LDS Podcast "Latter-Day Lights" - Inspirational LDS Stories

Revitalizing Faith-Driven Leaders with Cumorah Academy: Patrick Sedivy's Story - Latter-Day Lights

• Scott Brandley and Alisha Coakley

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When the Lord calls you to rebuild lives beyond your wildest dreams, will you be brave enough to take the first step?

Father and serial entrepreneur Patrick Sedivy recounts how a divine prompting to serve in the Czech Republic propelled him on a decade-long mission to create Cumorah Academy—one of the leading faith-driven leadership institutions in the world. Met initially with failure when an early venture fell flat, Patrick chose to learn from the disappointment rather than abandon his God-given purpose. Even through hardships such as financial setbacks and soul-stretching leaps of faith, he never stopped piecing together the blueprint for the best real-world curriculum a school like his had to offer—one in which spiritual conviction and practical life skills intertwine.

Nestled in the Czech countryside, Cumorah Academy today stands as a transformative place of growth for young adults worldwide, in spite of its foundations originating from immense sacrifice. With each unexpected detour—from uprooting his entire family to a foreign land to facing near-insurmountable debt—Patrick found his faith strengthened in the end, guided by the truth that genuine success springs from first seeking the Kingdom of God.

Join us as Patrick reveals the twists and trials that brought Cumorah Academy from a fragile dream to a living testament of hope—proving that even the loftiest call to “come and build” can become a bridge to brighter futures.

*** Please SHARE Patrick's story and help us spread hope and light to others. ***

To WATCH this episode, visit: https://youtu.be/699NeI0H7Yk

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To DONATE to Cumorah Academy, visit: https://www.cumorahacademy.org/

To CONTACT Patrick directly, email: patrick.sedivy@cumorahacademy.org

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Scott Brandley:

Hey everyone, I'm Scott Brandley.

Alisha Coakley:

And I'm Alisha Coakley. Every member of the church has a story to share, one that can instill faith, invite growth and inspire others.

Scott Brandley:

On today's episode we're going to hear how one entrepreneur, led by the Lord to develop an academy for future leaders, is remembering to seek first the kingdom of God while pressing forward with faith. Welcome to Latter-day Lights. Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of Latter-day Lights. We're so glad you're here with us today and we're really excited to introduce our special guest, patrick Sedivy, to the show. Welcome, patrick, thank you.

Patrick Sedivy:

It's great to be here.

Alisha Coakley:

Thanks so much for reaching out to us. Scott and I are thrilled to be able to speak to you, because we love all things entrepreneur, all things personal growth and development, all things leadership. It's going to be a good show. I think there's going to be a lot of talking on Scott's part in this show, so some listeners might be very happy to hear that.

Scott Brandley:

but I'm pressure, you're putting the pressure on Alisha.

Alisha Coakley:

I know, I know, I know, but I'm really excited. I'm going to try to like contain some of my excitement, like hold it down so that you can have the main floor. But we are, we just we love this topic and we love what you're doing. And it's really cool because there's actually a funny thing. I just found out one of our former guests, Jordan Robbins, his brother, I believe, Seth, it's his name, Seth Robbins.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yes.

Alisha Coakley:

Came and helped you for one of your leadership things.

Alisha Coakley:

And I was like oh, what a small world. And it was literally right after I got done talking to you on the phone that I saw Jordan share on his Facebook that his brother had went and like taught a class or did something with your academy. And I was like what a small world, because I don't know Seth, I know Jordan. And then I just got the phone with you and I was like what? It was just like one of those affirmations that the Lord gives me where I'm like we're on the right track. This is a guest that we need to have on air.

Scott Brandley:

So it's all exciting. That's cool. I love it. Yeah Well, Patrick, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Patrick Sedivy:

All right, sounds good. Well, I'm just a normal guy, father of five kids. Three are grown up and out of the house and we've got two still at home. Just for a couple more years, and then we'll be empty nesters. Nice, I was born in Canada, in Montreal.

Scott Brandley:

Hey me too.

Patrick Sedivy:

Really.

Alisha Coakley:

I'm from Alberta. You guys are like twinning.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, maybe we're going to talk hockey in a little bit, but yeah, so I joined the church when I was 18. Went on my mission to the Czech Republic, which is actually where my parents are from. They defected from communist Czechoslovakia in 1969. And after my mission got married. My wife actually served her mission in the Czech Republic as well. So we both have ties to that beautiful, beautiful country and we are serial entrepreneurs. My wife and I have pretty much done business together ever since, you know, kind of the first year of our marriage, all the way till now.

Alisha Coakley:

So that's awesome. Yeah, I have to say that is a hard, hard thing. I've always been like a low key entrepreneur, like doing my own little thing, and we're just now getting to that point where, like we just bought a business and we're working you know my husband and I working side by side and I'm like I do not like you, Go away, Go work with someone else. Kudos to you and your wife for being able to work multiple businesses for a very long time together. That's a very hard thing to do.

Patrick Sedivy:

Alisha, I know exactly what you're going through. It actually took a lot of work and effort to run a business together as a married couple, because you're not only partners, you're also spouses, right, and you're always together and typically we're very different from each other. If you and your husband are anywhere anyway, like me and my wife, we're like opposites oh yeah, so it took us a good 10 years to figure out how to stay in our own lanes, but yeah okay, well, I guess I'll just start clocking the years yeah, start that timer my wife.

Scott Brandley:

My wife doesn't like business at all and so every time I talk to her her eyes kind of glaze over and she's just like miles and nods. But anyway, yeah, that's awesome. That's why it works for you guys, yeah. But yeah, we're really excited to hear your story, patrick, so why don't we turn the time over to you and tell us where your story begins, my friend?

Patrick Sedivy:

If you want to know where the story begins, let me start with my parents, then my parents, as I mentioned, are from Czechoslovakia. They both grew up in very strong Catholic families. They were very, very faithful you know, going to church faithfully every Sunday, and you know church and religion was a very deep part of their life. However, where they lived in Czechoslovakia, under communism, that was very much oppressed. So ultimately they ended up defecting from Czechoslovakia, ended up in Canada, which is where I was born, and I grew up being an altar boy, helping in mass on Sundays and so forth, and ultimately actually I wanted to be a priest.

Patrick Sedivy:

I think I mentioned that here I did want to be a priest. I think I should mention that here I did want to be a priest when I was younger and then, when I was about 16-ish years old, I started to have a lot of questions I think a lot of young people have questions at that age and questions about God and faith and religion and all that kind of stuff. So that desire to become a priest kind of just slowly went away and I just wanted to have a career and whatnot. So yeah, that was the very origins of my story and I think it's important to understand that part, because then you understand my tie to the Czech Republic.

Alisha Coakley:

That's awesome.

Patrick Sedivy:

So when I was 18, I had a friend in school who had gone to a summer camp called Shad Valley and this was a kind of interesting summer camp. It's a program where they had 10 different locations where they ran this program and every one of the locations were on a university campus, like University of New Brunswick, university of Nova Scotia, university of Manitoba and had one at Waterloo University. So at these different universities they'd get a group of about 50 students together, usually 18 or 19 year olds, and it was kind of like a geek camp, if you will, for people who were in the top of their class at school and what they were hoping to do is just and what they were hoping to do is just give them exposure to a lot of different fields so that they can choose what field they wanted to go in for their profession and career. So, for example, as part of this program, you know, we would just live on campus there for a month and every day we would have a different professor come, like a biologist, and he would share the cutting edge stuff of what he was researching. Or then we'd have a programmer come the next day and talk about what they were doing and we'd have a chemist come and she would talk about chemistry and so on and so forth, and so we get the exposure to all of these different fields of study and at the same time, we had some really fun projects. We did some really fun outings and excursions.

Patrick Sedivy:

But the reason why I share this story is because it was at this summer camp where I met an individual. Her name was Cheryl Pinkney and she was actually the program manager and she was doing it as an internship for BYU. She was at BYU and she was getting ready to go on a study abroad in Switzerland and one of the languages the main languages in Switzerland is French. I happen to speak French fluently, being from Montreal area, which is part of Canada, to speak French fluently, being from Montreal area, which is part of Canada. And so she came up to me at one point in the first few days of the program and she said I'm going to Switzerland and I just need to practice my French. You know, I learned French in school but it's just not great and I need to practice it so I can communicate better. And so so I agreed and I happened to be, out of all 50 students, all of them from Canada. I happened to be the only one that actually spoke French fluently.

Alisha Coakley:

No way.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah, I don't believe in coincidences, by the way. Ok, so the way. I mean I didn't want to teach her grammar or anything like that. That's how boring is that? So I just figured, well, I'm just going to speak to her. Right, the more we talk in French, the better she'll get. And so literally, we would spend hours after the day was over, usually late night, usually breaking curfew of the program, and we would just sit in the cafeteria and just talk in French. So we got to know each other pretty well and I knew, you know, she would ask questions about religion. So I knew she was very religious, I knew that she was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she knew I was Catholic and you know we knew a lot about each other just from all of these conversations.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, about halfway through the program, the program director decided to fire her, but keep her on until the end of the month, until the end of the program, which didn't really make sense. Basically, the effect of him firing her was I'm not going to sign a paper saying you completed this internship. So she was really distraught about that and really upset in our conversation. And because I knew she was religious. I said well, why don't you pray? And so she did. And you know, being Catholic, we're used to saying the Lord's Prayer repeatedly or other prayers that are repeated. And she prayed very differently. She prayed very sincerely and I had never in my life heard or felt a prayer like that before. I really felt the Spirit at that time, not knowing it was the Spirit, but I just felt something. It was a spirit, but I just felt something right, and so that kind of just sat, but I just had this feeling, you know.

Patrick Sedivy:

And then forward, a couple of weeks later, as the program ended and I was headed home, she gave me a copy of the Book of Mormon and in my mind I was thinking okay, I've taken a bunch of philosophy classes, I've taken a copy of the book of Mormon, and in my mind I was thinking, um, okay, I've taken a bunch of philosophy classes, I've taken a bunch of logic classes. Um, this will be easy to prove that it was written by a person. And there's a bunch of contradictions, right, I mean, it's five pages of a book that's supposed to match doctrinally with the Bible. I'm like take walk to prove this is wrong, and then I'm going to pull.

Patrick Sedivy:

So I went home with the Book of Mormon in hand, ready to prove it was wrong, and I have to say that was my best failure of my life.

Scott Brandley:

Wow.

Alisha Coakley:

That's awesome. It's interesting because I was just thinking about like one of the comments that we had had in Sunday school today where someone had like been really disappointed that they lost a job or whatever, had to be able to get into this other job to meet somebody else who then was going to be able to share the gospel with them, and stuff like that. And it's just interesting how the Lord works like that sometimes. Had she not been disappointed, exceedingly disappointed would she have ever brought that up? Would she have had that prayer? Would you have felt something? Would she have felt led to give you the Book of Mormon? It's just interesting to see you know how God can use failures and disappointments to like you know this came up in our Sunday school class today as well.

Patrick Sedivy:

You know, we were just talking about how the Lord leads us through things that are sometimes difficult and unexpected, painful, and those things are the very things that we need for our own progress and growth.

Alisha Coakley:

So yeah, just like you said, yeah, so did you keep in contact with her afterwards, cause you were only there for a short time? She was only there for a short time, yeah Right, so like what I mean, what happened after you read the Book of Mormon and OK.

Patrick Sedivy:

So I took the Book of Mormon home, trying to prove it was false, right, and I started reading it. I did have maintained contact with her, we stayed in touch, we actually talked over the phone quite often, still, still, and she suggested at one point that I just talk to the missionaries because I was having some questions that she probably was struggling to answer, and so I ended up calling up the missionaries inviting them to talk, and so we started talking about some things. The second visit we had, they invited me to be baptized and I just laughed at them. The second visit we had, they invited me to be baptized and I just laughed at them. So that kind of just started that conversation with with the missionaries. I I could, even though I laughed at them, I still continued to meet with them and, um, you know, I I just at no point did I really feel like, okay, this, this is the truth, or anything like that, like the Book of Mormon is the Word of God. I didn't feel that. In fact, they challenged me to read and pray and I did, and I didn't feel like I really got an answer to that question of whether the Book of Mormon was true, and what I did feel is just keep going forward. I felt God just telling me keep walking, keep walking along this path. And so I did. And at one point I felt like the Lord was saying keep walking, get baptized. And so I did. Can get baptized. And so I did.

Patrick Sedivy:

And I remember very distinctly the day I was going to be baptized it was actually a Sunday that I was going to get baptized after church. I'm there sitting in church and, by the way, my parents obviously were not very happy about this. My parents were Catholics. My mom wanted to be a nun before she got married and my dad wanted to become a priest before he got married. I happen to have uncles and cousins who are priests, so that's kind of just gives you an idea of how important the Catholic church was to.

Patrick Sedivy:

Obviously they weren't very happy about the fact that I was going to visit the Mormon church, right, or, uh, going, you know, reading, meeting with the missionaries and so forth. So anyway, here I am, sitting in sacrament meeting. Uh, the day I was going to get baptized and I just had all these fears and doubts just start like coming in upon me and as I was just sitting there, I just grabbed my Bible. I picked it up and I just randomly flipped it open and it landed on Matthew, chapter 14, where Jesus is walking on the water right and all of the disciples that were in the boat were afraid. They didn't know what it was, whether it was a spirit or whatever, and they got afraid and Peter said Lord, if it's you, tell me to come out on the water.

Patrick Sedivy:

And then he steps out and the Lord says, come, tell me to come out on the water. And then he steps out on the and the Lord says come. And so he steps out on the water and he starts walking on water. And it's funny because most people actually focus on the fact that he started sinking but he was walking on water, which is, I mean and he was the only one that got out of the boat.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah, exactly yeah. But uh, then he's walking towards Jesus and he feels he notices the wind and the waves all around him and all of a sudden he gets really scared. It's like what on earth am I doing Right? And as that fear sets in, he starts to sink and he cries out for help and the Lord just reaches down and says oh ye of little faith. Lord just reaches down and says, oh ye of little faith.

Patrick Sedivy:

And as I read this passage, I just felt so deeply connected with that experience. I felt like Peter's experience was exactly what I was going through right there in that moment, metaphorically, not physically, walking on water, obviously, but just the Lord beckons me to come unto him and I start coming, and then I just get afraid of all of the stuff that's around. Right, I'm going to say all of this stuff, Am I doing the right thing? Is this really the true church? Is it a cult, Whatever? Blah, blah, blah, Right. All these fears and all this darkness just starts coming in. And I just called out in my heart and in my mind with fear and I opened this passage and it was like the Lord was talking directly to me, saying oh ye of little faith, you know.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

That story, that experience just really calmed me and so I went through with it. I I got baptized and, uh, looking back now, I have no idea why the missionary who interviewed me before my baptism actually approved me to get baptized really so, like I, you're probably familiar with some of those baptismal questions.

Patrick Sedivy:

But some of them were like do you believe the Book of Mormon to be the Word of God? And I literally answered. I said it's a good book, I've read it, it has good things in it, but I have no idea. Yeah, word of God.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

Okay. Do you believe Joseph Smith was a prophet? I don't know. I've never met him. Obviously it seems like he did good things. Um, do you believe president ezra taft benson, because he was the prophet at that time? Do you believe president ezra taft benson to be a prophet of god? Like I don't know, I've never even heard him speak. He was sick at the time, so he passed the time when he was, you know, giving general conference talks and so forth. So those are the kinds of answers I gave to all of the questions, right?

Alisha Coakley:

Right.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so, anyway, so, by some miracle, this missionary elder, oh, I can't remember his name, oh, shoot, that's too bad anyway. Uh, he, he approved me to be baptized and uh, so I was baptized and I just kept walking down the path and I remember other members of the ward were saying so are you going to go on a mission? Because I was 18, right?

Alisha Coakley:

and after a year after your baptism, you could go to the temple.

Patrick Sedivy:

You could go to go on a mission Because I was 18, right, and after a year, after your baptism, you could go to the temple, you could go on a mission. I would have been just 19 in a few months, basically. At the time, you know, by the time I was a year in the church and so people were asking me are you going to go on a mission? President Spencerencer w kimball says that every worthy able-bodied male it's like I don't want to serve a mission.

Patrick Sedivy:

I don't feel like I should serve a mission. I just want to be a nuclear physicist, I just want to go to university, right? So that's what I had in my mind. Well, months later, months go by and I just started getting these feelings like, well, maybe you should go on a mission, maybe that would be a good thing. And so, slowly, the Spirit's just working on me and ultimately I just feel like the Lord's just telling me go serve a mission. So I get ready to go on a mission, still don't have what I would say or what I would feel is a testimony of the gospel, of the restored gospel.

Patrick Sedivy:

I believed in god. Oh, I believed in god very firmly. I mean, that was I mean from. My parents gave that to me, that that faith right, and that belief believed in jesus christ and in fact I felt like I would have, I felt like I could hear him. You know, to use president nelson's words, um, at times, but never with an answer to the question is the book of mormon true, or is the church true, or is joe sm Smith a prophet, or any of that? Well, I decide to go on a mission.

Patrick Sedivy:

I go to the MTC and one day I remember Elder Kikuchi gave a talk and for anybody who knows Elder Kikuchi, he's a very powerful speaker, general authority, who was, I believe, from Japan, and I think he was tasked with giving the repentance talk in the MTC, because he called every missionary in that room and there were hundreds or if not maybe a few thousand. He called every missionary to repentance. Wow, few thousand. He called every missionary to repentance. So I go to my room after this devotional and I get on my knees and I just start repenting of everything, everything I can think of, and as I'm repenting I just have this strongest feeling come over me your sins are forgiven you. And I knew in that moment that my sins were forgiven.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

It was kind of like an christ. I knew that he was my savior and it was a very, very personal thing and, as I was, I had been praying to know if the book of mormon is true. I mean, I was in the mtcTC and my thought pattern was look, if I'm going on a mission, if I'm supposed to be teaching and testifying of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, the church and all that kind of stuff, I better know it's true. I don't want to be lying or do I want to go and just waste two years doing nothing? So I had been praying about that in the MTC and, as I had this feeling of being forgiven of my sins, I decided to ask those questions because I felt extremely close to the spirit, might I say even enveloped by the spirit. Right, it was like my whole body was feeling like. It was like if Jesus Christ was standing next to me. Is the way it felt right? Or just wrapped in a blanket? I don't know. I don't know how to describe it exactly, but I decided to ask.

Patrick Sedivy:

So, is the Book of Mormon true? I'm going on a mission and I really want to know, and this feeling that I had when I felt the Lord telling me your sins are forgiven. You just came back to me really powerfully, and so at that moment I knew that the Book of Mormon was true and it's the Word of God. So that kind of emboldened me. So I asked the next question on my mind, which is is Joseph Smith a prophet? And that same feeling came back again. And then so a couple minutes later, I decided to ask the next question is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the true church? And that feeling came back again.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

It was strong and so I had a really, really strong testimony at that moment.

Patrick Sedivy:

A couple weeks later, still in the MTC, I was reading the Book of Mormon and I actually started to read the Book of Mormon from the beginning again and I was reading the introduction and kind of towards the bottom of the page of the introduction, it talks about Moroni's promise.

Patrick Sedivy:

It references Moroni's promise in Moroni 10, verses 3 through 5. It references Moroni's promise in Moroni 10, verses 3 through 5. And after it quotes that or references the Moroni's promise in the introduction, it says those who pursue this course will come to know by the power of the Holy Ghost, that Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of the world, that the Book of Mormon is the Word of God, that Joseph Smith is his prophet in these latter days and that the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints is the kingdom of God set up for. There's something like I'm paraphrasing now, but you know the second coming or something like that. And when I read that and realized that those were the exact same four things that I had received a testimony of just two weeks earlier, the spirit came back just as strong as that night, a couple of weeks.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so it was a really strong reconfirmation and testimony to me that what I felt two weeks earlier was the spirit, and so, from that point on, I have never doubted the truthfulness of the gospel.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh, my goodness.

Patrick Sedivy:

That was my foundation.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow, oh man. I wish I could get a whole download of information as quickly as I mean, not that it wasn't you know, it took you time to get it, but to all at once.

Patrick Sedivy:

That's wow, that's amazing yeah, and the interesting thing is it's just you know, I didn't know right away. Some people want to know before they do anything. I guess one of the things I learned through that experience is you have to walk forward with faith and you have to do before the testimony comes. Right At one point in the New Testament the Lord's talking to his disciples and he says Not those who say Lord, lord will enter into the kingdom of God, but those who do the will of my father and those who do the will of Lord will enter into the kingdom of God. But those who do the will of my father and those who do the will of my father will know the doctrine that it is of me.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah.

Scott Brandley:

Also, and you shall receive no witness until after the trial of your faith, exactly.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah that. That all happened in the NTC. Yes, yes and where were you going on your mission? I don't remember if you shared that in in. I mean, I know, but like um for our guests or for our audience members yeah, great question.

Patrick Sedivy:

So, um, when I was preparing to go on my mission, there was just a couple places I absolutely did not want to go. People were asking where do you want to go on your mission? I thought I always thought Israel would be cool. Right, but obviously, israel, yeah, into missionary work, um, but I said, okay, anywhere but inner city, anything. I didn't want to go to LA, new York City, chicago, detroit. I just I'm a country guy, right, I need wide open spaces. You know, keep me away from gangs and that kind of thing Don't like it. That's why I didn't like inner city. And so, anywhere not inner city and anywhere not the Czech Republic, guess, where I was called Czech Republic.

Alisha Coakley:

Was it in an inner city?

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, no, not really. I mean, you do have.

Alisha Coakley:

That's good, you got half of your wishes.

Patrick Sedivy:

Exactly, but it just felt like I don't want to go back to where my family's from you know, anyway. So I I got called there and I was not super happy initially. Then, when I was the mtc, I thought okay, well, this is kind of cool because I already speak czech, because my parents are czech.

Patrick Sedivy:

Right, we spoke czech right and so I thought this is kind of cool, I already have a leg up, an advantage. And then I got there and the moment I walked off the plane and saw the local Czechs, I'm like, hmm, that looks like my grandma, that person looks like my uncle, and I immediately recognized the gene pool. Everybody looked extremely familiar. Not only that, but as I started serving I noticed that everything they do is exactly what my family did, but nobody else in Canada around me did.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

Things like we took off our shoes when we got in the house and put slippers on, for example, right, or the food we got in the house and put slippers on, for example, right. Or the food we ate, the kind of food we ate, or just the way we interacted with people and I so it was the gene pool and just the culture were all what I grew up with and I just fell in love with people. So, I fell in love with the country, the culture, the people, and that changed a lot.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow, almost like the Lord, I don't know knew what he was doing, or something Right, right, wow. Now you mentioned that your wife served in the Czech Republic too, and so like at the same time did you guys meet there?

Patrick Sedivy:

So she's a little bit older than me, she she started her mission before I did, but most of our missions did overlap. I don't really remember interacting with her except on one occasion, and that was actually the day she was coming home or going home from the mission. I was in the mission home and ran into her, and so I just asked her. I said so what are you going home to? And she said oh well, you know, I waited for this guy on his mission and he waited for me on my mission. So I'm going home to marry this guy. That's the only conversation I ever remember having with her.

Patrick Sedivy:

Oh my gosh, Even though even though I do choke with joke with people sometimes that we were companions as missionaries, but most people don't believe me. I find somebody who does and that's funny.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh wow. So was she back. Like did you guys live both in canada? Were you both called from canada like how did that happen?

Patrick Sedivy:

no, so she, uh, she was born in michigan but grew up mostly in uh provo, and so she was here and when I uh well, I guess I should add this part of the story she probably made the first move, if you could want to put it that way, one day after I was home from my mission in Canada, you know, several months after I was home, I get a phone call out of the blue at like 11 o'clock at night.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh, wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

And as a good return missionary, I was already in bed at 11 o'clock at night and I get this phone call. It's her and we start talking for a little bit and she says I just was thinking of you and I have a book that I'd like to send you. So she got my address, she mails me this book and so forth. I for sure remember that I responded to her letter. I didn't have mail back then, right, I mean, it's just all snail mail and she does not recall me ever responding to that letter really um, I thought I had, but anyway.

Patrick Sedivy:

Um, then fast forward. I end up going to byu uh to go to school, and we met at a mission reunion, we kind of remet, and so we talked for a few minutes and she was teaching at the senior MTC at that time, and so she invited me to come help her teach the missionaries to learn Czech, because my Czech was a lot better than hers was. So I go to teach the missionaries, and after that lesson that night I invited her to go on a walk around campus and that started our dating, and 28 days later we were engaged.

Alisha Coakley:

You didn't even wait a whole month. Nope, wow, man, you like surpassed the stereotype there, you like surpassed the stereotype there.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, you know, what's really cool is that, as missionaries, when you're not thinking about dating at all or anything like that. And there's no way she would have been interested in me, because I was your quintessential nerd geek, you know, and just the way I dressed, I had no clue how to dress. You know, normally, um had a dress, you know normally Um, so, um, she had no interest in me at that time and I just was not thinking that at all, um, but you get to see people in their true light when you're not in a dating scenario.

Patrick Sedivy:

So I saw her as a missionary who she was and she saw me as a missionary who I was and work ethic and values and that kind of thing. So that kind of helps cut through all of the stuff and months kind of trying to cut through in the normal dating scenarios.

Scott Brandley:

Nice, that would cut out a lot of that foundational. You know stuff, when you start to date right, you can kind of skip a lot of that.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah, because you try to hide who you really are. You try to put your best foot forward and you never know. You're always wondering is this really how this works? Yeah that's cool.

Patrick Sedivy:

So anyway, so we got married Typical, you know, young broke student, you know as we started having kids while I was still in school, before we had three by the time I was graduated. And then, a few years after I graduated I think it was about four years after I graduated my dad, who happened to be living in the Czech Republic at the time passed away, and this was actually another really interesting experience. So, my mom, it was a Sunday morning, I remember still. You know, I tend to read these key moments in my life. I tend to remember a lot of just the surroundings, of what's going on at the time, and I remember where I was in the house.

Patrick Sedivy:

My mom called me, let me know that my dad had passed away, and I just remember going up to get ready for church, getting in the shower and just having this real peace and calm feeling. I did not feel despair as my brothers I have, you know, I have older siblings, five older siblings and my brothers in particular felt this despair at my dad's passing because they felt like they had unresolved issues with him, unsaid things that were unsaid or undone right. But I just had this tremendous calm and I remember going to church and our kids getting into the pew and my wife sitting down, and I sat down and I left this space next to me for my dad and I remember feeling the distinct feeling that my dad was sitting there next to me at church the first time he'd ever come to church because he had never gone when he was alive and I just felt like he had an understanding of what I, what I was doing and why I joined the church and all that that was so cool, give me crying here, wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

But yeah, that was a dear, dear experience to me and anyway, we went. We ended up, my wife and I ended up flying to the Czech Republic for his funeral and it was a beautiful funeral, lots of people there. My mom went and some of my siblings not all could make it, but some of my siblings made it and it was a beautiful funeral. But after the funeral and as we were getting ready to fly back home, we decided to stop by the mission home just to say hi to the missionaries, see how the work was going and all that kind of thing, right. And so we stopped by the mission home and I remember the mission president. He sees us and we kind of introduced ourselves and his name was President Chittister.

Patrick Sedivy:

He grabs me by the arm and he's not a very large man but he had a firm grip and he just grabs me and he took us into this room. I still remember exactly the room it was and he sits us down and, um again, I, these are. This is this case where I remember the surroundings. I remember exactly the room where it was, um, and what it looked like and felt like around. And, uh, he just started sobbing and he said I'm going home, I'm finishing my mission in about three months and you guys are a dime a dozen in Utah. You need to move here. And he said I don't care what you do, I don't care what callings they give you, I don't care what you do for work, you just need to be here and just be a strength to the saints here in the Czech Republic. No pressure, no pressure.

Alisha Coakley:

You just need to be here and just be a strength to the saints here in the Czech Republic, and so that pressure.

Patrick Sedivy:

So my wife and I who I mean both of us served our mission there. I've got family who still lives in the Czech Republic. You know I still stay in touch with them. I'll go visit them from time to time when I'm there and we're flying home and we always wanted our kids to learn Czech and we wanted them to be part of that heritage you know part of who I am and we just never were able to. I mean, as a young couple with kids, I mean you're juggling everything. You're juggling just making ends meet. You're juggling raising kids, you're pulling out your hair. You know juggling school for a good part of it, and we never had the time to teach our kids Czech or anything like that. It was always too impractical to speak Czech to each other, always a lot more efficient to do it in English.

Patrick Sedivy:

So we went home on that plane and we talked pretty much the whole flight home. We talked about well, what if we were to move to the Czech Republic? And at that time we already had our own business. We had a store, a retail store called Elisa's Bridal and where we sold wedding dresses and prom dresses and stuff like that, and we were running that store and we were like there's no way. The store is in a position where we could just leave and live on another continent. So by the time we got home on that flight, we kind of concluded okay, let's go to the Czech Republic in two or three years, after we've put things in order, hired the right manager, trained the right manager, put systems and processes in place so that we feel comfortable to be able to leave. So that's kind of what was in our mind.

Patrick Sedivy:

And then, a couple months after that, we're sitting in Sunday school and I just get this strongest impression move to the Czech Republic now. Wow. My wife was sitting just to the left of me and I just leaned over to her and I whispered in her ear. I said we're supposed to move to the Czech Republic right now. She leaned back and whispered to me what does now mean? I just told her. I said how soon as we can possibly make it happen. Well, to make a long story short, within two months we were on a plane with our three little kids and our dog flying to the Czech Republic. And my wife asked me so where are we going to live? And I said I don't know.

Patrick Sedivy:

Oh my God Live. Yet Things were too busy and hectic with the business and everything, and so I haven't had time to do that. And she goes. Well, did you pick a city where we're going to live? And I said, yeah, well, I'm thinking Brno, the city where you know I served. You know it was one of my areas, and people are super friendly in that city. It's a great place to raise kids. So so that's what I'm thinking. And she's like okay, well, we land in Prague, we rent a car, we drive down to Brno it's a couple hours away and we rent a bed and breakfast place for a few days.

Patrick Sedivy:

And I just at this payphone going through all of the classified ads looking for an apartment or a place where we could stay, and my wife is walking around the park with our kids and our dog while I'm dialing to find a place to stay, and and I've quickly found out that landlords in Europe are not super excited about having a family with three little kids. So we were getting turned out left and right, just turned down over and over again. It's like how many kids do you have? I mean, the average family in the Czech Republic has 1.5 kids at best. Right, oh, wow. And we have three kids. So to them, we're like, what are you doing? The average family in the Czech Republic has 1.5 kids at best. Right, oh, wow. And we have three kids. So to the to them, we're like, what are you doing? You're like recklessly overpopulating. So, um, I was getting turned down and and and then, if anybody got past the okay, you have three kids. And then I mentioned we have a dog too. It's like, oh, definitely not.

Patrick Sedivy:

Anyway, finally, we come across this place where they, uh, they say, um, yeah, we're okay If you have three kids, we're okay If you have a dog. And so it happened to be a family who had a lot of kids and a bunch of dogs too. So they're very understanding, right, yeah. But they said, well, there's one problem we're not quite finished getting it ready yet. When do you want to move in? And I said right away. And they said, ok, well, come have a look and see what you think.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so they got their entire family trying to get everything finished and ready and cleaned. They were almost done, but not quite. And so we come, we look at it, we say we'll take it, because I knew how hard it had been to just find a place to stay, so, um, so I said we'll take it. And then they said, okay, give us two or three days to just finish up what we can. And you know there's just going to be a couple things that we still need to finish up. But if you're okay with us coming in maybe from time to time to just finish these last little things, then we're good to go. So we take it and, yeah, that's us now in the Czech Republic. We've been there for about a year. We ended up being there for two and a half.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Scott Brandley:

Wow.

Alisha Coakley:

So did you guys have like another business going on at this time, like where you know?

Patrick Sedivy:

because of the time difference, you know, between Europe and Utah, I would start work typically around four or 5pm at night, typically around 4 or 5 pm at night, so the days were spent with kids. It was a great time in our life. My wife and I remember it as one of our best, happiest times in our life. Our kids although you know they were actually excited to go and then when they realized how hard because we just threw them into Czech schools they didn't speak any Czech. They knew maybe three words in Czech by the time they got there and so to them it was really hard, and so that honeymoon period of them being excited to go on this adventure with their family kind of wore off pretty quickly and it became very difficult for them. But now they look back on it as some of their most cherished memories as well, even though that was really really hard for them.

Scott Brandley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

About hard things that push us forward right.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah.

Patrick Sedivy:

But in this process, my wife one day, you know, had this impression I need to go and offer to teach english in the school for free, just so I can be closer to the kids, and the principal was very reluctant at first and then finally allowed her to come do that and that was really good for our kids. But just through this process, um, what was really interesting is one day my wife and I were in our house uh, you know that rental place that it was kind of like a twin house, twin home that we were renting and, um, one day we were in the house in different rooms, and both she and I had the exact same impression at the exact same time, and so we came to each other, found each other in the house and we started filling in each other's sentences and one of us would start. I just had the strongest feeling yeah, that we're supposed to start a school. Yeah, and it's got to be in English. Yeah, and it's going to be, you know, it's for young adults, to help them, you know, meet each other and strengthen each other and prepare them for, like, we were totally just filling in each other's sentences and so we knew that it was from God, we knew that it wasn't just some random thought that one of us had right, because we both have this strong impression at the exact same time.

Patrick Sedivy:

So from that time forward, we're like, okay, we're going to be starting a school in the Czech Republic for the Czech young adults, and we knew, we figured out, I mean, that it was going to be expensive. So it's like, okay, we've got to make our businesses successful enough that we could fund launching this school. So for the next 10 years, that's what we set out to do is to make enough money to do that. And in the process of that came 2008, which was the big economic downturn. Right, all of our investments, we lost all of our income. At that time, our business crashed and burned. It was a different business by then, and so we started from less than scratch. We were actually extremely heavily in debt. We were about three quarters of a million dollars in debt at this point wow after.

Patrick Sedivy:

After, after October 2008,. Very memorable month for me. Wow, not in a good way, right and um, yeah, so that's when we started another business, which led to another business through connections, and it's just really interesting how the Lord leads you and I'm going to spare some of the details here but by 2015, we were basically, we had paid off all of that debt and our business was our new business, was now successful enough to where we're like okay, we have enough income and enough money that we could test out this school, and we had no idea what we're going to teach. I mean, talk about the Lord giving you line upon line, precept upon precept, right, a little here, a little, there, a little. We knew we were supposed to start a school, but we had no idea what we're going to teach. We're not teachers, we're not academics. What are we supposed to teach? Okay, well, we're entrepreneurs, let's teach business.

Patrick Sedivy:

So we decided to start this business school called Royal Business Academy in the Czech Republic, and so we get started. We launched this pilot program just in the summertime of 2015. And it was like pulling teeth to get anybody to attend. Most eastern europeans were not entrepreneurial at that time. It's changed a lot, actually, since then. Now they are a lot more than they were then, but at that time very few of them wanted to start a business and it was pulling teeth just to get them to come to the school. And when we did get them to come, we had, like a lot more guys than girls.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so we did the pilot program again in the summer of 2016. And we had the same challenges and struggles and we decided, look, this isn't meeting our objectives, so let's just shut the school down. So we just kind of we had a partner, somebody who was helping us get it started, and we just told him we said, look, this isn't what we thought it was, it's not right, so go ahead and do with it what you want. And so he kept going for another year, I think, and then he shut it down.

Patrick Sedivy:

And then he shut it down About three years later, 2019,. This is actually a time when we actually moved back to the Czech Republic in 2016, when we were getting ready to do the second round of our pilot run. Right, so we go back to the Czech Republic, we're living there doing this pilot run. Then we shut it down. It's like, okay, that's kind of a downer, but, yeah, really, really hard, like one of the most emotionally difficult times in my life, because I felt like god told us to start this school. We start this school and it's not right.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so shut it down and I just felt like, why? Why lead us through all that? And we had spent a ton of money, a ton of time launching this school and it felt like for nothing, so we had shut the school down. We're living in the Czech Republic and having another great experience, of course, with our kids Again, hard for them, but ended up being a great experience for them that they remember with a lot of fondness. And you know this.

Patrick Sedivy:

Second time we were in the czech republic, it was with our younger kids, so our two oldest were already moved on out of the house. Our third one uh, well, actually on one of them was on a mission. One of them was getting ready to go on a mission, and then our third one ended up going on a mission while we were there in the czech republic. So, um, our two younger ones weren't super happy about being thrown into a Czech school to learn Czech. It was, again, very difficult, but now they look on it with fondness. Well, 2019, we're living in the Czech Republic, still with our family.

Patrick Sedivy:

We ended up being there five years this time around, and my wife just walks into my office one day and she says God prompted us to start a school. We're not finished with it yet. We need to do something. And I told her you're right. So we got to work, we got thinking about it and we got to asking ourselves a bunch of questions like why wasn't it right before? What were we doing wrong? What do we need to do differently?

Patrick Sedivy:

And so we started asking questions, like one of the things we realized is that it's not good to just focus on business, because not enough people want to start a business. So we said like, okay, what does every young adult need? But nobody teaches, whether it's high school or university. And we concluded some of the most important things that we've learned through our life out outside of gospel, outside of what we needed for business, specifically, what are the things we needed for our life that nobody taught us and we're like, well, leadership, and then soft skills like communication, teamwork, conflict resolution, public speaking those kinds of things that nobody learns anywhere else in school. So we decided to do and we had to rename it because we couldn't call it Royal Business Academy anymore. So we renamed the school and we now call it Kimora Academy. So that was 2019. We're getting ready to launch it in 2020. And what happens in 2020?

Alisha Coakley:

Dang COVID oh man.

Patrick Sedivy:

So that postponed everything by one more year. So it wasn't until 2021, until we actually launched Kimora Academy. But we launched in 2021. And going strong ever since. And I'll tell you this when we first did the pilot program that very first year in 2015, in our minds we were thinking this is a school for the czechs, because our hearts were in the czech republic. We both served our missions there. I have family there. We're like for the czechs. Well, that first pilot program that we did, it became clear and I felt prompted this is not just for czechs, this is for all of Europe. Okay, the interesting thing was when we relaunched in 2021 as Kimura Academy, during the very first semester fall semester 2021, as we opened up, I had the very distinct feeling this isn't just for Europe, this is for the whole world.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow, no pressure again.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, it was just taking my vision, what I was able to grasp Right, constantly, just slowly expanding the vision right.

Scott Brandley:

Mm-hmm.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so, yeah, we have students now coming to us from all over the world. We have students from. We've had students from japan, myanmar, you know, as far there on the east we're talk asia. Yeah, we've had students from africa, although that's the only students from africa that could come to kimura academy are the ones that are already within Europe, because the Czech Republic just doesn't give visas to Africans hardly ever. But we have a ton of students that are coming from Latin America. We have some students from North America coming.

Alisha Coakley:

So, yeah, it's really, we have students from all over the world coming to us now so tell us a little bit about like what that program looks like, because it's not like a high school or anything like you're not there for a whole year or whatever, learning all of the academics, right it's. It pretty much focused on leadership and soft skills and things. So so what does that look like if someone was going to come and be a student?

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah. So we decided very clearly we're not going to try to compete with other schools, we're just going to do what they don't. Do what they don't. That's really important and and so you know I mentioned leadership, right, and and one of the reasons why we pick things like leadership and those communication skills and so forth is because if you look at a job like, look at any position, whether it's a programmer or an engineer or a teacher or a lawyer, look at all any of these jobs and what separates those who are on the lowest end of income for that job and those who are on the highest end of income for that job I don't know what is it what's?

Scott Brandley:

I would say leadership communication um confidence, yeah, confidence, yeah.

Patrick Sedivy:

That's exactly right. That's what separates it.

Scott Brandley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

So that's where we focus, and so we teach leadership, and we teach very differently than other schools. We actually approach education in a very holistic way, where we're not teaching somebody for any particular job or well, we do a little bit of that too and I can get to that. But our core program is not focused on any particular job or profession, but it's applicable to all. And it's applicable not only in your job or profession, but it's applicable in your personal life. In a family, which other or which father does not desperately need good leadership and good communication skills?

Alisha Coakley:

Especially with teenagers.

Patrick Sedivy:

Right, wow, so we teach is applicable there. Which person in the church, in any calling, does not need good communication skills, good leadership?

Patrick Sedivy:

yeah everyone, everyone needs, and I mean I've seen bishops who have terrible leadership skills yeah the lord calls them and he qualifies them and they get the job done right, but could they have had greater influence? Could they have had a greater impact on the individuals that they serve, and whether they're bishops or relief society presidents or primary presidents or whoever right, or teacher monday school teachers? Could they have done a better job if they had better communication and better leadership skills? And the answer is a resound Definitely. My opinion yes. So these skills are all extremely critical, whether you're, you know, whatever profession, or at home, or at church, or in your community, if you're going to do community service. And so our approach is let's build and strengthen all of that. So we strengthen the individual, we teach the individual, um, in a spiritual way. We teach them in. You know, our students walk away, and we measure this walk away with much higher emotional resilience than when they arrived on campus.

Alisha Coakley:

Really.

Patrick Sedivy:

They arrive with greater hope for the future, they leave sorry, I meant they leave with greater hope for the future. They leave with greater faith. They leave with greater leadership skills. So it's this approach to the whole person, right, what's going to benefit them as a whole in all these aspects of their lives, and that's what we focus on. You know, it's really interesting because not too long ago, I guess about a year ago, I read an article that showed some research that 58% of young adults these days feel a lack of direction and purpose. Wow, almost two thirds of young adults.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah.

Patrick Sedivy:

And I mean, we don't need the research to tell us. I'm sure you've seen it, I'm sure you've seen it in the church, you've probably seen it with your kids, you've seen it with friends, kids, kids. You've seen it with friends' kids and that is having a catastrophic effect on the rising generation, and so we help them capture this vision of what their life could be. President Nelson says, you know, in talking to the youth in 2018, so the youth of 2018 are the young adults today, right, the 18, 19, 20 year olds today, and he told them, he said you're among the best the Lord has ever sent to this planet, to this earth. You have the capacity to be smarter and wiser and have a greater impact in the world than any previous generation, and I believe that to be 100% true.

Patrick Sedivy:

I've now worked with many young adults from all over the world and I see the same thing over and over again they will be doing. Their desires are incredible. Their sense of what is just and true is uncanny, nelson has said, and at the same time, you see the rising generation, these young adults struggling. They're facing challenges none of us had to face as young adults how pervasive pornography is, um, just how all the demands and pressures of life and and everything that's constantly around, like hardly ever being able to find peace or quiet or inner reflection. Right, you're all just. Everything is so interconnected. You know, before we got on this call, we silenced our phones. I mean, how often do people actually silence their phones and turn them off and disconnect?

Alisha Coakley:

Right.

Patrick Sedivy:

And, in fact, fact you know, as I've done more research um studies have shown that depression rates globally have skyrocketed since 2012. Like you look at the charts and graphs, it's like this, then 2012, and it's like what happened. What happened in 2012?

Alisha Coakley:

yeah, around that time cell phones were common social media was common yeah those darn cat videos started coming out so there's something about that, right.

Patrick Sedivy:

This generation will need to learn how to deal with those devices because they're not going away, right? And I don't believe the answer is like take away everybody's phones. Um, right, somehow the rising generation needs to figure out how do we use this rather than being used by this. And I'm not going to get into that conversation because I think you know lots of people will have different feelings and emotions and thoughts and opinions on that topic, but I think that it's fair to say that it's had an impact, right.

Alisha Coakley:

For sure.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah.

Alisha Coakley:

Well, it's interesting too because, like I know that the church, they started their self-reliance program, um, and originally there was. There was like finding a job, you know, uh, bettering your education, um, doing your finances, and let's see what was it. Uh, oh, starting and growing a business, right, they started that first and then, right around COVID time, they released, so, like we know that it had been in the works for a little bit before they actually released it globally, but they released the emotional resilience program. Because I think that I feel like the church is always ahead of the curve, right, like I feel like we're always, like we just have a little bit more information that's given to us, you know, by the Lord, for us to get prepared for the things that are coming in the future, and I think that that's one of those things that, um, I mean for years, for the entire time that the church has existed, it's always promoted self-reliance and then for us to actually get this program with self-reliance and then to add the emotional resilience classes in it. It just shows you how much the world needs it because there is so much power on both sides now, right, like to distract and to um, depress and and um to like demoralize everything and then, on the flip side, there's so much power for good, too, if we can just tap into it.

Alisha Coakley:

I love what you said about not being used by technology or social media. Like to use it as a resource, but not to be used by it. That is. That's amazing. So tell me, how long do your students come to to the? And it's all in person, correct. It's not like an online thing.

Patrick Sedivy:

Right.

Alisha Coakley:

They come in person to the academy, and how long do they stay?

Patrick Sedivy:

It's more than in person. It's actually fully residential.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh, okay.

Patrick Sedivy:

So your typical in-person school. You might live in an apartment somewhere and then go to school, right. But here we actually. For our campus, we bought a small hotel.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

It's a small hotel in the beautiful Czech countryside, disconnected from distractions around right. Czech countryside, disconnected from distractions around right, I mean if you look around 360 degrees, it has to be at night for you to see light in the distance, like some light somewhere.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh, that's awesome At least any houses anywhere.

Patrick Sedivy:

I know, so it's separated from all these distractions. So the students come, they live together, they study together, they work and play together, and it's this really cool experience. And that's actually part of the education itself, because, as you're teaching things like communication or things like conflict resolution or leadership, how can you do that in a vacuum?

Alisha Coakley:

True.

Patrick Sedivy:

You actually can't effectively do it in a vacuum. You could teach the theory, theory, but you're not going to actually get the practical application at all and it's not going to sink in deep and it's going to take a lot longer to learn anything. So we actually bring them together, you teach them in the classroom, leadership or communication or whatever the topic may be and then you put them into these scenarios and environments where they actually will have to apply it. So, for example, all of our students are divided into groups of about 10 to 12 students and each group needs to come up with and plan and execute on a service project in the community.

Alisha Coakley:

Nice.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so they're practicing their communication, teamwork and leadership skills all at once together, as they're doing that activity from the things that they learned in class. So although what happens in class the curriculum itself is important, the magic and the most important piece is actually what's happening outside of class okay yeah so how how long is the like?

Alisha Coakley:

how long do they go for?

Patrick Sedivy:

so it's for three months. It's actually about 88 days, is what we call a semester, and they only come once, really, um, so no need to come for four years. You're not going to get a degree. I mean, if you want to go to your university, there's lots of universities around the world that are great where you could get that degree right. Or if you want some any kind of specific certification or anything, you can do that somewhere else. But they come for three months. It's designed to be just under 90 days so that nobody needs any kind of special visa or student visa.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh, okay.

Patrick Sedivy:

Because the Czechs just don't do that. So yeah, so as long as you have a passport and you don't need a special visa to come to the Czech Republic, you could come on a 90 day visa, kind of thing. Just visit.

Alisha Coakley:

And what are the ages?

Patrick Sedivy:

So our students are 18 and up. We typically have students, you know, our average is probably around 25, 26.

Alisha Coakley:

Oh OK.

Patrick Sedivy:

So it's not like not usually right at eight. I mean, we actually do get quite a few that are 18. But we get a lot that are in this 25, 26. And then we get some that are in their, you know, early 30s or whatever.

Alisha Coakley:

Okay, awesome. What about 41?

Patrick Sedivy:

Anybody 41 yet.

Alisha Coakley:

I don't know if I could take off three months, but I could try.

Patrick Sedivy:

No, it's a great experience. Wow, honestly, it's life transforming for these students. You know you talked about self-reliance. One of the classes we have is a class on how to find a job. One of the classes we have is a class on how to find a job and just to give you an idea of our approach to education, it's not about going through the motions and doing the assignments and whatnot although all that stuff is important because it builds up to something. But we just have one criteria to pass that class get a job really no.

Alisha Coakley:

Is it like getting a job there while they're doing the academy? Or is it fully immersive where, like you, don't do anything else outside of?

Patrick Sedivy:

get a job for when you go home, right so? And then we even say we don't care if you actually take the job, no, just get offered the job. Because some of our students are going on to university, or some of them are going on a mission or something else, right, so they might have other, they don't plan on taking the job. But if they're taking that find a find a job class, they need to demonstrate to us that they know how to get a job. And there's only one way that you could prove to me that you know how to get a job, and that is go get a job and so that's our question.

Patrick Sedivy:

And we do. Of course, you have the assignments and you have the theory and all the components that lead up to that, but ultimately you want to pass, go, get a job, and every semester, between 93% and 97% of our students graduate with having a job offer. That's better than anything they've had before and their average pay increase compared to their previous job is 80% or more.

Alisha Coakley:

Wow, nice, 80% or more, yep, wow, that's incredible. I mean, that's literally life changing. Like to go to go spend three months just just to learn that not including all of the extra amazing things you know that you guys are teaching but just to learn enough to get you paid almost double what you're getting paid like can honestly change someone's life completely.

Patrick Sedivy:

Absolutely.

Scott Brandley:

I think a lot of it just comes down to skills and strategy. I mean, in my own personal experience, like I had a lot. I was a bishop and I had a lot of people that needed better jobs or needed a job and as an entrepreneur, I just went and I got some software to help like create really nice resumes and I would just go in and I would create their resume for them and they would get way better jobs. But it's just because I knew what to say and I knew how to format it and I knew the strategy and the psychology behind it. Their their skills set didn't change right. It's just having some basic information and knowing how to set it up and make it look nice, really. So that's really cool.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah, and we actually do both what you described. Right, we do. How do you present yourself? Because some of them come with linkedin profiles of I don't know them laying on a beach somewhere, right? That's their linkedin profile picture. That's what they're looking at, right? So you know, part of it is improving your resume, improving your linked profile, teaching them the networking skills and things like that. But there's the other side of it, which is what are the actual skills that you have? And so as they learn these leadership, communication, teamwork, reliability, accountability skills, then that makes a lot more enticing to an employer, so their opportunities open up. And when an employer compares two workers and says I've got a guy that knows how to program here and I've got this guy that knows how to program, but he actually also has leadership skills and communication skills and knows how to present himself, well, I'm going to go with that guy and I'm going to pay him more than I'm going to pay that guy.

Scott Brandley:

Right.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah, yeah.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah.

Alisha Coakley:

I'm in it, I love it so much, like I'm in a. My day job I mean, we bought our business but my day job right now that I'm still working, is essentially training new employees and getting them connected with um, with like, uh, people who need in-home care and everything, and I, I you would think that being in this position and working in that, in that kind of environment, would just really soften my heart and make me like such a kind person. But I have gotten so hard because I've seen so many people, young adults, especially in their twenties and stuff like that, maybe in their thirties, who just I mean as simple as like they just don't show up for the first day of work and they don't bother to tell the client and they don't bother to tell us and then they'll ask us like a few weeks later, oh, can you send me some new clients? And we're like what, what are you talking about? You know, and it's just, it's like you can see, there's this huge lack of integrity. Number one is what I've I've realized the most with um these generations and I do, you know, I blame partly COVID, partly social media, partly the education systems, you know, and I don't know about the rest of the world I'm just talking about here in America.

Alisha Coakley:

But you just, you see this, this extreme lack of just know-how and just like common decency and communicating professionally one with another and not stepping up and taking responsibility for your actions I mean, I can't tell you how many, how many of my employees have been like oh, I'm so sorry, I have a family emergency. I'm like nobody has that many family emergencies and if you do, go get a new family like work around and what are you talking about? So it's, it's. It's just ah, my gosh, I love what you're doing because I feel like it is so needed and you're right, I've got, I mean, I've gotten to the point where I've told our hiring manager I'm like, listen, if you get any bad juju during the interview, you don't have to justify your juju, just say no. You know like, just say no, it's okay. Or start, let's start hiring people who are 40 and up, you know like, who are part of that like generation where we didn't grow up with a screen in our face.

Patrick Sedivy:

I don't think it's an age thing. Right Going back to President Nelson's comment about the youth and the rising generation, they have a capacity to have greater impact on this world than any previous generation.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah.

Patrick Sedivy:

And if you really believe that, if you believe President Nelson as a prophet and when he says that, then we've got to somehow clear away what the world's way of looking at this rising generation is, have more of how the Lord sees them. So we mentioned earlier a little bit about pioneers, right, I think we just we talked about that really briefly, and you know the pioneers that were in the handcart companies, as they were crossing the plains, they struggled. And when you look at it, why did they struggle? Well, they were freezing in the cold, they were starving, they didn't have enough food and they just plain weren't equipped for the journey.

Alisha Coakley:

They didn't have enough food and they, just plain, weren't equipped for the journey.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, I actually feel the same about the rising generation. They're freezing in this darkness, in this cold, dark world that's really confusing around them right now. They're starving for direction and guidance and they're ill-equipped for the journey and the task at hand which, as president Nelson points out, they're going to do a lot of great things, right.

Patrick Sedivy:

Oh yeah, I love that. What is our job? Our job is to just let's, let's, let's help equip them as best we can. Let's, help prepare them for the journey. Let's give them any guidance we can, but they're going to do incredible things, I promise you. I promise you. They're going to do incredible things if we just do our best to do those three things help give guidance, help prepare them for the journey, equip them with the skills and things that they need. And what I've found with the students that come to Kimura Academy is they have great desires. They want more, they want change, they want something different in their lives. They want a different world than the world we're living in right now. They just need a little bit of guidance, and as we do that, they start doing great things.

Alisha Coakley:

I wow Makes me feel bad.

Scott Brandley:

I just said I take it all back.

Alisha Coakley:

I'll hire all of the millennials I don't want you to feel bad at all?

Patrick Sedivy:

No, no you're good. I just think that we need to reframe a little bit of how we look at and how we approach it.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah, Like maybe don't focus so much on the frustration but on the potential.

Patrick Sedivy:

So it's okay.

Alisha Coakley:

That's how Heavenly Father works with me, is he has to reprimand me a lot?

Patrick Sedivy:

Definitely people you got to say no to in a job interview, right.

Alisha Coakley:

Yeah.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah, I'm kind of jealous, patrick. I mean listening to your story. It's what a cool idea to be able to just create your own kind of curriculum and your own um, yeah, your own school to teach people these life skills when they're young, just to give them that much of an advantage so quickly, so quickly, I mean. The things you're teaching them have taken me well and you probably like your whole life to to figure out, yep, exactly. And so being able to, being able to take all of your life's knowledge and your wife's life's knowledge right, bringing all that together and condensing it into 90 days, and that, wow, that's just so powerful. So, yeah, man, that's awesome that you've put this all together.

Patrick Sedivy:

And I will say it's not just me and my wife, it's many, many other people who have helped at various stages along the way, right, and who have said things, taught us things, who who came to campus to help teach the students and they taught a principal. I'm like, yeah, we need to teach that every semester, you know? Uh, so, so lots and lots of people that have helped in various ways, and so it's been really wonderful how?

Scott Brandley:

how have you seen it over the past three years? Evolve like what's that experience been?

Patrick Sedivy:

oh, uh, uh. That's a great question and you know, when we did our very first semester in September of 2021, I felt like that was awesome. These students got a lot out of this. You know we did a good job. The students felt like it was awesome. I look back on that semester and I feel bad for them.

Patrick Sedivy:

I look back on that semester and I feel bad for them, because the really cool thing is, every semester, every three months, we're able to iterate and we get better and better. Every three months we have new visiting mentors come, we have new people come and contribute and it's like piece by piece where we're making improvements, and what it is today is a quantum leap from where it was in September of 2021, just three and a half years ago.

Scott Brandley:

That is so cool so.

Alisha Coakley:

I want to know more about the mentors, like we mentioned earlier. I know Seth Robbins was a mentor that came and spoke to your students and stuff like that. What do you look for in in those mentors and do you give them topics or do you just kind of like ask them a question and have them prepare something Like wow, how do you? I guess how. How do you pick your mentors and if someone wants to be a mentor and reach out to you like what's that process look like?

Patrick Sedivy:

Okay. So we do have mentors come throughout the semester. We have quite a number of mentors that come and we do give them some curriculum to teach. So if you could kind of imagine, come follow me and the way that curriculum is structured. But for leadership, gotcha, so you have certain things to read or some content and you kind of have a framework of what the lesson is or could be about. And so our students do have content that they take, that they read online, whether it's articles or videos or questions or journaling or whatever that they do before they come to class. And then they come to class where one of these visiting mentors comes and they infuse that topic and lesson with their own life experience and stories right Nice, their own approach to that topic. So if, for example, we're talking about building trust, developing trust as a leadership, you know a key leadership attribute or end skill, then whoever the visiting mentor is, that they're that week that we have that topic we'll be teaching about trust and integrity that week.

Alisha Coakley:

Nice. And how do you, how do you pick your mentors?

Patrick Sedivy:

So we look for people who, first of all, are firmly grounded in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. Um, because we want them to have our same values. Uh, we want them to, uh, to bring the spirit. In fact, often we tell visiting mentors before you come, go to the temple, make sure that you have an extra measure of the spirit in your life in preparation to come. So we want them to bring that. We want them to be successful in their own sphere of influence, whatever that may be.

Patrick Sedivy:

So, whether it's doctor or lawyer or businessman or teacher or stay-at-home mom I specifically put that one in there because we usually have couples come together and sometimes what happens is the wife just kind of sits in the background and says well, I don't really have anything to add to this topic of leadership what, what are you talking about? You just raised five kids, you've served as young women's president or you've served as whatever the calling, and you don't have leadership skills that you could bring to the table to teach these young adults. So we want them to be successful in whatever their sphere of influence. And then we also want them to have a passion for helping the rising generation and beyond, just a passion we want them to have an ability to connect with young adults, cause passion doesn't mean ability all the time.

Patrick Sedivy:

It does, but not always, so we want them to have both.

Alisha Coakley:

Very impressive resume. How do you find them, and can they all be my friends?

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, we do it through our personal networks. We look for, we look for, you know we ask around and we ask for referrals and I'm constantly you know I reached out to you, Alisha I'm constantly reaching out to people to to meet new people and get to know people that could be good fits as visiting mentors and yeah, okay Wow.

Scott Brandley:

That's fun. So I have two quick questions. One do you tie the church into it somehow, or is it just you try to kind of surround the students with good people that have church values?

Patrick Sedivy:

Let me describe what that aspect of Kimora Academy looks like to you. So often people will ask the question is it only for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? And the answer to that is no. Typically, on any given semester, we'll have 25 to 30 percent of our students who are not members of the church. We do have church on campus under the direction, with authorization from the area presidency and under the direction of the Prague stake president and bishopric. So church is held on campus, um, every sunday we um, so we do have that kind of tie to the church. The area presidency has designated kimura academy as a gathering place for young adults, which makes it so that we can offer things like self-reliance classes or whatever. We use church materials. We have used church materials for some of those in the past. We use the church materials for the emotional resilience class, like you mentioned earlier. Institute is taught on campus. That's part of our core curriculum. Everybody takes institute class, whether or not they're members of the church. Wow, kind of like you were to go to BYU, right? I mean, if you're not a member of the church, going to BYU you still have to take a religion class, and so there are those aspects that tie directly into the church, and then you have the aspects that tie indirectly, like you mentioned, surrounding them by good people. I mean we have great visiting mentors, we have great other students, you know we have great you.

Patrick Sedivy:

For example, when I teach leadership classes, I typically teach at the beginning of the semester, the first week and a half, and one of the classes I teach is on having a life vision. And when I teach about having a life vision, I teach from the scriptures. I teach from the creation, how God created everything spiritually before he created them physically. I talk about Alma, who asks can you imagine standing before God at the judgment day? Right? And so he uses language of envisioning, and so that's what we talked about. That's part of what we talked about. I mean, it's not the only thing, obviously, but I do bring in scriptures into that. Or when I teach about commitment, the importance of having commitment, I talk about Nephi I will go and I will do. Um, I talk about nephi. I will go and I will do as the lord liveth and as I live. We will not go back to our father in the wilderness unless we have the brass plates.

Patrick Sedivy:

again, that's a paraphrase, but that's essentially the thought, and the thought I communicate to them, I I bring up to the students is basically nephi is saying I'm not going down, I mean over my dead body, I guess would be a way of saying I'm not. I'm not going back to dad in the wilderness unless I have the brass plates and you know you're gonna have to kill me, I'm gonna have to be dead before I go back without them. Yeah, that's a level of commitment A lot of people aren't used to.

Alisha Coakley:

Right, right.

Patrick Sedivy:

Our students get it.

Scott Brandley:

They get it, wow. So. So my second question is for people that that do go and teach or mentors that go there how does that work? Is it like a volunteer thing? Do they go on? Is it like a trip? They go on for a couple of weeks and then they just go to Czechoslovakia and teach and then come back.

Patrick Sedivy:

We don't pay our visiting mentors. They pay their own way to get there. Yeah, so there has to be some level of commitment on the visiting mentors. How long do they typically stay? Each visiting mentor couple is on campus for a week. Okay, from Saturday to Saturday, and, of course, if they want to do additional travel around all of wherever in Europe, they want to, afterwards or before they can, if they're going to do that, I usually recommend they do their travels before coming to campus, because that way they don't have to deal with dead lag while they're on campus. We already we get them over that.

Alisha Coakley:

There you go, and then you provide housing for them on campus during their stay. Yes, then you provide housing for them on campus during their stay.

Patrick Sedivy:

Yes, typically we provide housing for them on campus, unless we have multiple visiting mentors at the same time, in which case we don't have sufficient capacity for that. So if you have another place that we can have them stay.

Alisha Coakley:

Okay, cool.

Scott Brandley:

And what about students Like can anyone from anywhere go there and do they pay to go? Like is there a tuition?

Patrick Sedivy:

So there is a tuition. You know, talking about commitment, we ask commitment from our students as well before they come, and we do have scholarships. So, students, we don't ask that people go into debt to come to Kimora Academy, but we ask that they make a place. And so, you know some people, if they're coming from the US, maybe they're able to pay for the full tuition. And, by the way, tuition includes room and board and all of the activities and transportation, you know, to any activities we do within the country. Or I mean we do a temple trip every semester to Germany, and so that's all included in the tuition, right? So somebody coming from North America might have the capacity to pay for that whole thing. Right To them. That's their sacrifice. To come To somebody coming from To them, that's their sacrifice. To come To somebody coming from Nicaragua. We had a student that came to us from Nicaragua that I mean literally the shoes on his feet were falling off, wow, where one of our team members saw his shoes and said come with me.

Scott Brandley:

They put him in the car, took him to the store and bought him some clothes and shoes I mean.

Patrick Sedivy:

So you have like complete broad spectrum right. And so we do offer scholarships based on need and it's on a very individual basis.

Patrick Sedivy:

Anyone who's not able to pay for the full tuition. We just simply have them fill out a finance form so we have an understanding of their financial background and we also have an interview individually with them to talk about their financial situation. We also talk about the importance of having skin in the game and sacrificing for your own education and development, and then come to an agreement with them about what their scholarship will be.

Alisha Coakley:

Awesome. Now I have two questions. One I'd like to know about donors, like do you have a way that people can donate to this to help with the scholarship programs? And then two have you seen any like conversions happen, you know whether it's someone who is a member of the church, who's a student, who comes there, who's I know you mentioned earlier like they, they tend to have more faith and everything like that when they walk out. And have you seen, I guess even people who aren't members who decide that they want to go ahead and get baptized?

Patrick Sedivy:

Great question. So what was the first one? I already forgot.

Alisha Coakley:

I was sorry the donation. I know I got to get better at just asking one at a time. I'm learning and growing to um donations. So how do you, how do people become a donor?

Patrick Sedivy:

Yeah, so you could just go to our website, kimora academyorgorg. For people outside of the church I have to spell out Camorra, but those who are in the church they're familiar with that word. So c-u-m-o-r-a-h-academyorg and there's a donate button there so you could donate that way. And then your second question about conversions. We have conversions very regularly, in fact, to the point where I approached the area presidency and said if I find a couple that could serve as a missionary and they put in their mission papers, would you assign them to Kimora Academy? Really, it took a little while to think about it, and that semester we actually had four baptisms. And the area presidency said I see why you want a missionary couple here.

Alisha Coakley:

Yes, oh my gosh Wow.

Patrick Sedivy:

And in fact just this last week I got a message from one of our students. They were posting about another student who did join the church after coming to Kimora Academy and they have an article in the Liahona magazine. Really so a little bit about her conversion story and she says an academy in the Czech Republic, but she doesn't say the name of it. I think they probably got out of the article, but she's talking about Kimora Academy. That's where she found out.

Alisha Coakley:

That is so cool. Oh man, I love that so much.

Patrick Sedivy:

We have people who decide to go on missions. We have people who are less active when they come to us as students and then they become more active. And we have people who aren't members, who don't get baptized, and they just leave having a deeper understanding of the church and the gospel, regardless of whether they get baptized or not. And we have people who get baptized two years later, like just a month ago. One of our students that was with us in 2021, or maybe it was 2022, early 2022, she just got baptized. So sometimes that happens a little bit later.

Alisha Coakley:

That's phenomenal.

Alisha Coakley:

You know, what I love about this is I love that you found something that you can do and like that's very true to you and and you know your business and your entrepreneurial spirit and stuff like that that is also tied in with that threefold mission of the church to proclaim the gospel, perfect the saints and redeem the dead.

Alisha Coakley:

Because you're even making like like temple trips, like you're like making that like a part of each semester to go to your temples in Germany and stuff, and like I just I think sometimes, especially as members, we think that we have to like separate, like we can only do business over here and then we can only, you know, be church people over here, and and some people think that you can't marry the two together but I love that you're doing it, like you're doing it and you're providing jobs and providing education and you like you really are perfecting, you know, the the, not just the saints, but just the children of God and and you're like making the world better, one student at a time. It's just it's super inspiring. I love it.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, I just, I can, and honestly I've, we've, my wife and I have felt led this whole time, um, and you know, just from the very idea of doing it, as I described earlier, and um, it is so fulfilling, it is so awesome yeah, I think a lot of people like would have a dream to do that.

Scott Brandley:

You know, and you're actually living it, which is, like lisa said, it's incredibly inspiring and, yeah, hopefully people watching this podcast.

Patrick Sedivy:

You know, if you want to help help out, I'm sure that Patrick could figure out something for you to do to be part of it If you have felt any kind of inkling or prompting to help in any way. Yeah, let's, let's connect. Let's, let's figure out what that looks like.

Alisha Coakley:

I love that man. Yeah, patrick, you got out of the boat. That's I don't know like you got out of the boat and you are still walking on that water and even though you might, you know, sink a little bit here and there trying to figure things out, like I, I just think that you guys are going to do amazing things. You already are, you already have. I just think it's going to continue. I'm curious with your vision. You know, like you talked about just having like a vision and stuff for life. What do you see for the future of Kimora Academy and and just your future, I guess, in general, like maybe it's not just the Academy, maybe it's something else, like what? What's your goal?

Patrick Sedivy:

I don't know that else in me at this stage of my life my life, the vision for Kimora Academy I imagine and hope and pray before I die, that there are 15 campuses worldwide, each campus with the capacity to have 200 to 250 students per semester.

Patrick Sedivy:

When that happens, we will be impacting over 10 000 young adults lives each year wow vision and to make that sustainable, um and build the infrastructure and the succession plan in place so that that could continue on after I die and continue to grow after I die. That is the vision.

Alisha Coakley:

I love it. It just gives me all the feels I can't believe we have been on for as long as we have like, just fascinating. You've made the time fly.

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, I hope I wasn't rambling too much, sorry.

Alisha Coakley:

No, not at all.

Scott Brandley:

No, this is really fascinating. I mean, how often do you get a chance to have an interview like this right, or hear the origin story of somebody that has a vision like this? This is, yeah, this has been a treat for sure. So, patrick, as we kind of wrap things up, we probably could talk for another three hours, but I don't know if people have that much time. But, wrapping things up here, what are your final thoughts that you'd like to share with those who are listening?

Patrick Sedivy:

Well, I think I'm going to go back to. I was just teaching Sunday school today and we were talking about the brother of Jared going to the promised land and he was. He was led along the way and then he gets to this big ocean and he ends up spending four years there. I don't know if he was waiting or trying to figure out what do we do next, or whatever, but anyway, ultimately the Lord tells them you still need to go across that.

Patrick Sedivy:

And so I asked the students in the class today what is the big ocean that is standing between you and where you need to go and you need to be? And then I said don't let that stop you, because the Lord will help you figure that out and he will make miracles happen in your life. He will lead you step by step, not always giving you everything, and it's not always going to be comfortable. I don't think it was comfortable in those barges, as they traveled for about a year, you know, or however long it was in the actual barges, and it's not always comfortable and you don't always know what you're going to do. But he will create miracles in your life and you will get to know him in a very personal way that will change your life forever.

Scott Brandley:

I really love that.

Alisha Coakley:

Well, you're incredible and what you're doing is incredible. Your wife is incredible.

Patrick Sedivy:

Like she's waiting on me.

Alisha Coakley:

We have really, really enjoyed our time with you today and and just thank you so much for coming on here and sharing your story and, um, we're going to encourage our listeners. Guys, make sure that you guys go to. Is it the Kimora Academy or just Kimora Academy?

Patrick Sedivy:

Kimoraacademyorg.

Alisha Coakley:

Okay, and we'll go ahead and share the link in the description. Go to Kimoraacademyorg. Check out the website. Share this podcast with others. Share the website with others. This podcast with others. Share the website with others. You just never know who wants to get involved, whether it's as a student or a mentor or or donor, or maybe someone has another idea that could even improve on the Academy, what they're, what they're doing already, and and just really what a wonderful way to spread light. So thank you.

Patrick Sedivy:

Thank you for having me.

Scott Brandley:

Yeah, Thanks, Patrick, and thanks for everyone tuning in. And if you have a story that you would like to share, go to latterdaylightscom and let's also hit that share button on. You know wherever you're watching this. Let's, let's do some five second missionary work and get this story out there.

Alisha Coakley:

Yep, absolutely All right, guys. That's all we have for you today. I hope you guys have an amazing week and if you want to get in touch with Patrick, just let us know. I'm sure, Patrick, you can even share your social medias or whatever else too. So check the description, leave a comment, Let us know if you guys want to get in touch with Patrick, if you guys have any other questions for him or want to be able to support him.

Scott Brandley:

Awesome. Thanks, guys. We'll talk to you next week with another story from Latter-day Lights. Until then, take care, bye-bye.

Alisha Coakley:

Bye, thank you.

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Scott Brandley

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Alisha Coakley

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