Hey guys Thunder E here and welcome to my mini gaming PC build now I haven't done a gaming PC build in a while and I thought this one was necessary Well, I'm at home and you guys are home too. So hopefully you guys are staying safe I wanted to build a PC that was smaller and took up less space because the space I use for my gaming PC Is where I also used to record a lot of my videos So I needed something with a lot of power performance and that's why this video is here Now I want to give a big shout out to Samsung for partnering and sponsoring this video They reached out and said hey, would you like to check out the 970 evil plus which is this bad boy right here? And I said, yeah, I mean I need some MVMEs and these are MVMEs and they have some really good performance So what other parts do I have in this build that makes a lot of sense? So I started off with the processor It's an AMD 3950x. I'll be using AMD processors for a while And this bad boy is pretty much one step to a thread repair or technically is a thread repair if you want to call it that It's powerful performance is great 16 cores 4.7 gigahertz Truly amazing processor to use for a small build like this next up is my RAM I went with the crucial ballistic RAM 32 gigabytes 32 hundred its RGB RAM It's really nice again fits into what I want to in this build Right here now the MVMEs I got two from Samsung I've got one terabyte and a two terabyte of course one for the OS one for games the reason I am really liking what I see from the 970 evil plus is the fact that its read and write speeds are Tremendously high thirty five hundred and thirty three hundred and we'll check that out in this video because it is truly Amazing that I can have that because that means that my games can be read faster Low times rendering all that stuff it comes into play when you put this kind of system together Now this is all going to be mounted on some motherboard and I want the gigabyte eros x50i It's a mini itx board because I'm building a small Small PC great thing on this board is supports up to 64 gigabytes of RAM This also has PCIe 4.0 and has Wi-Fi 6 and will support everything that I'm putting in here Plus the big thing for me is that it also takes up to MVME slots so I can use both of this at the same time on this kind of small board my graphics card is a GTX 20 DTI it's a founders edition the reason I went with this is because it fits quite well packs a lot of performance Into my case and the case I'm using you guys guessed it is the NZXT H1 mini this is a mini itx case you see a lot of builds So my build is not going to go into a lot of detail, but I like this case I mean this is like a plug-and-play case for PC building if you build the PC You know it's it's can be a process especially if you're doing something custom But this is so easy comes with a 650 power supply is also got water cooling as well So you've got a water cooling pump and it's so easy to add all the things in here now Speaking about how easy that build is the case itself pretty much opens up I'm gonna drop of course my motherboard, but before I do that I put all the things I need in there Of course my my CPU the 10 950 X my RAM as well as also my MVMEs now As I mentioned there are two slots on there There's one at the back of the bottom and then there's one on the top which has a cooling fan So that's where my one terabyte is gonna go into and then my two terabyte will go in at the bottom of The motherboard now I slid in our motherboard into the case that's four screws right there Then I put on the cooler. That's pretty simple. I close that up and Next thing I need to drop in is my graphics card now the graphics card Basically, there's a wrap wrap around stand loop that I could connect the card so you can fit and Close the case and we are good to go This is a lovely looking case and build the reason I went with this went with the white is because It takes so much a small footprint. So think about it in all that. We've got a 3950 X We've got you know 32 gigabytes of RAM We've got three terabytes of storage and MVME storage the 970 EVO plus. We've got a GTX 2080 TI And we also have a small great looking case now. What about performance? You know forget that let's go ahead and jump in and blame Nana We got a test how well those MVMEs actually do because Samsung did say 30 up to 3500 and 3300 and Looking at the numbers here. This is truly impressive. It actually does 3553 Which is slightly more than the stadium and also 3328 or so Which means that you're gonna be getting speeds that actually mentioned by Samsung. The other thing also is that the MVMEs Are guaranteed with a five-year warranty So that's actually pretty nice that you can have this for quite a while a long amount of time and still have Warranty coverage for it, but it also means your games are going to run well now I did also a benchmark test with 3d benchmark and I was quite impressed with also what I got because when I compared it to Other benchmarks online. This was placed at 96 and the only thing that beauty was the similar system Except with a dual SLI You know configuration. This is just of course a single graphics card. So you're thinking next okay with yeah It looks great. It's nice, but what about the gaming performance? We've seen the benchmark numbers and you're thinking what about Call of Duty war zone Which we can actually play and also games like do me channel How do they run on a system like this? I gotta tell you just looking at the benchmark numbers this thing ran This is at the max settings here for Call of Duty mobile I was able to get above a hundred frames per second and max out everything at throwing all the shaders and this thing Ran like a beast and even do me channel which you know has a lot of crazy settings on there I max that out and again. I was able to get high 90s hundred frames per second on the system as well Which is truly truly amazing. I like what it I This system brings to the table and even when I'm editing videos and editing in this video that you can see me on there The performance of editing is much better. I'm getting faster times as well So it's also reading off my drive and you know, some people say yes, you know There's a benefit of having a better GPU and also better CPU But also, you know the storage comes into play that read write ability for you to read faster So it can render faster goes a long way and I like those aspects here So there you have it guys. That is my mini gaming PC build Hopefully you enjoyed this video and if you want to go ahead and do yours build yours I have the parts list below plus if you're looking to pick up that brand new Samsung 970 evil plus NVMe. I have a link for you as well. Check it out It performs as advertised and everything is pretty cool. Now if you guys want to see more games or more builds or Just more performance tests on this build. Let me know. Otherwise, don't forget to like share subscribe and Always enjoy entertainment


Namaste and welcome to our N5D mid-month energy report for 2024. From my heart to yours, thank you for your support. Just a quick reminder that I issued new N5D quantum tie-dye t-shirts throughout the month and that as part of our Patreon family, you get $5 off each t-shirt you buy with the code at the checkout. And that includes our latest shirt, the quantum fire element that I released today, so check that out at N5D.net. There's an energy floating around that's similar to the energy of the summer of love in 1967. At the time I was only 6 years old when that happened and while I didn't fully understand the summer of love, I remember that energy. Yeah, that's me wearing bell bottoms and making the peace sign. I remember that feeling and this feeling wasn't felt until after the solar eclipse which made me wonder about the transformational energies that solar eclipses bring. So let's take a peek at them. Our friend Mercury Retrograde came back on April 1st, but honestly it's nothing to fear and there are lots of lessons we can learn from Mercury Retrogrades. Mercury Retrograde is a time when Planet Mercury appears to be moving backward in the sky. This can be seen as a metaphor for reviewing and reflecting on our past decisions, actions, and experiences. People can use this time to re-evaluate their lives, revisit old ideas, and reassess their priorities. During Mercury Retrograde, technology can malfunction or you might experience glitches during Mercury Retrograde. Just be prepared for delays, technical issues, and equipment failures, and have a backup plan in place. Mercury Retrograde can be a time of spiritual growth and awareness. People may feel more connected to the divine and have a greater sense of spiritual purpose and meaning.


Winston Edmonds in here for Studio B. Now I've got another conversation. You know these product experts are my favorite conversations because they know so much. So much knowledge. Got Randy Arsena, who's going to give me some information. What is your favorite topic right now? You've got so many trends. What are you following closely? Thanks, Winston. So I think the things that we're most excited about right now, and you're hearing a lot about it at the show here is certainly flash storage, right? We made a big announcement in April about IBM flash systems where we're really driving the economics forward on flash. So we're going beyond the pure performance benefits to really talk about the value proposition of flash from an economic perspective, which we think is going to be pretty fundamentally disruptive this year for the remainder of this year. The other thing that we're getting a lot of airtime with is the store-wise family. So we've got this whole family of products now that share common functionality, a common code stack, and a service level that sits on top of these products that enables from very small to very large configurations to be implemented, common services, common user interface, very easy for customers to expand as they need it. So I think those are the two things right now that we're getting a lot of airtime on. Pretty exciting. Let's talk about flash for a little bit. You talked about transition, just kind of the way we think about it.  Tell us a little bit about what you've seen in terms of economics. Yeah, so flash, everyone pretty much knows that flash is a very high performance tier. So we recognize that there are performance benefits, but of course what's held it back from being deployed more widely is the cost. I mean, relative to spinning disk, it's still very expensive. But what we're finding with these new flash systems, these shareable devices that can be put on a sand fabric or put behind SVC and presented as a high performance tier, the utilization levels go up really high. So we get very high utilization with the same extreme performance, sub microsecond performance or microsecond level performance. So you get all the benefits of the performance characteristics, but you're also now unburdening the CPUs, right? So the CPU, if you think about all of the elements of the stack, processors, networks, interconnects, everything has accelerated dramatically over the last couple of decades, except disk. Disk has had a very, very nominal increase in speed. So now when you introduce this ultra high performance storage tier, it sort of changes the way you think about architecting applications. So not only are you able to leverage processor horsepower better and more effectively, so that drives down licensing costs you save on software. We can dramatically reduce footprint, right? Physical footprint. So power cooling becomes dramatically lower. So we're actually seeing much more economic parity now with all flash systems as compared to hybrid systems of flash and spinning disk. No, it sounds like that kind of requires a bird's eye view of the entire IT scenario. How difficult is that when you're speaking to CTOs and of course they can look at a very general look and it still seems, doesn't seem cost effective, but so how difficult is it to show them that value? Well, I think that's one of the areas in which IBM is actually very uniquely positioned in the industry because our perspective as a full solution provider, full stack services, hardware, software, best practices, we gather lots of industry and survey data from our customers and from the industry at large. So we have a very clear picture in many cases on an industry by industry basis and a use case by use case basis, the things that work, the things that don't work as well, where we can get those best practices and those economies of scale and we engineer that into the solution. So when we go have that discussion with a CIO or a CTO or a VP of infrastructure, we are bringing to that discussion a level of experiential data and expertise that most organizations, most other vendors don't have. So we can make pretty bold but very defensible claims about the sort of economic benefits that you're likely to get and we've got data to back that up from assessments and other customer engagements. Even so though, because you are offering this product, sometimes it's still, you're the salesman. Is that the secret of IBM Edge and that you have partners and customers all here, all sharing best practices and there's learning happening. Is that the secret of this event? It really is, I think. This is first and foremost, I mean it's a marketing event obviously but there is an incredible educational component to it. If you look at the tracks and all the, so there's essentially three simultaneous events going on. There's executive edge, winning edge for our business partners and technical edge which is a more purely technically focused track. There are hundreds and hundreds of sessions. So if you come here as a participant, whether you're a business partner or a customer, you can consume vast amounts of education in one place at one time and it's a fantastic resource for both our business partners and our customers because it's an opportunity for them to not only get refreshed on what IBM is doing and our point of view and our strategy going forward but to get a deeper level of expertise on existing products that they may not be fully familiar with. So it's a great opportunity to do that. You know, I know when I need information I go straight to you because you've got it ready for me but some of these customers as I'm talking to them, they really are leaning on other customers that they've met here and it's like they understand how this solution worked. It's pretty incredible to watch, kind of the domino effect with customers. Yeah, and one of the things that's most exciting for me is when we get customers to come to events like this and present, right? They're sharing their experiences and from my perspective as an IBM person, I think they're inherently more credible than I am because they actually spent money to buy these solutions so they've invested in this technology. They're getting value from it every day. They're driving business benefit and competitive advantage. So their perspective, I think, is immensely valuable because when they share their experience with their peers, their industry cohorts, they have very real world context for how they're using these solutions, which is tremendous. And actually this event is really a hallmark in that regard and that we have, I think we have about 100 customers who are actually presenting at this event, which is remarkable, so. Let's jump in the time machine and take us forward because as excited we are to educate customers on the here and the now, there are things that are happening and the future products that are poised to be versatile enough to handle whatever the future throws at us, but kind of tell us what to expect and the types of solutions that can weather those future storms. That's a great question and one of the questions we get most frequently from our customers is that all sounds great. I mean, you've painted a picture that sounds very appealing. I understand the compelling economic advantages. I understand the operational benefits I can get. So how do I start? Where do I begin? So we've developed actually a pretty pragmatic approach to helping customers go through this journey of getting from where they are today to getting to a more highly optimized, smarter storage infrastructure. And it's a very practical path. Again, going back to what I said earlier, based on best practices and the lessons learned from thousands of customer engagements all over the world, so we've been able to be very proactive and pragmatic about how we recommend implementing these solutions. So we'll say, for example, identify your high value workloads that are the most IO constrained or the most performance sensitive and migrate those onto one of these new IBM Flash systems. It's simple, it's non-disruptive, it's transparent, and you'll get immediate benefits with no architectural changes required. Then once you get to that step, you can then move logically to the next step. You can start looking at reclassifying data. You can look at virtualization. You can look at some of the other advanced services and you can sort of get yourself along that path without having to make a sort of big bang approach. You don't have to go sweep the floor and replace everything you have today with new stuff. You can do it in a very pragmatic, very economically viable way. Now here at IBM Mint, we've got a lot of IBM personnel running around just sources of knowledge. We've got customers, we have partners. And then we have a third party analysis here at Silicon Angle. Just ask your opinion, how important is it to have kind of a separate entity, these very curious individuals that we are in, but at the same time, we call it as we see it? How important is it to have that third party? I personally think it's extremely important. I mean, one of the things that I spend a lot of time doing in my role is working with analysts and communicating outside of IBM. So not just to customers, but to business partners to analysts like yourself. So I think it's immensely important. From our perspective, it gives us additional information to help drive our strategy. We get information obviously from our customers. We have our own ideas about where we think the industry is going and how we think our portfolio is evolving to accommodate these changing workloads and changing environments. But I think where the analyst community is immensely valuable is, as you said, you bring an objective, a very broad base of information. So we find that to be incredibly useful. I mean, as we're making strategic decisions, we need to understand what's going on in the industry outside of IBM that we may not be as in tune to. So I think it's immensely valuable. We've had theCUBE now and I think all of our major events for the last couple of years, it's become kind of a fixture here. So we think it's a great resource, not just for us, but for our customers who aren't able to be here. For example, they're watching streaming content from theCUBE. They'll, we'll repurpose some of this as we go around the world and sort of franchise this event and other geographies. So it's tremendously valuable. I think we've developed a really good partnership with Wikibon and SiliconANGLE, so. Fantastic. Now you're my go-to guy for all things IBM and the future of storage. For folks that maybe want to tap into some of that knowledge, is there a way to follow you on Twitter or do you have a blog or anything? There is, I have a, I'm ramping up Twitter a bit more. I've been on a bunch of projects, so I've been a little bit Twitter averse, but truth in storage is my Twitter handle. I would also recommend people look at the storage Alchemist, which is my colleague, Steve Keniston, has a blog. He's more, he's very active and has been for many years. You can follow IBM Storage, has a half a dozen different feeds that are very, very active. So yeah, there's a lot of resources. And in fact, if you're on Twitter, we're hashtagging everything here with IBM Edge, so you can get on some of those streams and you'll get some good follow recommendations there as well. There you go. Really appreciate you joining us. Okay, thank you, Winston. Appreciate it.


just don't have a lot of money. Most of them graduated as teachers. And unfortunately, now if I'm stepping on anybody's toes, I don't want to. As a general rule, teachers don't make a lot of money, but they give hard what they make. So you gotta be careful with them. It's all in my comment. I'll quit with that. Thank you. I think Trustee Chambers, I'm sorry. Okay. Go ahead Dr. Ducey. I was just gonna say, when I spoke about the alumni, I was really not talking about the National Alumni Association, the people in it right now. I'm talking about finding ways to go after those people who are not participating at all who are not giving at all.  They will do anything to carry this university along with myself. But we are talking about finding ways to get to those people who have not been an active part of our association. So on the one hand, we're talking about, he was talking about changing everything. On another hand, I was speaking of how important the alumni is and how we can gather more people together to give because instead of giving you zero, they can give 25. I started out as a teacher and you're right about that. But we can always give something. We can give, but we're finding that we're not having enough people that are giving that could give. And we need to find out what those areas are and find out how to communicate with them. And the great things that are doing that we're doing down at Liberty State University. Thank you. Thank you. Trustee Tine. That's the chambers I think was next. Oh, I'm sorry. Trustee Chambers. Thank you, Gwen. Trustee Chambers. As a overall, just to think about what Chancellor Martin said, one thing he said was something about the atmosphere. So on campus, we have to think about what is that atmosphere? Like, yes, I understand this year is not a regular year because of COVID. But what is our core values? What do we set ourselves apart from other institutions? So that's what we have to think about. And like when we have like foundations such as like, we are very diverse to HBC. So when we have foundations like that, we have to promote those foundations that we can't change up from those foundations. So I think as just when we promote in ourselves to alumni, to students coming in, we have to show that. I know yesterday, BC Walton said that one time, one of the donors said, they only hear from our university whenever we're asking for money. So one thing I talked to her about yesterday is how could we change that? Sending thank you cards to them, random times throughout the year, just to say like, we're here, how you're doing and things like that. So just to change the narrative whenever we're reaching out to them, asking for money. Like, yes, we need money from them, but let's not always just reach out to the town to say, hey, we need money for this and that and the third. Thank you, trustee. trustee time. So I don't think anybody is saying that our alumni are unimportant or aren't huge partners of the university. I think the question is, how do we best organize our interaction with them? And most universities today do not leave it up to an outside organization to be the interface with alumni. Most of them are very purposeful and have staff that are engaged with them. With my alumni, it's all internal staff driven. And then the social side is more of the alumni association side. And that's how you network and see each other and things like that. But I think what some of us are asking is, are we organized the right way and staff the right way to really gain the maximum of that interaction with our alumni? Thank you, trustee Evans. Yeah, I think we're all saying the same thing, but the common interest is in the love of this institution, the recognition that ECSU is moving in an incredible direction and how do we support that and how do we support its continued success? And I think, Alexander Haas sounded interesting or somebody similar who could come in and help us coordinate those thoughts, have an objective look as to what we're doing and all at the table figure out where we move forward. So everybody is recognized and valued and can participate in the best way possible to support the institution. Thank you. And this is part of our self-examination too. We look at ourselves as trustees in our giving history. That has not been stellar in the history of the school. The time that I've been on the board and I've been able to see the statistics, we have not been consistent givers or even participants when we've been trying to get 100%. So we're looking at, as trustee Tyne and what just was saying too and Evans and Bunch, that this, I'm sorry, Barnes, this is about every system is designed to get the outcomes that it has. And so our system is perfectly designed to get what we've got right now. So looking at the literal systemic structural change that one person, one leader invited his team to go through, that was Chancellor Martin, got the results that he is now getting. So I'm sure there's lots of iterations but in that process it is, and he didn't really answer my question, I wanted to know over what period of time and all of those changes that he made at a much larger institution, probably can make in a shorter amount of time but it is labor intensive because it's about relationships. If the alumni understand that they have a driving center field role, but we're not gonna have them as an outside organization that is going to be telling the university what it will and will not do. And I don't know that that's actually true of our situation or a foundation that is doing something else. When we're all under the same umbrella, we're all aligned to the same mission, look out. It's the same thing we were talking to President Hans about are we all aligned as a university, as individual universities with the system mission and how are we achieving that and holding ourselves accountable? So I think that if we identify this as a priority and we need some more information about policy 600 as we've asked, but if we identify this as a priority, then we get to be educated about what are the best routes and have the discussion with some of the leadership from the national alumni and the foundation at the very beginning at the table as we're educating ourselves. So it's not something that we're just saying, hey, this is what we're gonna do. No, we're bringing you in. Look at this institution and maybe there are others that have done a wholesale reorganization and what it has done. One thing that we get to see over and over again and we've certainly seen it with Chancellor Dixon we've seen evidence of it with other chancellors at our school is we're not a huge ocean liner. When there is intention and some resources to make a change, look at what we've seen in a year and a half, two years under Chancellor Dixon. So that is one of the main reasons why I find it so exciting to be a part of smaller institutions because we get to be a part of that. We get to be part of that engine. So I think that this is worth our consideration to look into. And so while I know we're at a retreat, I would love to hear, I think have we heard from every trustee about whether it's your will for us to get some more information and further investigate this. And Gwen, this is where I'd like for you to go down the roll and then also open it up to the Chancellor before we go down the roll and any members of the team, BC Walton, if you want to add anything before we just hear from the trustees as to whether we should put some time and energy and by we, we mean the Royal Week as we're going to be asking you all. We want to put some time and energy as to whether this is something we should further investigate. So open it to the floor. Yes, Chancellor, please. I would like to yield my time to BC Walton since I'm on the agenda to speak next. So I would like to yield my time to her. She has any comments. Thank you. Thank you all for your, thank you all for your feedback and all the comments that you all have made. And so what I will share is just insight and information just based on, I guess, study and practice within the field. So you all know that I've worked in advancement for a while and certainly have found the work that North Carolina A&T and Chancellor Martin and his team to be very informative, very forward thinking over time and a model for many institutions. And as I've listened to your questions, just kind of wanted to give you some information. One, Alexander Haas is a consulting firm, of course, that's still around and it is very well-known, very well-respected within the advancement profession. Many members of the team there are still individuals who do a lot of teaching and instructing and are individuals that you can call on for consultation when you need something. Dr. Casillas does a wonderful three-part series on the art of the ask, has done it a lot of conferences, the room is always filled and running over. So just a wealth of knowledge and that is who was a part of that assessment for A&T. John Taylor, who's on the team is really kind of the inventor, Godfather of advancement services. And it is just a phone call away to answer any questions that we even here at ECSU since I've arrived has answered. As we looked at our policy for naming, really kind of helped to answer questions that I had before bringing it to you all to ensure that I was bringing a document and information to you all that could stand. So an excellent firm for the test of time. ECSU has had an assessment that was conducted by Alexander Haas, the assessment was conducted, completed, the report is dated December of 2015. I do have that in my possession. And someone asked about the timetable for North Carolina A&T's progress. I can tell you that as I have kind of followed and studied that model and how they've kind of taken that on. One of the things Chancellor Martin mentioned was the change in staff, alumni relations in particular. They elevated the alumni director's position to an associate vice chancellor of alumni relations. And the position, the first person they hired in that position started in the role, in the new role on June of 2014. I remember that because the person was a non-graduate of North Carolina A&T, which was the first time they had someone in that role who was a non-graduate, and she came from University of Maryland. And I just remembered that because I thought it was a really big deal. And so I believe they were actually kind of doing the assessment maybe about a year or so before. I remember talking with folks who were on the assessment team because I think I was at North Carolina Central at that time, just to kind of get a perspective on culture of the institution. So 2014 was one of the first hires in really design of the organization. So I hope that information is helpful and insightful. I look forward to working with all of you. I'm certainly listening and taking notes. And I'm happy to answer any other questions that you might have. Any other comments? Yes, trustee Barnes. Yes, trustee Barnes. Just like to ask with respect to the report that we have from Elisabeth Hoss, can we share that with the board? I believe so. Yes, okay, I'm sorry. Are there any recommendations at that point were similar to what they made with respect to A&T or were they different? I'm not sure. I would be to review it. Again, it's been a while since I looked at it. Thank you. Okay, so just so I, we're doing something here that makes sense. Do we need more time to, as a board, talk about whether this is something we should investigate? We see we've got something that happened five years ago. Maybe reading that and then coming back and then that's a recommendation. There's one recommendation on the floor. Anything else? In terms of how we, if we're going to advise our advisory council. Yes, go ahead, Phillip. It seems to me that we write our goals for five years, five years out. If that's a five-year-old assessment, that a lot of things have changed at ACSU in the last five years. Certainly, I think, looking at it and reading it, studying it somewhat, but it doesn't seem to me like that would be necessarily relevant to us. But of course, we need to look at it first, but just my thought. I mean, the work of this information process. Yeah, the recommendation that I was making was, based on what we heard this morning and the takeaways, is this something that we should get more information on so that we can then start looking at how might we bring the foundation and the Alumni Association in the learning process. So that when we sit in the position, if it bears out in policy 600, that we get to make that recommendation, that they already were a part of the learning process. I mean, what we heard this morning was incredible. It was massive structural change and now we've seen what the outcome has been. And those are kind of the brave, bold moves that if you're willing to do it, but you gotta start everybody together learning because they're gonna be outliers or people that just don't wanna do it because it's changed, period. So just talking about a process and how we might move forward in this process. So I guess, Gwen, what I'm asking is if you'll do roll call and invite the trustees to say if they'd like to move further in learning more about the process and then next steps to come out of that. Okay, so Trustee Harold Barnes. I would like to move forward in the process. Trustee Phyllis Bosenworth. I would like to move forward in the process, yes. Trustee Lynn Bunch. I would like to move forward in the process. Trustee Andy Culpepper. Move forward. Trustee Jimmy Chambers. Trustee Chambers, you must have stepped away. Trustee Christine Evans. I would like to move forward with the process with a recommendation for a timeline. Okay, I'll come back to that. Trustee Stephanie Johnson. I would like to move forward with the process. Of course, Trustee Jan King Robinson. I'd like to move forward. Trustee Paul Tine. I'm on mute. My butt is a little bit worked in there. I would like to move forward, along with the timeline, who's responsible for this process? Are we directing this or is this a committee within the organization or within the Board of Trustees? Those are things that we need to consider. Absolutely. And after we come through this, let's come up with a recommendation as to what that process, who's gonna lead that process? I'm sorry, go ahead, Gwen. I believe I've captured everyone, but I don't think that Trustee Kenneth Wilkins came back on, so. Okay. So thank you all. That was unanimous. And Trustee Tine, it appears that that would fall under the Standing Committee of University Advancement. We have a strategic initiative right there. So that would be the trustees that are on that committee and V.C. Walton that would lead that process and sort of iron out what that would look like. In terms of the inquiry, does that make sense? Any objections? Yes. Since it was sort of direct to me, it makes sense to me, it's just, I think we need to be clear in what we're asking. I mean, we've talked about generally looking into a process to generally see what we're doing with advance or with alumni relations. All right, so let me take a shot at what I think we're saying. Thank you so much. Right, this is why I really enjoy you. Yes, this is right. So what I believe we're saying is that based on the presentation this morning of consolidation of the National Alumni Association, the Foundation to embolden the ability to have a really solid university advancement program, we're looking at what that consolidation, meaning the elimination, I didn't wanna use the word elimination, the consolidation, bringing them under the umbrella, what that process might look like, whether that involves bringing in this consulting assistance again or another consulting assistance, getting more information from someone in Chancellor Martin's, on Chancellor Martin's team, but looking at what would those building blocks look like so that then that committee under university advancement would that trustee would then come back and provide that information to the board of trustees on some of the steps that we would take. Does that sound like a fair, not too fuzzy clarification? I'm asking this of all the trustees in terms of the general direction we're going in. I don't particularly like using in any way the phrase of getting rid of anything. Right, consolidation. Very moment we say that here today, then by the moon, you know, so let's just eliminate that what we're trying to do is to optimize the process. Optimize, that's right. Fundraising and engaging the stakeholders. That's right. It's the re-envisioning and he talked about consolidation. So there's still a critical have to have, absolutely. Okay, any other comments? Yes, trustee. I would say we, I think yeah, it's much broader than that. We need to identify an advancement plan. And we need to put a structure in place to, or a process in place to being able to implement that plan. Well, the advancement plan has already been envisioned by our new VC. We're talking about a structural change. Right. Which we're going to find out from Alan where our role is in that. Chancellor. Maybe it's how we're going to help them implement that. I think it's. Right, then our role becomes how we become a part of supporting that. But we're just talking about the structural change. Because what we heard earlier was broader than just the affiliated organizations. It was, not only it was how they operate together, how they work together, the communications plan, the reporting requirements, how everybody's held accountable. That's. It's a process that creates a whole other level of firepower. But it's still running. It's still, we're talking about making a suggestion or recommendation, because we're an advisory group for structural change. And then the chancellor and her team will say, yes, this will do this or not. But it's going to be at our behest that we're making that recommendation. Do I have that right, Chancellor? Oh, thank you, Chair. Just a couple of comments. So I think the chair would hit the bell on the head in regards to the process. And I think, you know, what we have to think about is the fact that Chancellor Martin and his board went through this for a while, for it was a process that kind of led them to this. One thing to think about, because if you know, he also said there were changes in the board of trustees because they were looking specifically for people who had certain skill sets to fill gaps in order to do some of these things that he's been able to do to change the culture. And I think we have to be mindful that any conversation about our affiliated entities, if you notice, he did say that the trustees developed this advancement committee. So they became the lead on navigating these relationships in conjunction with advancement and alumni. So that's bringing more to the plate for all of you as trustees to take on, because that arm that exists now has to be consumed by the current governing structure, which is the board of trustees. So you have to be willing to do that as well. And that's what has made it so effective at A&T because the board of trustees is looked to as the major fundraising arm and the coordinator of all these other different people to bring money in too. Because you remember they started out with $4 million and now they're at $18 million that they have raised. Well, a lot of that has to do with the restructuring and changing governance in that regard, but it took the trustees taking on a whole lot more responsibility as it pertained to fundraising and coordinating fundraising activities with these different groups that previously existed. Perfect, that's a beautiful segue into our self-examination, but I would like to recognize Provost Ward. Thank you, Provost Ward for joining us. Absolutely, absolutely. I'm delighted to see you. Yeah, it was presenting, so I wanted to make sure I was present. Yes, thank you, thank you. All right, well, we're gonna segue then to the chancellor and her comments. So Chancellor, you've got the floor. So thank you so much, Chair Robinson, as well as ECSU trustees and my team that are on the phone and all of those listening today to our retreat. I just wanna thank my trustees because you make my job easier from the standpoint of your support and your advocacy for the university. I never, as I mentioned before, used the word I because it's all about us and we do this together. And so we've come a long way in two years to the point where some people are saying it's miraculous to see an institution transform as we have in just two years. And so I'm excited about where we are and I'm excited about where we're going. And to the support and leadership of all of you, we have a dynamic strategic plan that's gonna take us through 2025. And so your work on that plan is our roadmap to where we want to see this institution going. The pieces that we have discussed today around the fundraising piece, a role of trustees, role of chancellor and how we work together are critical to our success. And I have to say the board that I have today is energized and ready to make the bold moves that we need to make as an institution. And I'm happy to have all of you serve. I just wanna take some time, even though our guests are gone to thank our guests, Governor Powers and President Hans and Harold Martin, Chancellor Martin and his board chair, Vanessa Harrison for joining us. And I especially wanna thank our chair, Dan King Robinson for her vision in this virtual retreat and for making sure that everything was in order. And she and vice chair Bunch, making sure we had the proper speakers and logistics in place in conjunction with deputy chief of staff, Gwen Sanders. I thank you all for bringing us together at this point to have some of the discussions we've been able to have. But chair Robinson asked me to talk a little bit about expectations that I have of the board and then expectations that you should have of me. And I think a lot of what I heard today really echo what I'm gonna say or talk about because Harold hit on a lot of these things and so did his board chair and how they work together. But if we think about the most productive way to move forward, it is basically being on the same page and keeping the lives of communication open. And though we are in unprecedented times, I am very excited about all that we have accomplished regardless of this pandemic that we're experiencing now. We've never missed the beat through this pandemic and I don't expect that we will. I do expect that we will have a story to tell about the success of our campus, making it through the fall semester. Because comparatively, as president Hans mentioned, we have the lowest or some of the lowest number of COVID cases. So when I say our campus was committed to minimizing the spread of COVID, everybody pitched in, everybody was committed. And I especially thank my senior staff who you all see on the Zoom and those who are not able to join us for their leadership in helping us pull this together so that our students were welcomed back, our students, faculty and staff welcomed back to a very safe campus. So a couple of expectations. And I have to thank deputy chief of staff, when Sanders for giving me some insight on some of these things that were discussed between the chancellor and the board of trustees at a previous date and derived from some of the resources out there with AGB. But there's a couple of things to think about when you as board members, there's some expectation that even was mentioned today that I want you to consider. One is acting on behalf of the best interests of Elizabeth City State University, staying informed on university updates, both positive and those that present challenges. And what I mean by that is you're not gonna know everything that's happening at the university. I just can't, if that was the case, I would be calling you every day all day or every other day and you would get tired of hearing from me. But you will hear from me as I go through the chair first anything as Harold mentioned, he referred to it that anything that would hit the newspaper. But there are things that I will as chancellor, depending on what it is, the level of seriousness that we're facing on whatever it may be, I want you to know because I don't want you to be blindsided on anything. I don't want you reading about it in the newspaper or hearing about it from your neighbor is something that I want to make sure that you know because you represent us, you represent ECSU in the community and in your jobs and friends and wherever else and whoever else you speak with. And the next one is respect the most important principle that the chancellor works for only the board as a whole. So thinking about the fact that we respect each other and I have no complaints in that regard because I feel the support of this board, I feel the energy of this board, I'm not gonna say it was necessarily there when I first started, but we've come a long way with the energy piece, not the support, because we're always there with support, but the energy pieces and what accomplishing what we did not know was even possible. So I thank you all for that. Also remember that the chancellor speaks on behalf of the university and the board chair speaks on behalf of the board and avoid surprises by avoiding public utterances. And so I think we've been doing great with that. Chair Robinson definitely has spoken on behalf of the board when asked to do so and has done a dynamic job in doing so. And I think this wasn't expectations she put in place in regards to what she expects and protocols for the board of trustees. So I respect that. And she and I talk about different situations that we need to provide any type of message, always make sure that she's informed. Also maintain confidentiality. The board is the sound, this board of trustees is my sounding board. And I want to be able to bring you anything, anything I'm even thinking about. And I think we've done a really good job of keeping these things confidential. So I thank you for that. And we will continue to do so. Also be the example in personal philanthropy. And many of you have talked about fundraising and your personal contributions to Elizabeth City State University. Any conversation about, you know, taking on the affiliated entities or anything like that, we still, the board has to be the role model. So people have to see that the board is giving 100%. And they have to see that to trust and believe that we are being good stewards of whatever they decided to donate. And sometimes people donate based on who they see donating. For example, with our latest campaign, the 1891 campaign, I had a couple of alumni as well, let's miss Walton call me and say, Chancellor, when are you gonna donate? We need your name up there because when people see that you donated, they'll donate. And, you know, I went ahead and did that because I said, oh yeah, I got to hear it and do that. And so when I did that, then there were more people who saw me as Chancellor, my husband, my two daughters, all of us donating separately. And that, you know, prompted them to want to donate. And when they see others, their classmates, people they work with, when they see that they have donated, they will donate. And so that's a big piece of what we need to concentrate on is making sure that as a board, we are solid or you all are solid as trustees and your financial giving to the university. And then support the chancellor and the leadership team. We have great relationships, my leadership team with the board of trustees. And I tell you, I am grateful because not all chancellors have this great relationship with your board.  My board won't support, you know, these things. And I don't have to say any of that. And I am grateful and it's truly a blessing that I have a board that supports the mission and supports the leadership of ECSU. And that's what's critical. Also be the voice and ears for the institution. If you hear something out there that's not true, correct them. Don't hesitate. Don't feed into it. Don't spread it, especially if it's something negative, call me.  And I think, you know, I have to trust that the trustees, the alumni, the faculty, the staff and the students know and believe and love your institution so much that they will correct that misinformation and really add a positive light on the university. I'll tell you right now, I think I was talking to Jimmy or one of the other students.  You never see a negative tweet or post about North Carolina A&T State University. You never see it. Why? Because they handle their business inside their institutions like family. That's why you don't see it. And so I think, you know, as we are hearing these things, you know, ask for, ask any of us, anybody on my leadership team, myself, and we will give you the proper information needed to correct whatever you're hearing out there that's untrue. And lastly, I just mentioned support and advanced emissions. That's what we're here for. That's what you have me in place for leading the institution, leading, you know, into the future, all of us building a foundation that will sustain this great institution for the future. And that's really, really important for all of us. So what should you expect out of me? So first, I should provide data and information that is comprehensive, accurate, and useful. I think we've come a long way for our board chair, Chair Robinson, as well as our former chair Barnes who wanted the information provided at the trustee meeting to be more comprehensive for us to give you more information, more things to talk about, be more transparent. And so we will continue to do so and continue to work towards doing even a better job at that. And I have asked my staff, I've set that as an expectation for them as well. Also, I will respect the board's fiduciary and other responsibilities to hold the institution accountable to the general public. I want to do all I can to lead this great university in the proper way. I want to do everything that's possible to make sure that you understand where we are from a financial standpoint, where we are with any financial challenges that we see or anticipate. But working together through leadership, Trustee Colpemper, your leadership has been superb. Working together through these things is how we get through them.  And we need to hear from you. So don't think you don't have a voice. You have a voice and I appreciate that voice and I want that voice. So please continue to be there. I will be an academic leader. I will be savvy when it comes to the politics and an effective fundraiser by consulting as much as practical and appropriate with constituents. So I am also fundraising. Also having conversations. V.C. Walton, I'll tell you, my two years of being here, I've not had as many meetings as she puts me in now with potential funders and that's a good thing because I've always, I had always questioned when I started at ECSU, why am I not meeting with donors? Why am I not meeting with alumni? And she has definitely jumped in and really took that ball and ran with it when it comes to this. Every time I look around, V.C. Walton is telling me I need to be on a Zoom with some company or someone to talk about ECSU and I'm quite happy to do so. So more things to come in that regard. Gracefully assess style decisions of opinion. I, of course, support and respect all of your opinions. You will never see a time where I don't listen. We may not always agree, but I will listen and we will have a good conversation. And that's what I appreciate a lot about Chair Robinson because she and I can have some really good conversations sometimes if we don't always agree, but we're good. You know, at the end of the day, we're both focused on doing the right thing for the university. And I appreciate that about her and her leadership because that's what we need. We need someone to ask questions and to, and to make sure that we're on our peas and hues and doing what we need to do. Also, I will avoid surprises and form the board on matters right away, as I mentioned before, use the boards time efficiently.  You are volunteering to do this. And, you know, and I appreciate that. And I don't want to overwhelm you and I don't want my staff to overwhelm you with things. I want it to be very intentional and specific around things that we need to bring to the board and how we can work together. And lastly, work closely with the board chair to educate and lead the board. And I think we've been doing a good job of that board chair.  So, together, we must embrace the shared vision. And I think we've done that. We have our five-year strategic plan. We must implement and agree upon the plan, which we have done so, and commit to being advocates, telling the story of ECSU, being good fundraisers and recruiting students because we know that's how the university gains operational budget and our budget at large with the number of students we enroll and we want to continue to recruit students. So, telling our story, being strong advocates in the community will draw potential students to you, which in turn will come to the university. So, those are some things I want to mention. So, I will pause there because I know I've taken a lot, but Chair Robinson, I hope I met the expectation that you had and what you wanted me to talk about. I thank you all for your service. I thank you all for your support of ECSU and me as your chancellor.  So, I'll hand it back. That was great. I love that. I love that. Thank you very much, Chancellor. I'm sorry that was improper English, but I had it. Sometimes that's what you need. That's a point across. Sometimes that's just what we need. So, thank you very much for just hitting the nail on the head there. We must continue to challenge each other and the board needs to look at, we've tried to put some things in place, but we need to have these kind of open and frank conversations. And also in terms of timing and what we're trying to do, before we move, the board has given me the go ahead to just move on through with today's meeting. So we're gonna skip the formal fun part. And I don't, you know, Gwen had a great idea, but we're gonna save that for another time as the board is ready to keep moving. But I do think it's important before we move into looking at a review of the trustee's self-assessment, that we just take a moment to recognize that the Chancellor, her team, the faculty, the staff, the students have done all they have done through a pandemic, through a massive social justice upheaval in our country and an election cycle that's not been at this device of, I don't know, in the history of time. So here we are. And still the trains are running and for the most part on time. And so every now and then I think it's important to come back in and just look at that perspective. And Chancellor, know that the trustees are aware, we talk about that. We're following the numbers. We're talking to students and faculty and staff because we're in this small community and we hear. And it is remarkable in the context that we're not hearing about COVID, we're not hearing about disruption. We're not hearing about concern that I'm not gonna be able to go to school and meet my goals. So it's a Herculean feat in an unbelievable time. So just wanna say kudos to you and your team, everyone, it's just an amazing job. And I know that you're recognizing your staff, your faculty and your student at every chance because I want them to know the board's aware. We're aware. So moving to our self-assessment, I would just like for the board to consider that we look at maybe four of the questions that were asked because we were pretty much in agreement except for maybe four questions. And then looking at those, that was number one, the time we spend on issues of greatest consequence. We had six members who agreed that we do spend sufficient amount of time and five members that agree we do not. And so I thought we'd look at that. And then number two was individual performance. We had five members who agreed and six who thought we needed improvement in terms of understanding the needs of our students. And then under that same area, number five, the understanding the needs and concerns of our faculty. Three agreed and eight felt that we needed improvement in that area. And then on the areas of improvement, there were some issues around financial support and timely information. And then I would like to save the comments for the last. So if we could go through those areas and if I've missed anything of those areas other than the comments, please let me know because we do have the time to discuss. But I'd like to take it one at a time. So on number one, that the time on issues of greatest consequence, there was, you know, 50% were saying that we need to improve that. Would any member of the trustees like to address that? What number on the? That is number one. Let's see. The number one, what number? Board performance number eight. Number eight. Yes. Thank you. Trustee Bosmour. But any member like to comment on that? That we need to better spend our time on issues of greatest consequence to ECSU. This is our opportunity. I'd like to say something about that. I think that because of all of the issues that we've had to work through in terms of getting this train running in an effective and efficient manner. And I think we all include the chancellor have done a great job of that over the last several years. But from a board of trustees perspective, at some point, I think we would need to step back from being as engaged as we have in the past in the day-to-day things that the chancellor's involved in. What he did is that we delegated to her the authority to do some things that the board of trustees would always have to wind up approving and that kind of thing. But I think the board from a macro point of view should be looking 10 to 15 years out in terms of what we think this institution ought to be. By that time, we probably would have gone through at least one or two other chancellors because as much as we would love for chancellor to stay here for the last the next 20 years, she's not gonna do it. Now let me say it again in her English, she ain't gonna do it. But in other words, I think from a board perspective we need to be looking at what we want this university to be 20 years from now, 15, 20 years out and then start to at least raising those questions so that we don't always be in the position of handling problems as they come up or things we've already thought about. We put the framework into place and even though we may not have implemented that plan, at least we know it's out there. And so the matters of complexities and neutrality and consequence of the things I think that the board should be focused on in a large sense. Now, obviously we do what we have to do at this point in time, but I think from an overall board's perspective, we need to be looking at those kinds of things as well. Thank you, Trustee. Any other comments on that item? And that's part of our policing ourselves. So if we get into the minutiae, we're getting into management for one of us to remind us that we need to go back up to the 40,000 foot level and that that's us making sure that we're spending our time on what's gonna have sustainable growth. All right, if there are any other comments on that one, I will move to the next one. And that is question two, individual performance items four and five. More than 50% of us believe that we understand that we understand, don't believe that we understand the needs and concerns and perspectives of the students. Would anyone like to comment on that? Wasn't just doing the same thing, let me say that I think that we could benefit from at our board meetings to have different organizations on campus as well as others to come in and to just do a presentation and an update on what's going on on campus and that at least every board meeting with one student group serve as our guest at that meeting that one, they would attend the meetings to the extent they can and to be our guest at lunch. So we can hear directly from the various groups that are on campus and that we're all familiar with each other and are able to appreciate each other as we go forth. And that's... Yes, trust, thank you, trustee Bunch, trustee Tine. I just don't feel that I know, other than what trustee Chambers does an excellent job of bringing to the board meeting. And this may be COVID related that there's just not very many opportunities to hear from students and interact with them and hear what their life is like and what's going on. And when we had the meeting or when I was listening to Chancellor Martin, it was, they're very intentional about their board meetings and interaction with the university and events and things like that. I feel like I show up, I meet with all of you, which is great. And then I leave. And that's, there's just not as many. And again, it could be more COVID related. I could be more sensitive to it right now, but just having more of those opportunities to interact with students and staff for that matter. I don't really have a chance to hear from the professors and the folks on the ground that are getting the work done to... I feel like we're making decisions without knowing more from them. So that's why. Yes. I'm Trustee Lent Bosworth and then Trustee Colfeber. And I would agree with him about that as well. But I think some of that also falls on us and I haven't been particularly good about it, but going to events on campus where the students are there and we get invited to those things, but sometimes the middle of the day I'm working and we have other obligations. But I think that maybe more intentional, some more intentional time for us to be, to meet with the students and also the faculty for us to actually be there and interact and it might be something we could work on and work toward. All right. And I know that the Chancellor, we don't see her, but she is listening to us. And I see, is Dr. Wilkins still here as well? Do we lose him? He said, great. Because this is something that when it's happened, we've all very much enjoyed, but maybe there can be now a more formalized part of our board meetings where we're hearing from faculty and students and also having the opportunity to sit next to and engage at lunch. Because you did that a few times, but maybe we make that a standing part of our meetings. So I'll look forward to chatting with you all about that. I'm sorry, trustee Culpeper, I'm sorry, sir. And Chamber. I'm praying for one of those folks who, who voted that we don't have enough time with them, but I'm not sure that that's part of our job as trustees. As long as we only have one day of me meeting a quarter as trustees, we can't spend a lot of time with the students and we can't spend a lot of time with faculty. And I believe that's something that we're not supposed to do. The trustees have a broader job to do. It's a bigger job to do. The students and the fact, I mean, be nice. I like trustee Bisonworth's approach. We do that in some other event, but not in trustees meetings. We've gotten more important. Well, I don't know whether it's important or not, but anyway, it's the way that the system is structured where we have certain committee meetings that we have to go through and that we have to do. And that takes a full day. And I don't know when we're gonna have time to get to know the students and get to know the faculty. Thank you for your comments. We have trustee Chambers and then trustee Tyne. I'm gonna let trustee Tyne go first. Alrighty, trustee Tyne. I couldn't more strongly disagree than those last comments. Because we're responsible to the students and the region that we serve. So knowing, let me finish. So not knowing what their viewpoint is and what their hopes and aspirations are and are we meeting the things that they're supposed to meet? And I'm saying just some more formalized ways to interact, like just sitting at the table, or once COVID's over, being able to meet with them at a social hour afterwards. And again, I said it's been more difficult with COVID, but I think we are, it is imperative that we know what the people that work in the institution and utilize the institution think about the decisions that we're making. Thank you for your comments, trustee. Trustee Evans, you wanna go ahead and make your remarks. Yeah, if you don't mind, trustee Chambers. Thank you. Because I'm going to say I'm sure that this was all planned by starting this out with Governor Powers and his discussion about relationships and being able to talk to folks and for the first time not going for an ask. But so I think it is important to be part of the community, to hear the pulse of the community and that's from the students and the faculty and things like that. And I really think that COVID has really been a part of that and that's the angst that I personally am feeling that if I wanna get up and drive out there and I have to do it a little bit, I have to be able to plan since I'm in Raleigh, but and go to a basketball game or go to those opportunities that are presented to us, that ability and that comfort level is just not there right now because we wanna keep that low COVID rate down at the university. And I would have to agree with trustee Call Paper and in terms of the appropriate time for our board meetings, there may be particular topics that we can get feedback on and things like that. But I think it's about, and it is important to hear that in a formalized manner, but I think it's as much if not more the opportunity to build and develop this relationships and just feel that pulse like Governor Powers was talking about earlier. Thank you, trustee Evans, trustee Johnson. Yeah, trustee Johnson. I think if we, each one of us adopted a student, with that meant that would mean that we wouldn't have to interact at board meetings or whatever. And I don't mean to take care of them or whatever or that kind of thing. I'm just saying adopt a student to talk to that you can interact with and keep and it helps you keep engaged on what's happening with the campus, because that's the only thing I can think of right now that will be sensible to do. I always adopted a student. The young lady I adopted four years ago, she's graduated now. She's, you know, she's working and she's a math and computer science major. So they're great things going on out there. And then she has a sister that's there and I interact with her constantly and she's doing well. So I'm excited because as a trustee, I feel like I have an obligation to interact some kind of way. I don't need you to tell me how to interact, but I know as a trustee, I need to interact. It was nice to go to football games because you could interact there a lot. But I have to trust trustee chambers about what he's sharing with us. And I think he's very honest about what he shares and what the needs are. So that was just a suggestion of mine that each one teach one, each one learn from one. So that's where I am with that. I love that idea. Thank you, thank you. Trustee Chambers, I think we've all spoken. Well, I appreciate the feedback that you all gave. So just a hint on some of the things. Like trustee time said, like you, we as a student, sometimes you have to meet us halfway. Like yes, I give you all the opportunity to come to our town halls, but maybe I could beef it up some more and just have a set event where it's you all as a panel and I have students come in, they can put Q and A's for you all. So maybe I could probably do something, different outside of lines of you just coming in on a town hall, you know? So sometimes we just have to think outside of us. It's not always that, you know, the time conflict and we could just always come together and think of a time what works for all of us to hear student needs. So you know what you need to really advocate for. Thank you so much. Yes, I understand like you can come to sporting events here and there, but still meet, sometimes you have to meet the students halfway and that's something I'm still learning. You're like, yes, I'm a student, but I'm learning as I go on and on more in my position is you have to meet the students halfway. So that's all I ask all of you just to, you know, think outside of box, meet the students halfway. Thank you. Thank you. And I would just like to say that we very much enjoyed when the students would come and maybe that can become more, you know, part of presentation where you're telling us about things, maybe the people who are involved can tell us just cause we'd like to see and hear from them. And then also if it's possible to have them, you know, maybe three or four join us for lunch, but that's something that maybe you and Vice Chancellor Brown can discuss as a possibility cause some of us do get out onto campus more and others of us only when we're at the board meetings is that our opportunity. So thank you. I'm going to direct us to question five, moving right along here. What are the areas which the board could improve? And the first one is the financial ability of trustees to support ECSU. And the wording of that, I'm just going to sort of throw it out there, but I think that there is the opportunity based on the statistics that I've seen that's not just the amount, but the participation. When we had our campaign 1891 strong campaign, I think it was four trustees, is that right, V.C. Walton that participated? And what the point of that was is to show the support of the board. And that's why we said, you know, if you got $8.91 or $18.91, whatever, you know, five dollars, we wanted to get your name on the board. And on the, when I say board, you know, what was going to be shown. And that was because it does speak to people and people do look to see our involvement. And I think sometimes, even though we may be giving, when we have those kinds of campaigns that are just showing participation, we don't really understand the importance that that may have. But there's also meeting our agreed upon goal of a minimum of $3,000. So we said we would do that as a board. And this is our first year. And I've asked V.C. Walton to please advise because we've got until June, is that right? To make that goal. Some people have surpassed that and that's incredible. And then some folks aren't on the board at all in terms of the, when I say board, I mean, they're not on the roles. They're not, they have not given yet. And whenever people give, there's no problem or issue about timing. But when we're asking about trying to show participation, we are trying to show that we are involved and we are engaged as we are. When we're trying to meet our agreement that we're gonna have a minimum amount, that was just the amount that the board voted that we thought would show that we're all in. I was told and I'm gonna ask, I don't know if it was Trustee Wilkins that was helped me with this or another individual. But I got to see what the giving, and I asked last couple of years ago, what was the giving amounts of other HBCUs and some of the majority schools, PWIs, that was asked. And I was under the impression that A and T did have a minimal amount. And it was significantly higher than the amount that we were asking our board to give. But there was a very high giving rate and there was a much larger percentage of the board that was giving. And so this year I'm asking that, whether it's the amount that we decided or some other amount, larger or smaller, that 100% of us are giving that that helps us with grants when we can say 100% of our board has given. So I just wanted to preach a little bit on that one. If any other board member has any other comments about that particular item, Trustee Culpepper. I think it would be helpful on the, to make sure that we're all giving in these various fundraising events we have. That at least, I know that the university is on a June 30th physical year, but most of us individuals are on a December 31st physical year. And if we could get a list of the numerous fundraisers we're gonna have in the 2021, 2000, yeah, it'll be 21, 22 school year, when they're gonna have, then we can set aside some money for each one of those fundraisers. Whereas some of us prefer to give one check and that'd be it. Then we can meet these various goals, but if the Advancement Committee would give us a list of those fundraisers, then we can make sure that we have some money available for those fundraisers. Second thing I'd like to point out is if it was $3,000 minimum, I think we should go up this year to at least $3,500 or $4,000. I think the ANT minimum of their members was $50,000. At least that's what the judge told me when we met up there and I've known the judge a long time and I was surprised that he had $50,000. But that's what he told me. So he's a judge, I assume he told me the truth. Thank you, Trustee. We have Trustee Tye and then Trustee Johnson. This one I completely agree with Trustee Colpepper. We had this conversation last year in our last retreat where one of the key things when you're giving to any organization is predictability and ease, right? And we talked about, okay, these were the three things that we were gonna make sure that we had money set aside to come up to our 3,000. And so if we're gonna change the expectations, then they need to be brought to us so that they change the expectations. And the other thing is when we discussed the minimum he wanted higher last time and I asked him to start at a lower mountain that I would support him vehemently in upping it the next time. And so he has my full support. Thank you, Trustee. Trustee Johnson. Yes, first I'd like to probably, I don't know if I need to use the word apologize, but I was not made aware of how you all were doing this. And I thought about Pastor Wilkins when I came up with this scenario that at my church, when I give and they say, well, give for women, they give for men, they give for this, they give for my birthday, I say, if you can't take it out of what I gave, which was a lot more than what I would normally give, a person would normally give, then sorry. But what I'm saying is I've been blessed to be able to give a substantial amount over and consistently. I did not think twice about 1891, but if you as my chair had said to me, had given me a buzz and said, listen, you're not on a list, can you do 1891? Of course I can do 1891, but my first thought pattern is, you can't get it out of what I give, but so I understand better now, but I will not, I'm still gonna act the same way with church, but with the university, I'll break it down a little better if that's what you want me to do, or I'll give more because in my mailbox, every day there are five groups of organizations asking me for something. So, because I make sure to do my best with Elizabeth City, I don't think about the other giveings. I remember someone calling me one day in the last couple, maybe two years ago and said, this is the day of giving. I know you give, but can you give some more? Okay, if that's what you need me to do, that's what I'll do. But I really am apologizing because I didn't realize that my name needed to show up here, here, here, here. Yeah. Because my name already shows up here, so thank you. I appreciate that. I sent out an email, but I sure can call y'all. I don't mind calling and busy with y'all. Well, call me because I get 500 emails a day too. I can call you. All right. Any other comments about that, Ida? Yes, one other comment. Yes, trustee. Wouldn't it be easy enough if we had a process that would allow, as the trustee called Pepper said, one check to be written and that it can be spread by advancement over those things that come up during the course of the year rather than asking for four or five different things in the course of the year. If somebody writes your check for whatever that the amount is in January and says, whatever is going on in the course of the year, can you a lot, 10% for this, 5% for that, whatever, and make it a lot easier for people to remember. Okay. Thank you, sir. Alrighty. Yes, I'm sorry. That seems like a lot more difficult for the bookkeeper, but maybe not. It seems to me like your suggestion, along with trustee Johnson, if we just know about it and that that's what we want to do is have everybody's name on there shouldn't be that difficult to write an extra one, you know, an extra check. But if the, Harold, if the accounting is easy to do, then that would certainly make it easier for everyone. I just don't know how difficult it would be for the accounting people. Anyway, that's all. Chair, Chair Robinson, may I say something, please? Please, Chancellor. Okay. So just in listening to this, I agree with Trustee Bosenworth that and Vice Chancellor Walton can correct me, but it will be an administrative challenge to try to keep up with that for sure. But one thing I just want to mention that my husband and I do is we have a set amount of money that we give to ECSU each year. And Vice Chancellor Walton knows what I want that amount of money to be each year. So what I do is put that money aside and I give as different things come up. So I kind of manage that myself so that I'm keeping up. But as long as I get to by December 31st, as Trustee Cole Pepper said, as long as I get to that full amount that I said I'm going to do for the year, then that kind of stays in my management to make sure that I'm taken from that fund to give to the university for the total amount that I said I was going to give for the year. Does that make sense, Trustee Barnes? I mean, I know that's probably putting a lot of, more responsibility on the trustees, but if you say 3,000 a year, then maybe you put your 3,000 aside. And then when day of giving comes up, you may give $1,500. Then when another campaign comes up, you keep dipping into that 3,000 so you pay your whole 3,000. That's what I'm trying to describe. That does make sense. I think the other way would be less stress on board members, but that certainly makes sense about allocating it that way. Alrighty, yes, Trustee Evans. I think if we could just have an agenda item at the beginning of each year, talking about what the upcoming campaigns are, and then we can all decide how we're going to distribute it. And at that point, if there's a particular request that all the board members participate in a particular campaign, that can be brought to our attention. I can't wait for next year. We're going to knock it out the park. Thank you. Yes, we see you all too. Chair Robinson, can we start ahead of next year? Because we have been. We certainly can. They are giving it coming up. What is it? December 2nd? Is it, Anita? Giving Tuesday. Giving Tuesday. That's great. In your upcoming board meeting, you will see that we have the solicitation plan that we're sharing for the rest of the year. Moving forward, if I'm still here, you'll see it sooner. But the solicitation plan would be laid out a year in advance until you'd be able to see what the plan would be. So you'd be able to see which opportunities you had to give. Some of them are more public than others, meaning they might have a public roster, like the 1891 campaign where we want your name to appear. Like they are giving, like giving Tuesday. And you could see those in advance. So you would be able to plan. But in December for the December Board of Trustee meeting, you will be able to see the solicitation plan for the rest of the year through June 30th of 2021. Alrighty, thank you. Okay, I think we can move along to the next one. And I believe that the chancellor addressed this issue, timely communication of the chancellor between full board meetings. Is there any comment or discussion anybody would like to have on this particular issue in terms of how we can improve based on what our chancellor just shared with us on the information that she's giving, the information that you have been receiving. Any request for any additional kinds of information? I do try to send emails to you all every now and then.  You've all been very, very accommodating when I've called. I don't try to call you a whole lot so that when I do pop up, it's usually something that requires your attention. But I am certainly open to any recommendations for more or different kinds of ways of communicating. The floor is open. All right. I have one comment on this particular issue. And the chancellor provides us a lot of information, especially as it relates to how we rank in various areas in various periodicals. And I know historically, and that used to be one of my pet peeves, is that when you raise issues about the university six, seven years ago, and then what the university would tell us about, well, we ranked number one, and this ranked number two in there. But what I'm saying now, our ranking is equal to what we are producing. And that's so important that when we're ranked as number one in the list of that, but we've got a poor graduation rate, a poor retention rate and all of those kinds of things. But I'm glad that we were able to marry what we're doing on campus with whatever financial ranking, the best quality education in terms of cost and all of that. Now we have facts and data to back up those rankings. And I'm glad that we've done this. So thank you chancellor and the board. Great, thank you. The next one was professional development, more opportunities to meet that. And so that is something that, we're open to suggestions. Vice chair Bunch and I talked about this with the chancellor, like what were some of the opportunities, what did the board want to hear? We went with development this time because that's so critical to our existence. And we think we have lots of opportunity there. But in terms of having retreats, right now, correct me if I'm wrong chancellor, we have at least one retreat a year. Sometimes we have two, is that correct? That's correct. Yes, but typically I think the last couple of years we've been having the one in the summer. Right. Right. So that is professional development. And so if there are other modes or means, articles, I used to send articles to you all, but I wasn't so sure that you were loving that. But if you would like more information on things that we're reading, I am a reader, I can up my game on that. But if you have specific areas you'd like some professional development on, if you would let me know, it would help us in our planning. So I open the floor, if there are any comments now on that particular issue and our opportunity to improve. Anyone? Okay. I think we can do some additional fundraising to do it. But I think it is invaluable for trustees to have an opportunity to go to AGB meetings because you meet trustees from all over the country. And there's valuable insight that you can gain from that. Obviously that can be a cost of proposition. And but it's something that we need to work toward making sure that we are able to attend some of those conferences. Obviously we can't do it all together as one board, but that's a valuable thing to be able to do. Yes. And I think once we hit some of those and exceeds some of those advancement goals, that might be more of a reality. So thank you for that. I know our chancellor has to leave at two. So I'm just going to touch these very quickly. I think we've got 10 minutes or so. The next one is demonstration of greater appreciation for governance versus management. Improve BOT giving to 100%. We've talked about that and giving at a higher level. Improve participation and identification of cultivation potential givers. Talk about that. Greater focus on partnerships that will help build increased streams of revenue. The demonstration of greater appreciation for governance versus management is what we'll be doing for the rest of our lives as we serve on boards. All of us have been in management and so it's very difficult to get ourselves out of the weeds. And so we just need each other and the chancellor's team and they've done a great job. Alan and Derek have really pulled me aside. I've given them permission to a couple of times to let me know when I have been in the weeds and to go back up to the 40,000 foot level and they've done it with love. And I appreciate that, guys, as long as it's with love. And I think we can police each other to do that. But that's part of what being on a board is, is making sure that we are on the governance end. And I really do feel that our board gets it more right than not. Is there any comment on anything within that statement that anybody would like to make? Y'all ready to leave with the chancellor. Okay, the last one. We have a suggested amount of money that each member should contribute. I think we've talked about this. Encourage members to be ambassadors for ECSU, being prepared and seek understanding of what the issues are. I think we're there. Any comments on that last one? Everybody is good? All right, I'm gonna make some. Yes, Phyllis, please. Trustee, one of the trustees suggested that we raise the amount to 3,500. Was that a, was that a, is that something we wanted to talk about or is that for later? I think that that's something that we take back to the committee and we make that a committee that then brings it to the full board and we can have a full body discussion about that. I think that's a very real recommendation. So we wanna work that through our committee structure. And in December. Great, there we go. I trust that Colby, trustee Colpeber is gonna make that happen, right, trustee? Yeah. Okay, that is his committee. All right, before I make my closing remarks, Chancellor, we wanna leave with you. Has anybody had any last thoughts on anything we discussed today or anything relevant to our mission? To be the best stewards to our schools? I'd like to share with Dr. Dixon that I know as a leader, you have some hard decisions that you have to make. But I saw a decision that you made for the university that brought our numbers up as far as students were concerned. And I just wanna personally thank you for that because that's extremely important to have more students so you can have more staff so you can have more students, more people graduating, become productive members of society. So it is tough to change around and make decisions, but if you keep on doing what you're always done, you keep on getting what you're always got. And that did not happen. And that was through you and I thank you. Thank you, Trustee Johnson. Thank you very much both, Trustee Johnson and Chancellor. Any other comments anyone would like to make? Thank you, Chancellor.  And we love you to life and not to death. Well, thank you very much, my brother.  I'm sorry we didn't get to play because I also know that you all like to play. So we'll make sure the next time that we'll carve out a little time for some fun, just as we get to know one another a little bit more. Always thank you, Chancellor, the team, the faculty and the staff. We don't know everything you do, but what we do know you do, we know it's a herculean effort. And we see the results are matched. And so we just thank you so much. And we ask you never, never, never, never hesitate to reach out to us individually or as a group as to how we might make your jobs a little easier. Definitely. So we all keep showing you love. And there might more demonstrative ways to show our love. So let us know about that as well. Thank you, trustees. To everybody, please continue to be safe and take care of yourselves and your family. I'm being Lester Holt right here. I love he says it every night. Love y'all. God bless you. Thank you all. See you next month. Thank you, Trustee. Bye-bye now. Thank you, Trustee. Bye. Bye. Bye-bye. Thank you, Gwen Sanders. Yeah, she always deserves a thank you. Yes.


So after doing some research on Billie Eilish, watching interviews, analyzing song lyrics and reading comments from her fans, it seems like a lot of the Billie Eilish fans are worried for her and I think it's a topic that we should really discuss. I'm gonna die one day so it doesn't really matter, to be honest. But everything, nothing matters. What is up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul where we talk about the problem but focus on the solution. And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about mental health and what I like to do is pull different topics from pop culture and try to teach you how to improve your mental and emotional well-being or maybe even help somebody that you know. So if you're into that stuff, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. So in this video we're gonna be talking about Billie Eilish but I think this is a more important discussion because it's not about Billie Eilish. Chances of her seeing this video, one in a million, right? But I wanna start a conversation because I think for us on the outside looking in, it's, I wanna bring up some topics that we should all be thinking about when it comes to helping somebody that we might know who's struggling with depression. Now the question of the day is, is Billie Eilish depressed? I don't know. I know this might come as a shock to some of you but I don't know Billie Eilish. I do not know Billie Eilish but like I said I wanna bring this up as a discussion because basically a lot of people requested for me to check out some of her other songs and lyrics and things like that and one song that people kept recommending to me was Listen Before I Go, alright? And looking at these lyrics, it's a troubling song, right? It's a song that a lot of people can connect to but we're gonna show the comments in a section or some of the comments rather and it has fans concerned, alright? So anyways, some of the lyrics go like this. Take me to the rooftop, I wanna see the world when I stop breathing, turning blue.  If you need me, wanna see me, better hurry cause I'm leaving soon. Sorry can't save me now, sorry I don't know how, sorry there's no way out but down, hmm down. So like it's a song about somebody jumping off a roof, alright? And like here's the thing, again I don't know Billie Eilish, I don't know if Billie Eilish is depressed. I'm gonna talk about her method of like storytelling in a minute because that brings up another topic that we need to discuss but anyways I'm talking from the experience of somebody who for many years I was extremely depressed. I contemplated ending my own life and I've lost a lot of people who have taken their own life or they've died of overdoses and things like that but it's also important to realize that a lot of us have experienced just people in the mainstream who have lost their life far far far too soon, alright? So anyways as I was looking at this song on YouTube and looking through some of the comments like I'm gonna do another video about Billie Eilish fans particularly in depression within youth but anyways that's what I was expected to see in these comments section but I saw these instead. I saw a lot of people saying that they're worried for Billie Eilish, right? And here's the reason why I think this is a really important topic to discuss. So some of you saw that the other day I did a video on Lincoln Park lyrics for the song Heavy and talking about Chester Bennington so Chester Bennington unfortunately took his own life not that long ago and I know there's people who are like oh you shouldn't comment on you know these things you know other people and their mental health and mental state but here's the thing that I think is natural for a lot of us especially when it comes to depression suicide people taking their own lives like I don't know if you're like me but a lot of us ask why why they do it and as somebody who grew up listening to Lincoln Park and watch a lot of interviews with Chester like when he passed away I started because I hadn't listened to him in a while and I started watching all of his recent interviews I'm like were there any signs were there any clues what what could people have done to prevent this and and it's it's confusing like something that I do as somebody trying to recover from you know depression and most days are pretty damn good for me so if you are struggling with depression like believe me things can get better now I have my ups and my downs and things like that but what I try to do is I look at other people and I try to analyze what's working for you what's not working for you what can I do differently to you know avoid getting back into those dark thoughts so I was I was really interested in these Chester Bennington interviews and like it seemed like on paper he was doing everything he was supposed to do he was talking about going to therapy he was also somebody who was back and forth in recovery talked about going to 12 step meetings even in the music video for heavy you saw kind of a 12 step meeting setting right and when he passed away and you know there were interviews with his wife and you know people like Mike Shinoda people were talking about how happy he was and like this was so so so unexpected and and that's what that's what messes me up because I'm sitting there and it's just like okay what do we do how do we know the signs how do we know what to look for right and it's not like I said this isn't just necessarily Billy Eilish but what about the people in your life and you know there's a question I'm asking I don't necessarily know the answer to this okay and I think Billy Eilish is a great example of this because when I first did a video on Billy Eilish and talked about her influence and things like that I had a lot of people saying like you need to watch Billy Eilish interviews you need to understand her songwriting style you need to understand how her and her brother Phineas write songs and it's true a lot of her songs are stories her and Phineas create these these characters right but to me that's even it's even scarier because you're able to put on this mask whenever you want right like I would imagine so I'm a father I have a 10 year old son he's gonna be a teenager soon being a teenager is rough a lot of symptoms of you know mental health issues can pop up during teenage years and I think about that as a father but like Billy Eilish has positioned herself to wear this mask whenever she wants to okay and what I mean by that is she could make these dark lyrics and talk about very personal experiences but if anyone were to talk to her about it and say like are you okay I'm worried about you she could put the mask on and say oh no I was just creating a character that's not me I'm not in that dark place that was the character I was talking about and that's something very concerning because a lot of people with depression put on a mask I can share from my personal experience from the outside looking in a lot of people didn't understand how how tormented I was inside inside my own mind because outwardly I could wear this smile all over the place and part of it was part of depression and I don't know if you could relate to this is my brain would tell me oh people don't care about me nobody's asking me how I'm doing why aren't people coming to me and asking me how are you doing Chris and I came to realize later that they didn't have a reason to like you can look at me you can look and like I looked like happy I was making jokes I was going to work every day or going to school every day back in high school so for someone to ask me that would be very out of the ordinary because I wasn't giving off any signs or symptoms so that's one of the troubling things about dealing with these mental health issues is that we we have to reach out and ask for help we have to do that because a lot of us are good at putting on that mask you know what I mean so my suggestion to you what's worked for me is I have to fight that inner voice that tells me that nobody cares about me I had to take responsibility and accountability for my own depression I had to start reaching out to other people I had to start going to other people and saying hey I'm not okay right now can you talk you know what I mean like I had to do that because I couldn't constantly put that expectation on other people so the other thing is to it's like and there's a question I want to ask you that I don't necessarily know the answer to like at what level do we get concerned so some of you who have been around my channel for a while you know that I worked at a dual diagnosis treatment center we specialized in addiction for people who have mental health issues as well and I remember this this young man he got really he was very quiet introverted shy didn't talk much and he got into it with his therapist one day and me and this kid had a really good connection right like he would come in and talk to me and everything like that him and his therapist got into it one day and she came over and she saw him drawing in his notebook in the treatment center and he was drawing like a scene of him killing her right and like when you're working in that type of treatment center it's like how seriously do you take this like how do you take this thing right was he just drawing something to let out his frustrations which is completely normal or just something to be concerned about right and everything ended up turning out alright that kid's actually been sober for a while now I talked to him probably not that long ago but maybe in the last few months but anyways it's just something that I want to like bring up as a topic of conversation because there are people in your life who might be struggling and you don't even know it so although I was talking about how people need to reach out and ask for help and I hope if if Billie Eilish is depressed she has people in her life who she can talk to but like on on the other end of things I think it's a good common practice to like just sit down with like people in your life and just say hey how's it going like how are you really doing right not that just kind of like in passing like hey what's up how you doing but like really ask them like what's going on in your life how are you doing how are you feeling about this you know something happens to that person like or they have a rough day like ask them like how are you feeling about this and see if you can open up that conversation because one of the main goals of this channel is just to start opening up that conversation and having it normalized so we can start talking to each other and helping each other alright but anyways let me know all your thoughts down below on this topic if you liked this video please give it a thumbs up if you're new make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell because I make a ton of videos and a huge huge thank you to everybody supporting the channel over on patreon you're all amazing and in case you missed it go over to patreon I just put up the Q&A answers so make sure that you go check that out alright thanks again so so much for watching I'll see you next time