Matt Harmon: It is the first episode of a brand new calendar year here on our Monmouth Weekly podcast series Today. Among other things, we are talking about the world of entrepreneurship with special guest Allison Gilbert, university President, Dr. Patrick Lehe. This is faculty member Matt Harmon. It's time for our Monmouth Weekly podcast series, episode number 45. Thanks to Zoes for listening. Not really the best of weather conditions as we record episode number 45 today. Little gloomy outside on a late January Wednesday afternoon. We're gonna try and brighten your spirits a little bit with our Monmouth Weekly podcast, which is just now into another episode, the 45th overall with University President Patrick Leahy. I am faculty member Matt Harmon. If I stick my hand out my office window and wave, you might be able to see me. We're we're just across the way. I prefer it outside though, when there's like leaves on the trees and sunshine. I, I'm gonna have to put in my contract for next year. Only won't reco record podcast when sunny and bright out. Patrick Leahy: Well, I was gonna say fir first time in 45 attempts that we at least find ourselves on the same campus. Maybe someday we'll find ourselves, ourselves in the same room. But good to be with you, Matt first time of the the new calendar year anyway. And sure, hope you had the, the rest arrested and relaxed vacation and winter break that you ritually deserve. Matt Harmon: You know, it, it's interesting every time, I feel like over the course of the last couple years you know, we, we do it at the start of a calendar year. It's really the midpoint of the academic year. So it's, we're starting a new semester. We're starting a new calendar year, but yet we're in the middle of something as well. And, and as we talked about in our December episode, obviously there's a lot that takes place. You know, whether you're talking about the summer months or in this particular case, kind of that four to five week inter intermission, basically in between the fall and the spring semesters. Bring us up to date a little bit on, on what's taken place over the course of the, the holiday season in the first couple of weeks of January. The, the one that I'll, I'll lead you in with, I know there was a fantastic event around the Springsteen archives that we have here on campus, which was really a, a highlight of the month of January. Patrick Leahy: Well, I know that you are yourself a Springsteen fan, so happy to start with that. You know, it doesn't take us long here at Mammouth to get ramped up after our short winter break. But one of the great events was a symposium, a full day long academic symposium that the Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music hosted on the 50th anniversary of the release of Greetings from Asbury Park. And who knew the interest on an eight hour academic symposium around the release of that, of that album. But Bob Sci told me he thought he would have 75 or a hundred people. He had to shut down registration at 600 people, some of whom flew in from the UK and Ireland to be there. So it was a fantastic, and is a perfect representation of what that Springsteen Center can be for Monmouth. I mean, it brought a lot of new people to campus to talk about, you know, this great popular music. But to look at it a, you know, from an academic perspective, it was just fantastic. Matt Harmon: We've got a good episode for you. On tap we will bring on Alison Gilbert, who is the director for the Entrepreneurship Center on campus here in Monmouth. We'll do that in just a little bit, but just trying to catch up with things that have been happening. We've got tons to talk about here today. That was one, I don't know, I'm gonna have to call, I'm gonna have to call Bob on that. He knew that there was gonna be way more than 60 or 70 people coming to that. That's, that's insane. That's inflated numbers. That's just Patrick Leahy: Bagging me. Is that the ? Matt Harmon: That's a, that that's, Hey yeah, we're gonna get like an OK turnout and then Nope, we had to shut it off at 600. There's no way he thought there was gonna be savvy Patrick Leahy: Move savvy move on his part. Matt Harmon: Yeah, very savvy. That's a, that's a way to get in good with, with university leadership. You know, the, the, the other probably key piece of those couple of weeks in between the fall and the spring semester would be winter commencement, which has been something that has become a tradition here at Monmouth over the course of the last several years. Having been a, a, a part of it a couple of times along the way, reading names at that it's a, it's a great function and it's a way I kind of feel like for students, families to make sure that they're part of it because there are so many people who are on the, I I, I hesitate to even say non-traditional anymore, cuz I don't think it is whether you graduate early or you graduate in nine semesters as opposed to eight. But like that mid-year of time is a lot of people finishing up. Where if you said, Hey, come back in, in May, they might not come back. So to do it in January offers that opportunity. Patrick Leahy: I'm, I mean, I think it's just a, a measure of our commitments to students that we do commencement ceremonies three different times a year. You know, of course the, the biggest one is in the spring, but then we do a summer commencement ceremony at the end of the summer session because some students finish then and don't wanna wait. And then we do it mid-year in a winter ceremony because we wanna offer this commencement exercise as close to the time that they finish their respective degree as possible. And I love doing it. It's you know, it, it, it gives me an opportunity to, to sort of participate in a lot of different ceremonies. In fact, I counted 'em up, Matt, this is my 12th year as a university president, and I have had the great privilege of presiding over 58 commencement ceremonies, now aided in large part, as you know, by the the covid experience where we did nine one year and seven the next year, , you know, but still 58 times I get a chance to to congratulate the students on the completion of their degrees. And I always say it never gets old for this university president. Matt Harmon: I'm gonna say the same thing I said about Bob Santelli, your numbers are inflated and I feel like you're sandbagging the overall perception of the number of commencements that you oversee. But if you wanna stick with that high 50 number, who am I to argue with it? Great to see as we're in the second week of the semester ad class this morning, we've got class again tonight with some meetings kind of sandwiched in between. And this podcast here today as we record, great to see students back on campus. And, and I do kind of feel like, and, and I was walking from where my office is in planer and had to go over to Bay Hall for a class that I teach over there. And I did get the sense like, it's, it's kind of now back to normal with students walking around. You know, we're all living in that post covid world, but it's just nice to see people out and around and probably feeling more normal than they have over the course of the last couple years. Patrick Leahy: Yeah. As you know, I do these open meetings on a monthly basis. We just had one this morning, we decide, decided to do it in person, and I think 300 people showed up and then a hundred, another 190 or so on the live feed. So yeah, I do think it's returning to normal. Remember that, you know, even through the winter break and into the, you know, spring semester, you know, there have been athletes on campus all the entire time. It seems like it never stops for those in particular varsity athletes. So it's, it's just great to be back up and vibrant. You know, you and I have talked about this. College campuses were made to be active and energetic and high energy and were getting back to that, fortunately. Matt Harmon: And, you know, I saw it, albeit it was in a, it was in a tough loss. A week ago, almost a week ago now, the, the night that the men's basketball team played the College of Charleston, there was a really good turnout with that crowd. The student, the student kind of area was I would say more full than not, which was really great to see. And again, it's part of that kind of transition back to normal life, but also part of supporting your school, supporting what's going on on campus, whether it's athletics, whether it's academic, whether it's all of the different speakers and things that we have on campus, the events that take place. That's what, as you just said, that's what a college campus is supposed to be. Patrick Leahy: Yeah. And we had that nationally ranked team on the ropes there for a while, didn't we, Matt? I mean, that, I think it was the first time in like 15 years that a nationally ranked basketball teams been on campus. There's a lot of nationally ranked other sports on campus. But first time a nationally ranked basketball team was on campus in a while. I had a board meeting that night, so I had to come at halftime. So I arrive and we're winning by six, and then I take my seat and we end up losing by whatever. So, Matt Harmon: No, any correlation between the two events, Patrick Leahy: note to self if things are tracking, just stay away, I guess Matt Harmon: you know, one of the things that you and I have talked about over our time doing our podcast in this ever-changing world of covid is how to engage students in different way. And I think that's a really good opportunity for us to bring our guests on today. Who is Alison Gilbert? She is the director of maas Center for Entrepreneurship. Alison, a very good afternoon to you. Thanks for coming on and giving us some time. Was really excited when President Lehe had suggested that we bring you on having been hired at the university in, in July of 2022. So you're in that like sixth, seventh month time period. And, and so important, I think, for what you do, and, and we'll be able to talk about it in a lot of different ways, but I'll lead you in with this one. And it would be finding ways to do just that. Students over the time of covid, let's say not just students, but anybody thinking of ways, how do you make extra money? Well, you become an entrepreneur. And, and it leads into directly what you do and how to try to engage the students here at Monmouth. Allison Gilbert: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. For sure. I mean, I am delighted that we're, we're working with 17 students already and just by them knowing that we are actively investing in supporting them in, in whatever way, whether to be help them to incubate an idea or accelerate an idea or even brush up on entrepreneurial skills that they can apply to any entrepreneurial path. I've been talking to schools all across campus, like of the 17 entrepreneurs that we have working with me here at the center, they're coming from all different schools. So the School of Social Work, the School of Humanities, the School of Silence, of course, the, the School of Business here too. And have been having conversations with the nursing school. I mean, we, we've been, people have been very excited to be collaborating. This is faculty and students. So it's nice to know that there's that hunger and that desire for, for this kind of work, whether, like you said, Matt, they wanna start a ha side hustle or really are looking to scratch some sort of entrepreneurial curiosity itch. Matt Harmon: President Lehe, I, I'm gonna let Alison kind of talk about her background, but I want to get your your thoughts on this because I know that prior to her being hired in July of 22, this entrepreneurship idea existed on campus. But with her hiring, this is kind of throwing again into a, into another gear as she and I were talking before you had hopped on almost saying like, this is the, the 2.0 version of what entrepreneurship means here on campus at Monmouth. Patrick Leahy: Yeah. I come to Monmouth and I ask do we have a Center for entrepreneurship? And you know, I get the favorable reply that yes, we do. Okay. And then I get the even better reply, Matt, which is, we have it in name, but we really, it's, we've let it fall dormant over the years and it needs to be re-energized. That to me is more exciting because I get to now be involved in helping to re-energize this you know, a little bit more in my image. And this is something that, you know, I, I did at Wilkes and something we did at Scranton. So this is a really important part of my being the president here, is how do we create a very vibrant center that can at once serve our students, as Alison mentioned, but also be a resource for our, our immediate community. You know, the, starting with the Monmouth County community, I love the way a Center for Entrepreneurship can serve that overriding purpose that I have, that a private institution should nonetheless serve a public purpose and center for entrepreneurship allows that to happen. And so it was wonderful for me to hear, we already have a center, so I didn't have to create a new one, but that it needed to be re re-energized. So we changed the model and the key to the whole thing was to go out and find the right person to lead it. And I think it'll be clear to folks that we did find the right person, Matt Harmon: Alison, for you being that person. And, and I think one of the nice things about Monmouth as president Lehe just said, private university, but serving the community, this is your community as a Monmouth County person. Like you are now back home and you are able to probably connect a lot of dots. But, but take us through a little bit about you, about you and your background and, and how you have become now developed into this role in charge of entrepreneurship here at Monmouth. Allison Gilbert: Yeah, yeah. I was on route to law school after college. I went to school down in DC and could not answer the question why I wanted to be a lawyer . And up until that point, I had a pretty binary thought process of what it meant to be successful. I thought I could either be a doctor or a lawyer. And my young 22 year old self was, couldn't answer that question. And a friend said, Alison, if you can't answer the question why you wanna be a lawyer, maybe you need to rethink this. And that exploded my brain. And I was, had always been very passionate about cooking. And so after being so cerebral and, and focused on my studies for all of my life up until through college, I said, you know what? I'm gonna follow my passion for cooking. And I ended up working at a bakery in Ocean Grove that had just started by the now owners of Watermark in Asbury. And then I, I was bit, and I moved to New York and I went to culinary school and I said, I'm gonna open up a bakery in New York City, and I'm gonna go, I worked at a kitchen in Midtown, and I'd put on to the universe that I wanted to get experience in food media. I wanted the full 360 before I opened my own thing. And I opened, I, I ended up right place, right time moment, ended up getting connected to a food media startup, so a digital food magazine that was just starting called Tasting Table. And I ended up getting a job there. And so while food was what got me there within the first year, I became the coo, and we scaled that into a multimillion dollar business readership in the millions. And I said, you know what? I wanna bottle this up and bring this to as many businesses as I can. And so that then opened me up to start my, my startup studio, which essentially I've been incubating women-led businesses for the past decade plus. And my mom is an adjunct professor here at Monmouth University. She's been here for 25 years. I grew up with Monmouth in my backyard. I'm from, I started out in Shrewsbury and now we're an interlinking. And when my mom saw the role for the director come up, she forwarded and she said, I think this is perfect for you. And I had already just moved down back from Manhattan and here, here we are. But yeah, I, it's, it's great to be back in my home area and connect the dots from this community in Monmouth County that I hold near and dear to my heart. My mom's also been a teacher at Shore Regional, so I sort of grew up with that in my life too, so I'm really connected to that community as well. So West Long Branch and Monmouth, I went to soccer camp here at Monmouth. So , Matt Harmon: I'm gonna, it's a Allison Gilbert: Great moment. Sorry, I'm, Matt Harmon: I'm gonna ask both of you this question and you can piggyback on, on each other present. Layhee, I'll, I'll ask you first and then Allison you, you can continue tell me why the idea and the thought of entrepreneurship is important to be part of a college campus and community present. Leahy, I, I'll let you take the first crack at that. Patrick Leahy: Yeah. I, I believe that there are skills entrepreneurship is a, a critically important skill for our students in the 21st century. I mean, it's, it's not just as Allison said, those individuals who say, you know what? I want to carve my own path by creating my own enterprise. Yes, we want to be a resource to serve them, but I think it's also, can you teach students to be entrepreneurial and the value that they will add when they go work for a really established corporation. I mean, hiring managers are looking today, I think, for people who are entrepreneurial, scrappy, innovative, creative. And so I think a university is such a perfect place to, to offer these, these programs and services to develop entrepreneurial mindsets. Some, some of which will result in new enterprises, others of, of which I think just enhances their ability to have really successful careers. That that's why I think it's so important to a university. Matt Harmon: Allison, do you mind kind of piggy piggybacking on that answer in your own thought process of, of why, especially for, and I know it could serve more than the campus community, but specifically to those on campus, why it's important for, to have this center for the 18 to 24 year olds? Allison Gilbert: Yeah, I mean, ex exactly what, what Pat said, and, you know, the skillset that employers are looking for is more amongst a lot of things is the, those soft skills. And when I think about entrepreneurship, I think of it really as creativity. And it's, it's having the tools to, to be resourceful and to think critically and to tap into your passion and how to channel that effectively no matter what setting you're in and learning patience. And I think of, of, of entrepreneurship as, as creativity and also a muscle. And we all have that. And you, you, you, you learn to kind of do the, the five pound weights, and then you build that muscle, and then your reward is to, is to be able to lift 10 pounds. And so the sooner you start to tap into that, the, the sooner you strengthen your, your overall professional toolkit of what you're bringing to the market or, or any kind of enterprise. And so I think it's also, you know, sharing the frameworks and creating the spaces that inspire these new ways of, of thinking and, and just really tapping into what I believe is an existing well of creativity and in all of us, Matt Harmon: Alison Gilbert joining us here on our Monmouth Weekly podcast. It's the 45th episode with university President Patrick Leahy, faculty member Matt Harmon. We are talking entrepreneurship here with our center on campus. President Leahy, you, you, I know you have kids, I have kids. Alison, I I would ask you this for that age group specifically that, that we're kind of talking about here on a campus community. Everybody wants things now, right? They want immediate success, they want the payoff, they want the social media engagement, whatever it could be. How do you learn to teach people that want to become entrepreneurs, start their own business, that the word struggle or failure might be part of the equation along the way in their journey? Allison Gilbert: Yeah, I think people like to talk about these 10 year, you know, I mean, these overnight successes, and I say like, and lots of people will tell you like, overnight success is a 10 year journey at best. And I think that, you know, how you teach that, I think as you expose people to the universal experience of what it takes to build something. And the more we share the stories of, you know, actually what looks like an immediate amazing immediate success on the outset on the outside, is actually someone who has been consistent and toiled and learned the art of navigating those struggles and those challenges. I tell everyone, starting a business is not for the faint of heart. And that's why if you are gonna go down that path, you, you wanna be really committed and passionate about the idea and have even a higher purpose. Because at the end of the day there will be those moments. Every entrepreneur will tell you that, and you need something bigger and and more impactful to, to get you out of those, you know, those harder times. But even so, I mean, in this modern economy, it's tough whether you're starting an own, your own business or not. And so it's interesting to me that I in the hu the hundreds of people that I've coached over the years, no matter who you are, no matter what background, no matter what gender, everyone also has their own experience of navigating fear. And it's also learning how that comes up for someone in their life. And it's these convers when we have more conversations about, oh, that was hard for you too, even though on the outside it looked easy. I think that makes this more of an entrepreneur an approachable path for people. But, but starting there, like where are your limiting beliefs? Where might you be thinking with a fixed mindset, when you have the opportunity to really think with a growth mindset? A lot of it starts with mindset. And oftentimes people don't even realize that they're being entrepreneurial, but maybe they didn't even associate that with themselves. Matt Harmon: I, I love the idea and, and you know, as, as we record our audience is listening to the audio, we can all see each other video-wise and President Elahi, there was a lot of affirmative nods of the head as you listen to Alison talk and, and, and I'll go back to something that you mentioned as well, the life skills that you can learn trying a business or trying something entrepreneurial, whether it's turns out to be successful or not, there's so many lessons that you can learn, and I'll equate it to the, to the classroom. I mean, so many classes that I teach in the sports field and the broadcast side of things, you know, everyone, how do I get an A? Well, it, the, it's not about getting an a, it should be about the process of figuring out what, what it means to work hard, what it means to struggle, what it means to have to go back and maybe potentially change things. And I, I think it's a great lesson for any student on, on a college campus, especially those here at Monmouth. Patrick Leahy: Yeah. And, you know, success in an entrepreneurial venture is n never a straight line , you know, as, as, as Alison suggested, you know, an overnight success. Yeah. Ask the person who has, you know, been successful overnight, how, how many years they struggled to get there. And, and there's something really valuable about that. I, I love the level playing field that entrepreneurship allows. I mean, yes, we need to make sure that that startup funds are available equally across different populations. We need to make sure services are available, but entrepreneurship is, in some respects, the most equitable thing in the world, because anybody can be an entrepreneur. You know, and I was involved in this at, at, at Wilkes, I hope we can be here, but when I was at Wilkes and we were running the Kirby Center for Entrepreneurship, we were really involved at the United Nations in their effort to create an, an international day. You know how they have 180 international days, and the one we were pushing for was international Ms m e Day, micro small and medium Enterprises Day. There, of all the days that were celebrated across the world, there was not one to this point that celebrated small businesses and by extension entrepreneurship. And the case we made was, there is no better way to lift people out of poverty and to put 'em on a track to a more productive and fruitful life than to support small, oh, well, micro, small and medium sized enterprises, i e entrepreneurship. So there's so many reasons why I love entrepreneurship, especially embedded at a university. Yes, it's reports up through the business school, maybe for obvious reasons, but I love when I hear Alison say that there are students coming from social work and nursing and, you know, the hu Arts and Humanities that should prove more than anything else, that it's not limited just to traditional business majors, but that we all have that entrepreneurship possibility in us. Matt Harmon: Yeah. And, and Allison you know, we'll, we'll finish, we've got a couple minutes remaining. We'll finish. I, I'd like to get into this, you know, from a standpoint of being an entrepreneur and a as I'm on campus in our communication department building here in, in planer, like there's, so, there's so much of the media side of it that goes along with it. Social media, having your own podcast, getting the word out about things like it, it all kind of comes hand in hand. So you might say, I have this great idea, and that might be a great idea, but how do you make it come to life? What we talk about here on campus, specifically in this building, it's so important. You gotta have social media, you probably have to have some other form of a media outlet to let people know, here's what's going on, Allison Gilbert: For sure. And where there's opportunities for us to cro, like collaborate across campus. I'm, I'm open, so anyone hearing about this, please, please get in touch with me. I was just over in the communications school the other day. I have a student a graduate student in the social work program, starting a really exciting nonprofit in Long Branch. And I was just over there talking to PR Professor Semos the other day and was saying, Hey, can we maybe find some ways to collaborate on graphic design work to support? And she said, oh, we have a nonprofit project where students work on designing a brand kit for a nonprofit. And I said, really? I said, could, could we enter hi his idea? And so I texted him, and then we wrote the brief, and now that's being shared with her students to see if that's the nonprofit that they would wanna do the brand kit for. But, but, but where there are opportunities for us to collaborate, we can also embody the kind of spirit that goes into innovation here on campus. The more, more minds we can get involved in these projects, just, just the more we will all learn and be successful. Matt Harmon: Is it that easy if a student on campus has an idea or an interest point to just reach out, contact you Allison Gilbert: 100% a Gilbert at mom edu. I, I am very friendly. I'm very warm and welcoming, I think the other students would tell you. And that is the best way to get started. And even if you're not even sure if you have an idea, or even if you're not totally sure if entrepreneurship is for you, come on by and let's talk because we're also doing other programming that can support you in other ways. So let's just meet and chat. The more I can get to know you, the more I can figure out how to support you. Patrick Leahy: Yeah, I just wanted to add, I mean, I, I wanna make abundantly clear. This is not just for the individual who has an idea for a new venture. Yes, we will serve that person well, but for anyone who's like interested in, in new venture creation or wants to learn more about business, as Allison said about nonprofit, you know, the creation of a nonprofit is an extraordinarily entrepreneurial effort. Come to the center, meet Allison, and maybe you can partner up with somebody you know, other students whom you don't otherwise know who are working on their particular idea and just get exposed to it and, and help out and contribute. I think you'll learn a ton in the process and maybe it will prompt your own thinking around you know, entrepreneurial ideas. Matt Harmon: President Lehe, let, let me ask you this from a standpoint of, if, if the hiring of Allison is kind of the part of the re-imagining of this Center for Entrepreneurship, the 2.0, what's the, what's the next move for it? Because I can, I can hear it in your voice, I can hear it in Allison's voice, like the incitement is there, it's genuine, how to get students involved, how to connect them, how to engage them. How does this become the next big thing on campus? Patrick Leahy: Well, Allison can tell you about programming that she has in store, including, you know, we're bringing back the, the hawk tank, you know concept. And, you know, we're gonna have a ton of fun with the programs. To me, I'm really focused on helping Alison build out the appropriate space so that in addition to just a couple offices, that there's actually you know, for lack of a better word, maker space, you know, I mean, not maker space in the official, I mean, we're not gonna have you know, a lot of equipment in there, but you know, the kind of place where you can come and collaborate with other entrepreneurs, you know, where you can share ideas and you can hang out and create a, a sort of a social component to this as well that needs to kind of the proper kind of space. So I'm helping her identify that space, and then we'll need to raise some resources to build out that space. So that to me, you're, you know, we have a great director. We have that director collaborating with the faculty across campus. That's a wonderful way to build out our scale. We need to put that in the right space. Then we'll have to add staffing over time, and I'll be working with Amanda Claus to try to find the resources to ensure that we can take this to the next level and make sure that it is sustainable over time. So my goal will be to stay out of Allison's way when it comes to programming, but to help, you know, break down obstacles to the space and to the resources that she's gonna need to take this to the next level. Matt Harmon: Alison, tell me in closing here as we wrap up, give me a, a a a look into what the spring semester will mean in terms of getting this more out into the campus community events that you have coming up. Allison Gilbert: Yeah, as Pat mentioned, we're bringing back Hawk Tank which is building upon a program that has been done in the past and has had really positive positive conversation around it. And this year we're bringing it back with that next level of cross campus of it being a cross campus initiative. The finalists will be announced next week, and they come from all, all different schools. We're gonna be piloting a small business entrepreneurial internship program this summer with a great company called Beyond Maine. We're still finding the small businesses that would wanna be matched with students who then can get the exposure and the experience of, of learning an entrepreneurial project and then also supporting a local business here in Monmouth County. We're, we're, I'm in talks with Tony McDonald and I over at uci. We've been thinking through something in this blue tech space, which is harnessing the ocean for innovation, which is a whole other topic for, for, for another day, but just a seed plant to, to listeners that that's happening. And a bunch of other programming tracks and, and film and media and just general entrepreneurial skill building. I'm excited tho those things will have more to share as the year goes on. But specifically in, in the spring the most, we're doing Hawk Tank. It's on April 6th, 6:00 PM in, in the, the Great Hall Auditorium. We've had some outside mentors who are really excited to be collaborating with us on these student projects. And the, the, the finalists, which I'll be excited to announce, like we've got some really strong contenders and I'm just really excited for that. Matt Harmon: Is it safe to say that Friday night, I'm pretty sure it's Friday night, cuz I watch it on a pretty regular basis as well Friday night, like in that eight, nine o'clock range, are you glued to the TV watching Shark Tank every week? Allison Gilbert: ? I do enjoy my Shark Tank. And our judges, I mean these will be, this will be a modeled after that and the judges that we bring on board I think will also know to be maybe be a little bit more friendly to, to our student projects. But definitely model after our concept, which I can't take credit for, cuz that was, that was a legacy concept. It was a great idea and we're building upon it. Patrick Leahy: But if Matt, if you, if you tune into C N B C, you can watch Shark Tank pretty much on a continuous loop. So you don't have to wait until Friday night Matt Harmon: Almost, almost every day and every night. That's I, Patrick Leahy: And you can learn a ton about business. Honest to God, you can learn a ton about business watching Shark Tank. Matt Harmon: I will close, I will close with this and I'm gonna put the blame, I think on our university president. As I read Allison's bio, which is on the Monmouth website. The last line talks about your chocolate chip cookies, of which I would've thought my co-host would've made sure that I had one to sample going into the interview. So that will have to be round two of when we bring you back, because I am always a fan of assaulted chocolate chip cookie. Patrick Leahy: Your co-host has yet to sample those salted chocolate chip cookies, just so you know. Allison Gilbert: Yes, I'm now I'm having a running list of people that I need to bring these to. So now, now that will happen soon. And I've been on meetings and people say, I've heard about these chocolate chip cookies. I finally went on a meeting the other day and I brought them with me and I said, they're here . So now I just know, I think that's gonna be part of my, I need to, I have a whole list of people I need to have the bring them to and happy to do it. Matt Harmon: Alison, we appreciate you coming on and giving us some time. Welcome to the, to the Monmouth community and the Monmouth campus. Having been hired in July of 22, wish you nothing but success and can't wait to see what you have kind of in, in line for the campus community over the course of this semester and your, and your years coming forward. Allison Gilbert: Thank you so much for having me. I could not be more excited to be here at Monmouth and I'm really excited about all the work we're we're doing together. Matt Harmon: President Lehe, if we're winning a game at halftime, don't come. Patrick Leahy: I got it. I got it, I got Matt Harmon: It. Don't come, won't make Patrick Leahy: That mistake twice. Matt Harmon: I won't make, I I will make sure that if I see you coming in at halftime and we're winning, I'm gonna direct security you out. Thanks for coming on, setting this one up. Really enjoyed the conversation about entrepreneurship and stuff here on campus and look forward to getting back together with our February episode. Patrick Leahy: Yeah, thanks Matt, for everything you're doing here at Monmouth. Matt Harmon: We will say goodbye here from our January episode of our Monmouth Weekly podcast. This will be on all of our podcast platforms. If you ever have a suggestion for a topic or you ever need to reach out to myself or President Lehe about the podcast, feel free to do so either through email or on social media for Alison Gilbert or thanks to her coming by University President Patrick Leahy. I'm faculty member Matt Harmon. We say so long with our Monmouth Weekly podcast, episode 45 in the books. We'll see you next month in February.