Top of Mind with Tambellini Group
Top of Mind with Tambellini Group
Part 1: The Power and Benefits of Blockchain Technology in Higher Education
Blockchain technology (blockchain) has a growing influence on higher education. An institution that is well on its way to becoming the first blockchain university and knows this better than any other is Maryville University. In this Top of Mind episode, Dr. Feng Hou, chief digital evangelist for Maryville University and visionary leader and advocate for the adoption of blockchain, completely immerses listeners in its possibilities by giving them an inside scoop into his intuitions blockchain journey.
Hello, and welcome to the March episode of Tambellini Group's Top o f Mind Podcast. I'm your host Liz Farrell. In this episode, we're talking about blockchain and higher education. This topic couldn't be more timely as it seems like e very d ay, we a re all hearing more about blockchain. Just last week, we had a s uper b owl filled with so many advertisements for cryptocurrencies and services, which we know u tilized blockchain technology. And recently, University of Pennsylvania, the Wharton School of Finance made big waves. When they a nnounced they would accept crypto as tuition for their new blockchain courses. So beyond knowing that blockchain is part of crypto and that it's gaining more adoption, it's true value i n applications are still a n enigma to many. And there's a limited understanding i n the higher ed community overall about what it can do, but that is changing slowly a nd surely e very d ay. And our g uest today, Dr. Feng Hou is one of the visionary leaders we can thank for spreading the gospel of the power benefits and real-world applications of blockchain to transform so much in higher education. In fact, he's even played an influential role at a large portion of the select group of colleges and universities that already forged ahead on implementing an applying blockchain technology and more importantly, reaping the rewards and benefits from these projects. So he currently serves in a role with a very cool title, in my opinion. He is chief digital evangelist at Maryville University in St. Louis. And at Maryville, Feng has and continues to be instrumental in leading initiatives and service of President Mark Lombardi's vision to be the first truly blockchain university, a Maryville Metaversity. Dr. Hou has also been a CIO for over 20 years. He teaches courses on blockchain at Maryville. He serves as the ed education vertical chair for the chamber, the national blockchain chamber of commerce, and he is regularly invited to speak on blockchain technology around the country to students, faculty, and higher education leaders. Um, I don't think we could ask for a more knowledgeable and enthusiastic ambassador for blockchain in higher ed than Dr. Hou. And we are very lucky to have him take time out of his busy schedule today to enlighten us. So welcome, Feng.
Speaker 2:Hello, Liz. And thank you for having me and looking forward to our discussion.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for joining us. We've so much to talk about. And as I had mention you, when we last spoke, I feel like we could spend hours talking about this topic. I mean, at least I, I would be fascinated to talk about it for hours and not only because of the future possibilities, but all the current blockchain projects that you are involved with at Maryville and beyond. And I know you're also active at advising and guiding other institutions and implementing blockchain technology, but let's start by setting the scene for what you do at Maryville. I mean, as I mentioned, I really like this title chief digital evangelist, but to be honest, it sounds more like a role suited for someone at a bleeding-edge startup than at a university founded in 1872. So can you describe for us what you do as chief digital evangelist at Maryville?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And thanks for mentioning about my job title. It is indeed a cool job title and I have just really enjoyed it since I joined Maryville about three years ago now. And as the chief digital transformation evangelist, my job primarily is to—I report by the way directly to the president, Dr. Mark Lombardi—is to advise and assist him in crafting the s trategic transformation strategies and t he roadmaps, and specifically, trying to help him realize his vision to build t he nation's first b lockchain university. And, w e can talk a little bit in details later, but however, for this j ob and really i s just t o help i n a university who's already well on its way for digital transformation. And then just to add some very interesting projects, say for example, that w e have gone through several wrongs of what we call it as the lighthouse projects and to create d igital employees to provide 24 b y seven, those kind of online assistance to our students based on their needs. And then we have also created kind of a contact l ist environment by implementing what we call it—this student digital ID—and, o f c ourse, then the blockchain university initiatives. All these, t he significance, of all these have actually helped t hroughout the COVID-19 pandemic. As you know, we started this about three years ago, that was before the COVID-19 pandemic first started, and it s o worked really well to h elp t he university to create this kind of c ontactless environment to prevent the spread of the disease, and then also, h elp move for the education online so quickly. And so I'm h appy to h ere to discuss more about that. And, y o u know, a s part of the whole initiative that Dr Lombardi has set goal, right, and tha t we wanna make sure that we want to support students with all of their academic credentials to be readily verifiable, to help them, you know, finding the jobs and/or pursuing mo r e advanced study ea s ily. And, as he has been very famously said, that we want to make, you know, student life in the classroom as challenging as we can, but we also want make their lives outside of the classroom as easy as we can. So, just take this journey as the whole digital transformation, really trying to make our student lives easier. And also, as for the institutional efficiency, and he has set goal that he wants to have the institutional business processes and student services in particular to be automated at least by 50%, if not more. And that is of course, a very ambitious goal. And given that we have so many different business processes, and many of them are still heavily, you know, involve manual intervention, right? So, i t's just a blockchain, i t's just the right tool. And with the power of a smart contact to help with that. And of course, I also want to talk a little bit about my journey when I first started with blockchain. And it was from my previous job when I was the CIO at Central New Mexico Community College. And at that time, and there was a strategic, you know, goal in the college's strategic plan is to help students really, truly create a student-owned credentialing solution. Blockchain, it just right, right thereto help us achieve that goal. So we actually joined earlier and, in some of the initial kind of institutions with MIT and with one other university actually in Australia and the three, and then plus then CNM at Central New Mexico Community College, we started this blockchain, you know, journey and to get students and credentials degree diplomas on the blockchain. And immediately they can use it to verify when they are looking for their jobs. And I personally talk to several employers and a sked them why they would like this kind of a solution because i t's such a new technology, but then they told me for two reasons. Number one, it saves them times, right. It just verification that takes seconds. And the number two, of course, it saves them money. The verification is all free. So all that. A nd of course I can, you know, give you much more details as we continue this conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's just what I love about the New Mexico Central New Mexico Community College. I've got that name right for the institution, I think.
Speaker 2:Yes. Central.
Speaker 1:Okay. Yes. That you, you had the title CIO there, and, but you were serving as, as this digital evangelist in charge, this has been an ongoing passion and area of expertise for you. And it's in interesting to see all these different projects. I know that you consult on some to other institutions. So, before we dive into, I definitely wanna get into the details of some of the exciting work that you've already done at Maryville and the results there. But, um, and even that includes some impressive why, but I have to admit that before I spoke with you, my assumption was that higher ed is light years away from using any blockchain technology in any sort of real, tangible way. Like you talk about, um, so many times when I'm talking with CIOs, you know, people in your position, other technology leaders, um, the current theme and the frequent frustration is they feel their institutions are so far behind and under resourced when it comes to their enterprise counterparts, in terms of realizing these benefits of whether it's cloud computing or automated technology like AI, other things they're like, yeah, it's great, but we've gotta do so many things before we can even consider doing that. I have to admit though, when I heard all the compelling proof and examples of what you've shared with me, I've come around and I must admit, I'm like a convert at this point. I'm a total optimist about this. I've become very jaded. But you have reinvigorated me to really believe that this can, can change things for the better and can do things probably faster than a lot of us. Um, think so, can you share with our listeners, some of those reasons why you see this, this critical mass—I don't know if we call it a critical mass yet, but we, you, you gave me such a painted such a g reat p icture o f t he momentum that has happened. That's there. And can you just describe that growing national awareness, some of the funding initiatives that you see that are really moving this forward?
Speaker 2:Sure, sure. As a matter of fact, you know, I really appreciated that the efforts such as yours, right? And, even this conversation will help, you know, promote awareness among the higher education leaders, which I think is very critical at this point. But, fortunately that, you know, we all working together the federal national level and the state level, and of course, at each individual institutions. And I just attended, I was invited to present at this two-day, virtual meeting, hosted by National Science Foundation and the topic there is a blockchain in education and education in blockchain. And, well, you know, the right topic that for all of the higher educations to get involved right now. And of course for NSF, such a national organization, to put their effort and their funding support behind it, that also helps promoting the blockchain adoption in higher education. And at the same time that at the national level that a few years ago, the US Department of Education and has held two blockchain summits in DC. And I was invited to attend both of them. And those kind of forums provides that opportunity, not only for those blockchain advocates to share our experiences and our, you know, knowledge, but also help, you know, bring the awareness to the education leaders and to the national leaders to help them understand the significant impact of blockchain on education. And of course, which we will, I hope talk about the details and the specific, you know, things and efforts that we've made here at the Maryville University. And at the same time, you have the US Department of Commerce and the Chamber of Commerce, as well as the Blockchain Chamber of Commerce and the many other organizations at the national level and the state level. And I was invited, for example, to the Oklahoma Senate, kind of interim study and to share with them what the blockchain can do for education. And, I've attended so many national, regional, and the local events just to help promote this awareness of blockchain. And, as for the funding, recently, the American Council of Education also provided some blockchain initiative and supported some funding with some funding for some universities and on the blockchain initiative. So some the are all very, very encouraging to see. And, um, but of course, uh, we are still at a very early stage and with the blockchain right now, the general pattern is then that many institutions either through their onsite or, and particularly the online, program offerings that they are, already started teaching a blockchain. And that's very important. And because today, if you go to LinkedIn, just do a keyword search blockchain for the jobs. And, there were just hundreds of thousands. And, a couple of years ago on LinkedIn, actually blockchain-related jobs, was ranked the number one, the most demanded, you know, talents over there. So that's a very encouraging here at the Maryville University. And we have started our own kind of a blockchain curriculum. And I, myself has been have been involved and in both helping, developing the courses and the curriculum, as well as, teaching some of the those classes. So all these effort helps to at least to boost the, you know, the blockchain making ure that people understand that the blockchain is not just the cryptocurrencies and that there are so many other functions and features that higher education can take advantage of.
Speaker 1:You know, it also is something that you have told to me in terms of you do all these speaking things, there's, there's so much enthusiasm and response to them. Whereas I talk to CIOs a lot where they know the benefits of cloud computing and people can see the impact, but it's sort of like, they try to explain what needs to be done for the in infrastructure or what they have done. You know, people don't see the work behind it, and it's not one of those things where most people can talk about it and get people excited about, we need a new ERP system. We need to go to cloud-based modern. They sort of get overwhelmed by the technicalities of it. Whereas it seems like the response you get when you talk about this, or when you're around other, you know, you talk going to Oklahoma, for instance, like people don't get overwhelmed, like I'm in way over my head. They say, oh my gosh, this is possible. This is cool. This is exactly what we want to do.
Speaker 2:Totally, totally. And it, for example, I just mentioned about the national science foundations today, virtual meeting, uh, to discuss about the blockchain and education. And I also co-led a breakout session that the participants and overwhelming express their desire that they want to learn more and that they also express their needs that to have some kind of helping hand, some guidelines and with some kind of a roadmaps and best practices. So in that, I'm just so happy that, you know, here at the Maryville that we have started this journey a little bit ahead of the other schools so we can share right. What we have achieved. And so what we have learned. And so some of the, the lessons that we have learned, so others, they don't have to, uh, repeat some of the not necessarily active, but the redundant, the processes that we may have gone through. So, uh, these are all part of this kind for, you know, uh, getting the technology ready and you are absolutely right. And, uh, with every, uh, literally every person that I've spoke with, even some of the people who initially doubted about the real value of a blockchain education, but after they, uh, saw, watched our implementation of theblockchain use cases, and they said, well, here it is. And, yeah, when I talk to people, I, uh, you know, try to even not to mention blockchain technology that much and use the users experience, right. The use the ROI, as you mentioned earlier, and the case studies, and that's more compelling than just trying to sell blockchain as a technology.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Without a doubt. And, and that is, I, I think the, the, the magic ingredient in all this here, um, when I first reached out to you about doing this podcast and, you know, I said, oh, let's talk about blockchain. What do you wanna talk about? You said, I wanna talk about the, how I don't wanna talk about the, why, why has been discussed, um, on that note. So in talking about the, how, what you're doing at Maryville started with three r oadmaps as all great projects do, u m, w ith three major stages. So let's start, just give a brief overview of what those three stages are, and then, u m, l et's walk through a case study for each.
Speaker 2:Sure. And, uh, uh, as, uh, you, you know, we talked about earlier that this is all started, uh, from, um, this vision that the mayoral president, Dr. Mark Lombardi had that, uh, in 2019, when he, uh, presented his VI vision to the university board of trustees, uh, about, uh, building Don nations first, uh, blockchain, uh, university. And then, and of course, uh, it, it, you know, uh, people like myself and others here and, uh, are working to help, uh, achieve that, uh, you know, uh, vision. And we started by, uh, building the roadmaps, right. And we started from planning and how can we get to, uh, you know, the, uh, this, uh, uh, grant vision that the, that Dr. Lombardi has. And, uh, so, uh, and then I, uh, developed this, uh, roadmap and with specifically, uh, uh, specific three stages, and we, uh, started from stage one with relatively, uh, easier task, which is just to start, uh, moving or issuing all academic credentials, blockchain, so they can be readily shareable and verifiable. This is very important. We wanna make sure that our students, uh, credentials that, uh, uh, that is, uh, temper proof is imutable and can be, you know, verified, uh, instantaneously. And, uh, so, uh, we are not just talking about the degree diploma transcript, but we're also talking about the digital badges and certificates and some of those skills based. And we also added a couple of other things that I think, uh, are also important for your audience. Uh, one is the, uh, skills effects, right? And that there was a, a, a growing demand from employers today that, uh, instead of just a piece of a paper to say what, uh, you have learned and what, uh, you can do, and they want to see some kind of evidence and then verifiable artifacts, such as a video Clipse soundbites, and you even programming codes, and then students can prove to say, you know, I used to tell the story about, uh, the leadership, uh, you know, uh, training and to talk about endurance and the persistence and those kind of thing. And what would be better if you can show a video clip, if someone has joined a, a Boston marathon and just show that towards the finish line, somebody dash through doesn't matter what the, the numbers about the, you know, somebody has, uh, uh, you know, participated in a Boston marathon and complete, and that, that shows that the, the person and has that kind of, uh, ability to endure and, and then to be able to, uh, finish that kind of, uh, uh, you know, very, uh, tough work of, uh, running a marathon. So, uh, showing is much better than just to tell. So, uh, that's the stage one and stage two that, uh, as I mentioned earlier, that, uh, uh, our president wants to, uh, automate the, the student services and the business processes by 50%. And the smart contract is just a right tool to help running all this automation. And also there's some, uh, added benefits in addition to what we talked about, you know, uh, uh, this, uh, uh, being on the blockchain being imutable being, uh, kind of, uh, verifiable, but the, because it's on the blockchain, it runs on its own. And without relying on a third party piece of software, so then the university doesn't have to pay, uh, the, uh, any subscription fee or, or fee for the third party. And then also that, uh, because it is, uh, blockchain on, uh, it's the smart contract on blockchain, it's just reliably and consistently running by itself with, uh, uh, little or no additional, uh, needs for any additional support. It is just, you know, running, uh, the process, uh, on its own. And, uh, and of, so there are capabilities to later to modify if we need it. But, uh, so that's the stage two is to, uh, uh, automate the, the business processes and by leveraging smart contract and stage three is tokenized education. And then as we have all heard that, uh, the hypes about the, the NFTs and about the web three, about the, uh, you know, even the D five and as well as Dow like decentralized autonomous, uh, organization and all that actually, uh, we are actually right in this stage right now, three to work with, uh, the facting members, professors to develop, uh, certain courses, tokenizing, uh, some of those learning unit and then create a stackable module. And then, uh, that helps to create a modular learning. So learners can have for multiple ways to create a smart pathway for their academic to, uh, to achieve their academic successes. So, uh, just very briefly, and these are the three stages that, uh, we have built on the roadmap to achieve, uh, this, uh, grant vision of, uh, blockchain university.
Speaker 1:And we know roadmaps are often, I mean, I think of them sometimes it's like, when you have hire a contractor to, to build a new house or do a remodeling, like they're usually longer than, than plan, but that that's another area where Maryville being one of the firsts and these projects where you all seem to have stayed on task on target. So now I wanna get more into this nitty gritty of where the rub or meets the road, um, for every stage in the roadmap. Um, you have compelling case studies. Um, you, you talked about the first one with the you've called them the low hanging fruits, these credentials, and I love this, this five second on-demand transcript solution. So my understanding is that these credentials can be issued on blockchain today. And as you mentioned, they're, imutable also known as like tamper proof. They're student owned, they're secure, they're ready, verifiable and shareable. So I, having gone to university many moons ago was shocked when I first started looking into technology and where it's at in higher ed, that it's still the case. Like, if you need a transcript, you know, you still have to like, maybe even write a check by hand, I don't know, to, And then there's this piece of paper that has to be snail mailed, or maybe it's, you know, a PDF if we're getting a little bit crazy here, but tell us a bit about the, you know, that transcript, why it's a problem, what you were able to do with the blockchain there. And then we can talk a little bit about the results, but let's start with those two.
Speaker 2:I would be happy to, that's actually one of the use cases that I am mostly, proud because, again, when we are talking about a blockchain technology, what we really should focus is really on what can it do, right? What kind of, benefits can our students, faculty and the staff and other stakeholders can, you know, enjoy from the implementation of a blockchain. And so, yes, we consider all of the academic credentials in our stage one to some extent, because that is a much easier task. And, as I mentioned, that I had already implemented, um, degree ddiplomas at the Central New Mexico Community College and prior to joining Maryville. So, we actually got that up and running pretty quickly. And, we partnered with then, what is called the Learning Machine, which has now been acquired by Highland and to implement a solution that was initially developed in the MIT's media lab, and which is called a Block Search. And, we got that up and running literally in just a few weeks and you know, so, but. However, as we all know that when we are talking about the learning credentials in the, probably the most important piece, it's the transcript, right? When you apply for job apps or when you pursue your, advanced study and, what your employers would need is so they want, after they decided to hire you. And then they said, well, you need to send us your official transcript and, and not necessarily your diploma or a degree. And of course, the transcript solution is also a little bit more involved in terms of technology, because it has to tap into the student r ecord system t hen, a lso, in the events when t he student h ave some kind of a h ose and i t needs to tap into some other systems. So the major challenge really is for the students and particularly, for the digital native students today, that the time it takes and, also the cost. Right? So, you know, when a student is getting ready to start a job, and then they need that transcript in their hand immediately, and now, right. So anytime that would take for them to receive that transcript, it would be the time delay for them to start any new job. So these are the major challenges. And then on top of that, and we have all heard the stories, how, you know, many and of those credentials, including the transcript have been, you know, really just fake. And they're, you know, being, manipulated, being altered and so tempered in different ways, including even the PDF format document as a digital version that, you know, there's certainly ways out there, plus there are also kind of what we call it, this diploma mail, right? Those kind of online businesses, and they help create the reason they can do that precisely is because those credentials cannot be easily verified and cannot identify who actually is the issuer the original, or to use a term as one of the characteristic of blockchain, the providence, right. And where was this piece of transcript or, degree diploma originated from? And, most of the time people will have to find time and to call, and of course, maybe send an email to theor regional institution and wait for them to get response back. And that is also further delay. So these are the challenges, for the current transcript system. So, for us to say, we use blockchain to address those verification issues to address those problem issues, security issues, and those are all great, but however, we also took the opportunity to look at how we can improve the existing transcript, uh, solution by significantly, uh, you know, cutting down the time. It will take that's where the five second that we actually run the side by side and, you know, so the students, now, they just send a request and to the transcript system, and then in five seconds and the process will complete, and then they will get an email in their email box. And then that email comes not from any third party or any service providers, but comes directly from the original issuer in this case is Maryville University. So to the employer or any other recipients of these transcript, they will not only get this information directly from the university, but also there is a quick button them for them to verify, and it takes seconds for them to go through six stringent verification process. And in that process, that the first thing they will identify is this transcript or this credential or originated from Maryville University. That's the number one. And, of course, uh, during this process has the content of this transcript ever been altered or been changed. And with blockchain technologies, we all know they cannot even move a single dot or add space or otherwise verification process will fail. And then the recipient won't be able to actually see that the transcript or credentials o nline. And, it is just that reliable. So, a gain, the bottom line here is that it solves the student, y ou know, problem that they have to w a it f irst and foremost, and then it also he lped c ut down the co st. And in i mplementing th is s olution, we essentially cut down the cost from Maryville to issue a transcript for student by at least 40%. And, s o, a nd th e w e'll get into the deep de tails o f RO I l a tely, but the significant impact here is that this is an o n de mand 2 4 by s even. So, as a student from Maryville, they don't have to worry about is this a weekend? Or is this after hours that they have to wait for the next day? And that they can just request a transcript anytime, anytime. As a matter of fact, if you watch the administrators,— kind of a dashboard—and the students, they don't, they r equest a transcript or any other, credentials anytime they w ant throughout the day. There's no such a thing as daytime and nighttime, and for many adult learners and the nighttime, i t i s t he best time for them to, you know, work on academic, y ou k now, l earnings.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's almost like, you know, they, they, I mean, it is that they expect it right, but you've made it so easy for them that they're probably thinking, of course, well, it was always this way, which is, as we know, not the case. Um, one other thing,
Speaker 2:Can I just share?
Speaker 1:Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2:I attended one of the meetings with this is the Maryville provost leadership group of meeting. And so, we were talking about the, you know, some of those smart contract solutions. And so I used the term, I said, you know, can you believe, or do you still remember how, and several vice presidents says, of course we still remember, because so we, we implemented this solution just last year. So we still remember those kind of a tedious, laborious, the process that we had a go through. Exactly. Just as what you said that now it makesall sound and it looks so easy, but it really solves a huge business challenges and problems.
Speaker 1:And that is a great segue into the ROI thing here on some of these numbers. Like you mentioned, just looking at the numbers here, there were 4,000—4,121—total transcript requests. Was that over the course of a year or six months?
Speaker 2:Oh, a lot. This is a time when I sent this to you over the course of, a year. Yeah.
Speaker 1:A year. So, I mean, that's a lot. They used to cost$5. They now cost$3. You have 180 hours saved in staff time at$15 an hour. You know, without going into all the numbers, basically what it ended up with is this, um, you have a tangible ROI on this that you've actually saved money. And when we hear the promise of other things, whether it's cloud infrastructure, just saving money, there's usually big upfront investment required. And I think that it's very important here when we're talking about your ROI numbers to acknowledge the fact that as you've said to me, like a lot of these don't really have any cost upfront, like there's no budget line number needed. There, there is staff time that is needed, but you're cutting. You're using the same staff people. It sounds like for these as you were, who were doing all the, the work before, so there there's actually, you don't, there's not a big cost of entry in this.
Speaker 2:Yes, just to clarify actually at Maryville, Maryville students don't pay any money for the transcript
Speaker 1:Okay. And
Speaker 2:University pays. But however, the calculation is very interesting and, uh, traditionally that a student on average, and when they started looking for jobs, they normally would request, three, four, or even more transcripts, right. Because they want to send those to different employers and so forth. So, which means then that the Maryville, uh, had to pay for each of the transcript, even though it is free of charge to the Maryville student, but the university had to pay. And now that we have created this blockchain-powered transcript solution, it has not only cut down the per transcript cost, but because of the, you know, verification capability because of the providence and all the other features when we created this one, we hand this transcript to our students and put it into their hands and they store it in their email or their digital wallet, and then they don't need to come back to request any more so it saves money in different, multiple ways for the university. So, even though we can get into the details and, we use some very conservative number, but really the bottom line here is that as what you just, that the ROI is really pretty, positive and the, you know, overall than an institution can, you know, achieve their return on thier investment in less than two years. And in some cases, as we will discuss us about our faculty transcript is that is actually less than a year. And, another thing I also wanted to, just to add to what you just said. Yes. We sometimes we tend to think that we need to have a perfect solution to start. And a Maryville president, Mark Lombardi would say that don't let the perfect be the enemy right of goods.
Speaker 1:Oh, good. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Uh, you know, uh, so we can start any solutions and then there's another, kind of a lesson learned or experience that we can share as a best practice that actually was listed in my seven criteria, which I would talk about later that we partnered, you know, with, we develop what our, you know, roadmap and how we gonna achieve it, and what are some of the business functions, and then work with the student services and the business functional faculty groups, and to identify those processes and streamline the optimize, all that, uh, you know, is what the university can do, and then get to the final point, doing the coding, doing the technical, hardcore technical stuff. And then we partnered with a business that's much more experienced than what might have been, you know, the internal IT staff will have to go through this kind of trial and error to learn and to pick it up. So I just want to clarify on that point, there will some upfront cost for the partnership, but however, those are not into, certainly not into the hundreds of, or even, you know, in some cases, tens o f thousands of dollars.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And, and that's an important clarification to make. What I like too is when you're talking about ROI and all these cases, you've laid out, you separate them into tangible and intangible benefits. And I think both are tangible, but you've been very particular with your tangible in terms of, okay, these are like the real numbers, the intangible benefits, though. You've touched on those a little bit. And I think before we move on, I want to talk about smart contracts yet, but I just wanna, yeah. Make sure that we emphasize the fact when we're talking about intangible benefits here, we're, you know, that the students not having to wait. I mean, when we're talking about being, uh, for digital natives, being student first being respectful of their time and experience and what they're looking to achieve out of the education like that impact is so obviously clear from the efficiencies that happen on the back end. It's not just making everyone's jobs less tedious or less time consuming. It's about, I mean, just the factor. If I were going out into the workforce today and I was a graduate of Maryville, and I'm trying to get a job. And as you pointed out, like all these fields where they need tons of people, my university gives my transcript and all this information on the blockchain, I think going to an employer, I'm gonna look like, wow, this is someone who comes from an environment that's really forward thinking and gets it. I mean, that in and of itself, I think is very tangible and we can't quantify that numbers, but it just seems very obvious. And I wanted to make sure we emphasize that point too. Dr. Hou provided us with so many excellent examples and proof of tangible value at his university during our discussion. In fact, there were far too many to include in just one podcast. So with that in mind, we will continue our conversation on blockchain with Dr. Hou next month. In part two of our Top of Mind podcast series on the power and benefits of blockchain technology and higher education, we hope you'll join us to hear more. And don't forget to check out all of our episodes, blogs, and resources at thetambellinigroup.com.