The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe - 394: Kris Engelstad—Don't Call Her a Philanthropist

Episode Date: July 9, 2024

As trustee of the Engelstad Foundation, Kris has overseen the endowment of over $300 million in scholarships and grants. Kris talks about working as a maid in her father's hotel on the Las Vegas strip, what she learned from watching him build several Nevada landmarks, and what it's like to manage a billion-dollar foundation.

Hey, it's the way I heard it, specifically episode number 394. This one was almost called, for God's sake, flush the toilet. Because it was just a terrific observation by Chris Inglestat, today's guest, who worked as a maid once upon a time for her dad in Las Vegas. You said Inglestat? I believe it's Engelstadt, isn't it? Engelstadt. You know what I said? I thought you said Inglestadt, which sounded.

weird to me that is interesting maybe i was thinking of laura ingalls from little house on the prairie well i'll tell you what the last thing i want to do is mispronounce chris's last name because chris anglestat has turned out to not just become a friend but become a real supporter of the microwworks foundation yeah and from her days when she used to work as a maid in las vegas which by the way flush the toilet folks i mean if you're staying in a hotel room You know, this is one of those basic things you can do. Just flush the toilet so the maid doesn't have to. It's not too much to ask.

The bar is super low. Very low. Very low. You know, it doesn't take a lot to make Chris happy. At least it didn't back in those days. Today, her standards have evolved a bit. And she is currently in charge of roughly a billion dollars. Right.

The Engelstadt Foundation. Well done. Has been incredibly generous, not just with microworks, but with a lot of organizations who are doing incredible work in Nevada and North Dakota in particular, but some other places as well. And the reason I thought you guys might like to hear from her is because, you know, I don't have a lot of billionaires in my life, especially ones who care this much about our country, who care about our education system, who share my concerns for what's going

on with our workforce, and who has actually put their money where their mouth is. Chris and I are going to talk a little bit about this project in Nevada that she made happen with microworks and a high school there called Western, where we finally got our work ethic curriculum. That's the other reason, Chuck, that I wanted her on. I think what she helped us do can be duplicated, dare I say, from C to shining C. Yes, certainly all across America. This would be a great thing to put in high schools and, you know, entry-level colleges, I would say. I think so, too. I'll let her speak for herself.

It's not called, for God's sake, flush the toilet, although she really wants you to. It's called don't call her a philanthropist because she doesn't see herself that way, which is interesting. She's a steward. Correct. A custodian. And you know what else she is? She's a girl who loved her mom and dad a lot and takes their legacy very seriously and looks after the money that they put in her care. as best as she can imagine they would.

I think it speaks to her integrity. I think you're going to like her a lot. And without any further ado, actually, you know what, there is going to be a little adieu. A little more ado? There's going to be a little more ado. But Chris Engelstad is coming up right after this. D do do do do do do do do.

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And? Thank you for doing this, by the way. Thanks for asking me. Well, for the record, you're a, I'm going to call her a non-traditional guest. Hmm. Why? Well, because you're singular in your uniqueness. We've had documentaries and authors and we've had dirty jobbers and we've had a lot of different people on here.

But I wanted to talk to you candidly because I, I'm kind of envious about the position you're in, but mostly I'm just curious. You know, by way of backstory, you've been very generous with the MicroWorks Foundation. And people should probably know how this happened, at least from my perspective. I got a phone call. You're spelling stalker? Not yet. Not yet, but a boy can dream.

But actually, that's funny you say that because this office got a call from Andre Agassi. And he said to me, they don't believe. who I am. I didn't. I didn't. He had to get through, like, I don't know, he had to get through Ashley or was ever answering the phones, and then Mary was like, no, this is not, this is, because I have a lot of friends who would yank my chain. So clearly one of them is impersonating Andre Agassiz. And he calls, and we finally get on the line, and he introduces you to me and tells me this completely unbelievable story. But I'd like to hear it from you, actually. You called Andre to somehow find me.

I became a stalker. Yeah, why? So, well, a few reasons. I think it just all came together at the same time. I'd been very disillusioned with a lot of educational things that we've been doing. Looking for other pathways. It just so happened I'm listening to a podcast. You're on the podcast.

I was familiar with you and what you did, but not fully. This podcast or I was a guest on somebody's? You were a guest on Megan Kelly's. Ah, your taste is excellent. So I listened to you and thought, check, check and check. Everything you're saying, exactly what I think. And so now how to find you. So I thought, who do I know who might know people?

Oh, Andre. So I called him and he said, do you think all famous people know each other? And I said, well, I'm calling you and I bet you find him. He said, fair enough, fine. And so he said, I don't, but I can get somebody who probably does. And so another round of phone tag and said that they didn't believe who he was. He finally gets to you. And he said, he'll talk to the two of us together at first.

And I said, okay. And so I remember being on the Zoom. And I've known Andre a long time and know him pretty well. And I watched him with you. And I thought, should I be in the room? Because there's a lot of bromance going here. And I can tell he's very enamored with what you're saying. And we hung up and I was more convinced than ever I wanted to do something.

And Andre called me right away. And he said, what about that voice? And I said, go home to your wife. No, it's getting weird. Stop talking to me. But I knew talking to you that it might be a pathway to do. do something different. And what I had seen traditionally doesn't work. Well, thanks. I'm glad he reached out. It was a funny call. He's clearly Andre. I mean, you can't impersonate Andre on a Zoom call. He's

clearly him. You're clearly you. You've been supporting his foundation for how long? Well, gosh, 20 years maybe. Wow. Something like that. And so people understand he does some pretty great work in Nevada. Yep. That's his home. Although he lived not far from where I live now once upon a time. the Bay Area. I think he's had numerous homes. But he's a hometown boy.

Yeah. And so, you know, the whole town loves him. He's the poster kid for our city. And he's a great ambassador for our city. And so where he could have made his money and walked away and lived his life, he felt a need to come back and do something about education. And this is from a guy who didn't finish high school. Mary Steffie, who also didn't finish high school.

because their parents determined they were going to play professional sports. But they decided both of them that it was important to do something educationally. And so I just thought, you don't have to do this. The fact you want to do it and you put so much of your time into it, I'm in. I'm in. Who did you call to introduce you to Andre? How did I do? I didn't.

I think he asked to meet me. That sounds bad. We had a mutual friend, and I think he knew I was interested in working in that space, and at the time he had his school, I was invited to take a tour of the school with him. And then we started going to dinner, and it's just sort of where it ended up. I don't want to get too bogged down in the details, but I'm so interested always in the grout, the connective tissues and the way people wind up coming together and how people wind up learning that they might share a thing in common.

You know, here you're listening to Megan Kelly. I happen to be on. People start to triangulate. But, you know, Andre decided to set up his foundation for his own reasons. I did the same. You know, we all take different paths. Your path is the most interesting to me because it's a truly Forrest Gumpian. It's a very crooked line.

To be a woman in charge of about a billion dollars, that her parents left to her, not just to distribute willy-nilly, but they gave you parameters, they had a plan, and you are now the custodian of all of that. So before we just kind of get into how you think about the business of running a foundation, tell me about your dad and your mom and what it was like to grow up in a family like that. I'm an only child.

My mother's from German farmers, and my dad's from a Norwegian family, so they were super warm and fuzzy. But they really believed in work. That was the common denominator. It was work. And so I remember I was raised, I wanted for nothing.

I was raised around people who had a lot. And... What state? Las Vegas. So it started in Vegas? Well, my dad, we came from North Dakota, Grand Forks, North Dakota, where all my family still is.

My dad was a builder. I won't even call him a contractor then. He was a builder. And the building season is pretty short in North Dakota. Like three weeks. So if he came through Las Vegas on my parents' honeymoon and he just saw a land and thought and loved the son and thought, if I'm going anywhere, I'm going there.

This is mid-50s... This is 1954. I'm born in 58. He comes out, leaves my mother and I with my grandparents, grandparents and he goes out and builds our house and sends for us and my uncle drives us out with the U-Haul. And that's where I was raised. I mean, my life was, I was on a bicycle and in my bathing suit and jumping in pools and didn't know any different from anything. Was there money when you were a kid?

Mm-hmm. There was money. But it was made very clear to me. This sounds horrible. It was made very clear to me. It wasn't mine. Mm-hmm. It was his. It was my mother's. And if I'm lucky, I get to get some benefits from it, but it's not mine. And then I just never thought it would be mine. I thought, okay, I understand. It's not. Fair enough. So when I'm sitting around at the table with them and my friends, I'm 13, and my friends are starting to talk about their cars and what they're going to drive, and I pipe in with what I want. And my dad just starts to laugh. He's like, that's great. He goes, how are you going to pay for it? I'm like, pay for it. And he said, yeah. So at the time he had his first motel you'd hit coming from California at the strip. And he said, you can be a maid.

And I said, okay. And so my summers 13, 14, 15, 16, I was a maid. I had a full shift. I can still, believe me, I can turn over a room in about 12 minutes. I make a corner like you cannot believe. Wait, but I have to ask because now you stay in some pretty great hotel. Do you still, when you walk into a hotel room, is your first perspective that of the maid? Yes, and I'm very nice to the maids in the room.

I'm super nice because it's not a fun job. Oh, my God. So I was really proud of myself, took me three summers to save up $3,500, and I bought a brand new Toyota Corolla, and I loved that brown car, loved it, loved it. and when the car gets delivered, I'm super pumped, and I go out and on the seat of the car is my $3,500 dollars. And I had a little, at that time, a little passbook for a savings account. And he had it shoved in the envelope with it and said,

come and see me tomorrow. We're going to talk about what you're going to do with that. And I said, okay, and he said, you know, had you not worked, this wouldn't be here. And you're how old again? 16? I'm 16. Back to the actual job. for a minute. You know, you can always tell when I'm out to dinner with people who waited tables,

I can always tell. And what don't people know about the business of a hotel maid that they should know? Not just maids. I think I worked every position from the front desk and sales and the cage. And I think they don't understand how hard service is. And especially when maids are doing things, these are the people you don't see. And I know you want to have. have fun and not pick up after yourself as you do at home. But there is some consideration to not treating people poorly. And I don't think people think about that often enough. The bed didn't make itself. These things didn't happen on their own. You don't have to call and demand things. What can people do as guests in rooms that would make the job of a maid a little simpler,

a little more humane, I mean, just basic things? Oh, well, I mean, flush your toilet. There you go. Oh, man. There you go. That would be a nice. Well, that's about where you're at. Could you flush your toilet would be awesome. I'm not asking a whole lot. And I'm going to get in and out of your room as fast as I can, too. Believe me. I read a horrifying report.

I think I did a story once on the condition of rooms in various hotels vis-a-be black light, right? So people going with a black light, and you would think that the Motel 6 is, and maybe the holiday it expresses would be at the low end of the most disappointing things that that black light could reveal. And that maybe as you get into a better class of hotels,

Ritzes and Four Seasons and whatnot, you'd see just a heightened level of civilization. Yes. Vis-a-vis flush toilets, et cetera. Yeah, yeah. Well, but that's not true. No. Because the time you spend costs money.

And so when you're a maid and you get your chart and you have either stayovers or changeovers. Stayovers take you less time because you're not changing out the linens unless they request it. You're not changing those things out unless you're asked. Changeovers, you're doing it, but you're never changing out those duvets and those comforters.

Those things go out maybe once or twice a year. Yeah, sorry. And so, yeah, I do stay in nice hotels now. I do not like to lay on top of those. Yeah, and the remote control. Yeah, no thanks. Yeah. No.

Well, this black light, and forgive me, I didn't think we were going to go here, but I do feel the need, because my listeners expect it. The fluids that the black light can reveal. Yes. All right. Now, these are universal. I mean, we're all just made the way we are, and we all produce the same sorts of things. But it's the quantity of the fluids and their location that varies so dramatically. And the point I'm trying to make is, while you would think it'd be a full-on bacchanalia in a motel six, right?

it's not, but it is in the four seasons. Again, you know what I'm talking about, Chuck, these fluids. I don't want to know. No, Chuck doesn't know what you're saying. I don't, yeah, can you spell it out to me like I'm a small child, Mike? All right, Chuck. Well, when a man and a woman love each other very much, they get together sometimes in strange rooms where they pay for, by the day, sometimes by the hour.

Oh, okay. Right. Now, that which is left behind can be identified with the help of a black light. All right. All right. And the location of those fluids. in a four seasons are far more esoteric and ambitious than in a motel six. And I would love to get your take on why you think that might be.

I have no idea. However, I will tell you that the real hazard, at least if you're a maid in Las Vegas, I would imagine other cities, people come to Las Vegas, they're depressed, they take their money out, and they have a really good time, and that's how the maid gets to find them. And that is not uncommon at all. I would think probably every maid out there who's worked for any length of time has. Has stumbled across a...

You just have. Yeah. It's just what people do. They come and have one big last hurrah. Yeah. And then... Check please. Don't answer their door.

Until the maid comes in. Until the maid comes and can't quite get that bathroom door open enough. And then, oh. Oh, then it's open. Oh, and now I have to go home for the day because I can't think. Because suddenly that unflushed toilet ain't so bad. I'll take it. I'll take the toilet.

Don't even care. That thing in the tub, that's not what I wanted to see. Did that happen to you? Yeah. Yeah. More than once? Yeah. Oh, wow.

More than three times? Yeah. Holy cow, what's the number? I'm going to say probably four. And I'm going to count the one where I was in the kitchen. And we heard this pukongong. And the top of the ceiling tile did this. And we thought, kind of an air handler or what?

What's happening? Oh, no. And call maintenance, they go up and they go, nope. Came off of the 17th floor and I like, okay. Good grief. But I mean, people in the pits of despair, right? They don't know what they're thinking, doing, or whatever their issue is. And they don't think beyond that.

You're not going to think about the person who's going to come and find them. Wow. That's the first thing I would think about. Well, because you're not that depressed, right? You're not depressed yet. You're not there where you just, you can't think beyond anything but that. So I got that going for me. There you go.

That's nice. The day's looking up. Yeah, you have flush. You always flush. You know, I mean, double flush sometimes. With a courtesy flush. Oh, yeah. Might take chances.

You're not an animal. I hope so. We're not animals. I love that. I belabor the point only because to be 16, to have discovered four suicides, to have cleaned up, God knows how much. Now, your dad knows this is going to happen.

because he's a man of the world. Yep. And so he's not babying his little girl. He's not babying his little girl at all. In fact, I was, I think I was his little buddy. I was somebody who accompanied him. I was on construction sites with him, and I would travel with him on the weekends,

and I think he wanted to prepare me for the world. And he knew they weren't going to be around forever, and what am I going to do? And he would say to me often, my dad wasn't a very prolific guy as far as how he spoke. But he would say to me, you're a mark. You're going to be a mark.

Yeah. And if you're going to look for somebody who's going to provide for you like I have and give you a home like I have and your lifestyle I have, you're always going to be disappointed because it doesn't happen. This is an anomaly.

So you better be happy, you better be self-sufficient, you better know how to do that. There was no complaining in my house. There was none of that. I mean, even when my dad was sick, when I was sick, you just didn't sit around and talk about it. You get with it. Nobody cares.

Well, like, what am I going to do about it? Right. That's sad, but I don't know what I can do for you with that. What are you going to do about it? D-DU-DU-DU-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-M. Well, people are still raving, I tell you, about my mother's performance in the latest Pure Talk commercial. and if you haven't seen it, I encourage you to give it a look on my Facebook page and read the comments. They're hysterical.

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I like Ralph. You know, I mean, it's great to have the clear-eyed understanding. that you want your kid to pay some semblance of dues, but the managing of the expectations is also great. I mean, to say straight up, you're a target. Yeah. People are going to know this. And so gird your loins, as it were, prepare yourself.

Be really careful. Were you? Not always. I wished I was. I wish I'd listened to him more. I wish I'd really understood what he was trying to say to me sometimes. Yeah. But, you know, he was my dad.

I didn't think everything was a pearl that he was passing on to me. And I thought, you don't know. You don't know, Dad. He knew. Did he build the casinos? That's how he started everything, because he was a builder. He bought the land.

The land was center of the strip across from Caesars. Land, land, land. And he bought a small motel, tore it up, built a hotel, did the same thing with, he did the Las Vegas Speedway in town, couldn't care less about racing. decided it was a niche that was missing, so built it.

His whole thing was just building. He was a builder. That's what he did. So he didn't own the casino. He owned it. Oh, he owned it. He was a sole operator in the town. Yeah.

Well, I mean, not to put too fine a point on it, but that's a bit more than a builder. When I was growing up, people would say, what does your dad do, and I didn't know what to say. I remember I'd said it to my mother. I said, well, I don't know what I'm supposed to. to say to that. She goes, he's self-employed. I said, well, that doesn't answer anything. And so I'd say to him, what do you do? I do things. Don't worry. Okay, but can you be specific? Can I give some,

like this guy's dad's, this? And can you give me an answer? Look around you. I built this. This is what we do. Figure it out. Okay. Thanks for the clarity. So what do you do? I mean, I think I know, but I mean, what's your business cards say? I don't have business cards. I do have my assistance in my purse, though. If you want something, I'll give you hers. Apple's not too far from the tree.

I don't know what. You know what? That's interesting because I dislike the word philanthropist. I think it's a really weird. It sounds to me like ladies, turn of the century in New York, who went to the orphanages and handed out, I don't know, it seems weird to me. A little haughty, maybe.

A bit. I think nobody would understand this either, but I think the most accurate thing I do is I'm a steward. I didn't make this money. I watched it happen. My dad passed away. My mother had no interest and didn't know how to do it. And so I knew that my job would be to grow it. Hold on. Your dad passed away. He was relatively young. 72. He's been gone 22 years. Lung cancer. Lung cancer. Quick. Really pretty fast, yeah. Faster than he expected, for sure.

Tell me. He was diagnosed, and as I had described to you before, he was a guy who, he was a real alpha. He took charge. He fixed it. If you had a problem, he can make it go away. And then he gets a diagnosis, and he thought, okay, no problem, I got this. And went along his way, and things weren't going as well as he had experienced. expected. By the time he was available to fly around and try different trials, he wasn't eligible.

And so by the time, we fly down to Texas, they opened him up, they closed him, and said to all of us, just take him home. And that was three weeks later he died. And so it wasn't until those final three weeks. He absolutely thought he was going to live. And I saw the most pissed off human being because he just couldn't believe that this is what was happening. He couldn't believe. He couldn't fix this. That's a builder. That's a guy who spent his life knowing that the solution to the problem would involve a saw or a level or a tool-driven, tangible thing, a scalpel in this case.

So he skipped over fear and went straight to indignation and anger. He was just furious. He was absolutely furious. And my mother is in shock. My mother's primarily just interested in being his caretaker and charting all his medicines. And does he sleep at night and what can she do? And so there's three weeks of a flurry of people coming into the house of planning. How do we get rid of all the real estate?

How do we get rid of the warehouses? And he had spoken about selling one of the hotels at one point and then became very serious. about not telling anybody he was sick because then they would take the price down of the property. Nobody could say anything. And he did do enough. He told me a few things, a few people that would be calling me as soon as he died

and what they would want. And I said, okay, and sure enough, exactly the people he told me called me maybe a day or two after he died. And, hey, you know that picture? And, you know, I'm like, yeah, I'm giving it to my son. Wow. Yeah, and I would have known.

I would have let them buy it. I didn't know the value of it. Yeah. So did that jaundice you? I mean, did it make you feel angry or sad? Both. Because my mom was a wreck, and I am an only child. And I think the reason I look back and think the reason he had me with him all those times is people paid me very little attention.

which was really a blessing because I was with him all the time in meetings and I would just sit and I'd listen and I'd watch and I'd hear everybody and I'd watch the guy who was sitting there who couldn't be further up my dad rear end

and then I'd watch him walk out and I'd hear how he spoke to the assistance out front and how horrible he was and I just kind of cataloged it was like oh now I know who you are Yeah. I know exactly who you are.

He's the guy who doesn't flush the toilet in the room. He's the guy who snaps his fingers at the waitress. And what's the word? Unctious. And he's talking to a guy that my dad would never allow anybody in the hotel to call him Mr. Engelstead. He was Ralph. In fact, every night he'd go and sit at the bar, have his usual drink. What was that?

Well, he called it a VD. It was a vodka and Diet Coke. But he loved order of VD and watched people make a face. And I go, why do you do that? You know what you're doing. Because I'm Ralph Ingleston. Because I know what I'm saying, and I can't. So we're sitting there and there's cigarette butt.

And my dad gets up. And my dad is, there's a little shovel and things and the little sweeper. And he's sweeping it up. And one of the porters came and saw him. Oh, oh, oh, don't do that. He goes, no. He goes, my job. Not a problem.

I can do it. So he just, that's what he did. And so it never occurred to me that you lived. differently. So I was angry. I was angry at cancer. I was angry at him. I was angry at the situation. And then I think it was a week between when he died and we buried him. And I don't think I actually grieved for about a year. I think I was just in auto because there were so much going on. So many things to settle. So many things to try to wrap my hands around as well as take care of my mother, that I don't think I really sat and had a good cry for about a year.

Had the foundation already been formed when he died? On paper. It was very loose on paper. Had it been funded? We left the directives when we were selling these assets, the assets were to go into the foundation, anything he hadn't carved out for anybody. So I knew where it was going, and I knew what it was supposed to do. And I obviously had a sense of his own sensibilities, what he would or would not fund. Now, I will say that as the years have gone on, that's changed. I think giving money away has changed and what the expectations are has changed. If he saw the world we were in now,

he might change some of his ideas too. You know, I could see some needs, especially in our city, and so that's sort of where we went and what we're doing with it. Here's why I like you. Andre makes the introduction. I hop on the phone and now I realize, okay, it's Chris Engelstadt and there's a fair amount of money and she would like to help micro works and that's nice. And you didn't really ask me a lot about the foundation. You asked me about my granddad. And you kind of kept at it the way I'm keeping it you now. And I liked that because, you know, this foundation, modest though,

is a tribute to him. And so is dirty jobs. But the weight of it, it's not heavy on me, but the older I get, the more I realize, oh, I'm doing that because of this. And so cause and symptoms. So here you are. Now, we've given away maybe $10 million in work ethic scholarships. You're up to around like 300 million or something like that. And that's just one area. You've got buckets all over the place. My point is, it seems intensely complicated and ever-changing. But in the end, how do you feel the weight of your dad and his wishes? And how do you weigh and measure ultimately the people you decide to assist?

I don't feel a weight. I don't. I do feel a responsibility because I watched him every single day. He was the guy who, if I looked at my watch, I knew exactly where he was because that's what he did that time of day. I never remember him being sick. I never remember him staying home. And so, you know, those things count. And yes, he was successful.

But there were many years when he first came to town where it was a struggle to make a payroll. I got to pay these guys. What am I going to do? I'm just cognizant of what that was. And I think he had the same feeling about his dad. my dad at one point got very heavily into cars and he had 780 when he died. I know. That's a few.

That must have been an awfully big garage. Well, here's his problem is that he never had a hobby. So he found a truck that reminded him of what his dad drove as a salesman of Ford and it had, you know, the wood in the back. And my dad bought one and rehabbed the whole thing. and then of course, well, then I need all the trucks like this. And, well, then if I'm going to do that, I'm going to have to have guys to work on it. And, well, if I'm going to do that, I have to have a guy to go to Europe and buy all the parts.

Oh, well, I have to have a museum now. It's like, do you do anything that's just for fun? Yeah. And so when he passed, we sold everything except we kept that Model T, which is in my mom's garage now. But he had that feeling about his dad. And so I don't think it really matters what the dog is. amount is, is what you watch them do, for me, that was the inspiring part of, I think for me, the worst sin is complacency. And so if you're going to sit and just do nothing, I don't get the

point. I just don't get it. If you're a pain in the ass about it, great. If you make your feelings known, fine. If you vote with your dollar, fine. But to have no thoughts and no opinions, not to do anything, I don't get it. And I find that I'm surrounded by a lot of that, and I don't understand it. I don't know if it's a theory, but I think about that. Jagged little pills are a lot more interesting than those smooth, rounded suppositories. Do we keep going to toilet? I'm sorry.

But when I think of retirement, and I think about the way that's been baked into the path that most people sort of assume they're going to take the way it's been positioned as a reward and as a wishful fulfillment. You know, I think it's completely wrong. I think it's wrecking people's lives long before they get to the place where they could retire. Your dad didn't sound like a guy who had ever contemplated it.

He could never. He could never. And his brother loved to boat and liked to do that. My dad thought it was a colossal waste of time. colossal waste of time. Why are you doing that? I don't know, because it brings him joy, happiness. He'd just be like, yeah. He didn't understand it.

It didn't. So, I mean, for him, no, he was never going to stop working. I think when you come from North Dakota and you come from these people, that is the way it is. And for me, look, since I've been doing this really since I was 13 in one way or another, I can't imagine what that would look like. like. My kids are both involved now. I've got a 30-year-old son and a 27-year-old daughter. I met them. Terrific people. Thank you. And I think they kind of look at me like, hey, TikTok, lady, when's this going to end? And I think, okay, I might wind it down a bit for me

and not be there every day, but I just can't imagine I'm going to stay home and do what? I want to ask you broadly about the world of philanthropy, and I know you don't love the word, but I sat next to you not long ago at a dinner. And we were in a good-sized room, and there were a lot of people in that room with a lot of money, and they had all gathered because they wanted to uplift some ideas

and some organizations. Let's stand together. It's not a secret. They've supported us, and I go there, and I think I even gave something approaching a speech that evening. You did. Something.

Spoke about a poem. Oh, right. That's what you did. Yeah. See, I paid attention. Which poem, Mike? It was two tramps in mud time. Oh, you love that one.

I do love that poem a lot because it marries vocation and avocation. That to me is a big chunk of whatever the American dream means to me, you know. But my question is sitting there with all these quasi-like-minded bloody do-gooters who have access to an awful lot of dough. How do you think about? really using this as wisely as you can. And how was the Ingolstadt Foundation targeted and focused today? Did your dad leave parameters or did you get some leeway to? He really didn't leave much in the way of parameters. I think he trusted my mother and I that we knew him and knew his heart and that we would steward it the best way that we could. But we didn't get any

marching orders. I mean, things were happening quickly. So that's just how we had to be. We had to to do things. I think how it's changed for me, though, is that for a very long time, I didn't experience any joy whatsoever in handing out any gifts. Even if I thought they were going to a good cause, there was something about writing the check and sending it out that I just thought, I mean, it feels almost like monopoly money at some point. You go, I know I did something good, but I don't feel it at all. And so I decided at that point I had to do it a little differently. And I'm more interested in projects and things that I can see that we can maybe do something to change a system. We can do something to fix something at a root level that is broken. Otherwise, I feel like I'm just

band-aiding. And it doesn't feel like I'm getting anything done. And here's your check. And I'll see you again next year because you're going to have the same problem next year. We fixed nothing. Well, are you sick of it yet? Are you sick of AI hogging up all the headlines and sucking up all the bandwidth? You find yourself wishing we lived in a simpler time? Do you miss a rotary phone? Well, get over it. The genie is out of the bottle. The poop is out of the goose, I'm afraid. AI is here to stay. And every business in the country is asking themselves, the same question. How do we make it work for us? Well, the answer to that question varies, but you'll find it in a free guide that you can get right now at netsuite.com slash Mike. It's

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It's filled with super useful information, and again, it's free at netsuite.com. That's netsuite.com. I don't want to presume to put you on some sort of metaphorical couch. But could that feeling have anything to do with the fact that the $3,500 wasn't left on the seat of the corolla for the people that you're helping? In other words, where's their made story? What did you see them do to earn it? Maybe I'm saying it the wrong way. You have to do your diligence, obviously,

but you don't have that personal. I mean, it's just interesting to me. I think some of them saw me growing up and felt sorry for me because, well, they were all having, they were going to the lake and they had, I was going to work with my dad because I couldn't drive yet and cleaning. But, God, you know, I look back on, I could point to all kinds of them that have had stories

and things happen, that they were just ill-equipped to bounce back from at all. Yeah. They just couldn't. And I think some of it goes back to that. So what do you do now to make the gift giving a little more joyful on your part and hopefully, you know, more impactful on the recipient? Well, I do things that I think I'm interested in replicating. So I do things that I think could be taken nationally.

One of them is a place that we, we've named after my mother called Betty's Village. And it is housing for people with Down syndrome primarily. But disabilities. And so, you know, they're living longer and longer and their parents can't keep them. And it really resembles a college quad. It's got a pool and a park and a rec room and all these brightly colored buildings that they get to come and live with their friends.

didn't get to see their friends before. They'd go home and sit on the couch on a Friday, get picked up by the bus on Monday. Now they all hang and they have friends. I think their life is better. I have a cousin who has a son, at my son's age, with Down syndrome. And they live in North Dakota.

There is no such facility up there. So I look at that and think, okay, it's an idea. We're building Betty's two now because there's such a demand for it. There's such a waiting list. And I think, okay, we could take that. We could move that.

We can move it to another community. I think that with the program you and I are doing. I think we'll see what this little experiment looks like. And if it works, I don't know why we couldn't roll it out, whether it's national, it's another school in Vegas, whichever it is. I just think there are things that could be done rather than handing somebody a check. I think it somehow loses meaning. Just by way of exposition, what Chris is talking about is,

is a work ethic curriculum that we've had in the works here for a couple of years based on that sweat pledge hanging on the wall that finally got finished and we got it into some trade schools. But we really had a difficult time getting it into big public high schools. As you may have noticed, you know, there's boards and there's bureaucracies and layers upon layers of stuff. Right. But something really great happened in Clark County at a high school called West. Western, where they were open to the idea of taking this curriculum, but it was your idea to say, let's attach a very specific gift to it. So the kids in this class, something like 750 kids. Right. So the top 50 or maybe 100. They've had 80 families that came to the initial meeting

and said they're interested. Now, I think that'll end up being 50. Just at the end of four years, you have some fallouts and life happens. Right. But I think if we end up with 50 at the end, I think that's success. Yeah. It's real simple because with your help, I don't know what the ultimate amount will be, but it looks like between $4 and $5 million attached for the top 50, the top people who get through the program.

And that's a free ride to any trade school in the country. Yes. So not a university, a trade school. Why does that matter to you? Well, again, I guess because my dad was a builder. He did go to college, but he was a builder. And the way that he got to college was a scholarship. He was loading box cars on a railroad on the summers.

And there happened to be a professor that also was doing that and starts talking to my dad. He goes, you're a smart guy. Why aren't you going at school? And my dad said, I can't afford that. He said, get a scholarship. My dad had never heard the word. So, you know, I play hockey. Good, get a hockey scholarship.

And he did. And it was something I heard about all the time as to what he thought made a difference in his life. So when I started listening to what you did, I contacted a friend in Las Vegas who does a lot of educational work. And I just said, tell me the worst performing high school. And she didn't hesitate Western. It's one of the oldest ones, one of the originals. It's in kind of the center of townish. The difference is now is that the principal is a really dynamic guy.

And he gets his kids, he understands them, he was them. And so they have a huge dropout rate. And because we're such a transient town, you don't keep track of really everybody. Sometimes they just don't come back to school and you don't know what happened. Right. So I think he was so open. to saying there's another pathway to be successful. And it's also the challenge in our town is there's so many jobs that pay cash.

So if I want to go be a valet parker, I do some things. And I've been failed by the school system. So I don't think I'm very smart. I don't think I understand things. But I can go out here and make some cash. You're going to tell me I need to do how many more years of what? And I don't get it. But this is something you can do.

get. This is something you can actively work on and you can do. And the point I try to sell to all of them is you have the ability to change your family tree. You're too young. You don't understand what that is. But you have the ability to show the other people coming up what you can do. There are other pathways to doing something to make you successful. And so I think it's something that's going to resonate. And it's something that resonates with the parents for sure. Well, resonates with us. I can tell you that because to your point, it is something that could be duplicative. I've been noisy as I can about it, and we've heard from other people in other states who are in your position, not quite in your position, but who, you know, people ought to understand. When you run

a foundation like yours, you're legally bound to disgorge a percentage of the assets every year. Yep. To do that thoughtfully, I will say, is a challenge. If I wanted to, you. If I wanted to, just write checks, we could. But again, what am I doing? Am I doing more harm than good? Am I accomplishing anything? Or do I really need to do some due diligence, figure out who somebody is, what this does or does not mean for them? And then I can give it in a thoughtful manner, but that takes time to really do the work. And that's why, thank God, my daughter is all over it. She is on the ground running. And like in a diligence way, looking for the right opportunity? She is my kid.

And she takes things very seriously. And really she thinks with her heart. And she wants to help people and fix things. So what other initiatives really have your focus right now? And again, I'm talking broadly. Is it education? Is it health care? And are you mostly staying in Nevada and North Dakota?

Or are you expanding geographically? We have been across. the country, we are now doing this. We're shrinking it back because what we're doing is we're taking a hard reset for this year and into probably the first quarter of next year. If I want my kids to be part of this and to really have a legacy piece in this and to feel it and to pass it onto theirs and theirs, they've got to find the thing that lights them up. It may not be education. It might be environmental. I don't know what it'll be, but we need to take a second for everyone to think about it and come back and say, this is how I want to do it. Fine. There's more than one way to do this. We can do this.

And so we do stick to Las Vegas a lot more because it's my backyard. I know it. I understand it. I'm not opposed to going elsewhere. I just found when we were outside of Las Vegas, it was much harder to try to keep an eye on it or to figure out what was really going on. Because it's such a unique place with such unique challenges. You mentioned it's transient. But it's so much more than, I mean, it's so rooted in tourism. Yep. So hot.

Yep. I mean, it really, it's like a crucible in some ways. It will shape you. Or you just pry and wine a lot, which is my go-to. Yeah. So back to the college thing, there's been some press. I saw your name pop up recently. Yeah.

In vain, I think. Yeah, you know, I mean, it's funny. I wrote something recently, not really an open letter, but there was such dissatisfaction among wealthy donors to the Ivy League, to the point where they're affirmatively withholding. I'm right there with them. Hundreds of millions of dollars, affirmatively withholding it. And I'm like going, you know, hey fellas, is that money really burning a hole in your pocket? I mean, because we're doing another thing.

Isn't it funny how nobody burns a flag at a trade school? Isn't it weird how you don't see a lot of protests at the, you know, Lincoln Electric or plumbing schools and whatnot? Well, it's the same reason I explain to people about the people in the Midwest. My family, they're farmers or mechanics. We have some nurses, but they get up at 4.30 in the morning, and they go out and they work hard. And they come in well past the time the sun goes down, and they care about, can they pay their mortgage, are their kids healthy? Can they afford insurance? Can they take their vacation a year?

And what your pronouns are doesn't ever enter their heads. And it's not that they're haters. It's not, they'll address you any way you like. But it's not in their top 20 or 30 things that are important to them because they're just trying to have a family. That's the difference. And so I think the further you get out from there to the coastlines, people look at someone in the Midwest.

Maybe as being a little simple or not understanding. No, they understand plenty. They get it. They just have different priorities. Do you think it's more challenging, I'm generalizing, I suppose, but to run a billion-dollar business or a billion-dollar foundation? I think it's challenging to do anything well. That's what I think. And whether you're profit-making or your profit-distributing, it's hard.

And look, I've made mistakes. I've given out some cash some times that just came back and bit me. And then I learned, and then I don't do that anymore. Yeah, but without naming names, how does that happen? I mean, did you not do sufficient diligence, or were you dealing with a bad actor? Both. In some cases, a little of each. And then I just can't believe that that one got past me, so I double down and don't do that again.

You know, it's the same thing as you brought up with the letter you read. You reach a point where enough's enough. And then you have to call it. You basically withheld a generous donation from a big college. We have given $45.5 million in total to the university in Las Vegas. I am so disillusioned by how it is run poorly. Much more thought is given to administration and their own perseverance and preservation than there is to the students. And so I reiterated that I would absolutely continue all the scholarships we have going because it goes directly to the kid, and I'm not going to penalize them. But I will never give them another penny. They don't deserve it. Wow. They don't deserve it. I mean, you can put yourself out as higher ed. That's great. You have a massive budget. You need to allocate it correctly. You need to pay attention to your students. You need to

pay attention to your donors, frankly. I mean, I'll give you an example out of it. We, with the help of four other donors, built the med school. They tried for many years to build a mid-school, couldn't quite do it, told us that we couldn't do it. And there's four women. And we just got really pissed. And so I thought, oh, can't we? I think we can. And we built it.

We didn't have to use public works. So we built it well under budget. It's a $120 million school that got built in no time. And it's just stunning. They get the use of it. That's all they have to do. come in and just appreciate it. But we started getting ugly letters

from their legal department. They wanted the building handed over to them now. Our facilities director who'd go over to just make sure everything's being taken care of. She was denied access to the building. It got very hostile very quickly. I mean, are you a threat? I don't know. I can only liken it to. If somebody comes to your home and brings you a gift

and you look at it and it might be the ugliest thing you've ever seen, you go, thank you. And you put it in the regifting closet. But you don't look and go, what else? That's what they do. And so I don't get lack of gratitude. Look, I am a very low-maintenance person as far as I will pay you not to go to a gala. I don't need a plaque. I don't want my name anywhere.

Please, please, don't just forget I need it there. What was it? You gave a million bucks to somebody somewhere and they were like, where do you want your name? Where do you want the plaque? Yeah, please, no. Please no. And so it's not that. There is a basic gratitude level.

And so we have nine acres that surround this building in our plan because Las Vegas is a desert in so many ways, including doctors. We leave. Something goes on. We're out. And so we were going to build another building next door that had mental health, had a blood bank, had an autistic awareness group, several different things. I said to the university, probably for seven months, mental health doesn't pay for itself. We need to come up with a formula and other disciplines that will pay for it.

They'd keep coming back to the table, everything but mental health. Nothing that can never get there. And I finally said to the Dean of Medicine at one point, I said, what don't you understand? We're having mental health. And he said, mental health has a sense. stigma. And I thought, yeah, and you're a doctor. So can we do something about that? But they walked down, I thought, there's no getting there with you guys. And so when I decided to part ways, the only statement the president gave was that they're very sorry, our negotiations fell apart

and that, but they still have those nine acres. I'm like, you don't even know what you don't have. You gave us the nine acres. We own the nine acres. We were going to build the buildings. What negotiations would we have with you? I don't understand. We had discussions about what else you could do. But clearly, they didn't understand a public-private partnership. Truly, they acted like we invented this.

This is very easy. It's very simple. They don't get the concept. What they like is, the old-fashioned donating, we need $50,000. Okay, give me the check. Please don't talk to me again, and I'll come back and see you next year. No strings, no fuss, no just give me the money. Yeah, and don't ask how I use it.

Don't ask me to account for it. It'll be your privilege to give it to us. Oh, please, your God, let me give it to you, please. I hope this doesn't sound like sour grapes or people need to understand how, and it's not just universities, but there are a lot of institutions who get in their own way. And for whatever reason, it just can't seem to accept a gift and treat a donor. Is it respect? I think it's such a weird position.

Like, it's so unusual. It's such an odd thing to do. I think generally people look at me like I'm a walking ATM. And I've only noticed this when I have turned down a gift request. It's kind of indignant. And I think the attitude is, well, you have it. What difference does it make to you? And it's like, well, I get what you're saying.

but just because we have it doesn't mean, look, it doesn't belong to me. So just because I happen to have some control over this doesn't mean I have to do what you want me to do. Yeah. Yeah, I guess it's an entitlement. It's an expectation. Look, I'm just having a hard time. I know you are too, and I know a lot of other people are too. But when you talk about forgiving, when you talk about forgiving a student loan,

from a Harvard grad. Harvard has $51 billion in an endowment. Oh, I know. $5.1 billion. Uh-huh. And they're still out fundraising. What? I'm like, what can I do for you?

And I don't even know where Stanford is. Probably close. Probably all along the same. They still have legacy programs. They still have alumni. They still have all these donations. They're still getting money from the feds. So I don't have a question.

I just want to say, man, how much patience is required in your world to simply stay sane? I think the biggest problem for me personally is that I have a very long fuse and it's arguably too long. And I let it go and go and go until I finally, I'm done and when I'm done, I'm done. But I need to, and this I think is my lesson from this last incident, is I need to really shorten that fuse. Because when, you know, that old saying, when somebody shows you who they are, believe them. Believe them. I think I spend a lot of time going, no, it can't be that. He didn't mean that.

Yeah, you did. Yeah, you did. And so, yes, I believe who you show me you are now. And I'm just not willing to stick around and find out what else happens. A quick yes or no to duel, if necessary. I've been told I'm very terse. Everyone knows where they stand with you, and I said, probably. I hope so.

So is the fuse going to get shorter? Yes. Wow. How far as short was that? Well, look, I'm not going to read it. No, it just was. You know, if you allow yourself to be taken advantage of, and I have far too many times, I think, or I gave a little extra leeway or a little extra grace

thinking you could use that time, you'd be able to do it. I don't think I was right very often with those. I think more often I was wrong. And I should have pulled plugs way sooner, not going to involve to begin with or pull the plugs sooner. I just love the fact that you're out there looking, looking for something that feels like character or something that your dad would recognize

and give you a thumbs. up for and whether you're calling your inner circle and Andre Agassiz is calling me and I just want people to know that you know Bush got a lot of crap for this but that whole um thousand points of light thing remember yeah well that's you you're one of the points of light and sometimes it's a church and sometimes it's this and that but mostly I don't think the feds are going to fix this this college thing I don't think any institution is going to fix anything. This is very pessimistic, but unless there is a huge, complete blow-up, I don't see it changing. An example, we have a very nice president of the University of North Dakota right now.

He's a very nice guy, and I like him. But we sat through four presidents before that that weren't so nice. and it's a symptom of bad governance, boards of regents that don't function. You get a president in, you get all the provosts and the people around them, and it's just this trickle-down. You're going to have to wipe that slate clean, and I don't see that happening. I don't get how that would be. It's certainly not in my lifetime.

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It's my favorite way to support MicroWorks and my favorite whiskey to sip responsibly after a long day of interviewing people on this podcast. Pick up a bottle at noblespirits.com. K-N-O-B-E-L-Spirits.com. Soon may the nobleman come to bring a bottle for everyone. One day when the waitin is done, we'll take a drink and go. You know, I say that sometimes it's just in a general way, it feels like things have to go splat.

It's got to get a little worse maybe before it gets better. But I don't know what role my listeners can play in that other than stomping their feet and saying, wait, look, like, if I were a taxpayer in Nevada, and I read the article that just came out about how the biggest college there, university, is squandering money that might ultimately, tell me if I'm wrong, but might ultimately have to be made up for in the tax base at some point. I mean...

Well, we had, there's an example. We were University in Reno, UNR, UNLV, each were given money from ARPA funds. We were tasked with, it's the leftover money you get from different, it was COVID stuff. So we were each tasked with what you were supposed to do with it. Our governor currently wanted a blood bank. We didn't have a blood bank. Shock. But because you're dealing with the university system, UNR was very savvy.

They got their marching orders. They did what they were supposed to do. UNLV just never got to it. So guess what we had to do? We had to send $20 million back to the state because we just couldn't figure it out. So you also have two very large donors that I know who have each complained to me that they put in calls to the president

even though they know what's happening. They want to give him money. He doesn't return their calls. So when he was out one day, somebody said to him, you haven't returned so-and-so's call and he kind of laughed. He goes, oh, I dropped the ball. Yeah, you drop the ball.

Oh, geez. You drop the ball. So I have a lot of people have reached out to me since this, some who have been, some who do not. Everyone kind of feels the same. But I say to every one of them, it doesn't matter if you think I'm right. You're not saying anything out loud. I'm the squeaky wheel. So if I'm always the person that they see walking into a room and then I get a collective eye roll,

well, look, guys, somebody has to speak up. we have to do something collectively, because what is their incentive to ever change anything? They have brand new contracts signed. You'll have to buy them out of their contracts. They're all about being tenured. They're untouchable. So what are you going to do about it, except kind of wring your hands, and it's horrible, and you're right, it is. Well, what does Splat look like to you? I mean, for the university system in general to really get the memo, does it mean donations are withheld, does it mean big companies suddenly come out and say, look, sorry, but you know what? We're not going to hire.

We're not going to hire from these schools for the next year, two years. I think it's a start because I think that the only thing they understand is a dollar. And so I think that is a start. In our system in particular, we have a regent system that is huge. There's 12. They're elected. When you go to a Nevada voting booth, there are two different seats that are listed at the very bottom of the ballot.

It's to be a trustee for the school district and it's to be a regent for the university system. The two largest budgets in the entire state, they can't allocate funds. How can you possibly understand what's happening and how you do that correctly? And I'm one of those people too. I'm at fault for that. When I saw regions at the end of a bell, I'm like, region, okay, maybe I knew the name. Well, that's how people vote. And that's why they're in those offices. So, unless we have them appointed, we have some quasi system of that, that maybe is a step in getting people who are more reasonable. I mean, I would like to see, whether it's school district again, or we're talking

about higher ed, I would like to see people who have done well in their life. You don't need to an ed background. Do you need to understand business? It's reading a P&L. It's allocating funds. Somebody who's done well, who'd be willing to give of their time for however much it takes a month, go through those things, make the votes. Their egos don't depend on it. They have other things to do. They're busy people. Yeah. But they'll get it done. That would be a more effective way, I think, to start to make any changes. But nobody who's in those positions is interested in making the changes. What they do instead is we get a group of regents who complain loudly that they don't get enough parking passes. They don't get enough bling and access to seats for the basketball

games. Why don't you talk about the kids that aren't graduating? Why don't you talk about some other things? It just seems to be so upside down to me. And everyone acknowledges it, but kind of shakes their head and walks along. Well, I want to congratulate you for taking a stand. Actually, that's not true. A lot of people take stands, but you took it publicly. I had to, because unless I did that, he would have gotten that letter and thrown in the trash and nobody would have known I wrote it. Yeah, good point, but I'm going back to the Corolla and the $3,500. And there's a guy who was here earlier, Stephen Pressfield, great author, 81 years old now,

and we were talking about the unintended consequences. of misassigned encouragement, which is just a click away from enabling, right? They're so adjacent, and I don't want to name names, but big foundations, the biggest foundations in the world. And I look at where their money goes, and I look at the amount that goes, and I just wonder if the person in charge of all that Geltafroichen

ever just walks right up to the mirror and says, am I making it worse? Am I enabling something ultimately with my money? Because it is tonnage at that point. $20,000 is not $200,000. It's not $20,000. But it's all relative to somebody.

It's all relative. It doesn't have to have a lot of zeros behind it. I think that's why I stick to a lot of scholarship pieces because the rest is uncontrollable. And I know that this kid, for this amount of time, wants to walk across that stage, and have something to show for it, and I'm happy to have them do that. That's something I can get.

I would rather do that all day long, every day. And I don't even, I never meet the people really, thy scholarship. I very rarely know who they are. But, you know, I went to dinner about two weeks ago and put my credit card out and paid for it, and the waitress came back and said, Engelstead, yes. She goes, you put my son through college. And I said, oh, she goes, thank you. And now he's applied for this and I'm like, awesome.

I would do that every single day, then have the Inglestead wing somewhere. I mean... See, this is really down to the nub, and I know we're short on time. This is what I'm struggling with. I'm microworks. Your macro works, at least comparatively speaking, right? But to suddenly have that feeling, that connection through a waitress, once again, the waitress comes back into the story,

You know, through the maid. Yeah. You put my kid through school. Let me tell you what my kid's doing. Yeah. That shit matters, man. Real quick sidebar. What happened to me a couple months ago,

I was in Ridgeway, Colorado, signing whiskey bottles in a little liquor store. Nobody in this town. I didn't think anybody was going to come out. There was a line of people down the street. So flattering. I'm just signing and we're laughing. And this guy comes in.

He's clearly a laborer or a builder. I couldn't tell. He was dirty and he'd had a long day. and he's holding his cell phone and he says, hey man, can I show you something real quick? And I said, sure. And he holds up the phone and he's FaceTiming with his kid. And his kid is about 30 feet up an electric pole. Dug in, lineman.

And his buddy's holding the phone. I'd want to be yelling. Get off the phone. I'm just like, too, wait. Pay attention to what you're doing. But he just looks down and he yells, Mike Rowe, you paid for this. Say, is that awesome, right? And I look at the old man's got a tear in his eye.

He's like, my boy was never going to go to college. But six figures keeping the lights on. Nice. Damn right, I'll buy your whiskey. Absolutely. And all of a sudden, to be honest, I was starting to feel a little sorry for myself. I was late for the flight. People were waiting.

And I'm like signing whiskey bottles like, oh, the struggle is real. My hand is a cramp. But it's those little things. I do because my mother's a very religious person. She's never gone or seen any building we've built. She's never set foot on them. One, I took her to Betty's Village on off hours once. And I was like, you know, God, Mom, you've done some nice things.

Wouldn't you like to see it? She said, no. And I go, well, why? And she said, because I know that you're doing that. And I know when I go to bed at night and I say my rosary, I know I made somebody else's life better tonight. And I don't need to see them. And I thought, well, I don't have that faith.

And I'm happy you do. But I get that when I run into the waitress with the sun. And I think, oh, there is something kind of nice to say hearing that or hearing how the story turned out. And isn't that great that he had something? I'd quit. I'd quit without those reminders. And I'm fortunate because people know how to find me. And I, unlike you who has to call a famous tennis pro in order to get to me,

Other people with the internet know how to get to me. And they send pictures and they send those little things. Like two categories. You need to attend from a diligence standpoint because you are a steward. But you also need to drink from the well for yourself because you're a human. And if you don't get some kind of affirmation on a manageable human level, that life becomes about letters like this. And man, that's not what I want to spend my time doing.

And, you know, to that point, I get to this time of year every year, and I get really cranky. I've had a lot of this stuff going on. And I'm just like, ugh, I'm done. So I leave. I check out for like two, three months, and I go stare at the ocean. And I tell the people in my office, if it's not time, sensitive, you're all very capable. Everyone understands what they're doing. I don't want to

entertain any questions. I don't want to talk about it. And I come back every September and I feel great. I have to go and almost unplug and decompress and not know that every time I'm having dinner or meeting somebody, I'm waiting for the shoe to drop because I'm waiting for the ask. And that happens constantly, which is why I don't go to a lot of, I used to go to a lot of different activities I like to do, but I got hit up a lot. So I just, don't do it. Yeah. And you know, I just want to go and sit with my friends,

and my best friends are friends I've had since I was in kindergarten. And they don't care what I think about dinner that was served, more or less what I think about anything in the world. Right. They're like, pipe down you. And that's what I need in my life. I need to have people that knew me when I was missing teeth and had bad scan. You played hockey?

No, but I had a family of them. I learned to skate on ice skates, a hockey skates. didn't your dad build the rink up there in North Dakota? Yep, he built it. That was his piece of, he had dedicated building the building before he had a diagnosis. That particular part of the country gets a flood every 100 years. The 100 year flood comes through. I am two weeks away from delivering my daughter and my grandma's getting moved out of her home into a gymnasium and some school somewhere.

And anyway, my cousin's FEMA comes in. Everyone's sitting in trailers. So my dad decides he's going to build this hockey arena. Not only, I think, because it's where his heart really was, I never saw my dad more relaxed and happier than when he was back up there. And his pals that he'd play with and they'd sit around and drink and laugh. So he decided to do that. And he gave $100 million.

And then he was also the contractor. So built it and had a lot of cameras set up all over the place. someone would watch the construction. And there was a controversy at one point in time because they wanted to change the mascot. From what? From the fighting sue to they didn't care what, just not the fighting sue. And to be clear, this is not a woman named Susan. No, this is with an ex.

And my dad said this, everybody there, the school has been there 90 years. Everyone graduated as this is why I played under. I'm not going to do that. if you do this, I will stop building. And they said, no, you won't. And he stopped building and let it sit there for a bit. And then he said, here's the deal, guys. That's how it works.

So then right before it got, it was open in 2001. So a few months before that, he had his diagnosis. So when I was telling you, when we walked out on that ice, everyone is chanting his name. and my dad, who was not a crier, I looked over and he was very teary. And I thought, I'm going to get teary. I thought it's the very first time, and it's the last time you're ever going to be on this ice.

And everyone standing here chanting your name doesn't know that. But we know it. And I know what this means. And he passes. And as soon as he passes, all the people who shared their loyalty and we're behind your Ralph and that's right and that logo's correct,

every one of them turned. Wow. Because he wasn't there anymore. He wasn't there anymore to fight it. To protect it. So what's it called now? Well, they call themselves the fighting hawks. I don't.

A little switcheroo. They gave a logo or rendering of what it would look like, which was kind of a morphing of with headdress and it was a hawk. And by the time the rendering came through, it looks like a UPS delivery guy. It looks like hockey players should be in brown shorts

running with the package. You had a headdress on a hawk? Well, it was the Sioux. I mean, we're a native country, right? I get it. And the people who really didn't want it to go away were the Native Americans. Oh.

They were the ones. They said, it's the only thing keeps our name alive. And you drive another 60 miles to go on the reservation, you can see why they needed to keep it alive. and so you didn't do anybody any favors. I don't know what, did you improve their lifestyle? Did you help with what's happening on the reservation?

Or you made yourselves feel a lot better because it was a horrible thing to be called. You just put it further out of sight, out of mind. Yeah, look, we did a good thing. Virtue. Did you? That's the government. The government's given more money to Native Americans than anybody else in the nation. And the state of the reservations.

it's like what you were saying earlier. You know, you've got to follow through with stuff. You've got to build something. You can't just write a check. It doesn't work. Well, and what I didn't realize until I got into that was I could see there was a lot of need out there. And so we had had some discussions about building a home because there's a lot of homeless kids. There's a lot of drug use.

There's a lot of alcoholism. And it's a harsh climate. Trying to build something that they could have. but as I learned, the tribal leaders aren't any different than any politician anywhere. And so the people I was dealing with who wanted to build this wanted it built outside the limits of the reservation because they didn't trust the elders to do anything. So it doesn't matter whether you're talking about the U.S. government or that,

if you get people, it gets some level or the regions. A regents. Trustees, they get some level of power. Yeah. They will not let that go. And maybe you're the threat to that because you don't need them for anything. And in fact, you control a sizable asset. And if they take that, does that somehow emasculate them?

Does that somehow reveal their vulnerability, their submissive posture? I actually think the power, if I hold any power, it would be that I have the ability to speak freely. So you're not going to take my job. You're not going to cost me my home. You're not going to, you can say whatever you like. I have my five friends. I'm fine. I have the ability to say it and not have any repercussions other than maybe you just don't like me.

And that's okay. But other people don't. They're dissatisfied as well. But they are afraid they'll get fired. They are afraid that'll be taken out on their kid at school. They are afraid of that. And that shouldn't be either. You realize what you've truly inherited, your dad's demand around that mascot name.

I mean, they basically dared him, right? Like, you're not going to stop building it. And of course you would. And I wonder somewhere in this guy's mind, he's like, you're not going to take the money. You're not going to pull the plug. Yeah, as a matter of fact, I will. Yes, and I'm not doing it to drive you to your knees or bring you to the table. I have told you all the way along the line, I'm unhappy.

This doesn't work. I don't understand. Help me understand. Here's what I find is an exception at universities. There's arrogance everywhere. But the arrogance with somebody there is that if you have a name and you have letters after your name, you assume that you are smarter than every person that you're talking to, and you haven't generally worked outside of a very insulated system.

So you're protected in every way. You have no idea what it means to make your own money, to make a payroll, to make budget. You're accountable. If you don't bring it in that quarter, you don't get any money either. They have no concept, and that's how they treat people. I know we're super long, but I got one last question. I'm going to let you go. Sometimes I feel like we're shooting with a shotgun, and sometimes I feel like we are with a rifle.

Right now, Chuck and half a dozen other people are going to be. going through a giant stack of work ethic scholarships. And we are weighing and measuring. And we're trying to find the best people we can find. And it's very difficult to look into their hearts. You know, it's very... Do they do a tape? Do you see any video of them? Yeah, yeah. There's a one-minute video they have to do. Actually, what they're asked is to provide a 13th statement for the sweat pledge. Okay. And if you're applying for, you know, a second round of scholarship, show us a day in the life of what you do. And those are great as well.

Okay. So there are ways. None of them are perfect, but there are ways to try and assess who you're talking to. But the question is, should I be helping as many people as I can modestly?

In other words, no full rides, because I want them to have some skin in the game. Or do I really narrow that more like a rifle and say, I'm going to help a much smaller group of people, but I'm going to do everything I can to make sure we've got the very, very, very best. Quantity, quality, through the lens of philanthropy,

which I know you don't like it. If you helped a smaller group, though, what is it you think would be different that you could accomplish rather than having a wider range? That's a great question. And the answer is it goes to the real charter of microworks, which is not to help the maximum number of people.

It's to help enough people who truly exemplify the question. qualities we're trying to encourage and then do what we just did in Nevada, get the press out, tell their stories, right, both at the front end and the back end. So we're very much at the front end over at Western. But to go back and talk to people now, a welder, a plumber, an electrician, five, six years later, like to sit down with them like this, if that person can tell me the right story, their story, the right way, with a measure of pride and various Militude and so forth, that will do more to persuade parents and other kids and guidance counselors, right?

So I'm trying to take the long view, but I also want to help as many people, but it always comes down to degrees, right? So I would say, and I'll speak for myself, is that I can go in and speak to a group of people, and I am a privileged older white lady who they probably hear talk and go, wah, wah, wah, blah, blah, blah. Now, I can get a kid who I scholarshiped, who's maybe five years older than these kids to come back and talk to them, and they're paying attention because they get this person. So I wonder if for you, let's say it's a welder. You know who's completed your program and who's really excelled. You know who that person is or people. What about if they come back to the people who are applying to be welders, let's say? And they're do the one-on-ones because, hey, I went through it, it's hard. I get it. I thought of giving up to, but this is what I did. They might give them, and feel free to call me during your two years or your journey. If you feel like you can't call me. Well, that's the idea. Because they're welders, they have jobs. They work 60 hours a week,

plus over, right? So I can't send them out into the world as an ambassador, but I can sit down with them, get them on the record, and then put money behind those conversations. And we are doing that. And we're to do a lot more of it. But would I rather that welder be someone who we, whose educations and certification we fund it entirely? Because you know how the game works now, right? Kids who need a scholarship might apply for 10 of them, you know, and they'll cobble it all together. And then. And they almost have to. Exactly. Because the prices got awful crazy everywhere. But again, and we're so small, but I feel like you're probably wrestling with a similar metric. talking points when I go forward. And look, I have a daughter who got the same degrees as I did. She got a

psych degree. I did psych. I did social work. My son got a finance degree. But my talking point is, if you're going to go into liberal arts, figure something else out. Because the way the market is now, unless you are a doctor, an engineer, something that takes a specific skill set that you can earn the money to pay for that loan, awesome. But you're being sold a bill of goods on a liberal art degree that for the most part, the money you're putting in is not the ROI. It's not what you're going to get. And it's going to take you how long you're being sold a bill of goods that may or may not work for you. And you really need to have the full scope of what this means before you commit. And so I think the gift of scholarship, and even if they put some skin in the game, is that you get more of an even,

playing field when you get to start. You know, starting isn't when you start school. Starting is like, okay, now I've kind of have a, I've got some skill, I can figure this out. But what's it worth? Is it worth what you think you put into it? Look, I mean, until you came along, frankly, we, every so often, we'd pay the full boat for a superstar. But what we're doing in Nevada at Western, and I want people to understand this because I do want to replicate it in other states. That's a full ride. Now it's a longer tail. It's going to take them four years to get through that high school.

But they know now in their freshman class that there is a brass ring at the end of it. And it's completely paid for. I think that's more powerful. But you play the card you get, right? Well, and it's powerful when you can get the parents in. So in this particular high school, you have a lot of single. single parent households, you know, or two parents in a house that are just working really hard. If the parents know there's some option for Johnny, all he needs to do is hit these different

benchmarks that are going to be in place. I'm most proud of the fact not based on a GPA. If you've been failed, why would you do well scholastically? But based on attendance, are you a disciplinary issue? What's the problem here? I think it takes the parent, because Johnny doesn't get it, Four years to him seems like 40. The parent needs to be the one to reinforce, reinforce, reinforce. You can get this done. And since we made the announcement with you, I've had more people from trade schools reach out and say, we'd love to participate. That's great.

We'd love to come in the school. We'd love to start with those kids. I didn't know that we had behind Allegiance Stadium where the Raiders play. We have a big water tank underground that they teach underwater welding in. No idea. Yeah. No idea. I learned that.

No clue. I narrated the series about the building of that stadium. What would your dad say if he could look down and see Allegiance Stadium? He'd be really pissed they didn't use local labor. Oh, wow. I bet he would. It was the lack of local labor was an issue. Chris, we're humbled and grateful that you support Microworks.

And it's really cool of you to come here and talk. Well, thanks for taking my phone call. Well, look, it wasn't easy. It wasn't easy. Once we got through that Andre guy. Yeah, what? This guy, butt out. You were a piece of cake.

Tell him I said hello, by the way. I will. And one of these days, we're going to drag his retired ass in here. And his wife, who is delightful. So I hear. Yeah. Thanks, son. All right, thank you.

This episode is over now. I hope it was worthwhile. Sorry, it went on so long. But if it made you smile, then she'll be. Share your satisfaction in the way that people do. Take some time to go online and leave us a review. I hate to ask, I hate to beg, I hate to be a nudge.

But in this world, the advertisers really like to judge. You don't need to write a bunch, just a line or two. All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. Not four. All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. And not three. All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. Definitely not too.

All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. We need five. All you got to do is leave a quick. Even if you hate it. Five-star. Especially if you hear it. Thank you. Thank you.

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