Jeff Ritter, PhD
Founder, Transform Learning
Jeff spent 25 years as a professor at La Roche University in Pittsburgh. He watched enrollment decline year after year. He sat in faculty meetings where the budget cuts got deeper. He saw colleagues — good teachers, good people — lose their jobs because the model stopped working.
Instead of accepting that campuses have to die when enrollment drops, he built Transform Learning — a company that combines AI technology, workforce development expertise, and deep understanding of what actually happens inside a struggling institution. Not from a consulting firm’s distance, but from the inside.
Jeff has built and deployed AI-powered career exploration tools across multiple countries, workforce coaching platforms for veterans and returning citizens, civic transparency technology for municipalities, and the institutional data infrastructure that powers campus transformation planning.
“I didn’t start this company because I saw a market opportunity. I started it because I watched good campuses close and good people lose their jobs, and I knew there was a better way.”
Our Team
Krystal Friesth
Systems Design & Sustainable Development
Krystal is a systems builder with deep roots in international development, organizational design, and AI-powered learning. A Peace Corps veteran with a Master’s in Sustainable International Development from Brandeis University’s Heller School, she has led process excellence at Palladium and DAI, managed complex grant portfolios, and co-founded theCommons Academy. A longtime Stanford AI facilitator, Krystal brings the rare combination of program evaluation rigor and entrepreneurial vision that campus transformation demands.
Sara Russell, Ph.D.
Academic Leadership & Student Success
Sara serves as Associate Academic Dean at Duke University’s Trinity College of Arts and Sciences and Director of Undergraduate Research. A Hampshire College graduate with a doctorate from the University of Maryland, she spent a decade teaching at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics before moving into academic administration. Sara understands how institutions serve students from both sides — the classroom and the dean’s office — and what it takes to redesign academic experiences that actually work for the communities they serve.
Michael Tompkins, Ph.D.
Business Strategy, AI Literacy & Higher Ed Administration
Michael is an Assistant Professor of Business at West Liberty University with a Ph.D. in Strategic Management from the University of the Cumberlands, an MBA from Youngstown State, and an MS from Duquesne. Before faculty life, he served as Associate Dean at the Community College of Allegheny County — giving him firsthand experience with the workforce-focused, community-serving model that campus transformation is built on. He’s currently leading AI literacy initiatives at West Liberty, funded by a Truist grant, ensuring students don’t just hear about AI but actually use it in meaningful ways. Michael understands both the business case and the classroom reality of transforming how institutions serve their communities.
Scott Silverman, Ed.D.
Higher Education Administration & Student Affairs
Scott brings more than 24 years of higher education leadership spanning student success, enrollment strategy, and noncredit programming. As Interim Dean of Noncredit and External Programs at Santa Monica College, he has built bridges between traditional academia and workforce-focused programming — exactly the intersection where campus transformation lives. Previously Assistant Dean of Students at California Lutheran University and Associate Director at UC Riverside, Scott earned his Ed.D. from USC researching student engagement. He knows how to build inclusive campus cultures that serve people beyond the traditional 18-year-old undergraduate.
Kevin McAllister
Grant Strategy & Workforce Development
Kevin is a 20-year veteran of higher education who founded TryAngle Solutions to bring strategic grant writing, capacity building, and management consulting to colleges and nonprofits. He built one of the largest majors on a college campus by combining workforce development with academic rigor, collaborating across alumni relations, career services, and community engagement. Kevin understands the funding landscape — WIOA, EDA, USDA, foundation grants — and how to write the proposals that turn a campus transformation plan into funded reality.
Debbie Brockett, Ed.D.
Executive Educational Leadership & Strategic Operations
Debbie brings more than three decades of experience transforming instructional systems and leading large-scale organizational change. As Superintendent of McMinnville School District, she led a $137M organization serving 6,300+ students and 900 staff. As Regional Superintendent in the Clark County School District — one of the nation’s largest — she oversaw 6,400 staff and guided 108 schools through complex operational transformations. A passionate advocate for equity and historically marginalized communities, Debbie has consistently closed achievement gaps and expanded access to high-quality learning. She’s served as a high school principal, led two schools simultaneously as a franchise principal, pioneered academic pathways and behavioral interventions, and taught graduate-level courses in educational leadership. A certified AI Learning Consultant with a doctorate from Nova Southeastern University, Debbie knows how to take a vision and turn it into an operating organization that actually delivers.