The new grand bargain

00:21 Introduction

Sanjay SrivastavaThank you, Kemi. Thanks for joining me on this podcast. This is the second episode. I'm actually excited about the whole idea about bridging higher ed to the workforce. This is a topic I'm very passionate about, and I know you are. So once again, thank you.

Kemi JonaGreat to be here, Sanjay.

Sanjay SrivastavaSo when we get started, it'd be great to get your journey, a little bit about your background, to get the audience familiar — where you are, what you're passionate about.

00:43 From Northwestern to Northeastern to UVA, and why few schools copy the co-op model

Kemi JonaSure. Well, I am currently the Vice Provost for Online Education and Digital Innovation here at the University of Virginia. I've been here for two and a half years. Before that, I was in a similar role at Northeastern University in Boston, which, as you know and many of our listeners know, is known for its experiential co-op model, bridging school and work. And before that at Northwestern University, where I was research faculty working on learning technology. So throughout my career, I've really focused on the cutting edge of learning technologies and learning sciences, and trying to think about how does technology allow us to improve the quality of learning experiences for all learners, and to also increase access to high quality education for learners across the globe and across all stages of their life. I know those are topics you're very passionate about, Sanjay. So it's exciting to be able to dig in with you today.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, one thing which you said, Northeastern — I always think about Northeastern as kind of the shining star, right? How they sort of transformed this whole university by focusing really, really heavily on the connection to the employer. So is that a somewhat accurate description of Northeastern's transformation?

Kemi JonaLook, I mean, it hasn't really been a transformation. Northeastern started as really a blue collar commuter school for the families in Boston who couldn't afford to send their kids across the river to the pricey schools in Cambridge. And co-op really began as a way for students to basically work for a while to earn enough money to pay for the next semester. That was the original version of it, right? So it was very much just a way to kind of work your way through school. And many students still do that today, in a less formal way.

Kemi JonaAnd then over time, it evolved into what's now called the co-op program, where students do six-month paid placements, usually two in their college. Sometimes they do three, but that can stretch things out a lot. And that has really become their signature brand.

Kemi JonaAnd it does require a huge amount of staff commitment — over 100 staff managing relationships. And also, you have to adjust the academic calendar because students are constantly leaving for co-ops and coming back. And you have to have the dorms be able to let people leave and come back. There's just a lot of behind-the-curtain work that goes into actually fitting it all together, even though the idea on its surface seems sort of obvious and great.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, so to make it work, you have to really commit to the whole model, right?

Kemi JonaYou really have to commit, and it's a heavy lift. And so I think that's where a lot of people are like, well, why doesn't everybody do it? Right. If it's such a great idea, everybody should do it. And the answer is, because it's really hard and complicated, and it takes a deep commitment to organizing around it. And I'm sure we'll talk about this later — it takes a big commitment to manage relationships with employers throughout the process, and making sure that you're finding placements that make sense for students.

03:48 Why the entry-level doom narrative is already reversing

Sanjay SrivastavaRight. For the audience, how this came about — because Kemi and I were on a panel which Vocareum had organized at ASU+GSV. And the topic there was agentic AI and what impact it will make for the students as they're entering the workforce. And I don't know if you feel that way, but that feels to me like ages ago.

Kemi JonaIt does.

Sanjay SrivastavaHopefully that was peak hype. Maybe, maybe not.

Kemi JonaIt's not even two months. It's like six weeks, I think. Yeah, it's crazy.

Sanjay SrivastavaI know. And also I think it feels very timely because of the graduation season, right? So I'm just wondering, what are you hearing? What's the update on the whole sort of entry-level jobs — how are the students faring?

Kemi JonaI agree with you, Sanjay — it does feel like a lifetime ago, and maybe it is a lifetime in AI time ago. But I actually think things have changed even in those six weeks since we were together in San Diego. The pendulum is swinging back from that peak AI hype, as I think I predicted it would at the panel. So I was sort of pleased to see that.

Kemi JonaMay 19th, which was yesterday as we record this, the Wall Street Journal had an article with the headline that says companies say AI is reviving entry-level jobs, right? So it's very timely to your question. And the article talks about this new Strada survey. They surveyed 1,500 employers, and they found that companies are flipping from, you know, AI is killing entry-level jobs, which we talked a lot about, and was sort of the dominant theme, I think, that was running through the whole event, right — worry about that. And now the narrative is sort of that AI is boosting the need for entry-level workers, particularly those that are sort of AI skilled.

Kemi JonaAnd interestingly, the survey found that something like almost three times as many senior leaders expect AI to increase entry-level hiring in 2026 versus decreasing, right? So that feels very different than the kind of doom scenarios that we were reading about back in early spring.

Kemi JonaAnd what's actually happening — and probably no surprise, given how closely you work with students and employers on both sides — is that companies are finding that their youngest workers evolve and change as fast as the jobs are changing, and that new grads who can apply AI are much more productive than grads might have been a couple of years ago, right, on a sort of apples-for-apples basis.

Kemi JonaAnd so, to your question, I think the pendulum is going to continue to swing back as we get through some of this hype and the realities of what AI can and can't actually do, and also what new grads can actually do and how powerful that is if they have the appropriate skills, mindsets and abilities to come in and really hit the ground running and make a difference.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, absolutely. The whole doom and gloom really felt like it was coming from the very Silicon Valley software companies, and we were just projecting it on the entire economy. So yeah, my hope was — and hopefully it's turned out to be correct — that there are so many industries out there. And I talked to my friends who are executives, who all know they have to do something about AI, but they're still not quite sure. And the only way you can start moving is you have to recruit new talent.

Kemi JonaExactly right. And a lot of the Silicon Valley headlines even today, right? I think Meta was in the headlines today, which is May 20th, for your listeners, right? And they're laying off people not because they don't need the skills, it's because they need the money to pay for data centers, right? So that's a different conversation than AI replacing the skills that a new graduate has, right? So I think it's important that we peel that apart.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, absolutely. In some businesses there has been a massive shift of capital from human to GPUs. But that is limited to just some businesses — some really feel like you need to buy GPUs to compete, but most of us don't.

Kemi JonaThat's right.

07:45 What employers actually rank first — and last

Sanjay SrivastavaSo one of the things which I know you're pretty passionate about, like helping basically build the bridge, is the whole co-ops as you discussed, or internships. And I'm just wondering if you want to sort of talk about it, and especially in the context of what you're doing currently.

Kemi JonaAbsolutely. Well, it's interesting because we've been talking a lot about how to bridge the sort of school-to-job transition. It's on a lot of people's minds. Obviously, we're in graduation season now. And so you're going to see a lot of stories about graduates either getting jobs or not getting jobs, or being sort of employed versus underemployed.

Kemi JonaBut the Strada survey that just came out that we were talking about earlier — they asked employers to kind of rank what's most important when they're hiring. And in order, it's a candidate who had direct work experience, like a real job, followed by an internship, followed by any kind of project-based experience relevant to the role. Then all the way at the bottom, has a 4.0 GPA, academic awards. So like, guess what — this is the most important stuff. And we've sort of known that, right?

Kemi JonaObviously the Northeastern co-op model is based on that — the work, the internships and things that students see. And so what we try to do here, Sanjay, is recognize that, as great as a summer internship is — and we can talk about some of the challenges later on, because I know you've got some questions about that — but we wanted to find a way to create more flexibility and access.

Kemi JonaBecause not everybody can do a summer internship, assuming even that there were enough. We have students who go back and work in the family business and support their families, or do caregiving. We have student athletes who have to practice all summer, right? The football team is here all summer practicing.

Sanjay SrivastavaAthletics, I'd have heard, right?

Kemi JonaAnd the list goes on and on. People who are traveling, right? Maybe they have a three-week global studies term. So take some off of the list.

09:41 The UVA Career Academies

Kemi JonaSo what we've been doing is launching a series of online, virtual, asynchronous experiences that we've been calling UVA Career Academies, where we pair some training — either some of the work we did together, a Google certificate in AI, or, you know, UX design or whatever it might be — with a virtual internship hosted on the platform that we use. And these are typically small, midsize companies, right? They're not Fortune 50.

Kemi JonaAnd the great thing is that students can do it on their own schedule. Typically they like to do it over break, right? So surprisingly, they're just too busy during the semester to fit it in. We've done something like over 250 students over the last year in a variety of formats, usually again over breaks. Students really — they're voting with their feet.

Kemi JonaAnd hopefully that gives them an opportunity to explore roles and careers that is relatively low risk, because that's hard to do in an internship. You gotta make a choice and you gotta stick with it. So here they can sample a lot of different kinds of industry sectors, different kinds of roles — they can do project management, they can do technical, they can do UX, whatever it is, finance, marketing, social media. And then they get to work in teams. So they're building their teamwork, collaboration skills, leadership skills, how to interact with a client, basically, or a manager who's giving you feedback. It's gone really, really well.

Kemi JonaAnd we are now evolving it this summer — we can talk about this a little bit more — to focus on AI more specifically, in response to some of the concerns and topics that you raised at the top of the show.

11:28 Low-risk exploration, and running out of bites at the apple

Sanjay SrivastavaNow that sounds great. So as you said, they can sample multiple projects. I did not realize that — so they can do more than one of these. Sorry, what do you call them, the non-internship, virtual… career academies?

Kemi JonaCareer academies, yeah. That's right. We kind of cluster them in different topic areas, different industry areas, to let the students kind of pick and choose what they might want. And really part of the goal, Sanjay, that I think has often overlooked — even in places, or especially places, like Northeastern, but any school that does internships — is you don't get that many bites at the apple, right? If you're doing summer internships, you might get two or three summers if you're really lucky. You know, at Northeastern, you usually do two co-ops.

Kemi JonaBut let's say one of those turned out to stink, right? Like it was just terrible. Like, okay, that's a good news, because now you know you don't want to work in investment banking or whatever, or be a paralegal. But now you've just thrown out half of your chances really, or 30% of your chances to gain that industry experience, right? And so we wanted to really make low-risk exploration much more accessible. To let you try stuff out, figure out what you might like, what you don't like, but not have to spend an entire summer committing to doing it until you really felt like that was a choice for you.

Kemi JonaThese smaller — usually they're like 20 to 30 to 40 hour experiences — give you real hands-on experience and give you a chance to say like, yeah, this is kind of interesting. I like this, or I like this industry vertical and not that industry vertical. I like to work with a nonprofit or public sector, or private. And that is something that I think we have not done a good job as a sector overall in higher ed making more feasible. We just assume like kids will show up, they know what they want, they do an internship, and that's all.

Kemi JonaWe need a continuum of experiences, from shorter, low-risk, exploratory to much more in-depth, hands-on, traditional co-ops or internships where you can really dig in once you've decided that, like, yeah, this is the thing for me and I really want to go for it. So we see them as very complementary and developmental.

Sanjay SrivastavaNow that makes a lot of sense. And you made a great point about the opportunity cost of their time, because not only, of course, you're getting exposure, but your odds of getting hired by that company, right? I mean, it's tremendous, right? Something like 50 to 60%, whatever the number is. So you can only get that many bites of the apple. So let's talk about the AI for VA. How is the new version getting launched?

13:49 AI4VA, the Chamber of Commerce and the library

Kemi JonaYeah, so this summer what we did is we sort of evolved the Career Academies idea, because, as we talked about at GSV, Sanjay, there's a lot of anxiety out there, whether it's well deserved or not, but like people are anxious and that's real.

Kemi JonaAnd we recognize two things at the same time. One, that as AI tools become more broadly accessible out in the marketplace, small businesses and not-for-profits are wondering how to take advantage of these tools. These are organizations that are too small to afford an Accenture, a Deloitte, or a McKinsey consulting engagement. These are mom and pop, maybe five-person companies or whatever. And so I think they're really struggling to kind of figure out like, how do we take advantage of this? And maybe, you know, the efficiencies could really be the most helpful for a small business, right? Because they're always scraping by, there's never enough people to do the work, and there's always some compromise you have to make along the way.

Kemi JonaAnd at the same time, as we've been talking about, Sanjay, students are increasingly being asked to come out into the workforce and demonstrate AI competencies, that Vocareum does a great job of helping to train and to document. And so they want to be able to put that on their resume and they want to be able to be competitive. But schools tend to be slower at integrating these into curriculum, right? Some go fast, but even then it's almost impossible for anybody to keep up these days.

Kemi JonaAnd so we thought, why not pair our students with small businesses and not-for-profits in Virginia and solve both of those challenges at the same time. Let the students build applied AI skills on real projects — like real messy real-world projects, not toy problems, but actual business problems in the world. And also lift up our small business community, who doesn't have access to expensive consultants, and who really need the efficiency improvements that they can get from AI. They do mini consulting engagements, very lightweight, to help train these small businesses on how to use the tools and benefit from them.

Kemi JonaSo we've, again, paired up the Google AI professional certificate, so students have to complete that before they get matched up in their project teams. There's usually four to five to six students on a team. So they work in a team. Sometimes one of them acts as the project manager and the other ones do the work.

Kemi JonaAnd then we have 26 so far employers across Virginia signed up, five not-for-profits, a total of 133 students across nine of our 12 schools have signed up, including, as we were talking about, 19 student athletes. So obviously, this is a great opportunity for them to, during practice during the summer, build these AI-relevant skills. And so we're really excited about that pairing because, again, as a public university, we are supported by the taxpayers of Virginia. And we feel like this is a great way to give back while we're helping our students gain the skills that they want to put on their resume and that they know that they're going to need. And so if people want to learn more, they can go to our website at ai4va.org, and check out all the latest information.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, I'll make sure we'll add it in the comments when we release this. So one thing which I was noticing when I read the information about — that the Chamber of Commerce was sort of engaged and involved. So that's pretty exciting.

Kemi JonaAbsolutely. We're really grateful. We have a couple of partners aside from Grow with Google. As we mentioned, we have the Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce, who has been a great partner in helping us recruit local businesses. And we have our library — the dean of our library, who has really been a champion for AI literacy here at the university, has spun up a kind of an AI project lab at the library. So if any students are still here on grounds during the summer and they want to do teamwork, project teams, they can go to the library and there are library specialists who can help them, advise them on different AI tools and technologies and generally support the work. So we're really, really excited to have both the chamber and friends at the UVA library.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, just something a little off topic, but the whole library thing is pretty intriguing. So I was talking to someone like a year or so ago in the public library — pretty excited about the whole idea that people from all walks of life coming there, and they might want help with getting, maybe applying for like kind of benefits or whatever, right? So AI being a skill and that being the delivery mechanism — I haven't been able to engage in it, but I definitely want to go back and see. Because I felt like this is one place where you can scale to the population which otherwise might not have a computer at home or might not know how to use one.

Kemi JonaYeah, absolutely. I think you're right. I mean, just like it was sort of basic technology and access in a decade ago, I do think that public libraries, to the extent that they can, will also become resources for their local communities in using AI — for, whatever, people want, or small businesses too. So yeah, we're really excited to see how this works out. It's our first pilot. If it goes well, then we hope to expand it and share it with other schools and universities across Virginia. And maybe next year we'll have a much bigger impact, but one step at a time.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, that's awesome. And as you said, every small business now needs efficiency to the extent they can get it in terms of workforce — some sort of an automation, which AI can do. And as you're pointing out, they can probably benefit the most, right? You're getting a call in the middle of the night, you need AI to triage it and maybe tell you, is it an emergency that should wake you up because the customer somewhere — the pipe has burst? But there's so much to be done. And this seems like a great initiative just on that, right? Helping the local small businesses, connecting them to students. And I don't know how else would you do it, right? It doesn't feel like — just like the public library, how else would you provide access?

19:36 Messy problems, and learning to tell a client no

Kemi JonaWell, that's the thing. And I mean, I also like the thing that I'm excited about too, Sanjay, is what employers are looking for — our graduates, obviously who have AI skills, but more importantly are able to tackle messy problems in the world, right? Not kind of back-of-the-chapter problem sets, because those are very convergent answers. There's one right answer, you get it or you don't, but that's not how the world works, right?

Kemi JonaWhether you're doing software development or anything, where you're going to really add value is by taking a messy, ill-defined problem and figuring out how to scope it down to something you can actually do. Some of the most powerful moments we've heard from our students in the Career Academies last year is when a CFO or somebody comes and asks them to do some data analysis and create a dashboard, and basically they look at the data and they're like, yeah, it's too messy to actually do what you want. You don't have the data. And they have to go back and tell them no — they have to say, no, we can't do that, but what we could do is this instead, where you would get reliable insights.

Kemi JonaAnd that's a very sophisticated skill, to be able to tell your client no — for a good reason, and not put a sort of garbage-in-garbage-out solution in front of them. Especially in the age of AI, right? That's the key thing. You have to know whether the data you're putting in is going to be reliable and clean enough to base a business decision off of, right? So that was a very sophisticated moment for our students, who had a real eye opener around, like, they were scared, you know, they're like, I don't know if we can do this. But if we don't, we're going to be in troubles later, because it won't work out. Right. So they had the analytical capabilities to know, but the interpersonal business savvy was a real learning experience. And I think they walked away from that project with something that will really serve them well in the future.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, and as you're saying, it's like the whole judgment layer has become so much more important. The execution layer — sure, it's interesting — but the judgment. So the more we can expose students to the opportunity where they have to really exercise their judgment and see the consequences, right, I think the better off they would be.

Kemi JonaTotally. And also just because AI makes it so easy to just like look like you've solved the problem and create a beautiful dashboard or graphic or whatever. And it could be complete garbage, right? But nobody would know because it looks pretty. And so I think that's the trap. And I think students who, or graduates, or workers who can have that discernment are going to be much more successful as we navigate through this era.

22:11 Choosing a major in the middle of the hype

Sanjay SrivastavaAbsolutely. So another topic on the top of mind — and I know we talked about it in the panel too — just so happened that today I was looking at a Business Insider article which said something like 16 or 17% of the students actually change their major because of the AI hype, and something ridiculous like 45 or 46% actually considered doing it. And I know you heard about this Eric Schmidt, right? The booing at the commencement speech when he mentioned AI. So I wonder a lot what's going on in campus as the students have to make this massive decision about what major to take, and you're trying to make decisions in the midst of all this hype — and only certain kinds of hype get amplified, for all the obvious reasons. So I'm just wondering, how do universities deal with it? How do you guide the students to make good decisions?

Kemi JonaIt's a super important question, Sanjay. I appreciate you zeroing in on this. I think what we've known for a long time, but it seems to really come into focus, is your point around student advising. And not just letting students kind of wander around without any real support.

Kemi JonaAnd so, you know, at UVA, the College of Arts and Sciences has recently doubled down, re-engineered their entire advising process for first-year students, integrating career pathways. So I think you're seeing a lot more focus and attention. And maybe just because of how crazy the labor market does seem, that has come to the front burner for a lot of schools, which is great, because I think that's important.

Kemi JonaAnd it's also important from a kind of equity standpoint, because you can't just assume that students from wealthier backgrounds and students from less resourced backgrounds are going to succeed at the same rates, right, because they don't have the same kind of social capital to draw on if the school doesn't pick it up.

Kemi JonaSo there's a new book out from Ned Laff and Scott Carlson called Hacking College, which really attacks this issue directly, which is: how do schools help students who maybe don't even have any idea what they're interested in? Kind of like we said, have that low-risk exploration, go out into the world and really figure it out.

Kemi JonaAnd so my advice for students really is that your first job is to kind of come to college, if you have that good fortune, to explore new ideas, new topics, right? Broaden your perspective. Universities might not be seen as doing great on all things, but one thing they are good at is putting you in contact with lots of very expert faculty from lots of different disciplines, right? It's just like going to a candy store that allows you to kind of check out different areas of the humanities, arts, literature, engineering, just down the whole list. And you may never get a chance to learn from that many world-class experts again in your life.

Kemi JonaI mean, it's kind of a running joke that folks who are our age, Sanjay, were like, yeah, I would go back to school in a minute if I could spend four years doing nothing but learning from really smart people. Like what a dream come true, right? Because, you know, you get to be an adult and you got to work and take care of your family. And if you're lucky, you get to read a book for 30 minutes before you fall asleep at the end of the day. So students should not pass up that opportunity.

26:15 Curiosity, and why being average is over

Kemi JonaAnd the reason I think in this age of AI, Sanjay, that's even more important than ever, is that you have to figure out what you're really interested in one way or the other. However that happens. Maybe you have the good fortune — I was lucky. I was into computers and I majored in computer science and I didn't change my mind. That was lucky, right? I know that that is not the norm. But you don't want to just come in assuming that you want to be an investment banker, only to find out that you're stuck in a job that you absolutely hate when you graduate. That's not a win.

Kemi JonaAnd the reason I say that it's even more true for the age of AI is that you're going to have to have the passion and persistence to keep learning all the time. I think that has become super clear. Nobody knows where AI is going. But one thing that's super clear is that being average is over. Those sort of average, rote roles are going to be the ones that are probably most at risk.

Kemi JonaSo you have to really have the passion to keep learning and developing yourself even after you leave school, right? Especially after you leave school. And if you're doing something at a job that you can't stand, where's that motivation gonna come from? You've gotta be passionate to keep yourself sharp and keep learning in the age of AI. So yeah, of course, you're gonna wanna pick up — if you wanna go to finance, you better learn some economics and finance skills, that's important. But you've got to really find a way to find something that you are committed to being persistent and resilient and continuing to be really exceptional at, if you can. You don't have to be exceptional at everything, but you just have to be exceptional at a few things where you can really stand out from average.

Kemi JonaAnd also just build the mindset of, I've got to keep learning, I've got to keep sharpening whatever skills that make me really differentiated in the workplace. And the kinds of things that employers are looking for, we talked about before — having real experiences, communication, teamwork, strategic thinking. And those never change, right? It's like year after year, you do every survey, they're always the same. And so being able to come out with real experience where you've got the teamwork skills and leadership, project management, all the important human skills — I think those are the kinds of things that are really going to set you up for success no matter where it takes you.

Sanjay SrivastavaAbsolutely. And also that passion probably helps you kind of withstand the hype, right? And so you don't panic, because passion maybe will counterbalance some of the worry that gets thrown.

Kemi JonaWell, you've got the curiosity, and that's one thing I don't think AI has yet is curiosity, right? And so the ability to see new opportunities, and then maybe use AI or not, whatever field you're in, right? That's really important. So I think it's like that old saying: education is the lighting of a fire, not the filling of a pail. That's more true than ever. We've got to stop thinking about education as just like dumping a bunch of facts in our students' heads, like filling their heads like a pail. And we've got to really think about how do we light that spark of that curiosity and drive to keep learning.

28:41 The new grand bargain, and where public policy fits

Sanjay SrivastavaAbsolutely. So, been a fascinating conversation. I just want to close on one final thought that you mentioned in one of our conversations — that you were looking forward to maybe a new grand bargain between the employers and the universities. And I'm just wondering if you want to comment on that as a closing thought.

Kemi JonaYeah, I appreciate that, Sanjay. Look, we've been talking about how important that relevant work experience is for graduates and internships. The Strada survey — it's the most important thing that employers are looking for. We know that on one side because they're telling us; 1,500 employers just told us that. Yet the number of internships is down 17 and a half percent year over year from last year. And there's something like between a hundred to 300 applications per internship — like the upper end is more tech, right? And so, you know, the gap between the number of students who wanted an internship and who actually got one was something like 4.6 million last year, right?

Sanjay SrivastavaWow.

Kemi JonaSo it's not like the students aren't trying to do the right thing, right? They know how important it is. They're listening to the surveys and employers. That's this gap between what employers are saying they value the most and the fact that there's fewer and fewer of these internship opportunities. You could argue, the students don't know, they don't want them. But no, the data shows that they do want them. They just can't find them.

Kemi JonaAnd also in terms of just the hiring — like, during GSV we were talking about new grad hiring is down, unemployment for young workers is worse. So there's a big disconnect between what employers say they value and this commitment to providing the real-world experiences. And so if employers keep pulling back on early career talent and maybe not hiring as much or at all — well, where's that going to leave them in five years when there are no junior people to promote into that next level management role, right? So that's the gap.

Kemi JonaIn my view, we need a new grand bargain with employers that says, look, we're listening to you. We understand what you're saying is valuable. We want to try to encourage our students to do these internships, and we're going to weave in things like career academies to give more access to real-world employer projects. But we can't do it by ourselves. We need employers to meet us in the middle, and we need this new grand bargain. So there are some thought leaders out there like Brandon Busteed who have suggested that employers should offer internships at a target rate of like 5% of their total, just as a metric to shoot for. So we need more ideas like that, and more employers stepping up in both summer internships, but also virtual internships and other kinds of opportunities in hiring.

Kemi JonaThat's the grand bargain. If we pull back on the investment in student internships and work-based learning and new hiring, it's not going to fill the talent pipeline of tomorrow. And it's not going to help universities who already are being thrown under the bus for not providing enough apparent value in preparing for the workforce. So it's a win-win if we do this together. And that's why I've been calling it like a new grand bargain — if we do it together, we'll be a lot stronger than if we just point our fingers at each other and blame the other side for whatever problems they look like.

Kemi JonaI'm optimistic about that. Some people are waking up to this idea that we do have to invest. And it's not a waste of money to hire a new grad, because they actually can be super productive now. I hope, you know, folks listen to Brandon and other people with these kinds of compelling ideas, and that we'll see some national movement towards this kind of new grand bargain.

Sanjay SrivastavaAnd maybe public policy should be up on the table too, right? And as a part of the grand bargain.

Kemi JonaIt would be great if we saw more publicly funded internships, or ways to support maybe small businesses who don't have as much money to support a summer intern. There's lots of ways that I think we can make it accessible. We just have to kind of really come together, either on a state-by-state basis, if that's what it takes to compete for talent, or at the federal level with some policies around apprenticeships and other kinds of work-based learning.

Sanjay SrivastavaYeah, that makes a lot of sense. Thank you, Kemi. Really enjoyed it. It's great — got to talk to you twice over the last two months on this topic. This is amazing.

Kemi JonaThanks, Sanjay. It's really been a privilege to be here, and appreciate your thought leadership and hosting these kinds of conversations and bringing these topics to your listeners.