned in any way? May I answer? Yes, please. So they are aligned. When you look at the findings of H273, it makes the case based on research that Seeding Power did to compile those findings. It makes the case that systemic racism exists and it's affected wealth disparity for not only black people, but also indigenous people and other people of color. And it proposes a solution. One specific intervention that the state could do in terms of how it invests money and distributes power. So I'd see a connection there because one could say that H273 is an example of one kind of reparation. So I see a connection there for sure. I would say that it would be beneficial for us to continue taking acts of reparation regardless of whether or not we do further study. In other words, there's enough findings out there and we've passed enough legislation where we've acknowledged there's a problem that to say, oh, we shouldn't take action, we need to look into it more. I think we're past that point. We've already taken actions and like I showed you before the timeline and there's more. There's the ethnic and social equity studies bill. There's other examples we could give. However, I feel like what we do, so if I'm trying to think of like an analogy, it's like you have a house and you know, it's an old house. We live in Vermont. Most of us live in old, many of us live in old houses. You know the old house has 80 things that need to be fixed and you just don't have the time, resources or energy to fix them all at once. And in fact, there's not even the workforce to do that.  You try to plan ahead, but the reality is sometimes you're like, oh, I guess I'm doing that thing now because this just happened. And I feel like that's the approach we've been taking where we know there's all these problems and we're like, well, this year we're gonna fix the windows. Next year, we're gonna paint. The next year maybe we'll do the heating system but I don't know yet. But ultimately the foundation needs to be fixed, you know? And until we fix, we can keep fixing everything else but if the foundation is off then things are gonna crack again, things are gonna break again. So I think that, you know, as we continue moving forward with dismantling racism, we have to get to the root. And we're taking, hopefully taking a step with proposal two, the voters will decide ultimately. That's who decides to amend the constitution. But I think us bringing it to the voters, even if it did not pass, it raises public awareness. I tend to think it would pass because most people don't want slavery in the constitution. At this point, most people don't believe slavery should exist. But I bring that up because it's all interconnected. And so we could be fixing the foundation while fixing the windows, but it would be good at some point to take stock of all the problems in the house and to make a strategic plan like a capital plan of what we're gonna do when and what timeline because then, and that's what this work could give us because if a group took the time and energy and had the resources to do a comprehensive study and compilation and an official public record of the state that acknowledges how slavery happened here, how we benefited all the things you heard then and they gave us some ideas. We could construct a roadmap over the next few years and then looking back, really be able to say that as a society, we faced the problems of the past took a step forward. However, while we're doing that, it doesn't mean we shouldn't fix anything. And so I think we should pass past proposal to, I think we should pass H273 and other equity bills that are spread all through our committees. But I also don't think do, it's not mutually exclusive. Like doing that won't erase the need for this so we could do all that. And we might look back in 10 years and say we missed a bunch of things because we didn't really look hard at the past and create that space as a society to face the trauma and to heal. So I don't know if that's helpful but that's my musings on how they're all connected. Oh, are you all set? No, it's all right. Yeah, I've set for now. Thank you. All right, Representative Walsh. Thank you, Chair Stevens. I've got a, this might sound like nitpicking but I've got a question. I wonder if the definition of the potential beneficiaries is a little bit too restrictive. It seems as if we're limiting this to Africans who are brought here or the living descendants of those Africans brought here because of slavery. And it seems to me that might exclude a number of people who would be equally deserving and a couple of things come to mind. For example, Jamaicans who perhaps were not directly brought here from Africa but was a way station and they're not living descendants of those slaves or people from any African country who came here voluntarily. For example, during the 20th century and were subject to Jim Crow and those other systemic racism issues that you raise. So is, I don't know if you want to try to broaden that definition or if that's a real problem or is that something to leave to the task force to try to define? Dr. Representative Walsh, that was something that we were particularly aware of when the bill was being put together. And I will note for you that when you get to the operative provisions of the bill it specifically uses the term person. So for example, in section, let's take a look at this, both sections one and two when it discusses the study and development of reparation proposals it is for any person as a result of practices and institutions that are then listed below that. So it's not specific to any particular group or category. It's for any person that is either a descendant of or a party that is directly affected by any of the institutions or practices that come later. Furthermore, when you get to the section of the bill that deals with the task force and its recommendations one of the duties that they have in developing both the study and the proposals that result from the study is to examine within Vermont's context who should be a beneficiary based on the particularized history that they are studying that will come back to the General Assembly and you can make decisions from there. May I also weigh in? I think that explanation that would seem to capture my concern. Thank you. May I also weigh in, Chair? I'm assuming yes, it looks like you know it. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. I'm trying to just be more aware because on Zoom sometimes you can't tell things. Yeah. That just to expand a bit on what Tucker said that the bill was written centering African-Americans who descended from the institution of slavery in America but we try to acknowledge that there's circles beyond that circles around that initial group that are impacted and the further you get from the center the perhaps the less the impact perhaps not but we really tried to center start by centering Americans of African descent who came from had roots in the institution of slavery people who have descended from enslaved persons but one could say that if you were Jamaican you're most likely you know if you're an African of African descent from Jamaica you're most likely a descendant of slavery you know if an enslaved person so that's another layer but then another layer are you mentioned recent immigrants from Africa although their families may have faced a completely different legacy of colonization that's interconnected with the slave trade and what happened on earth over the last 400, 500 years they're not impacted the same as immigrants but they are impacted by systemic racism and so that you know so they're another circle and then we go further and we would say that other people of color have faced harm because of systemic racism that's rooted in slavery before those groups were even on the continent and we're not even talking about indigenous people in this discussion yet who had a whole other story of oppression and who were also enslaved you know at times you know so it really I appreciate Tucker's point because the task force is to study and develop reparation proposals for any person we did say that and then we go on to center black people who descended who are descendants of enslaved people and go outwards so I hope that also helps a bit that it was deliberate to center and lift up the struggle of the people who have suffered the longest from it in this place but we didn't but we wanna also acknowledge that it affects many others so and the benefits go the same way too that even people who have descended from slavery benefit from the institution of slavery in some ways and you know because it built the economy we have so if somebody climbs the ladder so to speak let's say somebody is a descendant of an enslaved person but they become wealthy investing in companies that are rude you know that started from exploiting slave labor in some way even though that person has faced harm they're also benefiting so it actually gets really complicated and we need to think about that this part of the process too I'll stop there but just that's just some more thoughts about the harm that slavery has caused and the benefits it caused and you know I think the question is who faced what in that equation? So representative Parsons. Thank you I was gonna save this til we got if we went further with this but since the conversation is going I might as well go along with it. I think the past five minutes really brings up one of the reasons that reparations has always been kind of on the back burners because you either cast too narrow of a net to really capture people who may have suffered from it and then you start growing it out and you just you can't stop. It's really hard to stop growing as representative Cheena said growing those circles around from that you know from that center central group where do you draw that line where you say all right we're stopping expanding this circle and that's in my opinion where it's always come down to where the struggle is because you can't I mean like you said should reparations go to a black millionaire or do we cap it out? Do we cap it as a net wealth? You may have you may be in that small group but now you're flourishing. Are you out of that small group now? There's just so many variables in it that you know the impossible and I think that's why it hasn't happened because it probably is to try and I don't know put a dollar on somebody's suffering I guess I don't know what the goal is but. No it's clearly been difficult and it's and I think the question here in this bill is should there be a task force that can delve in not just to the philosophy of that but of what a possible solution might be and presented back to us. That's the question in the bill. I guess just to expand on that I understand it but this isn't the first committee that's been or Ruth has tried has been done over and over and over and over and that's why it always stalls in my opinion is that you just I appreciate wanting to have that committee to try and figure that out. That committee's been had multiple, multiple, multiple times throughout this country and I think finding that group of people and where you where the cutoff line is is always kind of where it ends. Great any further questions for Tucker or for Brian at this time? Can I ask Tucker a question? I got my team unusual. Yeah well just because representative Parsons you said that it's been tried before. I know this has been discussed but I wanted to ask Tucker because I who has actually passed reparations task force? I think the city of Burlington currently has one but they haven't finished their work yet. Who else has passed one in our you know and actually done this? I'm not specific to Vermont just to throw that out. Yeah, yeah exactly. Yeah I was asking Tucker like you know yeah like because Tucker might know this and if not this might be an area to take some testimony but so I would recommend bringing in some folks to give you testimony on this. Here is what I'm aware of. The commissions and task forces that have been tried in the past focused on very discreet issues and populations. So in the United States the only one that I'm aware of was in Maine and it dealt with the indigenous populations in Maine and very specifically with the what we're known at the time of Maine as the Indian schools in Maine and it dealt with the dissolution of native families in that state. Outside of the United States there have been truth and reconciliation commissions that have dealt with very specific proposals and the most notorious would be in South Africa and I can send you the materials that I have but again I would recommend bringing in someone who has done more meticulous and detailed research on the perhaps more specifically international bodies because that is a component of this bill. It speaks very specifically to addressing and perhaps adopting international protocols for these recommendations. So looking at some of the international bodies that have been created around truth and reconciliation reparations and similar issues. And thank you Representative China for taking time out of your day to present this bill and to Tucker for walking us through it. And we will start to put together a list of stakeholders and folks who perhaps Brian people who are part of the racial justice alliance and others who can discuss the histories that might be involved with this as we move forward with it in conversation. All right everybody, it's 11 30 and I think I'm gonna call it lunch time. Unless anybody had any further comments on going to go back to where we were before talking and talking about any of the particular legislation that we've dealt with or we can, we can just take the break now and I don't know, is it warm enough to take a walk yet? Yeah, let's just do that and Representative Murphy. Thanks Chair Stevens. I just was gonna ask, I know we've had at least one bill and of course I'm totally blanking on what it was where people had questions and it was suggested we'd bring in some witnesses and stuff. And so as we do have bills come to our agenda if you could send out a highlight or tag any for us that are at a place where we can do the deeper dive where we should be asking those questions or say if that's the level we're coming to on this bill are we gonna be hearing from this group or person? Just if there's some, I'm starting to kind of lose track of where in the chute many of our focuses are. Yeah, no, that's fair because there's gonna be a lot of distractions what with a lot of the new bills. Some of this, we still have bills that haven't been introduced from last year. We are going to get a number of bills this year. So yes, that's totally fair about just to make clear. And again, sometimes you'll know by the numbers, right? Anything passed for 70 something like the bill I brought up today, that's this year. Anything before that is last year. But yeah, no, it's totally fair. Just in terms of what level of preparation folks wanna go into, yep. Well, and just trying to help you with what you want us to be ready to do whether we should be ready to think that this is closing out today or this is one that we can put in some thoughts for further look. Yep, I agree, I hear you. Representative Walsh. Thank you, I don't remember exactly when I did this I think it was two years ago. I put together a report for the committee on truth and reconciliation commissions. I can resend that though it's more along the lines of truth and reconciliation rather than this much bigger scope of this task force. I also have details of what the main commission did. The one that Tucker Anderson referred to both very short documents, I can send them to Ron and send them out to the committee. And I think, you know, perhaps again, the potential area of study for on 387 too would be Evanston Illinois just had last year instituted well, they actually tried to make their first payouts of a reparations plan, but they had put money aside several years ago, call them reparations and then have been trying to figure out how to distribute funds in a way. And so that would be an area that we could look into as well, but that's not for today.