In this episode of "Political No-Brainer," hosts Jeff Rabinowitz and Zak Zakaluk are joined by Daryll Blackhall, COO of Workforce Academy, to discuss the future of education and how it aligns with the needs of today's evolving workforce. Together, they explore the skills and training essential for modern careers, the challenges of adapting traditional education models, and how industries are partnering with educational institutions to close skill gaps. Daryll offers expert insights on how Workforce Academy is leading the way in preparing individuals for the rapidly changing job market. This episode provides a forward-thinking conversation on education, employment, and the future of work.
Political No-Brainer Podcast
Preparing for Tomorrow: Educating Today’s Workforce - Featuring Daryll Blackhall - Political No-Brainer- Episode #30
(upbeat music) - Hello America, and welcome to our podcast. We're two pals with different viewpoints and thoughts. We really don't know much. Discuss news, politics, conspiracy theories, and much, much more. One's a genius, and the other's an idiot. Or are they both idiots? Or are they both geniuses? You be the judge. Now live from beautiful central Florida, welcome to political no-brainer. Your hosts today are on your right. Hey Zach, and to your left. - Me, Coach Trippy, a.k.a. Jeff Rabinowitz. - I have coach, as they like to call him, Darrell Blackhall. He comes live, he is the chief operations officer for Workforce Academy. I almost said a leak, 'cause that's where you're near and dear to my heart where I know you're from. - Absolutely, absolutely. - But Darrell's been an educator for 20 years, and I think he worked with my wife, at least 10 of those 20. - Yeah. - You guys started together at a leave for five years, I know when she was there, and then Workforce Academy for a couple of years. - Absolutely. - Darrell's a good friend and a very, very, very smart man in the education world. I also hear you're quite a history buff too. - I love me some history. - I know, I don't remember if it was Asher or John that used to tell me how they used to come to you for helping. And Mr. Price rest in peace for math, 'cause John was not very good at math. But hey, we've got a great show ahead of us. We're gonna dive into some education topics. I know Trippie is chomping at the bits because it is near and dear to his heart, so I'm gonna let him kick it off with some, but actually before that, I don't know if anybody saw the breaking news today, there was a school shooting. We just started the school year. Come on, guys. 14-year-old kid shot, I don't know if he, I think he killed four kids. - He had two teachers, two kids. - Okay. And there was another teacher who was wounded, so I mean, there was-- - Like nine total. - We were talking about this a little earlier. It almost didn't fit the narrative 'cause he was carrying a shotgun for one, which, oh, it's not that big mean assault rifle that AR, that's assault rifle, that's what it stands for, right? And it happened in Georgia and I don't know much about it. I haven't seen enough, they haven't broken, but really, really shocked me was how fast they released the juvenile's name and how fast they said he'd be tried as adult. We're still trying to figure out who the guy was who shot Trump, but hey, that's a whole different ball game. So, hey, prayers out to all the folks in Georgia. It's heartbreaking to hear a 14-year-old kid's life is ruined and he's ruined other's lives forever. And so, thoughts and prayers out to the folks in Georgia. All right, so, let's get on with the education part of our show. I'm not educated, so I'll let the idiot take over. - Well, I think that the best way to start off is like, Darrel, talk about workforce academy. Let's start there. - Oh, absolutely, you know, I love workforce academy. I've been, I've been, I started there as a history teacher and really bought into the program. You know, it's an academy that's only 11th and 12th grade. And what the mission of the school is, is to help those 11th and 12th grade students find jobs and then to get them through to the other side of that high school piece. Most of them come to us from the other 21 high schools in Orange County because they don't have the grades. They don't have the credits or they haven't passed the state exams. So they come to us and we work with them because we're small, 280 kids when we're topped out. And that gives us an opportunity to really start to know who they are and what they, you know, what they need. And our teachers work really hard. I mean, Ms. Zach was one of them for a few years and you know that she has that passion for the student and that's really what it takes to help get these kids through because they have fallen through the cracks in that traditional education piece. Because, you know, they've been on this high school campus with 2,000, 3,000 kids and there's like five guidance counselors. And so, you know, there's so many kids that don't even get seen anymore. And so to get these kids that have been, you know, it's like last call at the bar, gentlemen. Hey, look, y'all ain't got to go home, but you can't stay here, right? - That's right, that's right. - So here's the list of all these charter schools. So, and we are that one that fills that gap, right? That will take those 11th and 12th, man, those super seniors, right, those 19-year-olds who have just figured it out, you know? The ones that figured out that a high school diploma doesn't mean anything unless you don't have one. And then all of a sudden you go, oh, man, I really need the key to the next door, right? Otherwise that ceiling comes up on you real fast. And if I can get the key to the next door, then I can go to trade school, then I can go to Juco. Or I can, you know, if I'm just that guy that I need to work, I need to have a job because dad walked out and I'm trying to keep the lights on at mom's house, right? We have a few of those. And so, in that case, look, I just need him to go to work one day, come to school the next day and cash his check, get that GPA and those credits where he needs to be, walk across that stage in May and get on with his life. I tell them all every day, I love you, but you gotta go, right? I'm like your parent, I love you, but you gotta go. So, I want you to get what you need, right? See the teachers, stay for tutoring, do those things, pass that test, and then get the hell out of here, right? And that's what I need. - I was quite shocked and I know a lot of kids are trying to better themselves and get into the workforce. And some of them have kids, they gotta take care of kids. - Absolutely. - You know, I just found out, though, from Ash, my youngest son, he was talking about going to the military and, you know, he doesn't have his high school education. Go figure, his mom's a teacher and he dropped out, but that's a whole other stall, yeah. But the Navy now will take you, as long as you can pass the ASFAB test at a high score, they look for a certain score. If you can pass it, then that's good enough for them. And I'm like, well, that's kind of good 'cause it'll get some kids into the Navy that need to maybe be in the Navy, but is that what we wanna tell our kids? - Well, here's where we are, though. I think, I mean, I hate to say like such a blanket statement, but it's kind of where we are as a nation, right? We need, look, my uncle ended up in the Marine Corps 'cause he might've been in a car that didn't belong to him, right? And so they were like, oh, you know, maybe you can go to jail or join the Marine Corps 'cause we're talking it was the late '50s, early '60s. - Right. - So now we're kind of getting back to where, look, the red states can only produce so many kids, right? You look at who is putting kids in the military now. And those are the kids that are coming from the Southeast, right? My oldest boy is a recruiter for the Coast Guard. And he struggles because the Coast Guard has a little bit of a different standard, you know, their Department of Homeland Security, right? So their Azfab's a little higher, their, just their requirements are a little different. So they're having trouble meeting their standards to be mission ready. And if you're talking to small branch like the Coast Guard struggling to be mission ready, then how about that? You know, I mean, look, I saw a report that said we had to put 18 ships, like just kind of stick them off over here and move those crews to be manpower ready on some other ships. - So they're that short-handed? - Yeah, they're that short-handed. - Yeah. - So, you know, if we can, if we could get him in the Navy, look, you know, he may not, he may not be driving the boat, but he might be painting the boat. And if that's what he can do, then God bless them. You know, in 20 years, then get on with yourself, my friend. - I tell them, I said, I wouldn't say it's a regret, but one of the paths I wish I had taken was just done the military in 30 years and out. I'd be retired right now, you know? What are you gonna do? And so let's touch on that for a minute. Your education background, you have your bachelor's from Florida State and then you got your master's from UCF. Did you do the Coast Guard prior to the college or after? - Absolutely, that's how I got to college. - There you go, you did that GI bill. - Yeah, absolutely, man. Let's see, that's how I got to school. - How many years were you in the puddle pirates? - Six. - Nice. - Six years of the puddle pirates. - Absolutely, man, I'll take it. - Yeah, thank God for the Coast Guard. Well, actually, Ash wants to do the diving, not a diver, but to save the divers who jump in when boats wreck and they go and say, that's what he wants to do. - Rescue swimmers. - Rescue swimmers, yeah, thank you. - Rescue swimmers, my kids are swimming. - Thank you, I know your kids are swimmers. They're gonna be rescue swimmers. - Yeah. - Or they're gonna be Olympics. - So I wanna make a couple points here. I think it's great what you guys do. When we talk about kids essentially being lost and then they find their way at their workforce academy or they find their way in the military, there's something I read. It was actually by Charles Koch, who wrote, he's done a lot of writing, but one of his books was from the bottom up and he talks about, in a part of the book, not all of the book, how corporate America is just spending an absolute fortune. They hire the best, kids. They hire the best candidates, but they have to teach them life skills. They still have the expense and training them as the simplest life skills. And I just think we need to do is, what you're doing and life skills, an online course of life skills, how to buy a house. And you guys, I was reading your website. You guys are doing a big part of that. How do you balance a checkbook? How do you sign, how do you read a lease? Do you know what you're, would you know what you're signing when you sign a lease? - How about how about we start small? How to write a letter and then address an envelope? - Oh, right. - Absolutely. - Yeah, so one thing I do, I volunteer at a home for homeless veterans. And it's not necessarily that they have PTSD that makes them homeless when they get outside the military. It's a simple fact that they went from high school or they were lost in high school. They got into the military. Like you said, the Navy's taking people at high school degrees and the Marines may be too, but when they get out of the military, for whatever reason, if they don't stay the course of 30 years, they're not ready for the world. They're not ready to get a job. They're not ready to rent an apartment and they wind up in this predicament of homelessness. - And then if you don't do something like you did, Darrell, you did your six years and then you said, "I'm gonna go to college to better myself." Then you came out and look, I went to the Navy, it was for construction. I got out in the late '80s, early '90s and there was really nothing, I mean, there was construction, but it was kind of, we were almost in a depression. - Right. - So I had to go a different route. So imagine my biggest thing when I was talking to Ash or anybody who wants to go in the military, they're like, "I'll just be a grunt," whatever. But what does that give you life skills? I mean, it teaches you how to do certain things, how to square away and all that stuff, but coming out as a grunt, you're just gonna go work at McDonald's 'cause that's all, you know, we're publics and no knocking them. Look, the guy who used to run my Publix was with him for, I think, 30 years and he retired a multi-millionaire, you know. So, but that's a whole different ball game. But, you know, I just, you have to aspire, if you're gonna go into the military, have a game plan, I'm gonna go in the military to become a police officer. I'm gonna go in the military to become a teacher, a lawyer, go be a jag, whatever, and then let them teach you what you need to do. - Right, what you say McDonald's, for example, it's a funny thing you said that because I just read a story about it. The guy he said, "I never knew this would be my one "and all job." He's been there 50 years. He's a daughter operator of 31 stores and who knows what each store nets him. So, he may be in the $12 million a year range for all that. - But he's in that very, very small percentile. - No, you can. I think something that we should teach kids is some level of consistency. You can't just look at, yeah, you're busting trays out off the tables at McDonald's. But if you grow at the company or you at least learn the discipline it takes to keep the job to show up on time, to do what you're supposed to do to come and shave, to come in properly, neatly dressed. You know, you're all important skills that we take for granted. And-- - I fear though, the problem is, and I hear where you're coming from, but we come from a different generation. - Well, that's what I'm saying is we do. - But these kids today, if it works too hard, they just quit. - Well, unfortunately, I've heard stories of kids who have a really good job and show up a couple of minutes late every day. Well, a couple of minutes to a boss, if he adds it up over time, adds up, adds up, adds up. And next thing you know, you're in the office getting a rip. And then next thing you know, you're getting fired, but when I get fired, I was only 10 minutes late. 10 minutes over 10 days is a lot of late. - Right. - You know, but they don't care. They just think, all right, I'll just go live in my parents' basement and play video games and become a professional gamer. And you know, if you can do that, go for it, make a ton of money 'cause there are people making money that way or, you know, and on online personality like we aspire to be. I just think, I don't remember before my ex and I went our separate ways. I don't remember not having two jobs 'cause I had to make sure there was food on the table for my family. There was no way I was quitting just because they didn't like it. 'Cause they were tough on me. 'Cause they made me cry. I had nobody ever made me cry, but because they were hard. I'd go to work as, you know, midnight security, get up the next morning. I wouldn't even get up the next morning, go to a job the next day at a car dealership or something. And whatever I had to do to make the bills pay, you know how it is. Jeff, how many times have I talked to you and you were asleep in the parking lot between shifts? - Oh yeah. Yeah. - That's something we need to do. - And I won't mention where you work because you probably get in trouble 'cause you sleep in their parking lot. (laughing) - But do you do that at Workforce Academy to teach kids about all that sorts of discipline and stuff? - Absolutely. You know, because ironically, I had a young man today, right? He got sent to me 'cause he just, you know, he had a little trouble with the filter today. He couldn't quite, he couldn't quite turn it off, right? So he came to me and we were talking and I was like, hey man, you know, I don't, I don't, look, I know discipline is huge, right? And I know it takes up a lot of minutes of my day, but I know that there are talking points in there and there's learning to be done even in that midst of just discipline. And so I usually go the route of, hey, what are you doing after this, right? 'Cause they're thinking, oh my God, I'm gonna go in there and see coach. He's gonna talk to me about, you know, me not doing the right thing. And if I can say, what are you doing after high school, man? And have them go, wait a minute, this isn't what I was expecting or even what I'm used to. That's what I want. And then he said, I wanna join the Air Force. And I was like, man, if you go into Air Force and you're constantly doing this, you're gonna be doing pushups 'til the Earth spins the other way, right? So I need you to learn how to control this. But now, after you get graduated from here and you start to go to the Air Force, here's what I want you to be thinking about. And that's exactly what we were talking about today, believe it or not, was a job that transfers. If you don't think that you wanna be in for 20 years, 30 years, I need you to be thinking about a job that transfers, not being a, you know, even being a rescue swimmer, what the hell are you gonna do on the outside world, right? I need you to, I mean, you're American hero and then what? So I need your life card at the YMCA. That's gonna transfer. You know, I need you to be thinking about working on the helicopter, not jumping out of it, right? I need you to be thinking about doing those kind of things. The thing that is gonna put money in your pocket. So to answer your question, sir, is, we have a A and B schedule, right? So our kids, like if you're on A schedule, you come to school every Monday, every Thursday and every other Wednesday. So then the obvious question is, if you're not in your academic classes, what the hell are you doing on campus, right? So those are the days that we are doing exactly what you talked about, the life skill things. I want you guys to be working on business law to be able to know how to read a contract. I want you to know how to buy a car and protect your credit score and how to, who, if you get an apartment, what's electric company do you even call? You call in, oh, you see, you call in Duke Energy, you call in Florida Power, who are you calling? And you don't even know how to turn the power on at the place. So you wanna make sure that those lessons get taught. And I am one of those firm believers of, if you don't teach a child, an adult won't know. I mean, if you don't teach a child, an adult won't know. And so you have to keep pounding because the things that our parents taught us have gotten lost over the years. I mean, we have people right now making fun of kids on Facebook that say, holy hell, if we just write in cursive and put stick shifts at all these cards, we'd cripple a generation. And that is frigging shame on us, man. Because we never taught them. We never taught them cursive. We never taught them how to reach cursive. And we never taught them how to drive a clutch. That's on us. So don't talk about the generation if they've never been taught the skills, right? So you gotta make sure that those skills for the next, for that life after high school, I talk about the life after high school all the time. Because like we were talking, man, I'm 60 plus years old. And I'm gonna be the first one to tell you when I graduated at the age of ripe old age of 17, I didn't even know I was gonna live this long, right? But I'm glad my parents instilled in me those things I needed to do to survive. You know, I knew how to, I knew how to cook. I knew how to fold my clothes, right? And the Coast Guard took care of the rest, right? Making sure I was squared away, what to do, what time, you know, I was supposed to be where. And so we start to press how important those life skills are. And then, you know, we talk a lot, we talk a lot about college, but we also talk a lot about trade school. Because, man, you can't get a plumber out of a truck for less than 100 bucks, right? So I always like to use my own kids as an example. My daughter works in the medical field. Her husband is an AC guy. And they make almost the same money, right? And we're talking about a guy with a trade school as in a girl who went to frigging Florida, right? So we are talking to, to, you know, what you would think would be opposite career paths. And they are doing, they're doing great, right? And he works in the AC business. So, I always push that trade piece. You know, last year, we had four kids go to Job Corps. We had two go to the culinary school in Miami, and we had two go to the construction piece over there in Clearwater. And I'm telling you, those kids are doing good, because one, they can get a high school diploma without taking the test, the Florida State Assessment Test, because it's a federal program. So if they pass what they need to do, then they can get their, they can get their diploma through Job Corps. Holy mackerel, they can get their driver's license through Job Corps. Job Corps will teach you how to swim for Pete Sakes, right? - Is Job Corps part with you guys, or is it - No, absolutely not. They're Department of Labor, right? - Okay. - And so if you are 16 to 24, you go and you move in sort of like college, right? You go and move in and they teach you a skill. Like in Clearwater, you can be everything from a pharmacy tech to an electrician. And if you go to South Florida, they do the culinary piece and do things like that in Miami. You go to Jacksonville, where our third Job Corps area is, they do more welding metal work up that way. If you wanna go to drive a train, they'll send you to Texas, right? - Wow. - After just, there's a lot of programs out there. If the kids know where to look, right? And I think that's where workforce is really, I want you to pick your life after high school. If you wanna go to college, I hope you get there. If you wanna go to trade school, I hope you get there. If you wanna go to Job Corps, man, a military, I don't care, that military route, I'm kinda proud of, I enjoyed that. I love being called a veteran. I like being able to stand up when they say, "Where's all our veterans at?" I love that, right? So, you know, especially now that I'm an old man. So, I think it's just super important that we start taking that time with these older kids, right? Because, look, we start talking about graphic lines like in the third grade, we need to start putting that stuff behind and go, "Look, you know how to know how to graph a line, but I'm gonna tell you how to pay your taxes, right? I want you to be able to do these things, protect your credit score. They gum it, do not be paying 35% interest to your Visa card, y'all. They are stealing your money, so, so... But if you don't teach a child, an adult won't know. - Right. - 100%. And, well, let's talk about trade schools. I mean, one of the best things John ever did was he went to welding school at Lake Tech. - Absolutely. - And now he's, he's 24 years old, making 25, 30 bucks an hour. And his cousin went and did it. His cousin actually went on the road and works, he's a union welder and tours around the nation. I think he'd make it like 50, 60 bucks an hour. And I mean, that's insane. - Not wonderful. - Unless you're slinging rock, what are you how you making that money? - Right, absolutely. - And the reason John loved the welding aspect puts his earbuds in, pulls his mask down, and he just, nobody bothers him. He doesn't want to talk to people, which is great, which is fine. - So let's talk about you doing more. Like you said, you spoke to the Commissioner of Education, right, Florida Commissioner of Education, he wants to open more schools. - Absolutely. You know, it was so, it was so awesome. You know, Senator Randy Bracy, from our district here in Orlando. He stepped away from his, well, in the last election, he stepped away. I guess made it even two cycles ago. And, but they served together in the Senate, him and Mr. Diaz. And he said, and Mr. Diaz is now our Commissioner of Education for the state of Florida. And they were just, you know, out of barbecue or something. And he said, man, you gotta come down and see this school. And, and he was like, you know what? I might just do that. And dog gone it, they called us about a week before and said, hey, Mr. Diaz wants to come see your model. And we were like, what? And absolutely, right? So he came down and he wanted to see what workforce does. Right? Since we're the only, since we're the only school like this in the whole state of Florida. So we, we talked about our model. What we do, life after high school, the work component, how we can, how the work component becomes an elective credit, right? So they get a grade for working. So then he was like, this is amazing. How can I get these schools in my other 66 counties, right? And, and we talked about, you know, the difficulty of maybe doing it in rural, rural area because trying to get that many jobs, right? If you have a big school where you have 300 kids, where are you going to get them all to work, right? So in a bigger town, you know, in Orlando, man, we don't have any trouble finding jobs for these kids. But if you were in, if you were in Live Oak, right? Where, what do you do, right? What do you do with those kids? But, so we talked, we talked about that. And then there's a special heart that, that he recognized, and I appreciate his, his, his, his, a stuteness and picking this up, is your teachers to really have to, to pour in, right? You have to care about each individual student because you are trying to contribute to their life after high school long after you, you turn them loose to the world, but you have to work so hard because most of the kids that we get, they come to us with like a 1.2 GPA. And you, you know, you got to get them to that 2.0 and you have to get them to that 24 credit mark and you got to get them through that, that fast test or the algebra one or whatever it is. And you have to be willing to come in early, stay late and, and be that, and be that support. Sometimes we are the only thing consistent. I mean, this is alternative education, y'all. And we are sometimes the only thing consistent in these young people's lives. And so you, and so it takes a special, it takes a special teacher. It takes a special admin staff to, to be willing to continue to pour in to, to this, to this group. - What is the, what is the demographics in your school? - I would say we are 90% African-American and 10, and probably 10% Hispanic. We, and we got like two white kids. So, so, but you know what? A lot of that is location 'cause we are right there on Rio Grande. And so, - You guys are deep, deep in the hood. - Yeah, we are. Absolutely. - Right by the stadium. We're holding the lights, watching them in shores. We are on that side of the division, right? - Yes. - So, but do you know, in the last year, we are really seeing a change. We're starting to get those kids from boom. We're starting to get a few kids from Winter Park because they're buying into our success. You know, when I can say, "Hey, look, I can get you to graduate." And the Winter Park saying, "Hey, I don't know where you're going, but you can't stay here." You know, they'll say, "Look, you know, I'll take the chance and I'll take that opportunity." You know, we'll show them that door to Valencia 'cause you know, Valencia is really getting into this straight school business. And it's a great story. If you haven't heard, the one of the band members of Metallica has really loved the roadies, right? He was like, this show wouldn't work if it wasn't for the roadies and the construction guys. And so somehow you had a connection to Valencia and next thing you know, there's Metallica money pouring into Valencia to get into this trade school program. And so it has been, man, now there's welders. Now there's forklift drivers. There's, we got kids going straight from workforce like after school to go learn how to drive a forklift, to go buy into the programs and it doesn't cost them anything. And it's almost like a dual enrollment. And so we are getting kids to start make money, putting operator money in their pocket and learning those life skills. You know, getting that job, as you and I mean, you guys understand, but getting that job changes your circle, right? Because I'm talking to the same 16, 17 year old kid, right? So, you know, whatever, but now I've got this job. Now I'm standing next to this 40 year old mom who's dropping life on me, not only teaching me how to fold this t-shirt, how to do whatever, telling me how to do inventory, but she's also dropping the life on me, telling me, boy, you better be doing this or you better be saving your money here. You better, your circle has now changed. - Yeah. - That is so important. That job piece becomes so important because now it's more than just a paycheck because now you're learning all those life skills. You got to deal with that woman that didn't want people on her Chick-fil-A sandwich and she's pissed off with you. And now you got to try to explain to her, ma'am, thank you for giving me the opportunity to fix this, right? And not go, man, it's a pickle, get the hell away from me. No, no, no, no. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to fix your sandwich, right? - Right. - So you got to learn those life skill things. And if there's not, there's just not enough places for our young people to be exposed to jobs and still have the opportunity to earn a real high school diploma, right? And we're not talking about a good enough degree, a GED. No, we're talking about, we're talking about getting a real high school, Orange County Public School diploma and being able to put money in your pocket. It's a, you know, I love it. I love what I do, man. I know the passion is I've taken, I've shamed, hired your show. - That's all right. That's why-- - No, we wanted to hear, we wanted to hear, but I want to hear from you. I want to hear, I told Zach, I can't believe you got this guy, this person, this guest. I'm amazed. I want to do this show today. But I love the term dropping life on you. And I want to tell you what, I was a restaurant manager. I used to go to, I worked for a chain. I used to go to 25 different locations, right? I used to say without the term dropping life on you, 'cause I didn't know it. I tell these kids, look, especially the servers, you're not going to make the most money in here as you might another restaurant. Let me tell you what you are going to have. You're going to learn multitasking skills. Like you said, you're going to learn communication skills, you're no longer going to respond. Go F yourself, it's just a pickle. - You're just angry. - I'm sorry, ma'am. I realize we're, you know, one team, one dream. I did ring it incorrectly, but the kitchen put it out wrong, you know. And so when you leave with or without two weeks notice, you've left here with something. So make every day you stay the best possible day you've had at work until the next experience. And I would first and foremost acknowledge this isn't going to be your best work experience, but it is going to be a very, it is going to be a very riching work experience. And that's just something I just think, not my restaurant. And we don't usually use the business I work for names, but it's something we need to convey to, not only to kids, we need to convey it to restaurant managers, we need to convey it to adults in general that pop. There's a TED talk, positive messaging, it's everything to a kid. It doesn't, you could have a kid swim every day and he's not the greatest swimmer, but I got to tell my kids who are really some of the top swimmers in their team, you're learning discipline. You're staring at the bottom of a pool for three hours a day. You're learning discipline. - Yeah. - And so even if you, you may make it to Olympic Charles, you may make it to the Olympics. I don't know, I don't have that answer. I don't know how the competition's doing when you get there. I don't know where they'll be, but this is an experience in life that you can never replace. So don't always worry about winning. Don't always worry about leaving your friends behind. We're enjoying them, enjoy every bit of it. And we, that positive messaging should come from teachers. It should come from restaurant managers. It should be out there conveying to kids every day, no matter when you run into them. You know, and I just love what you say when you say drop in life on them. Grown-ups in general should be dropping life on kids. You know, there are grown-ups who feel like they're putting their life in their hands when they go to a kid with his pants half down to his knees and saying, you know, you really should just buy a pair of pants to fit. And you might wanna rethink that logic 'cause you may be putting your life in your hands, but it is something kids need are here. You know, that a part of your next day is gonna be how you appear in front of people, how you present yourself. Now, we do that dress code thing, right? So we're a dress code school. So that is usually the first reality check for a lot of these, especially the young men, right? That when we say, gentlemen, you're gonna wear pants, you're gonna tuck in your shirt, you're gonna have a belt on, we're gonna wear closed-toed shoes. And you're like, no crocs, you mean no slides? You're right, that's what I mean. No crocs, no slides, right? And no grills, no, no, no, no, right? Because I want you to be able to work anywhere. You're gonna have human-colored hair, right? So you see a black girl with blonde hair on my campus? Absolutely. Will you see a, will you see anybody with like green hair? No, not at all. Because I want you to be able to work anywhere. Like we had a job fair two weeks ago at our school, right? We had employers come out to our campus to interview our kids. We had a daycare. We had the Gaylord, Gaylord Palms came out. We had the sign, like they make the fast sign signs are us. You know, they actually manufacturer the signs, metal signs, canvas signs, you know, those kinds of things. And they hired, I mean, we probably had maybe 11 kids get jobs that day, right? And so we even had for the after-school care lady, that she came out and held her little orientation right on our campus. So she came out, you know, because our kids, they worked at AB schedule, so they weren't in class. So they were able to do their orientation and not take away from their academics. So they were able to meet in one place, right? So there's so much positive things that goes on that never gets any attention, right? But we know it's happening, right? The churches work so hard. The schools are working hard for what they have, right? 'Cause when there's 3,000 kids on a campus and you got five guidance counselors and you got a hundred teachers and you're, it's like, there's just gonna be kids out there, it'll just loss, right? And we have to do whatever we can. 'Cause guys, I'm at the end, right? I am at the end of this thing. 'Cause I am not gonna work 'til 30 minutes before my funeral. No, I am going to retire at some point. And I wanna make sure that I leave the planet a little bit better than what I found it. And that is pretty hard to do 'cause I grew up in a great time. I grew up in that, in that, you know, I went to high school in the late '70s, right? So I mean, you know, we had a student smoking section for Christ's sake. So I mean, it was just a whole different time. And 'cause I'm just in case you couldn't tell by the voice, I'm pretty country, right? So, so we, I had a great experience growing up, right? I didn't have to worry about somebody in a white stalker van stealing me or my sister, or, you know, it just, it wasn't like that. We didn't live in fear, we didn't do that. And I wanna, I wanna, I wanna show the kids that I come in contact with every day that this can be a great place. You just have to start, you know, being that example. - Yeah, and we need more of those academies. You know, there's another thing that's always on my mind. I tell Zach so many times there's, it's called timing out, timing out of foster care. There's kids at time out of 18, hit the bricks. And they get a pretty different estate that's not enough for much baby rent, potentially a bus pass, but not a rent and a car. First thing they do is often, and I just say this, I don't have percentages, but often they realize the one thing they have to trade over and above their elder competition is themselves. And that's how a lot of these kids wind up in the sex trade. - Yes, absolutely. - We need more workforce academies where these kids can get in the A/B schedule, where they can continue to get there, just like you said, get their high school degree, get a B schedule that they could show up for work three days a week. And in addition to their per diem, have a car, have something keeping them really occupied, work and school, rather than hitting the streets at night. And we just need more of that. That is the solution for a lot of things that's going wrong in the world today. When people say more kids are bad today, they're not bad, family's not as together as it was. Kids that grow up and go to a home with no dad and a mom passed out on the couch with me, they're working too much or drinking too much. - Right. - They have no direction. So what are they gonna do? And if they flounder in high school and they fail at high school, but they have a place to go after that, or when somebody goes to them and says, you know, there is this workforce academy where you can continue to get your GED, where you can continue to get your high school diploma. - Absolutely, yep. - And have that AB schedule is a lot like Jackson. We were older when we were doing two, three things. I was, like he said, but he was too, sleeping in my car, three hours, get up. I tell my wife, call me in an hour, call me in two hour, call me in three hours, get up, wake up, shake it off, go to another job and then go home that night and get a good night's sleep. But there's plenty of time to do a lot more than a lot of these kids are doing. And part of it is getting their high school education and potentially their college education after that. - Well, and you know, I'm a firm believer in the trades. I don't think you should go to college just to get a degree. Because truthfully, what's a liberal arts degree gonna do for you, you know? But if you go to school to become a truck driver, you go to school to become a welder, a mechanic, things that we're always gonna need. Look here in Florida, you remember, was it John's graduation when the AC, the duck man came? - Yeah, the duck man. - And he would give out scholarships for kids to come work for him. - Absolutely. - To become an air conditioning guy. - Yeah, like internships. - Always need an air conditioning guy in Florida. - You will not need someone who has their degree in ancient literature that no longer has a language anymore. No, you need somebody. Look, I got guys who cut my grass. You gotta start somewhere, but you gotta also know, I don't know how to fix these mowers 'cause they broke down. Well, now I got a mower shop. There's a guy here in Sorento. He's been there, I've been here in Florida for 30 years. I bet you his shop's been here for 50 years. And he probably does well. He probably started as a kid tinker. Now he fixes mowers for the rest of his life, whatever. It doesn't mean you have to do that for the rest of your life, but get yourself started. You know, one of the things like, you talk about, I joke about that too. Start writing in cursive and everybody start driving stick and we'll crush a generation. But if we don't teach kids how to drive stick, look, my parents, old school. - Absolutely. - I was just talking about this the other day. I took my driving test in a five-speed car and the guy said, are you sure you want to drive stick for your driving test? I said, I don't know how to drive anything else. And my dad said, if you know how to drive a stick, you can drive anything, which is true. I can drive a truck, I can drive this car, I can drive whatever it takes. - Absolutely. - But you throw a kid in a car, an 18 wheeler and they look at it goes, what's this thing in the middle? Where's drive? Come on, bro. There's no drive. There's three, why is there three buttons, or three pedals down there? - A little pop-up, yeah, yeah, yeah. - What is that thing down there? That's called the clutch, or heaven forbid. - And don't have the high low, the high low. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. How do I get to the 18 gears? - Yeah. - Yeah. So I mean, not everybody wants to be a truck driver, not everybody wants to work in the food industry, not everybody wants to be a welder. Okay, sure. Some people want to be doctors, scientists, lawyers. Go to school. - Absolutely. - And that's-- - But don't go to school. Don't go to school and waste your mommy and daddy's money. - Absolutely. - Become another burden on society. - No, no, no. - And I will be the first one to tell you. When I lost, I was supposed to play ball in school. And when I lost my scholarship for that, my father told me, you're not going to college. I said, why? He goes, you're not wasting my money, you'll become one with a keg on a couch. - Yikes. - In reality, 'cause that's what you did in college, right? So I started out at 14 years old, I worked at a gas station, I pumped gas. In Jersey, we pumped gas, right? - You still do. Thank God I'm doing it for a while. - Yes. - That's why, do you know, hang on, let me tell you. You know, that's why there'll never be buckies in New Jersey. - Right, 'cause there wouldn't be enough guys to hire to pump gas. - There wouldn't be enough, you need 50 gas attendants on every ship. - Right, because they have 250 pumps. They're building the biggest one here in hell, I think. - From one state to country, me and Zach seem to have a fascination with buckies. I just love buckies. - I love buckies. And I just thought of that. - Well done. - I love buckies. No, no, it's right, but here's the thing. At 14 years old, I knew how to make change, proper change. - Right. - I had to multitask, 'cause were you? Yes. I knew how to multitask because you had four pumps going at once, checking oil, washing windows. That guy's only getting five bucks, make sure he doesn't go over five. This, that, the other thing, you gotta run around like a lunatic. I'm thinking back in my head now, I go, I don't know if I could do that now. - No. - I don't know that I would want to do it. You know, people come in and they go, give me three bucks, you know, obviously when gas was 99 cents back, it was 79 cents. - Yeah, it was with gas. - Give me three bucks and a pack of smokes. All right, pack of smokes was 75 cents, $3, so it's $3.75. He gave me a five. How much do I give him back? - Right. Yeah, with no machine, man. - Or they don't throw you off and use your five dollars. Or he'll throw you off and he don't five dollars and 75 cents. Oh, crap, now what do I do? - Now what? - Yeah, yeah. - A quarter or something, crazy. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I mean, you know, people gotta learn, I was not a math whiz in school by any means. Math and science made no sense to me. And then you threw letters in it and I was really confused. I was an English guy, my mom's an English teacher, my wife's an English teacher. I can't barely speak, but it's okay. - But you can read, I'm back to you, can read. - I can, I used to love reading. And I loved history because it took memory to remember those things. - Right. - Right. And I did really well. So when I was my senior year, they said, "You have to take a math class to pass." I said, "I've taken all the basic math. I don't want to do algebra. I don't want to do that. I don't, they said, "No, no. We're going to give you basic check writing and accounting." - Oh, dude, I've been all over it. - Teacher had to write checks and how to keep your ledger. So I used to make fun of my dad 'cause he'd be down in his office doing the bills and he had a ledger where he'd write in green and in red. - Yep. - I went to this class and I went, "Oh my gosh." - Now I understand. - I understand. Now obviously we have everything on our phones. - Oh yeah, absolutely. - My mom's like, "How do you keep checking your checks?" I go, "I haven't written a check in 20 years, mom. Everything I pay through with my phone and it's right there, it tells me. What if the banking system crashes? What if your phone crashes? What if you actually work or you have to pay a bill and they require you to pay with check? Do you know how to write a check? I mean, I don't, and I'm not going to show this, but I took a check from a customer the other day, right? An elderly lady. She doesn't deal with credit cards. She paid with a check. - Right. Yeah. - Okay, great. I mean, if I told my kids to write me a check for, you owe me rent this month, give me a check, 500 bucks. A what? No, no, I'll just cash app it to you. No, you got to write a check. - Can you tell it to me, what can you do? - Can you write it to me? Put it in an envelope, put the right postage on it, return address into the address. Can you do that for me? - And a stamp. - They would have no idea. - No, it's something to be a part of life for another, for a long time, to be really-- - And if the internet, if the internet, if the interweb is the old people would call it, the interwebs, the interwebs, if that crashed, we'd be screwed. How would they, how would they get anything anywhere? We'd be screwed. - Yeah. - So you have to be prepared. Look, I've got a friend I'm going to get on this show. He's like, he's my brother. We've been best friends since we were little kids. He's a prepper. - Okay. - And he goes, I'm going to survive because I know how to do things. They will not survive because A, they're going to try me and they're going to get shot, or B, they'll just die because he who runs out of food dies first. - Oh, absolutely. - This guy trained himself to build his own garden. He grows his own food. He has probably 50,000 rounds of ammo. He probably has five, 600 gallons of water. You know, and he's got everything prepared. I think he's a little over the top. But hey, God bless him. I love him and I told him when Ish hits the fan, I'm coming to Texas. We're going to Tahas. - Yeah, absolutely. - And he's like, come on, let's go. But you know, you don't have to go to that extreme, but you're right. My youngest, who we were talking about earlier who started her senior year at UCF, go night. - Yep. - Charge on. - I taught her how to start cooking. - Yep. - So she would cook eggs in the morning for herself. 'Cause I got tired of doing it. And I said, "Jana, you're not going to marry a chef." Well, maybe you won't marry a chef, go for it. But he might not be there all the time. So you got to cook. And microwave food gets boring after a while. So she learned and she cooks and I'm proud of her. You know, she'll come out and go, "Mommy, can you cook me something?" I look at her and she's like, "But it tastes so much better when mommy does it." And I said, "Okay." - No. - And Lorraine loves that. She loves that, she gets, all right, I'm good. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - But I know that when Jana does move out when she graduates and moves out, which I don't know when that's ever going to happen. I keep telling her, "You're never moving, how are you?" But when she does, she'll be able to take care of herself, you know? And how many kids, unfortunately, that probably go to your school. And that's why I asked the demographics. 'Cause I know the neighborhood you're in. - Yeah. - That's actually my territory for where I work. - Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I know you've been there, yeah, absolutely. - I have, but I see these kids because I go to their house to measure for offense or whatever. - Right. - There's no dad, it's just mom. - No, no. - And mom's at work, so little Junior has to show me the survey and show me where the mom wants the offense and what they're looking for. So he has to be articulate enough to talk to me. He has to understand what he's looking for. And he has to understand that this is going to cost money. This isn't free. So I dealt with one the other day down off of Ivy or Texas. I don't remember. - Oh, goodness. - Yeah, they love me down there. The fence man, the bug man, and the post man. They love us all. - I was bugged out. - He said, I'm going to apply for credit. And I looked down and he goes, "Yeah, I got a job." I said, "My man." I said, "All right, good for you." He got a credit. I mean, I was in the auto industry for 100 years and the last 10 years or whatever I worked in the buy her, pay her industry. - Right. Okay. - I got critics. I do, yeah, I got three. Okay. This kid knew what he was talking about. He knew how to handle his money. I was proud. I was like, my man. - Yeah, absolutely. - He was barely 18, if that, you know? So I ask you, maybe he went to workforce, I don't know, but it seems like, or maybe he's got the mom who's got the grandma who's got the grind on them. - Yeah, absolutely. - You know, because unfortunately in the demographics, we talk about, and I can't say that for all of them. And I can't say for all that demographic, it could be other demographics, but the problem with a lot of these poor neighborhoods is there's no father involved, so they're not getting taught the guy things. How to play the bills, how to do this, how to do that. - How to change your freaking tire. - How to change your light bulb. - Yeah, absolutely. - Right, you know? And I give you kudos because I feel your school stepping up and taking the reins for that. - I've been, you know, it's a good thing, because, you know, like you said, I get to be coached to a lot of kids. And coach is one of those, you know, it's one of those words where it's a noun and a verb. - Right. - 'Cause yeah, you could say go see coach, right? And that's me. Or then there's that little piece that I do once you get to me. And that's that coaching piece, right? - So there's that noun and verb, right? So I look at it that way as that two part job. Sometimes I have to be, you know, the physical coach, but most of the time I just be your coach. And that's what I, and that's really the role I love to play, because I just wanna make you better. I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to break you down. I'm not trying to, 'cause look, you can pour water on a drowning guy, right? You can, or you can bust your ass and reach over the side and try to drag him out, right? - Right. - So what role do you wanna play? - Of course you can be the guy with the camera phone recording him. - Absolutely, right, with that solutions. So you really, the commissioner was right. You need a special heart to do what we do. 'Cause if you don't care, you could just let these kids go and you could run a half-assed school and you would have some success 'cause some kids want it. But most kids don't even know what they want. Until you start, until you start asking the questions and then showing 'em a path. And let one or two be successful. Let 'em find that job and keep that job. Next thing you know, they got money in their pocket and all of a sudden they are doing some good things, man. And I tell you, it matters. And I just love to be a part of something that matters. - Well, you know, and it's so important, but let's touch on that a little bit. My wife's an educator, you know, she's been in the business for 19 years, 18, 19 years, whatever, you've been 20 years. - Yeah. - The sad thing I'm finding out is these people who had the passion and the fire are burnt, they're done. - Yeah. - And the new kids that are coming up probably don't understand it or know how to have it because they're not from the old school. They don't know how to light that fire. They just wanna be a school teacher. They thought it was a cool job. You know, I get my summers off or whatever. Hey, don't get me wrong. My dad was a school teacher. We did a lot of traveling. My mom was a school teacher. And I look back and I go, I should have became a school teacher. I'd have been a PE teacher. Get to learn shorts every day, you know. But how many of these teachers that had the fire and the passion just gave up, they don't care anymore. And the kids are getting kicked to the side. You know, that's the sad thing that I'm hearing also. And then you're getting people coming in who want to become teachers who may have the heart and the passion to do it. And their first year, they just get their heads kicked in by the students or by admin or whomever. And who wants to deal with that crap? - They don't, I mean, look, we don't make enough money for that solutions, right? - No. - So-- - School teachers, cops, firefighters. - And when you start thinking about, you start thinking about the money we make per hour, shit. Man, I can go 10 bar and make more money. So, you start thinking about that. Then it becomes the passion, right? And I go back to 1979, right? Department of Education gets founded. And we have been going downhill ever since, right? We were number one in the world in education. And then we've had the Department of Education and we have yet to be number one again. So-- - Number one Florida or just the United States? - United States, what are we doing wrong, right? And I think what we're doing wrong is we're trying to all be on page seven at the same time. And we know that kids don't work that way, right? They don't learn at the same speed. And some kids don't even care about page seven. So now what are you gonna do? So you can't cookie cutter this thing too much, right? And let's face it, the schools in Des Moines are not gonna be the same as the schools in Boston. So how are we gonna keep-- How are we gonna get them all to going, right? - Right. - So we as a nation have got to kind of figure it out. And we also too have to stop with the teacher grading system. Because I don't use it. I refuse to use it at workforce. Because it really is just a popularity bullshit contest, right? - Right. - No, because if my teacher's not working, I'm just gonna go in there and go, hey man, what are you doing, right? I don't need an iPad. I don't need to slip in there when he's not looking and take some notes to make sure the lesson is written on the board. No, no, I don't need to do that. I don't need a gotcha for my teachers. What I need to know is what they need to be successful and make sure they have those tools, right? - And how many teachers are frustrated because they're having to teach to learn the test? - Yeah, teach the test. - Teach the test. - Is there-- - They don't get to use their passion of education? - Right, 'cause I have to teach this fast, best algebra one, biology, and what is it? US history, those are the tests I gotta teach to because of my kids, see, and that is what, you know, they gum it. Here's the thing that bothers me the most. I'm older, but I never had to pass one test to earn my high school diploma. - Right, we had to take the standard test, absolutely, but it didn't mean for, it didn't matter. - But it didn't matter. As long as I'd had my credits and I had my GPA, I was gonna walk across that stage. - Yeah, 'cause I used to Christmas tree it. - Oh, absolutely. The California achievement test or whatever the hell I did. - We took the Iowa test, yeah, yeah. - Whatever it was, right? - Yeah, yeah. - We used to take it at the end of the year and then it just compared you with other kids in that grade, right? It was all it was. - Well, they would just tell my parents they have a, you know. - Most of them kinda look like a friggin' genius, right? And they just, I just Christmas treeed better than they did. So, so. - You got lucky, right? - Yeah. - I hit the right code. - I picked C in the right place, I don't know. So, but, you know, I went to class every day, right? Right now in the state of Florida, not from, this is why there's not for nothing stories. We are at 22% almost truancy rate in the state of Florida. Our kids have not come back to school since COVID. - Right. - And how do we, and I, you know, that has been my, that has been my battle cry for this year. I, dude, I call parents, I send texts, I have sent letters home and I'm in week, what, four? And I'm telling you, I am already reaching out to parents 'cause I've had kids, I've seen twice. And I'm like, I can't, I can't have you fail because you're not here. - Yeah, but don't they get it automatic grade, even though they don't show up? - 50. - Yeah. How is that fair to the guy who shows up, but he's not as smart and he's maybe getting a 60. - Wait, they don't show up, they still get a 50? - Yeah, that's Florida, yeah. - Orange County, is it Florida, Orange County? - It's Orange County. - You contact the parents one of these, they say they're gonna show up, they're gonna show up. - Some of them, some of them really do get, some of them really do, they're like, "Oh my God, I'm dropping him off right down the street." You mean, he's not walking? I'm like, "No, Mom, he's not walking," right? 'Cause I don't see him. So, but some of them are like, "Oh, he's working too much, so then I can go down." So, honestly, I do this. I'll ride down to where this kid is working. And I will tell the boss, I'll get with the boss and I'll say, "Hey man, I really want him to graduate because I'd really like him to be your next manager." But for that, that means you're gonna want him to have that high school diploma. So, let's work together. I have talked to parents, I have talked to bosses, I have talked to aunties, grandmas, couch surfing, people, whatever it may be, because, you know, we work real hard just for them to be successful. Because their success is my success, right? - Absolutely. - I have to, I have, you have to wrap your head around that. Look, you're not always gonna get that pet on the back. You're not gonna say, "Man, that coach is the best guy ever." You know, and if you live for that, this is not to feel for you. But if you just want to truly improve the next generation, then absolutely education is the route for you. Because you need to pour into these kids because parents are too worried about being their best friend and not being their parent. - Right, that's the problem. - Nobody has to be that guiding light. Somebody has to install that moral compass because I am not gonna be your friend. I am not Willy Wonka, I don't sugarcoat anything. I am gonna be blunt with you, I am going to tell you exactly like it is, and I'm gonna tough love you through this whole process. - 100%. - And that's just important to me. - So when you reach out to the parents, what would you say the percentages of the parents that actually care, that want to get involved and put the foot in their kid's butt? - 30%. - But 30%. So you got 70% kicked to the wayside. - 70%, man, if I could get 50% to return my call or email, dude, I would, I would dance the toskey. I mean, I just, I can't-- - Now let's ask about the employers. What's the percentage of them wanting to work with you? - Now probably, probably about 95% because they want a good employee. - There's the problem, not a problem, but it's the role, the world is backwards there. - Absolutely. - It should be 95% of the parents wanting to be put in their foot in their kid's butt and get to school. - But when you get with those parents and you get no response whatsoever, like you said, I didn't even return in your calls. I mean, is there still hope to get to those kids? Can you talk to the kids directly somehow or? - What I do is like say, I haven't seen you for a week, or I haven't seen you in two weeks. And so I kind of put the bolo out at the front desk, right? And I'm like, man, these are the kids I'm looking for. So if they happen to come in a third-party because we have a check-in system, we, our school, you know, 11th and 12th grade, but we go through like C-world security every morning, right? So you come in, when you come into our school, you come in through our gate, your backpack gets gone through, you get wandered, and you get, you know, you get your morning. Man, I'm so glad you're here today. Nothing but love for you. I hope you have the best day ever and get on to class, right? So you get your two minutes of encouragement before I even, but I mean, 'cause I am there to greet you at the door. And then the parents that I can get a hold of, yes, but the kids, they start to know that they do have adults in their life that care about them. You know, it may not be coach. It may be, it may be my math teacher. It may be my science teacher that they have a relationship with. And then all of a sudden they start coming to school for that adult. And then, you know, because they want, they want some kind of acknowledgement or kudos or at a job from some adult in their world. And sometimes, like I said earlier, that we are that only consistent factor in their life. - How many times that? - That's why it's important that we come to work every day. - Right, well, how many times at a league, I'd hear the story where Ms. Zach gets her cursed out and yelled at, but by the end of the week, the kids go, "Hey, Ms. Z, you gonna take me to church?" - Oh, yeah, absolutely. - You know, she's like, wait, you were just cussing me out a minute ago, but-- - Did you just tell me to go have myself, yeah. - But you want me to pick you up for church? You gonna pick me up for church? And, you know, I don't know if you know this, Trippy, when Lorraine was at a league, we actually had to get a van for the church because she brought that many kids to church from the school, 'cause they all wanted to be a church. - Oh, that's a beautiful thing. - She never forced one kid. They actually would ask her. And the funny story is the majority of those kids were, you know, Ali is the alternative school in Lake County. It's where the, I call it the bad kids school, but there's no such thing as bad kids, it's just bad parents. - Right. - But it's where, you know, this is where the kids are, but you come to find out, these kids have been going to church all their life because their grandma takes them or something like that, and now grandma can't be there, can't do it, and now mom has ex-steps in, and she's taking them. - Yeah, that's a beautiful thing. - You know, I remember one point in time, we had to go to the Sanford Airport to pick up one of those super big 19 passenger vans 'cause nobody had one, and we had to rent that because she had, I think, 22 kids going, so we had to drive one color in the van. - That is awesome. - Yeah. - That's great. That's beautiful. - No, she'll tell you, the kids were just cussing her out the day before, and now they're in church. - She had, there was two sisters at a league. That seemed to, they had that love. - Miss Zach, I love you to, oh, you can't tell me, you know, not to do this, but she's like, giving them great advice, like, hey, you know, don't go out and sleep with that boy, right? Or whatever it is, and they're saying, you know, boom. And it's like, damn it, I told you not to do that, right? So-- - Yeah, the joke at Ali was that a couple, a couple generations, like, let's say, I don't remember what, how many years she would say it, she says, everybody who's gonna be going to Ali is gonna be related. - It is, absolutely. - 'Cause they all, everybody slept with everybody there. - And we, there were people that would thought, we had these two boys. They thought they were cousins, and then at lunch, they were sittin', and they were talkin', they found out they were brothers. - Wow. - And it's like-- - I had kids on the football team when I coached in Mount Dora. - Yep. - They were brothers, but they lived two different dads, but it's a mom. - Yeah, same mom, but different dads and different sides of town and-- - Yeah, I'm like, wait, wait, your brothers, but I'm droppin' you off here, and you over, oh, different, I get it. And the funny thing is, Lauren used to keep her pictures of the kids up on the wall, and they'd be like, those are your kids? Yeah. Same baby daddy. Yeah. (laughs) - Yeah, yeah. - You know, that is so odd, because it is true. They do, that is because it's not frequent, or it's not usual, and so you'll see. They'll say, well, how many wives have you had? I mean, if you say, if you got like less than five, right, or whatever, if you say, you know, like with me, I got nine grandkids, right? And they're like, well, holy mackerel, right? And it's like, oh, you know, my kids have been married to the same people from the beginning, and they're like, oh, wait, what? How is that possible? I said, look, they just found Reiki Wolf. So yeah. - Let me break in here for a real quick commercial trip. We gotta talk about our sponsor. Got backup. Yeah. - Yeah. - Do you need storage? How about six terabytes for up to six separate accounts, all for the low, low price of $9.97 a month? Check it out at zaxworld226. Got backup.com, totally encrypted and secure. You control your data and so much more. Check it out in the link I'll put in the bio or go to zaxworld226.got backup.com for all your backup needs. All right, back to the show. - All right, let's go on to school safety. - Okay. - Let's come. 'Cause I know you had something about, of course you have to take to be a gun-carrying teacher in Florida. - Yes, sir. - Is the Guardian program specifically for a armed personnel or is it Guardian can teachers be armed? Is that what you're trying to ask for me? - The Guardian program, you like, I'll have to see if I can break it down. You don't, in Orange County, you don't have to be like a librarian. In some counties, a teacher can't care, right? Like, because they don't want that. But an administrator, a librarian, a maintenance guy, right? He could carry, but they don't want the teacher to carry. Now in Orange County, teachers can carry, right? So, go through the Guardian program. And that is done through the Orange County Sheriff's Office. - Okay, and what's involved with going to the Guardian? - You're not a sworn peace officer. You're just a Guardian, basically it's- - No, we have one job. And that is to stop an active shooter. - Right, okay. - We have no law enforcement powers at all, right? - So if fight breaks out, you just gotta stand there and watch it. - Well, no, we do intervene, right? But that's on us, right? That's on us. - I haven't forbid your gun pops out. - Well, no, I don't, right? Our Guardians don't, because I'm not inserting a weapon into a squirmish, right? - So I don't, but if it's another teacher, or whatever, they will try to separate them. 'Cause we don't wanna have to dial 911 every time I fight. But I'll be honest with you, we have this policy at Workforce Academy. If you fight, we ask you to leave. I don't care if you started it, if you ended, if you just threw a one punch, or if you threw 20, I'm gonna ask your mom to come and get you, right? It's part of that whole being a charter school thing, our school of choice. So we haven't had a fight in two years, because everybody knows, like, if you swing, you're gone, and you've lost this opportunity, right? So we have that. So a Guardian-- - Did you guys have that a Lee also, if I recall correctly? - No, no, Ms. Valentino went through the whole referral thing where you like, you may go to like a positive pathways type place for, you know, 60 days or whatever, but then you'd be able to come back. - Okay, okay. - With us, no, you're just out. - One and done. - Yeah, yeah, sorry. - Even if you didn't start it, you were defending yourself, doesn't matter. - But I don't want you, no, 'cause when does defending you stop, right? - When does it get stopped, right? - I get it. - So, do you deal with any rival gangs hanging out and they want to fight, or? - You know, no, we have gotten to that point where our space is, and I hate to say it like this, is kind of, we are that we're an island, because we have all 22 high schools at this point, we have a kid from just about every high school in Orange County on my campus. - Really? - And so, they have, they learn to get along. And man, the jocks kind of finding, it's almost like self-segregation, you know, the jocks find each other, the video game players find each other, the nerdy kids find each other, the hood rats find each other, right? So, it goes, they find themselves in the lunchroom, 'cause we only have one lunch, right? So, everybody just kind of finds their spot. It works out, and it does work out. So, the Guardian program, it came after Marjorie Stoneman Douglas, and so, it went through the legislature, and then it became a county-by-county, you could choose, right? And it is funded by the state. So, it's kind of cool. I carry a weapon that the state bought me, right? So, I carry a glock that the state of Florida bought for me. So, it's kind of cool. But we check in every day, right? We have safe school meetings, I had one today. We talk about self, 'cause mental health has become a super, it's, I want to say that education and graduation rate is number one, but then school safety and mental health is number two. And we really want to start making sure our kids are safe, because, you know, look, look, what happened today in Georgia, right? So, this is why we go through a metal detector every day. What do I find, big gliders and babes, right? I don't, ever since, and we've done that ever since, you know, Lorraine had that gun, right? So, ever since then, we have started the program that, no, no, we go into a metal detector every day. So, have we found anything since that day? No, and that's been years ago. So, but it's super important. And the kids know that we are a safe space, because nobody tries to bring anything in, right? Like, I have a policy that is just mine that I think maybe Orange County may make them crazy, but I don't care. My kids write a links bus, right? And some of our young ladies, they carry the little pepper spray, because they write the links bus. And so, when they check in in the morning, they hand it to me. Coach, here's my pepper spray. I put it in a little zip fuck bag with their name on it. And when they leave in the afternoon, I give it right back to them, right? And that way they can get on the links bus with their pepper spray and they feel safe, because I want my job, I really feel my job at the school is to make sure my teachers and my kids go home safe every day, 'cause I wanna go home at the end of the day. So, I wanna make sure they go home at the end of the day. So, school safety to me is so, you know, so important. You know, there's so many little things that take your time during the day. You know, that you still have the same principle where 20% of the knuckleheads take up 80% of your time, you know, so, so, but for the most part, it's silly things like, get off your cell phone, right, stop doing, squint tick talkin' in the middle of biology class, you know, little stupid things. - Now, do you guys let them keep their phones? 'Cause I remember at a league, you couldn't have your phone. - No, so here's what we do. And thanks for askin' 'cause this is new to Orange County. So, we have a box, right, like a phone box. And so, when the kids come in, it's clear, the box is clear, you put your phone in the box and you lock it and you get to keep the key. It breaks up that separation anxiety, right? 'Cause they can still hold the key and then the box is clear so they can still look and see it 'cause our classrooms are small, you know, we only got about 18 to 20 kids in a class. So, they can look up there at the front of the room and still see their phone in the box. So, it breaks up that separation anxiety. Then, you know, like just for the bell rings, the teacher says, "Hey, go get your phones out of jail," and they go get their phone and they go to the next class and they lock it up, right? Then, now, this is where we differ from Orange County Public Schools. At lunchtime, I allow you to have your phone. I don't care, text your girlfriend, call your mom, I don't care, right, do whatever. But here's what I found. Even though we allow now our kids to have it at lunchtime, they're still using lunchtime to be social with each other in the room. You know, when they had the kids and they had the phones all the time, you know, without locking them up, when they would go to lunch, they would be sitting at a table full of kids, but they would still be, you know, all right here texting, watching videos, doing whatever. But now that their phones are locked up, they're starting to communicate with their tablemates. They've got that self-segregation thing going on where the jocks are over here talking about college football and, you know, the computer game kids are over here, and then the other kids are over here, and they're actually talking with each other and they're not just face down into their phones. So I, and we're only four weeks in, and I'm already seeing the difference. So I'm just praising God that, you know, that the kids are doing the right thing, so. - So how do we get more guardians in the fire a little? - It's voluntary, right? - Is it a tough course? - Actually, you know, we have to shoot better than a police officer. We're held to a different standard. So we have to shoot the pistol course, and we have to shoot at an accuracy of 85%. To be a law enforcement officer, you have to shoot at 80. So they hold us to a different standard because we are constantly carrying a weapon on a school campus, right? So they hold us to a different standard. So at the beginning, you work on scenarios. You do a little bit of what you're allowed to do and what you're not allowed to do, like, you know, like bag searches and things like that, you know, to make sure you're not violating any rights. But a lot of it is out on the pistol course, just becoming, because a lot of these people are teachers. They've never really shot before. - Right. - So now they're learning to shoot and they run you through, it's sort of like the competitions that you see, where you're moving between barrels, you're in different scenarios, where you're there, shoot, don't shoot. We went to Valencia College where you shoot the video, the video now, where you, it's all interactive and it's a laser, you're shooting a laser. So that's-- - Have you been to the place up in Sanford called Decision Tactical? - No, and, but I just learned about it from the Orange County, Orange County. - They go practice there. It's so, oh. - Aw, he kicked out a video of it. - All right, so, yeah, they told me, they told everybody, anybody needs a door kicker. They should, they should bring me. - That's your job. - You get to kick down doors. You have real life scenarios. Now the scenario I was in was a domestic violence, but they have a mall situation. I think they're building, I don't know if they have a school, but they have, it used to be the movie theater there in Sanford at the mall. - Oh, oh, I know exactly where that is. I did not know that. - You use the guns you use are glocks. - Yep. - But they're all CO2. - Right. - But they-- - So it gives you the-- - They recoil, yeah. Man, it was so much fun. I mean, it was, the training was awesome. Yeah, we gotta go. Coach, let's go. - Yeah, yeah, it would be fun. Let's go. - Yeah, I had a blast. And, you know, you do, there's a competition where you go through and you shoot targets and you go through like, they have these bags hanging from the ceiling that are supposed to be like, people, you gotta get them out of the way and move through the crowd. Like always having full gun control the whole time. - Yeah. - And finger, you know, obviously gonna know what your finger is. - Finger is fun. - Yep. - And then you go into the scenario. We happen to pick the domestic violence one and you have to give commands. We only had one guy talk to one guy down. The guy actually put the knife down. I kept the guy. I didn't have time to argue with him. I just shot him. I don't have time for that. - That's the police officer in you, though. Hey, look, I don't have time to deal with. - I ain't got time for your nonsense. And none of us, those guys all went with, none of us, there was a dog that they had behind. It's a fake dog, it's a video, obviously. But it's supposed to be a distraction, but some people do actually shoot the dog and I'm like, did anybody shoot the dog? They're like, no, nobody on your team shot the dog. I was like, good, because I was shooting you. - I'll shoot the dog. - Don't shoot the dog. - That's Ryan. - Don't shoot the dog. - It was cool. I had a young guy with me and I was kind of being a to him and I kept calling him boot and trying to get him through there with head on straight, but it was a good time. I mean, and if you go, we should go. But you should bring anybody who's a guardian. So what is the difference? Why doesn't your school have an SRO? Why do you need a guardian? Why can't you get an SRO? Do you know, the bottom line is the bottom line. Because we're a charter school. - Right. - We actually have to cover that cost out of our budget. And right now, it's about $70 an hour. - Well, I understand Lorenz. - So I would rather pay my teachers and then volunteer to do the job myself and rather, because right now, I have a tutor, right? I have a paid tutor that is on there to help my kids pass tests. And I would rather pay them and carry the weapon myself than, you know, have to have a SRO on my campus. You know, I'll just, I'll continue to take my volunteers, right, whoever wants to go through the program. You know, we have three. - What's the floor to pay for the program or do you have to pay for it? - No, that was budget. - No, no, no, no, no, for the Guardian program. - The Guardian program is paid through that coach Aaron, coach Aaron Feis, it was a Florida statute. So the Florida pays for us, pays Orange County Sheriff's office for us to go through. Now, if I worked for a, say, a security company, it doesn't cover that. But if I am a, but if I am a school employee, then the state of Florida pays for that training. - So are there schools that actually hire security companies as Guardians? - Absolutely, it's a, it's a huge growing business. - Okay, okay. - Actually, I think there should be some lobbying done that every school gets funded to have. - Right, well, but how many schools, now this is something we should probably figure out, how many schools out there have SROs, rather than the Guardian? - One of my kids schools, they're both charter schools, one of them has an SRO and one of them cut the funding out this year. And he was very popular amongst the kids. And I think it was a terrible decision. But like you said, you've got to come to that conclusion. The administrators have to come to that conclusion. - 'Cause like you said, coach, it's the bottom line. - It's the bottom line. - Yeah. - So if somebody wanted to become an SRO school. - And you did that every morning. And the kids loved them and it was an important position. They made a decision and they make a lot of good decisions. And I'm sure that was the right decision as far as funding goes. But the state should fund it, should have to fund it. Should fund all schools. - Well, you know, and I see I agree with you 100%, right? I think because who are my kids? My kids are Orange County Public School students, right? I'm not a private school. I'm not a, and I'm not even, I'm not even selective, right? If you, if you choose to come to my school, I'm going to, I'm gonna take you and try to fix you. I'm gonna meet you where you are and I'm gonna try to fix whatever's broke and get you down the road. So, but the way that Orange County is and I'm not, I'm not at all speaking ill of Orange County Public Schools, I'm just saying we're not in that funding pool, right? We do, we do pay somewhere between five and 7% of the funds that we receive to Orange County Public Schools for administrative and things like that, right? So, do you fall under Orange County? - Technically no, 'cause I have to pay my own teachers and we're not in the Florida retirement system. We are so, we do follow a lot of the same policies because it's easier to say, look, we follow their policies so it kind of, legally it helps us, but for the most part, no, we have to pay our own bills and make our own way. - Okay, and that's how, that was how Ali was, wasn't it? - Yeah, 'cause you have to recruit your own students. Like I don't have, I don't have a middle school that's gonna dump into me at the end of the year, right? - Right, yeah, I saw that direct mailing. - I have to do, yes, I have to do direct mail, I have to, I go out and I visit like the guidance counselor and I tell them what we do, what the, you know, who-- - You need a good salesman working for you. - So, man, you're probably right. I'm telling you, if my business development officer ever leaves, I'm calling you because, because, man, we need somebody that can mix and mingle with our employers, right? I have a lady who is awesome and she works with our local businesses and she tells them what we have, what do we do? And she's the one that sets up these job fairs and does those kind of things for me, but she is, she has dropped the hint already that she's thinking of my retirement. (laughing) - So-- - You're gonna have to think about it too though, you've dropped that hint tonight. - Well, I have, but I, but brother, I still got about four or five years. - Oh, no, we need you, we gotta grow this, we gotta grow this thing. We gotta grow-- - So, let me ask you, I meant to ask you this earlier, sorry, I just popped in my head. When you run these job fairs-- - Yes. - Do you instruct the kids how to dress and how to talk and how to present themselves? - We're already in business casual. - And the employers are okay with that. - Yes. - Okay, 'cause a lot of job fairs, they expect you to wear it, you know, jacket and tie. - Now, now, if they come to us, they already know how our students are gonna be. - Okay, okay. - If we, like, like, if there's a, if there's a, like the governor's job fair that's out of the fairgrounds, - At the fairgrounds, yeah. - Now, sometimes we'll run a van, right? We will do just like LA did to take these kids to church, right? We'll run a van, we'll take the kids. Now, that's different. Yeah, we will talk about wearing a tie. We also do mock interviews. Look, I have volunteers that'll come in that were like business owners or whatever, and they will come in and sit with our kids and they will do mock interviews with them and to kind of get them used to those tough questions, to kind of get them, to get that feel of what it's going to be like. So we do that for this group, because a lot of them don't know, right? They've never had a job before, or they're moving up, right? They've had that McDonald's job, but now they're going to FedEx, or they're going to Amazon. - Right. - And so now there's a different questions to be asked. - And some of them may never even know how to tie a tie, or know that you're supposed to. - No, there, I do that every day. - I'm sure you do. - I mean, we coach the little things, the tie in our tie to make sure, look man, put a t-shirt on underneath that thin shirt, so you don't look like you got your nipples out, right? You know what, whatever it is, right? We want to make sure that these fellas are looking good, right? Make sure that you're belt in your shoes, match, right? We want those simple things. 'Cause I want you to get the job. So I don't want them to have any reason to tell you no, right? No reason. You came in, you smell good, you look good, your shoes and your belt match. Your hair is right. You know, and so I don't want any reason to have-- - You teach them what their gigg line is? - Say it again. - You teach them what their gigg line is? - Absolutely, our belt in our shirt-- - My shirt, my belt, my zipper. - Yeah, they all got to be straight, right? They all got to match. - Yes, absolutely. - We have to, man. We have to, 'cause-- - 'Cause even if you go for a job at Universal or Disney or SeaWorld, they may accept you in khakis and a polo, but if you're the guy with, maybe just a shirt and tie on, you don't have to wear a jacket. Florida's, I mean, it's ridiculous to wear a jacket. But I always do, but that's just me. But you're gonna stand out a little more than the kid who showed up with just a polo. - You don't have to tell if you do shirt? - Yeah, absolutely. - Yeah, yeah. - Yeah, absolutely. And that's what, that they need to know, right? Because they don't know. And so they need to be know, they have to know that you will get one shot to make a first impression, right? - Right. - So you have to make that shot count. So I need you, I need you to show up. I need you to be, you're straight. I need you not to be chewing gum or smelling like weed or doing whatever. I need you set, right? And so, and that's just, that's just super important. And sometimes they go, ah, coach, you know, whatever. And then they'll get the job and they're like, dead gum, you were right, coach. And it's like, well, you don't get to be this old by being stupid, right? - Right. - So, so you just have to, you just have to, you know, just keep, and you have to keep pouring, right? You just have to keep pouring into them, right? Eventually that seed's gonna grow. Because those little things, you're watering with the little things, you know, there's nothing more successful to me than when I'm interviewing someone and they reach out and they shake my hand, look me in the eye and say, hey, how are, you know, how you do it with a smile? - Absolutely. - Other than, hey, what's up, man? You know, what's going on? - Yeah, or staring at their shoes. - Right. - No. - No, I don't care how much it hurts to do it, put that smile on your face, shake their hand, and actually act like you're excited to be there. 'Cause if you're not, then go home and sit on your mama's couch and, you know, be the lump you're gonna be. - I make them do research on the company before they go. So like, like, we're going to the Levi store. I want you to know what is the best-selling brand of Levi's in that Levi store. I want you to know the 501's are the best-selling, you know, you know, style of pants that they sell, or how long they've been in business, or I want you to know the manager's name. I want you to understand these little things, because it's gonna be the little things that separate you from everyone else. And if you look like you've done your homework before you got there, man, that may be what pushes you over the edge. - I'm learning something here today. - It's true. I mean, and one of the, I meant to a guy who wants to be in the car industry. Lord only knows why, but he wants to be. - Yeah, God bless him. - Right? He loves it, and I tell him, look, don't walk into the manager's office and try and baffle him with knowledge on an engine. 'Cause if you ask me what's under the hood, I'm gonna be like, I don't know, it's a car. Gets you from point A to point B to pay your bills so you can keep that car. - Right, yeah. - You have to know how to talk the lingo. Why are you here to make money, to profit the dealership, to profit myself? How are you gonna do that? Talk to as many people as I can. You know, stuff like that, the little things. - Absolutely. - That you have to tell them, because then you get the guy who comes in and he's just like, oh, I was looking at the Corvette 454. It's got six barrel blah blah. I'm like, dude, what are you talking about? I don't care. - Right. - You know, they're like, what's your, the worst question you can ask me, and it's just me when I was interviewing. Hey, man, what's your favorite car? I go, the one you sell that makes me the most money? No, no, no, but what's your favorite car? All right, next, you obviously don't understand the business. I don't care, they're all iron sleds. They all are there to make money. - Right. - You know, just like if you go into, like you said, with Levi's, have a little knowledge, know something about the company. If you walk in and you're just there for a JOB. - Yeah. - And that's all you're ever going to get. - Yeah. - You know, but if you walk into a Gucci store, know a little history of Gucci, why do you want it because it's a cool thing? Well, who cares why it's cool? What's your demographics that you're selling to? Who do you have to know how to talk to? Why do you got to talk to that person? What are they looking for? You know, it's stuff like that. So, and that's what you guys are doing. These kids today, man, it's terrifying. When I was, when I was in the restaurant industry for a little while and I'd interview them, I didn't pick a server, just, look, you had to have experience. You got to know how to carry a tray and, but I wanted someone who was the bubbly. Yeah, exactly. (laughing) Could be how you carry a tray? - Yeah. - Yeah. - That's it. - You got to have that. - He's got a couple tunnel from carrying a tray. - I'm the bubbly guy too, so. - You have to be bubbly. You have to be-- - I hit all the high marks. - Right, and the one of the things that really impresses me when I go into a restaurant, and I would steal a server if I could, if I was still in the business, if you don't have a pad and you remember exactly what everybody ordered, and it came out to everybody's where they knew it, and my drink never was empty. Don't walk by 100 times and ask me how is everything, 'cause, dude, I'm talking. Just make sure my stuff is good. You know what I'm saying? That's why you're gonna get the job and you're gonna get the tip. You know, and it just, like I said, it's those little things that come with years of experience and knowledge. I didn't get, like you said, this old from just-- - Just bumping around, yeah, absolutely. - 'Cause my parents were multi-millionaires and left me a ton of money. - Yeah, whatever. - My parents were school teachers, so we were rich. - Oh, yeah, right, right, right. - Rich, and my dad taught accounting, business, and law in high school. He knew I struggled with math, and he would bring me home diddos every night. I can still smell those diddos, you know, the old-- - Yeah. - Oh, yeah. - You know. - Yes. - So, yeah, we were rich in diddos, as I used to say. Yes, every kid before the test, we'd all-- - Yeah. Somebody said, if you smell these really hard, it gives you a little buzz. - You get a buzz. You get a little-- - A little higher. - A little buzz before the test. Well, hey, listen, coach, I don't wanna keep you up all night. I know you gotta work tomorrow. But we gotta do this again, coach. - And here's what I think. The next time we're gonna do it, I wanna get LA on because, you know, you guys will get some good banter with the education-- - You gotta set up the coach was saying, no, are you in or? - I am in, y'all, you just, look, man, this has been so much fun. I've got to spend the last hour just bragging on my school, and hopefully, and hopefully-- - We gotta do this again. I love what you guys do. I was reading your website and tentally, just before the show, last night, the night before when Zach told me-- - He's lying, he doesn't know how to read. - That's true, though. I was watching the pictures, but intently, but-- - Intently at pictures. - And I just-- - All right, you know, our show is called "Politik No Brainer." So we gotta bring up politics a little bit. We didn't talk about the orange man or the sleepy man, so we're not gonna. But what can we do to fill a buster? - Hi Lahey, like that trippy, I used one of your words. - Villa buster. - Villa buster, this government to get the education to wake the F up, for lack of better words. - I challenge you guys for this, and help me out, and maybe you can challenge the government for this. You realize we got a country to stop smoking in a generation. We need to use that same marketing machine to make education cool and important again. Because we let everyone know that smoking kills you. So how can we use that same marketing knowledge to say that education is the key to success? You don't need to have that degree in cave painting, but I need you to understand how to just keep a balance of your business, right? To understand that customer service piece. To understand a little bit about history, that you are a business of one, and everything that you know is a deposit into your business. So with that way, you understand that why am I learning this poetry coach is because it's a deposit into your business. Now next time you're trying to make a sale, and that customer says something about what's work, all of a sudden you can make a connection with him, and maybe make a sale. And so why is that important? And so if we could get our politicians to understand that we're not talking about, we're not talking about college anymore, we're talking about education. There is a difference. There is a difference between knowledge and education, and then there's that degree piece. 'Cause I went to college, man, I mean, y'all understand. So, and I don't know, I learned how to give you five pages on pencil, right? I can tell you, I can give you 5,000 words on why a pencil exists. But does that really help me? No, it doesn't help. But, I mean, it does, 'cause now I've learned that it's mental and self-discipline. But I really want kids to know, you know, that somebody's got to teach these kids that being smart is cool. Being able to speak that King's English is okay. Correct. You don't have to use slang to be accepted in certain communities. I don't have to use the N word to describe my cousin, my brother, my whatever, right? I don't, I can use other words. I can use words that are even more powerful. I can, and I do that through education, right? I do that by understanding that words are powerful, words have meaning, and that I need to, Mr. Senator, I need the funding in the advertisement world to let everyone know that education is cool and be nice to the smart kid, 'cause you're probably gonna be working for him. So, you know, it's just that easy, right? 100%. We've got our work cut out for us. Oh, absolutely, dude, I just got, that's my 100-year plan, are you kidding? I agree, that's my 100-year plan, sir. So, we can start a new campaign called mega, make education great again? Yeah, absolutely, if that's, if that's-- I knew you would. It's funny, 'cause, you know, I'm a libertarian, you know, all right, I'm not sure the government, I think we could candle our own stuff if they would just let us, right? I think people would treat each other okay if we didn't have, if we just were given the opportunity, right, I just, I have not given up on the human spirit. I really think that we will be good to each other if allowed to, sure, there's gonna be those people who are always gonna try to take advantage. But I really think that maybe they are the minority because there are still a ton of good people left out there and there's still a ton of good people that wanna help people, that wanna do the right thing and will if they're allowed to, right? If the, 'cause, you know, we gotta get out of that, no good deed goes on punished foolishness, right? We have got to, we have got to make away somewhere. - I agree, I agree. - I tell you, you know, my experience in the restaurant is like I said, 25 locations over the course of 23 years, I met 25 hundred great kids. Nowadays, I call them the Anthony Bourdain kids. He said they were, so these misfits just get together in a restaurant. - Yep. - They put together a business and deliver on that business and deliver to those customers. They're all great kids and they all have huge potential. There's not a single bad kid in the bunch and I've ever met in all the years I've done this and I have complete faith that the more we invest in them, the better America will be. - Absolutely, you know, I always say there's no such thing as bad kids, there's bad parenting. - Right, but even- - There's such thing as bad dogs. - Because no one knows kids. - No one knows kids, no one how hard they work, no one how conscientious they are. Every single one of them, there was never a bad kid in the bunch. There were some kids that didn't get the restaurant business, it wasn't for them, but they gave it their all, you know. - Well, yeah, it was funny. John's first job was at McDonald's and he swore he'd never work in a restaurant again. - Yeah, but that's right. - And then there were some of us who we loved it. I mean, you know, I got married and had to move on, but I loved running the bars when I did, you know, the restaurants and all that fun stuff. But yeah, okay, so we have a mission and a plan in place. Now we're just gonna have to implement it. And- - You guys let me know. - We're gonna get you back on this show. - We're gonna have it back, sir. - Absolutely. - 100%. - I appreciate you, we appreciate you for- - Absolutely. Hey, nothing beloved gentlemen. I appreciate, I appreciate you guys and giving me this opportunity to brag. So like I said, nothing to love and love and respect. - Is there a website anybody can go to for your school? - Sure, it's www.workforceacademy.com. It's a great site. I tell you, I've been on it a lot the last couple of days. Check it out just for your own self enrichment. Even if you don't have kids, even if you're not lost in the site today, check it out. Get to know it. - Go through the interwebs and check it out. - Go through the interwebs. - Yeah, absolutely. - Well, on that note, I see a dog about to attack you there, Fipperoo. We're gonna wrap it up, guys. Thank you for listening, we love you. We totally appreciate you guys out there. Like, subscribe, share, tell a friend, telephone, tell everybody. And until next time, much love and peace. - Peace and love. - Love. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)