448: Sheree Utash—It’s Only the Best School in America

The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe

Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 39.1K Ratings

🗓️ 26 August 2025

⏱️ 76 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Mike chats with Dr. Sheree Utash, Ed.D., president of WSU Tech and a national leader in workforce education. They talk about how she reinvented a community college into a national model for workforce development, her role in taking Mike’s S.W.E.A.T. Pledge and shaping it into the mikeroweWORKS curriculum, and why she believes skilled trades are key to America’s future. It’s a perfect pre-Labor Day discussion.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, friends. It's Mike. It's the way I heard it. And it's only the best school in America.
0:09.9	That is the title of the episode. My guest is the one and only Sherry U-Tash. Chuck, am I overstating
0:15.7	things? Is it too hyperbolic to suggest that WSU Tech in the heart of America is the best school in America?
0:23.1	In Wichita, Kansas. No, it's certainly one of the best schools in America, and it's a very, very good
0:29.1	school for aviation technology. I know that. Well, maybe the best there for sure, but I don't know of any
0:34.3	trade school that's done a better job of reinvigorating the skilled trades from the ground up.
0:39.7	They're so passionate about the trades.
0:42.1	And Sherry Utash, who's been running the school for years now, is such a great educator.
0:47.3	And am I biased?
0:48.4	You bet I'm biased.
0:49.8	The Microwworks Work ethic curriculum was designed, adapted, and ultimately embraced at WSU Tech.
0:59.7	That was the first of 70-some schools to take it. And hopefully there'll be 700 more somewhere down
1:05.2	the road. And if that happens, then Sherry Utash needs to be thanked profusely and over and over again.
1:13.4	Absolutely. Yeah, she had a lot to do with it. Curriculum was actually started at WSU Tech.
1:19.2	Jade from our office here, me, a lot of other people. Jennifer Rowe, you know, helped to develop
1:25.3	the curriculum right there at WSU Tech.
1:28.0	Yeah.
1:28.5	Look, it's a hard thing to do, guys, to look into somebody's soul and weigh and measure their
1:33.9	commitment to work ethic.
1:35.7	But getting a curriculum that does that into a school is a super interesting and I think
1:41.2	important thing to do and a fine topic since this will be our official Labor Day show.
1:48.3	Because honestly, when you talk about that part of our workforce, the skilled part, you have to talk about our educational system.
	...

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