Episode Transcript
[00:00:28] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: Welcome to JCEL Jabber. My name is Ian Mehta, I use he him pronouns, and I'm an Associate professor of Educational Leadership and Policy at the University at Buffalo and I'm also one of the board members for the Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership. JCELL publishes peer reviewed cases for educational leaders who are in preparation programs as well as for practitioners who want to connect theory to practice as part of professional development efforts.
The journal is available online and the goal of JCEL is to help educational leaders create more equitable learning experiences for communities across the globe. Each case has a narrative, teaching notes, discussion questions, and learning activities for educational leaders to consider.
[00:01:24] Speaker C: Hello, My name is James Wright and I am an Assistant professor in the Department of Educational Leadership at San Diego State University.
JCEL Jabber is a platform designed to help educators explore how cases from the Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership can be used to support leadership, learning and practice. As a quarterly podcast, JCEL Jabber highlights special special collections of articles that are temporarily made available for free to increase accessibility and raise awareness about systemic inequities in school Systems. In each 30 minute episode, listeners are invited to dive deeper into a specific case. We provide nuanced analysis, connect you with the author to share additional insights and discuss how scholarly practitioners might apply the case in real world educational context. Given the recent seismic national events and the alarming rhetoric emerging from the new administration, many vulnerable communities are facing drastic challenges in this climate. Organizing and allyship are crucial for those of us committed to equity in schools and school leadership. We While we've witnessed strides in culturally responsive leadership, we've also seen troubling increases in anti black sentiments and practices, even among some advocates of equity, culturally responsive school leadership, and Social justice and My.
[00:02:58] Speaker A: Name is Terry Watson. I'm an Associate professor of Educational Leadership at the City University of New York. I teach aspiring urban school leaders and utilize culturally sensitive research approaches to improve the educational outcomes and life chances of historically excluded and underserved children and families. In this episode, we will not review a case. Instead, we will engage in a conversation that unpacks the ways that anti Blackness shows up within our circles of social justice, equity, and culturally responsive allies.
This conversation and this podcast is meant to generate interest in a potential forthcoming collection of special cases around the topics we will discuss in today's podcast.
[00:03:47] Speaker B: So, as both James and Terry have noted, there's no real shortage of cases in JSL that attempt to address the importance of cultural responsiveness in teaching, school leadership and curriculum and instruction for planning and professional development. In fact, if you were to do a simple search in jcel, you would find that there are literally hundreds of cases that in some way shape or form purport to include cultural responsiveness as part of their framing. However, how we problematize cultural responsiveness is of critical importance, especially as we navigate a resurgence of efforts to make education apolitical and ahistorical. As educators attempt to teach historical truths in US Society, we must be able to provide tools and frameworks to confront anti blackness, but also to resist concerted and calculated efforts of white Christian nationalism that is willing to use a variety of political tools, including violence, to maintain the power and privilege of whiteness. From this, there's a need to create coalitions of educators who can raise their critical consciousness to provide culturally responsive instruction to students who are minoritized, marginalized and otherized.
[00:05:02] Speaker A: And to help us answer some of these questions and prepare the next generation of school leaders and curriculum instructors, we have the one and only Dr. Goldie Muhammad, who is a professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She's also the author of Cultivating Genius and Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy and the follow up Unearthing A Guide to Culturally and Historically Responsive curriculum and instruction. Dr. Muhammad will help us unpack these conversations and highlight what they mean in coalition building. Dr. Muhammad, welcome to the show. Can you please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your work and its relationship to the topics we will discuss today?
[00:05:48] Speaker D: Well, thank you first for having me. It's such a joy to be with you all.
I've been in education I think for about 23 years now, first serving as a teacher to my older brother Abdullah. As a kid I was an instructional leader and a curriculum writer before I knew it because I would play school with him and allow him to be my student to force him to be my student. But you know, since my childhood and really knowing what my passion would be and is of education and teaching, you know I went into classrooms as a, as a teacher, as a literacy coach, serving as a curriculum leader, instructional leader, as directing a school district for curriculum and instruction and I have been a for the last number of years I've been a teacher educator.
But as I work with many scholars and pre service teachers today I still go into the classrooms and teach children K12.
That's important to me as I strive to be a leader in this work. It's important that I still work with children as I as I elevate the work of instructional leaders which is connected to what you all are doing.
In addition to all of that, I write curriculum on a weekly basis. I'm writing lesson plans, unit plans, often for teachers, but more often just for joy.
[00:07:37] Speaker C: Thank you for that introduction. Dr. Muhammad, we want to create an opportunity for you to engage in a discussion and expound on the points outlined by Dr. Watson in order to help jumpstart ideas and conversations. And that will lead to our special collection of cases. One of the points I'd like to hear your thoughts on is how does anti blackness show up in communities of social justice, culturally responsive allies and the ways it is perpetuated by black and other people of color? Secondly, the backlash of white rage that has occurred throughout history as noted by Emory historian and professor Carol Anderson in her book in white rage in 2015 and how we are in a period of white rage right now. Dr. Muhammad, can you please expound on these two points?
[00:08:30] Speaker D: Yeah, so thank you for that question. I mean, it's a question that I constantly ask myself. Anybody who's engaged in real humanity kind of efforts to make this world, the society and systems and structures and schools better. We are constantly asking the question how did we get here and why are we still here? In many ways the question and the thoughts that you're providing are contributing to that idea of like how did we get here? When I think about how does anti blackness show up in communities? We have to go back to history. We didn't just land here in anti blackness and so called culturally responsive allies who are authentic and those who are inauthentic.
And we didn't just land here where there are black folks and people of color who subscribe to those ideologies of anti blackness. We have to go to history. And when we look at the history from the founding of this country and the colonization of this country in different parts of the world, we see whiteness, white supremacist culture. You can add other cultures, you know, Christian, white, Christian values, cisgender, you can add other things to that. But there has been a white supremacist anti blackness culture in the development of nearly everything we can think of. We can think about, of course, through history and structures of institution. We can think of business, entertainment, music, health care, all the different fields, science, religion. In some ways right has been permeated and saturated with these ideas of whiteness and anti blackness and grown going throughout the decades. We see it in policies, we see institutions like universities, like there's a university called University of the south that was founded with the sole purpose to perpetuate enslavement. It's in their founding documents that they want to grow and graduate folks who will vote to maintain the institution of slavery. Right. So we see it in the documents and the policies and the structures, everything that creates systems. So of course we see it in the schools and what's happened there has been attempts to disrupt, interrupt, rewrite, but not to the point where it has done the significant work that's needed. And that's why it still show up today.
When we think about our own lives and growing up, we still, even though folks say we're so far removed, you know, decades from 16, 19, we still, we still saw it in cartoons, we saw sexism and anti black racism and we saw it in literature, we saw it, we heard it in music, in advertisements, in commercials, when we're purchasing things. And it still show up today. Sometimes it's not as explicit, is implicit, but harm is harm, whether it's implicit or right there in your face.
And we know that when things are perpetuated in this way, these beliefs and ideologies can be taken up from people who might be oppressed the most.
And that's how we begin to see it perpetuated by black and indigenous and people of color. Because that social conditioning is real, language is powerful. And you know, I'm constantly reminded that this quote of language being the tool of the empire.
And if you can control, and it is said that that's what Christopher Columbus was told when he came here, if you can control language, you can control people.
Thinking actions and language can be a lot of different things in a system. And that's what has happened, this sort of controlling and whitewashing of language through different systems. And it's being seamless throughout everything. That's how we arrive to where we are today.
And you know, to your second point regarding white rage, I think there are some folks that will do whatever they can to hold on to what they feel is power, control, harm, oppression because of lots of reasons. And that's why again, these things still show up.
[00:13:38] Speaker A: Along those lines. Dr. Muhammad, where do you see your work going? I know that cultivating genius was well received.
Unearthing joy again have them both blockbusters as you know, a few weeks ago, the 45th President will now be the 47th President elect.
How do you see your work responding to the anti blackness, the lack of humanity it seems to be facing children in the places that we call schools.
[00:14:10] Speaker D: Yeah, so I'm asked this question a lot and you know, there are times people have been doing this work around, real work around justice and Equity and anti racism. Like, we are tired of having to respond to harm and hurt and oppression. They should respond to love.
They should be the ones responding to humanity, to joy. All these things I do in my work, I've been asked this question, and I said, why is it on those who do the work for communities the most to respond?
But I know at the same time, the work that we do is in a constant response. It doesn't matter who's the next president. We've been talking and doing the same thing since our ancestors were forced here and fighting for their joy. They fought for their joy.
And so we see our ancestry throughout times. Our parents, our grandparents.
The work is the same. The leaders might be different, the policy pretty much the same, but might be tweaked a little bit. But when we study history, all of this is nothing new. So when I'm struggling, like, what do we do now that we have this. This new something that we're about to embark upon? I'm always asking myself, what did the ancestors do? Because this is not new. It may be a new year.
So I'm always first asking, what did they do? And some of the things they did, they organize, they study, they cultivated their genius in a way so that they are ready intellectually. They sometimes created their own spaces when they didn't exist. Okay, we can create our own schools or, you know, our own spaces for love and justice when they're not provided. They. They protested and advocated and engaged in activism in many different ways. It wasn't just protesting, like holding signs. It was letters. It was boycotts. You know, so I'm going through all the things that they. And I'm trying to personally see where do I see myself. At the same time, I'm looking at my grandfather, you know, my parents, you know, my grandfather was one who was a school principal during Brown versus Board of Education. I'm also looking at, like, what didn't they do that I need to do? Like, rest and breathe and heal in different ways, make sure I take care of my health in different ways. So that's. That's what I'm always trying to do. But I'm. I am ultimately keeping with my mission. My mission is love.
So my response ultimately, don't. It does not matter what is about to happen next. My response very consistently, and I remind myself of this every day I wake up, has to be love, has to be humanity, has to be want for the next person. What I want for myself and my own people, you know, like that humanizing kind of thinking and actionable steps. That's what. And this is why we have to really know who we are in this. Because folks will come in and try to harm us, harm our thoughts, harm our work, try to make other people believe that we are not doing justice and liberatory work and work that's good for all. So we have to know ourselves. We have to keep course of doing the work that we know is important and that our children need.
[00:17:55] Speaker A: Thank you for that. I love the fact that you stand and center not just love, but joy in your work.
Will your next iteration be on love? I know we spoke about Unearthing joy. That's the follow up to Cultivating Genius Unearthing Joy.
[00:18:13] Speaker D: You know, it's funny because at one point in my life Bettina Love would nickname me no Goals Goals because I said, I don't know if I want to say what's next. I just want to let the wind breeze and take me.
So that became my nickname for a while. But my next project is curriculum. As you all know, with the work that you all do with curriculum, leadership.
Curriculum to me is the heart and soul of a school. That's why people are trying to ban curriculum. And I thought to myself, why are people trying to ban and legislate curriculum and control it so much? I thought, why not? You know, I go through a whole list in my head from day to day. Like why not? That song I just heard on that seemed a little racy. Or that Netflix show about murder. You know, it seemed like another show is about pain and just these very like real life stories about some kind of tragic event. I noticed that folks are not trying to ban things that bring folks the most money.
They know when you control curriculum, you start to control generations of thinking and mindsets. See, I don't look at curriculum as something to indoctrinate or control a child. I look at curriculum as, you know, a garden of beauty for children to grow and to learn and to be elevated by to experience sensations of joy in their bodies. That's how I see curriculum and you know, so my next project, all that to say is curriculum projects. I'm writing my first curriculum entitled Genius, justice and Joy with a publisher, small publisher named Lerner, grades K through 5, where teachers and educators can take my model and implement it right away. I'm also writing a book again for K5, where for parents, paraprofessionals, teachers, educational leaders can pick up and engage in these pursuits of my model with the child in like 30 minutes or less. So they're both Curricular endeavors that can then take the two books but then put it into action where we can use it like tomorrow.
[00:20:42] Speaker B: I think that's so amazing. I can't wait to see what that looks like.
And so somewhat related to what you've shared, Dr. Muhammad, can you speak a little bit about the importance of, as we think about the development of educational leaders who should be instructional leaders, who then also should be committed to addressing issues of inequity that they see in the classroom through instruction or curriculum that's being used? What might you suggest to educational leaders out there as they attempt to develop themselves and to support teachers who are able to enact more culturally responsive instruction in the classroom?
[00:21:25] Speaker D: Yeah, that's a great question. So I wholeheartedly believe that educational leaders, especially school principals, must be instructional leaders. I mean, I know there are some leaders that might be in finance or it takes so much to keep a school or a school district going. I learned that as school board president once.
But for those who are, you know, set to or hired to be over schools and children development, it's important that they understand instruction. It's important that they understand curriculum, that they know the standards set forth from the state or the school district, that they must know the curriculum in and out. The curriculum is the heart and soul of a school. It's why children come.
You know, they don't come just to be baby, you know, like babysitting. And there's some historical things around that where, you know, part of the day was just so that an adult can watch the children. But no, they are coming for the curriculum and instruction. Therefore, the leaders have to know read. If you lead, you must read, right? They have to prepare themselves. But the most important thing I feel that educational leaders must do as they continue to prepare and to develop their instructional leadership is that they have to teach children. It's that simple.
You know, when I say that folks shake their head, but it is still a big disconnect between instructional leaders, educational leaders, and even teacher educators who go into the classroom and teach children who write a lesson plan. Plan. How can any of us, including those who write these articles about education, how can anybody write about education lead, talk about children and curriculum and what they need and they have never written a lesson plan or haven't written one in 15 years.
Like, I don't even engage with folks like that, especially if it's in terms of a debate. Because, you know, if you have not if you're trying to tell me what children need curricular wise, but you have never Written a lesson plan.
You've never written a lesson, a culturally responsive lesson plan, and actually taught it to see the joy in the children's eyes.
Where do we start the conversation?
So I would, I would hope that.
I lastly say, I hope that instruct these, the educational leaders. And as instructional leaders, they see themselves as the pedagogical leader.
One who knows theory, one who knows strategies, can teach children to get to point A and point B. And Nelson Mandela, he named himself once as the gardener. And he says, in some ways, I saw the garden as a metaphor for certain things of my life. He says, a leader must also tend to his garden. He must. Must plant seeds, he must watch them, he must cultivate and harvest the results. Like the gardener, a leader must take responsibility for what he cultivates. He must mind his work, try to repel enemies and preserve what can be preserved and eliminate what cannot succeed. So to me, I see the. The school, the teachers, the children as the garden as well as the curriculum. And that school leader, that educational leader, is the gardener. You can't just, you got. A gardener knows what to do.
And so all that to say that, how can we think of our leaders as gardeners to the genius garden? How do we think of our leaders as the ones who can model for us what's needed and not just report findings and data and agendas and schedules. That's administrative work. But take your genius to another level and be the inspiration. And I can honestly say I think that's why a lot of teachers gravitate toward me, because I'm in the classrooms with them.
A lot of times, especially in New York City, I would not do a PD unless the teachers would see me teaching. They had to see me struggle. They had to see how the students respond because that made them trust me, me, because I was teaching their kids. And so we became like a partner. And they listened to me differently when they saw that I was writing lessons and trying it out and listening to them.
[00:26:05] Speaker B: I think that's a huge part of what sort of happened in the last 25 years. Part of the failed accountability experiment. There's a huge disconnect between what principals might say or look for and then what's needed in the classroom. So I commend you for addressing that and for still being a leader in the classroom.
Quickly, I just want to do a quick follow up. Can you speak to the moral obligation that we have as educators to honor racial identities, cultural identities of students and the assets that they bring with them to the classroom? And how do we Leverage that to help students learn to engage in rigorous instruction.
Why is that important for us as instructional leaders?
[00:26:52] Speaker D: Well, it's important for a couple reasons. Number one, we cannot teach or lead who we do not know, and we should not.
Education is a very unique field and you cannot, you cannot directly compare it to any other field because who else has a job as an educator? Who else has 30 lives with 30 histories, with 30 cultures, possibly languages?
And in one five minute marking, like section of a school day, it could be hundreds of things that will impact that five minutes. There's really nothing else like it. So, you know, we have to say that if you choose, if you have been chosen for this field and if you choose to take up your calling, you have to get to know our children.
You cannot teach and lead who you do not know. And the second, we have an ethical obligation to do no harm. You know, I think if we had a different history in this country, we can have a different conversation, but we have the history that we have. We cannot erase it. We have a history of violence, abuse, harm, misunderstanding, confusion, lack of. We can go on and on. Given that it will be morally wrong to ignore it and to think that there are not ramifications here today, especially when there is no educational or curricular reparations. Especially, especially.
And we have enough proof and data to say that it is still here. So. And we have children hurting and, and we should want no child to hurt. Like the doctor's oath, do no harm knowing to our. And honoring our students racial and cultural identities is a form of doing no harm and teaching to that. And how do we leverage these identities and learn about them? See, this is where parts of the system must change. We have to change our teacher education programs. We have to change hiring practices.
Our teacher education programs, in my opinion, has to include classes of unearthing and unpacking archeology of the self. Like Yolanda Celie Ruiz says, we need a class where I can get to know me first.
And the harms that I have been taught, the racism I've been taught, the homophobia I've been taught, and so on. Because if we don't have that, how am I supposed to get to know a child and their cultural identities and disrupt any harm going forward? So we have to, we have to modify teacher ed. We have to modify teaching evaluations, hiring criteria. This is what it takes to be hired at our school. Interview questions, standards, curriculum. All of these things have to tell the collective story of honoring and elevating students racial and cultural identities. See Right now we have that through an approach called culturally responsive pedagogy. Right. But it is not mandated. We have never mandated it. I mean, where is it? I mean, if it is, you know, shout out to that district. But in most states they say it is suggested, is highly recommended. Here's a guide for it, which is what the state of New York did. Or here are some teaching standards, which is the state of Illinois, what we did. But there was no mandate around it. I don't see it so much in teacher unions demands. I don't see it as much as on school boards that we need to have a policy around it. We have statements. A statement is not a mandated policy.
So all these pieces has to come together because then what we'll see, we'll see data collection to collect data on students identity to collect data on students joy and who they are. And I'm not just talking about demographic data like we have 55% African American.
I'm talking about the kind of data that says what is one talent that a teacher has not recognized in the past? What's one genius gift that you carry? That's the identity care that I'm talking about. What's genius about your culture? That's the identity data I'm talking about. That's my hope and dream of what schools can be. And it's not that far fetched. Agreed.
[00:31:27] Speaker B: Well, and then to your point that you write about, then how does that, how do we show that we love the children? Right. That are within our classroom. Right.
[00:31:35] Speaker D: Yeah. It's a form of love. And you can think about it with any relationship, romantic friendship, if they've gotten to know you and acted upon that, it was a type of love that you can't even describe. And it's the same way with children and teachers.
[00:31:52] Speaker A: I, I wish there was a way that we could have like the teacher's teacher.
[00:31:58] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:31:59] Speaker A: So that there, there's a body of knowledge that we know that's in that person. Which is I think why you're so well received is that you're a teacher. Yeah, I guess you're Dr. Goldie Muhammad. But you also teach. You also go into classrooms. You don't just write curriculum, you make and live and experience curriculum with teachers. And that's part of your efficacy. And what I find concerning is that so many folks are coming out with curriculums that are absent of love or the joy. And, and it's like teaching in a box, you know? So we create these modules that you don't know what they look like. In the real world. And you as the professor or the author of the curriculum, you haven't gone out into that classroom or community and taught it. And so I find that so distressing. And I know you do that. And so, you know, I'm not just a friend, I'm a fan. Like, one of the reasons why, you know, I think you are so successful is because you are.
Rudine Sims Bishop talks about mirrors and windows and sliding glass doors, how we need to give that to children. But I think that teachers need that too, and leaders need that too. You need to see yourself. You need to see not only who you are, but who you can be. And I think curriculum gives us the key. So I'm really excited that you're writing curriculum.
[00:33:18] Speaker D: And you know, to that point, I know we're all busy. Like, it's hard to get into the classroom with children for leaders and teacher educators, but it's not impossible. So it's never a question if it's hard. It's a question if it's possible. When I was my first year as an assistant professor, my second day, when I moved to Atlanta, I met with the local school and I made my own interview. And I said, hi, this is me. This is my background, here's my resume, my cv. I would like to be a volunteer, non paid teacher here. And you just call me whenever you need it. And we can do background checks, all the things, you know, that we normally do in the schools. Like, I just created my own job.
And so, and even going in once or twice is, is a great idea. But the system is not really designed for teachers to be creative, artistic pedagogues. The system is really created for them to read a script or to follow that, that curriculum you described, like in a box.
And it's evident because they only have like 30, 45 minutes of planning.
Why would you give a 45 minutes to an artist to create like they would look at. An artist will look at you like what?
And we do that to teachers. So this, this is what I mean. Like, all parts of the system has to change. Really. The schedules have to change if we're going to honor these concepts of genius and creativity and artistic kind of curriculum.
[00:34:51] Speaker A: Yeah. And the thing is, we know that if you look at lab schools, if you look at independent schools, if you look at these open classrooms, we know what works for young people, but it's just who we choose to give access to, to create these equal spaces where all children not only can, but they will learn.
[00:35:09] Speaker D: Yeah. And teachers deserve it too. You know, teachers deserve to feel joy and happiness and excitement when they teach. And no one became a teacher to test, prep and read a script. I mean, that's so boring. I mean, we. We want to have fun, enjoy too.
So I. I like to think that it's that reciprocal relationship that happens and beneficial. Right. For both.
[00:35:37] Speaker A: I think if we were to not only diversify the field, but increase the number of happy, healthy, and loving relationships in schools, then we have to help teachers not only perfect their craft, but give them, again, those same mirrors and windows and sliding glass doors.
[00:35:55] Speaker D: Yeah, exactly.
[00:35:56] Speaker A: I think that's what, that's why I'm so excited for your next project. This curriculum, how you're, you know, you're doing it with, you know, with young people, English. So I think I know, but why K to 5?
I didn't hear middle school, I didn't hear high school. I heard K to 5 a couple of times when describing your upcoming projects.
[00:36:16] Speaker D: Yeah, in my background, when I was a teacher, I was a middle school teacher.
You know, you have to have a starting place. And so even working with publishers, you know, there's, there's. And I understand this, there's a strategic plan around everything.
There's a business behind everything. There's research and market data behind everything.
And this particular.
I thought. I thought to start to K5 and build up.
Now, this particular publisher I'm working with, they're known for. They write children's books Pre k through 12. But the bulk that got me most excited, I try to say, where does my energy go? Was their elementary books first.
And I feel there's a lot of energy around 3 5. So I'm actually starting with 35 and then going to K2 and then hopefully in the future, 6, 8. So, yeah, I think that'd be a good. Good. I think 35 is good middle grades where you can see so much. You can see the younger development, but you can also see the complexity of thoughts. So I felt like that was a good starting point. And sometimes you just make decisions and pray on it.
That was a part of my decision too. Like, I felt really good.
But what's interesting, even though it's a K5 starting point, the themes, the histories that are being taught are so. I mean, there are parts where I'm like, wow, is this college level? They're so genius and complex, and I think so many children will be able to connect to it. And so many teachers, and there's a lot of Harlem in it says, so I think you're going to Love that.
[00:38:04] Speaker A: I'm about to jump to the screen and, like, let's see it. Let's do it. I'm excited about that. And I think, again, 35 is a beautiful place to start because also, for retention, I know that third grade year is always a big hump for some students and families, and it's nice to know that there's a. A tool kit or a set of models that teachers can look to to help learning become irresistible. Like, I really think students don't fail. I think we fail them.
[00:38:36] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:38:37] Speaker A: That you're pushing so much into curriculum and really teaching the teachers. I think that's so important.
[00:38:43] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:38:44] Speaker A: And so I'm. I'm excited about that.
[00:38:46] Speaker D: Yeah. One of the.
One of the units is about the National Memorial African Bookstore in Harlem.
It was called Harlem's Greatest Bookstore. The book is called the Book Itch. It's a children's book. For third grader. Yeah, for third grade. And. But this is what I mean. This is a kind of part of history that people may not know about. Brother Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali. There was, like, these great leaders who would come and get just full. They were not eating food. They were eating words and being nourished in their bodies. And it's a great part of American history.
So this is an example, like. But I feel like adults could benefit from this kind of learning as well as third graders. So that's one of my Harlem connections in the curriculum. And this was, like, in the 19th, 30s.
[00:39:39] Speaker A: Awesome. Thank you. And actually, the project that I'm working on looks at these first Harlem school leaders who are black women.
Gertrude A. And. And others. Meaning First. First early school leaders. And many of them, of course, started as teachers and became leaders because they wanted to make sure that black children were being educated to their full potential. Potential.
So thank you for your work, Dr. Wright, Dr. Mehta, Dr. Brewer. Is there anything you'd like to ask our illustrious guest, colleague, and friend before we wrap it up?
[00:40:16] Speaker C: In this episode of Jcel Jabber, Dr. Muhammad expounded on various dynamics within instructional leadership or various principles of instructional leadership that I thought that I think are very pertinent, particularly around the ways in which we find these new ideas being discussed about the value of instructional leadership, particularly the ways in which instructional leadership is starting to be married with supervision and. Or culturally responsive instructional leadership, as well as culturally responsive school supervision. We're starting to see a lot of the nuances and the specifics in this case as outlined by Dr. Muhammad, but there are also some other discussions around the roles in which school leaders can and do or even should engage with instruction with the classroom.
I thought Dr. Muhammad made some very astute claims about the role of teachers or the role of leaders in relationship to the classroom and in relationship to curriculum and being hands on in the curriculum. And I think that's a part of a broader conversation. And I think that those thoughts and those ideas will hopefully spark a significant amount of discussion as we start to, or as we start to trend these new waves and engagements with instructional leadership as a significant component of school leadership, and even more so specifically, the value and the ways in which instructional leadership needs to be culturally responsive. Thank you.
[00:42:42] Speaker B: I just want to thank you for the nourishment that you provided us, the community that you allowed us to be in with you today. And I think this is so important for educational leaders to hear. I do think that we need to reimagine the system. And you spoke eloquently on that today. You know, how do we nourish the kids that we take care of, but then also teachers? And how does that lead to a better society, one that's more equitable, where everybody can see their genius seen and highlighted? And so I so appreciate you spending time with us today. Thank you.
[00:43:21] Speaker D: Thank you. Thank you all for the work that you all do. We have to just keep it, keep it moving and remember all the people who are with us with it.
[00:43:30] Speaker A: Thank you so much, Dr. Muhammad. Enjoy the rest of your efforts. Afternoon.
[00:43:34] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:43:36] Speaker A: Academic year.
[00:43:37] Speaker D: Thank you. You too.
[00:43:50] Speaker B: Yeah.
