Working To Restore Justice with Dr. Kaylah Holland and Danielle Maco

Join The Edge Hosts Georgia Terlaje and Jessica Pack for an amazing conversation with Dr. Kaylah Holland and Danielle Maco about working with students who are incarcerated and ways to help bring restorative justice to your classroom. 

Transcript

ISTE The Edge CL Podcast with Dr. Kaylah Holland

Georgia Terlaje: [00:00:00] It is Time for the Edge, a podcast from its D community leaders. If you are an educator, administrator, or anyone in the field of education, this is a podcast for you. Throughout our upcoming episodes, its D Community Leaders will present stories of those who are engaged in the challenging, yet fulfilling work of education.

Coming up today, we're gonna have a conversation about educating our incarcerated youth. I'm looking forward to this discussion as I know very little about the topic and I just love to learn new stuff. I'm one of your community leader hosts, Georgia Tlai. I'm a TK five instructional coach and educator of 34 years, and I'm here with my favorite partner in crime, Jessica p.

Thank you 

Jessica Pack: Georgia. I am Jessica Pack, a middle school teacher and it the author, and I am so looking forward to today's episode too because we are going to deep dive with [00:01:00] some very special guests about education within the juvenile justice system. Today we are joined by our fellow isti community 

Kaylah Holland: leader 

Jessica Pack: and one of the is 20 to watch in 2022.

Dr. Kayla is the director of instructional technology and blended learning at break free education, as well as an advocate for incarcerated youth. Kayla, thank you so much for 

Kaylah Holland: being here today. Hi. Thanks so much for having me. Well, you've brought 

Jessica Pack: an incredible guest to the table this week for us to connect with.

Would you like to introduce to our 

Kaylah Holland: listeners. Yes, absolutely. I'm so excited. So my guest today is Danielle Maco. She is an instructional tech coach and former classroom teacher who works in a juvenile justice facility. So we're really excited to chat about our kind of national look and then our very in-classroom look at what juvenile justice looks like.

So I'm really [00:02:00] excited to welcome Danielle. 

Danielle Maco: Hi everyone. Thank you so much for inviting me to this podcast. I am Danielle and I have been a classroom teacher for the past seven years, and it's my first year as an instructional tech coach, and I'm loving it so far. And my classroom experience has really given me a lot of opportunities to bring into my tech coaching sessions with teachers, and I'm excited to be here.

So 

Georgia Terlaje: to start us off, 'cause if listeners like me don't know a whole lot about this topic first of all, like who provides education to incarcerated students? 

Kaylah Holland: Yeah, that's a great question. So if you, it's really different per state. So there are some states where the local juvenile justice facility, which could be a detention center, Or a, a jail.

It's some states, those are connected to the local school districts. So for example, [00:03:00] in Lincoln, Nebraska, the facility located there is connected to Lincoln Public Schools. In other states it's a statewide program. So for example, in West Virginia or North Carolina it's a, it's a. Statewide program, it's run very much like a county.

So you have one superintendent with the normal hierarchy, but they're in charge of all juvenile justice facilities in that state and then in others like Massachusetts, where my guest Danielle is from, it's a statewide program, but it's run by a nonprofit. So they are collaboration educational services, and they run.

All of the facilities located inside of Massachusetts, and then other states have nonprofits as well. Maybe their state run, maybe they're not, they're local. I mean, it's really all over the place. And it's just dependent on, on each state

Danielle Maco: and specifically in the classroom. For our, in [00:04:00] Massachusetts, for example, like Kayla mentioned we're a public nonprofit and so. We get a lot of experiences from our teachers, new teachers veteran teachers teachers who are you know new to the field. And we, just get a lot of different experiences for classroom teachers.

Yeah. 

Jessica Pack: It sounds like there's a pretty big variation about how things are run and, and probably what things look like from, from facility to facility, but what does education kind of look like in a juvenile justice facility typically? 

Kaylah Holland: Yeah, I think that's such a great question and it, it's, it's different at each facility, but there are trends that take place everywhere and.

There are a couple. So one of them is that classrooms are full of multiple levels in each class. So when students are brought into a facility they're most often housed in a living pod based off [00:05:00] of their time of intake, right? You would think that. Someone somewhere would say, Hey, let's put all of the 15 year old kids together and all of the 16 year old kids.

But unfortunately that does not happen. And it's based off level of security or, you know, level of their charge that they have or literally when they were brought into the facility. So what that means is each living pod stays together. So they come to class together, they leave class together, they're in the living pod together.

What that does for the classroom is creates this environment where you might have 10 students in your classroom, but you have five different grade levels. Or you know, often the students have severe academic gaps, so they might be 16 years old and should be in the 10th grade, but they haven't been to school in 18 months, so they're really.

You know, they have the academic gaps. They're more on like an eighth grade reading level. So that's a, that's a large one. And then [00:06:00] another one is that there are so many restrictions placed on teachers. So not only are you teaching four or five levels in one classroom but you are doing it often.

Some places only allow a rubber pencil and paper. You know, we, we at break free try to really champion the use of technology. We like to empower places to purchase Google Chromebooks and help train teachers and things like that because those devices can be locked down and managed and controlled. But a lot of places, they have a lot of restrictions on materials, what is allowed in the classroom, even down to technology, what websites are allowed, what websites aren't.

You know, it's just really locked down in terms of what's allowed. And then obviously there's multiple levels, so teachers go through a lot, and I know Danielle can really talk about this from a specific classroom. 

Danielle Maco: Yes. Yeah. I was a classroom teacher for six, seven years before becoming a tech coach last year.

And really [00:07:00] the days varied. Most often. The first thing I would do, I have a set schedule, right, so I'll know I. You know, math will happen, like first period. It's a two teacher program usually that I taught at. So I would teach math science in a class called E Y F, which is a life skills class. But really one of my first things that I would do going into the program is asking the supervising staff, the security staff, what does the numbers look like today?

Is the student staying in the unit today? Is there a student going to court? Because that really changes our grouping. Like Kayla said, our numbers vary. So I, my speaking from my experience, I taught at a young women's facility and our. Numbers in residential sometimes would range from four to, I think the most I had was 10 at one point.

Depending on also the dynamics of the students, we'd have to split [00:08:00] into two groups, three groups. Our facilities some facilities are large and secure facilities, meaning they have locked doors like automatic locked doors, and some are run more like a group home. Setting, which is the one I taught at.

And really our space, you know, we would use any space that we can. So if it's the library right in front of my classroom, a staff, a security staff would have to sit in the middle of both rooms to monitor. And so really each day was really different. And I think it's one of the. You know, unique settings and it really, it no one day looks the same.

And that was one of the aspects of the job that I actually really liked was because I was being challenged every day. And, you know, it's something new similar to what Kayla said, I think in Massachusetts we do a really good job. The, [00:09:00] the state. Does a really great job of moving students where they're needed.

So right place, right time, and it might not be the right time, but right placement for a student. So we really try to place a student near where they're from so that like family can visit you know, that like, that can happen more. Of course there's some security exceptions, but for the most part, the state really does their best to place a student in their area unless there's like a extenuating, extenuating circumstance.

Kaylah Holland: Yeah, I think it's important to point out too that these are called secure schools, right? So any, so we call public schools. Charter schools, whatever's located outside of these facilities, we call them community schools. So we, in secure schools often have students coming from community schools and going back to community [00:10:00] schools.

So there's kind of two paths that students are, are in. There's a pre adjudicated space, which is where students have been charged with a crime and they're waiting to go to trial. And so those are. Sometimes in group homes, sometimes in detention centers, depending on their charge, the security level could be a little bit lower.

And then once they've been to trial, they could either be released back to their community school after spending. You know, one six months inside of a facility or they're sentenced, and that's the post adjudicated section. So if they're sentenced for so many months or years or whatever that looks like they're in that facility full-time until they age out and go to an adult prison, or they.

Complete their sentence and are released. So we say a lot that, you know, our students come from public school or community schools and go back to community schools. And so you know, our teachers outside of these facilities can be so [00:11:00] impactful on, on students. But, but the statistics really are about like 700,000 students went through the system, you know, in our most recent.

Tracked year and the average age of a, of an incarcerated student is 15. It's an African American, 15 year old male. That's your average student that that's held in confinement. 

Georgia Terlaje: Well, listening to Danielle and, and Kayla, you talk about like your day and all the things you have to keep track of. It makes it, I'm curious like what led you into this work?

Because, you know, the community, the gen ed teacher in a community school, we have enough hoops to jump through and flexibility and I didn't even think it was possible. But you've, like, said it to another level. So what w what led you to 

Danielle Maco: this work?

Yeah, I mean, I came to this job right out of college, like literally, I think I remember it was a month after I [00:12:00] graduated, and in my master's work, I, you know, the, the juvenile justice space for education is unseen and not talked about. It wasn't like, Publicized that I could even do like student teaching there or like connect to a local program because I mean, if I was doing my you know, my residency work for college, I definitely would've wanted to like do some volunteer work, but it just wasn't around.

And so I landed on this job actually. A college professor took some professional development classes with the nonprofit agency that I worked for. And they happen to have an opening for a summer school program. So our students are residential. They live there. They live there. And depending on how long they stay, like Kayla mentioned, like a month, weeks a day sometimes you know, half a year, nine months was the longest that I've [00:13:00] had a student.

So I had the chance to see summer school happen. In a juvenile justice space. And I just never went back to, like, even trying out for a public school or private school, I just really found my niche with the students here and, you know, just the, the work and the purpose and what I went to school for and I felt, felt like I found that in a juvenile justice space.

So it happened by chance and. I just, I never look back. I, there's other opportunities that came up, but, you know, I always just go back to like working with juvenile justice youth how much they need, you know, adults that care for them, that see them, that value them so that they can go back to their communities and like bring that learning with them.

But yeah, that's how I happened in. Yeah, it's this job. 

Kaylah Holland: Yeah. And Danielle's a fantastic teacher. I, I mean, I just wish you could be a student in her classroom. And she is really, she's wonderful, but honestly, she's unique [00:14:00] in that she, one has been in the juvenile justice space for almost eight years, and two, never taught in a public school and came from, you know, straight from her degree into teaching juvenile justice.

I think that's unique because a lot of. JJ teachers, you know, taught in public school first, and so they are so. You know, stuck in this like structure of, I have first period from eight to eight 50, and I have second period from 8 55, like in a juvenile justice facility. I call it organized chaos because on the schedule it says first period starts at 8:00 AM but the first period really starts when the officers decide to bring the students to your class.

So it might be eight, might be 8 0 5. If you have a good relationship with your jds, you know, then. They might try to bring them on time. I mean, it's really organized chaos. And that can be really hard for teachers who taught in a public school first and are [00:15:00] so ingrained in that schedule. So I think Danielle's pretty unique in that she came directly from, you know, college to work in jj.

That's probably why she's such an amazing teacher. She has she doesn't know what it was like in other places. 

Jessica Pack: I am just astounded at the level of flexibility that you have to employ and also just man, relationships seem to be just the cornerstone of what you're doing, whether it's the relationship with the students, or like you were saying, relationship with the officers.

Everything seems to kind of, you know, Have that as a linchpin. And I'm also thinking you must have to really create some compelling learning experiences for the buy-in from the kiddos that are participating. Could you tell us maybe a little bit more about that and the role break free has in, in kind of creating that type of compelling learning 

Kaylah Holland: environment?

Absolutely, and I totally agree with you. We, [00:16:00] we really have to motivate students and I don't know if you've ever heard Rita Pearson's Ted Talk. Every Child Deserves a Champion. It's one of my favorites. And she says in there, kids don't learn from people they don't like. And that's so true. So I think the first thing you have to do when kids come into your classroom is try to build a relationship with them.

And you can imagine, I mean, we're meeting kids in the worst moment of their lives, right? They've been arrested for some reason. You know, it could be. For something they really did or for something they really didn't do, and they're just in the wrong place at the wrong time. We don't know, you know, we don't really ask that, ask those questions.

But break free, we are a small nonprofit and that's who I work for. And we work to really improve education in juvenile justice facilities. So we work with lots of different teachers in lots of different states. I do professional development trainings and all of that for teachers around the country.

So I, I. Feel very blessed to be in a lot of different facilities and see [00:17:00] how they're run. And sometimes they're really good and sometimes they need a little bit out of extra help. But one thing that we do to support teachers is we create monthly initiatives for students. So when you talk about that phrase, you know, you have to really motivate them with some highly engaging activities.

We try to do that with our monthly initiatives, and we've built up a program for last year, the, the 2223 school year, we had 12 initiatives. So we ran one each month and then we had two for two different months. And they're based on all types of subject levels subject areas. They're based off of, you know, aligned to standards.

They're aligned to the ISTI standards as well. So we really try to, Create, have students create real products that are connected to authentic audiences. I think if you boiled our work down to like one sentence, that's what it would be. We try to help teachers have students create real products that have authentic audiences.

So [00:18:00] these initiatives that students do create a product for each one. So, Think, think like students are building paper rollercoasters and they're creating three D models of the layers of the earth and atmosphere. They're writing songs, they're writing poems, they're writing speeches. They're looking at Henrietta Lacks and doing a three D model of a cellular structure.

I mean, there are some really robust initiatives taking place, and kids are so creative. I know this last year we launched a new one called Unexplored. They all start with un, if you notice that there's a lot of uns. We believe in the power of change and UN is a prefix that changes the word it's connected to.

So we start each initiative with the word un. 'cause we believe students can change their lives with education. So unexplored is new for us. It's a space exploration and geometry initiative. And sometimes, you know, you just put things out there and you're like, I hope this works and I'm not sure what we're gonna get.

And their end initiative [00:19:00] product was having students create some type of space suit. So like the helmet or you know, the, the suit, the boots, the gloves, anything like, whatever you can create. Just send it and. We know that given the restrictions on materials that teachers have in their classroom, the one thing you can count on is that they're gonna have paper and they're gonna have cardboard, and they're gonna have tape.

So what can you do with those three things? It's kind of like a problem solving thing. And I promise you, we started getting in submissions for this initiative and. One student in, in Massachusetts, actually not at, I don't think Danielle's facility but literally built a full size space suit. I think the student's actually in it.

Yes. When they sent the picture, it is a full size space suit. I can send it to you. Maybe we can include it in the, in the show notes. It was incredible and it just blew my mind. I mean, these kids are so creative and honestly, [00:20:00] They have so much trauma from regular school. I mean, these kids are not seen in schools.

You know, Danielle talked about like, she came to this work because juvenile justice just isn't something people talk about. It's not something people talk about. And, and really a lot of teachers in public schools have come up to me and said, I don't know where my kids go when they're gone for four or five months at a time.

I'm like, well, You know, you have a facility 10 minutes from you. That's, you know, probably where they are and like making those connections. So just really encouraging teachers to build those relationships. I had a student tell me once that he was arrested and in a facility for four months and then went to his trial was released back to his public school community school, as we call it, and he was searched 17 times on his first day back.

17 times. Now, that is not an environment that a student's going to want to go back to the next day. I've had kids tell me that they wish their [00:21:00] public school teachers would invest in them as much as their jail teachers. That's what they call them, you know? I mean, there are really great teachers doing good things, and these kids come to them with these academic gaps and trauma from being in school and just feeling.

Not seen and not valued and feeling labeled. They're labeled. Troubled kid, bad kid, criminal, you know? And really all they need is support. They need someone to build a relationship with them and say, I know you hate math, but like we're gonna do something fun and we're gonna study geometry while we study this space and look at the International Space Station.

And you just used all this geometry that you didn't think you could do. To build this one life-sized space suit that looks incredible, you know? So we do, we do have a lot of really engaging activities that we consider to be high quality and. Can, can really get into that student's creativity. Well, and I love, you know, [00:22:00] that you, you, you're using creativity 

Georgia Terlaje: because that's, that's a path that can take you out of your situation.

Like if you're full on in a project, that's your passion. You can kind of not think about your environment that you're in and hopefully get some joy out of that. That, you know, maybe find something you wanna do as when you get out and become an adult that is along the same pathway. So I think that's beautiful.

'cause so many times it seems like, you know, when kids aren't academically where they're supposed to be. All we fo focus on is intervention and the creativity piece is missing. And I think it's so 

Danielle Maco: essential. I like that you mentioned that, Georgia, because when I first met Kayla, it was as a teacher participating through the break free initiatives and you know, we've mentioned that our students will come in in the middle of a lesson, right?

I, I could get a student tomorrow and I'm in the end of my unit, or I'm at the middle [00:23:00] of my unit and I have to. Find, you know, a way to engage the student who is not in a space, you know, emotionally or mentally yet to like, take in, you know, new experiences and new learning. And so what I really enjoyed about break free initiatives is it really.

Was engaging, it was all project-based learning. A lot of it is hands-on and it opened up doors and like opportunities that students normally wouldn't see or try themselves. For example, I think one of the first years that I joined in, they have an initiative called Unsung and students write lyrics, but break free also gives us Accounts to create music so they can literally go on their computers and create the beat, you know change the tempo, whatever it is, and then sing over it.

And one of my students was like, well, I just [00:24:00] wrote poems I didn't really know I could sing. But you know, when you bring creativity and you don't kind of. Narrow down like what students can and can't do, and you just introduce new things. You can really see like where they can take it and what level they can achieve.

Kaylah Holland: Yeah. So there are great facilities who are doing things outside of break free with creativity in that authentic audience piece. So there's a facility in New Orleans, Louisiana. They have two schools, two facilities within their school, and they host an art gallery every year.

So October is National Youth Justice Awareness Month. They have kids create art, and I'm talking about really cool art like. Slides made out of duct tape and these beautiful Mardi Gras mask and things like that, and they have a real art gallery. The public can come you know, everyone can come, but not students obviously because they're in the facility.

But the way they connect students is they have [00:25:00] numbers on each of the pieces of artwork. And so when I go in, I have gotten to go and it's just wonderful. I can see like number 62 and I write it down and write all the feedback. For that specific piece of art. And then, you know, the kids get it the next day.

And that's so beautiful that they're getting, they're getting multiple pieces of paper from feedback from their families, from strangers. Because if you ask a kid, like, if you create this product, who do you want to see it? They're gonna say, I want my judge to see it, and I want my mama to see it because I want my mom to be proud.

Right. There's another facility in upstate New York who. He, this teacher is amazing. He's an art teacher. He was not able to get any canvases at the beginning, and so he's trying to figure out how do I teach art without having access to the real materials? And he is leaving the facility one day and he sees the kitchen crew.

Breaking down cardboard boxes, cardboard's easily accessible in these places. And he says, I can make that work. And [00:26:00] so he had students start painting on these cardboard boxes, beautiful portraits of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King. And then the facility finally realized, I think he's really trying to do something.

They got them canvases, and now those canvases are on display in their local airport, and there's this beautiful little thing that says, these are created by students in this facility and dah, dah, dah, dah. And their artwork is on a rotating display in the airport. I mean, talk about having an authentic audience.

It's just beautiful 

Jessica Pack: fault. Well, and the voice that those kids are lifting and just. Developing. That's so amazing to me. I, I totally went down a rabbit hole looking at the different initiatives today on the website. And I loved 

Kaylah Holland: the poetry 

Jessica Pack: initiative that you had in April. The words unlocked one, and I was reading through the, the different poems that kids wrote, and I'm just like, flabbergasted.

Like there is no 

Kaylah Holland: way that I could ever write something so beautiful. I know. And I 

Jessica Pack: just, I'm really touched by that.[00:27:00] 

Georgia Terlaje: You guys were touching on this a a bit, but what are, what's some advice, because you've really kind of piqued my interest, just kind of about getting, you know, public school community teachers. Somehow maybe partnering with juvenile justice teachers. You know, that's something we can maybe talk about later, but how, how can teachers disrupt the school to prison pipeline?

Like what are a couple things that teachers could actually go do with their students that might help in this 

Kaylah Holland: regard? This is one of my favorite questions because that's exactly what we have to do is disrupt the school to prison pipeline because we try to take care of the kids academically and emotionally, you know, when they're with us, but obviously we would prefer they never come.

We don't, we don't want them in these facilities. We want them to stay in their school, obviously. So that's what teachers need to do is disrupt the system. [00:28:00] And I think honestly, one of the best ways you can do that is to recognize your own unconscious bias. Because labels matter and we all have unconscious bias, right?

I mean, I've heard an example of you know, it's can be your unconscious bias could be as subtle as like scrolling past the male candidates when you're looking for a babysitter, right? That's, that's bias. So we all have our own level of unconscious bias, but these kids, They have such labels given to them, and those labels really matter.

And, and those labels are important that they're positive. But I think I said this already, they're, they're labeled troubled and bad and criminal, and they start to believe those labels. There's a teacher in Maryland, I love to tell this story because she's fantastic. I was touring their facility and I popped in to observe her class and she was calling her students king.

Like, you know, king and then their last name. And I was already [00:29:00] like, I love you. But I pulled her aside afterwards and said, tell me why. Why are you doing that? And she had up on her wall, the word criminal as a mind map and it had all these different definitions and she said they're going to believe.

What you say about them. So if you say they're a criminal, they're gonna believe it. So if they're gonna believe something, I want it to be positive. So we're kings in this class and they really live up to that. And you can see 'em when they walk in. They straighten up a little and you know, like they're important in her class and they feel valued because they're given that label of King.

And I just think that's so important. So that's one thing they can definitely you know, start looking at their own unconscious bias, but realistically, Once kids enter the school to prison pipeline, it's very difficult to get out and it's really easy to get into the pipeline and it really has to do, it starts with how you deal with punishment in your own classroom.

So if you look at your own classroom and start using restorative [00:30:00] practices instead of punitive, Punishment if you stop sending kids out to the principal, because the more you send 'em to the principal, the closer they are to going to an alternative school. And once they get to alt an alternative school, they're in the system.

Right? And it's just so easy to just keep going and going and going and going, and they're in that pipeline forever. So I think that's, that's the next thing is to really look at your own classroom, to really look at how you handle punishment. And then I. You can really advocate for these kids. Do you have a resource officer in your school?

And if you do, why? What are the policies behind having that resource officer in your school? What are the ramifications for having that resource officer there? Is it, is it positive or is it negative? You know, really ask those questions of your school or your district. And then there are several diversion tactics where we can divert kids out of the court.

Program out of the school to prison pipeline and really keep them in school. So really looking [00:31:00] up like the sentencing project has a great paper on diversion tactics, so really looking at those and, and implementing them in your classroom. But just simply, it starts with positive reinforcement of restorative practices in your classroom.

Creating a safe space for kids to come. They know you're not gonna judge them. They know you're not gonna label them. You can be their ally and they know they can come to you, so you're not the one searching them 17 times in one day. 

Danielle Maco: Yeah. Thank you Kayla. And if I can add to those you know, the, the, the list you mentioned and it's.

Some tangible things are in the classroom relationship building, right? Positive youth development like Kayla mentioned, but like apologizing when you're wrong, right? Like students, adults make mistakes too. We don't know everything also. So we should be teachable at times. All the time. We should be teachable by students or [00:32:00] by others.

And this year I think. You know, one of our, one of the great things that my organization does in conjunction with the Department of the State is we have a racial conference every year. I think this year was the third year that it's happened, and I'm so grateful for it. It's just a really great learning opportunity and not just teachers are invited there, teachers are invited there, counselors, social workers, clinicians are invited.

And so it's really a alert. You know, we we're coming at it from all angles, not just from the school side, but one of the great things I learned from the guest the guest speaker, a son Davis, you know, he has a book called 

Marker

Danielle Maco: Hope Dealer's Handbook, right? And so as teachers, we have to. Deal. Hope we have to deal joy.

And like that's part of, it's not in our job description, but it's like embedded in there. Those are the things that [00:33:00] we have to do. I think giving students voice and choice, right? Like if a student says, I wanna watch, or I wanna learn this book, we, we should take that in. Like, let's, let's make a book club out of it.

Whatever that what, you know, however, We can bring that in and including culturally appropriate and respond culturally affirming books and curriculum in, in our own in our own teaching. You know, books that reflect our students, books that they wanna read. Books that, you know, affirm their life experiences, listening to songs that they listen to.

I think these are all just the tangible things we can do daily. JJ spaces are, 

Georgia Terlaje: Well, and I keep coming back to the word I think Kayla said, and it just seems overarching these kids and, and all kids, they wanna be seen and like what you're talking about. You know, if a teacher's able in, you know, a [00:34:00] public school to understand, you know, scaffolding different things.

But our district's working on U D L. Which is incorporating, how does a student learn? Like, do I learn best, like with the book of my choice doing these activities, or maybe I need to create a movie or a song, but all those help kids feel seen and it just seems to me that's the most powerful thing. I, if I think of anything from what you said today is, is helping these students feel seen and, and that know that they matter.

Kaylah Holland: Yeah. I mean, isn't that what we all want, you know, as humans to be seen and feel valued and belong? Right. I think it's a sense of belonging too, and I think that's why. Really good teachers who are in these JJ facilities really impact students positively 'cause they, they make them feel like they're valued and they belong and then they send them back into a public school.

And we're just really hoping that teacher is gonna [00:35:00] make them feel valued and belong as well. But I think that's what it comes back to. I agree with you, Georgia, just really being valued 

Jessica Pack: and belonging.

This was such an amazing conversation today. Thank you so much for, for sharing with us and helping us learn and grow as professionals. And I know that our listeners will have just taken away some really wonderful, practical ideas, no matter their educational context. So thank you very much for that. As we're drawing to a close, where can listeners connect with you and where might they look to learn a little 

Kaylah Holland: bit more?

So you can learn more about break free on our website break free ed.org. And I am on Twitter at Holland, Kayla. I'd love to connect with you there for me. 

Danielle Maco: I don't have any handles, but I love sharing teacher resources or just being a thought [00:36:00] partner with other educators. And you can reach me at my email d neko@collaborative.org.

That's 

Jessica Pack: amazing. Thank you so much. Well, that wraps up this episode of the Edge podcast. We hope you had a great time and learned a ton. My name is Jessica and you can find me at PAC Woman 2 0 8 on Twitter and Instagram. 

Georgia Terlaje: And I am Georgia Tlai, and you can find me at Georgia tlai on Twitter, and you can find Jessica and I both at storytelling saves the world.com.

Jessica Pack: On behalf of everyone at ISTE the Edge podcast, remember to keep exploring your passion, fostering your creativity, and continue taking risks, all things that can bring you to the edge.