Get Down to College Business

Sarah Holtan, PhD sits down with Gary Daynes, PhD, the Founder and Principal, Back Porch Consulting and Interim President Salem Academy and College, for a blunt conversation about why most small schools are making strategic mistakes, and what they can do about it. This chat is a must for anyone working in higher ed who’s tired of wishful thinking and wants practical advice on how to future-proof their institution.

Gary explains why wearing too many hats isn’t just exhausting but often a symptom of bigger strategic problems. He calls out the damaging habits of building plans on imaginary growth, and shares the overlooked power of focus: it’s not just about efficiency but about creating a mission that actually matters to students, staff, and the broader community. If you’ve ever wondered whether your school’s “unique” value is just a buzzword, this is your episode.

Are colleges shooting themselves in the foot with unfocused missions and bloated org charts? Listen in to hear Gary’s straight talk on what truly moves the needle at small colleges.

Episode Highlights:

12:30 - In the growth period, many schools added professional master's degrees. And so their net tuition revenue was growing in part because they had an MBA that had 100 students, or they had added an MFA or something like that that had strong local attraction that generated a lot of revenue.

22:21 - Athletics is an area where schools who do athletics well are learning to support students in the ways that students most need to be supported.

24:07 - If you have a school with 1,000 students and you have 75 English majors, you better damn well figure out what's going on with your English program, because that is remarkable. And you need to preserve the strength of that program and duplicate the duplicatable things elsewhere in order to ensure that other programs are strong in that sort of way.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Gary Daynes, PhD

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Sarah Holtan sits down with Dr. Robert Kelchen, Professor of Higher Education at University of Tennessee - Knoxville, to ask the hard question: can a new college president truly turn around a university’s finances? If you’ve ever wondered why some presidents seem to steady the ship while others are just along for the ride, this is an episode you can’t miss.

Most people think hiring a new leader is a silver bullet, but Robert uncovers why financial miracles rarely happen overnight—especially at public universities. He reveals how private colleges, without state funding, are forced to make tough, often painful choices about staff and programs just to keep the lights on.

What are colleges getting right (and wrong) when they hire new leaders, and what can faculty and staff really do to survive the shake-up? Listen and learn from a leading higher ed finance expert.

Episode Highlights:

03:37 - At public universities, they're dealing with the state, dealing with governors, lawmakers, higher education boards, and that limits their ability to make changes as quickly.

05:46 - It's not reasonable for the first couple of years, but it's also something that is coming up in more job postings for presidents. So even if it's not realistic to expect it, institutions are expecting it.

13:10 - These are positions that they're emotionally draining and the expectations are often not realistic. And that's why you see both presidential salaries going up to basically get people to do the job, and also the tenure going down.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Robert Kelchen

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Can New Presidents Improve Colleges’ Financial Health?

Paying for college stirs up way more than just number crunching—it’s a raw experience laden with stress, overwhelm, and uncertainty. In today’s episode, Sarah Holtan, PhD, sits down with Mark Mitchell, Vice President of Access and Affordability of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), to cut through the facts and talk about the very real feelings families face when tuition bills are due.

Mark reveals what’s changed in the financial aid landscape and why the pressure is only getting heavier for families—and what colleges can actually do about it. If anxiety, confusion, and those unexpected extra costs sound all too familiar, what simple tweaks could make college feel like a better investment?

Don’t you want to hear what most colleges are missing when trying to ease the burden for students and their families? Mark Mitchell breaks it all down—emotion, process, and practical solutions—in this eye-opening conversation.

Episode Highlights

04:05 - It was the first time since we've done this survey that stress topped the list of emotions.

09:56 - If more families are working more to make the tuition work, it's easy to imagine like the added stress that that brings with it.

14:39 - It's more about how to make sure that that stress doesn't make them stop doing what they need to be doing for their child.

37:05 - If somebody's struggling with something, just ask them. Get a group of families together and say, hey, what's wrong with this process? How can we make it better? What are you struggling with?

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Mark Mitchell

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In this insightful episode, host Sarah Holtan, PhD, sits down with Kevin McClure, PhD, Professor of Higher Education at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. They discuss the critical state of employee well-being in higher education.

Dr. McClure unpacks the evolving landscape of university workplaces, addressing the challenges facing faculty and staff post-pandemic, and offers actionable steps for leaders looking to create a truly caring institution.

The conversation dives deep into why employee well-being is more than an HR talking point—it's a strategic imperative for any college hoping to thrive. Dr. McClure shares research-backed strategies, stories from his own journey through burnout, and the essential structural and leadership changes required to make real progress.

Episode Highlights

02:05 - The state of employee well being in higher education is not great... we're still recovering from a really challenging time period during the pandemic.

09:50 - Doing what's right for employees is actually doing what's right for the organization more broadly.

21:14 - We can't really bring individualized solutions to organizational challenges because they're only going to go so far.

36:38 - Care is something that leaders themselves can also expect, and that's a reasonable expectation.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Kevin McClure, PhD

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In this forward-thinking episode, Sarah Holtan, PhD sits down with Melik Peter Khoury, DBA, to explore how higher education leaders can harness the transformative power of AI—not just as a technological tool, but as a driver for architectural, workflow, and cultural change in universities.

Rather than dwelling on AI as a source of academic anxiety or a threat to jobs, Dr. Khoury shares actionable strategies for integrating AI into executive functions, staff productivity, and student learning.

Listeners are invited to rethink old paradigms and learn how embracing AI can help institutions stay relevant, flatten organizational structures, empower staff, and offer students the fluency they’ll need in an AI-powered workforce.

Episode Highlight

05:02 - If you don't know how to use AI, if you don't embrace it, if you don't understand how it works, then your organization is going to be out of date before you even know it.

17:15 - AI will make certain tasks redundant. But right now, in my opinion, the lack of imagination from organizational design is what would make employees obsolete.

27:56 - If you are graduating a student and they are not AI fluent, you're already making them obsolete in the workforce.

37:44 - If you are in a leadership position in higher education and you do not experiment with AI, and then show your direct reports and their direct reports and your peers that you are and normalize it, you will get stuck in time, and the world will pass you by.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Melik Peter Khoury, DBA

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Could a better way to support faculty actually decide which universities survive the coming years? In this episode, Sarah Holtan, PhD, talks with Derek Bruff, the Associate Director of the Center for Teaching Excellence at the University of Virginia, about how Centers for Teaching and Learning (CTLs) shape a college’s future, even when budgets are tight and change is constant.

Derek shares his candid perspective on what makes a CTL truly matter: it’s not just space and tech, but trust-based relationships, faculty skill-building, and aligning with what the university really values. If you’ve ever wondered why some CTLs thrive while others fade, or how to measure their real value, this episode will surprise you.

Want to know the one key metric that gets admin attention (and how your CTL stacks up)? Listen in as Derek pulls back the curtain on CTL impact.

Episode Highlights:

17:57 - It's important to have people in your center who can build kind of trust based working relationships so that faculty come to see the people in your center as folks they can trust, they can be a little vulnerable with to say, you know what? This part of my teaching is not going as well as I wish it were.

22:46 - It's really hard in 2025 to separate technology out of teaching and to think of those as two separate things. Right? So much of the teaching that we do is technology integrated. And so I think CTLs need to have kind of a a at least a voice and a space in that. They don't necessarily need to run the thing or have a lot of resources in this, but there needs to be kind of a an organizational structure in place where CTLs can speak into those technology issues on campus.

26:26 - If you're not able to hire a full time person into a CTL role, there are a number of campuses that will make this a part time faculty job. And so you might give a faculty member a course release or two or more so to free up time to kind of serve a CTL like function. This is a this can get things started. It's hard to have a huge impact with that model, but it is one that I see a lot.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Derek Bruff

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Sarah Holtan, PhD speaks with Brandon Moore, Executive Director of Learning & Development at the Kacmarcik Center for Human Performance. Higher Ed is struggling with shrinking resources and shifting student needs—but what if colleges could learn a thing or two from how the corporate world approaches workforce training? Brandon shares how his team treats employees as whole people, prioritizes training that actually fits real jobs, and isn’t afraid to fail fast and let go of tired programs.

Are you stuck wondering why graduates struggle with “people skills” once they hit the workforce—or if colleges can keep up with changing tech? Get ready to rethink what truly matters in student (and employee) development.

Tune in to hear Brandon Moore unpack what higher ed can gain from corporate L&D, from handling skills gaps to monetizing campus expertise.

Episode Highlights:

14:47 - I think if you're not aligning your overall learning strategy and development strategy with the overall business goals, you're probably putting yourself in a position where you have a gap whether you know it or not. There's a blind spot that's coming around the corner pretty soon.

21:12 - What I have learned is that the more versatile you can make your programming, the more versatile you can make your training, meaning people don't have to come in to a workshop for two hours, give them a virtual option. And if you can give them a virtual option where they can sort of socialize and talk about that virtual option, I think that sort of learning experience environment is critical in an ever-changing versatile environment.

34:12 - It's really about understanding where they're at and going to them in their space and letting them know that we are going to intentionally try to collect information from you. And we just want you to know that we're going to do something with that and follow-up with that group and say, "We've heard you and here's how we've made these changes."

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Brandon Moore

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Sarah Holtan, PhD sits down with Bruce Hoeker, CFO at the Association of Business Administrators of Christian Colleges (ABACC), to cut through the confusion on college finances. If you think understanding your institution’s business operations is just for the CFO, Bruce wants you to think again—and shows why the financial future of your college depends on broad, strategic awareness at every leadership level.

Too often, faculty and department heads are promoted into roles where financial savvy is assumed, but training is missing. The result? Strategic priorities get underfunded, and warning signs go ignored. Are you sure you know which questions will protect your school from the next crisis?

Ever wondered how to spot financial red flags before it’s too late—or what separates a true CFO from a bookkeeper? This episode gives straightforward answers and real-world resources for non-financial professionals.

Episode Highlights:

03:36 - There's a lot you should be asking and a lot you should know. How is the institution doing? Are we healthy? If not, why, and what are we doing to fix it? You want to ask how the strategic plan is being funded. Do the resources allocated align to the highest priorities of the strategic plan? You want to ask about financial trends. What do they say about the institution's future? And you want to make sure you have the data you need to make informed financial decisions for your department. You also might want to know what departments are generating enough revenue to cover their expenses and what departments are not.

12:45 - I would say we need to understand that a CFO is a strategist, not a bookkeeper. And, unfortunately, many colleges have a bookkeeper in the role of a CFO. So to understand the difference, the CFO is a strategist. The true CFO, the real CFO, is responsible for financial planning, both long and short term. They're responsible for projecting financial needs to aid in strategic decision making. They're responsible for interpreting financial data and trends. For management use, looking at the story behind the numbers, not just the numbers.

19:32 - Do we have the data we need to make decisions? That's key. If you don't have the data, get the data. We need to be asking, are the resources we are allocating to various areas, are those the areas of greatest importance? And that can be found in your strategic plan. So are we allocating resources to the most important areas? Are we investing in the right areas to drive long-term growth? We want to ask, "Are we performing against targets and budgets? Are we living within our means?" We want to, again, talk about our biggest threats. What are we doing about them? That's a very important board conversation. We want to talk about how dependent is our institution on its various revenue sources, and what are we doing to protect and grow those resources. We want to be asking things, like, "What do our trend lines say about such things as donor revenue?"

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Bruce Hoeker, CFO

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Sarah Holtan, PhD, sits down with Lucie Lapovsky, PhD, a financial expert in higher education and Principal of Lapovsky Consulting. In today's episode, discover how tuition pricing strategies could hold the key to college sustainability, especially in the face of declining enrollments and a challenging educational landscape. Lucie's insights offer a fresh perspective, challenging the conventional high tuition, high discount model many institutions still follow.

Lucie breaks down the importance of understanding the true cost of education, emphasizing that tuition resets are about smart pricing, not just sticker shock reduction. Her advice is to look beyond the immediate gains to the long-term benefits of a pricing strategy aligned with your institution's values and market demands.

Curious about what happens after a college decides to reveal its true cost to students? Lucie’s conversation reveals surprising outcomes that can enhance financial resilience and market perception.

Episode Highlights:

02:23 - What most people know today is that not everyone pays the published price. There's a variety of ways students get financial aid or what we sometimes call discounts off of that price. So there's how you're perceived in the marketplace, what the message that price gives to students and their families, and then how it contributes to supporting the programs at your institution, how the revenue contributes to supporting them.

06:09 - Give them something that doesn't cost the college much or anything, but is a prestige indicator. So, for example, you might say, we are accepting your child, and we want you to know that they are part of our Honors Program, and this will provide them with a dinner with our Board of Trustees, invitation to special lectures, or, meeting with our special lecturers when they come. Things that parents can go and brag about and get other parents to say, "Wow, that child is special," rather than just the size of an award.

17:00 - It's amazing how many schools do not have good data systems and where there are data systems, there are multiple ones that don't agree. And so, number one, irrespective of what they're using data for, it's very challenging for a school to operate strategically without good data. And so, I will provide schools I'm working with a template of the data I need. And in some schools, they'll send it back to me within twenty four hours. And in other schools, a month later, we're still struggling to get the data and it's wrong, and we keep redoing it, and it's this system and that system. And so I would urge schools, no matter what you're thinking about, you want a really good data. You want be able to know how much you're discounting the students, what types of students, but you also know want to know what your cost of education cost.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Lucie Lapovsky, PhD.

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Sarah Holtan, PhD sits down with Nicole Gahagan, Ed.D., Associate Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at Madison Area Technical College, to talk about the intricate world of change management within higher education. In this episode, Dr. Gahagan shakes up the conventional approach to institutional change by focusing intently on human needs. Looking to improve student success and employee experiences? This one's for you.

Dr. Gahagan shares how ignoring human needs can backfire during change, causing resistance and inertia. She highlights the importance of purpose in change initiatives, stating that without understanding the "why," stakeholders might disengage. She also discusses her research insights into the key human needs during change: coherence, purpose, belonging, support, and confidence.

Want to know how focusing on these elements can change how an organization operates? Listen to discover Dr. Nicole Gahagan's unique take on creating a sustainable culture that embraces change as an opportunity, not a threat.

Episode Highlights:

03:11 - Change doesn't have to be this ominous, jarring, or exhausting things, but it can certainly feel that way when institutions aren't managing it well. The biggest mistake I see colleges and universities make are a lack of investment in building organizational change capacity and then failing to take on a human-centered approach during change events. So if leaders initiating change do not want to spend their time managing the panic that ensues every time a change is introduced into the environment, then they need to be disciplined and deliberate about doing those two things. So it's really about creating the conditions right for continuous improvement and innovation and for that to be something that you are building and maintaining over time with a lot of intention in order to create and sustain this change ready state.

06:54 - Based on my research and validated through my experience, humans have about five baseline needs in order to think and act differently in a way that will help the organization achieve their goals. That's coherence, purpose, belonging, support, and confidence. And without acknowledging or addressing, these people can't or simply won't change their mindsets or behaviors deeply and pervasively enough for an organization to achieve their intended outcomes. It's when these needs aren't met that you start to see resistant behaviors emerge.

14:19 - I wanted to find out how mid-level administrators make sense of their role in the context of organizational change. I use mid-level administrators, or I defined it very broadly, because it really depends on their organization and the layers of leadership they have. But what I said was anybody between cabinet and front lines that has some sort of supervisory responsibility, somebody who is in some way managing or leading others and would need to help cascade that change.

Sarah Holtan, PhD

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Nicole Gahagan, Ed.D.

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