On this episode, Ashley Kryscynski shares her experience as a first generation college student and member of the first graduating class of the CASC minor program. Kryscynski reflects upon her transition to the U-M MSW program, the tools she developed around advocacy and resilience, as well as her current work, managing county level communications through public relations, lifting up marginalized voices, and creating community content in the spirit of equity, inclusion, and justice.
Amber Williams:
Hi, welcome to PodCASC, stories of community action and social change in the real world. And if you didn't catch that before, that's PodCASC as in the undergraduate minor here in the school of social work. This is an ongoing series of interviews that feature the diverse stories of CASC alumni who share highs, lows and other revelations about community action and social change after college. Each interview captures unique stories about some of their earliest memories CASCing, how certain lessons learned carry with them or have been challenged or contradicted over time. Today's interview features Ashley Kryscynski, hosted by Joe Galura, a longtime advisor and faculty in the minor. Check out her story.
Joe Galura:
Welcome listeners to the CASC Alumni Podcast. I'm your host Joe Galura, a lecture and advisor in the School of Social Work. And it's my privilege to introduce today's distinguished guest, Ashley Kryscynski. Ashley graduated with a degree in American culture and was not only a member of the very first CASC graduating class, she was also on the very first CASC student staff establishing the groundwork for some of the minors features which we have all come to know and love, the CASC graduation ceremony, the weekly new e-newsletter, and of course overestimating the amount of food we order at CASC events.
Joe Galura:
Ashley matriculated to our MSW program and now works for the county's Intermediate School District serving as their specialist in communications and public relations after having previously coordinated both WACY, the Washington Alliance for Children and Youth as well as the Washtenaw Futures College Access Network. Welcome Ashley.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Thanks Joe. I'm very excited to be here today.
Joe Galura:
Can you tell us a little bit more about who you are, name, pronouns, community, where you're from, identities?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Sure. My name is Ashley Kryscynski. My pronouns are she, her and hers. I currently live in Ann Arbor here. As you said, I work for the Washtenaw Intermediate School District at the county level, but I am from Frankenmuth, Michigan, which is a small town about one hour North of Ann Arbor.
Joe Galura:
Known for it's chicken.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes, known for its chicken and German heritage and beer. It's well known as Michigan's little Bavaria. Fun fact, we're actually the second busiest exit off of I-75, second to Disney World. So that's our claim to fame I guess.
Joe Galura:
Did you grow up at Frankenmuth with the chicken and everything else?
Ashley Kryscynski:
So I actually moved to Frankenmuth when I was in middle school in seventh grade, actually one month after 911. Prior to that I lived in the Metro Detroit area in St. Clair Shores. So it was a pretty big shock for me moving from a relatively urban community to kind of the middle of nowhere, Michigan. Or at least it felt like the middle of nowhere, Michigan, when you're a middle school student.
Joe Galura:
Can you recall any experiences pre college that's struck you around social justice, change, community, social responsibility?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Sure. So I wouldn't say that there was one defining moment. It was an expectation within, especially the Frankenmuth community, that you are an active member, that you are giving back to your community. That we are all responsible for making our community what it is and giving back. It really wasn't until I got to college that there was this term around social justice, that it was becoming more of a formalized idea in my mind of, that's a large piece of my identity.
Joe Galura:
Can you talk a little bit about what you did in undergrad? I mean I mentioned that were American culture and CASC.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Sure. So when folks ask me exactly what do you do with an American culture degree and it's not unlike what so many other students hear, what are you going to do with your psychology degree or your sociology degree? American culture is very much one of those types of degrees. And I think what I really enjoyed about the marriage between American culture and CASC was that American culture is very much focused around the theory and kind of the movements throughout American history, both mainstream, but also the counterculture types of movements within our history. And the CASC minor gave me a way to take a lot of that theory and historical knowledge and put that work into practice. So how did we get to where we are today and now what do we do about that?
Ashley Kryscynski:
So a lot of my American culture type of background came from history, political science, gender studies, race studies. And again, CASC gave me that framework of here's what we can do with all of that information, now how do we put it into practice?
Joe Galura:
Yeah, so American culture is actually multi-disciplinary like you mentioned.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Absolutely.
Joe Galura:
So then it's actually an easy transition into CASC?
Ashley Kryscynski:
It was. I think that's what I was so, so very fortunate to find CASC in my senior year of undergrad because I was kind of lost in the waters of theory, if you will. And CASC was something that came up during one of my courses where all of these students were saying I'm a CASC minor, I'm a women's studies major, I'm a psych major, I'm a political science, I'm an X, Y, Z, all of these majors. And CASC was really that thread tying a lot of us together and allowed so many of us to put that work into action.
Joe Galura:
So let me break out kind of the two parts of CASC. So I highlighted your role as student staff, but can you talk about some of your formative experiences as a CASC student. And then we'll talk about staff stuff.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah. So this is a tough question because it's amazing how fast time flies. So some of my experiences in undergrad, I think probably the most defining one that really steered me towards CASC was I think it was a project community course in the department of psychology specifically. And we went to Detroit, to Southwest Detroit and the Delray community and worked with people's community services, which is a nonprofit, a community based nonprofit. And we specifically took time that semester to work with students, most of whom were late elementary, early middle school, to take action and write to their local representatives around the wastewater treatment plant and the pollution that they experience because that plant is right across the river from them.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so that was really one way for me to see the difference that can be made, working directly with communities as a steward of their voices sometimes. Because I think especially when we work with young people, it's figuring out how they can make their voices the most powerful. And so we were working with them, like I said, to write letters to their city council members about the impacts of the pollution. So many of them wrote stories of how the pollution in the air had led to them having essentially so many of their family members and their friends having asthma. And so even for them as kids to say, I can't go outside and play because already it's hard for me to breathe was really a pretty monumental shift for me in my education where I realized that I needed to take, again all of this theory that I was learning in American culture and put this into practice because the theory is one piece, but really what are we doing to make our communities better? So that was one. That was probably the most defining experience.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I also worked with planned Parenthood through a class. So we did some advocating and grassroots work around, this was really fun actually, around teaching fraternity members about safe sexual health. So that was really a pretty exciting piece when we heard back from them actually that it was really informative for them and to help get them involved in talking to their brothers around safe sexual health.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I'm trying to think what are the other pieces? The class actually where I found CASC through was working with ESL, English as a Second Language students. That was my senior year, my first semester. I really only had a little bit of time to jump into the CASC minor, but it was really ... it was heaven sent for me.
Joe Galura:
How did you land on the student staff?
Ashley Kryscynski:
How did I land on the student staff? I actually don't remember this story, Joe. I remember that I-
Joe Galura:
I thought you worked for Katie.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I did. So Katie had told me that she needed a little bit of extra assistance. I think it was actually the summer right after the CASC minor, right after I had graduated. So I graduated in spring of 2011. And I had started to work with Katie a little bit on just some small tasks, just to support CASC. And that role then expanded into doing the weekly newsletter. Because I think one of the powers of CASC is just the network of things that students are involved in and the information sharing and the resource sharing. And so I worked with her on the newsletter, getting that up and running, which as you said is now something that continues to this day.
Ashley Kryscynski:
We tried to really figure out how do we make CASC a community. And so we really worked thoughtfully and diligently around how are we building community in a meaningful way? And sometimes that was having backpacking nights where we could have CASC students share about courses with each other and what was really meaningful and impactful for them and how can they share those experiences with other students, so those students can have those experiences as well. That also meant how do we build other networks in engagement opportunities.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Always around food. I'll never forget that Katie told me that the number one thing you need to have when you're organizing communities or creating community is to have food. And the horror story that I tell to this day that sticks in my mind is that Katie went to a community meeting with six people. They were asked to RSVP so that the meeting could provide food and they provided six bagels, all different flavors of bagels. So it just created this really awkward tension, of "Well, I actually wanted that bagel." Or "I didn't get the bagel I wanted." And "Oh, I can see that somebody else wants the bagel that I have." And so I very quickly learned food is key and having enough of food is key. So that was really quite the experience. And I think to this day, you also mentioned that there's often a plethora of food options.
Joe Galura:
What do you remember about those early CASC graduations?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Oh boy. I think because I was part of the first graduating class where there were really only, I don't even think they were more than 35 of us at the time.
Joe Galura:
I think that counted faculty too.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I think that might be correct. It really felt like we were building the plane as we were flying. And so again, how are we honoring community and the connections that we've built while also making it a celebration? Because for so many of us, CASC was the first step into our social justice careers. So how are we really launching for young professionals now into the world. So it was a little chaotic, especially because CASC grew at such an enormous rate. There were 30 of us in the first year, the next year was 60 and then 120. And so we really had to shift pretty quickly how graduation was going to be presented.
Joe Galura:
I remember you and I would sit in those planning meetings, right?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes. Yeah. And at first it was, CASC graduates, congratulations, invite all of your family and friends. And then as the program grew so rapidly, it became how are we honoring and friends and community and also manage the size of the class and our attendees. And so it was pretty chaotic. But I think what we really always came back to was how are we building and honoring community in CASC? And I think that graduation to this day still does that.
Joe Galura:
And I remember too, because you were in charge of food, even with the exponential growth you always had enough food.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes, always. Of course.
Joe Galura:
So you mentioned this being a transition to the MSW program, so how did that work? I'm sure early on in your American culture career, you didn't envision yourself as an MSW student.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah. I actually, again, I had no idea that an MSW program existed, what it was, what social work was, what social justice was prior to college. So I felt like I was on an on ramp that was going very, very fast. And so the transition to the MSW ... And I think for me something that not a lot of folks talk about was I was feeling personally pretty burned out after undergrad. So I took a year off, but stayed connected by working with CASC. And so I was able to make a lot of connections within the school of social work with current students, with former students, and really talk about what are your career goals in life goals and how do you see yourself fitting into the MSW program? And I was able to use a lot of that knowledge to shape what I wanted out of the program because I took a year off and was able to go into it with a little bit more of an eyes wide open kind of idea.
Joe Galura:
Yeah. Then as now, the number of CASC graduates went directly out of their MSW?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes. Yeah, actually, well, I think a lot of it is because there's pre admissions. And that didn't exist at the time when I first joined CASC and graduated from CASC. But I think now the program is so much more closely aligned with the MSW program, I think it does a lot of service to the undergrad students in CASC. That they're able to explore what's happening at the school of social work a little more intentionally than we could at that time.
Joe Galura:
You did have conversations with the folk that went directly from undergrad to MSW.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes, absolutely. And there were a lot of really great lessons learned, both positive and negative about their experiences because I think graduate school and undergraduate degrees are so different that no one really tells you that there's these differences until you experience them. So I was really able to lean on a lot of my friends who had gone straight into the MSW program.
Joe Galura:
So what are some of the important lessons you learned about? So we'll talk about transition. So there's the transitions undergrad to graduate school and then graduate school into the field.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Sure. So some of the really important lessons, and probably the most important one that I take with me to this day, is to advocate for yourself. I know we are at a world class university and in a world class school of social work. And so if there's something that you really want to do, I was told, keep asking until you find somebody who's able to do it with you. Because sometimes I think especially those of us who are first generation college students, we hear no, and we don't push anymore after that. And so really building up my own skills to advocate for myself and my own resilience to say, okay, I heard no from this person or this department, how do I change my trajectory so that I can get a yes somehow?
Ashley Kryscynski:
I think really, like I said, building those advocacy skills for yourself is so important not only in your undergrad and graduate program, but those are important skills as you enter your professional career too because I think we hear no very often and too many of us give up at that and there's often another way to open that door.
Joe Galura:
I heard you self identify as a first generation college student? Can you say a little bit more about that?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah, absolutely.
Joe Galura:
Particular, like you mentioned, this is a podcast and there may be some CASC podcasters that are also first gen.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah, absolutely. That is an identity that I hold very near and dear to my heart. I forgot to mention I'm also adopted. I'm an Asian American woman. My family is all white. Polish on my dad's side, Greek on my mom's side. And so I think I've always sat at this crux as far as my identities, of being a woman of color in an all white family and predominantly white communities. Frankenmuth is a middle and upper middle class community and we were a little bit lower income. And so sitting as a woman of color who's a first generation college student and also from a lower income family, I know the experiences at U of M can sometimes feel isolating, especially when you sit at the intersection of all of those identities.
Ashley Kryscynski:
So I have three older brothers and we all between the four of us run the whole gamut of educational experiences. I have one brother who didn't finish high school. I have one brother who started college and didn't finish. I have one brother who went to a technical school and got his bachelor's. And then I'm the only one in my family who did a traditional public four year university and then a higher ed graduate degree.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I see how all of our experiences are interwoven together and are all so different because of the education levels. But I definitely remember trying to figure out the FAFSA on my own. I think maybe even my first year of college, definitely my senior year we were still filling out FAFSA's with the paper application. I filled out Michigan's application for undergrad in a 27 page application. And so I think the challenges that I experienced because I didn't always have parents who could answer those questions that for some students felt second nature or like a no brainer, again helped me build my own resilience and self advocacy skills.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And I do have to give huge, huge, huge props to my parents. My dad had filled out the FAFSA for my older brother who did finish college. I remember, the FAFSA folks tell you it should take about 20 or 30 minutes. That form does not take 20 or 30 minutes if you don't have anyone in your family who's ever filled it out before or has an accountant or all of these things that the FAFSA was originally really designed for.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so my dad would spend hours and hours and hours trying to fill out that FAFSA for me each year. And then when he finally handed it off to me, oh my gosh, it was so overwhelming. I was like, "I'm going to get kicked out of school. The feds are going to see this." And none of those things happened. But not having somebody who really understood all of that was challenging at times. And U of M most students here come from relatively well off families financially, and that's not the reality for all students. And like you said, it does feel isolating sometimes, but there are folks out there who can help you, especially now as college access and retention and completion become a much bigger part of the national conversation.
Joe Galura:
I noticed, that the first position you had out of grad school had to do with college Futures. So is that connected in your mind?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah, absolutely. I think college access, just really, I knew before I even went into graduate school and definitely as I came out of graduate school that the work I wanted to do was in education. Like I said, I've seen firsthand how education access and degree attainment has impacted the lives of not only me but my brothers as well, given the wide range of education that we've all had. And so I knew that education was something that I was always really passionate about. Educational equity, making sure that all students have access to high quality education is key, especially in this country and in this state where education is so ... The unfortunate fact is that your zip code defines your education for so many students.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I was very, very fortunate to get a job right out of graduate school, as you said, with Washtenaw Futures, which is our local college access network, which focuses on degree attainment. And when we say college degree attainment, we mean any post secondary education. So two year degree, four year degree or trade or technical certifications. I think so many folks get caught up in the argument of "college", which they mean two year and four year degrees versus trade school. And really what this movement is pushing is any education beyond high school, you need something in addition to your high school diploma to be successful anymore. And whether that's trade school or college, it's a both and conversation you need something.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I was very fortunate to get this position with the guidance of the Washtenaw Intermediate School District where I work now. And also the Michigan College Access Network, MCAN, that's really leading a lot of the work in the state, definitely but also nationally around organizing in communities because educational attainment is something that every community needs and is requiring a cross sector community collaboration.
Ashley Kryscynski:
So my MSW work was focused on community organizing and children and youth and families. And this was the perfect crux, the perfect intersection for me to bring my passion around educational equity and community organizing. So degree attainment requires the business sector, government, higher education, K-12 schools, philanthropy and nonprofits. Everybody needs to be at the table.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And one of the pieces of work that I'm most proud of through that is that we were able to develop a scholarship with the Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation, Washtenaw Community College, Eastern Michigan University, and Washtenaw Futures. Where students who are first generation college students, students in poverty and/or students of color who graduate from a public high school in Washtenaw County have access to this scholarship.
Ashley Kryscynski:
It's a small cohort, but it is a scholarship designed solely for them where they get a college success coach. So someone who's there to act as both a mentor as well as a friend and a case manager to help them through all of those barriers that I kind of talked about as a first generation student. Because all the students in this cohort are first gen. And they have someone who's dedicated to supporting them. So I don't have to say Ashley back in college doesn't have to work on her FAFSA for 30 hours. She can ask her college success coach around how do I do this and be successful doing it?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Another aspect of that program is that their scholarship is multiyear funding. So we often hear, especially for first generation students, that their scholarships run out after their first or second year of college. So this scholarship provides funding for up to five years as well as access to an emergency aid fund. So understanding that so many students, especially first gen students, students of color and students in poverty don't always have the resources needed to get past those what we call speed bumps. Car breaking down, not having enough for your utilities that month or not having rent, or we had a student who was experiencing homelessness over their winter break. And so they were able to use emergency funds to cover housing costs for two weeks because their dorm was shut down for those two weeks.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I think programs like that community scholarship fund and what other local college access networks are doing around the state and around the country are really changing the game around educational equity, specifically in higher education.
Joe Galura:
So we're now in the present. And can you talk a little bit about how some of the lessons you've learned affiliated with CASC show up in your work today?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yeah, I think I can. So I think that the lessons I've learned in CASC are just so deeply embedded into who I am and the work that I do. So even though I'm not doing community organizing work any more, I'm managing all of the communications in public relations for our district at the county level. And so now I get to be responsible for whose stories are being elevated. And I think so often folks with more marginalized identities are often glossed over or ignored or just their stories are not told.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I get to be responsible for creating content that's shared in the community and sharing the amazing stories of our students as well as our staff and the work that they're doing that often isn't always recognized. Our agency, the WISD, has an educational equity policy, so our board passed this last year in June. And it outlines our commitment to equity, inclusion and social justice. And it also provides us six guiding questions. So what is the lens that we're making all of our leadership decisions through, but not only our leadership decisions, but really just decisions across and within the organization.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so I think now in my role in communications, in public relations, I get to be the one who's sharing the stories, and saying we are committed and here's the ways that we're doing this work and sharing that story. Because I think at U of M it's DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion. For us it's EISJ, equity, inclusion and social justice. Regardless of what alphabet soup you choose so many organizations are working intentionally and willing to roll their sleeves up and get in the messy work that this is, that anytime we can share our successes as well as our setbacks, really what we're doing is sharing the stories of what we're learning and how we're doing this work with each other. And I think that's so, so important.
Ashley Kryscynski:
Additionally, at the leadership team level, so I'm on our executive leadership team, I get to be in the room as we're making those decisions. Either whether that's pointing our folks back to those six guiding questions around equity or maybe shifting the lens through which we're looking at some of the things within our organization. So whether that's hiring or policies or board policies or implementation of a new program or partnership, the lens through which we as CASCer's look at things is a little different than what most others are taught to use. Whether that's in public health or medicine or education, we have a very specific way of looking at the world and questioning the world. I try to bring that into my work every day.
Joe Galura:
So have you ever encountered new challenges, lessons, or tensions?
Ashley Kryscynski:
So many challenges and things learned in lessons. And so this is always a tough one. Personally to me, we often get into a bubble, especially in the school of social work, and I think it's the best bubble ever most of the time. I think the people that I was around in graduate school and undergrad are just personally so inspiring to me. They're working on really incredible, amazing things to make our world better for everyone. It was a big burst of my bubble when I got out into the real world and noticed that that's not necessarily how everyone does things or what they all think.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And so that was a challenge and even a tension, especially in education, there's so many of us and most folks in education will agree we have an equity issue. And the tension is how do you implement practices and policies that make our systems and the experiences for our students more equitable, especially when it comes to resource allocation. That's the piece that we often don't talk about is the inequitable funding.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And at the end of the day, usually there's only X number of dollars. And it's really difficult for folks who have resources sometimes to make a change in how they distribute those resources or how they change their policies, which are going to affect their practices. Because all of those things that make our communities and our world more equitable, those take a lot of small steps, but they also take really large courageous steps too. And I think that's where the tension is, is that we have to change ourselves personally as individuals, but we also need to change as organizations and as systems and how we work within our communities. And it sounds really easy, but it's very, very hard in practice.
Joe Galura:
Yes. So now looking to the future. All right. Are there things you're looking forward to?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Everything, Joe. I'm so excited for everything. I think that what I've learned is to roll with the punches sometimes to always be flexible. Our world is ever changing. Our communities are ever changing and even though change is difficult, it's often for the better. And so how am I somebody who is either catalyzing change or supporting change as long as it's in a way that's creating a more equitable, inclusive future for all of us. And socially just future.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I think right now I didn't too much about it, but one of the pieces of work that I'm doing right now is we have a bond campaign in Washtenaw County right here. The bond, if approved, would actually go towards renovating and rebuilding a new High Point School. And High Point School is the only school program in our community that offers educational and specialized programming for kids with severe and multiple disabilities. And that's for any student age 3 through 26 in our community. And I think that is one way for us to make our world and our community more equitable and inclusive.
Ashley Kryscynski:
These are the students who need the most support. Most all of them need one or two adults per student. And the school building they're in just clearly wasn't made for them. And so if we really truly, again, this goes back to that tension, say we want to be a community that is committed to equity, inclusion, social justice, diversity, why do we have students who are in a building that wasn't designed for them? And so looking towards the future for myself, how are we living into this work? And that's one concrete way that I'm living into that work personally and professionally. But what are other ways that we can be really thoughtful around creating better communities at the end of the day?
Joe Galura:
So are there specific skills, knowledge and approaches that you want to build on to get to that end?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Yes. I would say that especially for any CASC student, but any student doing this kind of work, the skills that you need that are most important in doing this work and making sure that you're doing it collaboratively with others is to be able to communicate why you're passionate about this work in a way that resonates with anybody. I think in today's political climate especially, so many folks are hunkered down on their beliefs and they aren't willing to budge and they're not willing to listen to the other side or to other experiences. And I know, again, this is one of those things that's easier said than done, but really being intentional and thoughtful around listening to each other.
Ashley Kryscynski:
I often play back in my head that there's this saying that when we communicate, we listen so that we can respond. We don't listen to listen. And so taking that step back and listening to listen is so important. And I think that we often forget to do that. And so communicating but also listening to each other is really just at the crux of so much I think.
Joe Galura:
So is there anything you'd like to add? Anything, you've got the soapbox out. You want to say anything to future CASC students, people in involved in social justice?
Ashley Kryscynski:
Oh gosh. I think keep doing the work that you're doing. It's so needed. It's so desperately needed. We are often at the front lines of injustices in the world, whether that's locally within our own communities, nationally for the US, or globally, the skills that we gain as CASC students and alumni are really able to impact and facilitate change at every level. And so it often feels like the good fight, but it's also a hard fight.
Ashley Kryscynski:
And take care of yourself. I know we talk a lot about self care, but take care of yourself because yes, the work is hard and it's so, so important, but you can't do it if you don't take care of yourself also. And so take care of yourself and take care of each other and keep fighting the good fight.
Joe Galura:
Thank you, Ashley.
Ashley Kryscynski:
You're welcome. Thank you so much for having me, Joe. This was a pleasure.
Amber Williams:
Thanks for listening, everyone. And check us out next week for the next alumni interview. We'll be on Apple podcast and also Spotify.