Ready for www.PackagingSchool.com? Julie Suggs

https://packagingschool.com/
Is www.packagingschool.com how we can teach the future packaging professionals about sustainable packaging? 
Did you know you can learn about packaging online through this Clemson accredited program? 
Do you have 5-6 minutes time slots available for micro learning? 
Dr. Andrew Hurley started this online school through Clemson 
They have 3 programs that take 12 weeks or about 80 hours of time 
It's only been around for 6 years but they are making big strides! 

Check out our sponsor Orora Packaging Solutions 
https://ororapackagingsolutions.com/

https://specright.com/ 
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1329820053/ref=as_sl_pc_qf_sp_asin_til?tag=corygat

https://www.linkedin.com/in/cory-connors/

I'm here to help you make your packaging more sustainable! Reach out today and I'll get back to you asap.

This podcast is an independent production and the podcast production is an original work of the author. All rights of ownership and reproduction are retained—copyright 2022.

Transcript

Cory Connors: 0:34

Welcome to sustainable packaging with Cory Connors . I'm very excited to introduce my friend, Julie Suggs is the academic director for packaging school.com. Welcome Julie , how are you? Hey

Julie Suggs: 0:45

guys. Thanks so much for having me, Corey,

Cory Connors: 0:48

thank you for taking time. We appreciate it. It's a, it's a really important topic for our audience because education in the packaging world is really hard. So can you tell. Kind of, how did you personally, before we get into the school, how did you get into packaging?

Julie Suggs: 1:04

Oh yeah, I would love to talk about that. So it's kind of a strange, interesting story. Like probably a lot of people have I'll give a quick plug for the best school ever. I went to Westminster college in, in new Wilmington, Pennsylvania. It's a small liberal arts school basically in the middle of Amish country. I went there for my undergraduate degree. I followed my dad's footsteps. He went there as well. I got a bachelor's in chemistry and kind of from there I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do with my degree. And I was kinda thinking about that going into my senior year of college. And I found some really great internship opportunities available. Namely one through Cornell, it was Cornell summer scholars and I actually got accepted and it actually sent me to NC state to end up working in packaging and food science. So there, I got to. Make sweet potato juice and package it. So I got to kind of see the interaction between food science and packaging, and we got to, you know, aseptically package it. We got to see all kinds of things, tests for probiotics, do just amazing things at this really great facility at NC state. So from there, I kind of figured out that I really do love packaging, and I think that should be my passion kind of going forward. So you know, my senior year of college rolled around and I actually emailed Dr. Andrew Hurley, who was my current boss of the packaging school. And he's also professor at company university. And he, you know, if anyone knows him out there, he gets a million emails a day. And surprisingly, he answered my email and you know, was interested in having me as a grad student. So, you know, I interviewed with him and then I ended up being, becoming one of his grad students back in 2014. I went to Clemson from 2014, 2018 and got my PhD in food technology and packaging was kind of focused on packaging and that's kind of what. I got into packaging and my role right now, currently still working for Dr. Hurley as academic director for his.

Cory Connors: 2:49

What an incredible story. I love that, that you got a degree in chemistry that makes perfect sense. You know, that's never been my forte, the scientific minutiae of packaging. I'm more of a bigger, you know, secondary packaging has been our focus, but I love that you got that degree first and then you. Well, that's a really cool story. Thank you, Julie. That's awesome.

Julie Suggs: 3:11

Yeah, I'm a big into polymers, you know, that was my, kind of my, when I got to Clemson, I felt like I knew a lot about that already from that, you know, having the undergrad in chemistry. And then obviously I learned so much more about packaging that I didn't know from, you know, having an under undergrad in chemistry and in packages is so exciting and I'm happy to be in this industry.

Cory Connors: 3:30

That's great. And you guys serve an important role in the industry educating our future leaders and future employees of packaging companies. Can you tell us about the school? How did the school, the packaging school.com get started? So this is fully online.

Julie Suggs: 3:46

Yes, it is, it is all online. So, you know, as a company we've been around for about six years, it actually stems from Clemson university growing into an LLC to kind of meet the demands of business. The Genesis was kind of from Dr. Andrew Hurley and drew Felty. Dr. Hurley, again, like I said before is a professor at Clemson. He is kinda focuses on all things, packet and design, and he's just great. He's, he's a wealth of knowledge and packaging. He believes kind of in the power of education. You know, obviously while he values that four year degree from an accredited school, like Clemson in, he realized that that's really not the reality for everyone. He decided to open the package of school to help train kind of, and teach folks in the industry who are looking to get into packaging. You know, our curriculum is super focused on, you know, the packaging. Packaging, all things packaging really. And he really wanted to understand that, you know, not everyone has that chance to again, go back to school. So this was just an opportunity for people to take that online and learn more about, you know, off expecting.

Cory Connors: 4:42

It's incredible. So I didn't know. It was, it had only been six years. That's great. So times are changing.

Julie Suggs: 4:48

Huh? And you know, as the whole COVID situation happened, we felt like we were. Ideally placed in the industry because, you know, things have moved online and we have always been an online school. So we were excited to be able to train people from the comfort of her home safely. When that, when that happened and it's still happening,

Cory Connors: 5:05

did you see a big spike in enrollment when COVID hit,

Julie Suggs: 5:09

you know, what we did, we did, we kind of did a couple of, you know, promos and discounts just because of, you know, because of the state of the world. We did see some spikes and in education, some people that didn't know about us before found us because of this. So it was exciting to see that shift in the world for us to be able to kind of amend that shift in.

Cory Connors: 5:27

You know, I get people asking me all the time, how did you get into packaging? That's such a weird industry to be in. And so I love that's. One of my favorite parts of this podcast is how hearing people's stories. You know, mine is very unique. Yours is very unique. They all seem to be kind of round about no one grows up thinking I want to sell boxes someday, you know, or design. I want to design. Mano materials. I was like, come on,

Julie Suggs: 5:57

we've actually done a couple articles and kind of fun videos about how people have asked kind of what do you do in packaging? And a lot of people have said like, what do. Wrap gifts all day, or do you send stuff to go to ups? And it's so funny that people have such a limited understanding of all the things packaging really can do. And how important packaging is in the world, especially today with e-commerce booming. And there's so many reasons why it's happening so important that people just don't understand or don't know because they haven't been exposed to it. So that's, that's.

Cory Connors: 6:26

That's often a followup question is what do you mean packaging? What does that mean? And, and you're exactly right. It's the biggest industry that, that nobody talks about. They only complain about when they receive deliveries that are, are not packaged well,

Julie Suggs: 6:44

and not that, of course that's part of it, but it's, it's so much more than that.

Cory Connors: 6:47

So you're the academic director. Can you walk us through kind of. Your role, how, like what's a day look like for you? Like, are you, are you planning curriculum most of the time or are you what's tell us about, yeah, so

Julie Suggs: 7:01

I don't think I mentioned before the packing school is official licensee of Clemson university packaging curriculum. So this was developed over a decade by leading faculty. Currently, we do have three kind of major programs. And I'll talk about those, you know, throughout this podcast, but they are calling them specific to the packaging sign certificate of a mastery packaging management and the automotive packaging certificate. So basically as you know, the academic director, I get to work on all kinds of cool things. I have a really great creative team. We have. Awesome to work with Dr. Hurley as you know, that technical aspect of packaging. So my time basically is spent between student engagement, business development and curriculum development. So, you know, on the student side, I'm kind of the instructor cohort of the, you know, the mastery program that we run. And this program actually is run through Clemson center for corporate learning, which is basically Clemson, but it's more Clemson for continued education. So we did this on a lot of students that are currently in the industry looking to just gain those continued education. So this course is 80 hours of content. It's 10 courses and you do it in 12 weeks. So it's a pretty fast paced program and it does offer those eight continued education credits for those that are interested in those, a lot of employees kind of like to see that as a way for them to see their employees that are continuing to learn. So we kind of do value that. So that's kind of one of my primary roles to, you know, to work on that program with those students. So they basically, you know, hold office hours with them and all online, you know, cause they have students all across the board. Currently we have a class of about 12 and we have people from Brazil, from obviously from the states, from. That's America. It's all, it's all across. It's crazy. Cause we have a lot of different people from all over. So again, you know, I have to be flexible with time though. Then it's always, it's always fun to talk to people from, you know, just not just from where I'm from. So that's a major part of what I do at the packaging school. We also build a lot of curriculums to kind of fit the need of different organizations. This is kind of part of our kind of services aspect. So for certain companies like Colgate, mandolins, Coke, we've built sort of. I guess we've kind of started their programs from scratch. Like, so say for example, for Colgate, we recently built a kind of a foundations of packaging program for them. We found out from talking to a lot of their engineers that a lot of people that work there have obviously tons of background in chemical engineering, chemistry, mechanical engineering, industrial engineering, but none of them have been formerly trained in formerly trained in packaging. So they wanted to kind of get them the. And get them up to speed on all things, packaging, and basically be able to speak the language of packaging. So, so they have the theory behind packaging, not just the learning.

Cory Connors: 9:30

Wow, that's incredible. I always say that I'm a good first step for anyone interested in going into packaging is to go work in a packaging facility where they make packaging. I spent my first five years making corrugated boxes at Weyerhaeuser and cheese. What a great education and how to make it. That's

Julie Suggs: 9:51

so awesome. And that's something I haven't done yet. As far as worked in actual plant, I've seen, you know, we've done tours, we've seen, we've gotten a lot of footage, but I think you're so right. That, you know, online education, I don't think. It's just a compliment to, you know, that being able to see it firsthand and, you know, that's what we kind of aim to do is, you know, companies obviously have that on the job training. We just want to offer this as a way to kind of enhance that on the job

Cory Connors: 10:16

training. Yeah. And these days with YouTube videos, and like you said, your, your, your school is totally online and with the videos and the instructions. You know, of on online instruction is totally acceptable and what a great way to get a head start in a, in a career. So this podcast is sustainable packaging. Can you tell us what kind of focus does this school have if any, yet, or are you working on new curriculum that could leverage that sustainable packaging movement?

Julie Suggs: 10:46

Yeah, no, I think, I think that's a great question. You know, first off, I think it's really important, you know, to educate, you know, employees, consumers, students so they can be empowered with the knowledge and insights to help them understand that these issues, these huge issues, you know, sustainability is here, just do across the board. It's funny, Dr. Hurley are actually just working on a webinar for kind of a society that wanted just some help with sustainability. And Dr. Hurley mentioned the, you know, the UN goals and sustainability goals that I really never really realized were so crucial. So we were looking at a ton, a ton of different brands, like, you know, Costco, Pepsi, Coke Modulators. And it's kind of seeing how their sustainability goals all line up and how they all kind of make sense. So we're interested in actually adding that to our curriculum, because it's really important to understand that the companies, the companies goals, so you can accurately accurately, you know, discuss sustainability with them when you're talking about materials, you know, innovations and, and everything like that. So. You know, being the academic director at the packed new school, you know, I feel that creating and sharing meaningful, meaningful content is really great. And we want to do that by obviously, you know, continuing to grow our network. And we like to, you know, obviously we build things on our learning management system, our website, social media, and we think it's crucial to talk about, you know, all these sustainability issues.

Cory Connors: 11:59

Great points. It's so it's so critical. And how do you approach a company and say, you know, okay, here's where you are now. How, what, what's the measurement? How does, what does, what does success look like for you in sustainability? Does that mean we replaced. You know, a certain amount of non-recyclable materials, does that mean we figure out how to recycle those non-recyclable material? You know, things like education to their consumers are really critical. It's not just about you know, removing plastics. I think plastics are necessary. I think we w you know, Absolutely. It can be sustainable if they're recycled and if they're handled properly on the back end of their life. Yeah, absolutely.

Julie Suggs: 12:43

Yeah. I totally agree with that. You know, and it's, it's so cool to see all these companies goals like reaching to 2030, like talking about all these things they want to accomplish. And I think they will, you know, but I think what the health of. People like us like that can help educate their employees. I think that we can help them get there. And I, I really am. I'm hopeful for the future in this respect, you know, and we do have a sustainable packaging course, and we're always looking to update this, you know, we cover, you know, LCA energy sourcing, design optimization, effector covering. We also talk a lot about that. You know, the people planet and profit, cause obviously that's super important and the sustainability strategy. So we do have a great course. It's about it. It's about three hours long and it's definitely available on our website to check out. I think that's the. It is important for people to take, to understand your, the basics of sustainability.

Cory Connors: 13:28

That's great. I didn't know. There was one. So I'm excited to take it. I'm gonna I'll commit to you right now. I'm going to take your, your three hour course so I can learn even better. I'll be your, your next student. That's fantastic. Thank you. So what do you see as the future of sustainability? You've you've studied it. You've talked. Yeah.

Julie Suggs: 13:49

You know, and that's, that's a great question. You know, being an educator, I do feel like it's really important to understand all the facts. So recently kind of doing some research. I love research. That's one of my favorite parts of my job. I came across a study conducted by university, university of Plymouth that supports the fact that education can help change behaviors. And this one was specific was specifically on. Ocean pollution. So this study, they, you know, they looked at 120 educators from 18 different countries across Europe. And, you know, and they decided that, you know, these, these people were enrolled in online training about Marine litter. They asked participants to compete complete assessments on how the training changed their attitudes about the problem. So it was really cool to see. That these results indicated that the educators have your participating in the training would be more likely to further implement these similar training materials in their, into their teaching to raise awareness. So to me, that was like really cool to find this study because obviously, you know, we think this is super important. You know, in the education sector represent, represents an important agent of social change and we need to, we need to take that responsibility very seriously. You know, and, and this research helped me show help to show the educators can play that lead role in increasing knowledge. You know, it's, it's really essential to educate young people. You know, now that you know, the future, it really is in their hands.

Cory Connors: 15:07

Totally. And that's exactly why I started this podcast. I want people to know that it's possible. We can do this. We can be sustainable. We can. Come up with new materials, we can figure out better ways to use the materials that we're using a hundred percent. It's such a simple thing. And it's interesting. You mentioned, mentioned the Marine several of the companies I've had on here that have created sustainable packaging products. They were surfers you know, Sam Boex from flexi hex John from Cruz foam. These guys are all surfers you know, and it's like, okay, that makes sense. You're spending time in the water and you see something floating. You don't want that there. So you, you innovate, you come up with a new way, you help clean up, you help eliminate. So it's going to take more of that. I think the surfing community is incredible group of people. At least the ones I've talked to

Julie Suggs: 16:05

say that on the topic of innovation. We've done some art, you know, our sister company packaged insight who works really closely with quad packaging. We've done some really great consumer research studies, you know, with eye-tracking and facial coding to kind of understand where these gaps in knowledge are as far as, you know, recyclability on pack sustainability. And, you know, we think it's really important to consider those types of technologies when you're investigating sustainable.

Cory Connors: 16:31

Absolutely. And new, it seems like there's new materials coming out every month. I swear. I, I swear. I learned something. Weekly that's kind of mind blowing. Like really, you can make packaging out of mushrooms. You can make packaging out of, out of you know urchins. I don't know, whatever, you know, that's not one that's real, but it seems like they continue to find sustainable sources that could replace things that are less sustainable. So that's what.

Julie Suggs: 17:01

And at your end, I don't think that's going to stop. I think people are going to continue to find new materials and we're going to continue to learn about them. And you know, our job at the packages school is to stay on top of the times. You know, we do aim to kind of update our curriculum as these new innovations and these new materials come about. We don't want to stay stuck in, you know, say, you know, 20, 20, 20, 21, we want to keep on growing and keep on innovating with, with all these scientists and packaging engineers.

Cory Connors: 17:25

Definitely. So can you tell us how the school works? Is it is it like you just sign up any time and, or is, like you said you have a class now of 12, is there, is there like semesters or can you kinda speak to that a little bit? If I, when I signed up for my sustainability course, do I wait for the next term or

Julie Suggs: 17:46

no, that's a great question for you. And we kind of have past. So on our website, you'll find that there's courses like the sustainability course. We have core courses that are all just available at any time. They're all kind of asynchronous learning. You can log into our platform and take that, you know, anywhere, anytime that's kind of our, our mantra. You know, whenever you have availability, as far as, you know, ticket during lunch, take it during, you know, after work ticket, when you're dropping your kids off for school, you know, and we tried it, we aim to make all of our courses kind of interesting and engaging as far as using this technique called micro-learning. Where, you know, we have small bits of information at a time, so you're not stick listening to like a one hour presentation at one time. It's all, you know, five, six minute lessons. So you feel accomplished when you finish a lesson. So that's one example. So you could take all our, all of our courses, Allah cart, so to speak. And then we do have some certificate programs that run. Cohorts semester basis. So the certificate of mastery in packaging management, the one that's run through Clemson center for corporate learning, that's actually on kind of a quarterly basis. So we have enrollments going on through, you know, different dates. So currently we have one going on. That's going to end in October. The next one starts in December. So we have application processes rolling until through November. So it's kind of a process where, you know, you do have to apply. And then that is a 12 week program. So that is kind of a little bit more stringent as far as the timeline goes. But then we have another program that's kind of similar to this master program. It's called a certificate, a packaging science, where you have a, your access to 12 courses. And this is again, is licensed through Clemson university and you can kind of log in at any time, take the courses. There's no distinct timeline. You have to follow. You just have that year to.

Cory Connors: 19:20

That's incredible. And that's exactly the kind of school I, I need. I don't have necessarily three hours in a day, but I have five, six minute little segments that I can get away and learn something new. That's great. It's like, like you said, watching a YouTube video or something, you know,

Julie Suggs: 19:38

Our creative director. Kevin is really great at making kind of content engaging and fun. He's actually done something cool. I don't know. I can, I can do a shout out to Kevin cause he's awesome. It's called the packaging school show where during COVID he spent some time just talking about all the kind of current event issues. He had interviewed a lot of folks. He talked a lot about hand, sanitize them, packaging, all kinds of cool things he did, and he kind of just makes it fun and engaging. He modeled it after like a late night show. He was kind of just like a newscaster and talking and y'all need to check it out. It's about the package school packaging school show it's on YouTube. It's really fun. So we've actually put some of that into our courses because people really loved it.

Cory Connors: 20:15

I have subscribed to that. I love it. It's fantastic. You know, I love social media, so that's it's absolutely. I was impressed by that and a little bit jealous that I didn't think of that first. So kudos to you and your team.

Julie Suggs: 20:29

It's been fun. And I know Kevin wants to get back into it now that you know, obviously things have ramped up a little bit for him as far as, you know, creating different content, but he does aim to have some more shows coming up soon. So that's exciting.

Cory Connors: 20:39

Oh, that's so cool. Let me know if I can help in any way with those. Those are really good

Julie Suggs: 20:44

and have a tick-tock star like yourself on this.

Cory Connors: 20:48

TikTok star pushing it, but yes, I do have a tick doc page. Thank you so much. So what's the best way for people to get ahold of you guys and you in particular, Julie, you're, you're an amazing. Oh,

Julie Suggs: 21:01

yes, I would love you guys can contact julie@packagingschool.com. We also have an information page where, info@packagingschool.com . And we do have a phone number available where you will reach me or my colleague Diana it's 8 6 4 4 1 2 5 0 0 0.

Cory Connors: 21:19

Well, that's fantastic. You don't hear about phone numbers very often anymore, but when you do, I think it's fun. I love

Julie Suggs: 21:26

to talk to students, you know, one-on-one and so does Diana, so it's fun to actually talk to a human cause sometimes you go into a online. Something and you just talk to a bot. So we are real people at

Cory Connors: 21:37

it's it's a revelation when you can actually talk to someone and they are, are helpful. And I love it. It's such a good feeling. Well, thank you so much, Julie. I really appreciate your time. And I'd like to thank our sponsor Landsberg Orora for your continued support of this podcast. Listeners, please take a minute to review the podcast and share it with your friends. We truly do appreciate it. So. Continue to make a great sustainable packaging podcast episodes. Thank you so much. Thank you

Julie Suggs: 22:04

so much.