Trojan Course

Summary

Campus Files: Trojan Course – A Deep Dive into USC's Hidden Social Work Program

Episode Release Date: April 16, 2025
Host: Margo Gray
Podcast Series: Campus Files by Audacy

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Introduction

In the "Trojan Course" episode of Campus Files, host Margo Gray uncovers a troubling内幕 within the University of Southern California's (USC) prestigious online Master of Social Work (MSW) program. The episode follows Evan, a graduate whose journey reveals systemic deception and exploitative practices orchestrated by a for-profit company, 2U.

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Evan's Background and Educational Journey

Timestamp: [01:42]

Evan’s story begins in Nashville, Tennessee, where he navigated a challenging public school environment as an openly gay student. Attending Martin Luther King Jr. High School, Evan faced severe bullying and limited resources, shaping his resilience and dedication to mental health advocacy.

"Growing up gay in this kind of poor southern public school context, it was tough," Evan shares ([04:14]).

Despite these obstacles, Evan excelled academically, eventually earning a degree in philosophy and religious studies from UC Santa Barbara in 2019. His passion for mental health led him to pursue a career as a therapist, necessitating an MSW degree.

---

Enrollment in USC's MSW Program

Timestamp: [06:14]

In his quest for further education, Evan applied to USC's MSW program, renowned as one of the oldest and most selective in the country. The program’s online format promised flexibility without compromising academic rigor, boasting a 15-18% acceptance rate ([09:12]).

Evan recounts his positive interactions with an admissions counselor who built a strong rapport with him, sharing personal details to foster trust ([08:04]).

"I was thinking like, oh my gosh, she is like one of the nicest people I've ever met," Evan reflects ([08:40]).

---

Financial and Academic Challenges

Timestamp: [12:03]

Upon acceptance, Evan faced the daunting financial burden of over $110,000 for the two-year program. Despite expressing his financial insecurities, the admissions counselor assured him that financial aid would cover his loans, urging him to accept promptly to secure funding ([12:30]).

However, Evan's optimism waned when:

• Financial Aid Issues: His financial aid package never materialized, and his attempts to contact the financial aid office were met with silence ([13:34]).

• Academic Discrepancies: Professors taught inaccurate and superficial content without the expected academic depth. Evan observed, "They were just reading through lecture notes aloud. But they didn't study this in like a PhD program," highlighting the lack of qualified faculty ([14:28]).

• Unmet Promises: Resources such as a WeWork office space and robust career counseling were never provided. Clinical internships, a cornerstone of the program, were subpar for most students, emphasizing paperwork over practical experience ([16:09]).

Evan notes the overwhelming debt burden faced by his peers, particularly affecting women balancing motherhood and education, leading to widespread frustration and burnout ([17:21]).

---

Discovery of 2U's Involvement

Timestamp: [21:08]

Determined to address these issues, Evan escalated his concerns within the university administration. In a pivotal meeting, a high-ranking USC official revealed a startling truth:

"The entire program was being run by a for-profit company called 2U," explains Margo Gray ([21:24]).

2U, an Online Program Manager (OPM), was responsible for managing USC's online MSW program, effectively operating it independently from USC’s direct oversight. This arrangement meant:

• Different Standards: The online program had distinct professors, curricula, and admission standards, diverging sharply from USC’s traditional offerings ([21:43]).

• Deceptive Practices: Students were misled into believing they were enrolled directly with USC, unaware of 2U's profit-driven motives. Admissions counselors from 2U used USC branding to gain trust, manipulating students into expensive enrollments without transparent disclosure ([22:42]).

---

Aftermath and Legal Action

Timestamp: [25:17]

Evan’s revelation sparked a wave of similar complaints from fellow students, leading to a Wall Street Journal investigation that confirmed USC's deceptive partnership with 2U. The investigation highlighted how 2U targeted low-income individuals for federal aid benefits, prioritizing profit over genuine educational outcomes.

Eileen Connor, director of the Project on Predatory Student Lending (PPSL), emphasizes the exploitative nature of such partnerships:

"Something's predatory when it's structured in a way that the person making the loan can only win and the person who's taking out the loan has all of the risk," Connor explains ([26:30]).

In response, PPSL filed a class action lawsuit against USC, aiming to hold the university accountable for misleading students and perpetuating predatory lending practices.

Evan actively joined this lawsuit, alongside hundreds of others who felt deceived by USC’s promises.

---

Conclusion and Broader Implications

Timestamp: [33:14]

As Evan transitions to his career as a therapist, independently studying to meet licensing requirements, the fallout from the scandal continues. USC terminated its partnership with 2U in late 2023, yet 2U remains active, launching new online programs with other institutions ([33:14]).

Margo Gray reflects on the broader implications for higher education:

"When we can't trust any institutions anymore... higher education is in the crosshairs," she remarks ([31:00]).

The episode underscores a critical issue in modern academia: the increasing prevalence of for-profit entities like 2U exploiting students through deceptive practices masked under reputable university names. This erosion of trust threatens the foundational integrity of educational institutions, urging a reevaluation of partnerships and transparency in higher education.

---

Notable Quotes

• Evan on Program Deception:
  "I had just been consistently gaslit for so long and I knew in my heart something was wrong and I finally got the answers I wanted." ([22:42])

• Eileen Connor on Predatory Lending:
  "It's likely that they're going to fail, that they're not going to be able to repay that loan. And that's exactly how it played out for Evan." ([27:15])

• Margo Gray on Institutional Trust:
  "I feel a lot of sadness at what they're throwing away and what it will mean for us when we can't trust any institutions anymore." ([31:30])

---

Final Thoughts

"Trojan Course" serves as a cautionary tale about the hidden dangers within higher education’s evolving landscape. By exposing USC’s covert collaboration with 2U, Campus Files highlights the urgent need for transparency and accountability to protect students from predatory practices. Evan's journey from hopeful graduate to advocate for change exemplifies the resilience required to confront institutional malfeasance and strive for a more equitable educational system.

---

For more stories on educational scandals and institutional misconduct, explore Seasons 1-3 of Gangster Capitalism available in this podcast feed.

Transcript

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[Margo Gray]

It'S June 2022. The University of Southern California is celebrating graduation day for its social work program. A student named Evan is one of thousands of graduates.

[Evan]

At the ceremony I was in my cap and gown. I actually had my mom and dad fly in so they were there too. I was sitting down at my seat in my prescribed area. I want to say at least 30 to 40 minutes. And they had I think an indigenous Hawaiian woman come and talk. She's up there saying like we love all of our minority students and like all the poor people.

[Margo Gray]

To any outsider, it seemed like a routine part of the graduation ceremony. But for those who had been through the social work program, the hypocrisy was glaring.

[Evan]

I could see through it. I got so angry that I ended up just leaving and I didn't even walk and I was just like, you know what? I'm done. I'm done with usc.

[Unknown]

Foreign.

[Margo Gray]

I'm Margo Gray. This week on Campus Files, we dig into how USC outsourced its prestigious social work program to a for profit company and kept it hidden from students.

[Evan]

I'm from Nashville, Tennessee, and I grew up going to public school. And Tennessee has a really bad public education system.

[Margo Gray]

This is Evan. He attended Martin Luther King Jr. High School just west of downtown Nashville.

[Evan]

The school that I went to from, like all my developmental years was pretty awful. It was just in a low income area, bad infrastructure, pretty bad teachers, very, very little resources.

[Margo Gray]

But for Evan, the biggest challenge wasn't the lack of resources. It was navigating the school environment as an openly gay student.

[Evan]

Growing up gay in this kind of poor southern public school context, it was tough. The school I went to is so homophobic. I mean, it was also back in 2010s and before. So f slur was getting thrown around a lot more then.

[Margo Gray]

And there wasn't a large community of openly queer students Evan could connect with for support.

[Evan]

There was one other gay person at my school, and he was bullied so much incessantly, and I mean, even like the super, super nerdy kids would use him as a punching bag. And he eventually had kind of a psychological break and they just took him out and he was just gone. And I remember thinking at the time, like, dang, that's what happens to the gay psyche. It's like he came out, he was out, he was bullied, and then he just disappeared.

[Margo Gray]

As high school drew to a close, Evan was eager to leave Tennessee for college. But figuring out how to pay for it was a whole other challenge.

[Evan]

There was no mentor to talk me through this stuff. My dad is like an H vac and my mom is a ceramicist. And there wasn't any offering on their end that things were going to be paid for. So it felt really like I had to do it all on my own.

[Margo Gray]

It wasn't easy, but Evan managed to secure some financial support. He bounced around between a few colleges before eventually landing at UC Santa Barbara. In 2019, he graduated from UCSB with a degree in philosophy and religious studies.

[Evan]

It was from studying religion and philosophy and psychology that I went into, like, psychoanalysis. And then I became really interested in meditation and mindfulness, and I found that to be a huge, huge, huge resource. And where I grew up, there was just a lot of mental health issues, and I wanted to kind of help facilitate that healing for people.

[Margo Gray]

So Evan set his sights on becoming a therapist. But he knew it wouldn't happen overnight. First, he had to get his master's in social work, or msw, a degree required for most counseling jobs.

[Evan]

I started looking into a lot of programs to become a therapist. You type in therapy programs, and the USC MSW program just, like, flooded everywhere.

[Margo Gray]

USC's MSW program is one of the oldest in the country, dating back to 1920. From the start, it was a trailblazer. Long before it became common practice, USC sent students beyond the classroom to work directly with immigrant communities in Los angeles. Then in 2010, it broke new ground again, this time by launching a fully online version of its in person program. The ads that Evan kept seeing were for this online program.

[Unknown]

Welcome to a first of its kind digital campus that fosters effective and meaningful learning experiences in an online environment.

[Margo Gray]

USC's MSW program seemed like the perfect option. It promised the flexibility of studying online while offering the same opportunities as the in person program. According to USC's website, it featured the exact same faculty curriculum and access to career services.

[Evan]

I think I signed up for an email to get more information, and then that's when I was connected to the admissions counselor.

[Margo Gray]

The admissions counselor explained that she worked for USC and was there to guide Evan through the application process.

[Evan]

It wasn't just a one off phone call, or maybe I'm going to call you once a month. She was calling me every other day, many times a week. And she would just chat with me.

[Margo Gray]

She took the time to get to know him, his life, his story, and what had inspired his interest in social work.

[Evan]

I talk about being gay from Tennessee. My most vulnerable desires and goals, which is to help this really vulnerable community that I'm a part of. How I wanted to start a nonprofit to help LGBT people in the South. She was telling me how new she was, and she was disclosing information about her life, about her queer child. She was really building rapport with me in a pretty intense way at the time. I was thinking like, oh my gosh, she is like one of the nicest people I've ever met.

[Margo Gray]

For Evan, it felt like someone was finally rooting for him and his aspirations.

[Evan]

She really hyped me up. She was saying to me that, like, she was assigned a caseload of like, 20 prospective students. And she said to me as well that she thought they were not going to get accepted.

[Margo Gray]

Evan was cautiously optimistic since his acceptance was far from guaranteed. After all, he was applying to the number one MSW program in the country, per USC's website.

[Evan]

And on the website, it clearly stated as well that it was either 15 or 18% acceptance rate. And I remember being like, oh my God, this is so prestigious. This was a really highly selective program.

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[Margo Gray]

Evan could barely contain his excitement. He'd been accepted into USC's online MSW program. Of all the programs he'd applied to, this one was by far the most prestigious. But there was a catch. It was also by far the most expensive. The two year degree cost over $110,000, far beyond Evan's budget. He voiced these concerns to his admissions counselor.

[Evan]

I kept telling her how I was insecure financially and this was my number one concern. And she calmed me down. She said, you're not going to have to worry. Trust me. She said, you just have to accept.

[Margo Gray]

The admissions counselor reassured Evan that he could take out a loan and wouldn't have to worry about paying it back. The financial aid office would cover it using their own budget. Still, Evan was hesitant.

[Evan]

She was then starting to push me, push me, push me that I had to accept and if I didn't accept soon, I would not receive the financial aid.

[Margo Gray]

Ultimately, fearing he might miss out on the opportunity, Evan made the decision to enroll.

[Evan]

I just thought I was going to really elevate myself by going to this program and not one of the state programs which I was admitted to. And I was really excited initially, I want to say the first semester I was still happy and feeling grateful. And then it kind of hit me that I still hadn't received my financial aid package. And that's when the stomach dropped.

[Margo Gray]

Initially, Evan began reaching out to the financial aid office for updates, but his calls and emails went unanswered.

[Evan]

On top of that, in about the second semester, Evan, that's when I realized that the professors were really not doing a great job.

[Margo Gray]

Evan had expected USC's professors to be top notch, but instead he found himself in a class where the professor was teaching blatantly inaccurate information.

[Evan]

I just remember that she was talking about Marx and she was just misquoting and didn't know anything about Marx. And I remember raising my hand and bringing that up and she doubled down. And I remember being just like in almost like dissociative shock.

[Margo Gray]

Evan began researching his professors backgrounds and his stomach sank.

[Evan]

Once again, I realized these were only master's level professors. They didn't have any PhDs. They're supposed to be teaching history of psychotherapy, diversity and ethics. Just a really wide range of topics that actually isn't covered in a typical MSW program. These professors were just reading through lecture notes aloud. But they didn't study this in like a PhD program.

[Margo Gray]

In one class, the professor didn't even bother to pretend that he was putting in any effort.

[Evan]

I was initially excited because he was also a gay man. I was like, oh my gosh, this is going to be great. But we butted heads so hard because he wasn't teaching and he was showing just the TED talks the whole time. And I remember raising my hand and confronting him in the class and being like, are we going to talk about this or do this? And he got angry at me.

[Margo Gray]

But it wasn't just the professors that seemed off. His classmates also weren't what he expected from the top MSW program in the country.

[Evan]

A lot of the students in the classrooms were non verbal and the professor would occasionally would want there to be a discussion and no one would speak. And I started realizing the few people that would speak typically were more, I'm trying to use the right words. I started to realize that the people were maybe not too intelligent in the program. I was like, this isn't what I'm used to in academia.

[Margo Gray]

To make matters worse, it wasn't just the academic rigor that fell short. None of the resources that USC had promised were available to him.

[Evan]

I was told I'd have access to a full time WeWork office. They never gave me my WeWork. And I just remember being like, why the f are you offering this space to do classwork and then not giving it to people? I was also told that there was going to be a ton of career counseling incorporated into the education, and that was a lie as well. I went to the career center multiple times and they didn't know anything about MSWs or our jobs or the requirements to receive licensure or the state licensing test as well.

[Margo Gray]

Students had also been promised clinical internships in the field. While Evan managed to secure a decent one, that wasn't the case for the majority of his peers.

[Evan]

They went to horrible placements where they were just doing paperwork and weren't actually doing psychotherapy with anyone. And I remember being really disturbed by that because they were paying so much and they weren't getting any clinical experience, which is what they were entitled to.

[Margo Gray]

And like Evan, most students were paying far more for the program than they could afford.

[Evan]

Everyone was overwhelmed with debt. Everyone. That was a common thing. A huge amount of the women had children and there was a lot of tears in the classroom because it was overwhelming. And so I think a lot of the especially moms who were so burnt out in my program, they didn't have the extra energy to fight, fight, fight, fight, fight.

[Margo Gray]

But Evan did. So he started advocating for himself and his classmates first by raising his concerns directly with the professors.

[Evan]

They would tell me to talk to the student org to voice our concerns in a coalition, which I found was just a really strange thing because it was like unpaid labor that we were being asked to do as students to try to rewrite their curriculum.

[Margo Gray]

So Evan tried a new approach. He began reaching out to members of the administration and then I started going.

[Evan]

Higher up and higher up in the food chain to the student coordinator, the academic coordinator, because all these higher ups were pushing me, pushing me, pushing me because no one wanted to talk to me.

[Margo Gray]

After months of being passed up the chain, Evan secured a meeting with the top ranking university official who oversaw both the in person and online social work programs. He carefully planned what he would say, but nothing could have prepared him for what she was about to reveal.

[Eileen Connor]

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[Margo Gray]

In the spring of 2021, Evan met with a top ranking USC official over video.

[Evan]

It was intense. She told me everything. That's when I learned the entire program was different from the on campus program. She came clean.

[Margo Gray]

Evan learned that the program he'd been attending wasn't actually run by usc. Instead, it was operated by a for profit company called 2U.

[Evan]

I didn't even know that that was a thing. I didn't know anything about 2U. I thought I was going to USC. Shocking.

[Margo Gray]

2U is what's known as an online program manager or OPM. It's a for profit company that partners with universities to manage their online programs. In exchange, 2U takes a share of the tuition revenue. But the students don't realize they're dealing with 2U. They think they're simply enrolled in USC's online school. In reality, USC contributed nothing to the program except its name. The online MSW program had entirely different professors, a different curriculum, and even different admission standards.

[Evan]

We talked about selectivity and I told her how it was advertised to me as number one. She said that that was a lie on the website and that almost all the students are let in. She said to you lets in almost everyone.

[Margo Gray]

Evan was shaken, to say the least. Everything he'd been told about the program was a lie.

[Evan]

I'll say. I was also maybe a bit relieved because I had just been consistently gaslit for so long and I knew in my heart something was wrong and I finally got the answers I wanted. She told me she was going to help me receive financial aid that I was promised. So I left that meeting feeling great.

[Margo Gray]

But Evan's relief didn't last very long because after the meeting, the USC official went silent. He followed up by email. Still no response.

[Evan]

And that's when I got really hurt because I was like, this is just another salt in the wound of someone telling me that they're going to help me or do something and not following through.

[Margo Gray]

Evan believes the USC official genuinely intended to help him. But he suspects she later realized the problem was far bigger than she could fix.

[Evan]

I think that she realized I was one of so many that was lied to that it was like I can't help him and everyone. Additionally, I think she realized the scope of the corruption at USC was too high. I could feel talking to her that she was freaked out about this stuff and she just dropped out.

[Margo Gray]

Just a few months later, the USC official resigned, leaving Evan without an advocate. With nowhere else to turn, he channeled his frustration into his schoolwork.

[Evan]

We had to do a creative arts assignment at the end of the program. My entire assignment was about USC line. I was bluegrass musician because I'm from Tennessee. I got my banjo and I wrote a song called USC Lines and the teacher liked me and I could tell she wasn't ignorant and she knew what USC was doing. She couldn't respond because she knew when to be quiet. She knew that these classes were recorded.

[Margo Gray]

In May 2021, Evan completed the program. USC held an in person graduation ceremony on campus and Evan's parents flew in to celebrate him. But as we heard at the start of the episode, Evan' stormed out of the ceremony without collecting his diploma.

[Evan]

It was painful because I wanted to do the walk, but I wasn't going to be inauthentic and fake to myself when I was so angry at the program.

[Margo Gray]

The program had left Evan with over $100,000 in debt and no closer to being prepared for a career as a therapist.

[Evan]

I went onto the USC alumni Facebook page and I posted about my experience and it received 300 comments and thousands of likes. And all these people started pouring out and messaging me their stories about getting lied to, having to drop out of the program, where they didn't even finish the program but they had like a hundred thousand in debt. The stories were innumerable.

[Margo Gray]

As it turned out, the groundswell of support from people in debt revealed an even deeper controversy. A month later, a Wall Street Journal investigation uncovered the truth. It confirmed what the USC official had told Evan. USC's program was in fact being run by a for profit company, 2U. But the article also revealed something Evan didn't know. The program was specifically targeting low income individuals, not for their talent or potential, but because they qualified for federal aid money. Anytime you have a program that's the size of the federal student aid program, it's going to attract people who see it as a way to make money. This is Eileen Connor, director of the Project on Predatory student lending, or PPSL. Her organization has helped eliminate over $22 billion in student debt and continues to fight to end predatory student lending. Something's predatory when it's structured in a way that the person making the loan can only win and the person who's taking out the loan has all of the risk. And it's likely that they're going to fail, that they're not going to be able to repay that loan. And that's exactly how it played out for Evan. His loan money went straight into USC and 2U's pockets, but he alone was left with all the risk responsible for paying it back. Historically, the bad actors making the predatory loans were for profit schools. Places like Corinthian Colleges, ITT and the Art Institutes, which flourished during the 1990s. In recent years, these institutions have faced growing scrutiny for their exploitative practices for issuing loans to students they knew would struggle to repay them. Because of the scale of that and the number of people who were negatively impacted, there was a lot of work done around tightening rules on predatory for profit colleges. And in response, I think we've seen the share of students going to these schools go down, we've seen the money going to them go down. But it doesn't mean that the practices have gone away. Eileen explains that predatory lending hasn't disappeared, it's just evolved. Now for Profit companies like 2U are stepping in. They're helping schools meet the rising demand for online education, a demand that's risen since the COVID pandemic. So the pitch of a company like 2U or another OPM to these schools is, look, we have the expertise, we have the platform, we know how to develop these courses. You don't have to put up any money upfront. It doesn't require you to have a capital investment. You don't have to have dorms. You also can have a nationwide reach. You're not constrained by geography. Essentially, there's no ceiling to the number of enrollments that you can get. The pitch sounds great. In theory, these online schools allow universities to reach more students and boost their revenue. The problem, though, is that students generally have no idea about the behind the scenes arrangement. They think they're paying to attend USC or another university, not 2U. Nobody knows the name 2U. In fact, they're deliberately trying to hide themselves from consumers. For example, Evan had no idea that the USC admissions counselor who guided him through his application process was actually a 2U recruiter. A student would never know that the person they're talking to is not actually employed by the institution because USC Gave them USC email addresses. When we see like a Edu, we think that's a beneficent institution. I don't need to be on guard that this entity is going to be trying to treat me like a profit center. But that's exactly what was happening. The 2U recruiter wasn't looking out for Evan's best interest. Her job was to get him to enroll at any cost, even if that meant misleading him about financial aid. And that gets to the heart of the issue. 2U's mission is fundamentally at odds with USC's. As a for profit company, 2U's priority is maximizing tuition revenue. USC, on the other hand, isn't supposed to be driven by profit. It's meant to be focused on providing a world class education to its students. When I look at a school like USC or any other established, reputable school making a decision to turn students into profit centers, I feel a lot of sadness at what they're throwing away and what it will mean for us when we can't trust any institutions anymore. Looking ahead, higher education is in the crosshairs. And so we don't want to see these institutions that I think are so important to civil society and to our democracy essentially hasten their own demise by making these bad deals, by being greedy, by deceiving students, by choosing something that's expedient or clever over what's right. As for exactly how many of these companies exist and how much revenue they generate, Eileen says, we don't know. Since there's very little transparency in the industry, it is out of sight. There's not mandated data reporting. I think that's part of what creates these conditions for these programs to be predatory or deceptive. But we do know that these companies have persuaded hundreds of colleges and universities in the United States to sign on. Schools including Vanderbilt, Georgetown and Fordham. The widespread use of these programs is part of what inspired Eileen and her team at PPSL to file a class action lawsuit against usc. They're hoping to send a clear message to universities. If your business model depends on deceiving students, it's time to rethink. Should never be the case that the decision to pursue education or training beyond high school should be the worst decision that someone makes. The class action lawsuit is currently progressing through the legal system. Evan is one of the hundreds of individuals claiming they were misled about the quality of the program.

[Evan]

I'm so blessed because after that Facebook post that I did, I was connected to the predatory student loan folks. I applied for my borrower defense loan application that let me be a part of a large class action.

[Margo Gray]

Today, while Evan awaits the outcome of the class action lawsuit, he's working as a therapist, a career path that wasn't easy to achieve.

[Evan]

I had to completely study independent of my education from usc. There's state licensing requirements to become a therapist. We weren't taught anything on these tests. Why? Because 2U doesn't know. It's been a bumpy, traumatic experience. Leaving USC because they didn't prepare me whatsoever.

[Margo Gray]

Thankfully, no one at USC will have to go through what Evan did because at the end of 2023, the university ended its 15 year partnership with 2U. But the announcement dodged quite questions about the broader OPM model and made no mention of the ongoing lawsuit. And on the very same day, 2U unveiled plans to launch 50 new online programs with six other institutions. Special thanks to Aaron Ament for sharing his insights and expertise Campus Files is an Odyssey Original Podcast this episode was written and reported by Margo Gray. Campus Files is produced by Ian Mont Eliot Adler and me, Margo Gray. Our executive producers and story editors are Maddie Sprunkheiser and Lloyd Lockridge. Campus Files is edited, mixed and mastered by Chris Basel and Andy Jaskowitz. Special thanks to Jenna Weisberg Berman, J.D. crowley, Leah Rhys, Dennis, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Schuff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman and Hilary Van Ornam. Original theme music by James Waterman and Davy Sumner. If you have tips or story ideas, write to [e-mail].

[Soraya]

Some people play it safe, but that's never been my style. I'm Soraya and this is Rule breakers, the podcast where we celebrate the rebels, the misfits, and the ones who make their own way. Every week I sit down with athletes, entertainers and industry disruptors who don't just push the boundaries now, they shatter them. We talk about the wildest risk they've taken, the lessons, lessons they've learned and the moments that made them who they are. No fillers, no bs, just real talk of people who refuse to follow the script. And we don't just talk about breaking the rules now we prove it. Think dog shot collars, bug trivia, blindfold tattoos, and text roulette. The stakes are high and the chaos is real. So if you've ever been told to stay in your lane, this show is for you. You follow and listen to Rule breakers with Saraya, an Odyssey podcast available now for free on the Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts.