Ep. 1 - Imani Hill - Emerging Voices

In this inspiring first interview of the Emerging Voices series, Matt and Bri sit down with Imani Hill, a standout participant in NACADA’s Emerging Leaders Program, as she shares her path from aspiring school counselor to transformative academic advisor at Syracuse University. Imani opens up about her passion for student success, her work in academic recovery, retention, and four-year graduation strategies, and why career integration is essential in advising. She also dives into her experience teaching, leading soft skills workshops, and making an impact through the Emerging Leaders Program, as well as her goals for the future, including mentoring and conference presentations. Tune in for a powerful conversation on the evolving role of advisors and the importance of adaptive, student-centered support. 

*Emerging Voices is a spinoff of the Adventures in Advising podcast!

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Transcript

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Matt Markin: [00:00:00] hello and welcome to Emerging Voices and this Emerging Voices is a series of interviewing those within NACADA's Emerging Leaders program, which is meant to build a sustainable community of strong NACADA's leaders. My name is Matt Markin from CSU San Bernardino, and I get to serve as one of your co-hosts along with.

Bri Harvie: I am Bri Harvie from the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology. 

Matt Markin: Hey Bri, and we have a guest that we get to interview today. So we are very excited to be interviewing Imani Hill. Imani is from Plainfield, New Jersey and a proud graduate of Florida a and m University. Where she earned her Bachelor's of Arts degree in psychology and her master's in education alongside a K through 12 school counselor certification at Rutgers University in the Graduate School of Education.

Matt Markin: Although becoming a middle school counselor was the intended goal after graduation, the universe had different plans when she was presented an opportunity to serve as a resident director for a first year living [00:01:00] area at the university at Albany. During her first year within the role, she met a U Albany academic advisor who encouraged her to apply for an academic advisor position after learning about her background in school counseling.

Matt Markin: So fast forward to 2023. Imani began her current role as Assistant Director of academic and career advising within the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She advises a limited caseload and supervises a team of six frontline academic advisors.

Matt Markin: Her student and academic affairs background allow her to provide a holistic perspective on student needs, knowledge of strategies to increase matriculation, and understand the importance of each student feeling, a sense of belonging to their campus community. Imani, welcome. 

Imani Hill: Thank you, Matt. Thank you, Bri, for having me.

Imani Hill: I appreciate your time. Really excited for this. 

Matt Markin: Yeah, we're looking forward to having this interview with you and we learned a little bit from your bio, but we were wondering [00:02:00] if you can expand a little bit to tell us your journey thus far in higher ed and academic advising. 

Imani Hill: Alright, thanks.

Imani Hill: So I'll kick it off from my original dream of being a school counselor. My always had a passion for student success, just assisting students through their journey, through academics and trying times I eventually began my first advising position at university at Albany. And throughout the years I've advised throughout transfer population international students.

Imani Hill: First years all the way throughout their four year graduation rates. So I've always had an interest in retention originally. So to back up to my undergraduate times, my senior year capstone project was on four year retention rates at Florida a and m University. I always had a quite perplexing let's say state of mind when I would see people stay in the institution for [00:03:00] 5, 6, 7 years at times. So as a senior, I wanted to. Dive in onto why our population of students were staying at FAMU longer than four years. So fast forward to just my career now. I've just continued that passion of student success initiatives, retention very big on four year graduation rates and developing programming to cut that down, cut the six year graduation rates down.

Imani Hill: So that's been. More of my recent passions that have grown throughout my career. I enjoy teaching. I, throughout the years I've taught first year seminars one credit courses throughout the different institutions. So teaching is advising. I feel they're interchangeable, so I'm glad that I've had the opportunity to play both roles as an instructor and an advisor.

Imani Hill: And I've had the opportunity to. Teach my advisees or in terms [00:04:00] of students that I was caseload with. So I was able to have that double interaction. And then lastly, another passion I have is for academic recovery. I was an academic recovery advocate in my first role, and I've always tried to continue with a different programs that address students in academic trouble.

Imani Hill: I try not to say academic probation. I know that's. Typically the term we use, but language is everything. So I have a big passion of trying to change the narrative of what that looks like as well. As of right now, as you mentioned I'm at Syracuse University, I. I'm in an advising office of 35 individuals and I supervise a subset of frontline advisors who only work with sophomores through senior students.

Imani Hill: And we have a separate team that works with first year or incoming new students. So that's just a little more details in terms of. My background in [00:05:00] advising. I've had different journeys at different institutions, both private and public. Yeah, so it's been a great journey and I'm looking forward to see where it takes me next.

Bri Harvie: Awesome. Thanks. Money. Thinking of your path into advising, I feel like we hear a lot from advisors that they didn't. Nobody wakes up when they're five and says, I wanna be an economic advisor when I grow up. This is something a lot of us fall into. Given that you had that bit of a, an unexpected path into advising, it wasn't necessarily the plan.

Bri Harvie: How did that pivot, or how does that pivot impact your work with advisees or even your work as a supervisor with your employees? 

Imani Hill: Thank you for that question. I definitely will acknowledge, let's say the disappointment I had from not going into school counseling as originally intended. But I always knew that the common theme of what my career would be assisting students.

Imani Hill: In some sort of academic setting. I [00:06:00] preferred K through 12, but was still open to incoming first year students because in my graduate school internship in my last year, I worked within a school counselor office at a high school. So I worked with students applying to institutions scholarships, filling out FAFSA information.

Imani Hill: So I had some. Introduction to higher ed during my graduate time. But I would say I kept to the theme of what I wanted to do and I carried that out through my career. So when the opportunity presented itself to go to Albany, I, it was very unexpected. Did not think that was going to be the path of living with first year students after graduate school, but I would say.

Imani Hill: All of it has connected it to my advising. Philosophy and practice as of now. 'cause I use all the experiences from working with high school students, learning about their living [00:07:00] conditions when students first come in, and how that's directly correlated to academic success and or non. I've used a lot of my different experiences to continue.

Imani Hill: Applying that to my day to day. And then in regards to the staff that I supervise, all of them do have non-traditional paths to advising. I have an advisor on my staff that used to be a meteorologist on tv. I had one that used to be a math teacher. So definitely all walks of the career lifespan.

Imani Hill: But I think everyone's common golden theme is. Academic support, student success, and just being a helper of others. So I believe as long as you have those foundations within your actual just biology and pedigree of how you go throughout the day, then you'll be able to sustain within the career. Yeah, so that's how a lot of my [00:08:00] non-traditional pathways have led me to this role today 

Matt Markin: and yeah, I have a colleague years ago that did like our version of a guidance and counseling type master's program. Really wanted to go into high school counseling, but then fell in love with higher ed and then supervising our peer advisors and then was still saying, Hey, I was still able to use a lot of what I learned in the master's program and I can use it in working with college students.

Matt Markin: And you were mentioning about academic recovery. I know for some advisors that can be a touchy subject, how do I, discuss this with students. So like with your experience, how do you help students understand like it, this is, can be part of the process, this could happen to anyone and there still is paths to success in getting back on track.

Imani Hill: Great question. I actually designed a homework assignment for the course for students who did not pass a, their intro seminar course. And it was called why are you at MSU or Montclair State [00:09:00] University. So I'd like to start off with the students. Why so why are we here? And just breaking down.

Imani Hill: If these are internal drives and goals, or if these are family expectations, cultural expectations. So what brings you here and what is your main goal at the end of this process? Because throughout working with students in academic recovery, I've assisted students to other career paths, including trade schools, the police academy, other just.

Imani Hill: Associate's degrees because all four year institutions are not destined for every student who enrolls. I start off with the why, and then I also make an analogy of your GPS on your phone. You put a destination and it's gonna give you three different options. One might take you a little longer. One is the expedited route.

Imani Hill: Maybe the expedited route didn't go your favor, but we can navigate. [00:10:00] How to get you to your point that may not have been your original goal. I definitely also try to work with leadership and administration to recognize the different levels of academic warning and. How you can keep a student here or at the institution too long, and then how that has financial ramifications from that SAP appeals or just low academic progress to completion.

Imani Hill: So just waking up others to the. Let's say severity of the situation long term, whether they're not earning credits or they're taking out loans and paying for courses they're not earning the credits for. I have a larger goal for academic recovery in my career to highlight those and highlight the marginalized populations that this affects as well.

Bri Harvie: I have a bit of a follow up question on that. I also love academic recovery and I [00:11:00] was subtly trying to take some notes as you were talking over here as well. I, so you talked a little bit about getting administration and folks on board with the academic recovery. Plans that you work on with students, plural.

Bri Harvie: I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about how you can pr or how you work on presenting it to faculty or administration, as they often will have competing priorities. Thinking about administration, oftentimes it's about retention, but we know in our work is about retaining the right student in that we wanna make sure that the student is set up for success at our institutions.

Bri Harvie: And I know, faculty can sometimes, especially in professional programs, feel like they have to protect the profession a little bit and can sometimes lean towards harsher sanctions for academic recovery and things like that. How do you find. Your work how do you kinda navigate that middle space of needing to protect the student but also understand those competing priorities from faculty and administration?

Imani Hill: Great question. And that actually goes [00:12:00] into my NACADA's presentation I'm doing with another ELP cohort member about being stuck in this middle space between, let's say the people that you're trying to serve versus those you and you report to. So I would say my first. In my first role where I was an official academic re academic recovery advocate.

Imani Hill: There was actually funding allocated to that program. So we received a small stipend to work with these students. We met with them biweekly, so I really didn't have much of an issue for buy-in from faculty and staff and administration on this initiative because it was funded. And then now from my understanding, it has grown into a mandatory course that students have to take, which.

Imani Hill: Initially adds on to retention enrollment. So I think the overall long-term goal was the university, so I didn't have to fight too much. I would say my second role I was the [00:13:00] co-chair of the Navigate Workflow and training committee and we were tasked on setting the parameters for the early warning program.

Imani Hill: To your point of the faculty buy-in and priorities, unfortunately. Submitting early reports on the system was not necessarily on the top tier of their priorities. And I would say we had an average of. 13 to 14% participation rate. So we would, I would actually go to different college meetings within the university to speak on behalf of the Navigate early warning program and show different student testimonials of how important it was to receive their alert or warning ahead of time and how it was able to allow them to.

Imani Hill: Finish the course in a successful manner. So I'm very big on showing data and numbers and also qualitative data through student testimonies [00:14:00] and writings to try to show the actual work that it's happening and the need of it as well. In my second role, that definitely was a challenge, but I did share the benefits of.

Imani Hill: Your course is pass fail rate, how that can contribute to your possible 10 year package. So just trying to make it more attractive to see how they can benefit from. Letting them, their students know that there are some troubles ahead of time so we can have those proactive discussions about possibly withdraw from the course in redirecting.

Matt Markin: Yeah, it's definitely important to have all the aspects of data, so like all the pieces of the pie that, that you can share, but also, like you're saying, is going to these meetings and letting them know about the data. 'cause otherwise it'll just set on someone's computer, on someone's desk. And the information doesn't get out there.

Matt Markin: I think we're also curious about, you're assistant director of academic and career advising. So [00:15:00] can you tell us more about how your office is structured? Do students get both the academic and career advising from one advisor? Like how's everything divvied up?

Imani Hill: Alright, great. Our office, all of our advisors are both academic and career advisors. Now, Syracuse University has a centralized career services center that services every college and every college has its own. Career center within itself. We are the only college within the university that has an integrated model of academic and career advising.

Imani Hill: So for context, we have a director of career advising who pretty much champions all of our. Career programming. So for example, we take students on what we call local immersion trips every semester. So based on your major, we take you to local Syracuse employers for internships and jobs. And we take you throughout the day, we feed you [00:16:00] lunch.

Imani Hill: There's an alumni mixer afterwards. 'cause we have a director of Alumni relations who works along the career side. So we have a lot of our alumni assist our students with that. So yes, every academic and career need is serviced through our office now. Yes, a student can go to Central Career Services for additional resume support.

Imani Hill: They do have larger resources, let's say our office does, but essentially we prefer for them to come and speak with us. So it is my first time working. Within a integrated. Model, but not office. My previous office, it was a center where academic advising and career lived, but had two separate directors. We were just a physical hub for students to go here.

Imani Hill: It's one all come all for every service that you need. And in addition, we also [00:17:00] certify degrees, which is very different from typical advisors across the board. It's been a new experience. Very interesting. But that is another aspect of our roles. That is pretty much integrated with the student experience.

Imani Hill: So that's just pretty much how our office works. We also offer program called Alumni Connections, which is a matching service for current students and alum based on their interests. We put them through a training seminar for professionalism, how to write a proper email to an alum, and if we notice that there is.

Imani Hill: Let's say inconsistent communication. We will address that and hold the student accountable because we don't want to let's say scare any of our alumni away from continuing to assist our students. So it's definitely been a new experience. I know it's definitely a topic of discussion, whether they should be.

Imani Hill: Integrated [00:18:00] or if they should be two separate philosophies. But I will say as this being my first experience, I see the importance. I do recognize that there can be a separation. However, I do fully agree now that every academic advisor should speak a bit about career and about what we're doing afterwards.

Imani Hill: 'cause I recognized in my previous roles, I never really had the. Urge or thought to think about what's next. I just wanted to get you your credits. I wanted to make sure you were in good academic standing and you were at 120 credits. That was it. Yes, I, of course, I internally cared about what happened to you, but the actual work of.

Imani Hill: Making sure or ensuring that you were in a proper placement other than teaching. Like in my previous position, there was a teaching program [00:19:00] which was definitely more prescriptive. So you, we didn't really have to do the career part. But my interview process here definitely was an interesting experience 'cause we did have that debate of career and academic advising.

Imani Hill: They have convinced me that there is a there's a need and there is a value in the integration. So that's a bit about our office. 

Bri Harvie: It's great starting at a place and being convinced that they're always the right way. Thinking about your role there, or the role of your team, you spoke a little bit about the, like how to write an email to Anem to network and those.

Bri Harvie: Not so soft, but the soft skills. And I know it's a fairly common theme in advising now that students coming through a lot of our programs, especially those who went through high school during COVID and didn't get a lot of the in-person social growth that previous generations did, we're finding more and more students come to post-secondary without a [00:20:00] lot of those skills really finely tuned.

Bri Harvie: And it's. It's one of those skills that everybody needs to have, but nobody seems to want to own teaching it and helping the next generation learn how to. Do an interview, write a resume. Write an email to an instructor or an employer or alum or whoever. And so I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on, now that you're in a role that has those two roles combined what do you think the role of advising both academic and career is in teaching those skills to our students?

Imani Hill: That's a great question, Bri. I definitely from our office, the way we're structured is we have a first year team and upper division team. The first year team is primarily. Task to go over those those soft skills. So for example, I know they have a Blackboard module that students have to go through and do practice emails or just like what's a prompt and like how would you [00:21:00] respond and then an advisor will provide feedback or just edits on what they would change.

Imani Hill: I know when I taught a first year seminar. In my previous institution, that was one of my activities. I took actually just of course concealing all personal information. I took example emails and asked the students how they would be worded, what was incorrect, what was inappropriate. Another thing that at least I personally have noticed throughout this last registration cycle is also coping skills.

Imani Hill: Just how to be patient because when a seat is not in a section that they want or something is closed the amount of emotional breakdowns I've seen is quite alarming. And I have addressed that to larger leadership in terms of addressing this concern of teaching our students how to properly speak to [00:22:00] us.

Imani Hill: And administration and faculty, how to cope with things that are not going their way. How to not expect immediate results because to your point, the whole, the COVID. Time taught us to have things instantaneously and all the time, and I can get a permission to override something. I could do a pass fail.

Imani Hill: Things were so more lenient back then and we have to start trying to train and teach our students to get back into the normalcy of what it is to be a college student. I know this is not popular, but same thing with advisors being in the office. We are a student facing profession. I understand everything could still be done online, but if we don't keep the relational part of our roles, we will be replaced by technology and that is just the clearness of it.

Imani Hill: So we [00:23:00] have to make sure that we're still teaching these students face to face and running workshops and seminars. And that is one thing I do miss in this role. We do not have. A first year seminar that helps onboard students in terms of skills strategies, just how to be here. I don't know why, but there's not one and it's very apparent.

Imani Hill: And also I believe when you have a decentralized system, it's hard to try to create a standard or these programs when. Every college is doing their own thing. Even though we are the largest college at Syracuse, we're still not the most robustly funded at all, I would say. So I, other colleges have more resources than we do to do some of these workshops and programmings, but [00:24:00] I agree that advisors should be the people who are teaching these skills when we can, if we're not in this classroom setting.

Imani Hill: When you can during an appointment time or if your administration or leadership encourages. Some type of extra events after work type things. No one wants to do that often, but sometimes that's what it takes to get those things in. 

Matt Markin: Yeah, definitely. The human element's gonna be important no matter what.

Matt Markin: And I think connected to that is, I know a few years ago you also attended an Appreciative Advising Institute. I was wondering if you can talk a little bit more about that institute and what you gained from attending. 

Imani Hill: Great. Yeah, so I attended in 2022 virtually which was great.

Imani Hill: It was definitely an experience that I wasn't expecting in regards to the the layout, the cohort experience. The assignments we had [00:25:00] to do, but it definitely assisted with the retention of the material. I would definitely say that I have adopted spec certain aspects of appreciative advising. For example Deming, myself creating different spaces within my office to make a more relaxed and open environment.

Imani Hill: But I do. Feel that there are aspects of developmental psych sorry, developmental advising and holistic advising that I do try to pair with it. So yes, it definitely was a great experience. I know that there are things that I didn't necessarily think needed to be added based on the. Population of students that I served at the time and the caseload that I had at the time.

Imani Hill: But I highly encourage individuals to move forward and look into it. The instructors were great. That staff, that office is amazing. [00:26:00] Shout out to Dr. Bloom for doing all of that. Yes, it was definitely a great experience and I encourage those interested to do it. 

Bri Harvie: That's awesome. It's on one of my bucket lists is to go to one of these institutes in some capacity over the next few years.

Bri Harvie: So thinking about kinda the culmination of your experience in this non-traditional path into advising and then switching institutions and joining the ELP program in NACADA's what advice. Would you give to somebody thinking about applying to ELP or somebody trying to get their foot in the NACADA's door?

Bri Harvie: What do you think about your experience really in, I say incentivized, but really led you to wanting to get more involved in NACADA's? And what would you tell somebody newer to their profession to do thinking to when you first started back at U Albany? 

Imani Hill: Great. So what actually attracted me to the program was my first annual conference I attended in Portland.

Imani Hill: Yes. Portland. And I went to a session [00:27:00] and I'm in a sorority, which is Alpha Kapp Alpha Sorority Incorporated. And I saw one of. My, the members putting on the presentation 'cause she had a bag. So I said, okay, let me go in there and talk with her. And Mike ue, who is one of the mentors we worked in the same office and he shared with me that he was a mentor for the program and the individuals whose event I went to was his mentee.

Imani Hill: So he encouraged me. He's Hey mon, look into it. It's definitely a great program. At the time I was. Looking or seeking different other employment opportunities. So I didn't want to dedicate for a two year timeframe when I was in between situations. But the following year or two years later, the application came up.

Imani Hill: I reached out to Mike and I said, I think it's time for me to do it 'cause I wanna get more involved. On the larger end of NACADA's. And I would love [00:28:00] to be a continued representation of women, of black women in this industry and in leadership. So I knew it was my time, so I wrote my letter and I had Mike do my letter of support and I'm here and it's been a great experience.

Imani Hill: I would say anybody that's interested or curious, it's a great place to build connection amongst. People who get you. Like you can text the WhatsApp chat and talk about, frustrations of registration and graduation concerns and they just speak your language that may be not your environment can always understand.

Imani Hill: So it's a very safe space. The mentors have been great individuals, not just. For the program, if I need something looked over, if I'm doing a presentation. When Haley and I submitted our proposal for annual, we had Sarah look over it, so we. [00:29:00] I utilize this program in so many different ways, and I'm so very grateful for the experience.

Imani Hill: I actually had a former colleague reach out to me who attended one of this information sessions during region one, and she saw my name and she's Hey, is this you? And I'm like, yeah. So I definitely allowed myself to be available to her to for interest. I've proposed other potential mentors to apply.

Imani Hill: So I have nothing but great things to say I've been able to accomplish. Goals that I set out for myself. So 2025, I wanted to submit a proposal. I did that. I didn't think it would be accepted, but I did that as well. So I've had tremendous support and growth through just this year of doing it, and I've really encourage those who are interested just.

Imani Hill: Just to put your, put yourself out there and join a community of friends. 'cause that's what we are, we have a great time at [00:30:00] annual every year or regional. We have our different pockets, but I'm truly grateful for the class that I'm in and look forward to our continuous relationship throughout our career, 

Matt Markin: awesome. That's good to hear. Now I know sometimes when people are thinking about, should I apply to the emerging leaders program? They see that two year commitment part of it. Now everyone's gonna be different in terms of how many times they meet, things like that. What can you help someone kind of concern about the two year commitment?

Matt Markin: How's that been so far for you? I know we're, you're still within the first year of the program, but any advice that, that you can give about your experience thus far? 

Imani Hill: I would say it has not been a significant time commitment. I would say we meet as a group. Once every couple of months, and it's great because it's typically during lunchtime which definitely doesn't interfere with the actual workday.

Imani Hill: Every, the leader is very cognitive of our times. We have doodle sent [00:31:00] very far ahead of time so we could plan. So I have not found it. As a burden of time or a significant chunk of things to do, I've actually found it the most beneficial aspect of my career that takes the least time. And I definitely will stamp that with facts and proof to show how I have progressed in this year.

Imani Hill: I would say my steering committee commitments are probably more intense than. I'm on the the Advisor Wellbeing and Retention Committee and the research subcommittee. I have homework for that, that I still need to do. So that I would say is a time, this is a piece of cake, and I have had that concern from a mentor that I, or a potential mentor I reached out to, to encourage her to apply.

Imani Hill: And she's we're going through so many changes in the university and the department. I said, listen. I [00:32:00] promise you it's not going to take that much time, and the benefit is going to be so much greater than you recognize, and you're gonna be able to affect change on upcoming leaders like ourselves to learn from someone who has gone through a lot of the things that you have and has served in the roles that you have.

Imani Hill: So I definitely would not allow that to be a barrier. And moving forward. 

Bri Harvie: Yeah. I think there's a definitely a fear of. Especially for things like this, am I going to have to commit or am I going to commit to something that I am now not able to really commit to and biting off more than we can chew?

Bri Harvie: And I think that's one of the greatest perks of NACADA's as an association is it really is a choose your own adventure as far as commitment goes. And there are certain ways to get involved that just take, a couple of hours during a couple of months in one season of the year. And then there are.[00:33:00] 

Bri Harvie: So many variations between there and being board president. Like it's just really up to you as far as what you get out of it. Thinking about the next year, we're only. Not quite seven months in, I think into this year. It's wild how much you've already accomplished. What are your goals?

Bri Harvie: What's next for you in both, in and outside of NACADA's? 

Imani Hill: Alright, thanks. So I would say the next steps for me, I did volunteer to be a scholarship reader for this round. So I found that helpful when I was a proposal reader for last year's annual to give me the. Confidence and encouragement to write one for this one.

Imani Hill: So I'm still waiting on information on how my participation will go into reading those. So that's on there. I am a part of the. Advisor Wellbeing and Retention Research subcommittee that's currently working on a research Brif on advisor [00:34:00] job satisfaction and job descriptions. So that research Brif should be published in the fall.

Imani Hill: I'm working on that with a group of I believe it's five of us in total that are working on that. That is a summer project. And then lastly, I would just say getting ready for annual in October. I just, we just need to solidify a moderator for our panel. But that shouldn't be tough to do and just getting ready for that.

Imani Hill: So I would say that's the next. A couple of months of Iman's life at this point. But I definitely look for in the next year doing more let's say recruitment for ELP. I know this last cycle, just the end application either just ended or our upcoming, but just to start getting the bait out there for the next class.

Imani Hill: 'Cause I definitely. Know some of advisors that are in their beginning phases of [00:35:00] advising that would be great for the program in the next upcoming class. And then eventually, hopefully one year I'll be able to transition into a mentor and give the perspective from a different angle. Those are the things that are next for me. 

Matt Markin: Yeah. I think you're well on your way as far as applying as a mentor. You're already encouraging others, whether it's to apply as a mentor, emerging leader, telling 'em all about the different avenues of NACADA's, which is amazing. So keep that going.

Matt Markin: And, with your panel coming up in October title wise, that one is called stuck in the Middle. 

Imani Hill: Yes. So it's called Stuck in the Middle with you, navigating Mid Management within an advising center 

Matt Markin: and first presentation at the annual conference. 

Imani Hill: Yes. My first one, writing one, my first one being accepted and first presenting.

Imani Hill: So I think it was all in, in one kind of hit 'cause I didn't. I didn't think I would have all three happen at one time. So very grateful [00:36:00] for the opportunity and I think it's gonna be well attended. We reviewed our feedback from the reviewers and I think it's a untouched topic that a lot of, people maybe are a little afraid to speak on. But my ELP partner is also another assistant director at her institution. So last annual conference during our ELP sessions, we just started to chat, had a different, we had a similar conversation of what we were going through. Said, Hey, why don't we make this into.

Imani Hill: A proposal or presentation. We don't know what it's gonna look like, but we're gonna do this. And we thought, ah, okay. Yeah, we're just gonna talk. But we both were dedicated in making it happen. And I would say that's been the greatest accomplishment so far. And every panelist is also an ELP leader as well.

Imani Hill: So we are this, we're hoping [00:37:00] to, go into the larger Facebook group for ELP and just pose one more panelist for it to continue the promotion of the program to show how we are doing things. So really looking forward to it. 

Matt Markin: I love it. And I know I just got approval to go to the annual conference.

Matt Markin: Bri, are you gonna be there? So then I'm sure you'll have both of us in attendance to see all of our lovely eel peers on that panel. So it'll be great to see. So you got two of us that, that are gonna be attending to, to be proud to watch you all present your information there for stuck in the middle.

Matt Markin: But I think it's a great way to, to end our recording today, our interview. So Imani, thank you so much for being on and chatting about your background and also about ELP. 

Imani Hill: Thank you so much Matt and Bri. This was a great opportunity and definitely for those watching. If you're interested, definitely sign [00:38:00] up.