Hello, hello, hello splendid listeners. This is Out Loud in the Library, a Durham Tech Library podcast. I'm your host, Courtney Bippley, reference librarian extraordinaire, and today I have a guest interview and some library updates that I am really excited about. First update is, it's 2021! Happy New Year! I watched the clock change over to the new year with a sigh of relief. And then I went back to working on my jigsaw puzzle. It was anticlimactic. However, a new year means new library resources. Obviously, we have new books for you, including a bunch of new cookbooks that I was drooling over just a few days ago. I looked at the covers, flipped through the pages, stared at the photographs and read some of the recipes. And then I had to go eat a snack because I was hungry all of a sudden, weird. Database updates include a new streaming video database. In addition to all the streaming videos we already had through Films on Demand. We now have a database called academic video online, or AVON for short. 10s of 1000s of videos that instructors can use for their classes and students can use for their research. Find it on the library website on the Databases page. This next update is my favorite. Durham Tech has joined many other North Carolina Community colleges to provide ebooks and audiobooks in the Dogwood Digital Library. There's popular fiction, nonfiction, and classics for easy borrowing and downloading. You can access the books from our Databases page or from an app called Libby, you just download Libby, search for dogwood Digital Library. Pick Durham Tech as your home library and use your Durham Tech username and password to log in and gain access. If you already have the app because you're using it to access public library material, like me, you can add us as another library and have access to both. I've done it on my phone and already listened to an audio book with it. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. So check it out. There are a ton of books on there that would fit the read great things 2021 reading challenge. If you want those categories, head over to the library blog. I will put a link in the show notes. Now. My guest today is the new president of Durham Tech, JB Buxton. He was kind enough to fit this interview in right before winter break so that this could be the first podcast episode of 2021. I really enjoyed being able to get to know him better. And I hope that you do.
Present president Buxton, thank you for joining me today.
Hey, Courtney, thank you for the invite.
So tell me what it was like starting this new job as president of the college during a global health crisis. You started in the summer of 2020. And we were all locked down. You couldn't really meet anyone? How weird is it to come to a ghost town campus and just walk around and be like, "Okay, well, I guess I'm in charge."
Very weird. Having been involved in education, my whole career, it was maybe the oddest start to an education related job than I've ever had. I have to say, it was still very exciting. I feel very privileged to be here. I think everyone wants to do work that matters. And I'm not sure what work matters more in this moment than the work of community colleges and in our area, that work of Durham Tech, but it's also been hard. You want to be walking across campus, talking to students, you want to be dropping into your fellow employees offices and checking in you want to just have those chance encounters and that personal interaction. That's you know, the social aspect of education is such a big part of it, especially with our students not having the chance to be in person and have those kind of impromptu conversations and understand how things are going to develop those relationships. That's made it hard, but it hasn't dampened the enthusiasm I still feel.
That's really good. And it has been hard. We at the library have been missing students a lot. I mean, normally our building is full and now it's not.
Tell me about your connection to Durham.
I came to UNC from New Hampshire and came down to college and basically told my parents when I got here that they'd have to come down here if they want to see me because I wouldn't ever come back home. And it's pretty much true. But, Durham was the place that I came over to watch Durham bulls games in the old days or to play against Duke in rugby matches because I ran the UNC Rugby Club.
I didn't even know UNC had a rugby club.
Yeah, yeah. So I used to I used to come over to Duke every now and then the old bulls ballpark.
The one in the Bull Durham movie.
Yeah, exactly. And a friend of mine was an extra in that movie. I did not make the trip over. And so he got all the glory, although I've still never found him in there. So I still need to confirm the authenticity of that story, but he was supposedly an extra. But then I've done most of my professional career in the triangle. I mean, I've had a year out, couple years after graduate school and one year out when I worked in DC, but most of my career has been the triangle in terms of my base and public education statewide. So I've had a lot of experiences with Durham public school, Durham Tech, NC Central, over the years. Duke as well. So it's always been kind of an extension of my home base in a lot of ways. And always the place that frankly, I thought had the most interesting and productive politics, local politics, in the state. I'm gonna leave it at that.
Okay, sure. I don't think you're wrong. Has anything surprised you about Durham Tech? Since you've been here?
You know, I don't think surprise is the way I would put it. Let me tell you what, where things have been even more amplified, or enhanced, if you will, than what I thought. So let me give you a couple examples. I knew what a talented faculty and staff community there was here. I did not know just how talented I did not know just how varied and diverse the perspectives and experiences were that our full time and part time instructors and staff members brought to the campus. And so it didn't surprise me that the diversity of experience and talent was here, just how deep it is, was a great surprise. And I don't think people as much as they might understand how great our faculty and staff are, I don't think they understand just how deep that set of perspectives and experience goes. And it's something I'd want every family and individual in this in this region to know. That's one thing. I always knew community college system and Durham Tech, in particular, just how nimble and able to kind of turn on a dime these institutions are. I didn't know just how strong that capacity was, I mean, to understand more deeply what it took back in March of 2020, to turn this into an online operation and to continue not just the education aspect, but the student support aspect and the advising and a food pantry and all the work that goes on to support the institution. Nimbleness is not nearly enough to describe what folks did. And then same thing with students. I've had a lot of experience with Community College and community college students, just the the incredible backgrounds and talent and ambitions that the students bring and why they're here. Again, that didn't surprise me. But it's just even even deeper than maybe I understood.
Yeah, we have amazing students, I hope to be able to feature more of them on the podcast this year. What is the college doing in 2021, this new year, to address equity, diversity, and inclusion issues as we move forward?
I appreciate that question. Because that's one of our top priorities, not just for 2021. But moving forward. And I want to give you a few specific actions, because I think that helps you understand it, but then I'll then also talk about how it really pervades everything that we're doing at Durham Tech. Very specifically, as, as folks who listen will probably know, we put in place an action plan, not just a statement, but an action plan for what we are committed to do on institutional practices on things like recruitment, staff, hiring, leadership that looks like our student body, but also and very importantly, what equitable outcomes look like for our student body, how we're seeing completion and labor market outcomes that we can show are happening for all of our students. So we made a serious commitments. We're right now putting clear measures of success against those commitments so we can show that we're making success and course correct if we're not. We are, thanks to some philanthropic support, we are putting about 170 folks through racial equity training, and giving them a chance to engage with what's a great training experience. That we're fortunate to have an organization that does this work locally. And we're also putting a lot of community conversation, courageous conversations, real talk at students, faculty staff are involved in trustees as well. And so there are some very specific efforts that are going on. But I would say just as importantly, as those near term actions is more of a longer term commitment that equity becomes our strategy, if you will. That as the strategic plan rolls out in the spring, you're going to see that these commitments to equitable outcomes will drive the strategies we're putting in place for student success, and that it doesn't just become an initiative that might have some conversations or training involved. It's really how we're going to measure the success of our college. And those outcomes for our students in the goals that we set, then drive the kind of experiences in our courses, how we do our schedules, the kind of curriculum, we provide the kind of supports we provide faculty, how we hold ourselves accountable for the kind of outcomes in job placements that our students have that we make sure they're moving into sectors that have upward upward economic mobility. It really becomes our strategy is equity, if you will, and so it's it's larger than just a set of activities.
That's excellent. Equity in the short term, equity in the long term, both plans are absolutely necessary for Durham Tech and all community colleges to really tackle these issues.
As you know, 2020 was an incredibly stressful year for basically everyone. I don't know a single person who was like, "No, it was actually fine." What do you do to relax in your free time?
Define free time? *laughs*
*laughs* Time when you're not sleeping and time when you're not working.
That's right. I have long used reading and exercise as my, that fills up most of my free time. And-
Those are both good. Yeah, I'm pro-reading and in, in theory, pro-exercise. Just, not always in practice.
I'm an old athlete who still feels like I got a few years left in me. And so I've tried and it used to be that I exercise so I could keep up with my kids. Now they're largely gone. But, so a lot of my exercise is with my wife, whether it's walks or stuff in the home and tried to use that as a way to keep you know, kind of sound body sound mind just, as you said. You've got to find ways to to unplug from the work and and refresh. Reading has always done that. For me. I started out my career as an English teacher. I was a English major. And so literature and poetry and reading has always been a big part of my life. My dad was also a high school English teacher as well. So that's, books have been a big part of my life. And then last thing, I've been lucky that over the pandemic, my three kids have been home a lot. Two of them are college kids one works out in Los Angeles, but she's been home for a lot of the pandemic and so I've had a lot of time with driveway basketball and backgammon and and things like that. So it's it's been fun.
When you were an English teacher, what was your favorite book to teach?
Two. So I love teaching Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison, and I love teaching One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
Oh wow.
Yeah. And for different reasons. Those are very different experiences. As a book. I also love teaching poetry. My kids did not love learning.
Poetry can be a hard sell, because you really have to find the right poems for the right person to get them into poetry.
Absolutely. That is very true. You've got to find things that resonate that it doesn't feel like they're having to solve a puzzle, but they can just kind of feel in the in the economy and the power of the words, kind of have an experience with that that resonates for them. And that can be hard. It can be hard. Poetry makes more sense as you get older, I think.
Yes, definitely. So I don't know if you know this, you might have been updated by my boss, Julie Humphrey. But the library is rolling out audiobooks and ebooks. So do you yourself use audiobooks and ebooks or you a print only person?
No, I've used ebooks. And in fact, anything that's over about 350 pages, I like to go ebook now. Because it's just much more portable and easy. And you can move around. I still miss, I still haven't mastered going back in the book. And if there's something I want to reference, I know there are ways to do that. I just have not become proficient at that. Audiobooks, I've used sparingly. I've never, thankfully, had to commute very much in my career. And so I've never had long spaces in the car, maybe with a couple exceptions. And in those exceptions, I've done some audiobooks, but I don't enjoy the audio as much as I do the print or the ebook. Just Personally.
I started listening to audiobooks when I went to UNC Chapel Hill, and I was commuting from North Raleigh, and it was a long commute. And that was what brought me into the audiobook world. What was the last book that you read?
I had, I had two that I was kind of doing together. Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates, which is his first fiction book. I've been a real fan of his essays over the years. And Water Dancer is a very powerful read. Kind of a book about slavery and a protagonist who has this special power that he shares with Harriet Tubman. I'm not giving too much away in this book. But it's a lot of book about collective memory in the American experience. And especially in the African American community. I would, I would recommend it to anybody, if you like fiction or nonfiction, but it's a it's a great book. And then I also was reading Caste, which I recently finished, by Isabel Wilkerson. As we're sitting in this equity moment, the messages about caste and the way in which we as a country have always been governed by a racial caste in a, in a hierarchy. I think it's a really important read at this moment. And it's exceedingly well done, well researched, well argued book.
I'm just gonna throw out there that both of those books are available at the Durham Tech Library.
That's right.
And your public library as well.
Do you have any messages for the people?
I hope folks had a very restful break. I hope you had good time with family. And I am sorry that we all have probably had experiences over the holidays that had fewer friends and family than we would like a part of it. I am optimistic that the the advent of these vaccines tell us that we're starting to get towards the other side of this. We've got to really support each other this spring as we're still going to be more, I think, in the COVID moment than out. And we just gotta persevere to the end. And I think that just means supporting each other socially, emotionally where we can, and know that we've, we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. And also know we have done some amazing things as an institution to support students support the community. And we should be, I hope, buoyed by the role that we've played to make people's lives a little bit better at a challenging time.
Yes, one of the great things about Durham Tech is the sense of community here. And I think that that is key to the marathon of a pandemic. Thank you so much for joining me and coming on the podcast. I'm sure everyone's gonna enjoy getting to know you a little bit better because we haven't been able to meet you in person so much.
Courtney. Thank you. I appreciate what you're doing with these podcasts. I'm, I feel privileged to join the lineup you've already had on here, and I really appreciate the service you're providing for the campus.
Thank you.
A big thank you again to President Buxton for fitting me in before break and coming and joining me on Out Loud in the Library. I've put links to the books he talked about reading in the show notes. Durham Tech Library has all of the books in digital and physical format. There is also a link to Durham Tech's Equity, Inclusivity, and Diversity Action Plan. If you'd like to learn more about the action plan, I'd encourage you to go back and listen to the episode with Durham Tech's Angela Davis, where she explains all about it. I put a link to our Library Databases page as well as the Libby app so you can find our new Dogwood Digital Library. So many great books to read and listen to. My email address is also in the shownotes if you have any questions, comments or concerns, please reach out. I will email you back. I hope you have an absolutely splendid day!