Bridging Generations: Insights from a College Podcast Collaboration

A very special episode for Boxing Day, the hosts and students discuss their experiences with college, the value of education, the impact of AI on future job markets, the challenges of home ownership for Generation Z, and the difficulties faced by young adults today compared to previous generations. The discussion highlights diverse perspectives and personal anecdotes, providing a comprehensive view of the current educational landscape and societal challenges.

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We had a great time. You had a great time. I did, I did. You were in your element. And, And we did a podcast with him. I think we went there. I missed a couple, but I think we were with them 4 or 5 times. We went into the classroom. This episode of Bring Back the Porch, brought to you by Bernie Leahy, River Street Realty. Let's get you home. And we're back on the porch again with Bernie Leahy. We have had an interesting experience over the last three months. We got to go back to college. Not like Rodney Dangerfield did, but we had fun. Oh, we had a great time. It, probably. Well, I'm not sure what I expected. And I just don't know what I expected, really. But we went into a classroom with probably almost 20 kids, a little bit over. 20 students, Shawn DeGreeves, creative brand intelligence course. Wow. College. Yeah. Combining art and design students with, business marketing students and mixing them all up and then giving them some ideas, and they ran with it. Did they ever. Yeah. Yeah. So we had a great time. You had a great time. I did. I did. You were in your element and, and we did a podcast with him. I think we went there. I missed a couple, but I think we were with them 4 or 5 times. We went into the classroom. The. I guess the initial start was we needed some help. We needed some ideas in branding and marketing the podcast. And through, Lisa at the Chamber of Commerce, she said, well, you know, there's a course out at the college, that is looking for a guinea pig, which turned out to be you and I and the rest of the team. They they want to work on developing an image, a branding campaign for anybody. So we were the ones that we ended up, meeting with them back in September and, told them what we were all about is bring back the porch, what our ideas are, what we hope to accomplish. And we went away and came back about a month later. And they had some ideas for us. And then we came back again, and they had further refined some of the ideas. And as we were going through it, I said, you know, it'd be fun to do a podcast with these students. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now you. When's the last time you were in college? 1977. Yeah. So for me, it was 1976. And the funny thing was, is that it didn't feel any different than it did when I was at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario, as a broadcast journalism student. And, you know, the kids, I think are just the same as we were when we were students. And I really feel hopeful for the future, having interacted with these students. I don't I don't see anything to worry about there. Well, when when we finished off on Saturday and they presented to us the four groups or five groups, and then we had a little bit of an open forum there. You know, these these students were amazing. Again, I didn't know what I was, what I was thinking about, what what it would be like. I really went in with an open mind. But they have a really good future. Many of them in, in broadcasting or in marketing. They're worried about the same things you and I were worried about back in the 70s. That's never going to change. They will not have any experience that's different than what we did. Everything's different. More expensive. Less expensive. About two years ago, I was watching a football game on a Sunday afternoon. It the bears. It was not the bears. Well you know what it could have been I don't know. And I guy wanted to know about a listing I had. So I was talking to him. He was from away. He was in northern Alberta, I think. And so we got talking about the listing, and then he started talking about the youth of the world and how, you know, they were bad and not good. And, you know, this guy, like at the end of the conversation, I thought, geez, I should just sell out and move to the mountains like it features no good. I was getting phone other McCaig, who's a teacher I know and say Heather, is it that bad like. And I of course just wrote them off and he was being silly. But that's how we felt. But I felt really good going into into the college and talking to these folks and and I thought it was great. And. Yeah. And I think in the future we're going to get to be able to do more stuff with college. They came up with the concept they called Hype It or Swipe It, where we had some ideas and, you know, the idea was, why was this topic worth more, or should we just swipe it as they do, in social media these days? Move on to something else? So I enjoyed it immensely. It was fun. And, I hope that the people who are watching now will enjoy it too. As we go to the Medicine Hat college. For the one, maybe the only edition of Hype or Swipe. Yeah. Hopefully there's many more. Me too. Coming from the backgrounds where I come from, I don't think college is really worth it. I just know so many people that either drop out of high school or just barely scrape through high school, get a diploma. We'll go off, work the rigs and make anywhere from 26 to $46 an hour before overtime, and everything included. This episode of Hype It or Swipe It. Brought to you by McBride's bakery. Known for fresh, sweet treats. Everyone and Melissa that can't help but hype. Whether you're grabbing a coffee and a pastry on your way to work, picking up something special for the weekend, or just craving something warm and comforting. But brides is the place that brings our community together, one bite at a time. Thanks to McBride's bakery for supporting local stories and helping keep the porch conversation going. Well, Dorothy, as you probably have noticed, we're not in Kansas anymore. We have moved out of the back to the Porch Studios and into the Madison, that college where we are working with the students from, Shawn Degrees, a business marketing administration course, and the other art and design students. They have been helping us, try to package our podcast over the last couple of weeks. And we thought, you know what? Let's do a podcast and see what a how it works out. So we have a little segment here that we're going to call Hype or Swipe. We're going to ask our for students, our for guests some questions and just see what, answers. We get more kind of maybe intergenerational play we get in this first segment. We have Kadence Hermanson. Welcome, Kadence. Hello. Thanks for having me. You're welcome. Welcome. Thank you for being here. Because without you, we don't have a show. And Ethan Baker, welcome. Thanks for having me, too. All right. Our first question and we are going to be timing these. So we were going to try and keep them so that we don't get bogged down on it. And this is a big question because it affects everybody in education. Is college worth it. Go. Well I would I'm in the middle of this. I think college is worth it in the long run, because you need to go to school to have a good job in the future. But there's a lot of people who are also getting really good jobs, like in the oil field, you know, and that they can go to that from high school. Like my dad, for example, he dropped out of high school and he just went into the oil field and made a lot of money from that. And, you know, college is really expensive. But that's also the only way that I get through right now, especially with student loans. Like, that's the only way that I can, you know, have my own place. So. So in your opinion, college is worth it. I think it is. Yeah. Ethan. Absolutely worth it. Like, education. It's just been pushing me through all my life. Like, a lot of time. I don't actually know what I want to do with the rest of my life, but being in college is actually kind of directed me in the direction that I want to go and everything like that. So it's not always about education. Sometimes it's just about finding out actually what you want to do with your life. Instead of being educated and stuff like that. Do you have friends who have opted for the other avenue, not going to college and just jumping into the job market? Yeah, the my sister, she went straight from school to working as a police officer. She tried school for a little while, found out that it didn't work for her, and then she has a very nice career now in working as a police officer. So that works for her kids. I don't know anyone that isn't in school. Most of my friends are in college right now, so we're kind of all on the same level. So I think we all think it's worth it because we're going to have, you know, a stable job in the future that pays us money that we can live off of. So but that temptation is there to go for the money instead of the education. Yeah. That's true. Good. All right. Question number two I. Are they going to kill jobs for people like you in the future? Let's start with Ethan. Definitely. I, I'm in the art course. So looking at air and generating generative art and stuff like that is just extremely worrying, especially as it gets better and better and, you know, advances more and more because it's just ending up to the point where it's like, oh, now a computer can do this. So why are you going to want to pay someone to do this when a computer can do it? So, as to losing more and more jobs every, every day, not even week on month or. Yeah, it's just every day they're losing more and more. So AI's definitely going to take over at some point. Cadence. Well, not really, because, you know, there are the human like perspective, you know, so you're a human resource manager. You know, I can't do that for you. You know, you need to have that people part of you which AI doesn't have, you know, like the compassion and empathy. So there are some jobs that you actually need to have that that AI isn't going to take over, but jobs that are more like economical and statistical like that a computer can do, I think it can take over those kind of jobs, but the ones that are more human related? I don't think so. Do using case in that people will revolt against AI and it might just be a passing fad. I mean, it's happening now already and stuff like that, but it's just it's all based on it's people want to pay or people don't want to pay. If people want to be cheap and not pay an artist and they're just going to use AI, people can push back against that as much as they want to, but ultimately it's for what the people who's paying decide. Giddens. Yeah, I think I think AI is just going to keep, like moving forward in the future. I don't think it's ever going to go away. I think it's going to keep expanding, especially because technology's always expanding. So I think it's something that we'll just have to deal with and adjust with as we like. Every other new piece of technology that has come along. Exactly. Question number three will people in generation Z or generation Z and whatever we want to put it, be able to afford a home? I think that's a big question for college students and young people today. Let cadence have the first word. See this is also related to is college worth it? Because I think if after college, if you can find a good job, you might be able to find one that pays a lot of money where you can afford to buy a house. But like me as a college student, you know, I use my student loans to live right now. So, like, that's the only way that I can afford it. Being a college student. But, yeah. So homeownership seems like a impossible dream. Maybe a. Reason. It's not an impossible dream from my point of view. It just it it's one of those ones where it's like instead of, you know, getting to the end of the 20s and being like, oh, I own a home and can start a family and stuff like that. It's being getting to the point where it's like, oh, I'm at the end of my 40s and I have a family and now I can buy a home. It's just, it's. The housing market's going to snap back because there's only so many homes and, you know, only so many people that can sell them. So it's no one's buying them. So eventually. And what does a home look like for you. Yeah. Well it's just somewhere I can live with my family. Just, you know, like. A semi detached, fully detached apartment. I mean, I've always loved the idea of a condo, so that might be a home for me. Yeah. Well, for me, it's like where I feel safe, you know? Like, every time I go back home, it's like. That's where I can finally just relax and chill out. Okay, so. And the fourth question that we have, today is life harder today compared to previous generations? I don't know if we can answer that one, because you don't have experience from what life was like ten, 15, 30 years ago. But I'll let cadence start out well. I would say it's definitely not easy. You know, there's a lot of factors that play into it, like financials and, you know, knowing what you want to do with the rest of your life. So it's hard to find a job that like, pays full time and that you can still do things that you want to do instead of working all the time, and then going to school and having to pay for college like it's a lot. Adulting is hard. It is really hard. I wish I was still 16 again, living at home. Simpler time. Easy. Yeah, it's. It's a lot harder than it used to be, just from what people have told me, I'm sure. But like, finding a job is extremely hard. Like from like listening to my parents go on and stuff like that, they could put out like one application and be like, have a job the next day. But I get to the end of like looking for a job applications. I've sent out like 40 applications, and one person has got back to me to tell me they're not going to hire me. So yeah. No, that happened to me before too. When I first tried starting to find a job when I was 16. I sent applications everywhere and I only got one back that said yes. And that was like after a year of looking. And that is disheartening. Especially when you're trying to start like brand new, you know, and trying to get that experience at such a young age. The old question, you need experience to get the job, but how do I get the job if I don't have the experience? So you need to know. All right. Those are the four questions we have for Ethan and Kadence. And we're just going to shuffle the deck here now and bring in our other two students. We keep hearing the question, Will Gen Z ever be able to afford a house? River Street Realty believes real estate is about service, not sales. We all, buyers and sellers understand their options, navigate the process, and make decisions that fit their needs and their budget. Whether you are a first time buyer or an empty nester looking to downsize, let's get your home. And now we're joined on the set by Sophia Valenzuela and Colby Anderson, who are students in the course as well. And they've been standing off from the side. So they heard Swat, the first two guests had to say, so we'll see if that influences, what their answers look like. And we're going to start again with question number one, Sophia College worth it? I think it is. But I also think that doesn't mean college doesn't need a reform. I feel like there's a lot of benefits to being here, but there's a lot of negatives and there needs to be a relook at help. The system is made because as an art and design student, I find there's some difficulties between getting grades and learning. Learning the medium that we're supposed to be learning, you know. Okay, Colby, now you have a little different because you're a student athlete and that puts a little different flavor on it. Yeah, it definitely is a little bit harder. But, I'd say coming from the backgrounds where I come from, I don't think college is really worth it. Might be a bad take on it, but I just know so many people that either drop out of high school or just barely scrape through high school, get diploma. We'll go off, work the rigs and make anywhere from 26 to $46 an hour before overtime and everything included. So in my opinion, like in today's day and age, where everything's more expensive, it's harder to buy a home. I just really think that, college isn't really the route right now. So you'd be tempted if somebody called you up and said, Colby, I've got a job. Pays $65,000 a year. You'll be gone before the phone connection is ended. Yes, I would say that. Yeah, if it wasn't for sports, probably be down that route, too. So you mentioned negatives. If you can use expand on that a little bit. What do you see as the negatives. Yeah, it's very specific to the program I'm in. But I find the system where, we are graded on, we have four major assignments and not really much other than the four major assignments. And when you're in art, it puts so much pressure in not at not experimenting, not learning, not doing what you need to do, what the professor wants or what looks good. You don't really figure out the trade in that because of the focus on the importance of grades. Like you need to get at the higher number, the biggest number you. I don't really think grades reflect actual learning in any education system. Okay. Question number two. And this would relate I guess, to art and design students. As we saw earlier, I job stealers. Yeah. I do think it is taking artists job, but it's not just going to take artists job. Once I get smarter and more adaptable to things, I think there's a lot more jobs that are on, the way out. And I think, I think I is most definitely like the Canary in the mine, you know, it's showing the cracks in our current system on how things don't work and how profit is becoming more important over people. Do you think that perhaps I might make your job as an artist easier? Not at all. The it is all about intention and the thought with art and design, because if you go into it and you don't don't like overthink it, then what's going to come out is you're going to come up with something that someone else makes, and then someone else makes that. I is just about recreating and taking from things already made, and I don't think it makes anything particularly interesting or dynamic, especially for making a logo for a brand. That logo you get from AI is going to look like someone else's. Colby. Yeah, I think it's very job dependent. If you look at it as a whole, I don't think it's really going to take over. Definitely can make some jobs easier. Make lives easier. But again, like, we're very money hungry right now. We got greedy people in power. And, so when you look at it like that, yes, they can make a product or help you out, where it's cheaper because you can just get AI to do it for you instead of a human doing it. But when it comes down to it, like if you need a plumber in your house, is I going to do that for you? You know, if you need a gardener, who's going to do that for you? So I think it's very job dependent. But as a whole, I don't think it's going to take over. All right. Question number three. Well, the people of your generation, generation Z, be able to afford to buy a home, albeit if you take that job in the oil patch maybe. Yeah, making 65 an hour, hopefully I can, but, I think it's a lot harder now. I think, there's not enough education towards money these days, and especially with how expensive everything is, like coming out of like when you're 18, coming out of high school, like a lot of people should be starting to invest in either TFSA or their HSA. But there's not a lot of knowledge around that and people showing others how to get into those things. So, like for a lot of the generation, I think it is really hard and it's going to be hard for them to afford a house. But done right, and if you do it smartly, I don't see it being impossible. Will an art student be able to afford a house? And maybe you could come up with a masterpiece. You can have a mansion. Well, I think yeah, I think people going into the art, career were definitely going to struggle because the money isn't really there for that. And, you know, the housing crisis, everything is unimaginably, expensive. And the people, like, I can't it's so hard to get into the career like no one's hiring. So how am I supposed to afford a house when I can't get a job. A house or home? A home, yeah. However, what a home look like. I mean, for me, I would love, not a condo or an apartment. Like a separated house with a yard. I could have a dog. That would be nice. But then it seems like a little bit too impossible for me. And where would you hang your hat if you could pick it? I'm a small town boy, so. Really, like. I like the small towns. Like the one I'm from. Jason. Alberta, got about 700 people living in that community, so, Yeah, I think I'd hang out around, small town Alberta. All right. Our fourth topic that we, chose for today is, is life harder today compared to, past generations? Start off with Colby. Yes. I know it's hard for me to say that being a 20 year old who's born in 2005. So go ahead. You're young. But, I don't know. I'd say it's a lot harder. Especially when I hear, like, stories. Even from my dad when he was in college. He was also a student athlete. And Red deer. So, we can compare and contrast on a lot of things, but I'd say, like, when he would go out or anything with a team, it was a lot cheaper to go out with. To live in was a lot cheaper. And so it's just the course loads and everything. Nowadays, like, yeah, it's about the same, but you have so much other stresses as, young adult nowadays than I think you did back then. Severe. Yeah, I think I mean, yeah, I agree with the yes and no. There are definitely aspects that, are harder for the older generations. What they went through. But for nowadays it's, there's very little opportunities. The competition is extremely high. And there is so much anxiety regarding our future, and I'm so certain the older generations dealt with the fear for the future, but with how prevalent technology is, all we hear is about how there is nothing for us in the future. And does that kill your motivation? Me specifically, it used to, I found a kind of way to get through that and be like, hey, well, life's life. I want to live it. Even if I fail. That's okay. It's the point of it, I guess. Yeah. So just keep going. One day after the other. Exactly how do you keep yourself motivated? I don't know, just take it one day at a time. I think that's just kind of been my thing all along. And it's just like everything in your life that happens. Happens for a reason, and you just got to keep your head down and keep going. Move through everything that happens, and it'll all work out in the end. All right. We are now going to bring in our first two guests again. We'll, I guess we'll we'll vote on whether this segment was a success or not. So we'll get cadence and, Ethan back this episode of High Bitter Swipe, it brought to you with the help of gravity sports writer, own bicycle repair shop and sporting goods supplier in the heart of downtown Medicine Hat. Whether you're a lifelong adrenaline junkie or just dipping your toes in, they've got the gear and expertise to set you up right. From mountain biking to snowboarding to disc golf. So next time you need anything from a new deck to a fresh set of bindings, stop by Gravity Sports. Now your your concept for this segment was, hype it or swipe it. And I guess we have to, pass judgment now. So let's start with Ethan. Is this segment hype it or swipe it hype it. It was pretty good. It was pretty fun. Yeah. You liked it. Yeah, I loved it. Okay, kids. I hope it was. Well I think it was very interesting to hear everybody's perspectives and points of view. So I really like this. Okay. Sophia. I of course hype it. It's really nice to be heard and to have this opportunity to connect with and, the older generation. So, yeah. Hype it. Okay. And Colby. I hope it as well. Yeah, I, I had a lot of fun with this. I like comparing ideas, especially with art students, being a business student myself and, especially with, intergenerational talk about, you know, back then versus now. So. Yeah. Well, we didn't get into the grandpa talk. Oh. Oh, God. Grandpa. Come on. But, I was very, I enjoyed this as well. I think we will, hype it and we'll continue. I hope I can do another one or 2 or 10 or whatever, because I enjoy this immensely. Thank you very much. Thank you, thank you. Yes. Yeah. If you like what you heard today and you would like to support us, you can buy us some coffee through the tip sharing site coupon. That's a one time tip sharing site. You can donate money directly to us. It would help us immensely and allow us to continue producing high quality content for everyone to enjoy. So if you wish to support us by buying some coffee, we can enjoy it on the porch.