Rick Crossen: Inspired by IT

00:00:00 Sumer Beatty: Welcome to Tomorrow Makers, where we explore how we learn live, work, and play now and in the future. This is Sumer Beatty. 00:00:11 Carlos Ramos: And this is Carlos Ramos. How are you? 00:00:13 Sumer Beatty: I'm good. 00:00:14 Carlos Ramos: You caught me off guard a little bit with 00:00:15 Sumer Beatty: did I? 00:00:15 Carlos Ramos: With "this is." 00:00:16 Sumer Beatty: Oh, okay. I changed it up. I didn't mean to. Hey, we, we could record it. We talked a a million times about... 00:00:22 Carlos Ramos: Which is why we don't record it. 00:00:23 Sumer Beatty: Okay. Yeah. Well it's just the flavor of the day. Oh yeah. I normally say I am. Okay. 00:00:31 Carlos Ramos: Yeah. 00:00:31 Sumer Beatty: I'm gonna just change it. 00:00:32 Carlos Ramos: Yeah. 00:00:32 Sumer Beatty: Just listen next time. See what happens. 00:00:34 Carlos Ramos: Surprise us every time. Alright, we have Rick Crossen with us IT Faculty Information Technology Faculty. Been here for a few years, but really one of the rising stars as we have amongst a lot of faculty here. 00:00:48 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. I mean, when we get three people, four people saying, hey, you gotta have this person on the podcast, I'm interested, my ears perk up. I'm like, okay, I wanna meet him. So it was, it was fabulous. What a great conversation we had with Rick. 00:01:01 Carlos Ramos: Yeah. And then getting to, just getting to learn why it is that someone would recommend a faculty member or staff person for meeting with us and having a conversation. Just the hearing about how much involvement he has. With the students, not just in the classroom, on the trips, on the, I don't think we talked about the trips, but... 00:01:21 Sumer Beatty: We couldn't cover everything. You guys, like he is just involved with so much. I, I said you can't say yes to everything. Right? But I feel like he is just taking on one thing after another in a really positive way and he, he really truly cares. And that's apparent in this conversation. 00:01:39 Carlos Ramos: And a lot of connections. I mean, things that are, that are happening, he's doing that I'm doing. And then all, all three of us, we get to talk extensively about running, which is always fun. 00:01:47 Sumer Beatty: So he set a lofty goal for himself. He tried, last year, but, he'll talk a little bit about, just life circumstances that got in the way of that. But I think he's poised to reach his goal this year. And he didn't wanna tell us. He didn't want it to be public, but you know, you have to put that out there. We need to be holding him accountable for that and celebrating his success along the way. So join us in doing that. 00:02:09 Carlos Ramos: Absolutely. And our challenge to you is let us know what you are committing to and let's all, let's all go at it together. 00:02:16 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, it's not too late for a resolution or a goal setting. Jump in. 00:02:21 Carlos Ramos: Alright, let's hear from Rick. Just a couple of updates and congratulations to Rick since we recorded this podcast. Rick has earned the rank of Assistant Professor and he completed the 25K Hyner View Trail Challenge. We hope you enjoy this episode. Rick Crossen, in our IT department. And what's your, your actual full title? 00:02:55 Rick Crossen: Sure. So right now I'm currently faculty and IP as instructor. Specifically. I'm working on that, associate professor position. I'm applying for the promotion right now. So. 00:03:04 Carlos Ramos: Alright. What does that entail? 00:03:06 Rick Crossen: A lot of paperwork. I'd say it's a hundred pages printed out, in two binders. So I gotta make my a hundred page paper, a hundred page binder, make two copies of it. We're still on the print standard here, for, they review it, there's a whole committee that goes through and reviews that. Then it goes to President Reed and he then gives a final thumbs up or thumbs down whether I've met the standards to be promoted. So I'm pretty confident hoping things go well. I've been trying to kind of volunteer and do things that hopefully make me applicable for that promotion. I, I think I should know in the next month or so. So I'm excited for that. Oh, well that's great. 00:03:40 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, that's... 00:03:41 Carlos Ramos: Yeah, we, we will update the, the intro or the outro or the notes or whatever based on, what we hear of your status. 00:03:50 Rick Crossen: Awesome. Yeah, a lot of students call me professor. I'd love to have that as the actual official title, so, yeah. Well, great. 00:03:56 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, from what I see, I mean, you're involved in all kinds of things. I think you should... 00:03:59 Rick Crossen: Thank you. 00:03:59 Sumer Beatty: ...check a lot of those boxes. 00:04:01 Rick Crossen: I'm trying to be, and it, it's hard not to be with the, the way the students approach me and want me to be involved in things. And it makes sense. it's a good way to get to know the students and good way to kind of make myself known on campus. And I, I want to help with things like that, so it, it works out well. 00:04:15 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, I don't get the impression you're just doing it to, to check a box. I feel like you actually do enjoy, do like what you're doing. 00:04:22 Rick Crossen: I definitely do. And there's a couple of 'em that I'm checking boxes for, like College Council. I'm part of that. And that one's more of the official thing. But I still learned a lot in doing that as well. And I was kind of selected by the dean to participate in that because I volunteer for things and I was a little hesitant. 'Cause I've never been into like the higher education politic. And I'm new to that area. This is my first teaching job I've had. But I've learned a lot and, and I found out it's actually a really effective way to help even more, joining that College Council, because that's where we get on issues that are present at Penn College and how we can improve student engagement, things like that. So even though I was kind of initially hesitant about it, I actually, it's one of my more favorite committees now because I feel like it does have impact overall on the campus. 00:05:06 Carlos Ramos: Yeah, we don't hear enough about Governance, other than I, as, you know, staff, I'm not sure on the faculty side, that every year we'll get, Hey, nominations are open, Hey, you know, vote for, you know, who you'd like to represent on College Council, or any of the other, what, three, four subcommittees or committees. I'm not sure if they're, they're the committees and then there's subcommittees underneath those. But no, it's great that you're involved. 00:05:33 Rick Crossen: And, and that's one of the things we're working on too at College Council, is just the awareness in general, right? There are these committees out there that exist, but people don't necessarily know about them, and they don't have a place to find them. So one of the things we're thinking about is making some sort of central repository of like, okay, you wanna be active on at Penn College? Here are our committees, that you can do. So, and where do you see yourself helping out the most? Or what, what interests you? because, 'cause we agree that they're out there. Not always easy to find, for the most part. 00:05:58 Carlos Ramos: Yeah, and I think if everyone goes out to the MyPCT portal and looks for Governance there, yeah, that used to be the home and I'm not sure how up to date that information is. I think the communications committee handles that. That's a great place to start. 00:06:14 Rick Crossen: Definitely. 00:06:15 Sumer Beatty: Awesome. We're already off track. Good job everyone. 00:06:19 Carlos Ramos: I have one job on this podcast and that is to make sure that we're off track. 00:06:23 Sumer Beatty: No, it's all good. I'm glad you brought that up. I could probably have a whole podcast on that because I do have questions about what it entails. I was asked to be on it when I first got here, and I was like, I don't think I'm the person. I don't, I just got here. But I'm sure that is a valuable, you have valuable insight because of all the different things that you're involved in. So yeah. 00:06:41 Rick Crossen: It's, it's been a good time and I, it. It taught me a lot about the tools that students have to kind of express where they're having issues or where they could see improvement. And I didn't really know what they were until now. And I'll, I'll shout 'em out. On, on the portal, there's a thing called MyVoice, and the MyVoice is where you can say, all right, what's going on on campus? Are there issues? Are there things that are working well? It's your best way to kind of get your message out there to the Penn College staff and faculty is the, is the, MyVoice. 00:07:07 Carlos Ramos: And it does have impact. We've, we've seen changes come, you know, by someone, whether it's a faculty, staff, student filling out that form. 00:07:15 Rick Crossen: Yeah. I, I agree. And even myself, now that I'm aware, oh, the, MyVoice is, I filled one out myself, and it actually ended up working well. It was something that I, I as a staff member or a faculty member, I'm thinking to myself, okay, where do, where do I go if I wanna see changes? And there's my dean, which is a great resources, but maybe this, this, this, MyVoice is another external method that I could, okay. Maybe spread it further. Are there other departments that have this type of issue or other areas in the College that see an improvement in this area or something? 00:07:43 Sumer Beatty: Let's rewind a little bit, or maybe I won't, don't wanna say that 'cause I don't know where you're gonna put this piece. So you are, you've got this passion for it. Where did that come from? 00:07:52 Rick Crossen: I do. 00:07:52 Sumer Beatty: Have you always been interested in IT? When did that spark get lit? 00:07:57 Rick Crossen: Thank you for asking. Good question. Video games is where it comes out to. And my family playing video games. I've been playing games since I've been, I was three years old. My older cousins were at PlayStation One. the Nintendo 64, 00:08:09 Sumer Beatty: folks. He's young. Okay. I had a Commodore 64 computer. 00:08:15 Rick Crossen: Did... 00:08:15 Sumer Beatty: Yes. 00:08:15 Carlos Ramos: Woo-hoo. 00:08:15 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. 00:08:16 Rick Crossen: My grandfather had one of those too. 00:08:18 Sumer Beatty: Thanks. I'm not, 00:08:21 Carlos Ramos: I had the Atari with the little pinballs. 00:08:23 Sumer Beatty: Oh, get up. 00:08:24 Carlos Ramos: And we had to replace the, the buttons that actually came on the Atari with doorbells because, you know, those things were not really that sturdy. 00:08:32 Sumer Beatty: Oh, sounds aggressive. 00:08:33 Rick Crossen: So, started with the video games really. and, but I, for a long time, that was my only link to computing. I was playing video games growing up, with my friends, things like that. I didn't realize that there was a career path in video games until I went to public school. and that was about middle school age. I started taking computer classes. And at this point I'm coming from a private school background, I have a lot of positive things to say about private school. Unfortunately, they don't have those, those programs like computer programs, so I wasn't really aware that that area existed. And I took my first keyboard class and all those other students that have been in public school, they already knew how to type on the keyboard. I'm there like, oh, I've really never typed on a keyboard so much. So I'm kind of playing catch up a little bit for a year or two. then I joined high school and my friends were like, oh, you like video games? You should check out these IT classes, and it kinda all went up from there. I just, I really liked, they clicked with me. I was lucky enough to have a high school that had a nice IT program. I had friends that were in it and we kind of shared those classes together. At the pinnacle, I was spending maybe four periods a day in IT classes in high school. And I'm really lucky and grateful to have those opportunities. It kind of circles back to Penn College because I, in high school, I took what used to be called the PCNow courses now called Dual Enrollment courses. So I was taking Penn College classes in high school. So I've kind of come full circle in a way. And the fact that I took that class in in high school. Now I'm teaching that class. 00:09:52 Sumer Beatty: Are you? Okay. 00:09:52 Rick Crossen: And now I run the Dual Enrollment for, for the high school kids. And I can say, Hey, I was in your shoes 12 years ago, taking this class, and, and here I am now. So it's, it's really cool, really satisfying for me to complete that circle. 00:10:03 Sumer Beatty: Oh yeah. That's fantastic. So, as your involvement with the program, our students, just to remind our audience, students are taking these classes. At their high schools under some type of supervision, correct. with Penn College? Correct. 00:10:17 Rick Crossen: So there's two ways that we can allow high school students to take our classes is the articulation agreements and then this dual enrollment. they both have some pros and cons to 'em. I really am a big fan of this Dual Enrollment because they're gonna learn exactly what we teach them, in the College. They're right on track with moving into our curriculum. and it also gives some opportunities for students that maybe they don't meet the requirements yet, but they're still able to learn those classes. So, so the math requirement, that's one of the big kind of hurdles that high school students have to make it through to get into the Dual Enrollment. Even if they don't meet the math requirement, their high school instructor can still teach them the content. They just can't get it for credit. Right? So, but they're coming in to Penn College potentially with that knowledge already. So I've seen students that maybe they didn't quite take it for credit in high school, but they're still, they know it already and they do really well here as a freshman. So, yeah, it's, it's a really a pathway for students to potentially come to Penn College or just learn what it is to be a college student. 00:11:13 Sumer Beatty: So you went and you were taking these classes in high school? 00:11:16 Rick Crossen: Yeah. 00:11:16 Sumer Beatty: And then you worked in industry for a bit? 00:11:20 Rick Crossen: I did, I did. 00:11:20 Sumer Beatty: Okay. Tell us about how that, all went, and then how you then ended up here and what made you wanna be a teacher. 00:11:26 Rick Crossen: Yeah. Good questions. Good question. I definitely wouldn't say it's the most traditional answer either. So, I started working in industry. My first job was I worked as a network assistant, although I had a lot of job duties that were well above my title, for the high school that I went to Jersey Shore. I worked there for about four years. Worked there all through college, full-time in the summers, things like that. That's where I really learned what it was like to work in IT, dealing with the customer support, fixing servers in the data center, I don't know if you've ever been in a data center before, but it can be cold. It can be very cold. You're wearing, even in the summertime, you're sitting in there in a jacket. 'cause the, the computers get hot and the servers get hot. So they're blasting it it with AC. So it's an interesting environment. 00:12:05 Sumer Beatty: I did not know that. Now I'm imagining you with a beanie hat on and... 00:12:08 Rick Crossen: Exactly. 00:12:09 Sumer Beatty: Some gloves. 00:12:09 Rick Crossen: Yep. Yep. Winter coat, even in the summertime in there. 00:12:11 Sumer Beatty: Okay. 00:12:12 Rick Crossen: It can be a nice place to cool off if you're, if you're hot outside too. So I worked at the Jersey Shore School District, network assistant for about four years. Then once I graduated college, I got a job in State College and I worked as a database administrator, software support, so still in the industry, still in IT. And they offered me the opportunity to take my master's degree through, it was a company called Jostens, and if you're not familiar with Jostens, they make class rings, they make yearbooks, they make Super Bowl rings. I did a lot of software and database for the yearbook support. So if you were out there and you made a yearbook in high school, there's a chance that I helped you troubleshoot your issues. I probably uploaded your photos to the software for you. So, Jostens, they offered the tuition reimbursement and I was like, why not, you know, this is a opportunity that they're offering me. I might as well take advantage of it. So I worked on my master's degree while I was working at Jostens, and that's what really kind of set me up for the position I'm in now, faculty here at Penn College is, is the master's degree. Jostens kind of had a transition where the physical location was close and we moved to remote, which there's some pros and cons to that. I, I definitely like being a remote worker. I don't have to travel to work. You can wear some pajamas sometimes. No one ever notices. So there's some advantages to it. But I, I was just looking for more and I just looked, I'm looking to see what was out there. And my old high school networking professor or networking instructor, his name is David Becker. He emailed me and said, Hey, I saw that you moved back in the area a little bit, and I work at Penn College now, and we're hiring, what do you think about applying? So really, I owe it to him. So shout out to David Becker, my high school networking prof, teacher, he's the one that told me to apply for this job. He, he knew what I was like in high school, knew I was qualified for the position, and I had his support. So I did, and I was not super confident that I would get the job. I really, I really wasn't because I didn't have a background in teaching, but it, it went really well. I think I showed my skills in the interviews and that I think it went well. And, and here I am. so I never, never set out to be a teacher. I. But I, I'll tell you, it's one of the most rewarding jobs, if not the most rewarding job I've ever had. I'm really glad I'm here. If you're someone like me out there that didn't consider teaching as part of your pathway, it very well might be something you enjoy. You know, I never going through high school considered myself, oh, you know, a teacher, that's what I wanna be. But, it, it really has been impactful for me, and I'll tell you, it's, it's been the most directly rewarding job I've had. Just seeing the students make improvements. So yeah, I'm glad I'm here. 00:14:37 Sumer Beatty: And that's how we found you, because after three students come to me and tell me how awesome you are and how we should have you on the podcast, I'm like, we have to meet this, this instructor. 00:14:49 Rick Crossen: That's nice. So thanks to students. I know. I told 'em they get A's if they said that, but... 00:14:54 Sumer Beatty: Oh, okay. No, no, no. I think the one student I'll, I'll mention, he said, you know, being in Rick's class isn't. Isn't the common experience. We come in and, you know, it's Monday morning and he's like, how's it going? How are you? How's your weekend? And it's not like that question where, you know, oh, he's just asking it and then we're gonna move on. Like he, the student was like, he really cares. Like he wants to know what's going on in our lives. So how. How did your teaching style? Like is that just who you are as a person and then it became your teaching style? Or is there someone you sort of mirror your techniques off of? 00:15:33 Rick Crossen: Good question. So I definitely wasn't always like that, especially my first year here. It was, it, it's, it's a little scary being up front of the class and kind of getting the ball rolling and things like that. So it's a combination of teaching the way that I wanted to be taught in college. That, that was really my main goal coming into this position is teach classes in ways that I would've liked to be in them as a student. So that, that was the number one goal. And the second goal was, all right, I'm upfront. Everyone's here to learn, but how can I get them engaged? And, and that was the tricky part. And I'm still working on that part too. And that's, that's where a lot of the other instructors on campus that have that formal teaching background, they're helping me with those techniques or, or were spit balling and, and kind of sharing ideas with each other. It's a constant process just to figure out how, how can I get student engaged? My shortcut to getting student engaged is to know them, to know what they like, know who they are. And when you know them, they're much more willing to kind of converse with you, get outta their shell a little bit. So that's it. It, it works both ways. It's benefiting to them because they're, they're, they're wanting to participate more in class, and it's benefiting for me because it's easier for me to teach 'em if, if they're interested in talking to me and having those conversations. So it's kind of just the style I've developed to, to learn what my students are like and kind of convert, kind of trick 'em a little bit into talking with me. Ah, they're gonna listen to this. 00:16:52 Sumer Beatty: Well, I can imagine, I've been in some IT classes and they're, they're not the most talkative bunch. 00:16:59 Rick Crossen: No. 00:17:00 Sumer Beatty: So I'm picturing you're going in here and you're saying, welcome, blah, blah, blah. Like, and then you ask 'em a question and then they're just like staring at you. So do, are you getting into that performance mindset. We've had other instructors come in here and say, you know, sometimes teaching is actually a performance. You know, I feel like I need to put on a show to gain their attention. A lot of, people are used to being on their phones. They're constantly wanting to be entertained. 00:17:26 Rick Crossen: And that's an aspect of teaching that I never really considered before. so at Jostens I was doing some. Live demonstrations with large audiences. And I think that was a really good starting point here. 'cause I have to keep 'em all entertained. yeah, there's an entertainer aspect to it as well. And I'll, I'll, I'll tell you, it's when, when you say I, I have a new respect for when teachers say, talk about their, their teaching and the hours that it takes, teaching for like three hours straight doesn't sound that hard. But it sure is, it's, it, it's, it's exhausting in terms of just your voice. You're talking a lot. You have to, you know, keep everyone entertained. There's a, the whole new level of kind of activity required to, to do that performance or to, to be the center of attention for, for hours. But you see entertainment is part of it. 00:18:09 Sumer Beatty: Well, kudos to you. I think you're doing something right. Like I said, if we've got several students coming to me, it seems like it's not because you're offering them the A, but I feel like it was a very authentic conversation. So I think you're doing some things right. So good job. 00:18:24 Rick Crossen: Glad get that. And I, that's one fa of feedback I don't generally get is, is my classes are easy A's, which I don't really want them to be, you know. In the end of the day it's, that's not what college is about. It's, it's not about just getting an A because you pay money to come here. It's, it's about learning things. But the students that rise to the challenge, it's definitely possible. And I'll tell you, even my techniques aren't, aren't perfect either. There's still some students out there that are tough to get to converse, and it's just, it comes down to personality. A lot of times a lot of people out there maybe aren't comfortable sharing what they did over the weekend with a group of other people. I find sometimes those students work a little better after class or come to my office. I have some really good conversations with students like right after the class is ending where it's like a one-on-one situation where maybe they're not comfortable telling me what they did on the weekend in front of everybody, but they'll happily tell me when, whenever all the students have already left. Even just that they know that I'm open to those conversations, I think is another little doorway that's, kind of lets them have those conversations with me. 00:19:22 Carlos Ramos: Now a couple of things that, where Penn College stands out. 00:19:25 Rick Crossen: Yeah. 00:19:25 Carlos Ramos: Small class sizes, where typically you don't have more than 24 students in a class. This three to one lap to lecture ratio. How does that play out in your classes and how does that impact the student relationship between, you and the student and student to student? 00:19:41 Rick Crossen: Great question. And I think that's one of the huge advantages of Penn College and, and just the smaller institutions in general is, my strategy of building those student connections wouldn't really work if, if I'm sitting there with 40, 50 students. I, I wouldn't be easy for me to remember their name, wouldn't have enough time to talk about everyone's weekend. So, the small classes help me as an instructor build those bonds with students more effectively. And I also think they help the students learn a little more effectively, too, because they're able to, if I, if they ask a question, I know their name, say, Hey, oh, that's follow up from what you asked me last week, or things like that. We can have those kind of more in depth conversations with the small class sizes and IT especially. It's, it's easier to do IT projects in smaller classes. I have a lot of friends that have gone on to do very successful things. They're very success, successful, but, the classes they went to, like Penn State for example, they just... and I compare to them with kind of how I teach here at Penn College, and they're like, wow, like I went to Penn State, you'd think I would've had these opportunities to learn about this or use those hands-on experiences in IT. And they never did. it really comes down to, it's not that the professors there didn't want to. It's, they couldn't. They couldn't do those hands-on opportunities. There's not enough servers. There's not enough switches and routers for a hundred people in a classroom, right? We could do with 20, but not, not easily a hundred. So I definitely think the small class sizes help with communication. And that really helps with learning, too, overall. The hands-on learning that I think Penn College is all about and I'm all about is, is much more effective with the smaller class sizes. in my mind. 00:21:11 Sumer Beatty: You mentioned real world experiences, and I think in some of the areas on campus, it's more, there's a, an easier way to draw connection to, you know, the Culinary they're working in a on campus restaurant. What are some of the real world experiences your students are doing? 00:21:27 Rick Crossen: Good question, and, and I'll tell you that is. That's a tough thing to do in IT sometimes, right? It really requires equipment. It requires budgets. so I would say here at Penn College, we have two different IT labs, which is pretty cool. There's one in the engineering building, the BWD, and there's one in the ATHS that we just remodeled last year. So in those two rooms, there's actual networking switches. Networking routers. We have access points. So they're programming those things. They're, they're setting 'em up, they're setting up wireless networks and things like that. So we, we have lab infrastructure, but a lot of what we do with computing is, is on the computer itself. Right? So it's not as glamorous, not, you're not actually using a screwdriver or, you know, opening that stuff up. But we still have a lot of cool resources that are on the computers themselves as well. We have something, we call it CIT VM, which what that is is a virtual machine network. It's a virtual server. But what makes this one unique is that the students can set up their own infrastructure inside of our virtual server. So it's all hosted here at Penn College, and students can then set up a Windows server in there. They can, put users in there. They can know, manage permissions and things like that. They could do what a real network administrator would have to do all in the confines of Penn College's network. And this isn't just some simulation, this is the actual software itself. Even, even our database class, they're setting up a database management system with their laptops and things like that. So while I would say a lot of it's not on the computer, they're still getting the h the hands-on and air quotes experience that real IT professionals will have to have. Another pathway with, for real world experience, is our internships programs. Right now, I think there's, there's probably like 10 IT students that work for Penn College in either the Help Desk or the ITS department. And that pathway for them to get. Getting a job or an internship is, is awesome. And I think we've built that up over the last couple years and, and I know ITS is doing their wireless upgrades and that part of this is getting more students involved, but that pathway for, okay, Penn College's IT knows that we teach our students well and our students want to get an internship. So it's like a kind of a dual pathway or it works well for both of us, like they're getting good workers and we're getting our students hired. 00:23:39 Sumer Beatty: I would imagine your program's one of the ones where you often have a lot of people come to Career Fair and are looking to hire students even before they graduate. Is that the case? 00:23:49 Rick Crossen: Yeah. There's something interesting we see too. We see a lot of students, especially those that are going for four year degrees, that's their senior year. They might be approached with a job opportunity. And they're kind of in this tough situation where, okay, do I continue going to college and get my degree, or do I maybe go work at this full-time job I'm gonna get paid for? I've seen that happen several times where they, they might be offered a job, and they're kind of in a tough spot. I've also seen it go the other way where students get a job and then they pay from to come back to college. Yeah. The Career Fair is a great opportunity. One thing I will say about the Career Fair is not a ton of IT specific employers come. There's several, but mostly employers are in other areas, construction and building maintenance, welding, things like that. But all of those companies out there need IT workers. Right. And that's, that's where we have the advantage over a lot of the other industries where we can go up to one of those people at the job fair, the Career Fair, even if they're in, in the dental hygienics department, we can still talk to 'em, Hey, do you have an IT opening? And I've seen students have success with that where they're just give out their resumes because they know these big companies need IT workers. 00:24:52 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. In the area of IT, I mean, it seems promising because you're not, you can work anywhere in the world. 00:24:59 Rick Crossen: Definitely. 00:24:59 Sumer Beatty: It seems like the job opportunities are very, very vast. Have you witnessed students getting, like what areas do students usually after they graduate, go into? 00:25:09 Rick Crossen: Let's start with saying the kind of the areas that we teach here where we have majors for in IT. So there's four bachelor's degree majors. We have the game and sim major and which is pretty programming heavy. That, that's similar to the software development major. So those are the first two, programming majors. And then our third major is our network engineering major, which is kind of what our general IT networking focus major. And then we have the cybersecurity major. So. We've covered a pretty broad spectrum of, of areas in IT, and, and IT is so broad, really, we could, we could add five more majors here, for how many areas that IT really manages. So with my students or mainly I teach mainly networking classes. Where I see students go into, into jobs, there is like kind of the network administration role. They're managing the networks for businesses. They're making sure that employees have internet access, that they're making sure employees have all the device security that they need, their, their computer's working properly. I also see students go into a, a new kind of emerging area, a cloud computing, right? A lot of the resources we deal with today are on the cloud, right? OneDrive. I'm sure maybe even this audio that we're doing might be saved on OneDrive or something like that. Cloud computing is another big part of today's business environment that they need specialized IT administrators to make sure they're secure, make sure that they have accessibility and access to those, those sort of cloud systems. Yeah, mainly networking areas, but, cybersecurity is another one too. Now, I, I don't teach a ton of cybersecurity classes, but that's a really interesting area to me personally. It's a hobby of mine. I'm excited for what our students are doing in the cybersecurity industry as well. That's, I know with all these AI talks, that's, that's still on the table. Like we, we, if we're talking AI, we need to also talk security as well. So I, I'm thinking that the security majors are gonna be here to stay as well. 00:26:53 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. I'm glad you brought that up. You had mentioned you're on the AI committe. 00:26:58 Rick Crossen: Yes. 00:26:58 Sumer Beatty: Here at Penn College. I, that's probably not the proper name for it. Correct me. What's it called? 00:27:04 Rick Crossen: There's a couple of 'em. I'm 00:27:05 Sumer Beatty: Okay. 00:27:05 Rick Crossen: AI committee's right. Yeah. But I'm on like a subcommittee, if you will... 00:27:08 Sumer Beatty: okay. 00:27:08 Rick Crossen: ...for the curriculum. So we've kind of broken up AI committee here in the several subcommittees. We, we have the general meeting. Shout out to Andrea Campbell, the one that kind of threw that together. And I'm, I'm really grateful for that because she's brought together a lot of minds here at Penn College that all think IT is important to talk, or excuse me, AI is important to talk about, right? However you feel about AI. It, it's here, it's in the news and we have to address that, whatever opinions you may have on that matter. So my subcommittees called the curriculum committee. 'Cause from my standpoint, how are we going to address AI in terms of curriculum? Are we talking about it in our classes? Are we ignoring it in our classes? And what are we doing? And, and I'm not really trying to dictate the flow of that. I'm more just trying to get gauge where the faculty members are seeing interests and really where students are seeing interest. Right now, we're looking into developing, AI minors is our, kind of our main goal here, right? And, and the goal with these minors is for them to be accessible to as many students as possible. I don't want them just to be it minors is because ai, what we're seeing is used in pretty much every industry out there. Right? You could be, a, a welding, your job is to weld and you could use AI to help you weld. you could be out there in nursing and use AI to help you kind of diagnose patient issues. The architecture students very well could be using AI. So it's not industry specific, it's cross industry. And that's what our goal is here is, is how can we develop curriculum that includes as many students as possible, to get this AI minor. I have a lot of really dedicated faculty members working with me to help develop this. And it takes the whole college to come together on this. If we want students to be able to get this minor without taking a bunch of extra classes, without spending a bunch of extra money, we need to kind of get teachers on board with teaching this stuff. And it's going really well. And I think we'll see in the next year or two that these minors do become offered. Now, this is still in the works. There's no promises yet, but I really do think it would be beneficial to students. The first step in that process is, in my mind, teaching an AI course here at Penn College. Just talk, what is AI, right? Where did it come from? How do you use it? We could dive into the little ethical aspects of it as well. Because some students out there still maybe have not even used it yet, or don't know how to use it effectively. Where can you use it? How can you use it? Not as maybe a way to bypass doing work, but as a way to make your work even more efficient or improve the quality of your work. So that's the first step is teaching AI class. And I'm looking, I'm hoping to have a special topics AI class in the Fall 25. That's, that's the goal. I just gotta get it out there before advising comes up. But as of now, we're on track to having an AI class, Fall 25. 00:29:43 Sumer Beatty: Okay. Awesome. That was my next question. When can students take this class? 00:29:47 Rick Crossen: Fall 25. It's a hope. It's gonna be an online class. I think it's just gonna be one section. It's just me teaching it right now. I'd really love to get some involvement with some other, if this ends up taking off and if students are interested in taking this content, I'm foreseeing more sections open up, several sections a semester. I'd like to approach this class as almost an introduction to modern word processing as well, like, so we have a class at campus, CSC 124, where you learn things like how to use PowerPoint, how to use Excel. I could see this AI class also kind of bridging some gaps there as well. How could you use those pieces of software and then how could you use AI as well to kind of manipulate that or even be more efficient? So I'm thinking there will be student interest. so if anyone's listening to this, take a look. Make sure if you're scheduling, if you have yet to schedule for 2025, look for the intro to AI class out there. 00:30:39 Carlos Ramos: And I would say take a CSC with Ramos next semester. 00:30:43 Rick Crossen: Yeah, there you go. 00:30:43 Carlos Ramos: But I think this is gonna be it for me for a while. I've been teaching CSC 124 for a while, and I embed AI in that. So we have projects where we're using Copilot. 00:30:52 Rick Crossen: Exactly. 00:30:52 Carlos Ramos: In fact, students are doing that right now with developing a career guide. But use the AI to do the research, check the research, because obviously can't trust everything that comes out of AI on the internet. You can't trust everything that's on the internet, so you gotta do your homework. Yeah. But it is so important, and I see that basic writing skill. So many kids are, you know, they're used to communicating on text. There's a different way to communicate when you're in a professional environment and how can we use Copilot, like you said, to bridge that gap, to bring them, you know, closer to that so that when they get outta college, they are communicating in the way that industry is expecting and taking that to the next level. I think AI is really important there. 00:31:34 Rick Crossen: Yeah, I agree totally. And we're kind of at a crossroads in my mind, especially with, with the way students learn and interact with AIs. Are they gonna use, are they gonna rely on it totally to, to kinda do their job for them or do the writing for them, or are they gonna use it as a tool to increase their own ability to write? And I think it comes down to really us as, as teachers, or mentors, or father figures, mother figures, parents to tell our kids how they can use AI effectively to make them smarter instead of kind of as a reliance or a bypass to these learning techniques. 00:32:06 Sumer Beatty: You mentioned earlier, all the, you know, you've been involved in so many different things, and one of those is a fraternity here on campus. I'm assuming a student probably approached you, you're shaking your head. They want to, they say, Hey, you know, professor Crossen, can you help? You know, wanna be our advisor for this. How did that originate and what made you decide to step up in that role? Because you can't say yes to everything. 00:32:29 Rick Crossen: No, you definitely can't. And I was, I'll tell you, I'll be honest, I was hesitant at first, because I didn't know the time commitment. I didn't know the responsibilities I had. so it all started with a very good student of mine. I've had him in several classes. He came to my office one day and asked, Hey, you know, I'm in this fraternity here on campus and we're, we need a new advisor. We're kind of in a, a tough situation. If we don't have an advisor, we can't operate on campus. so. He, he wanted some help and I was, again, like I said, I was a little nervous about it. I didn't know what it would entail. I ended up saying yes, and I'm glad I did. In terms of work, really, really nothing crazy. I just gotta, you know, ensure what they're doing is up to par. They're, they're following all, all the proper... this is a pretty strict process on how you can do events here on campus through Engage. It's definitely needed. You know, you wanna make sure things don't get double booked, but it's a lot for the, for students and, fraternity members to kinda go through every time. So I help guide 'em through that process. I ensure that the events that they hold are, follow the required policies and things like that. I sign off on their events, give 'em some life advice, but other than that, they're, I'm, I'm mostly hands off. You know, they're, they're, they're pretty self-sufficient, I would say, in a lot of parts. So why did I say yes or why did I say yes to that opportunity? it comes back to myself and my college experience. Greek life is a decently large part of my college experience. I liked college even before I joined Greek life, but there was a, a kind of aspect of college that I didn't quite have yet, and it was a social aspect. I was lucky in the fact that I knew a lot of people from high school in college, right? kind of, oh, I, I know you already, we'll just stay friends. And I didn't really meet too many new people. It wasn't until I joined Greek life that I really started meeting new people and developing that kind of social aspect of thing. And I will say that I owe a lot of my current social ability and my ability to talk in front of a group of people to joining Greek life. Having just that, those skills and experiences of being in an environment, well, hey, you don't really know anybody here, and can you still present yourself effectively? Can you still converse and talk to people you've never seen in your life? So I would say it opened up a lot of doors for me socially. And it's one of the... college is short. And this is something I tell students all the time. It seems long in when you're doing it, but those four years of college go quickly. They go super quickly. and joining a fraternity or or Greek life in general, sorority, is a way that you can kind of prolong those years or reconnect. So with my fraternity, right, I'm an alumni. I still go back during homecoming and this is, we're over 10 years now, outta college. And I can still go back and I feel at home, you know, I don't feel outta place. And I've been on both side of things, even in college as a student and having alumni come back and from my fraternity and they're kind of older in their fifties and, but we had an instant connection, you know, and, and it is really interesting to see, 'cause they were reminiscing about their college experiences and I could say, what's going on now? It's just a bond that kind of transcends age and transcends like time periods. So that's really what it's about for me is, is building those bonds and those, those connections, that networking. I've had a lot of fraternity brothers that have gone on to do really successful things. Some are doctors, lawyers, things like that. And, and having those, that network and, that I know always has my back. I, I think it's a big deal. So I'm supportive of that here on campus, especially for those IT students out there. Again, we kind of talked about communication might be not their strong suit. Joining a fraternity could help with that, or Greek life in general. 00:35:50 Sumer Beatty: Did you wanna talk about any mentors? Did you have anybody that, really impacted you? I always like to ask instructors that because you are, in front of the class, you are a mentor to many students. So sometimes we draw on those who've influenced us. 00:36:05 Rick Crossen: Yeah, that's a great question and there's so many answers I could give you to that question, and, and it's hard for me to narrow, so I'll narrow it down into a few. But there's so many people in my life that have really had a huge impact for me. let's start with some family members. So, my grandfather was an engineer. He was a World War II vet. He was a huge influence. I mean, he loved math, which I'm a big fan of math, which is kind of an oddity out there. Most people don't like math. He was one of the only people in my family that liked math as well. So we kind of bonded over that from a young age. So he was one who really kind of made me thirst for knowledge. He gave me that idea that, okay, there, there's a lot of benefits to learning things. And so, my grandfather would be a big mentor for me in that aspect. the other mentor would be my father, and he.. We're really similar in a lot of ways we're really different in a lot of ways. But he was the one who really supported me in becoming a professor or teaching here at Penn College. He actually, when, when I was a kid, he used to call me the professor when I was a little kid because I guess I would give like monologues when I was like three or four years old, just kind of go off on things where I acted like I knew everything. So he, he was calling me the professor for a really long time. And when he saw that this was a possibility for me, he kind of thought it was like me fulfilling my destiny in a way. So he was a really big support. And my, unfortunately my father, he passed away of prostate cancer in 2021. He, he was able to see me work here, which is great. he, I worked here for three months before he passed away, and it was, he was really proud of that. So he was one of my mentors, my grandfather, my father. I can't leave out the, the female mentors in my life as well. My mother, huge, huge mentor in my life, my grandmother, so a lot of family members. I'm lucky in that I have a, had a lot of family support and I kind of use the motivation that they've given me to kinda keep going. So family support's been big for me in terms of professional support. I've had a lot of great teachers out there as well. and I'll tell you, I wasn't always a good student, especially back in, when I was in Catholic school at a private school. I didn't take class too seriously. I was getting C's and D's just barely floating by. And a lot of, and I, I was, I was not a well-behaved child. I kind of pushed my limits and I regret that I do, but I'm so thankful that I had the instructors that I did, that they put up with me, they were able to get me through where I needed to be and still learn some things. So, shout out to all my, elementary school teachers at St. Anne's in Williamsport, because without you guys, I mean, I wouldn't be here. 00:38:33 Sumer Beatty: So that was that early cry for, I need hands on. I want to work with my hands. I wanna use this math that I love and like make things function. 00:38:42 Rick Crossen: Yeah. Yeah. I agree. It's just I didn't really find my fit in, in the private school because they didn't have the trades that I was looking for. I like private school a lot and I learned a lot in, in terms of like base knowledge. Great. But just, I was disappointed in the variety of things that I had available to me and, and I'm, and the switch to public school for me was really what secured my job today and, and opened me up to all these different areas out there that that exist. And that's when I started being a good student. I went, I went from getting C's and D's to getting A's because I actually cared about what I was, I was working on. 00:39:15 Sumer Beatty: I love hearing that from people who are doing really well and they're successful and they're making an impact, because I'm sure we have listeners that might be like, well, I've screwed this up. You know, I've, I've gone too far. I can't bring myself back. But it, it's possible. It's, there's always a way back. 00:39:32 Rick Crossen: It's one of the things I bring up in, in my freshman classes is like, I give 'em a little trivia about myself to start the class. Like, okay, here's some things about me, which of these is true? One of the things I mentioned is like, I was, I at the top of my class in high school is something, and most of 'em don't ever think that that's true about me, which I agree. 'cause I'm, I wasn't. I was not at the top of my class and my kind of, I go into this little talk like, okay, maybe you didn't do too well in high school. That doesn't mean you won't do well in college, right? It all depends on how you. Right you, this could be a turning point for you. There's nothing set in stone here. If you decide you'd like to get A's in college you can if you put your mind to it. And I've seen a lot of students turn around, especially when they find areas that they're interested in, where they weren't doing too hot in high school, didn't really care too much, and now they care. Now they're doing really well and involved. 00:40:16 Sumer Beatty: You had mentioned you were in a car accident, and I think that was a huge shifting point, turning point in your life, and you said you were comfortable talking about it. 00:40:26 Rick Crossen: Yes. 00:40:26 Sumer Beatty: Walk us through what happened, what happened after? How did that change your outlook on life? 00:40:31 Rick Crossen: I'll tell you, it's one of the, been one of the biggest things in my life. I'll start it with my year of 2024 was a year I'll never forget. I can't say it was a bad year. I had a lot of bad moments, but I also had some of the highest moments in my life. I got married last year, so I, it's year, I'll never forget. But I will also spend, part of the year kind of, disabled. So I'll go give you a little background with my car crash. I won't go into details. But essentially I was driving down the highway, normal way to work and a woman entered the highway backwards. and she, and we had a head on head collision. I was gonna 70 miles an hour. We had our head-on collided, and I got life flighted from the car seat. I don't, I don't remember this event either, which is maybe one of the reasons I'm able to talk about it. I don't really have a lot of people ask me, do you have PTSD with driving? I, I really don't, only because I don't remember the car accident itself. For, for better or worse. First thing I remember is waking up in the hospital and they're just asking, they're yelling at me, give me a number, give me a number. I, I gave my mom's number. My wife wasn't too happy about that. But I can't give her mom's number. It's the only number I remembered at the time. And I'm at the hospital and I just didn't know, even know what happened at this point. And, from it, it took weeks for me to really get back to a state of standardness. I was in a rough spot for several months. I ended up with stomach surgery, due to the, you know, I was wearing my seatbelt. It saved my life. And shout out to seat belts out there. Please wear your seatbelt. I would not be here and doing this without my seatbelt. But the impact, I was going 70 miles an hour, head on head collided the, the impact of my seatbelt caused like swelling in my stomach. My small intestine closed due to swelling, and I had to get 20 inches of my small intestine taken out, which sounds like a lot and it is a lot, but luckily it's only about 10% of your small intestine out there. So, so I still got a lot left, but I was in the hospital for, for nine days. And I got my, part of my small intestine taken out and this was actually a month after the car accident. And it, they didn't, I left the hospital that night of the car accident. I didn't even say overnight, which is kind of crazy to think about. I was in this crazy accident, left the next day. I was home that, home that night. So, the stomach issues persisted for about a month. I got surgery. I was in Geisinger Danville for about nine days or so. That was a low point of my life. I'll tell you. I don't wish those types of pain on anybody. I, there was a point in time where I didn't eat food for like 12 days in a row, which is, I'll tell you, it's not an experience I wish on anybody. I was dreaming about food. I was just, it was having daydreaming. 00:43:04 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. What were you most hungry for? What were you dreaming about? 00:43:07 Rick Crossen: I'm a big Taco Bell fan. I know. Most comfort thing. Taco Bell. I was having dreams about like Italian food, those spaghetti. Yeah. 00:43:14 Sumer Beatty: Oh yeah. 00:43:15 Carlos Ramos: That's hard to go from those types of foods to a forced fast. 00:43:18 Rick Crossen: Yes, it is, and I was just laying in the hospital bed just dreaming and just having these daydreams about food I couldn't eat. But thankfully I've, ever since the surgery, I'm completely recovered. No, no stomach issues whatsoever. The other issue I had, from the crash was my, patella tendon in my knee was, about 90% severed, due the car crash. and that was a big one. They didn't find that right away. And I was walking around on my knee and I was like, oh, this kind of hurts a little bit. They were so worried about my head obviously, 'cause I was unconscious for a while. They were worried about my head. They were giving me x-rays in my head, MRIs in my head. They didn't look at my knee too much. They didn't actually notice that it was torn open until later that night. They stitched it up, didn't do much. it turned out my patella tendon had been almost, it was 90% severed by their estimate. They said it was just barely hanging on by thread. And the surgeon was not happy that they didn't find it. He was, he was kind of, he said, Hey, if they would've found that right away, we would've given you surgery the day you, you had this accident. So I was walking around on campus. I was, I was during finals week. I remember just going, going back to, class, teaching my students, and I'm like, my knees bothering me. I was walking around on a patella tendon that was hanging on by thread for quite a while. Then we realized what was going on. 'Cause like, hey, this isn't normal. I'm still having these problems. I was in a full leg brace for, for two and a half months. I was, I was actually set to get the patella tendon surgery, but the complications of my stomach was intertwining with these things. They thought my stomach was more of a preference and it was, it was more of a, more of a issue. So I ended up getting stomach surgery instead of knee surgery because they didn't wanna put me on painkillers for the knee surgery with all the stomach issues. And the surgeon said, well, you've, you've been kind of living with your tendon like this for a couple months now. We'll just see how it goes. And I went through physical therapy, and I'm still to this day rockin' my patella tendon that's only hanging on by a little bit. 00:45:11 Sumer Beatty: Are you serious? 00:45:12 Rick Crossen: Yeah. 00:45:12 Sumer Beatty: And you're running? 00:45:13 Rick Crossen: And I'm running. 00:45:13 Carlos Ramos: I was gonna say, that puts your next question into a whole new context. 00:45:18 Sumer Beatty: Does it hurt? 00:45:19 Rick Crossen: Some, yeah. Every day it hurts. I'm not gonna tell you, it's like debilitating, but it's noticeable. 00:45:24 Sumer Beatty: Well, so any little hitch in a stride makes you adjust elsewhere. So how is that not causing any other issues? 00:45:33 Rick Crossen: And, yeah. And that's something I've actually brought up with my, my doctor, my surgeon. He, he isn't, he isn't too worried about it. I guess. It's something I, I definitely should look at because I have noticed a difference in my stride, right? I, I'm, I'm definitely favoring my, my right leg, my injured leg a little bit more. I notice it a little bit. The surgeon was more saying it would be a muscular change rather than... So my left leg, the leg that didn't have an injury, that's a lot bigger now than my right leg. And he was kind of saying that that's probably the extent of what will happen. I shouldn't have too many other issues like skeletal or knee issues. But it's definitely something I'm keeping an eye on because I love running. But I don't want to do it if it's gonna kind of cost myself, walking in my sixties or seventies. So. 00:46:17 Sumer Beatty: Okay, so the running bit that happened after the accident, is that true? You're like, okay, I almost lost my life, so I'm gonna now run every day. 00:46:26 Rick Crossen: So I was already running before that, so 00:46:28 Sumer Beatty: Oh, okay. 00:46:28 Rick Crossen: Yes. I was actually going for about a... Last year, I was going for a thousand miles run is, and that got abruptly stopped in April when my car crash happened. So I picked it up again this year. So that's my goal, kind of my goal again this year. A little, little bit different than that. So my goal for this year is to do an activity every day. To do something active for myself, whether it's running, whether it's biking, whether it's walking, just something where I can record say, yes, I did something positive for myself. But my favorite thing to do is running. So I'm really trying to run every day if I can. I'd love to do a thousand miles and I'm on pace for it at the moment. I'm average about 20 a week or so. It's not easy, that's for sure. And, One of the things people say about running is, oh, you do it all the time. Like, it gets easier. It really doesn't get easier. It... 00:47:11 Sumer Beatty: You just get faster. 00:47:12 Rick Crossen: Yeah. You just get faster. 00:47:14 Sumer Beatty: The recording, are you using Strava? Are you using an app? 00:47:17 Rick Crossen: Yes. 00:47:17 Sumer Beatty: Okay. 00:47:18 Rick Crossen: Yeah. I use Strava. I'm big Strava. I'm, I'm a kinda... Social media is a controversial topic for me. I'm, I'm a fan of social media in its concept, but I'm not a fan of a lot of the ways modern social media is, is done and, and sort of the things that are pushed with that. But Strava's one that I am a fan of, that's, that's my most active social media, Strava, But yeah, so I dunno if this will be end up in the podcast, but if you're out there, feel free to follow me on Strava. that, that's something I'm active on and that's how I'm recording it. my goal is to have a 365 day streak, but for this year, that's, that's what I, that's my plan. 00:47:49 Sumer Beatty: That's impressive. And it makes you measure what you're doing other days because you're like, boy, if I wanna be able to do something tomorrow, I shouldn't do something stupid today. 00:47:58 Rick Crossen: Yeah. And it's definitely made me reorganize. And I'll tell you there's some, there's some positives and negatives to doing stuff every day. In some ways it's easier, which is weird for me to say. But it's true because if I know that I have to do something every day, it's already planned for, it's already kind of given. It's happening, right? So it is already set in stone. It's, I don't have to worry about it. I'm already doing it. I know it's gonna be there. Versus when I used to run, maybe I'd run four days a week, three days a week, it would be a little harder for me to do it because I would go from doing nothing to having to run. It almost required more motivation in a way. It's, it's weird. It's weird. I'm not saying it's easy to do something every day, definitely not. But there's different ways that it's difficult versus doing something every so often, which is something I've kinda learned along the way. 00:48:41 Carlos Ramos: And having that mindset allows you to, to pivot. So you could say, okay, yep, this, this is what my week looks like. I know I'm gonna have a 10 mile run on Saturday. You get to Saturday and something in life has happened. You're not at your your best. 00:48:56 Rick Crossen: Yeah. 00:48:56 Carlos Ramos: You can turn that into a hike. You can turn that into a walk. 00:48:59 Rick Crossen: Exactly. Exactly. I'm not relying on, oh, I have to run today 'cause I haven't run all week, things like that. Well, I've been running most all week, so I could take a day off, or I've been busy today. I could just do a walk or incline, jog or something like that. 00:49:10 Sumer Beatty: Do your students know about this? 00:49:12 Rick Crossen: Some. I haven't told them officially, so, no. No, and and that's one of the things that I'm worried about, bragging too much about it because I think I'm setting myself up for failure if I start getting too much into it, that that's kind of why I've really been hesitant on saying the whole thousand mile thing is my goal, because what if I don't do it? You know? I really don't want to set myself up for that type of thing. 00:49:32 Sumer Beatty: You'll do it. And I think if you put it out there, it you, it could be contagious, maybe. 00:49:37 Rick Crossen: I think so. 00:49:37 Sumer Beatty: Maybe you have a student that's like, oh, you know, and there's an accountability piece. Maybe they'll see what you're doing and think, well, maybe I'll jump in. 00:49:45 Rick Crossen: I think you're definitely right about that. And the fact that they like seeing people in authority or people from their field, mentor being physically fit or active. I, I do make use of the rec center on campus here in the CC, and I see students in there and we talk sometimes. I think that it gives me motivation seeing them in there, and I think it gives them motivation seeing me in there a little bit that knowing that I'm a little bit older than you, but I'm still out here kind of taking care of my body. So no, I haven't told them yet, will I? I, I might. They know I run and they know that I kind of advertise 5Ks on campus, but that thousand mile thing still under wraps. Little, little secret though. 00:50:20 Sumer Beatty: Well, I mean hopefully not now. 00:50:22 Rick Crossen: No, no. 00:50:23 Carlos Ramos: You know we got the Penn College Runners group on Strava? 00:50:27 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. Are you on that? 00:50:28 Rick Crossen: I'm not. I'll have to join that. 00:50:29 Carlos Ramos: Yeah, definitely. So I'll, I'll connect with you on Strava. 00:50:31 Rick Crossen: Please. 00:50:31 Carlos Ramos: And then you'll be able to, I'll, I'll shoot that, that link to you too. Or you can probably just look it up as well. But yeah, I think maybe, maybe there's a, maybe there's a public pact here. 00:50:42 Sumer Beatty: A challenge we can issue, yeah. 00:50:44 Carlos Ramos: You know, I know that across the hall, a member of our team has committed to a thousand miles. Wow. I've thought about it, but I also cross train a lot with bike. 00:50:53 Rick Crossen: Yep. 00:50:54 Carlos Ramos: And hiking. I've, I've talked about this in the team here. I have LT, single day, planned for summer solstice from dawn until dusk. 00:51:04 Rick Crossen: Wow. 00:51:05 Sumer Beatty: LT is the Loyalsock Trail. 00:51:06 Carlos Ramos: Loyalsock Trail. Yep. So 56 ish plus miles, and I'm like, well that's so close to a 100K. I'm sure I can pack another loop in there somewhere to make it the a 100K. But yeah, that's a, I think, I think there's a, I think there's some accountability packed action. 00:51:22 Rick Crossen: That, that'd be awesome. It's good to hear some of those other, other runners out here. I'm a biker as well. I have like five bikes. But I'll tell you, I just love running a, trail running something about being in the woods. Mountain biking is something I like to get into. I don't own a mountain bike yet. All my, I have all road bikes out there. I, I do a triathlon when I'm, when I'm able to in, in Lockhaven, it's called Lockhaven Triathlon and it is kayaking, biking, and running. So that's something you can look at too. It's not a full fledged triathlon where you're not, you're not running a marathon. it's like a 5K run, 15 mile bike and then a three mile paddle, definitely worth looking into. It's... 00:51:58 Carlos Ramos: Okay. 00:51:58 Rick Crossen: ...pretty, I would say it's pretty manageable, but definitely feels accomplished when you 00:52:02 Carlos Ramos: Yeah, I've always avoided the tris 'cause of the swimming. I'm like, I I don't really get a whole lot of time swimming. 00:52:06 Rick Crossen: Yes. 00:52:07 Carlos Ramos: But I did start paddling and I've had a kayak for, for years but started paddleboard. 00:52:11 Rick Crossen: That's what's made its nice for me as well. 00:52:13 Carlos Ramos: Thanks to this one over here and my brother. 00:52:16 Sumer Beatty: I'm keeping quiet through this whole conversation. I have so many challenges going on right now. I'm just like, be quiet, don't join something else. 00:52:24 Carlos Ramos: Last thing you need is another one. 00:52:25 Sumer Beatty: Oh, it's okay. I just signed up for this like burpee thing. 00:52:28 Rick Crossen: Oh. 00:52:28 Sumer Beatty: And I'm like, that's simple enough. It's not gonna take that much time, but you know, it piggybacks on one, you start, it's like 10, 20, 30, and then by the end of the month, I, I don't even know how many you're doing. It'll probably be doing burpees all day. I'll have to take a day off. 00:52:40 Carlos Ramos: Oh. Like to get up to like a hundred burpees a day or something? 00:52:43 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. I. I can't say no. 00:52:46 Carlos Ramos: I feel nauseous even thinking about that. 00:52:47 Sumer Beatty: I can't say no. A lot of us in this department are kind of, there's a little bit, there is some accountability. We see what each other's doing. Many of us are on Strava, so. 00:52:58 Rick Crossen: That's awesome. 00:52:58 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. 00:52:59 Rick Crossen: Yeah, maybe I can convince some of the other IT faculty members to join us too. 00:53:03 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, and I mean, I've said to others here, I mean, walking counts. 00:53:07 Rick Crossen: Yeah. 00:53:07 Sumer Beatty: Skiing counts. There's many things on there. I mean, I think even golfing counts. I don't know. Not to degrade that, but, 00:53:15 Carlos Ramos: Well, I did disc golf over the weekend. 00:53:16 Rick Crossen: Oh yeah. 00:53:16 Carlos Ramos: I put it in. 00:53:17 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. It all adds up. Strength training, like it's all Yeah. 00:53:20 Rick Crossen: Yeah. So a big Strava fan, I think that's, in my mind, that's the best type of social media is where you're doing active stuff on there like that. 00:53:27 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because social media is very controversial and you know, what are you using it for? How are you using it? But anything that's going to inspire other people, I think it's easy to rally behind. 00:53:39 Rick Crossen: And, and you're not really faking it too much on there. It's not like an Instagram photo where it's all staged, you know, perfect timing. It's, it's hard to fake the Strava posts for the most part. You know, it's pretty apparent if you're not actually doing what you say you're doing. 00:53:50 Sumer Beatty: Yeah, you get vulnerable. I mean, I've been on Strava since 2013. There was a point of time where I was like, I was dark. I have Strava dark, you know, they call it that. And I was like, I can't have people seeing that, you know, I'm struggling. Like there's some times where it's hard to get out or you're not doing so well, or you're not feeling it, and it's like, you know what? I don't care. 00:54:09 Carlos Ramos: I actually had the opposite problem. So when I first started Strava, I'm like, I, because I, when I commit to something like go all in. 00:54:16 Rick Crossen: Yeah, 00:54:16 Carlos Ramos: And so going all in from practically zero in terms of running to, I'm gonna run every day, I am gonna do this and, and that, I hurt myself. Yeah. Like, I mean, it wasn't major injury, but it was enough that I'm like, okay, well this isn't gonna, I'm not gonna perform well at all ever if I keep doing this. And so I did take myself off of it for a bit and then just started doing it casually and, and then, then work back up. And then I, now I have a healthy mindset with it. 00:54:45 Rick Crossen: I was in the same boat as well when I first started my running regimen about five years ago. I, I ran too much. I was running five miles every day. And my, my body wasn't strong enough. I should have mixed in. I should have crosstrained, I should have biked, should have done some other things. I didn't realize at the time. and I hadn't, I had some knee and IT band problems that really persisted for months and kind of took me outta the running game entirely. So it, it, it's not. It's not a sprint right away, you know, you gotta build up to those things or you might get injured. 00:55:13 Carlos Ramos: IT students, you're gonna have to join the club with with Rick and get out for the, get out for the one mile walk. 00:55:19 Rick Crossen: Join me on the Five @ Five with President Reed. 00:55:21 Carlos Ramos: There we go. 00:55:22 Rick Crossen: And obviously they don't need to run a 5K or anything like that. Just, you know, give a little jog if you'd like, you know. Go outside. 00:55:28 Sumer Beatty: We're all for that. 00:55:29 Rick Crossen: Get out of the den. 00:55:31 Sumer Beatty: Yeah. All right. So in closing, any parting advice other than joining the the Five @ Five or getting out there and staying active? 00:55:38 Rick Crossen: I would say I'm a big proponent of something called lifelong learning. Right? You never know everything. Just keep learning new things. Be having an open mind to things that you approach. Every day is a new day. Make make the best out of it. 00:55:50 Sumer Beatty: Excellent. Thank you. 00:55:52 Rick Crossen: You're welcome. Thanks for having me. 00:55:53 Sumer Beatty: Absolutely. 00:55:53 Carlos Ramos: Thank you, Rick. 00:55:54 Rick Crossen: Of course. 00:55:58 Sumer Beatty: Thanks for hanging out with us today. 00:55:59 Carlos Ramos: Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. 00:56:04 Sumer Beatty: Check out our show notes for bookmarks to your favorite sections and links to resources that we mention in today's episode. 00:56:10 Carlos Ramos: You can also find past episodes and see what's on deck for upcoming ones at pct.edu/podcast. 00:56:17 Sumer Beatty: And of course, we are open to your thoughts, ideas, and suggestions. So send those over at podcast@pct.edu. 00:56:25 Carlos Ramos: It's been real. 00:56:27 Sumer Beatty: Catch you next time. Oh, we are with the elite. We normally don't engage our guests in this IT situation, but he knows you're on the same level. 00:56:39 Rick Crossen: Well, not with this stuff, I'll tell you that. I don't do audio mixing stuff like that, but computers, I got you there. 00:56:43 Sumer Beatty: Okay.