ASU+GSV: Rebecca Agostino, VP of Learning at Multiverse

Rebecca Agostino is the Vice President of Learning at Multiverse, leading the program, coaching and intervention teams for the US region. 

Previously, she was the founding principal of Freedom Prep High School, a college-preparatory school in Camden, New Jersey, and a special educator in New York City. Rebecca graduated as a Robertson Scholar from Duke University with a BS in Economics; she earned a Master of Teaching from Fordham University and an MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Transcript

Alexander Sarlin: 0:05

Welcome to EdTech insiders where we speak with founders, operators investors and thought leaders in the education technology industry, and report on cutting edge news in this fast evolving field from around the globe. From AI to xr to K 12 to l&d, you'll find everything you need here on edtech insiders. And if you liked the podcast, please give us a rating and a review so others can find it more easily. Agostino is the VP of learning at multiverse leading the design and delivery of the apprenticeship experience for the organization. Previously, she was the founding principal of Freedom Prep High School, a college preparatory school in Camden, New Jersey, and a special educator in New York City. Welcome to the podcast.

Rebecca Agostino: 0:57

Thanks for having me.

Alexander Sarlin: 0:58

So first question, tell me a little bit about what Multiverse has been up to in the last year there's since we've been connected, where has it expanded its offerings? And how is it thinking about this new era.

Rebecca Agostino: 1:09

So we close the funding round in June, that has allowed us to really continue investing in our tech product and expand both in the UK and the US. We have a number of programs in both regions, as you noted, serving early career professionals and mid career professionals who are breaking into tech in business without a college degree. Some things that are really top of mind for us right now, exploring the world of durable skills, and how that is such a key unlock to helping apprentices move from theoretical knowledge to practical application and also on the job. The difference between being aware of project management techniques and actually managing a complex project, big gaps. And the real key there are durable sales. How do you communicate? How do you manage conflict? How do you speak publicly and convey in and bring messages, all of those sales come together to really determine whether or not on the job also spending a lot of time thinking about the role of the manager. At the apprentice, we think about the apprentices talent as a product of the apprenticeship program, the recipient of that benefit really is the manager, the person is supervising the apprentice to which the apprentice is joined, and how the participant really accelerate the work, the culture, the energy, the ideas on that team. So how we serve the managers we support them, how we help enable them to support the apprentices is a real priority.

Alexander Sarlin: 2:27

That's fantastic. So if I'm not mistaken, multiverses model is that people are doing apprenticeships at a company. But there's also learning experiences that multiverse is providing in parallel. And it sounds like a lot of what you're thinking about is terrible skills that you know, power skills, they have different names. Those are notoriously tough to teach. But I'm sure as a VP of learning, you've got that this a lot. Tell us a little bit about what it means to teach skills like you know, critical thinking, enthusiasm, you know, dealing with adversity and things like that, what does it look like on the ground? I actually don't

Rebecca Agostino: 2:58

think that they're hard to teach. I think you break them down in the same way that you break down a technical skill, where there's there's someone's discomfort and breaking it down in an almost an awkwardness or a fear of actually explaining to someone this is what's expected. But that's exactly why there are barriers for so many people and breaking into the to the professional or business space. Or the owners really benefited me and say here, the unwritten rules of your workplace on time actually means early. This is your business casual. Your manager says talk to me anytime they actually do not need to filter your questions through this lens. We can help our apprentices to navigate those uncomfortable situations by providing verbal instruction that is really clear and explicit. And then continued coaching so that they can keep going back to their coaches, you know, you said this is how I should manage up in this circumstance. What about that? I think a key in this space is coaching, which we've been expanding over the past few years, because apprentices get so much value by hearing their peers navigate similar durable skills that are able to build their toolkit to say, Okay, I know how to apply this skill in this setting. But my my friend, or my colleague, or the dependents that I met through the community platform, was talking about doing it this other way. And so now I've learned from them, and we just see a lot of value in these communities of learners. And we don't think that should be exclusive to the higher ed space or an in person is actually something

Alexander Sarlin: 4:20

that's really interesting. And you know, with adult learners, which I think all of your your learners, adult learners, that kind of sharing experience and expertise in different situations, you know, how things have been applied in different situations can be so powerful because people really do have life lived experiences, they have actually done things in the past and learn from them that they can share with each other. How do you facilitate the group learning in the workplace do all the different apprentice or apprentices at the same company and then they connect or do you have apprentices from different companies coming together to talk?

Rebecca Agostino: 4:53

We do group coaching in both formats and we see a lot of value in a group of apprentices are all employer they might have a lot How are you? How are you, we have a company culture of accent. They're all trying to navigate through that similar space. There's also, again to that point about seeing different cases, there's a lot of value of a credit system different either employers but even industries, talking about how they're applying. What that means right verbal skills, as you said, they persist across roles and functions. They also persist across employers, and speaking with apprentices at different settings are able to see some of the nuances of how culture manifests how you need to make decisions, oh, my team is really direct. So we give feedback directly. My name is Lester accent, this is how I'm able to ask for something that I need. And they can see each other really help you to navigate different spaces.

Alexander Sarlin: 5:45

I love this point about making the hidden rules of the workplace very explicit, and actually teaching them directly. This is something that's been a huge problem, especially with equity. Because people who are coming from underprivileged or under resourced backgrounds had no role models, they have had very little experience with these type of, you know, unwritten untold never spoken professional roles. I'm curious how you think about equity. You know, when you're bringing learners, whether they're young learners or risk killers or mid career professionals? How do you ensure that your cohort is sort of reaching people that represent a diverse part of the population,

Rebecca Agostino: 6:19

we have an admissions team that builds relationships with community organizations and brings apprenticeship opportunities to a diverse population. And so many of our employers partner with us because they understand that their workforces, especially in tech are not representative of our world. And you don't know how to go about actually reaching the average American and, and there's an increasing understanding, I think we see this a lot here at ASU GSB, that the way that we have been doing things is not going to be the way of the future and also that our existing systems certainly don't serve learners equitably, but are also doing a disservice to employers that they know that there are, there's so much talent in our world that they don't have access to, or again, our admissions team is able to find apprentices. We support them in interviewing with our clients going through the resume building process, interview, practice, doing a lot of verbal skills training as part of the stage as well, and then helping them to get hired and start their apprenticeship at our partners, and then to the to the piece on equity and enjoyable skills. You know, I think that one thing that's been interesting to see is that a lot of our I think just a lot of managers in general have a pretty strong growth mindset around technical skills. You know, I know you're working on Pivot Tables, that's actually not how you do it. But your journal skills are often an area where people don't bring a growth mindset, they say, oh, this person was late, they must not care. Or this person sent a very informal email, they must have come to me early, and people jumped to conclusions, just because the other person might not know what the norms are in their specific culture space. And so I think verbal skills are a major equity issue and can really break down a lot of barriers there. And there's also an education piece that must happen with employers and managers to to say, these skills are teachable and learnable. And direct feedback is really important. And couldn't we all use that radical candor?

Alexander Sarlin: 8:03

workforce? Absolutely. I, you know, you mentioned the managers being big part of this process. And I think that's, it's such an important relationship. They know the stat about people leaving their jobs, it's almost always because of the managers. And there's all sorts of potential tension there. I'd love to hear is a little bit of a curveball from that. But it's true. One of the big topics at this conference is artificial intelligence. Of course, there's all these new things happening and a lot of panels and a lot of people are asking, you know, how is this going to change the workforce? How is it going to, is it going to displace jobs? What is it going to really do? I'm curious how you had multiverse sort of see how to prepare people for, you know, not only to work with their managers and their teams now, but to be able to have those terrible skills, even if the world starts changing in some really unexpected ways.

Rebecca Agostino: 8:50

Interval skills actually become more important as technology is having an outsized role in our workforces. That human element, navigating lots of different opinions and navigating people's emotions, bringing in way that really resonates with different audiences. Those are all things that are uniquely human, and maybe one day will change. But for now, cooking our apprentices with skills to bring those elements of wholeness that a machine cannot bring isn't important. And and I think it's so interesting in discussions around Katikati and AI are the fact that these technologies will change work and learning. So we have questions about, you know, how can touch UBC help us to customize assignments and feedback for apprentices? But also how does it change the actual work that the apprentice is doing on the job and incredible the amount of unknown right now that we're all navigating together? But I think there's some things that that we know to be true in terms of the value of learning and communities and people learning with their peers and having meaningful discussion and partnership as they grow, as we've been talking about the importance of dermal skills and the human elements that we bring. And I think throughout all of this the importance of Have an AR model that coach or the human educator, that one thing to learn technical skills from a computer from asynchronous and independent work, but there's just such power and having a trusted partner and navigating career change and coaching, it's even more important now with all of these unknowns around technology, because we're not going to be able to predict all the answers, but having a trusted coach who can support you in those transitions, that

Alexander Sarlin: 10:26

that makes a lot of sense. And you know, the relationship piece. So I feel like there's this constant push and pull as we think about the future of AI between relationship building and human like our natural humanity and our relationships with each other. And then this new intelligence that is not a real friend, it's not a real teacher, it's not a real tutor. It's not a real coach. But we want it to be really effective the same way we want tutors and coaches and managers to be effective. It's a really strange time. One other question for you about the AI. And then I want to find out what you're excited about at the conference. So you mentioned that AI is going to change learning and it's VP of learning. I'm sure you're thinking a lot about that. And it's going to change work. I'm curious, On the work side, do you see a future where you know, the whole concept of an apprenticeship as you're working under people that know more about the thing than you're doing? But we're, I think about to enter a world where work tools change incredibly fast, where these co pilots appear everywhere. And there's a real chance that, you know, people just entering the workforce can be as skilled as their managers or their managers manager in a very short time. I'm curious how you're thinking about that world, like, what are the you know, quote, unquote, technical, or at least like tool building skills that you want to offer these apprentices so they can succeed in this extremely unknown New World?

Rebecca Agostino: 11:45

That's a great question. And I think so much of that is the value of bringing new talent into an organization. So this is certainly exaggerated with AI tools. But anytime an apprentice joins a company, they're bringing cutting edge understanding of the most recent and relevant technologies to that team. And, again, I think it's most pronounced here in this conversation, but we hear from our apprentices and their managers all the time that apprentices are also teaching their teams are saying, oh, there's a new technique that everyone's talking about, or have you tried managing your time this way that taught me and that's such a benefit to organizations supporting Junior talent, and bringing them in and also fostering the talent, but they do have to continue learning. And we're entering this era where we will all be novices that can open more opportunities in conversations for welcoming Junior talent into teams.

Alexander Sarlin: 12:33

I love that phrase we'll all be we're all novices in this new world. And that novice has a specific meaning and learning science to this ways to teach novices. So we're here in the second day of the conference, there have been all sorts of interesting things this over 7000 people here. I'm curious what your take has been what is what have been some of your big takeaways, and what is the zeitgeist this year? In your opinion?

Rebecca Agostino: 12:55

No, one thing that I've been reflecting on is that the conversations I'm hearing are non, does there need to be an alternative to college? The conversations are, since there needs to be more options for young people and people throughout the course of their careers. What might they be? How do we measure the quality of that new ones. And, you know, for me having been in education for over a decade, I think that's a really different conversation than one that we were having years ago, and a really exciting turning point. We're generally on the same page about the need for options and alternatives. And there's a lot of commonality and what we're seeing doesn't work, you can get almost more solutions oriented from that place. I think that's just tremendously. I mean, if you've been thinking about is either live innovators here, a lot of startups and leaders in higher education, who are looking at alternative funders, of course, and also most conversations end on question about policy and scale. We're all innovating. We're creating new ideas, but to bring this to the average person across the entire country, we're really going to need policy support. And that's an interesting place to be in, but also a really exciting one, because so many different people are trying new things. And we bring that information to policy leaders with really important data that we now have as as we're continuing to evolve and how we measure learning to say this is this is the way forward. You know, I think sort of similarly, conversations often come down to and and certainly in the apprenticeship space, about the role of the employer and What do employers want? How do they measure success? What are they willing to fund? And I think, the product patterns that we haven't had employers at the table in this conversation that ACDSee, were speculating about what they want to show me as an accredited provider, we have a lot of feedback and then data what they want, but the shift that we're seeing, right from the higher education, to being so focused on getting learners in seats to delivering outcomes in the workforce, essentially for employers really requires that employers are at the table that we're inviting their insights and feedback about the gym and learning styles and delivery models. And I think there's such an exciting opportunity to literally bring them to the table in the future. for both?

Alexander Sarlin: 15:02

Absolutely. That's such an interesting combination. So just putting these together, you know, the idea that it's now kind of accepted wisdom that the traditional formal University path is, you know, not only not the only path that is absolutely not, it can't be the path for the type of change we want to have in our society. It's something I've been beating the drum on for a long time, and the listeners will know. But it's also really, it does feel like that has shifted at this point. I've heard a lot about like skills based hiring and skills assessment and see this sort of idea of, if we all except the university degree is not the sort of big gold star stamp that that has always been the unpack of all, you know, if it's on your resume, you're hireable. If it's not, you're not, which has just been crazy, then we have to actually do the work to break everything down to just understand what the durable skills are. And that seems to relate to the employers right that they then you need to get in front of those employers and say, what are you actually looking for? Let's go beyond the job description. Let's go deep into what you're actually doing and figure out how to teach you it's a really could be a big turning point moment.

Rebecca Agostino: 16:05

Absolutely agree. And also, there's a huge risk that if we don't bring them along in the journey, they will go back to proxies for talent quality, that are just as inequitable as the ones that we're using right now. And there's, again, this opportunity to bring them along in the conversation, make sure that their needs are being met, so that nonprofits and innovators and community organizations are making decisions in partnership with the employer that really have the best interest of the average American, especially those that have been historically excluded and underserved. Yes.

Alexander Sarlin: 16:39

Absolutely makes me think of things like culture fit or self starter, these sorts of undefinable terms that people look for in interviews, that gives them the sort of the excuse to hire people like them and remove anybody else without an actual benchmark assessment of any kind. It's an exciting time. I'm really excited for this for learners and for employers and for well in this conversation, maybe not for universities, but they're going to be adopting in all sorts of ways when this kind of alternative is available. Thanks so much for being here with me. Rebecca Agostino, VP of learning at multiverse ed tech unicorn in London in New York, yet really changing the face of the workforce.

Rebecca Agostino: 17:16

Thank you so much for having me.

Alexander Sarlin: 17:18

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