The Luminaries Initiative with Provost Dr. John Woods

Chapter 1: Celebrating Alumni Achievements 0:00 The Luminaries is a new initiative for us. We wanted to do something that celebrated and recognized our alumni. 0:07 They demonstrate a huge amount of hard work, grit, and determination when they're students, and they continue to show us that every day. 0:16 We had well over 600 people either apply or be nominated. They're leaders in their community. They're accomplished in their discipline. 0:24 They're experts in their fields. They're folks who have done really, really well professionally. 0:30 There's no one thing, but it really is a continuation of the amazing experience that made them successful as a student. 0:38 We're really excited to share uh who was selected with the world. Well, we're excited to hear. 0:56 Hello and welcome to the Degrees of Success podcast. 0:59 I'm your host, Freda Richards, and today we had the incredible opportunity to sit down with our provost, John Woods, and talk about University Phoenix luminaries. 1:09 Check it out. John, thank you so much for joining us. Please tell me about the University Phoenix alum luminaries. 1:16 Yeah, the Luminaries is a new initiative for us. We selected 76 honorees and that harkens back to our founding in 1976. 1:26 We wanted to do something that celebrated and recognized our alumni for all of their achievements and something that kind of is synonymous with what they were to us when they were students. 1:40 As students, they demonstrated a lot of grit and determination, a lot of hard work and a huge ability to balance a lot on their plates all at once. 1:49 Absolutely. 1:49 ah While they were students as working adults and now in their post Phoenix lives, either in their professional life or their personal life, they've had huge accomplishments across 2:01 uh different industries, education, healthcare, business, technology, you name it. 2:08 And so we've ran this process and uh We're really excited to announce the people that we're going to be honoring this year. 2:16 my goodness, I can't imagine how excited you are. Is there anything happening outside of the recognition? Yeah, they'll get recognized on a dedicated web page. Chapter 2: The Luminaries Initiative 2:25 We're going to send them the uh recognition that we've created for them in a little box of uh swag and other things. 2:34 And then we hope in the future to get everybody together to celebrate at some point in person. of this. 2:44 Yeah, for me it's uh something we should do. We've got well over million alumni. 2:51 As I said, they demonstrate a huge amount of hard work, grit, and determination when they're students. 2:58 And they continue to show us that every day after ceasing to be our students. 3:05 And so anything we could do to recognize our alumni I think is really, really important. It's a way for us to show them how much we appreciated them when they were here. 3:14 and how much we value the contributions they're making in their own different ways today. 3:19 While they're no longer here, they're still people we think about all the time and we're really, really proud of them. absolutely. 3:26 I have to agree as the host of degrees of success podcast, I know my team and I have a very hard time choosing who's going to come because there's so many incredible guests. 3:37 How did you choose for the It was incredibly difficult. Let me tell you that. We had well over 600 people either apply or be nominated. 3:47 I was involved in reviewing the applications myself with some of my deans and uh it was a really, really tall order uh to recognize our honorees this year. 3:58 uh Huge number of impressive candidates for the honor and we're really excited to share uh who was selected with the world. 4:09 Well, we're excited to hear. that is a very large number of incredible students who have done overwhelming, incredible things. 4:18 Out of that number, clearly not everyone could have been chosen. Right. What would you say to those who were selected to be nominated, but not to actually get the Luminary Award? 4:28 Well, I would say congratulations on being considered because it's a really great group of folks. 4:36 You're an amazing company if you were considered. I would say if you weren't selected this year, you might consider applying again next year. 4:47 Or if you were nominated, have that person nominate you again. We hope to uh honor another group next year. 4:54 And there's no limit to the number of times. you might be considered. uh that's certainly one thing. Chapter 3: Engagement and Community Building 5:01 And then I'm hopeful that uh in being uh part of this process, although not being one of our honorees, that people might choose to get uh more involved with us as a university. 5:13 So the other thing I think I'd encourage people to do would be to join a chapter, come to an event, uh take note of the things we're doing for our alumni, read our publication, watch your podcast. 5:26 There are a lot of uh different things we're doing to honor and celebrate our alumni and we'd love for everybody to be involved in those. my goodness, absolutely. 5:34 We definitely want people to stay involved. I imagine that we have alumni that are deeply involved. I've seen a lot of these chapters growing. 5:41 Yeah, we've got events all over the country for networking ah that our alumni attend. We call them small bites because we usually feed people. 5:49 We've also got other kinds of networking events. We've also got homecoming events. 5:54 Our homecoming events are often centered around a fun activity, whether it's a lunch cruise or a baseball game. 6:01 And if you're watching for these things, they happen all over the country. And there are dozens of them between our small bites and our homecoming events. 6:09 I attend as many of them as I can, so I'd be really excited to meet some of our alumni at those events. I love that. 6:16 I love that you also attend so they have that personal connection with you as well. 6:20 When you're looking for the person to be selected to be honored, to be a luminary, what exactly are you all looking for? 6:28 It's always that the folks being either nominated or who have applied have done just incredible things after their time here at Phoenix as a student. 6:43 They're leaders in their community, they're accomplished in their discipline, they're experts in their fields, they're folks who have done well professionally. 6:54 There's no one thing, but it really is a continuation of the 6:58 amazing experience that made them successful as a student with their grit and determination that carried forward uh post-university and their uh personal and professional lives. 7:14 And the things that they've done are so impressive. be really excited to share these profiles. 7:21 to see the pride in your eyes when you speak about our students and our alumni. Before we leave, one, thank you for joining us. 7:28 Before we leave, I want to ensure that whatever you have to say to any of the other alumni that may be selected or looking to be nominated in the future or the current luminaries, I want to make sure you have the opportunity to say whatever that is to them. 7:42 I guess uh first and foremost uh how much we appreciate them. They trusted us with their education and we don't take that lightly. Chapter 4: Looking Ahead: Future Opportunities 7:52 uh They are folks we want to maintain a relationship with and serve uh ongoing with the career support we have. 8:01 We want them to be part of our community, part of our network. There are different things that, as I said, they can do to maintain that connection with us. 8:12 the networking events, the homecomings. um We want to maintain that relationship. We want them to lean on us for help with their careers if they ever need it. 8:22 I'm just really excited that anybody who would entrust their education to us would stay in touch. 8:31 That speaks volumes with well over a million alumni, well over I think it is now a million and a half people following us on LinkedIn with the- 8:41 the huge numbers of people who watch your podcast and connect with us on other, we'll say channels like uh Instagram or TikTok or whatever. 8:51 We just got this great, huge community and it means a lot to me that they stay in touch and see us as a partner for life in their career pursuits. 9:02 Well, know this from a current student, soon to be an alumni in August or April 2027, I have my doctorate. 9:10 So I'm so excited to join this community and thank you so much for putting so much intentionality into this alumni chapter. 9:18 I'm looking forward to being a part of it and I love seeing all the incredible things that are coming from it and thank you so much for joining us. You're welcome. We're excited to see you walk across that stage. 9:27 Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us for this special episode of the Degrees of Success podcast. 9:34 If you want to learn more about luminaries, feel free to check out this link here to find out how you can nominate someone or yourself. 9:42 As always, don't forget to like, subscribe, and comment. And remember, your next chapter might be your best one yet. 9:51 Bye.