Building Pathways to Success: A Conversation with Lassen College's Carie Camacho

[00:00:00] So you're the interim superintendent and president, so tell me how long you've been in that role and kind of how you got to that role. So, I have been in this seat for two and a half years. Normally an interim is for up to two years, but because I was placed during kind of the COVID lengthened it. So I've been in this role for about two and a half years.

[00:00:27] Prior to that, I was a interim role of VP or interim VP of instruction. And then prior to that, I was interim Dean of instruction. And it was, um, it was a re it was a. I was in a yoga class one night. I got a call at 7 p. m. that said, Hey, at 7 a. m. will you come and be dean? It was a really fast. Yeah, I was in the classroom and we just had this, um, an enormous leadership change overnight.

[00:01:02] And there were, there weren't any deans or VPs. And so I, I was asked to fill a spot and then I kept getting moved up and pretty soon I was in this seat. What created that sudden big shift on why all that, or can you elaborate on that, or is that something that No, we, what happened, uh, prior president had not, had non renewed two VP positions.

[00:01:28] Oh, I see. And then another VP was let go, so, or no, it was a dean and two VPs. Okay. And then he resigned right after. Oh goodness. So on our campus we had two brand new deans and that was it. Amazing. And that and, and Oh, I felt so sorry for him. It was two of them. And I had been, so this is my 27th year at the college, and I had been in a lot of faculty leadership positions and so.

[00:01:57] I'd worked in student services as a counselor. And then I was an instructor for many years and hadn't been a division chair in academic Senate and the union, a lot of leadership positions. And so it w I wasn't uncomfortable taking the position of the dean position. It was just like being a division chair, except for on steroids a bit, but, uh, and then it just, Constantly progressed and then I, so I think January 7th was my first day and then Covid hit.

[00:02:26] Right. And in March and what? And I, so then I couldn't quit or go back and forth. Right, right. I go, that's how it all happened. And it's actually. I, I can honestly tell you in my teaching career and in my counseling career, I never had one bad day. I loved working with students. I loved it. And that's the only, that's the only drawback about being in administration is you don't get that one on one daily, wonderful interaction where you see their little faces light up.

[00:03:01] But now in this position. I feel like some of the programs that I've helped bring on in the team that we have, we're able to have a bigger impact, although I don't get to see. They're sweet feasts every day, you know. Yeah, well, so we talk about this all the time in that, that Vistage group I was telling you about how we were all trained to be, you know, trained to be a teacher.

[00:03:26] Are you trained to be, uh, in my case, a project manager? Uh, one of the members of our group is, uh, is an engineer. And, uh, so we're trained to do these specific tasks, but nobody trains you There's not a program to, to go through in college that says I'm going to be a CEO or I'm going to be the superintendent slash president of this large college.

[00:03:48] And, you know, everybody kind of looking at me and, uh, so how have you kind of trained yourself? What have you done to kind of be successful? Because you guys, your college is doing terrific. Your enrollment is up, but can you just kind of reflect a little bit on what you think? I'm prepared you for being a great leader of the college, you know, well, thank you for that.

[00:04:12] I feel like I'm learning every day. Still. I look at my education. So my bachelor's degrees in sociology, which is to me the most fascinating field because you're just constantly learning about society and people and how it's always evolving. So that really interests me. And then my master's is in counseling and yes.

[00:04:35] The skills I've learned in counseling. And I've always kind of been a people person in the sense that I love people. I'm just more on the shy side, but the combination of all that and in sociology, I, we taught, I taught leadership styles and I knew, I knew just from lecture. What works, what doesn't work, who's more successful, of the CEO personality traits and what type of leadership style was considered the best.

[00:05:08] And so I knew all of that going in, but it was my counseling. I think my counseling skills and the way I approach people helped me a lot. Now, I will tell you that I have had two of my administrators. Because they've known me over the years and one just recently has met me said, you're too nice to be in that position.

[00:05:30] Yeah. You're too nice. And I said, well, this, you know, this is, this is who I am. And, and I'll work really hard and make it happen. And so we have just built this great team and we, I have amazing VPs and deans that do so much work. Um, but we work as a team, we work collaboratively and I think it's the Counseling in me.

[00:05:55] Yeah. That kind of, that's the only thing I can attribute it to because I did not have one CEO class or. I did not have one leadership class, zero. Well, yeah, it boils down to being able to develop great people and work as a team in a collaborative format. So the fact that you kind of intuitively do that with your background with counseling, that makes a ton of sense.

[00:06:22] I can see why, you know, people and people. Love to follow people that are kind, consistent, um, you know, I, I'm a big believer, you don't have to be a jerk or mean in order to be a good leader. And a lot of people think you have to, if you're going to be, if you're nice, you're going to get walked on, which is true.

[00:06:45] Uh, but you know, uh, I don't know if you're a fan of Brene Brown. She's a tremendous leadership. teacher, but one of her things that's really helped me because I lead very similarly, I'm very, very nice person typically, but, uh, her message was clear is kind and unclear is unkind. So whenever I'm talking to people and they need feedback, we all need feedback, even, even you and I, in our positions, we need feedback from our, from our team on what are we doing well and what do we need to work on.

[00:07:14] And there is. She. If we have a mindset of continuous improvement, you know, where we always want to get better, we want to be 1 percent better tomorrow than we were today. And your team knows that you really believe in that. And, you know, people love that. And they love that in their leaders. And they love to be part of a team that is concentrating on being better every day.

[00:07:35] And so Then feedback kind of becomes natural where you can, because this is not a negative, it's a positive. We're, we're great today, but I want to be even better tomorrow. And in order to do that, I'm going to give you this feedback and it's going to kind of go both ways. They got to feel comfortable doing it to you also.

[00:07:52] Yeah. I feel like you naturally do that. Just being in rotary with you and being around you, you just have a very approachable leadership presence about you. So congratulations. That's awesome. Well, thank you. So, tell me about, so your interim, how long before, I know they're talking about moving forward, uh, hiring on a permanent basis, and I think you told me you put your hat in the ring on that, correct?

[00:08:14] Yes, I'm in the process of, uh, getting all my paperwork done. So, this has to do with Ed Code on how you fly, it's a whole process, and it's open, the position's open now. Okay. And I believe it closes December 6th, I believe it's December 6th. And then there's a whole host of interviews and, and then the board, it's really the board that hires me, but we have a big committee that screens the paperwork and gets all the, the applications ready, does the first round of interviews.

[00:08:50] And then the second round of the interviews goes to the board. I gotcha. And then they decide. And then the position, my contract. Ends February 28th. Okay. So, yes, if I don't get the job, then I go back to the classroom. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and you, you love being, you have almost a win win outcome here. You get to go back to your students if you don't get it.

[00:09:15] Yes. And you get to keep doing the work that you really believe in if you do get it. So that's, that's a terrific. I, I really want, so, You know, the class A driving school we started, we're still waiting to get our trucks and we have to, uh, finish getting the rotation of students through the second two classes and get that all ironed out.

[00:09:37] Then we will have the first cohort through and know what to expect when we start, you know, the second cohort. So that I'm real comfortable with. Uh, we have another project we've been working on. I was very lucky and it was with Joe Wise. I was working with, um, he, there's a consortium of all these, uh, counties and they received a million dollars.

[00:10:03] every county and he was sweet enough we were in transition in leaders and he still wrote us in the grant. Oh. And so when I, so he's such a great guy. He's such a great guy. Yes. Oh so smart. He wrote us in, and so when I became interim, I said, absolutely, we want this money, we're going to put it towards dental.

[00:10:25] We had, when I was the division chair for years, we kept trying to figure out a way to start dental hygiene and dental assisting. And so that was our seed money to get that to grow. By December, the end of December, we should be doing all, with all the classrooms and one lab space, and then we're bringing in a crew to finish.

[00:10:43] For The big lab space, and we are in the process of hiring our director right now. Okay. And so dental assisting will start, I'm very excited. Wow. August 2025. So, I, I'm, I'm hoping to be hired because I really want to see that project through. Yeah. Yeah. And then the director will work with the dental board.

[00:11:08] And then we'll get dental hygiene together. And I don't know if it'll take us a year or two years to get that on board. You have to go through all of these outside boards and it's on their timeline and all that. But super excited about that. I've already talked to the chamber and we're going to have the chamber party on, in September, 2025, along with our ribbon cutting.

[00:11:31] Oh, man. I just, yes, just to a big, big party. Oh, that's great. That's great. I didn't realize. So that, that's really exciting. You've got the trucking thing getting going. Do you have, uh, well, let's just talk about the trucking thing just a little bit. So tell me how, uh, I, I know the answer to this, but tell me how that came to fruition and, and just a little bit about that.

[00:11:54] Well, that came into fruition because I was in line at Rotary waiting to get my meal and, uh, that's when I met you and you had said, I think you asked me if we were ever going to get trucking or could we get trucking. Yeah. And, um, and so I started asking one of the deans. What do we need to do to get this going?

[00:12:18] It's when you're running a community college in California, the, one of the things you have to do, you can't just say, Oh, I want to, I want a dental hygiene or I want a trucking. You have to have your labor market data. You have to go to our regional consortium to say, we'd like to do this. They have to approve it.

[00:12:38] We had to then develop all the curriculum. We had to hire someone to write all the curriculum, submit the curriculum to our chancellor's office. They have to approve it. I mean, it's a lot of time. It takes years. Like I've been working on dental for two and a half years. It takes years to get this. And so with your prodding saying we really need this, I started looking into it and we, we found a way to do it.

[00:13:07] But the important part about it is we did it with our non credit funds from the state. So it's free to the students. That part's really good. Amazing. Yeah. Yeah. So talk about your enrollment and kind of how it's, it's kind of as a, as the program started now, I think it started in October, right? Yes. So there's three classes.

[00:13:29] The first class is just the instruction part where they're learning the information that they need to get their permit. So that's over with. And so students were told. You know, go get a drug test, your physical, go take your permit, get your permit, then come back to us. And then what we're doing, we've purchased trucks.

[00:13:52] We have to get them here. And then I've also met with you to try and figure out a way to partner with you on that. We will be hiring the second and third courses require a lot of one on one with the students. So they're going to be in many cohorts and to get them through and we have Um, one of our, he actually has driven a bus for us for 30 years.

[00:14:16] He is going down to do the assimilation cause we bought a simulator and he's going down, I think next week, San Diego, the poor guy, to get training on, on using the simulator. So in running through this program, the first cohort's always going to be a little bumpy because we're going to figure out, first of all, we didn't know what the, the need was going to be and we had.

[00:14:42] There's 35 in the class, in the first class, and then I want to say we had 20, 25 on the wait list. Wow. Yes, so it's, yes, and we fit a need. I'm a, um, I'm very passionate about vocational training for our local kids. Yeah. You know, not everyone's going to go get a four year degree and we need options for the ones that don't.

[00:15:08] Yes. And, uh, you know, normally those that get a four year degree have either had that fostered through their, the drive fostered through their family, or they come to, you know, community college playing sports or whatever, and then they have counselors that kind of guide them. But those that don't want to do that, we need to have options.

[00:15:28] 100%. I agree more. I mean, when I was growing up, well, I followed her high school, that's where I went. We had an ROP program where, you know, we were like rebuilding transmissions, um, digging into the engines. We were learning how to run equipment. And then we had, you know, the, uh, Ag mechanics, where we're building horse trailers completely from ground up, horse trailers, uh, wood shop, you're building incredible, uh, pieces of furniture for your, for your home.

[00:15:55] And a lot of that, just, you know, it's funding. I know there's a lot of funding challenges in education right now. A lot of that has been stripped away from the high schools and brutal. And, and unfortunately, you know, I I'm, we run a construction company, as you know, and we just have a heck of a time getting.

[00:16:14] You know, we either have 18 year olds that come and apply that literally don't know anything. I mean, anything, when I say anything, what I mean is not, you know, not education wise, but more about, uh, more about like, they just don't know how to weld. They don't know how to cut. They don't know how to hook up a trailer to a pickup.

[00:16:35] They don't know how to back up a trailer with the pickup. They've just been so isolated in so many ways. It's. It's almost shocking. So when we can get, it's usually it's the ranch kids that do really good for us. Cause they've been around all of that for a while. And, and those are almost kind of at the top of our hiring list as kids that a, they grew up on ranches and then B.

[00:16:59] Uh, played sports because they understand, you know, the role of the team is greater than themselves, you know, instead of it's all about me, it's about the team and what the team is trying to accomplish. So I'm just so excited to see programs like you putting the trucking, truck driving, we truck driving is a.

[00:17:16] huge shortage right now. And it's great to see that it's answered with that real high, high enrollment like people recognize it because our truck drivers make a terrific living and their home virtually every night. Uh, it's, you know, they're not having to do the long haul clear across the country type stuff and away from their family a week at a time.

[00:17:37] They actually come home. You know, we do out of town projects a little bit, but for the most part, they're home. Nearly every single night and they make a terrific living and we can't get enough. So anyway, I really want to thank you for taking the lead on that and jumping on that. I'm really excited to see some graduates coming out.

[00:17:54] And, and, and then the other thing you and I've talked about is we have these tremendous kids that are graduating from, from one of these local high schools and they have no, a very few opportunities for families sustaining wage jobs. Right. And so, I'm just really excited that you guys have a program like that.

[00:18:12] The dental, uh, hygienist and assistant program sounds amazing. That sounds like another terrific outlet for young people in our community. Can you talk, give us a sense of what some of the other programs, the most popular programs at Lassen College that you guys are sending people out into the workforce or transitioning to?

[00:18:31] For your and kind of what the ratios of each is. So right now, we just at the board last night, we had our nursing director, Christy Myers. She's amazing. And, um, she gave an, an update. I'm at a sheet right here, actually. And she gave the update on where, um, our enrollment is in our programs. And so what she did, we hired her.

[00:18:55] I believe, I always feel like we're stealing the best employees from the city, but I think we got it from the city or the county. And she, so right now we have in our medical, our, our whole creative arts building is turning into our medical science building slowly and surely, but we have, they have simulation labs.

[00:19:19] Where the dummies, like Blink, give birth, talk. Oh my gosh, it's amazing what she has done. And, you know, some of it has been through our funding and state funding. And there's a big push in the state now because there's such a nursing shortage. Sure. To get community colleges to offer bachelor's degrees in nurses.

[00:19:42] We've, we're all lined up to do it. But, I think Newsom vetoed it, unfortunately, um, but there's still a big push and there's such a nursing shortage. They have to do it. The, uh, CSU's can't bump out enough nurses, but we have, so we have, um, EMT program right now, they are requesting that we have an advanced EMT, but we're so heavy into our RN program right now that, that we're, we're saying yes in the future, but right now we're trying to.

[00:20:13] Get everything calmed down, but we have phlebotomy and we have a CNA program. We have an LVN program and it's a, um, condensed program. So some colleges do it in two years, we do it in 10 months. Oh my goodness. And so we tell our students, yes, it's very intense. We tell our students when you're in this program, you really can't work.

[00:20:40] And I'm always amazed when we do the pinning ceremony. There are so many single moms. I have no idea how they get through it, but they do, but it's an incredible wage and the prison here, um, hires a lot of LVNs and they start off making, having great benefits, making a good wage and, um, going right into a job that we have, so we have the LVN program, which is the 10 months program, and then we now have our, our registered nurse.

[00:21:11] Nursing program in our end. Wow. And that's a two year program. But what we also did with that is we did a bridge program. So we have our LVN. And then we have our RN over here. And then people that are are the LVNs. Yeah. They bridge into the RN. Wow. And so, they've made it an easy transition. Right now we have in the RN program, we have 23 students, I believe it's 23, and then we have, or 15, and then we have, yeah.

[00:21:51] Another 20 some that are in the bridge. So next semester, starting in spring, we'll have 35 RN students. That is incredible, Carrie. Yes. Yeah. That is amazing. That part, we started the RN, I think, last year, and that was, those nursing boards, they don't mess around. We had to, we had to be very present for those, but we have our, um, and our pass rate for our NCLEX is 100%, which is amazing.

[00:22:24] So we have a very, very strong medical program. And then we'll, we'll add to the dental hygiene. We have a great welding program. Corey, we're, we're doing some big, I don't know exactly what it is, but some HVAC projects. So there's going to be more welding boosts. We have the CNC welding. We have great technology back there and he does the, I'm not going to get this right, and my dad was a welder and he's going to be very disappointed.

[00:22:56] He, he, he does. He's, what is it when you, certifications, you get your certifications here free. So he did. You can be a certified welder and come out. So yeah, that's a, that's a huge thing in our industry as well, Carrie. You know, oftentimes you'll be on projects that require some structural welding. They have to, has to be done by a certified welder, you know.

[00:23:18] And shoot, all of my guys have been welding most of their lives and they're probably As good or maybe even better than a lot of new certified welders, but if they don't, if they're not certified, then they can't, can't weld on the project. So, you know, that's, so we, yeah, so he did that and there's different certifications, correct?

[00:23:37] Yeah, yeah, and I'm, I'm, I'm no expert on it, but I do know, yeah, there are different certifications for the types of welding, yes. Yep, and he does that, and we actually did, was it last year? We started doing open houses for our local high school kids, and we would open up, we opened up our auto, we opened up our, Welding.

[00:23:59] We opened up nursing and we invited high school kids and their parents and the community to come up and see what's new. And we, and I actually took the board up there for a tour and it's very impressive. You just, you know, it's a trades building. It's in the back of campus and you don't think to visit it, but some really high tech, uh, machinery back there.

[00:24:20] And we have. Uh, a new auto instructor who, um, classes are packed and we have a pathway at our local high school. Uh, we have quite a few pathways, so our, our local high school students take junior and senior classes in a medical pathway, an auto. We have, I don't know if we have welding, we have fire science, we have AJ.

[00:24:45] And so these students take classes, they're. Junior and senior year. And then when they come to campus, they're close to having their degree. And I've been working with, I worked really closely with Morgan Nugent when he was here, and we've been working, uh, trying to see what we can do to get some kind of pathway for the students up there who can't be served by Shasta College.

[00:25:07] I don't want to butt into their region. Right, right, right. So keep it moving. You were naming some of the programs, uh, and did you say AJ was one? Did I hear that right? Oh, Administration of Justice. Oh, Administration of Justice. Okay. Okay. And so one of the exciting things we're doing there. So. We have, this is where I feel bad because I feel like people think we're stealing all the good employees from Lassen County, but we got the retired police chief, Tom Downing, I don't know if you've ever met him.

[00:25:36] Great guy. I've heard of him. Pleasure to meet him. Oh, he's, he's wonderful. And then Tara Avila. Tara is in everything. I don't know if you've seen her. She does a lot of writing for Susanville staff. She's, she does. The heroes, uh, where they get, uh, Christmas presents for all the youth in the county. She does amazing outreach.

[00:26:01] Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. She's amazing. And, um, she, she happens to be married to our baseball coach, but she's one of our administration of justice instructors. Both of them are finishing up their master's right now because we are applying, I believe, in December. This is another project we've been working on the past two years.

[00:26:22] We're applying to see if we can host a bachelor's degree on our campus. And the first one we're going to offer is, happens to do, um, I'm not quite sure the name of it, but it, it has to do with public safety. And Very cool. Yes. And then there's two other, that'll kind of be our guinea pig. There's a lot of hoops to jump through and that's, that's been, I think we've been working on that for two years.

[00:26:49] We have curriculum, we've been doing a lot of work behind the scenes. So if we can get a blessing on that, I have a board in my office that has everything that we want to start. And I believe we're thinking maybe that could start with, In a year or a year and a half, but we'd have a bachelor's degree.

[00:27:08] That's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, it's funny. I think college, the four year university thing has kind of evolved, uh, you know, I, I, a lot of young people come to me for advice. I'm not sure why, but they do. And the advice I consistently give them is if, if you're not sure what you want to do, if you really have no idea, don't go to a four year school.

[00:27:34] Don't. Don't go to a junior college. If you want, if you know you want to go to college, go to a two year university or two year community college and, and figure your stuff out. A, it's significantly cheaper. B, it's going to give you a ton of different pathways. And a ton of those pathways, Are, are making fantastic money coming out after a two year program if you decide not to go to the four year or if you get, hey, you find a pathway, you're excited and then transfer to the four year.

[00:28:05] That's what my, my, I've got three kids and my youngest. He played basketball for Shasta College. He wanted to go to junior college ahead of time. He had, he had fantastic grades, straight A student, but he just wasn't positive what he wanted to do and want to play basketball. But he took, you know, he took all the hard classes and in at Shasta, the chemistries, the physics, you know, all the things that you need to do to move on to the four year program.

[00:28:32] And then went to Boise State, and he said he was so prepared when he went. Everything transcribed, and he just had a terrific experience. And, and then we have a bunch of employees that we've hired here that have, uh, gone through like Shasta Colleges, um, Equipment class, you know, uh, construction equipment, and then my son has a company, my oldest son has a company in the forestry world, and they've hired some of the people out of the forestry program coming from, from Chesapeake College as well, so you guys are doing tremendous work, and I, I feel like not enough people realize How many terrific job opportunities there are coming out of the out of the community college and contrast that with these kids that go to a four year.

[00:29:17] They don't know what they want to do. So, I mean, hey, I was one of those kids. What's the easiest thing to do? Right? That's what's the what's the easiest degree to get? That's sometimes what you know. Uh, kids that don't have a clue or why do something hard. I'm gonna do something easy and they come out with a, you know, degree that just doesn't really translate to a good paying job.

[00:29:35] And here they are a bunch of loans. So yeah, we took exactly exactly a lot of loans. Oh, yeah, I agree. Yeah, I agree. I don't I feel like we're not doing a good job of getting the message out for Um, I feel like, you know, like Joe Weiss, when, you know, he was in that group with us, he would say, Hey, my mission is to make it, kids sometimes say, Oh, I'm just going to Shasta College, right?

[00:29:59] And you know, they're not, it's almost like they're apologizing. They didn't go to a four year and he said, I want, I want that gone. I want them like to have pride and, you know, excitement about going to Shasta College. To a two year thing, and I'm I couldn't agree more. I feel like you guys are of the best package for kids that None of us, the only thing I knew for sure, Carrie, this is a funny story.

[00:30:22] The only thing I knew for sure when I was 18 getting ready to graduate is that I wasn't going to be in construction. That's the one thing I knew for certain. And here I am the CEO of a construction company. So, uh, I think it's really important for kids to go to a place where they're not. A lot of your programs are free or, or nearly free and you can figure things out, uh, and figure out and talk to the graduates and talk to the people that are in the programs and have tremendous opportunities, uh, to go straight into the workforce at a pay, at a pay rate that, uh, That rivals the four year universities, in my mind, with, if they manage it right, with no debt.

[00:31:00] It's just, it's a win win. And I don't, I feel like not enough people know about it. Well, and you know, so I grew up in Southern California. Tons of opportunities down there. And, I knew that I had no idea what I wanted to do. And I knew that I didn't want to go to the local community college, which is Orange Coast College.

[00:31:25] It's a great community college. Great college. And so I started and it was so overwhelming. Your class sizes, you had 200 kids in a lecture hall. And I didn't know, I didn't know what I wanted, and I didn't know the questions to ask, and so I kind of got lost in it. I think I lost in two or three weeks, I said, forget this.

[00:31:48] And I had been coming up to Lake Elminore since I was 13. And so I knew, I knew of this college, um, had never been here, but I knew. And I literally packed everything up in my car. I think my mom had a heart attack and I said, I'm just going to go to school up there. And I couldn't, I was on my own down there and I couldn't afford, can't afford to live in Orange County.

[00:32:10] You know, when you have no college degree, I was way too seen. I was so lost. And so got in my car, drove up here, walked up here, didn't even know what to ask and said, I want to go to college here. What do I need to do? And it was life changing because it was so small. My class sizes were small. I got. Yeah. A lot of one on one attention, which in that point in my life, I needed because I, I could get, I didn't know the questions to ask.

[00:32:41] And it was that foundation that when I transferred to Chico state, I was so prepared, so prepared. And some of the best teachers, Dr. McDermott was here. He was the English instructor just out, he's not here any longer, but one of the best teachers I ever had in my whole educational career. And it was here.

[00:33:02] So, I'm really passionate about small community colleges because students are able to find themselves, I think, whether you go a general ed path and transfer like I did, or students that get into our forestry program, or welding, or now our class A, or nursing, there's, there's kind of something for everybody.

[00:33:24] I didn't know what I wanted to do. Yeah, that's a, that's an amazing story. So, so you went to Chico, right? So, and then did you, you knew you wanted to be in teaching when you went to Chico? No, I, yeah. Oh my gosh, so I kind of, I can remember sitting in the psych class going, Oh, I would never want to teach at a college, you know, thinking you just do the same thing over and over again.

[00:33:45] I wanted to be a counselor and I wanted to be a school counselor and I, I really wanted to work with kids and help kids. And I, but I loved Lassen college so much and loved, I love a small town. I love the Four Seasons. I loved everything. So I knew I wanted to move back to Susanville. I happened to, in college, Marry someone that was from Susanville.

[00:34:11] Oh, wow. And so, I said, I want to move back to Susanville. And he's like, I don't want to move back to Susanville. And we investigated small towns in Colorado. And finally, I'm just like, you know, if we have a family, I want them around family. So, begrudgingly, he moved back to Susanville with me. We both moved here.

[00:34:30] Neither one of us had jobs. I was commuting back to Chico because I worked at Costco, that paid my way through college for the last years. Two days a week, I would commute back to Chico so I had, we had income. He found a job and then I found a job and I ended up, I ended up at the high school as a counselor and knew I wanted to be back up here.

[00:34:53] And then it just transitioned into, I started teaching at night and just fell in love with it. So, I have a, had a really weird career path. Like, none of it was kind of planned, but everything I did, I ended up loving. So, so tell me, you started, you started teaching at night at, at Lassen College? Yes, when I was a counselor.

[00:35:14] So I was a counselor here during the day. Okay. So I started teaching a couple classes at night. And I loved it. And then there was a vacancy. One of our instructors went on sabbatical. And I had three weeks notice. They said, do you want to teach psychology? And I said, and I was qualified. I admit.

[00:35:36] California State has very, uh, strict guidelines and I said, sure. Amazing. So I did that and then ended up in sociology because he retired and just loved it. I literally, I was so annoying. I never had a bad day. I was, it was a great, it was a great job and the students, you never get bored. Yeah. Never. You know, and the topics always changing and it's just, it was, I feel very, uh, legitimately feel very blessed the career I've had.

[00:36:10] This is my 27th year here at the college, but that's not including, I mean, most of my life has been here. Some people would think that would be embarrassing, but I was here for three years as a student and then. I worked a couple years part time because I funded myself through college. So I had to work, save up and then go.

[00:36:29] And then went away to Chico, went away and got my graduate degree and then came back and started working here. Amazing. That is so cool. That's a great story, Carrie. I mean, so how, how as, how as a community do we educate kids better on how many tremendous opportunities there are at Laskin Community College?

[00:36:49] How do, I mean, I feel like you're doing a, you're doing a good job like in Laskin College, but, uh, there's a lot of other high schools around. Yes. How do we, how do you, how do we get the message out? We have, so we hired an outreach coordinator and she goes to as many of the local high schools as she can to talk to the students and then to talk to their counselors.

[00:37:13] Um, the, the, Unfortunate thing because of the, the way the budget set up in these smaller schools, there may not be a counselor or they, you know, they're, the schools are stuck with the funding the way it is. So we have done this past year, done a lot of outreach. And then another thing that we've done is, uh, opened up those pathways, we've increased our pathways.

[00:37:38] And so if you can get them in the door and get them exposed, and it's not like, oh, trying to get them here because we want our numbers up. I mean, it does benefit us, but basically it helps our community. Yeah. Because you're training. Yeah. You're training these students to be. You know, productive citizens and want to stay and keep our, our community thriving.

[00:38:01] That's how we look at it. Yeah. Well, you know, I'm keep going back to that CEO group, but you know, I, the thing about, so there's 20 members in that CEO group that I'm part of. And, and the only rule is you can't be in the same industry, right? So you can really be vulnerable and talk about whatever, what's kicking your butt as a leader in your organization without a competitor.

[00:38:24] You know, using that against you, right? So that's kind of the part of it. But I remember thinking when I joined it, that I have all these unique challenges that nobody else has. I'm sure what we do is so much harder because we have to be low bidder and we have to, you know, I have all these excuses of why ours was harder, but you get in a group like that and you realize, well, the exact same problems, there's not enough good people.

[00:38:48] Um, there's not young, it's hard to find, you know, the, the, uh, I don't know, the flavor of the month is the, I think every older generation looks at the younger generation and go, Oh, they're lazy. They don't work as hard. They don't have the same work ethic. You know? So there's some of that. Get off their phones.

[00:39:04] Yeah. They're all on their phones all the time or whatever the case may be. And, and, but what the overall. Overwhelming challenge that all 20 businesses are dealing with is, is recruiting and maintaining quality employees. And so there's just, for young people coming out, I sometimes I talk to them and they feel like there's no opportunity for me and I'm like, you, you have no idea how much opportunity there is for you.

[00:39:34] There are, there's incredible jobs that, you know, um, 20 years ago might've been a fairly low paying wage compared to other opportunities out there, but truck driving, operating equipment, uh, you know, dental hygienist, um, nursing, logging, forestry work, there's just all of those sectors pay extremely well and because there's such a high demand for good quality people.

[00:40:01] And so. God, the, the getting that message out to young people right now is like a personal mission of mine. I spoke at a lot of the high schools and, uh, you know, I've been to Shasta College a couple of times and it's just sometimes hearing it from an employer is a little better than hearing it from, You know, somebody that works for the college, if that makes sense.

[00:40:22] So I'm telling you right now, if there's anything I can do to help you, uh, in keeping out to young people, I'd love to help because that turns around and helps our entire industry and our community, and we're highly community involved, so. Anything I can do to help, I'd love to help, okay? Okay, thank you.

[00:40:40] Thank you. Yeah. So, hey, how have we been going? We're almost to about one hour right now. So is there anything that you want to kind of close with on that's important that we get the message out, uh, that you want to talk about today, Carrie? You know, at college, I've noticed that in the past couple of years, college has really gotten a bad rap because of the student loan.

[00:41:03] Yeah. Yeah. It's true. It's so neat. And, and so I try because people say, well, college degree doesn't, doesn't pay for itself. And the one thing I try and get out to students is first of all, go to community college first because you have your transfer opportunities and your vocational opportunities, but there's such, there's a thing called the California promise grant.

[00:41:26] And that is if you're a California resident and you're coming to community college for the first time and you're going to go full time, your tuition's free. And so I, I, I know. And so I just, I try and get the word out on that because they don't, they just see for those that aren't educated on how education really works, they.

[00:41:49] They, I guess they assume community college is going to cost them 60 grand and they're going to take a student loan. So just the best thing they can do is talk to a counselor, um, whether it be at their high school or any community college, really, you know, we'd be happy to service them, but just get out there.

[00:42:06] And if you don't know what questions to ask, just start asking one and it'll lead to other questions. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. Yeah. Great. I think that's a great place to close, Carrie. I so appreciate you. Thank you for being on our first, first ever North State. We really appreciate you and really excited to see the dynamic and incredible things that you guys continue to do.

[00:42:29] And again, anything we can do to support, please reach out. Okay. Ditto. Sounds good. Have a great day. Bye bye. Bye bye.

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