What happens when you feel unseen, unheard, and left out of most of the decisions about your education? Well, if you are Dr. Gess LeBlanc you spend your career raising up the voices of marginalized, diverse students.

Gess’s book “Who’s in my classroom” is a guide for educators (and all people) to understand the experiences of students of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds, sexual orientations, primary languages, and learning abilities. With stories written by the students themselves (through a collaboration with Youth Communication), Gess’s work is absolutely Great Work.

Join us as we discuss:

• Why Gess’s commitment and approach to Great Work deepened and changed when he became a father and husband.
• How he is able to his Great Work while maintaining a happy and healthy home life and marriage
• Why his work has always sought to find silenced voices and bring those perspectives back into the conversation.

About the Guest:

Gess LeBlanc, Ph.D. is Associate Professor and former Chair of the Department of Educational Foundations and Counseling Programs within Hunter College’s School of Education and is a co-founder of Hunter College’s Urban Center for Assessment, Research, and Evaluation (UCARE). For over 20 years, he has worked in the fields of teacher and leadership preparation. A developmental psychologist, Dr. LeBlanc’s research investigates the impact of developmentally and culturally responsive teaching on school climate. This research has been published in both psychological and educational journals and has garnered awards from the Spencer Foundation and the American Psychological Association. Dr. LeBlanc is a sought after speaker on the topic of developmentally and culturally responsive teaching and is the author of Who’s In My Classroom?: Building Developmentally and Culturally Responsive School Communities published by John Wiley & Sons.

As an expert in the field of child and adolescent development, he has served as an educational consultant to various school districts, state agencies, and non-profit organizations including the New York State Department of Education, the New York City Department of Education, the Highland Falls-Fort Montgomery Central School District, the Lakeland Central School District, the Valley Central School District, the Highland Central School District, the Dutchess County Board of Cooperative Educational Services, the Orange-Ulster Board of Cooperative Educational Services, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Studies, the Boys Club of America, Harlem Center for Education, Inc., Prep for Prep, City Year, Inc., Roundabout Theatre Company, and the Arthur Miller Foundation.

In addition to being recognized for his research, Dr. LeBlanc has been recognized for his teaching and service in the field of teacher and leadership education. He is a past recipient of Hunter College’s Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching, the Hunter College School of Education’s Harold Ladas Award for Excellence in Teaching, and was awarded the 2013 Distinguished Service Award from the Association for Equality and Excellence in Education, Inc. Dr. LeBlanc currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Roundabout Theatre Company, City Year New York, Inc. and the Harlem Center for Education, Inc.

https://www.amazon.com/Whos-Classroom-Developmentally-Culturally-Communities/dp/1119824133

About the Host:

Dr. Amanda Crowell is a cognitive psychologist, speaker, author and coach changing our perspective on the world of work. It IS possible to do Great Work-- launch a successful business, make a scientific discovery, raise a tight-knit family, or manage a global remote team-- without sacrificing your health, happiness and relationships.

Amanda is the Author of the forthcoming book, Great Work: Do What Matter Most Without Sacrificing Everything Else, and the creator of the Great Work Journals. Amanda's TEDx talk has received more than a million views and has been featured on TED's Ideas blog and Ted Shorts.

Her ideas have also been featured on NPR, Al Jazeera, The Wall Street Journal, Quartz, and Thrive Global.

Sponsored By The Aligned Time Journal

The Unleashing Your Great Work podcast is sponsored by the Aligned Time Journal! The Aligned Time Journal is here to answer the question "But HOW?" How can we figure out what our Great Work is? How can we get started, stay with it, and finish our Great Work so it can go out in the world and have an impact?

Click here to learn more, and try it out for yourself!

For more information about the Unleashing YOUR Great Work podcast or to learn more about Dr. Amanda Crowell, check out my website: amandacrowell.com

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Welcome to unleashing your great work, a

podcast about doing the work that matters the most to you.

I'm your host, Dr. Amanda Crowell, a cognitive

psychologist, speaker, coach, and the creator of the aligned

time journals. Every week on this podcast, we are asking the

big questions. What is great work? And why does it matter so

much to us? What does it take to do more of your great work

without sacrificing everything else? And how does the world

change when more people are doing more of the work that

matters the most to them? Whether you're great work is

building your own small business, or managing a remote

team at a multinational company. You'll find insight and answers

here. Today on the unleashing your great work podcast, I have

my very good friend and colleague, Jeff Lovelock. He is

an associate professor in the former chair of the Department

of Education at Hunter College's School of Education. He's the

founder of Hunter College's urban center for assessment,

research and evaluation. And for more than 20 years, he has

worked in the field of teacher and leadership preparation. As a

developmental psychologist, Dr. Long's research is investigating

the impact of developmentally and culturally responsive

teaching on school climate. He is a sought after speaker on the

topic of developmentally and culturally responsive teaching,

and is the author of the recently published, who's in my

classroom, building developmentally and culturally

responsive school communities, which I have to say I used in my

class, and it was an amazing textbook. Welcome to the

podcast.

Thank you very much. I really appreciate the

opportunity to be here. Thanks.

Yeah, I can't wait to hear all about your

great work. So why don't we just start right there. Tell me a

little bit about your great work?

That's it? That's a really interesting question.

Because when I think about great work, my first question really

starts with like, what does it mean to be great? You know, so

I've been kind of thinking through that a little bit to

really think about, like, is it a, like a personal investment,

or the time that I've allocated something? Is it the quality of

the work, or even the recognition of the work. And so

in thinking about what it means to be great, it also makes me

think about the things that I value. And as I kind of think

about that, it kind of leads me down this path of identifying

the aspects of my life in which I want to be great in the first

place. And so, you know, and so as I kind of think about it in

that way, I kind of put myself into different categories. And

one is, as a husband and father first, I really think about what

does it mean to currently be great in that area. And one of

the things that I pride myself on, I can't take full credit for

my wife, and I've always kind of thought about the raising of our

two boys. In this way, we've already thought about the fact

that we're raising someone else's husband and someone

else's father. And so really, like, what is that? What are the

things that we want to make sure that we instill in them, so that

way, we make them the best husband and father, they can be,

you know, in the future, you know, and so we've, we've

thought a lot about that. And so for me, I take a lot of pride in

in that level of relationship, you know, that I have with my

sons, and my ability to kind of model the things that I really

want them to see as evidence of what it means to be a good

husband on good father. And

what's an example of that, but what are

some of the things that you wanted to model for them.

So time, so So one of the big things that I've

really thought about, because a lot of that is investment in

quality time. And I know it sounds cliche, but I recognize

more and more how easy it is to be physically together, but

still be not present. Physically, they'll be absent.

And so really investing the time and connection. And as they've

grown from young boys into men right now, really feeling as

though I have an awareness of just their journey, taking the

time to talk with them, connect with them, spending time and

activities together. But really taking that time of investment.

And it's been challenging, sometimes, with all the

different things that I'm involved in, I've made sure that

I've essentially kind of scheduled time I know, it sounds

weird, but scheduling time with family first, and then planning

everything else around it, you know, so prioritizing and that

way, I've also been very proud of the fact that I've always

been kind of real with them. I've been very truthful with

them in terms of what my challenges or my struggles have

been, what my journey has been like, and trying to give them

that level of insight into my world, but also helping them to

see that they're creating their own path. They're trying their

own path, you know, and so, helping them also to recognize

that whenever, whenever, wherever, that they know that

I'm there, that they're gonna listen not always to solve the

problems, but at least help them to think them through. That

gives me a lot of pride. And so to be able to hear that from

them through their own mouth, that they appreciate that has

been really helpful for me. And so that, in a sense is kind of

helped me to kind of recognize my impact in that way. And it's

something that I really hold dear. Something that I really,

really valued.

Yeah. Well, and you mentioned that you're

involved in a lot of things, which I know to be the case. So

how do you like what, what have you realized? or what have you,

you know, come to understand that helps you actually balance

that, because that is a that is, I think, a universal struggle

for people who especially want to do important work, which I

know you do, and yet want to be the best possible father and

husband as well.

It's really interesting that you say that,

because I was, I was not always good at that, I think I'm

getting better at it. And I really attribute a lot of that

growth in meeting my dad, I remember one time just really

trying to juggle a lot of different things, and trying to

do all of those things really well. And I remember just

talking with him, and just kind of telling him that I wasn't as

happy with my progress with some of my writing and some projects

I was working on. And then I was also concerned with my son. And

he just basically just stopped me in my tracks and told me that

I need to really think about the difference between good and

great. And sometimes I have to be accepting of good. So

essentially, it's like, you can't be great at everything. So

kind of pick what you want to be great at, except that you're

only going to be good and other things. So this whole journey

towards great for me has been prioritizing certain things that

I want to be great in at certain times. And that's really kind of

helped me to kind of wrap my head around this thing. Because

I recognize that when this this move towards wanting to be great

always comes out of cost. And so we have to be willing to accept

that cost, while at the same time celebrating our successes.

Wow. Yeah, you know, what I love about that

is the idea of like, I mean, we've heard people say, there

are seasons in your life, and it always feels really big, like

this is the season of motherhood, but like your kids

or your heat, or humans for decades, you know, it's like, Am

I done with my season of motherhood. And I like the way

that you're sort of talking about, like, right now, in this

moment, or in this month, or under these circumstances, like

I'm choosing to be great at this. And I'm allowing myself to

be good at the rest of these things. And that that can shift

and change as your priorities free up and change as well. But

it feels like it would be actually something you're often

thinking about how to pick and choose which ones to be good at

which ones to be great at.

Yeah, exactly. And I recognize that with my sons

and where they are now. So I have one in early 20s, one who's

a late teens, and I see the they need you, but they need you in

different ways at different times. And so they might not be

as needy, quote, unquote, or need me as much as they did when

they were younger. But when they need me, they really need me.

And they need all of me. And so it's important to kind of

recognize and balance that out. Because those are the critical

junctures sometimes in their lives, so they're trying to make

key decisions. And the fact that they would turn to me means that

I'm a resource that they rely upon. And it's important for me

to recognize that and to really honor that by being all in all

in with my attention, or with my support all in with my

listening, you know, and one of the things that I've kind of

really had to remind myself of a lot is, the same practices that

I found impactful in the work that I do outside of my home,

are the same skills and practices that I have to employ

when I'm at home, you know, and

my skills and practices are those.

So patients listening, you know, these are

things and so sometimes, you know, I recognize that I can

sometimes kind of put my best face outside of the house and

needing to recognize I need to turn that inward as well. And

so, I've really tried to practice the same kind of, quote

unquote, good practices, that have really helped me in my

consultative work and other research work that I do. And

really turns back home. It's the same amount of detail and care

that I've that I take outside to take that insight to, I think

relationally that becomes critically important. And I also

realized that if I, if home is good, and other things are good,

too, right? That's the foundation for everything else.

And vice versa. And so to me, it's important to recognize

that, and I think during these past, you know, during the

pandemic and the legacy of that, you know, time spent together

and really creating those bonds and reconnections were really

important during this time and so I'm so those are some of the

some of the specific things that I've really recognized and

leaned on that have helped me outside of the house.

Yeah. So one quick question. And then I want

to hear about the work outside of the house. But I wonder, as

you talk about being really mindful and listening and very

patient with your work and with your family. I wonder like, how

do you make it so that you can be that patient all the time?

Like, are you are you getting time alone? Like how do you make

it so that you've got the resources to be so patient on

every front?

So So one of the good things that I have is that

I because of my relationships with both my wife and my kids,

they are very real with me too. So not always patient sometimes

I'm really annoying. All right. And so they essentially are able

to tell me in the most loving, kind, caring way possible. And

you're kind of being in this, you know, and that's been very

helpful. Feedback is important, right? Because that's what you

need. Sometimes it's kind of cold water to kind of stop and

say, you know, this is, um, it isn't about my intent, but about

my impact. Or I might not intend to be a certain way. But it's

not about what I intend. And so if others are feeling it in a

certain way, and being impacted in a certain way, that's what

really matters. And so I can say that I'm listening. But if

people don't feel like they're heard that am I really say that

I'm President, but if I'm not really fully present, and really

am I. And so that's been that distinction between intent and

impact, and has been an important one that I think

through a lot, I definitely also recognize that by building my

relationships, I think for all of us, we see that it's

reciprocal. So it isn't about just me being a psychologist in

the house and just listening to everybody. But it's more about

my relationship, particularly with my wife and my kids, where

I can talk through things as well. So it isn't just a one way

by any means. And I think what's happened over time, is also

being able to model some of that. So modeling that patients

and listening is also skills that I think my sons have both

also developed. And so I think that a piece as well is that

we're able to be supportive of each other. And it isn't a one

way by any means. But the ways that I've recognized also is

that I've had to become much more aware of my own social

emotional needs. And in order to be more self reflective, so I've

recognized that self care isn't being selfish, and that it's

really important to kind of establish the self care routine

for everything that I do. And so I make sure that there still is

physical activity, which is a kind of a classic aspect of self

care. But also, I've also thought about just connecting to

nature kind of at the spiritual kind of in a broad way, right,

like spiritual needs, addressing emotional needs as well. So

thinking about really who I turn to when I need to be uplifted,

you know, and making sure to maintain and nurture those

relationships, but also, cognitive needs, which is really

more about like, how do I measure my own success? Like,

what do I value? What are the things that I'm really looking

forward to tell me that I'm doing the right thing, and

really thought through a lot of that. So I think it's a

combination of God's and recognizing the importance of my

kind of self care needs, but also the kind of framework that

I use for myself, which looks at my, my cognitive needs, my

emotional social needs, my physical needs, but also my

spiritual needs. I think that combination has really helped

me.

Yeah. Wow, that's, that feels that feels

right. So I feel like the point that you made, which I wrote

down, was like, wow, it's not about my intention, it's about

my impact, that feels to me like a crux, like something you have

learned and learned, again, in your professional work as well.

It sounds so simple, but it's, it's taking a

really long time to kind of recognize that that difference

between those two things. And for me, the impact piece also

leads me to kind of think about, like, what is my impact? Impact?

Right? And, and what do I want my impact to be, you know,

ongoing things. I mean, if I think about my, my research and

my scholarship, you know, for a long time, I've been teaching

people who are going to become teachers, you know, school

leaders, counselors. And oftentimes, I found myself

struggling to fill the gaps in the in the literature. So

filling the gaps in the textbooks we were using, with so

many different articles, and always kind of finding the big

gap of really not hearing the voice of students in the work

that I was kind of teaching. And I kind of thought a lot about,

like, what is my impact on my students, like if all of my

students are in a school someday teaching, and others in the

school had been taught by other faculty? Like, how can I pick

mine out? You know, like, what's the mark that I leave on them?

And so that's where a lot of my kind of struggle around like

impact really started to focus much more on what can I do

better to kind of fill the gaps that I've been shot of

struggling to fill for a long time. And I was I was in a

school one day, I was doing some some work in a school, had been

doing some work in art school, particularly theater arts, I was

in a classroom as a theater teacher, in a school setting in

the classroom. And I just had like a morning where I was

working on a class I was teaching for Hunter. And again,

just kind of like trying to find the most updated stuff to fill

some gaps. And I was sitting in the back of a classroom like

squeezed into his elementary classroom and I looked on the

shelf, and there's this little Tony Morrison quote, and it

says, if you've, you know, if you find a book you really want

to read, but it hasn't been written yet. Then you must write

it. That was like the impetus right there, right, which was

kind of like stop complaining and do something about it. That

was the point. And that's really what led me to start writing the

book

was, Tony Morrison told you to write your

book. I love it. Well just tell us give us the give us the broad

strokes, I'd mentioned it in your bio, but just tell us what

you do tell us like your you wrote this book, but what's the

real thrust of your work the umbrella of your work.

So So my big work is really trying to support

diversity, equity inclusion in schools. And that's really my

big goal is, and so for me, my practice has always been to

center, youth voice, and everything. And so at the

foundation of my work is youth voice. And that's really been at

the crux of everything that I do. Imagine if you walked into a

doctor, and before you even said anything to the doctor, the

doctor would prescribe some medication for you, you'd like

you'd never go back again. But so many times, we're all these

decisions are getting made about children, all these decisions

about policy and instruction, and all these different

curricular things. And nobody ever asked the students like

they don't even talk. And so all these decisions that get made by

adults who kind of presume assume, you know all these

different things about students, but really never take the time.

So me that was compounded by the fact that for a number of

schools that I'm in, I'm thinking about the lack of voice

that bipoc students have the lack of that not that gender non

conforming kids have within their schools, and really trying

to think of, well, if all these districts want kids to feel a

sense of belonging feel a sense of connectedness to feel a sense

of caring? How do you do that without soliciting their voice?

Like, it just didn't make sense to me the other night, I mean,

and the other part that I was really thinking a lot about,

too, was, what kinds of knowledge bases do teachers do

staff, administrators really need to have in order to be able

to move the needle in this way. And so my work, I've been really

interested in the work of cultural responsive teaching for

a really long time. But I've always felt that I've always

been the sort that I've been reading to meet didn't do enough

to really address the development of students, and

really thinking about their development, from the

perspective of developmental needs. And so I look at this

work in terms of what all of our students have developmental

needs. So for example, the need to be intellectually engaged,

you know, a need to feel connected and need to have

movement within the classrooms, and need to develop emotional

competence, awareness of what their emotions are regulating

those emotions, I think all those things are foundational

needs. And so for me, if I start with that assumption, and the

question is how do I support those needs, in ways that are

responsive to who children are in ways that are responsive to

the lived experiences. So that was really the thrust of my

research. And the thrust of the book was really to blend the

fields of developmental psychology and cultural

responsive teaching into what I call developmentally and

cultural responsive teaching it really, the big goal was not

strictly about classroom instruction, but really building

communities that employ these practices. So I've used that

same approach, not just in terms of teacher and leader

development, but also as I work with school districts to address

their broader diversity, equity and inclusivity goals, where

we're really soliciting stakeholder voice throughout the

entire process. So over the last several years, I've been working

with a number of different school districts in the New York

City metropolitan area, as they tried to kind of come to grips

with a new reality that the community that they thought they

had really isn't that community. And so things that they thought

were wonderful and great and fine, aren't really that way.

It's haven't been that way for a really long time. And so, a lot

of this work was really spurred after, you know, the summer of

reckoning. And after the killing of George Floyd, it really just

revealed a lot of things that were simmering for a long time,

a lot of school districts, which had to do with how bipoc

children and their families, how gender non conforming children

and families have, to a certain degree had to endure, right and

tolerate intolerance for far too long. Can you give

us you know, not naming any names, or any

school names or anything, but can you give us an example of

what was something that seemed like it was totally fine and

good, that was revealed to be not what they thought it

was through this process. So one big thing was

about language use. And so many students have come forward,

writing narratives, bringing attention to school boards,

about the use of racial slurs, the rate the use of homophobic

language, in classrooms, the way in which certain key topics were

being taught. So for example, slavery being taught without the

humanity. So rather than talking about slaves, talking about

enslaved people, talking about slaves at a cat as a category,

talking about enslaved people as moms and dads as children,

because doctors as lawyers who were then enslaved, right, so

how that approach has been taken, it became critical and so

people recognize that essentially, like we've reached

the point we're not going to take it anymore, where parents

who have been educated in certain school district says it

has to be different for My children, and it still seems to

be the same. And so we need to move the needle. And so that's

where I have been asked to help support a lot of these local

areas to really rethink how they address these goals. Because of

course, we know that things are trending. And then it's easy to

just kind of check the box as we try to address diversity, equity

inclusion. And so what I've been doing is working with school

districts to really establish structures, district level

equity committees that involved district level administrators,

building level administrators, parents, teachers, students, all

coming together to really talk through around what are our

goals and identifying the goals and then establishing systems

for addressing them. And so the work is really centered on four

areas. One is broadly about the culture and climate of a

district. And it's important to gather baseline data on the

culture and climate because people see culture and climate

based on where they live in a community and what their

personal experiences have been like. And oftentimes, what that

means is that the experiences of underrepresented groups tend to

go unnoticed. Or people tend to kind of say, well, what are you

complaining about you making a big deal out of nothing, right.

And so it's important to gather as much information as possible

about the current state of the culture and climate of

districts. So utilize certain certain tools to be able to do

that. I also have been very proud of the fact that I've been

able to conduct state polls in districts. So I get a real sense

of how students are experiencing schools, how their parents view

things, how teachers, administrators, right to all

different stakeholders. And that becomes a really important

starting point, to start to center on what accommodate what

are some of the areas that districts need to address in

order to advance their their broader dei goals. And so

assessing climate becomes one key piece, but then we start to

center the work on other areas. And so one of the areas, of

course, is going to be around the curriculum itself. And so a

lot of work is being done now to really look at curriculum. But

in order to look at the curriculum, you have to change

the lens through which you're looking. And so a lot of the

work that I've been doing is really working with educators to

really help them to create a difference, right? When you

start to look at the curriculum through a DDI lens, it's kind of

a different approach. And so thinking of, can you give us can

you just give us an example of that, like,

what what lens? Were they looking for looking through?

What did they see and think it was fine? And then when you

switch the lens, how does it changes what they see? Oh,

great,

that's fantastic. So I'll think about it in this

way, maybe this might help to clarify, when I work with

educators, and this is not my language, but it's something

that I lean on a lot. I tell all of the teachers that I work with

that their curriculum needs to be both a mirror and a window.

And so students need to see themselves in the curriculum,

but the curriculum also has to be a way for them to see the

rest of the world, right to be able to see beyond their

community they see outside of themselves. And oftentimes, what

I noticed is that the curriculum is oftentimes a window in some

settings, where there are very few kids of color in the

classroom. So it's really reflecting just the particular

standards within the classroom. And in other cases, it's a

mirror, but it's not sufficient mirror. I mean, that's the

window. And so it's limiting in terms of what they're showing.

And so part of it then becomes whose voices are getting

elevated, what stories are being told about people different from

themselves? How's the representation happening? And so

we start to interrogate books, we start to interrogate lessons,

we start to interrogate practices within school. So it

isn't just about classroom instruction, we think about the

curriculum, because it's also about the assessment practices.

And so really thinking more broadly about what are some of

the practices that are currently employed? And are those

practices impediments to children's ability to really

reveal their strengths to able to be at their best. And so if

we have more flexible assessment options, right, more varied

assessment tools, well, that actually helped to reveal

student strengths more, then by limiting in the tools that we

employ, if we lean heavy on certain graded things. So for

example, homework is highly weighted in some of the schools

that have been homework has been a really big thing. And so we're

saying homework means getting zeros. Getting zeros ultimately

means failing classes. What are the assumptions that we make

about assigning homework? Well, one of those assumptions is that

children have a quiet place to go home and do homework, that

they have sources available to them. So one of the pivots that

we've been making is away from homework as a concept and moving

towards independent practice. And so if the goal of homework

is to establish that a child can do something independently, then

why not build that into the class day? Why not build that

into the class period? Where if you find out that they can't,

there's an opportunity to help some to do some correcting?

I know so I really sorry to interrupt you. I

just really liked that because I find that when you try to have

conversations with people about diversity, equity and inclusion,

it often becomes this argument about what is whereas you know,

like, are you actually putting practices in place that that

actually disadvantaged this group or not? And what does it

mean that you're saying that and what would it mean to admit that

you are doing that and it becomes so tangled so quickly?

Whereas if you say, Well, why don't we just broaden or like

more specify what it actually we're looking for? We want them

to have independent practice, nobody has to admit to have

wrongdoing. We don't have to agree on big, massive concepts

around race and equity. But instead, we can agree well, we

do want them to have independent practice. And now from a user

centered perspective, what's the best way to get that out of the

students sitting in this classroom? So it feels like it

really centers the conversation out of the political milieu, and

into what's best for kids?

Yeah, I really appreciate you saying, seeing,

because one of the things that I've also been really proud of

is that all of the work that I do in buildings is really

grounded in student voice. So I spend a lot of time doing focus

groups with kids a lot of times. And so I talk with the students,

I ask them some basic questions, right. So everything from what's

your favorite part of the day? You know, what's what's, what's

your favorite part of school? Two questions like? What are

some things that your teachers do that help you to learn? And

also, what are some of the challenges that you have? Right?

What are some of the struggles? What are some of the challenges

that make it harder to learn in school, and utilizing that

information, I can then feed into the professional

development work that I do, one of the things that I've been

doing, particularly most recently, is really trying to

help and this is where the DEI stuff comes in as well. Because

oftentimes, when we think about diversity, equity inclusion,

it's really easy sometimes to just center on race. And, and so

it's important for me to really talk more broadly about

diversity, you know, because there's so much there's within

group diversity that people sometimes miss. So, so I'm in

schools, where we might be predominantly bipoc Children,

predominantly African American kids. And they may say, like, I

don't feel connected here, because of my religiosity, or

not feel connected because of my sexual orientation, or my about

the fact that I may have a disability, it's important to

really think about diversity, and also include neuro

diversity, you know, I might learn, like all these. So I've

been really working hard to kind of expand a lens of when we

think about diversity, because if we fall into the racial, and

I understand the importance, I recognize why the focus is on

racial equity, I get it. But it sometimes leads us to fall into

a trap of thinking that we've developed a system to address

let's say, black people without recognizing the diversity within

that group. And so for me, I want it to be messy on purpose,

I want it much more layered on purpose, a little bit more

complex on purpose. And so, because of that, that's the

reason why I rely so much on student voice to really hear

from them of what's going on, particularly right now, in this

kind of quasi post pandemic, but still kind of pandemic time.

We're kind of in school, right, and we're noticing, like

releasing, reducing some of the distancing requirements and

releasing some of the mask mandates, but the legacy

continues. And so a lot about the stressors. And we know, the

disproportionate impact that stress has had, particularly on

children living in poverty, bipoc children and their

families, why we understand that. And so, for me, it's

important for teachers to also have, as a developmental

psychologist, understand the impact that stress has on

children developmentally, and one of the big things that I've

been leaning on is focusing on executive functioning, and

really looking at the impact of stress on executive dysfunction.

So one of the things that I've been doing with schools, I just

did this a few days ago in a school is I temporarily will

meet periodically, I should say, meet with large groups of

faculty sorting large rooms, you know, 4050 people at a time. And

we just do a noticing activity, essentially, let's talk a little

bit about what we're noticing in our students academically,

behaviorally, socially, emotionally. What I want to do

is listen to the language that they use as they talk about what

they're noticing. And so you know, you'll hear, and it's not

always deficit based. So I can't say that, but oftentimes, it's

like they're behind. They're needy, they're, you know, it's

these kinds of things that happen. And so I really tried to

unpack that language to try to help them understand well, this

is how these times have impacted on the child in front of you.

And that we can reframe the things that we're seeing. So

rather than that they're needy, what they're really presenting

as the child who needs a lot more assurance that they're

doing the right thing, assurance that they're on the right track

assurance that if they follow these steps, they can expect to

be successful, because some of the behavioral things that

people are noticing, from my perspective is much more

avoidance. And so if we can really help kids to feel

engaged, feel connected to the material, feel visible in the

material feel valued by the material that they're learning,

they're much more likely to be engaged and therefore less

likely to be avoidant. And so these are the kinds of

conversations that I'm having to really try to kind of craft that

lens. So that way people are kind of interpreting the things

that they're seeing in front of them in a different way.

Yeah, that's so interesting. You One of the

things that you know, you mentioned and actually, it's a,

it's a major part of your book that I loved the most actually,

it was such a small, was like a tiny little it was like what

teachers can do. And one of the chapters, and it was it was

basically it was talking about the notion of always being,

always being open to being surprised by your students like

i For me, it was it was related to Piaget, I'm trying to

remember exactly how you related it to him. Maybe it was

accommodation, and so always being ready to accommodate new

information, perhaps. But I remember thinking like this is

everything for these teacher candidates and for teachers in

schools, because if you it's messy on purpose, it's exactly

what you said. Because if you are always trying to keep

yourself open to new information, then you can't, you

can't get locked in on thinking you understand something based

on your cursory review of it. And that seems to come down.

Right, like the messiness comes the the surprise comes out of a

habit, actually of listening to your students voice. Yeah. So

I'm wondering if you're talking to the teachers, and trying to

help them develop their ability to really check in with student

voice as well.

Yes. It's interesting that you say that,

because right now, and I think context matters so much, right.

So we're now at a time of year where teachers are now

concerned, and rightly so about end of year assessments. So

whether standardized tests all those things, at the same time,

recognizing that there were there was, there were learning

gaps, there was interrupted instruction. And so there's

always that pressure to kind of backfill, so almost teach two

years of content in one year, because of gaps that are

present, right. And so what happens, then, as a result of

that, is there's a kind of a heavy lien on the kind of

transmission of academic information point that

conversations around connecting with students, right and

supporting the social emotional needs, is almost viewed as

coming at the expense of instruction, rather than as

foundational to learning. Oh, wow. And so that's where some of

that pushback has been, is essentially, like, I don't have

the time to do blah, blah, blah. And often, in my responses,

sometimes, like, you don't have the time to connect with the

kids in front of you, like, how can you teach? Right. And so

it's really that pivot. And a lot of teachers are doing

fantastic jobs are really integrating that into their

practice. But I still face some of those struggles, where people

are really looking at it as at the expense or at the cost of

instruction, rather than supporting instruction. And so

that whole of what I have to do is kind of like that mindset

shift is helping people to really recognize like how

important that is right now, when I asked students to talk to

me about their teachers and their teachers caring, because I

really want them to kind of unpack what that word care

means, like, what does care look like. And sometimes they talk

about the flexibility, like teachers understand that they

have things going on outside of school, or they have things

going on on the weekend. So they're flexible with them, you

know, they're connecting, you know, those those kinds of

things become really important indicators for children, that

they matter that it isn't about the chemistry, you're trying to

teach me, but it's about me first. And so you have that

flexibility. More and more, I'm working with teams of teachers

who I'm working with them to have shared calendars, so they

can identify when they're going to have things to do because one

of the things that you get is that you kind of teach from in

your own kind of bubble, and you forget that the children have

like, eight of you or seven of you, right? And so I want them

as teachers what was a realistic amount of homework every night?

And you know, some of the answers like, oh, 45 minutes and

hours like, well, they've probably had about six hours of

homework every night, you know? So if we start to think

collectively about like, what's realistic? How do we plan out

things collaboratively? So that way we can. So I have certain

schools where teachers might do like, we're going to do math,

every math is only on Wednesday, it's like you're going to get it

in and everybody else plans around other things. So yeah,

yeah, I'm done with stuff like on a Friday when you have five

tests in a row, in terms of even taking some of those good

practices that people were kind of forced to employ during the

pandemic and not throwing them all away. And so example, having

Sometimes faculty will post assignments for the week on a

Sunday night, and everything is due the following Friday by 11

o'clock, let's say. And then kids have the opportunity to

pick what works best for them in order for them to be able to be

at their best to do their assignments throughout the week.

Well, and they're developing the ability

to manage their own workflow, which is especially difficult.

This is such important work and I'm, I'm just curious about you.

Are you? Is this personally relevant to you? Do you did you

have a life experience of feeling like your voice wasn't

heard in your education or that your kids voices weren't heard?

Like, how does this resonate with your own experience?

So my answer is yes. And yes, and so as as as a

black male, educated in New York, so it's an interesting

journey because my dad was In the military until I start, I

was born in the Bronx, I was in elementary school, a Catholic

elementary school, I think it's important to grounded in that

way first, when when I was in, so that's a whole different kind

of experience. Until I was like second grade, roughly, but in

the second grade, and then my family moved to the Virgin

Islands. So there I was educated in the Virgin Islands, all the

way up until is going to high school. The things that I didn't

see, when I was in the States, I saw it firsthand, when I was on

the island of St. Croix. What I mean by that was teachers who

look like me who look like my parents, I had an elementary

school, I had four black male teachers and elementaries.

Wow, that's rare. It's unusual. Exactly.

So had these kinds of interesting experiences where

I expected to be able to be successful, because I saw it all

around me, you know, that. I went to look like my dad, and my

mom, the lawyers, everybody, the politicians, our Governor and

Senators, all, there was never any time when I was in that

period of my life, where I didn't think anything was

possible, because like the old content expression, the actual

represents the possible. That's, that's what I saw and lived. And

then when I came back up here, when we, because of the

military, my dad's positions, we move back up to the states, then

I became, you know, one of very few kids of color in my classes

when I was in high school. And so I just shifted automatically

from being in a space where kind of I didn't, where race wasn't

sailing it into being in a space where was really sailing all

over again. And I started to really recognize the gaps in my

instruction, or I got to see how my race served a certain purpose

in the classroom. So for example, it was not uncommon

when conversations around black people came up, it was kind of

like, what do black people think just, you know, we're needing to

kind of buy time I got to like my junior in high school, I

actually stopped one time sarcastically so Oh, we just had

a meeting. And this is what happened so many times. And that

kind of stuck with me. And then when I went away to college, I

went to Cornell. And when I went to Cornell, I remember

purposefully really trying to seek out, you know, people look

like me and connecting I, you know, I stayed in a dorm, you

know, all those things to ensure that that community was much

more like the community that had kind of given me comfort, in my

earlier formative years. But I've always had this kind of

sensitivity to not feeling visible or valued by the things

that I was taught. So even throughout my graduate

education, as a psychologist, it was always about, like, what are

the voices being silenced? What are the norms that we're using

to establish these theories, all of those things have kind of

always kind of stuck with me. And I kind of took that into the

work, the practice that I do, you know, within schools is just

like valuing the voice of the people in front of you. And

that's really been the through line all the time, all the way

through, also to recognize and value people as experts in

themselves as parents, as experts in their children, you

know, really listening those like, like Louis MO says,

talking about funds of knowledge, you know, really

thinking about how much you miss by not asking those kinds of

questions, you know, and so we were able to improve my

practice, it was much more about really recognizing, like, what

would just happen if I just closed my mouth and listened?

You know, what, what's the value? You know, and that kind

of that quiet contemplation and listening has been very, very

helpful for me, in terms of thinking about myself as a

parent, as a husband, myself as a, as a scholar, myself as a

practitioner, you know, all those things have been very,

very helpful for me, but it's been such a learning journey.

And that's been the piece that's been the most motivating,

because I've recognized that

no problem. Sure, yeah. And one of the things that I've

recognized is that I learned a lot by listening. That that's

been very, very helpful for me. So learning about as a

developmental psychologist, you know, we've read all the books,

we've got all the you know, we've got that level of

knowledge. But then really understanding youth

understanding their experiences, their lived experiences. And I

can't say that I have like full knowledge, but it's really the

process of seeking to understand that's been the most valuable.

It's really that time. It's helped me to build relationships

with the students in the schools where I work, because they

recognize that here's an adult taking the time to really listen

to actively listen, I take tons of notes, you know, and I

provide a lot of feedback to the schools. One of the practices

that I'm really proud of, too, is that the, the leaders of the

buildings where I work, we usually will launch the school

year by talking about the things that the students have raised in

the prior year and say, Come based on student feedback. Here

are some changes that we're making. And so it's been really

helpful for me because I also want students to feel that it's

just not about that you're talking but that there's action

As a result of it, and so I really want to reinforce the

importance of that advocacy. You know, and it's been great, you

know, a byproduct of me working in the schools is unfortunately,

oftentimes I am the only black male in the school, ma'am. It's

not uncommon. And so I've also found that particularly for

children of color, they tend to kind of we spend a lot of time

talking, we have a chance to really talk and connect. And my

work with a broader district equity teams as well, with

students on those committees, we've had a chance to connect.

So it's been very, very helpful for me to really have a real

kind of on the ground understanding of, of how

children kind of dig living these times, and how important

it is to have that information, inform instructional practices,

informed decision making at the leadership level. Because

ultimately, I think about education, kind of like if I was

running a business, if I want to have a business be successful, I

kind of want to know my customers think. And so right

now, it's a similar thing, I think it's important that we

know how students are experiencing school because

that's really the only way that we can advance any of our dei

goals.

I think it's just a beautiful and rare skill

that you have centering the voice of other people at the

center of your work. So I just really appreciate that. And I

really appreciate you. And I bet that there are people who are

hoping that you might be able to help them in their school with

some of this. So if somebody wanted to get to know a little

bit more about you, or see what it's like to work with you, how

would they go about doing that?

The best way to learn about me and my approach,

I think is through my book, I think my book gives a good

indication of my approach, and also my philosophy of how I go

about centering the voice of students. I think in the book, I

also provide some insight into the ways in which we can think

about the implications not just at the classroom level, but also

at the building level. And in my book, I also do make a

connection between my work and the broader work that I do to

address issues related to diversity, equity and inclusion,

with some lessons learned baked in there, so So I would

recommend if you're interested in learning a little bit more

about my approach in my work, I think the book is a great place

to start. I'm also available to suggest the blanc@gmail.com is a

way that people have been reaching out to me. So I've been

hearing from people utilizing the book, we've already been

connecting with some of them about possible professional

development opportunities. The book is also a collaboration

with an organization called Youth Communication and Youth

Communication. And I have also been providing professional

development services in the past. And we've been presenting

at conferences as well utilizing components of the book. And so

working with youth communications, and Youth

Communication has a long history of providing professional

development support. And so sometimes I can connect

individuals with Youth Communication, if it's specific

things that that they're pretty good at, or we work

collaboratively together. And I'm also available via LinkedIn.

And so people have been reaching out that way as well just to

stay connected. And so I'm happy to reach out or be connected to

anybody who's interested in the book or learning more about my

work, or if I can provide any support, either at the classroom

level or at the building level. So I look forward to being

connected with people who are interested in connecting with me

in the future. That's great.

So I will put a link to the book in the show

notes, and to your email address and to your LinkedIn. And I just

really, you know, I really appreciate the time that you've

taken, we've had a few technical issues. So if your patience has

been, I'm sure taxed a little bit. So I really appreciate it.

And I just want to add my own personal recommendation that

anybody who's thinking about schools and or even if you have

children in schools, just as book is is just a really great

way to understand the broader context of urban schools and the

lived experiences of students in schools where their needs are

sometimes met well and sometimes met less well. So it's a truly

remarkable book. You did a great job. Thank you so much for

taking the time to be on the podcast.

Oh, you're very welcome. Thank you so much for

the opportunity. You know, I'm passionate about this work. I

hope that passion came through. George is talking about the

works. And so thank you again. Thank you, man for the

opportunity. Really appreciate it.

Thank you. Thank you for joining me today

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