Jared Roberts (PelotonU)

Transcription

1 p.1 Jared Roberts (PelotonU) Jared Roberts: Hello Dave. David Cutler: Hey, is this Jared? Jared: Yes, it is, how are you doing? David: I'm doing great, Jared. Thank you so much for speaking with me, I really appreciate it. Jared: Absolutely, any time. David: Well, I'm wondering if you could just tell me a little bit about yourself. Where you grew up? Where you went to high school, and what attracted you to Peloton? Jared: OK, awesome, that's a great question. I was born in east Texas, in a college town called Nacogdoches, which is where SFA is. I moved to Austin whenever I was six-years-old, my dad got a job down here, and we moved. I've lived in Austin ever since then. All through out my high school, middle school, everything, I was home schooled. My parents had seven kids, and they home schooled all of us. Through just being home schooled, and stuff, I played a lot of sports with organizations and with different select teams and what not. It happened in my high school years, I got connected to a non-profit organization called RBI Austin -- that stands for Reviving Baseball in Inter-cities. Through volunteering and playing with them, I was given the privilege to, along with both of actually my roommates now -- it's crazy how it worked out -- we were given the chance to go play on the traveling team. Our coach for the traveling team that we went to a tournament in Dallas, and our coach for that team, his name is Timothy Scott. Tim and Hudson, who is my mentor and Director at Peloton, they were good buddies, and they served together at church. Through that Hudson went to Tim and asked him if he had any guys that didn't know what they wanted to do with college and what not. He was like, "Yeah." He gave them five or six of our names and it just happened that me and my two roommates were three of those guys that met up with Hudson and signed up to try this thing called Peloton. David: That's awesome. So how has it been so far? Jared: It has been amazing. Before this, I didn't plan on going into college. I had no idea what I really wanted to do. If I wasn't in Peloton right now, I'd probably be seeking a minimum wage job at Wal-Mart or something just living with my parents. But I've been given the opportunity to come into Peloton and enhance my skills and learn a lot of new skills. I have a clear vision now of what I want to do, career-wise, and I know who I want

2 p.2 to help along the way. It's just been great all around. The things that we get to learn through this program are amazing. David: Can you explain a little bit about what you want to pursue now, and what kinds of people you said you wanted to help or engage with? Jared: Yeah, absolutely. Before this, I was one of those kids in high school that was just like, "Ah, I can't take the debt of college. I don't know what I want to do. I'm not really that much of a school guy. I love learning, but I don't love school." I was like, "I'm just going to be that guy that moves overseas and nobody ever really sees again." People thought that was kind of a weird idea to do. I still have a passion for the overseas stuff, and so I've realized now, what I really enjoy doing is being creative. Peloton's helped me enhance my creative side. When I moved in, I got plugged into writing poetry and doing a lot of creative writing. I also got plugged in with photography and videography, and just learned that I love a lot of stuff like that. Now moving forward, what I'm studying now is business and entrepreneurship. I want to create businesses that do two primary things, one that they focus on the local economy, because I think it's very important to pour back into the local economy as much as possible and keep money local. That's how we keep our economy moving and going forward. But I also still have a passion and still have a heart for pouring into the economy of developing countries. I want to create businesses that do both that, that pour into the local economy and support it as much as possible, buying stuff local and selling local, but I also want to use funds raised by my company to pour into the economy of developing countries overseas. David: That's great. It sounds very charitable and philanthropic. Are those the kinds of areas where you want to pursue? Jared: Yeah, charitable, nonprofit, just the same thing as going down the road with Peloton. There are a lot of other organizations that do it really well helping out with overseas, and I just want to figure out a way to actually meet one of their needs. Not go to them, and try to give them what I think they want, but actually go to them and ask them what their needs are, and just try to meet that. David: That's great. How has online learning been for you? Sorry, I can't speak. How have you enjoyed online learning, and has it helped you realize your career path? Jared: That's a great question. Coming into it, just starting the first two, three months, I didn't really have a clear idea of what I wanted to do. Online learning, it wasn't too hard for me, being home schooled. It's been harder for some of my other roommates, but they are really catching on now. It wasn't too hard, but it was still a struggle to get used to it. Now, realizing that the disciplines that I can learn during online learning are going to greatly help me with my career path, since I do want to do entrepreneurship, a lot of that is working on my own, I have to be disciplined. I think that online learning is teaching me a lot of discipline, because if I don't sit down and if I don't go to a coffee shop and get

3 p.3 isolated, and actually do my work, there's no body really there to push me. It doesn't really get done. It is hard, and it does require more effort, I would say, on my part, and you can't really kiss up to the teachers, because you can only communicate through . You have to do a really good job to get a good grade. There's no attendance. They don't bump your grade for anything. I have a lot of friends that go to, not a lot, but I have a few that go to UT. They're based on attendance, based on just talking to the teacher, you can get a grade bumped up relatively easy, to be honest. But with me and my roommates and everybody in the program, that's just not how it works. You have to do a great job, or you just don't get a great grade. David: Yeah, I'm wondering, in the terms of the life skills, and the coaching you get, can you speak to what kind of support you receive at Peloton, either academically or socially? Jared: Oh, I think socially is where it's just crazy. We had so many people that love what we're doing, and love the development of us, that if we need help with anything...since I love to write, I really want to enhance my writing. I know that that's a skill set that's going to benefit me down the road, as I go into my career. There's just a number, and [inaudible 07:09] included that are just great awesome writers that are just there to help me out, anytime I need it, but also, they support you in anything you want to do. They really want you to pursue your passions, and so, they try to find those passions, and our passions are all different, for the most part, with all of the students. There are seven of us, and we all really have different passions and what we want to do. They support every single one of those, and they plug you into mentors, and we have our personal tutors that we meet with once a week, that'll help us down that, and help us stay on track with school, keep us accountable. David: I'm also wondering, do you plan to get an Associates degree, or a BA degree, or trying to see how it goes? Jared: Me and my two roommates, after the first two weeks they told us, "We're going to give you all associates, and then you have to make a decision." We said to each, "We're going to stay in here and tough it out together, and go for a Bachelors," because when we've been given an opportunity to get a Bachelor's degree debt free, it's not really an opportunity you can turn down. We're going to stay through Peloton the whole two years. I don't know, because Peloton gives us an option to transfer out and go to a traditional university to try that out. That's a possibility that we're looking into, maybe staying at Peloton, and transferring out. If we do that, we have to take on some loans, and have to go ask for a whole bunch of scholarships. It might be more of a wiser decision to just stay on with Peloton. David: Sure, talk to me a little bit about what you're doing for your work to pay for your experience at Peloton and the online university? Jared: My part time job that the 90 percent comes out of?

4 p.4 David: Yes. Jared: I started with a landscaping company called Cleanscapes. It's in Austin, Texas. Well, it's in North Austin, obviously we're in Austin, Texas, but we started with Cleanscapes, a landscaping company that does commercial landscaping. I started there, and it's all manual labor. I was there for about five or six months. Recently, three weeks ago, I started a new job at a golf course that's right up the road from my house that gives me a lot better hours that I can be flexible, and they let me leave whenever I need to go leave to go study. I just really took that job because of the hours. It's fun working on a golf course. You just drive machines around and talk to golfers, and it's cool. David: You've enjoyed it. How is this instilled in you, maybe a sense of responsibility, or not, that you didn't have it before, but a great sense of responsibility? Do you feel like you're missing out by having to work, and that you don't have the traditional college experience? Or is this an added bonus having to work, and at least, in your case, on the golf course? Jared: I think that it's one of those things that if you would have told me, like one of the four pillars of Peloton is obviously, part time learning, and why, because they looked at a lot of research that showed, you get about 20 hours that really holds. If you had told me that before, working part time and going to school, I would have said, "You're crazy," but coming and participating in it, it really does give you a better sense of the real world, and what it's really going to be like, that it's really going to be a lot of work. It's going to be harder. It just gives you one more drive and dedication. You just become way more responsible a lot faster than most kids our age. David: That's awesome, it sounds like, to me, it's been a great experience for you, not to put words in your mouth. Jared: No, you are putting the right words in my mouth. David: [laughs] Jared, thank you so much. Is there anything that I didn't ask you, that you think I should have asked you? Jared: Let me see, you didn't ask me the embarrassing stories about Hudson, but we can get those covered next time. David: [laughs] I like that, I like that, that's awesome, that's awesome. Well listen, best of luck to you. I'm so glad that you found a place that that you're passionate about. That you found out about what you want to do with your life. I think that's terrific. Jared: All right, thank you. David. Thanks for your time. David: Take care, Jared.

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