President Sands, we are two weeks into
the new academic year and this class is
significant well I think the
sesquicentennial class is is a reason to
celebrate first of all so a reason to
think about the hundred and fifty year
history of Virginia Tech and the
evolution of our land-grant mission but
it's also an opportunity as you pointed
out to reflect on where this class is
headed and to really use it as kind of a
barometer for the changes that are
happening around the world and and the
kinds of changes that are we have to
prepare our students for going forward
and I when I look at the the 30,000
35,000 students that wander around
Virginia Tech during the day or change
classes or or they're in the
laboratories and serving as research
assistants and across the board that is
in the back of my mind all the time is
what are we preparing them for and are
we preparing them in the right way and
and I think it's a great opportunity to
reflect on that. In terms of preparing
them what are the skills today that are
so important for Virginia Tech students
to learn? I think every student has
to have depth in a discipline you need
to be able to bring something to the
table and a lot of our students crave
having depth in multiple disciplines and
sometimes those disciplines are very
disparate they're not related to each
other obviously but that will continue
going forward but I think that there are
some skills and approaches that are
going to be needed for this generation
going forward that were always
important but or even more important in
the world we're entering. For example the
the ability to work in a team on a topic
that is much more complex than any
individual could handle and that
requires being able to communicate with
people that have different disciplinary
expertise, different lived experience, and
to do that in kind of a fluid competent
way so that you can incorporate that
kind of thinking into a solution or into
a vision or whatever it may be that
you're working on at the time. Virginia
Tech has a history a commitment to
research. Can you share the importance
and the impact of research? Research has
a impact across many dimensions. One of
the things that I used to think of as as
research you know
back when I was a kid was the discovery
and the curiosity based research that we
we do at universities like Virginia Tech
and that that will forever be important
because it's part of the human
experience. You ask questions, you try
to get the answer and Virginia Tech
is well-positioned for that. but we're
also really well positioned for what I
would call the opportunistic application
driven research and that's something
that we're really really strong in
historically and and we'll be going
forward. These are, this is a
situation where you have a problem
you're trying to solve, but you're
flexible enough in trying to solve it
that you recognize when you have a
discovery that is going to change that
the whole framing of that problem. I mean
it's one thing to have a problem that
you try to solve and you just stay on
that, but if you were aware enough and
your knowledge is deep
enough and you're at the forefront of
that field you're able to, our
researchers are able to recognize when
there's a breakthrough and really say
okay well then let's go off in that
direction and that that's something that
I think is really right in the
wheelhouse at Virginia Tech. The other
part that I think is so important, and
we're working hard on this, is a
transdisciplinary approach to
research you always have to have depth
in the discipline you have to be able to
work across adjacent disciplines this
interdisciplinary research but the
future I think is in pulling all that
together in a transdisciplinary
framework that allows you to take on the
problems that have policy implications,
that have implications for the human
experience, as well as the technology, the
science, the business aspects. Think
of a problem right now that's worth
solving a lot of the the only way you're
going to really do that is to pull that
kind of expertise together and we have
it at Virginia Tech because we're a
comprehensive university but the other I
think the other really important
orientation that we've got is the
ability to bring in partners because no
institution going forward can take on
some of these problems and some of these
challenges without partners. You can't
have it all. What we're trying to do
with our destination areas, with the
institutes, and with our research
enterprise as a whole is position
ourselves so that we
are a preferred partner, so that we can
bring in the talent that we need to to
augment what we've got and really take
on these these grand challenges. I think
collaboration is the key. We need to be
able to work with partners and some of
those partners are going to be other
academic enterprises, some of them are
going to be in the commercial side,
government agencies and non-governmental
organizations, you go down the list there
are partners both in the US and outside
that that you really need to bring in
when you're taking on a big problem.
we've tried to lead by example and in
the Commonwealth to show that Virginia
Tech is an authentic partner that we're
really committed to this. Probably
our deepest partnership at the moment is
with Carilion Clinic and we've had a
10-year experience with them in Roanoke
and we're looking forward to the next
decade and growing rapidly in that area
but if you think about what it took and
to to come to that position where you
can have a partnership across sectors
you know. We're higher ed, they're
health care, those two don't often meet.
The opportunity to to pull
together really is based on trust and
alignment. You have to have some serious
conversations to engage a partner like
that. You can't just assume that it's
going to stick together. You have to work
at it constantly. It's like a
relationship between two people, you
can't take it for granted. If you look at
the Commonwealth cyber initiative, I
think our experience with Carilion
Clinic, and there are many other examples
where we've been a trusted partner and
and we've been I think authentic in that,
it put us in a position with this essentially a cyber moonshot that the
state envisioned doing that they asked
us to take the lead on that and that
means not Virginia Tech not taking the
whole thing and running with it but
really bringing in all of our partners.
We've got now I think with the Commonwealth
cyber initiative something like 75 people involved in various working
groups to help us shape the
blueprint that we're going to present in
by December 1st to the Virginia Research
Investment Committee. They're from
all of our academic institutions, but
also from industry, from the startup
community, entrepreneurs, VCs, and
non-governmental organizations, the whole
the whole spectrum. We're all getting
around a table and
working through what this could look
like, because it will put, if we're
successful, it will put Virginia in the
league globally, in this nexus of data
security and autonomy with a focus on
cyber security but its connections to
machine learning, its connections to the
Internet of Things where there's a huge
opportunity space for Virginia. I want to
talk to you about something that we'll
hear you talking a lot about in the
coming days and that's an idea that you
call collective autonomy. I think the
way an example of that
that you know I think most of us can
relate to is using our GPS. We use them
to get from one place to another, it
tells us if there's an accident ahead
and it will reroute us. Talk about the
significance of that and the
implications of collective autonomy.
This idea that there's a emergence of human
cyber networks that are really changing
the way we we live it's
actually changing the way we make
decisions as humans. The fact that we've
got machines and networks of machines
out there that are interfacing with not
only individuals but collectively
with other human populations and the
example you used is a great one because
everybody can relate to it. Almost
everybody now uses GPS to navigate
and if you think about what's actually
happening there
you don't feel that when you're
doing it you you get this advice from
this device that says you should go this
way we know you want to go there but
this is the way you should go oh there's
been a change, well where does that data
come from? It comes from other humans
in the network and other devices that
are sending information into a
collective, essentially a smart system
that is learning as you go and then
feeding you back advice and if you think
about the how that changes your
life it in that case it saves you time
and it saves you effort you don't have
to worry about reading a map it's
just a fantastic addition that we've
taken for granted now but what happens
when it goes wrong. There are potential
downsides and there are potential
technology downsides and security
downsides but this convergence of data
security and autonomy is with us I think for the
foreseeable future. This is going to be I
think the major technological change of
our time but if you think carefully
about who has access to it it's not
everybody. It's people who are in
urban environments, typically where
younger generations have more access to
this and if you look at the wealthier
people have access to these technologies.
I think one of the concerns that we
all have is that the disparities will
grow as a result of the technological
enabling that that collective autonomy
and these essentially human cyber
networks will have on us going forward.
The expectations are changing
and what if some people have access to
this and others do not?
It creates a divide and I also
think it creates a problem with our social systems
our legal system,
financial systems, all of those also
become either they become
essentially unmoored from the reality
you know, they're based on a lifestyle
that we had 10 years ago or 30 years ago
or 50 years ago, and we have to rethink
all that. I think we essentially have to
rethink society as a whole as a result
of these human cyber networks and
collective autonomy and that's a
daunting task that I think Virginia Tech
is really well prepared to address.
Virginia Tech is already adapting
to meet some of these challenges
especially in terms of claiming its role
in research and developing information
and machines. Can you talk about that?
Well we're in a really good position to address a lot of these
challenges the fact that they're
happening so fast is daunting even
though we're I think we're well prepared
well positioned, but if you look at our
leadership and unmanned aerial systems
and drone technology, we have the
Mid-Atlantic Aviation partnership, we
have essentially the ability to look at
these issues and integrating unmanned
aerial systems with the
essentially the airspace we've got
that's occupied commercially. We've got
an opportunity
to take leadership there, I think we
already are. A lot of the new really the
new demonstrations, the first times, have
been done in collaboration with Virginia
Tech. Of course we had the famous
popsicle delivery to Jack, a two-year-old
in Montgomery County, that caught a lot
of attention, and we laugh about that
we think it's kind of cute, but the
reality is it represents the first time
that we've had a commercial delivery
over a populated area, and I think
that that is the beginning of a
frontier going forward. What's
interesting about it is not the
technology, it's the public policy piece
of that that is really new. The
technology part is pretty well developed,
the problem is more how do we
relate to this, how is this
accepted by the population, how do we
build regulations around it, how do we
ensure that it moves forward at a
pace that really doesn't put the U.S.
behind, that allows us to move ahead and
use technologies but still do it in a
safe way, in a way that is secure, and I
think Virginia Tech is really well
positioned for that. If you look at our
Virginia Tech Transportation Institute
another example where essentially all of
the regulations in U.S. associated with
connected and autonomous vehicles flow
through V TTI for analysis and for
testing, because we have the experts in
human factors there. Again, we have
the technology piece but we also have
experts in policy and regulation and
the way humans interact both from a
policy standpoint but also from a
dynamic human machine interface
standpoint so I think all those things
point to Virginia Tech being in a
leadership role going forward. We have
the opportunity, we just have to step
into it. Let's just end with the
recommendation for our students. I think
that some might want to know what you
would recommend for our incoming
freshman. Something to see, something to
do while they're here Blacksburg.
The Hokie Bucket List is a
lot of fun and I'm on it, so I get to
experience many, many opportunities to
meet students, so I appreciate that, but I
do think that what Virginia Tech
offers is a essentially a playground for
curiosity. In other words
if you're a student who's coming to
Virginia Tech, you should take advantage
of everything that we've got to offer
and that means being, if you're an
introvert like I am,
it means being forceful about being an
extrovert for part of your time here. In
other words don't think of this as
an experience that is just about you,
it's about because being part of a
community that is very strong. Every
survey we do, every analysis shows
that one of the strengths of Virginia
Tech is, or the fundamental strength
is Ut Prosim, That I May Serve, which
then creates, I think, a very strong
community. Thank you, I appreciate you
talking with us. Thanks Dawn, I've enjoyed it.