Braven Leadership Course Offers Career Preparation and Helps Grads Get Hired

Episode Transcript

Keziah Sullivan00:00:10

Welcome to From City to the World, a show that covers conversations from the walls of The City College of New York to our city, our nation, and our world. Today, we bring you a very special conversation between President Vincent Boudreau and Kilsys Payamps-Roure, Executive Director of Braven New York, and this year's Samuel Rudin Distinguished Visiting Scholar.

As the Founding Executive Director of Braven New York, she leads initiatives that equip college students with the skills, networks, confidence, and experiences needed to secure strong first opportunities that lead to economic mobility. Founded in 2013, Braven empowers promising underrepresented young people, first generation college students, students from low income backgrounds, and students of color with the skills, confidence, experiences, and networks necessary to transition from college to strong first jobs.

The Samuel Rudin Visiting Scholars Lecture, a component of this program, provides an opportunity for members of the college community to interact with outstanding scholars, business leaders, and government officials, enriching the education experience on campus. Previous Rudin scholars include Walter Cronkite, Tom Brokaw, Walter E. Mosley, Susan Lacey, Rick Burns, Frank McCourt, the Honorable Mario Cuomo, Nobel Laureate, Dr. Harold E. Varmus, distinguished physicist Michio Kaku, Tony Award-winning producer, Vivek Tewari, Nicholas Kristof, and Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

And now, let's listen to this year's Samuel Rudin Distinguished Visiting Scholar Lecture.

Vincent Boudreau00:02:00

It's a treat to invite you all here for the Rudin Lecture. This is one of the highlights of our academic year, our public programming year. I'm thrilled to have Kilsys Payamps-Roure with us today.

We started hearing about Braven pretty much as soon as I became Interim President in 2016, at a time when we were not ready to work with the organization. We weren't set up that way. I think after talking with the Braven organization, they had been doing work at Lehman College, were interested in expanding, but we kind of agreed that we would wait, and we did for a couple of years.

But this idea of an organization that would help us bridge the gap between what we teach on campus and what students need to learn in the workforce, and bring people in the workforce to campus to work with students was intriguing to us. We knew that under Kilsys' leadership, they had already been working with Lehman.

You'll see in her bio, the expansion in the New York City area is impressive. I won't say entirely due to your efforts, but she is the founder and leader of Braven New York. It began with her and expands as a result of her wise leadership. And so, please join me in welcoming Kilsys Payamps-Roure to City College for the Rudin Lecture.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:03:21

Thank you. I want to start by thanking you so much, Vince, for the honor, and Deedee (phonetic), for the honor of asking me to be the Rudin Scholar. I am so humbled to be here today with you all. Thank you all for showing up. I was like, who's showing up to this thing? I don't want the room to be empty, so thanks for showing up.

I want to share a little bit about myself because if I share about myself, I think it brings Braven to life and why this is so important, the work that we're doing, because I'm so passionate about it. Like Vince said, my name is Kilsys Payamps-Roure, and I was born and raised in New York. I always say New York City, it runs through my veins. I am a proud New Yorker. I love this city deeply and the impact of what happens to its people.

I'm also the daughter of Dominican immigrants. My mom is right here, sitting in the row. That's my mom. It doesn't fall short on me the sacrifices that my mom and my dad made in order for my sister and I to have a better life. My mom and my dad came to this country without knowing the language, without knowing anyone and so forth, but yet my dad was able to maneuver things that he didn't know and owning his own businesses.

My mom went to college here, graduated college here. I know that I stand on their shoulders and their sacrifices and so forth. Then growing up from a little girl, I kept on hearing things about perhaps I didn't belong. I have a vivid memory. I went to Good Shepherd School, which I love. It's a Catholic school in Inwood where I grew up and so forth. I remember at dismissal, the nun on the third floor, Sister Moreth (phonetic), yelling from the window to the parents that were picking up their kids, "Speak English, you're in America."

At that point in time, I couldn't really know. I was too young, so I didn't understand what that meant, but I knew that it made me feel something. It made me feel other. Should I be speaking Spanish? Should I be proud of who I am? And so forth. That feeling just compounded over time, whether it was when I went to college, which was a PWI, a predominantly white institution, in public safety, definitely targeted the black and brown kids on campus and so forth.

Two, when I went to my first job, and my jobs all throughout, I was usually one of the only or the only Latina in the room. I majored in accounting and I went to go work for the big financial institutions of that time. I remember distinctly, my first week in one of those institutions, a managing director stopped in front of my cubicle and I was like, "Oh, hi." He looked at me up and down and he was like, "Well, I doubt you have half a brain, so we'll see what happens." Yeah, that's really jarring.

That's one of the many things that I experienced. So although my parents worked so hard and I'm so grateful for everything that they did, when I was in college, I couldn't lean on them to help me navigate those unchartered waters of career and internships, which perhaps could have helped me set up more to deal with those situations like that.

I could have used Braven. I do this work because it is deeply personal to me. I don't want other students, other young adults, other first generation low-income students and so forth, although I wasn't first generation, but I don't want them to go through this. I want to change what that looks like for them. I want them to feel like they belong. I want them to feel empowered to have that seat at the table, to take up space.

The other thing that's just as important, I do this work because I want to change the narrative of employers about what does talent look like and where does it come from? That's why I do the work at Braven. A little bit about Braven, we are a national not-for-profit and we partner with wonderful college institutions like The City College of New York in order to empower first generation low-income students with the skills, with the networks, with the confidence and with the experiences that they need so that when they graduate, they're getting strong first opportunities.

We are all about creating access and expanding opportunities for students. It's been such a privilege to be the Founding Executive Director of Braven in New York. In order to help young adults in my home city, there's nothing that I wouldn't do for it. It's such a privilege. We launched at Lehman College in 2020, and to date between Lehman and City College, we've served over 2,900 students and we're on the growth path. So just really excited to share more.

This is not a Braven infomercial, by the way, tonight. Today's conversation really is about those connected pathways that are so important for young adults and for students.

Vincent Boudreau00:07:57

We're a Braven infomercial.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:07:57

Good work.

Vincent Boudreau00:08:06

We would also be saying that 84% of the students at City College who came through your program were employed within the first six months of graduating.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:08:11

Yes, they were.

Vincent Boudreau00:08:17

I'll say about that, and one of the things that Braven is really careful about is not just what's a job, what's a good job? When you think about what a good job is, what are the Braven criteria for a successful placement for students?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:08:34

By the way, that 84% is they are employed or they're in graduate school, which is just as important. I'm going to give you the definition of what Braven considers to be a strong first job, and then I'm also going to give you what I believe to be the definition of what a strong first job is in New York City.

At Braven, we consider a strong first job as one that is full-time and has a bachelor's degree. Then we look at other things such as salary, depending on industry and geographic location, we're looking at pathways to promotion. You don't want to be in a dead-end job role and so forth. Then we're looking at benefits.

Now, in New York, I think what happens is a lot of times young adults who are graduating into entry level roles, salary, rightfully so, is the most important thing. And it should be. The medium rent in New York is about $3,600. You have these students that are graduating, they're like, "Oh my goodness, I need to definitely have this job that can pay the bills." That is important.

But to me, what's important is a role that can compound over time. What I mean by that is a role where you are developing the skills that you can continuously reiterate and use. Those transferable skills that regardless of what role you're in, regardless of your tenure, you need to lean into. Those are those soft skills. Some people call them 21st century skills, things such as teamwork, things such as management and organization, things such as communication and so forth, self-driven leadership.

You want a role where you're developing that because that's so key and employers are looking for that. Then you also want a role where you're just not getting coffee. I mean, really, that's what you went to school for? You want a role where you're working on projects, where you can actually produce things that you can speak to, that you can put on your resume, that when you're speaking to employers during an interview, you can speak to that.

That's really important because what happens is when those things are in place, what you're setting yourself up for is the trajectory of your second and third role, and that's super important. You also want to be in a role where you actually have a manager that cares about what you're doing. What does that look like? That looks like someone that's giving you feedback and that you're getting feedback back and so forth that is able to help you navigate what the career path may look like in that organization.

Again, all those things set you up for a trajectory of a role and that's really important. I know this is going to be really controversial, and some folks in this room may be like, "Yeah. Easy for you to say," but I mean, a piece of advice that I would have for young adults entering the workforce, especially in this really hard labor market is, salary is important and you need to have a dignified salary in order to survive and so forth.

Just as important is what that role is, the skills that you're developing and the support that you're getting in order for you to get the trajectory to that second and third role, in order for you to get set up within a matter of five, six years to get that salary, because you're going to get it if you build the foundation for it.

Vincent Boudreau00:11:27

Listening to your introduction, your story about yourself and what motivates you, there's a way in which you can read the Braven program in a kind of antiseptic way. The students need internships, they need mentors, they need experience in the job market. You can go through that whole program without fastening onto the idea that this is also a way for students to develop or young people to develop the idea that you can't put me out of this space. I belong in this space.

And so, I wonder how you think about the relationship between skills development and experience, and that kind of stuff. I mean, in some ways, more fundamental empowerment of a student going through this program, how do those two aspects of it merge in the work you do?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:12:15

What's really important is to have a foundation in order to build those skills and the confidence that goes along with it, because you can develop a skill, but if you have no confidence to act upon it, to go network, to go ask an alumni to connect with them on LinkedIn, then those skills aren't important.

At Braven, it's really braided into what we do. It's braided into the three credit course and so forth where students are practicing that all throughout it. It's braided into a capstone project where they're leaning into all the skills that they learn. It's braided into the post career supports where they have a career coach, where they can go deep into like well, what other skills should I be developing in our career communities, based on their major, can help them do that and so forth.

One goes hand-in-hand without the other because the thing with the job search is that it's highly emotional. I'm 53 years old. I am a grown adult and I could just imagine I had to go on a job search right now, I'd be really nervous. It would be an emotional experience. It's highly emotional, but what helps you get over that emotion? The confidence. What helps you get that confidence? Being prepared for it.

And being prepared for it means that you have had an opportunity to have an internship, to be in the workplace, to see what it's like, to develop critical thinking and all that stuff. You have had the opportunity to practice networking and you're not scared to go out and do it. Like I mentioned, you're not scared to like, "Well, you know what? This person went to CCNY. Let me connect with them on LinkedIn to see if perhaps they can talk to me about a job and so forth."

You feel really grounded in your personal story. You have built your own narrative as opposed to allowing others to build it for you, which by the way, happens quite often with first generation and with low income students. Other people are really quick to build a narrative for you, and because you don't have that confidence, you're like, "Yeah, okay, that's who I am." And you're not.

At Braven, we really want to conflate those two. In order for you to be able to have that confidence, you need the skills, and then you're going to be workforce-ready.

Vincent Boudreau00:14:11

Is that also... I mean, is there a more direct conversation, a kind of... Does the empowerment happen because of the skills, or do you also spend time saying to someone who feels like they're not ready for this space, this space belongs to you? Is that some of what you do as well?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:14:29

No, absolutely. I think that's really important. One thing that I love about Braven is that a lot of the people that work within Braven, they mirror the students, the journeys of our students and so forth. I think that's really powerful, and this is the reason why.

If every week you're going into our class and let's say the facilitator of Braven looks like you and you see what they're doing and you're like, "Oh wow, I can do that," and then you have a leadership coach who's really like a mentor who is helping you through these 14, 15 weeks, and you're like, "Wait a second, that person also looks like me and they were able to do this." You're encountering... And you have the ability to go on tracks, which is what we call skill building and networking opportunities with really big firms.

For example, I was just at Barclays last week for Black History Month. The Black Employer Resource Group sponsored this event. It was absolutely fantastic. There were 30 Braven Fellows across Lehman, Rutgers, and City College that attended this. These were all black and brown professionals at Barclays that they were able to meet and do speed networking with it. How powerful is that?

Because if you don't come from a background where you don't see that, you don't even know what's possible, but now you're in front of someone that's goodness, they graduated, and they're really accomplished, and they're working at Barclays, and you just walked into this amazing building that you're like, "Goodness, I can see myself in here." That's really important, seeing images of yourself.

I think that helps to build the confidence. Building the skillset is one thing, but confidence is also another because not everyone is outgoing and gregarious, but if you have the confidence, you're able to speak about yourself in a way that's really compelling to potential employers.

Vincent Boudreau00:16:08

I wasn't going to ask you this question until in the back of the room, you said you were all fired up to talk about politics.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:16:15

Oh God, what did I say?

Vincent Boudreau00:16:15

You led me to this. If she objects, it's her own fault. Just let's put that on the record first. You look at the news and you look at corporation after corporation really, really quickly backing away from commitments they made to diversify the workforce or to help people who maybe come from under-resourced backgrounds make their way in the world.

You do a lot of work with some very well positioned corporations, and what I've seen is real enthusiasm coming from that sector. Do you also sense that in this current climate, there's hesitancy to embrace that aspect of the Braven mission? Have you managed to keep everybody engaged and enthusiastic?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:17:01

Yeah. I think it would be false to say that there's not hesitancy right now to engage in Braven or perhaps pause or take it slower to engage with us. No one wants a target on their back right now. There are organizations bigger than Braven, other not-for-profits, that quite frankly have had to either change their mission statement, have had to change verbiage, and all that stuff because they're afraid of getting sued, they're afraid of losing funding, and things like that.

When it comes to employers, what I have found is that they're still in it. You know what I mean? They still want to help to build pipelines for young adults. They're still really interested in engaging their employees with different volunteer opportunities and all that stuff, but they just may be a little bit slower to come to the table. You know what I mean?

Just a bit slower because they don't want that target on the back. They may have government contracts or whatever the case may be. We just need to be more patient. We need to be really clear about what our value proposition is and why it's still important, and why now more than ever, they should want to do this work.

That's all about relationship-building, and you have to be in it for the long run.

Vincent Boudreau00:18:09

Great. Great.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:18:10

I will say this though, I mean, knock on wood, I have yet to have an employer partner that has backed out of a partnership with us because of the moment in time that we're in. Again, it may be a little bit slower to come to the table or things like that, but they are still in the game and they still understand why this is so important, but they need to see YA, and a little bit if y'all know what that means.

Vincent Boudreau00:18:32

Well, okay. I'm going to worry this bone just for a second.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:18:36

Okay. Go for it.

Vincent Boudreau00:18:39

Why do you think the relationships you've built in this program with employers, and businesses, and industries have been more resilient than some of the ones we see nationwide? What's the secret of stiffening people's backbone when they're involved in this kind of work?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:19:00

Yeah. I mean, I think the big secret is that Braven is embedded in higher ed in a way that no one else is. We are a three credit course. I mean, I don't have to tell you this, you're the President of this College. For a college to a university to give us three credits, it's like them giving us their firstborn. It really is. That's no joke. It really is. It's a process. You know what I mean?

When you have a company that sees like, well, wait a second, they are embedded in higher ed. They're not like an additive program. It's not something that a student is taking, let's say, after school or whatever the case may be. It's not competing with the other things that they have to do like work, because a lot of them have to work to support themselves or their families and so forth. That right there is a proof point.

On top of that, you mentioned our data. We do have those proof points at CCNY. Like you said, 84% of our 2024 graduates were employed or went into graduate school. 21% of those graduates had at least one internship during their undergraduate experience and they were 30 percentage points higher when it came to networking self-efficacy and eight percentage points higher when it came to job search self-efficacy.

What does that mean? That means that they're going into perhaps the employee partners that we're connecting them to more ready with the skills that they're looking for, with the soft skills that we're talking about. I think they see the proof points in that, and they really see ourselves as a bridge between innovative institutions like CCNY and themselves who are interested in perhaps building pipelines and engaging their workforce and so forth, and we're able to do that.

I also want to name something real quickly. We have a three-pronged value proposition when it comes to our employee partners. One is, listen, we can help you build a pipeline for internships and for jobs. Some employers really value that. Braven, the work is undergirded by employee volunteerism. If you are an organization that values that, giving back, making impact and so forth, partnering with us helps to do that.

Then lastly, giving of your resources, it helps you to brand. That's really compelling to a company. It's a three-pronged approach. I would venture to say that I don't think there's any other organization out there that's doing it the way that we're doing it. We have the proof points to prove it, whether it's the number of employees that have volunteered, the number of students that have gotten internships and then jobs and so forth, the branding they've been able to get from it. It's been a win-win.

Vincent Boudreau00:21:25

It is a very impressive model. I want to just give you the chance briefly to talk about what is some pretty profound expansion. You're in the New York market for what, six years?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:21:39

Yes. Since 2020.

Vincent Boudreau00:21:40

So both your own expansion in this part of the country, but what Braven is doing is sort of nationwide?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:21:47

Yeah. Our ambition is by 2032 for us to serve 80,000 to 100,000 students. That's big. What does that mean? That not only are we expanding within our regions... In New York, we are expanding. We just fostered a partnership with the University of Mount St. Vincent. In five years, we're going to serve about 1,500 students. We're in conversation with other CUNYs. We're in conversation with Chancellor John King for SUNYs and so forth.

So expansion within regions, but also expansion within new regions. One of them, for example, is the University of Texas. That's a big one. That one launched. I think people were maybe a little bit surprised as to like, "Wait, Braven is going into Texas? How did this happen?" I'm really proud of that because we consider ourselves purple, which means we're not red, we're not blue. We're purple. To us, it doesn't really matter what the political affiliation is of, let's say, a certain state and so forth.

Our mission is always the same, and that's to empower first gen low income students to upward social mobility and to opportunities. We don't really care who's in office, what administration is in office, and what the policies are. We stay true to our mission. What going into Texas proved was the strength of the Braven model. Regardless of geography, we're able to transcend politics because our program is so strong. I'm really proud of that.

Vincent Boudreau00:23:17

I want to talk just a little bit about the relationship between the work you do and changes in the higher education space. So much of what you do, you do in close conversation with industry, with employers. I want to know, from that experience or from their insights, what is it that higher education should start doing?

What should we stop doing? What should we do better? Where do they see us as in some way deficient? Either that we're not doing something we should, or we're doing something wrong, or we're messing up. What do you hear from employers on this score?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:23:55

I think one of the things that you should start doing... By the way, I feel CCNY is already doing this, so kudos to you all. One of the things is really looking at student success as braided pathways. What does that mean? It looks like career-connected learning. That means infusing not only the academics, but also the pathways for professional experience. That's really important.

It doesn't mean that you're going to lessen the rigor of academics. It just means that you are also providing students with that type of experiential learning. There's easy fixes to that. It could mean a chair of a department or a professor of a department speaking to industry leaders and asking them to sponsor a capstone within the class, that can give that student real world experience within that industry that they can also put on their resume and speak to, which is so important, right?

It could look like having conversations with employers and being like, "Well, what are the skills that you're hiring for in this specific industry? What does that look like?" Then looking at your curriculum and perhaps adopting and adapting to that. I think career learning is really important, so I think you should start that. One thing that you should stop is working in silos within a campus. Sometimes, for example, and I'm not saying this is SECNY because I don't think that's the case, but sometimes for example, the career center is sort of seen as other, and it really isn't integrated into the fabric of the school.

That's a deficit. Also, that's not great for the students because then students don't feel as comfortable perhaps going to the career center. They may not see the value in it and so forth because it's sort of seen like a stepchild and so forth. I would say stop treating the career center or stop treating the things that you're doing around career development as secondary. Really infuse it and so forth.

Then what was the other one? What should you continue?

Vincent Boudreau00:25:56

Or change.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:26:00

This is going to be a little bit controversial, so I don't want to insult anyone in the room, but I think one of the things that higher ed perhaps might consider changing is the mindset that a liberal arts education, or an education, should just purely be based on that academic, whether it's accounting, philosophy or whatever the case may be, and that if you venture into infusing it with career development and preparedness and opportunities, then that you're watering down that bachelor's degree.

I think that should change, especially as higher ed is under attack, the ROI on higher ed. I think the mindset needs to shift a little bit. Both can be true. What happens is you're just strengthening the foundation of the college and you're really building for a more well-rounded student.

Vincent Boudreau00:26:50

It's funny you say that. I just came back from the American Council of Education and one of the very last panels was Undersecretary of Education for the Trump administration and Undersecretary of Education for the Biden administration. What was shocking in the conversation between these two officials was the huge amount of consensus.

You would imagine that these people would be speaking from absolutely different sides of the political spectrum, the policy spectrum, but where they both kind of came down, they said, "Higher education has not been accountable for the lives that students lead after they graduate and whether those lives allow them to address things like debt."

This idea of figuring out as part of the curriculum what's going to happen to a student afterwards is I think... It's not the Flavor of the Month, I mean, what both of them said. I think we need to think about is we are not going back to pre-Trump administration in terms of educational policy. And so with that in mind, I mean, one of the things I know that is tricky, and I know it's tricky because we navigated it here on campus, is getting an academic institution that has its own sense of its expertise to allow other actors with other educational mission into that space in a collaborative relationship.

I know every time you've come into a campus, your minimum project is for a Braven class to get three credits, like academic credits that count towards graduation. And so, as you think about how that gets worked out in different spaces, what are the arguments like? What is the winning argument on your side and what's the most difficult representation you get from academics who are not so interested in inviting you in?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:28:51

I think it's what I mentioned before where the academics or faculty perhaps feel that you are diminishing or watering down the BA or whatever the major that there is. They don't feel that that is what students came to learn. They feel like teaching them those professional skills is not what they should be doing.

It's interesting because I read a statistic this week where 42% of faculty in four year colleges do not provide any career counseling or advisement. Then you think about where you have first generation low income students that are going to college, and they're coming from a place that they're having really great conversations at the dinner table, but those conversations are perhaps not about the workforce, and how you can get into it, and how you can maneuver it.

So they're going to college looking for that, but yet faculty, professors, they're not teaching them that. That's a really, really big gap. The resistance to it really comes from that, what I've seen in my experience, from them feeling that, "Well, this is not a liberal arts education and we shouldn't embed college and career in that way," but that mindset does have to shift.

Vincent Boudreau00:30:02

So how do you break through? If I'm that guy, what do you say to me?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:30:08

Yeah. If you're that guy, I mean, a few things. I'm going to invite you to see the program in action. Come. Come see the program in action. Come see what we actually do. Come to a class. Speak to the students. I can speak about Braven all day long until I'm blue in the face, but when you speak to a student, a student like let's say Ryan, who is here at The City College of New York, who's first generation, who has said that one of the hardest things about being a first gen student is not having a playbook.

What do you do? How do you network? How do you go about things and so forth? And credits Braven and City College for everything that you have provided with giving him the confidence, the experience, and the skills to move forward. Speak to a student like that because when you're speaking to your constituents and they're telling you what they need, how can you ignore that? How can you say, "No, it is just enough for you to go get X degree in English. It doesn't matter anything else."

So I would invite them in, see the program in action, speak to the Fellows. Then I would also speak to our proof points, like this is what we're doing. The other thing too is we do, I feel like at Braven, we try really hard to embed faculty into the classroom. For example, we'll invite, "Come to one of our classes. Can you speak about X, Y, and Z," and so forth, especially if we know that there's a lot of majors within that class that it would be good.

We try to embed the community in a way that they feel like they're a part of it, that they don't see as as other. That's another way that the influence and motivating has to do with them, seeing themselves in what we do, being a part of it, welcoming it, welcome them to it. You know what I mean?

Vincent Boudreau00:31:47

Full disclosure, I've spoken at Braven events before. When I do, inevitably you or someone on your team asks me, "There's a lot of talk about higher education, whether it's worth it or not. Does a college degree still have its value?" So now I get my chance to ask you, is a college degree still valuable? And if it's losing its value, how does the work you do contribute to it?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:32:15

I find that to be a really interesting question, and I'm going to be really direct right now. Those of you that know me, probably are not surprised. I find it interesting because I don't think that in rooms where the one percenters are, they're asking the question about whether or not a college degree is still important. Those conversations are really just not happening.

My kids go to a private... Oh, my daughter's already in college, but my son goes to a private independent school here in New York. I can tell you that in this private independent school, college awareness, college readiness starts early on. There is no one on that campus that's telling their kid, "You know what? You shouldn't do it. You should go do this apprenticeship and maybe go do this technical thing." That is not happening.

So when rich white presenters start telling their kids like, "You don't need to go to college. It's going to be okay," then we can start having that conversation. I just had to say that. I want to start with that. Wait, what was the second part? Because I got so riled up about that. I forgot what you asked me. I got so riled up about that.

Vincent Boudreau00:33:12

Well, if you remember, that's how I answered the question last time you asked it, so we're on the same page. No, I mean, the other part of the question is, we are engaged in a collaboration to try to retain the value of this enterprise. And so, how do you see that going?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:33:26

Yeah. What I will say is this, that especially for low income first generation students, a college degree, it's still the most important way to upward social mobility. Even without being first gen low income and so forth, you are able to have $1 million more in earnings over your lifetime if you have a college degree. Those are not pennies people, $1 million more in earnings. That's one thing.

Then especially for low income first generation students, college is really important because what it helps do is it helps to build upon the trajectory. The compounding effect that I had mentioned before about the strong first jobs, that's really important. It helps them not only to build that upper social mobility, but to get roles where they're able to compound their skills, to compound their work products and so forth in order to get better roles.

That's really important. That's something that when you come from that background, you're just not going to, by default, step into. You can't lean on your dad or your mom, and your aunt, your cousin, your dad, your mom's best friend who can just give you an internship or who could be like, "Hey, don't worry about it. Let me get you this job."

I have a story to tell real quickly. My daughter's a second year in college and a few weeks ago I'm talking to her and she was like, "Mom..." Her friend's name is Evelyn. "Mom, Evelyn is so upset and she's so disheartened because everyone here is getting internships because their parents know everyone." I'm just like, "That's what it is, Evelyn. You have to get over that and you just have to do what you have to do." I'm like, "Well, let's have a little bit of empathy towards Evelyn because Evelyn's situation is a real one." A real one, where if you don't know someone, you're not going to get an internship? That's really hard.

The ROI in a college career or a college education, as far as I'm concerned, is important now more than ever. I think there is a ceiling that you're going to reach if you just go for those jobs that just give you those technical skills or whatever the case may be. The starting salary, yeah, that's really attractive.

Again, I am not dismissing that, especially for students that are in certain situations, but there's going to be a ceiling as to what your salary is going to be. There's also going to be a ceiling as to how far you're going to get into an organization, because I can guarantee you that if you don't have a college degree, I really doubt that you're going to become the EVP, the SVP, the president of an organization.

That used to happen maybe in the '40s and '50s, perhaps '60s. It doesn't happen now.

Vincent Boudreau00:35:53

There's another compounding effect that I think you may have some thoughts about, which is over my years teaching at City College, one of the things that happens sometimes with students is you get close to graduation and there's all this uncertainty. I mean, we're in a very uncertain job market right now, and students will opt not to graduate or to continue to take classes.

Sometimes you think it's, well, they want to learn more things. Sometimes you think it's a big, scary world out there and it's a lot easier to stay in school, take some more classes, decide you have to do a third major or something like that. I wonder, with your students, with the Braven students, as they get closer to that moment, what do you sense in terms of their relationship with the job market, with the opportunities, with their preparedness to have that conversation?

Because the number of years you're working has a big effect at the moment when you retire, And if you're going to spend three or four years not leaving college, that has an impact. It has a compounding effect just the way some of these other things do. What do you see in students getting ready to face this difficult job market?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:37:08

Well, I would say at least in the Braven Fellow, we don't particularly see them staying in school for an extra year or two. They just can't even afford to do that, so they are graduating. I have a lot of hope when I see the Fellows. I just heard... I moderated panel actually last week. Yeah, I think so. I think it was last week. I moderated a panel with four Braven Fellows across different schools. I was just floored. They were so inspirational. They were so full of confidence. I learned so much from them.

They were ready to take on the world and they understood that it might have been hard to get to that point, but they felt really prepared because they had the playbook, because they've had opportunities to have more at bat with interviewing, more at bat with experience that's important, such as internships, such as jobs where they're working on real projects and so forth. They feel really prepared to enter the world.

There are a set of students that I feel that they're really confident about this. And then of course, yes, you have students that it's scary out there because the job market is really hard right now, but there's things that they can do in order to help combat that. Do you want me to get into that?

Vincent Boudreau00:38:16

Yeah. Yeah.

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:38:16

Yeah. Okay. I would say for a student that is about to graduate, the things that employers are looking for, I would bucket it into three different things. One is they're looking for experience, and that's in the form of internships. Internships remain as the number one gauge of career readiness that employers look for, so it's really important for students to have that experience.

If you don't have that experience, you know what? Then you need to lean into projects that can give you that. If you're working somewhere, speak to your manager, speak to your boss. They could put in a project where you can really develop skills that are pertinent and that you can then transfer them to other things. If you belong to a club on campus, throw your name in a hat for a leadership role because you're developing skills that you can take with you.

Also, you can speak to that. And employers look at that. They'll be like, "Oh, you were the President of so and-so or the treasurer." That speaks the end that you were doing that, and on top of that, your coursework. The first thing is experience. Experience, again, it could look like in the form of internships, of projects, it could look in the form of leadership roles. The second thing is work samples. That's going to put your resume above the rest.

Employers get hundreds and hundreds of resumes, but let's say that you're a marketing major and you're going for a role in that. Take apart a recent marketing campaign, like dissect it and propose something new, and submit that as part of your candidacy. That will help you stand out. Or anything that you've worked on that speaks to the work that you can do, that's really big a work sample.

Then third, having credible sources to vouch for you is really important. So having those references, those recommendations, that's really key because they can speak to, when employers call them up, they can speak to like, how did so and-so show up at work? Were they open to feedback? Did they give feedback? Which by the way, is just as important and everyone should be giving them regardless of how old you are. Did they take initiative? Did they have agency?

Employers want to see young adults going into entry level jobs that are taking agency. I would recommend those three things: your experience, your work sample, and having those credible sources, which by the way, you're going to build those credible sources by doing the internships, by being in leadership roles, by speaking to your professor, by networking, by having people that vouch for you.

The whole point is that you have to start doing this work before graduation, not after.

Vincent Boudreau00:40:51

Do we know, and I'm again speaking mostly about academics, do we know how to write good employer-targeted letters of recommendation? Or are there things that we should pick up in what you've just been saying about what to put into a letter that we wouldn't necessarily think about?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:41:10

Well, I think it should not be a generic letter. When anyone ever asks me to write a letter of recommendation, I take my time. First of all, I feel like it's an honor for someone to ask you to write a letter of recommendation. That means that A, they see you in a certain light, and also, you have that type of relationship that they will want you to vouch for them. I think people should see it in that way.

If someone were to ask me for a letter of recommendation, the first thing I'm like, "Let me get the job description. Let me look at that and let me get your resume." And then let me think about how is it that I know you? What is it that you've shown me and how is that showing up? How can I pop that up in that JD, that job description? What are things that I can pull out? If it's looking for X skill and I know you've done this through my interaction with you via whichever which way, I'm going to write that in my letter of recommendation.

"In this role, you're looking for X, Y, and Z. I can tell you, I can speak to that this person has done that," blase, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I think a letter of recommendation should not be generic. You should not put it through ChatGPT and be like, "Okay, this is it." Take the time to write it because that can make or break someone going for an entry level role. That's really important.

Vincent Boudreau00:42:18

I want to ask you about a concept that I heard first at Braven, but I've heard it around campus as well. I'd like you to kind of explicate it and talk about it. You talk a lot about the Mighty Middle. Can you define that for us and then why is it important in the work that you're doing?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:42:33

Yeah. At Braven, we define and we talk about serving the Mighty Middle. The Mighty Middle are not like the high-flyers, those students that are just ridiculously excellent, and it's like A's, and they've gone into those really hard programs that they only take, like those high-flyers and so forth. It's also not for the students that need that extra support. We define the Mighty Middle as students that they've earned the right to compete in the workforce.

They have done everything right, but they're often overlooked in workforce. At times, they're taking roles that are not worthy of their degree. It's not worthy of the time, of the energy, and the money that they've spent. That's how we define the Mighty Middle. Braven, we're built around that. We're open access, meaning really anyone on campus can take the course. That goes to show you, it's not like some programs where like, "Oh, well, you need a 3.8 GPA or 4.0 GPA." No, not at all.

As a matter of fact, we've proven that regardless of your GPA, you can get what you need out of the Braven course and so forth. Not the high-flyers, not even the ones that are at the most need, really serve everyone. Although the Braven course, it's major agnostic, what's really important is that we focus again on those key transferable skills that students are expected to have when they walk into an internship or a job, but they're not really prepared for it.

We also have career communities. Like by the fourth class, depending on your interest, you're getting placed into a career community. That could be STEM, it could be arts and business, it could be explorers if you don't know what you want to do and so forth. The point is that we're helping to support the Mighty Middle. We're meeting them where they're at in order for them to be successful, in order for them to have more access to opportunities, networking and coaching, and so forth.

Vincent Boudreau00:44:23

Could you talk a little bit about what you see in the current job market? I don't mean tariffs and inflation. I mean, we're in the middle of a pretty substantial evolution in the world of work. And so, A, where do you see that going? And B, are there ways that students have to be prepared for that changeability today that maybe wasn't so important 15 or 20 years ago?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:44:55

Yeah. I mean, the world of work is really changing, especially because of AI. We're seeing that a lot of entry level roles, the scope is changing because you can get AI to do that type of work. What's coming out of that and what's being highlighted is the need for the soft skills, human-centric skills. That's important now more than ever. Those are things like communication, management and teamwork because what's happening is that employers now are expecting recent graduates to be completely career-ready on day one.

Whereas before, you would have like, "Okay, I have whatever, six months to learn my role and so forth." No, from like day one, you're expected to go in there with the maturity of someone that's much more seasoned and much more tenured than you. You're expected to lead in a way that perhaps a young adult just hasn't been able to do so.

I would say we see the shift in AI without a doubt. We're seeing entry level roles getting affected, but what's really being highlighted is the need for human-centric skills. Employers are really looking for that.

Vincent Boudreau00:46:15

I mean, you're halfway to answering this question, but let me ask the question. There might be a disconnect between what employers' expectations of college degrees are and what we're actually teaching students. First of all, do you see that as a kind of disjunction? And if so, how do we fix it?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:46:39

I do see that as a disconnect. Back in June, one of my board members, Akilah Greywal, she's a global head of product at Apollo. She held this breakfast and it was a cross sector of leaders that went to this breakfast. It was really talking about like, what can we do to help recent college graduates and so forth? And that, what you just said, Vince, that was really prominent in that conversation, the disconnect between higher ed and employers, and what are employers looking for, what do they need, and what is higher ed teaching, and so forth?

Again, this goes back to career-centered learning. It's a way to not dilute the academic rigor, but invite the professional experience connections into the coursework so that students are more ready for that. The other thing that I will say too though, is that like employers, they may be changing on a whim what they need and what they're looking for. And quite frankly, that's not fair to higher ed, especially institutions that are resource-strapped, that they're not swimming in it like let's say like the Harvards of the world and so forth.

I think employers need to be intentional about what it is that they're seeking, communicate that in a way that like if you're seeking this today, it doesn't mean that next year is going to be something different. Because if you're asking colleges to adopt that, to infuse it into the curriculum, they just can't be doing that on a regular cadence and so forth. I think that colleges need to be more open to having that conversation.

Vincent Boudreau00:48:07

Do you think we've done, I gather not, do you think we've done a good enough job in communicating where we are right now, what our mission is, how we can meet employers, or have we not done that well?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:48:23

At CCNY, I think you're doing a really good job.

Vincent Boudreau00:48:25

Oh, you would say that though, wouldn't you?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:48:26

No, no. I'm going to tell you why I think you're doing a really good job. For example, at the Colin Powell School, which is like, I don't have to tell you, you're the President, but it's the largest school here at CCNY, you do career mapping. For those of you that don't know, career mapping is really scaffolding a student's experience so that they're ready.

In the first year, I'm making this up because I don't exactly like how it works, but in the first year, they may have to take... I think it's the first year seminar though, they may have to take like a class and so forth. Then in their sophomore year or junior year, they're recommending them to take Braven. And then they're connecting them to employees so they can take an internship. That career mapping is really super important.

In a place like... Also, you have Braven at CCNY. In a place like CCNY, I do feel like you're doing a great job. In other institutions, not so much. Although higher ed is under attack right now, and I mean, you heard me go off my spiel about the importance of a college degree and so forth, I will say though that that pressure, it's not a bad thing because I think it puts healthy pressure and influence as to how to rethink how you're going about it.

Perhaps for a long time, higher ed was really comfortable in the status quo and we didn't have to embed career readiness, and these are conversations that we didn't have to have, but because they're under pressure now with what their ROI is, they have to start having those conversations. I don't think it's such a bad thing. I think some schools like yours are doing a great job and some not so much.

Vincent Boudreau00:49:48

Yeah. I mean, that was really the kind of thrust of that conversation I referenced earlier with the two Undersecretaries of Education where they're basically saying, and this comes from the Trump administration, there will be benefits from the pressure we put on institutions. Do I buy it? Probably not, not the way they're doing it, but nobody in the room was willing to say everything should stay the way it is right now.

In that same conference, one of the things you hear all the time is people presenting their visions of how the landscape of higher education is changing radically, and we've never been in a moment of greater change than we are now. If you'd gone to that conference anytime in the last 20 years, you'd hear the same framing of a different presentation.

We're in a dynamic space. One of the elements of that dynamism that I thought was at least, if it wasn't interesting, it would at least be interesting to ask you about, was the idea that big corporations, the Microsofts, the Googles, they all have robust educational programs now. The idea of higher education as being exclusively centered on places like City College or other colleges or universities is in a way eroding as education gets distributed in places that are not colleges, that are corporations and the like.

First of all, does that ring true? And if it does, is it a good thing or a bad thing? Third, if it's good or bad, inevitable, how do we prepare for it?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:51:32

Oh, it totally rings through. I just read an article where the Founder, the President of Khan Academy, he went to like, I don't know, Harvard, like all these Ivy Leagues, MIT, whatever the case may be, and he's like, "At Khan Academy, I am going to build a program that is going to model going to an Ivy League. So you don't have to spend $90,000 on a college education. For $5,000, I'm going to be able to provide you with the skills to do this."

I am not for that. I mean... And also let me say this, college isn't for everyone. College isn't for everyone. There are some people that perhaps you shouldn't be going to college. It's not your thing. That is A-okay. But the notion that Khan Academy, or Google, or Microsoft, or whatever the case may be are saying, "Don't go to college. Don't get your degree. We are going to build an infrastructure and a program that's going to equate that," A, there's no proof point in that.

I don't think anyone should be like, "We're not going to do this anymore," because there is no proof point. You can't stop doing what has been working on the off chance that something is working. Perhaps try both of them at the same time. It's not that I'm a skeptic of it, but I would definitely want to see that play into action, and then what does that mean? Okay, so for $5,000, Khan Academy is going to build this whole program, and then what kind of roles are they going to get, and what are they making, and what are going to be their pathways to promotion, and is there going to be a glass ceiling?

And then if they leave Khan Academy, they go someplace else, where are they going to start? Because they don't have a college degree. These are all questions that I have. I can't answer them. I don't know. I'm not in that, but these are questions that I have, and I think we should all be asking that.

Vincent Boudreau00:53:19

To start to ask those questions, thinking of it as a if we know we're doing a better job than the Khan Academy, and I think we do, but it's a compelling alternative. If you're thinking about cutting costs, or you could even kind of roll out that program in the name of a tepid version of accessibility. Everyone has access to the Khan Academy, even if it's not particularly effective.

How do we build a counter argument?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:53:52

Yeah. I think building the counter argument has to do with the braided pathways, the work that schools have to do with employers. It has to do with the career-connected learning, with infusing the curriculum with things that employers are looking for, with skills, with capstones, with learning opportunities, with networking.

I just think that the groundwork has to be laid in a different way. It's okay. Khan Academy could go do what they're going to do, and Microsoft, and Google, and all that stuff. At the end of the day, schools are still going to exist. It's not as if every single college and university in the United States is going to close down because all these other companies are going to be doing that. I just think we need to get better at what we're doing. We need to collaborate and not work in silos in that way.

Vincent Boudreau00:54:41

Do you think, as you test the political wins, do you think that we have lost our appreciation for an educated society as opposed to my education, and your education, or your education? This idea of "America will be better if our society is educated top to bottom," how do you see that reflected in the people you work with, their stand on that?

Kilsys Payamps-Roure00:55:14

Well, I mean, I think that's really interesting because when you think about the people that are saying who should be getting an education, once again, I would say that we're talking about the one percenters. So yeah, they're saying education doesn't matter for the black and brown folks, but not for the other people.

What's interesting is that now more than ever, you have a lot of first generation low income students, black and brown students that are entering college, and then now more than ever, their financial aid is getting cut. Programs that support them are getting cut. I think they still value that and that's still important, but the people that are having the conversations in the room perhaps should not be the ones having the conversations because they're the ones that perhaps are not as enthused about having a population that is diverse, that is educated.

Perhaps they just want to see a certain sector of the United States of America being educated. I don't know if I answered your question, but that's really just how I see it.

Vincent Boudreau00:56:16

I think you answered the question just fine. Look, in closing, I'll say the following, I was really looking forward to this conversation because it has been an absolute joy to work with the Braven organization, but in particular with Kilsys. We have been partnered since she began deploying her Braven elves to work with our students, and we've never looked back.

And so, I wanted to thank you for spending time with us, not just tonight, but all the work that we do together. Thank all of you for joining us in this conversation, and ask you to take just a moment and express your gratitude to Kilsys.

Keziah Sullivan00:57:13

You've been listening to another episode of From City to the World with the President of The City College of New York, Dr. Vincent Boudreau. Thank you for joining us.