S10E10 – Parenting to Create the World We Want

S10E10 - Parenting to Create the World We Want

Andrew: Welcome to the Integrated Schools Podcast. I'm Andrew, a White dad from Denver.

Dr. Val: And I'm Val, a Black mom from North Carolina.

Andrew: And this is Parenting to Create the World We Want. And today's conversation is a parent conversation.

Dr. Val: That's right. And it involves a little known story, but my good friend Jon Tobin and his wife Amanda are joining us today.

Andrew: Yes. And they are lovely. I'm excited for everybody to get to meet them. How did you meet Jon and, and why did you think we should have this conversation with him?

Dr. Val: Yeah, so we can thank Jon actually for me being introduced to Integrated Schools. He and I worked together, at Teaching Tolerance at the time now Learning for Justice, and he said, “Hey, Val, the work that you're doing with Clear The Air, and here at work, it would be great for you to meet the folks at Integrated Schools.” And so he orchestrated, um, just like some DM-ing that I had with Courtney shortly before she passed.

Andrew: Yeah, so for new listeners, Courtney Mykytyn, who founded Integrated Schools, co-hosted the podcast with me until her, her tragic death back at the very end of 2019. She was sort of the, the lifeblood of this organization when it started. And, Jon and his wife actually had a Zoom call with her, as they were grappling with their own parenting choices and that led him to introduce you to the organization, which led you to being here today and sort of, yeah a beautiful, a beautiful full circle to have him on the podcast today.

Dr. Val: Yeah, absolutely. And when he had kids they were young. As many of our listeners, they had kids who haven't started school yet. And so Jon has been on this journey for quite some time, not only learning with us, but figuring out how to put his learning into action.

Andrew: Yeah. And that's the story we wanna share today. Sort of his journey. And, he is one person. It is one journey. We're not trying to hold up Jon as the example of what everybody should do. I think about the first time JPB Gerald was on the show, his episode was called ‘Checklists and Merit Badges.’ There's this like tendency among White parents to want to know, like, okay, what are the six steps I have to take to be a quote unquote “good White parent”? And I don't think that Jon's journey is laid out as like, here are the six things that you should do in order to achieve good, good White parent status.

But I think it is a powerful story of how, you know, he is grappling with these things that we grapple with all the time. And then, and then living them out in, in ways that reflect his values, in ways that, the choices that he's making with his kids about where he is living, about his family, and, you know, leaning on the community of Integrated Schools to, to help him through that.

Dr. Val: Yeah, I do wanna cosign that these journeys will look very different, right? And there's choices that, where I am now in my life, I, if I had that knowledge, I may have made different choices for my young people. Um, but you can only make the choices based on what you know in that moment, in the circumstances that you're in and do better like the next time. And so, uh, this continues to be a learning journey for all of us, including Jon and Amanda and the choices that they're making and trying to figure out what's best for their young people. And I think the best thing we can do as caregivers and parents is, in young people's appropriate language, talk to them about these choices that we're making for and with them and why, so that you can continue to build this in your family.

Andrew: And then share those stories with your community as well. You know, we're thinking about the sort of themes for the season here. The importance of public schools, like Jon was deeply committed to public schools, from before they even had kids. The power of proximity of being in community.

You know, he talks a lot about the importance of being rooted in the space where you are, of really being somewhere. The power of storytelling, I think that listeners will find his stories very compelling. And then this idea of stamina. And you know, like, like you said, they continue to be on a journey. They were on a journey from before they even had kids. They've continued that journey and the recognition that you don't like make one decision and then your work is done. But that it's ongoing work, I think all show up in this conversation.

Dr. Val: Right. And I think what also shows up is sometimes you don't expect it, but if you're open to that, ‘yes’, you know, who knows, who knows what could come of it, um, the change that could come from it.

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: Be open to that “Yes.”

Andrew: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, yeah, in some ways his ‘yes’ to having a conversation with Courtney and your 'yes’ to join this podcast, is why the two of us are here right now.

Dr. Val: That's wild. Love it. That's beautiful. Yeah.

Andrew: Yeah. All right. Well, should we take a listen?

Dr. Val: I think we shall.

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Jon Tobin: Hi, my name is Jon Tobin. I am a White dad and I live in Jacksonville, Florida.

Andrew: Awesome. So, the conversation today is a parent focused conversation. We want to hear your story and kind of just reflect on it. So, maybe we can start. How did you come across Integrated Schools, as an organization?

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So it had to be around 2018, 2019. My son was about three years old. And we were having pretty serious discussions about schooling and education and all that. And so had been doing some research, um, just around groups that were focused on equity and education. That had been something that I cared about. It was something I was doing in my work. I'm a former classroom teacher, shout out to middle school teachers. Yeah, middle schoolers are my people.

And yeah, I think I just kind of stumbled across Integrated Schools as an organization, and it was, you know, obviously really small grassroots organization. And, we got in contact with Courtney. And my wife and I had a zoom call with her to talk about schooling and education and just ask questions and pick her brain. And, yeah, it was a really cool experience and kind of shaped, uh, it didn't shape, it helped kind of solidify a lot of ideas that we had had floating around in our heads around how we wanted to approach education, how we wanted to approach how we are involved in education. How we want our kids to be involved in the public education system. And so, it really helped kind of solidify a lot of our thinking around those things. So that's kind of how that all started.

Andrew: That's amazing.

Dr. Val: Okay, I'm having a moment. I did not anticipate having this moment because I didn't know Courtney was part of your story, Jon. And just what a beautiful time to just like pause again and see Courtney's impact, you know, on Jon years ago that led to this conversation today. I'm just, I'm feeling super moved right now. So…

Andrew: Yeah, me too.

Dr. Val: Yeah.

Andrew: That's lovely.

Dr. Val: It is lovely.

Jon Tobin: She made a really good joke with us about like being white parents, bringing like organic carrots to the PTA meeting. And it was really, really good.

Andrew: [laughing] And that’s stuck with you. That's awesome. Let's go back further. So you are married. You have children. Tell us your situation leading up to making a choice about schools.

Jon Tobin: Okay. I am married. I have two children. They are five and eight years old. My daughter is in kindergarten and my son is in third grade. If we want to go back, when I was a sophomore in undergrad, in Virginia, I just became enamored with public education, with the education system, with the need to be involved in the education system, with the need to kind of help improve things.

Not in a, sort of like savior-ish mentality, but more in like, uh, a deep respect for the teachers that I had growing up and a deep respect for the educators that I knew in my life, both like in high school and middle school and in college that were doing the work. And so that kind of really drove me to pursue my career in education, to really just kind of support the system and the belief in like it's, it's a foundational piece of our society, of our democracy.

Andrew: Why, like, why, what, what about sophomore year of college was radicalizing? How did you fall in love with public education then?

Jon Tobin: So there's this author that I really love. His name is Dave Eggers and he wrote a book called The Teachers Have It Easy. And it was about the public education system and educators that were just committed to the craft and committed to the work in spite of some of its challenges. And those stories just really resonated with me and something about the resilience of educators in the face of like challenges and even back then, like nothing like what we're seeing today in terms of challenges to the public education system, but just like them facing those challenges head on and just their commitment and dedication to supporting kids. I would not be where I am today if it wasn't for educators. Um, and I don't mean that kind of, you know, amorphously. I, I flunked out of college and had to work my way back and it was only because of the support of, um, I had high school educators reach out to me. I had college professors that supported me, advisors, and it was because of their support and their commitment to me as a student and as an individual that I was able to, you know, get back to school, finish school, finish well, then go on to grad school to pursue my master's in education.

And so, I quite literally wouldn't be an educator without them. And so, it was very personal for me, um, because I really struggled to kind of like find where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do. And even when I was in high school, I was thinking, “oh, why would I want to be a teacher? Me and school, we do not get along very well, um, why would I want to do this for a living?” But it was really through that kind of journey through you like freshmen and sophomore year and having those teachers reach out and having those professors support me, that really kind of shaped my decision to pursue a career and education.

And then through that, just kind of becoming a part of the system and working in the system just really shaped my perspective on the inequities. Working in Title I schools in Memphis, Tennessee, and learning about the inequities of the system and seeing firsthand kind of how those play out just really push me to want to, just continue to be a part of it and for my kids to be a part of it.

Dr. Val: Did your parents have conversations around race growing up? Because I hear you say the importance of public schools. And I think that's fantastic. And I'm wondering if that always meant for you, integrated schools as well.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. Okay. So we can go even further back. Um, I went to a very small private school from K through sixth grade. And there were 12 of us. There was an Asian child, there was a Black child, there was two Hispanic children. And then there were like three or four White kids. And that was like the class. So that was what I had grown up with. But kind of having those conversations about race, it didn't really happen. My parents didn't talk explicitly about it, it was through a lot of, like, the conversations that I had when I would go over to my friends houses, because we were all really close knit friends. And so it was going to their houses and kind of having that lived experience of being thrown into a lifestyle that didn't look like mine, uh, family units that didn't look like mine, and those sorts of conversations, just growing up with those kids and talking to them about their lives and their cultures and how they live their life and everything, but we all went to the same school. That kind of really shaped and formed my perspective growing up.

My parents talked about race in more of like a colorblindness sort of perspective. And I took that with me for a little while, but it was really when I went to college, I went to Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, which is a really large and diverse school. And it was through attending that school and being on campus, and being involved in different campus groups that that kind of shifted from like this colorblindness to that more equitable and celebratory, like celebrating diversity, celebrating integration, and really striving for that and appreciating it more.

Andrew: Yeah. I mean, it paints a, it paints a great picture of the little seeds that got planted along the way. That being in a real community, like finding shared humanity with kids who are different from you, which is to me, like one of the greatest powers of a truly well integrated school is that you have that opportunity. And then, you can't unsee it. You can't all of a sudden get to high school or college and not have those experiences stick with you. And then that sort of leads you to this love of public education and serving in Title I schools, and then you have your own kids and it's time to make a choice about where to send them to school. Talk to us a little bit about that process, that coming about that led you to search out an organization like Integrated Schools.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So there was never a question in my mind that my kids would attend public school. Um, even before I had kids, and like I said, it was really those experiences, with leaving school, going back to school and then going to Memphis for grad school and becoming an educator in the classroom, it just really solidified that like, my kids will attend public school because it's not just a critical institution, but it's critical for them to have that experience.

Which is interesting because my experience was one that I'm very appreciative of in terms of exposing me to a lot of different diversity and that sort of thing. And I went to a small private school. So I think a lot of my journey around sending my kids to public school was, like, I want my kids to have the experience that I had growing up in terms of diversity, but also the experience I had as an older child with public school. And so it was kind of like the marriage of those two things, of like, my kids can have that exposure to that diversity. And, we can be a part of contributing to and just being members of society.

Dr. Val: When you met Integrated Schools, you were also moving into a neighborhood that was transitioning or gentrifying in Atlanta, and that was a choice as well and then attending a global majority school, like you all had hopes for these schools, like, very early on, even when you bought the house.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So it's, it's very interesting. I went through a teacher residency program in grad school in Memphis, where we were in a cohort. And so there were 30 of us. And my wife and I were the first ones really of our close knit friend group to have kids.

Andrew: Okay.

Jon Tobin: And so that was really interesting, because I had my convictions and, and they were still forming their thoughts, because they didn't have kids yet.

Andrew: And it's different, right? Like, it's one thing to have convictions conceptually, that's a very different thing to have them when it's your actual own children.

Jon Tobin: Right. To have like a living, breathing small human and then to make decisions. And so, as Val said, we moved to Atlanta, in 2017, and we did move into like a transitioning neighborhood. And neighbors had told us, we were the first White people to move into this neighborhood in decades. A lot of the reason why we moved to where we did was not around integration or gentrification. A lot of it for us was just kind of, we wanted proximity to the city and we could afford it. And my lived experience growing up, as well as my experience in graduate school and our time we lived in Memphis for five years. Building that more authentic community was so critical and important to us.

So yeah, that's kind of why we sought that out. And then when we had our oldest, the conversations got really real because now we actually have a living, breathing child who's about to go to school. And like I said, it was really important for us to have diversity. That was what we had kind of valued. You know, you can hear stories about great schools and all these websites that measure things and, and, you know, from working in the system, I knew that a lot of those websites are extremely biased, are extremely racist, are extremely prejudiced towards certain types of data. And so we wanted our kids to go to a global majority school, as well as it needed to be a public school. When my oldest went to kindergarten, um, he was the only white student at the school. And that presented its own sets of, um, I don’t want to say challenges. There were some challenges, but overall it just, it, it had its own set of experiences. But he loved his teachers… that had a diverse teaching staff. And that was the important thing for us is that he was in the neighborhood school. And he loved his teachers and he was learning and he was part of a diverse community. That was really, really important to us.

Andrew: Yeah, tell, tell us a little more about making that decision. How did you choose that school?

Jon Tobin: You know after having the conversation with Courtney we went and we toured the school and I have mixed feelings about like touring schools, but at the time like we just we wanted to meet the teachers. We wanted to meet the principal. We wanted to see the space. And we didn't approach it from the sense of deciding of whether or not we were going to send our child to this school. It was just more so we could get an idea of what the school was like and kind of the vibe so we could mentally prepare ourselves for sending our kid there.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: What was it like being, like, the only white parents in the class? And and how did you build relationships with other parents.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So my wife she's sitting right here now. I was just going to ask you…

Andrew: Oh, awesome. Let's, let's bring her into this conversation too. Maybe she can introduce herself.

Amanda Tobin: My name is Amanda and I'm a White mom in Jacksonville, Florida.

Jon Tobin: The question was kind of around like, what was it like being the only white parents at our oldest’s school when he started Kindergarten?

Amanda Tobin: I don’t know that we were the only white parents, there were a number of biracial children at the school. However, I feel like being a white family in the school where it was not common, uh, definitely faced some skepticism from some parents initially. Especially since our area was beginning to gentrify.

But, uh, we worked really hard to build relationships and it also helped that our son made friends easily. And so I think the hardest thing for me was knowing how to lean into the discomfort when it was all very new for me as well. And um, just trying to be patient in the process of getting to know people and building relationships, even when we were viewed initially with, a little bit of, uh, trepidation. Not to say that we had to prove ourselves, but really just, we had to gain trust and we had to, um, build those relationships little by little, and it might have come a little bit more easily if it were a different circumstance.

Jon Tobin: That just reminds me of, of a lot because she's right. There was definitely a heavy dose of kind of skepticism of, “What are you doing here? Why are you here? Why do you want to be here? What is your angle?” sort of thing. I've heard, you know, stories and there are podcasts about, this, about, you know, white families coming in and taking over and, starting a club or starting a this or starting to that. And, the anecdote about Courtney's joke about organic carrots that stuck with me because that was the sort of thing that we did not want to do. We wanted to approach it with like a posture of humility and we did not have a posture of “we get special treatment because our son is the only white person.”

It was way more about like, we just believe in the system. We believe in the quality public education. We believe in the value of neighborhood schools and authentic community around that. And so, we're here and we're here with all the ups and all the downs, and we're just here to participate and be a part of this and not rock the boat. But just like, we're just here because this is where we live and this is the neighborhood school. And so we're not going to say, “Oh, well, we want the cheap housing price of a gentrifying neighborhood. But we're going to send our kid across town or we're going to send her to a private school or like, we're not going to be fully in this community.” We just made the decision early on, like if we're somewhere we're somewhere. And so that was kind of our mindset.

Amanda Tobin: We had really fallen in love with the neighborhood and really spent a lot of time getting to know the neighbors and just the overall community. And so it made it a much easier choice for us to choose this school in our neighborhood, even though it… by a lot of people's, typical process of okay, what does Great Schools say? Or what do the other neighbors say? Or what do the other parents that look like me say? Um, we knew that we cared a lot about the community. We cared a lot about our neighbors. And so our biggest priority was making sure that where we were planted is where we were investing. And, um, it made it very easy for us to make that choice because our community was really like our whole little world then, and especially when we hit COVID, it became even more important to us to really pour into our neighbors and having that school and especially doing the little remote classes was so important for us in feeling like we really belonged in that neighborhood and in that space.

Dr. Val: Andrew, what are you thinking, listening to this?

Andrew: Well, so yeah, I mean, I kind of want to go back again because there's like such conviction in, in your words, and yet it was counter cultural. And so I'm curious about, where that conviction stems from in your past, and then I'm wondering what role did the conversation you had with Courtney and finding Integrated Schools play in, solidifying that it wasn't like a new idea to you, but in kind of giving you the space to, to live into that.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So I think that the kind of galvanizing moment for me was when I went to grad school I was thinking, all right, I'm going to be an educator. I'm going to work in the schools that have the most need. I'm going to do as much as I can to help. And there was probably some White saviorism in there. Um, for sure that I had not wrestled with yet.

And my cohort of other folks in my graduate program was extremely diverse and we were talked about a lot as being sort of a, not the problem class, but like the class that got really close and went really deep, really fast. Classes would just go off the rails, our lectures with our professors, because we would just talk about race and we would have these really frank, blunt conversations. And it was my first time ever having like those really explicit conversations, because we had established that rapport and that relationship and it created this safe space, right?

And so there were folks that were Black. There were folks that were Asian. There were folks that were Hispanic and we're all in class and we're talking about like how race impacts us differently and talked about color blindness and talked about White saviorism and talked about education and, it was this moment of realizing like how valuable diversity is and how valuable integration is, and how valuable just those learning conversations are. And it created this posture of always wanting to learn and grow, which is something that I had had, but it really, really solidified in graduate school for me, in those classrooms with that small cohort of folks, all taking the same classes together.

Andrew: I mean shout out to your professors for creating that space. You talk about like the power of an integrated learning environment. What can come out of that? And you, you think about the way that it kind of transformed your whole life. Like that, that is, yeah, shout out to those teachers.

Dr. Val: Woo! Oh, I'm getting goosebumps. Such a great story.

Jon Tobin: Yeah, they were, they were, they were really, really great. Honestly, I took all my preconceived notions and my, you know, Dead Poet Society perspective and all of that stuff around, like, I'm going to be a teacher and we're going to transform the lives of these kids. And they transformed me more than I could ever transform them.

Just working with young people and being in a room with young kids all day long. Um, just completely transformed me in ways that I didn't anticipate. Like I never thought that flunking out of college could have been a positive experience, but being able to connect with students around, like, I'm getting a bad grade or I'm not doing well in this class.

My first year teaching, I was teaching freshman English and I'll never forget I had a 17 year old, a junior who was in my freshman English class and being able to connect with him around like, I know what it's like to fail. We've had vastly different lived experiences, but like on this we can connect. We can connect around education. We can connect around this experience of like…

Andrew: I don't belong here. I don't belong in school. School is not for me. School and I don't get along.

Jon Tobin: Right. Exactly. And being able to connect and build that relationship and build that trust and build that rapport just through being like, honest with the kids. And then they were honest with me about their lived experiences and their life. Those five years in Memphis, especially those first two years when I was in grad school and in my first year in the classroom really kind of changed the trajectory of my whole life… where I wanted to live, what I wanted to do, how I wanted my life to look.

Dr. Val: Okay. Fast forward because you picked your neighborhood. You talk to Courtney. You do the things that Integrated Schools advocates for, right?

Andrew: The Two Tour Pledge.

Dr. Val: That's right, you know. And then your kid goes to school. You figure out how to humbly be a part of the community. You're working to build relationships. And then COVID hits, and you moved to Florida - talk to us about that.

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So my oldest finished preschool virtually, which was… Not fun. [Val laughs] And then in first grade, he was in and out of school. There were outbreaks. He was there. He wasn't there. He was in the building. He wasn't in the building getting tested every week, all that sort of stuff. It just, that also kind of shaped our beliefs and convictions around like really digging in and being present in the community where we were.

COVID also revealed to us a lot of needs that we had as a family, which is why we made the transition down here to Jacksonville from Atlanta, a year and a half ago. And so, his first normal school year was his second grade year. Every other experience he had, had been rocked by COVID and he wasn't able to develop those relationships with kids. I mean, there weren't extracurriculars, there wasn't after school care in Atlanta, there wasn't all the, all the like pieces, that the PTA wasn't active because they couldn't be. And so all the ways that we wanted to dig in weren't available.

And then we went through personal stuff and made the transition down here to be closer to family and et cetera, et cetera. But when we were looking for housing down here, we had two criteria. We wanted to be close to family. And we wanted the school to be integrating… diverse. And so we didn't tour any of the schools. But I was able to reach out to folks online, like through Facebook, PTA groups, through family groups, and just learn about the school, and learn about their experiences with the school and learn about the diversity of the communities and so, when we got down here, my oldest had a really good experience in his second grade year at the school. My youngest, she attended a preschool that was, like, down the street, because she we were late on the public school pre K thing. And so we sent her to a Montessori daycare. We weren't necessarily all gung ho about Montessori, but it was the daycare that was close by and it ended up being great. Um, it also ended up being interesting because now she's like, “I would prefer to not do that.” [everyone laughs] Um, but, and, and her,

Andrew: The teacher's like, yeah, that's not how this works.

Jon Tobin: Yeah, exactly. Her first couple, her first couple of weeks in kindergarten this year, the teacher would say, we're doing this. And she would say like, “Oh, I don't want to do this. I would like to do something else. Can I do this activity instead?” And they're like, “no, that's not how this works.” [everyone laughs again] I know all she had known was Montessori and like, you get to pick and choose your, your journey. And that's not how it works. Um, but she's doing great now. So that, that was really good.

So yeah, again, we just knew that wherever we were going to be, we're going to be fully there. And so it was never really a question of whether or not we were going to send our kid to the neighborhood school, it was just a matter of how can we be involved? How can we be supportive in a way that is approaching with humility, without saviorism, with a posture of wanting to like learn and grow and not reinvent the wheel, but just like fold ourselves into what's existing and see how we can be involved in that.

Dr. Val: So throughout all of your storytelling you have hit on a theme of perseverance, right? You and your wife together persevered, you researched, you, you thought a lot about it, you built the relationships, you decided to commit. Can you talk a little bit about how you are able to sustain that? What's your source of support and joy? Is it just the two of you all together? Do you have a community that helps you persevere in these instances?

Jon Tobin: Yeah. So our family was extremely not supportive of our educational decisions when we were living in Atlanta, but they were extremely not supportive of our housing decisions when we lived in Memphis, when we lived in Atlanta. And so there was not a lot of support there, um, but there was a lot of support from my friends that were in the graduate program that we were all kind of teaching together and a lot of us like having kids and having similar experiences and having similar convictions, having that sort of solidarity, around like, this is… It's not like the higher ground, it's just, it's, it's what makes the most sense for how we want the world to look, how we want society to look. We wanted our choices to reflect the way we want the world to be, the way we want the world to look, um, and so that kind of drove all of our choices and our decisions.

As far as perseverance, a lot of it is, is just kind of supporting each other and also seeing kind of the fruit born in the level of empathy, in the level of community and relationship that our kids are building in the school community. It's, it's really, really powerful. To the point that last summer, this is an interesting story. Last summer, one of my oldest’s friends from Atlanta and his family came to visit us and stay with us. We did not know that they were going to bring their six siblings to stay at our house. Um… [all start laughing]

Andrew: Surprise!

Jon Tobin: Yeah, but it ended up being like really, really fun. We went to the beach. It was a great experience. It was, it was super awesome. But just like all that to say is the relationships that my oldest had developed even through the virtual schooling even through the in and out of school…

Andrew: Right.

Jon Tobin: …was just like so powerful and great.

Andrew: And that's sustaining. Right? Seeing it pay off. I love that idea.

Jon Tobin: Yeah, yeah, that's, that's very, very sustaining. Um, and just the fluency that, cause we have had explicit conversations around race, around racism, around bias, you know, in age appropriate ways, but talk about bullying, talking about all those sorts of things and just seeing that fluency kind of born out in the experience that our kids have when they go to school, when they're, when they're standing up against bullying, when they're standing up against bias language, that's been extremely powerful.

And I think it's one thing to have those conversations with your kids. And I think that that's like a critical component, right? But it's one thing to do that, and then your kid goes to an all White school, um, and is not seeing it, is not having those conversations with people that look different from them, that have different lived experiences from them. It just gives like a much deeper level of context and understanding that you can only get from living in a community and being part of a community that like reflects the world.

Andrew: Totally. Yeah. I mean, that's the magic of it. You're like, well, look at this book. Let's tell the story. Let's talk about it. But unless your kids can relate it to a friend of theirs who they see themselves as equal with, then it's just intellectual and it doesn't like actually hit their heart in the same way. And so then you don't get the chance to see that sort of like empathy blooming. Have you and your wife always been aligned on this?

Jon Tobin: Oh, that's an interesting question. I don't think we were misaligned in the sense that my wife wanted different things. I think one of the reasons that she is my wife, uh, and one of the reasons I love her is because of her commitment to community and commitment to being where you are. And so it wasn't that we were misaligned. It's just that I was ingrained in the world of education. And so I was able to like, think about those things. And then when our children came along, we started having those more in depth conversations, but we were very aligned on being in a community, on being fully present where we were, and valuing that diversity of thought, that diversity of lived experience, in how we wanted our life to look, how we want the world to look. And so I think that the discussion around schooling was a really easy one because we were aligned on some of the other things.

Andrew: Being the first people with kids in your friend group, did your decision making have any impact on them?

Jon Tobin: I think it did. It doesn't have to be this big, scary thing. You know, a lot of people can be like, ‘Oh, the dangers of public school or the et cetera, et cetera.’ And not that my friends felt that way, but just they're asking the same questions that White America says to ask around like, where are you going to send your kid to school?

Andrew: Get the best for your kid.

Jon Tobin: Right? Get the best. You've got to get yours. And that's all rooted in, in bias and prejudice and racism and fear and et cetera. And so I think it did impact them seeing us do it and lean into it and make mistakes and misstep, uh, not in the choices that we made, but just like in building relationships with folks in kind of having some of that, like misplaced White saviorism and just seeing us learn and grow and lean into that learning and growth I think was really powerful for them and we have some friends that live in Atlanta in a different neighborhood and they decided to send their eldest to their neighborhood school, which is really cool.

And so I don't know if it's because of us, but it definitely, we had conversations around those things and had conversations around like the value of being invested where you are and kind of having those similar aligned values around like being in a community, and really being in a community and not just like, ‘I'm here, this is where I live. I'll know you as my neighbor, but my kid is going to go somewhere else because they got to get theirs.’ But like, we're going to invest where we are and be a part of this.

Andrew: Yeah. No school decision is made on one factor alone. So right. Like, were you the deciding factor in somebody? Probably not. Just like your conversation with Courtney was not the thing that made you decide to invest in your school, but all the conversations we have, which are so important, which is why we talk about all the time, the importance of having these conversations in our communities, not being afraid to talk about it, to bring these things up and talk about it because people out there are wondering, they're curious. They're saying, I don't know about these messages that I'm receiving. I mean, I think one of Courtney's biggest brilliance was, was this idea of people like you do things like this. And so I think, you know, your story for your friend group is an, is, oh, well, maybe it's okay to do this. Maybe I don't have to follow it. I have these beliefs that I, you know, acquired over learning and teaching and growing and having this like incredible community experience to, to unpack all of the stories that I've been told. Untell them and retell them in new ways. And then I'm getting all these other messages about what to do with my kids. And maybe there is actually a way to kind of combine those things and, and bring them together. And it's, it's in the power of relationships. It's in the power of telling stories. It's in the power of being in community with people that you realize like, oh, maybe, maybe it is possible.

Jon Tobin: Yeah.

Dr. Val: As a longtime listener, what would be like something you would want people who are like you were when you first met Integrated Schools listening for the first time, trying to get connected, making decisions about how to get involved. What would you want them to hear from you?

Jon Tobin: So many things.

Dr. Val: Yeah. It's like a, a letter to your younger self. I mean, you are all the places that many of our listeners are right now and are going to be in a handful of years. And I think that's why I really wanted you on the podcast because I think your story is important to share.

Jon Tobin: Well, thank you. I appreciate that. I think trusting the process, it's something that we're discovering down here is there, there is a lot of disconnect and it's hard to know how much of it is we live in a much more suburban area now. And so it's hard to know how much of it is kind of from COVID and how much of it is some of the sprawl, but it takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of work to really be planted and, and to reach out and to meet people and to really integrate yourself into an established community, an established neighborhood, an established school. And so I think the biggest thing that I would want, um, if I was talking to myself, it would just be to trust that process and you take it one day at a time, one step at a time.

I'm not thinking about where my son is going to go to college right now. I think about that sometimes, but I'm thinking about his educational experience now. And so I think it's really important to just be present. In the moment to, make decisions that construct or are striving to construct the world as you want it to be. And the vision that I have , is one that is diverse of race, ethnicity, thought, experience, Because I think that that makes life richer. It makes the world better. It makes us better, more empathetic people. and so I think just trusting that process and working towards that in all the big and small decisions.

I think the other thing is, I think people put a lot, ALOT, of stock, right? And like we, we had the conversation with Courtney because other people had put a lot of stock in it. And so we put a lot of stock in it. “Oh, the education decisions you make for your children are huge.” And you can look at all the statistics and the disparities and the inequities and what impact it's going to have on them and all of that stuff. And, and all of it can be extremely overwhelming. It can be crippling. It can be debilitating. But I think, when you zoom in, it becomes a much easier decision when you're talking about your neighbor's children. You're not talking about the school or the education, you're just looking at like, we have this school, it has these children. It has these families that all care about education. They care about their kids' education. They care about the life of the school, right? And they have collectively decided for whatever reason, this is where my child goes to school. And so I'm going to invest on some level in this experience. And I'm going to invest in this community because this is where I live. And I think that there has grown to be such a disconnect between like living somewhere and really being somewhere. And just like, this is where my house is and all my stuff is all over the place, right? My kid's school is over here. My job is way over here. This is just where I hang out and rest my head at night, as opposed to like, this is a community and we're going to be a part of it.

Andrew: Hmm.

Dr. Val: Hmm. Mmm mmm mmm. Mmmm mmm mmm.

Andrew: That is beautiful. No. Yeah, this is, this is great. I really appreciate you coming. Sharing your story is, is, uh, I think hopefully an inspiration to others out there. You know, there's not the way to do it, but a way to do it. Um, and that power of, of being in community, of finding yourself rooted and, and investing in the things that are close to you. And then, and then, yeah, I think the idea of, you know, doing our small part in every moment to make the world look a little more like we want it to look, um, just super powerful and really grateful for you for coming on.

Dr. Val: Yeah, thank you, Jon and Amanda.

Jon Tobin: Thank y'all so much.

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Andrew: So Val, what did you think?

Dr. Val: There's a lot here. And I say that because I think there's a lot of lessons that we can take away, and I deeply value regular people in the struggle figuring this out. I think it's really important that we have scholars on, that we have uh, federal government, fancy people on, you know.

And I think it's really important that we also hear from people who are just in their neighborhoods figuring this out. So I think there's a lot of lessons that I hope folks can take away. Uh, the first thing that I wanna talk about is, because I don't think this is true for everyone, that Jon and Amanda were able to have conversations together about what they wanted for their children.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: And I know that everyone listening doesn't necessarily have a partner who's at the same place in them with this. And so that's like an added layer of work that you might have to do, or conversations that you might have to have. It's a gift to have a partner who is in it with you in, in the same way and is encouraging this, but it's not a guarantee. And so I don't, I don't want people to feel bad if they haven't had these conversations with their partners or if they haven't gotten to a place where their partners agree with them necessarily. But it's still worth the conversation each time you have it, each time you go to make that choice.

Andrew: I mean the, the number, the number of emails that we've gotten from people who want an episode just on that. You know, like my partner and I are not aligned on this, and, I've struggled to figure out like, what does that episode actually look like? 'cause um, neither of us are…

Dr. Val: Therapy…

Andrew: [laughs]…marriage counselors. And I mean, there's some very genuine emails and some of them are like, you know, basically you read the subtext and it's like, help me convince my husband that he's wrong.

Dr. Val: Oh yeah.

Andrew: And so, it's a real thing. And even, you know, like Jon, Jon and Amanda certainly we're able to find alignment relatively easily, but that doesn't mean it wasn't without cost. You know, he talks about their families and their broader families' trepidation around, you know, both their living choices and their schooling choices. And I think that's another piece of countercultural pushback that, that you have to make if you are making a choice like Jon and Amanda did.

Dr. Val: No, absolutely, because if you're counting on your parents to be that extended network to help you and they're not in support, that's difficult. That's difficult. And I recognize, and I, I hope this also feels helpful for some people. Jon mentioned that he didn't really have these conversations at home growing up.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: And so just because you haven't had a chance to have these conversations growing up does not mean you can't get to a place in your adulthood where you're making decisions differently for your family. Right? And I want people to be inspired by that, right? There's, there's no expectation that you've had all of the experiences that will help you get there. Because you can find community with folks who can help you get there. Where, whenever you're able to show up.

Andrew: Yeah. And yeah, I mean, talk about the power of community. Like, there wasn't one moment, you know, it wasn't one thing that kind of all radically altered him. It was a series of things, but, but those were all about relationships. Those were all about community. You know, it was in college, meeting some new people, engaging in some new activities and starting to broaden his perspectives. And then this grad school program with like a really powerful close-knit tight group of people all engaged in a similar activity, from a wide variety of backgrounds that were able to find the space to really share their own personal experiences and find each other's shared humanity. And yeah, you know, it happened for him, you know, in his twenties. The, the power, the potential. You know why I get excited about public schools as a place to do this is like, how powerful is that when you do it at five or eight instead of 25 or 28?

Dr. Val: Yeah. And you know, your examples just remind me that the, the stamina is built with every choice that you make, right? You don't arrive, but there's lots of little choices that you can make every day that help build the stamina for this, this, and I wanna say work… [laughs]

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: But is it work to send your kid to the neighborhood school? People can argue like, no, that's not really work. And I, I might even be one to argue that, right? Because in my mind, you send your kid to the neighborhood school, that's what you do. That's always what you do. I didn't really know about shopping around, and yet we recognize this is difficult enough for us to have a whole internet podcast about it because it, it must be difficult in some instances.

Andrew: Yeah. You were asking Jon about his sort of stamina and I, I immediately recognized the, the work that he is putting in and can also imagine a listener saying like, what's so hard about that? You're just going to your neighborhood school. Like, that is actually the easier choice. You know, you are, you are doing less. And I think it is that the countercultural piece, it is the, like, how do you, how do you find community to support you in that decision?

And, you know, he said like, it's, it's easier. Like he was made to believe that the stakes were much higher than they were. And, in making this decision, there was some freedom. You know, he, he talks about how it can become crippling. It can become like overwhelming and debilitating to think about like, oh God, I have to make the exactly right decision at the right time, because otherwise my kids' life is toast. You know? And sort of the letting go of that is liberating in some ways.

So I think there's, there's ways in which, you know, sort of once you've made the decision that that it is easier. And so maybe there's a little less kind of day-to-day stamina in terms of that. But then there are constantly these messages that you get from society, from your parents, from extended family, from friends about like, well, what are you really? You're, oh, you're sending your kid there? Like, what are you doing? That you kind of constantly have to have to push back on?

And then I think the other piece of stamina is, is the relationship building that, that maybe, you know, and, and Amanda in particular mentioned that like maybe it would've been easier somewhere else. It was worth it to them and it may, but it may have been easier somewhere else. But it just took like commitment to that and trusting the process and allowing time to go by for those relationships to form.

Dr. Val: Yeah. And, and listeners recognize that we, Amanda, was our bonus guest, right?

Andrew: That's right.

Dr. Val: So we didn't know Amanda was gonna join us. And then…

Andrew: She, she was working on bedtime and then she came in…

Dr. Val: That's right. Jumps right in.

Andrew: and had to, had to hop in and correct him.

Dr. Val: That's right. And start, and start giving us some insight about what it felt like to be, the only White family or the only non biracial family in the school and being wondered if you are a gentrifier. Right? And, that's certainly not something that I have felt, in any space that I've been in, but I have felt maybe people here don't think I belong. Right? And so I think it does require a deep commitment to your values when other people might think you don't belong, but you know, you're, you're there for the right reasons and you're committed to, to being in community.

And, I think that takes work and that, that probably takes constant communication, not only with your partner but with your children, because they might feel that as well, right? And that might be new and different and sometimes difficult because as you mentioned, if we wait a long time for these integrated spaces, children start to develop their own biases based on what they know and don't know, see and don't see.

Andrew: Yeah. And the values that we communicate to them by our choices, you know, we make choices for our kids and then we talk to them about it so that they have that kind of foundation to rely upon.

And then I think the other piece is, how do you find a community? And this is where I think, you know, Integrated Schools as an organization played a role for Jon and Amanda. You know, again, there's not like one defining moment, but , this combination of things that lead you to be able to make a choice like they made. And one of those things was kind of the community support of Integrated Schools. Because I think there is this value in finding other people to be like, “Hey, I'm kind of feeling this thing. Is that. Uh oh, you're feeling it too? Okay.” Maybe it's okay. Maybe that's not a sign that I'm doing everything wrong, but that this is kind of, you know, challenging work and I'm gonna keep doing it.

Dr. Val: Yeah, absolutely. One of my favorite quotes from Amanda was, “Our biggest priority was making sure that where we were planted is where we were investing.”

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: As someone who has done her fair share of moving, it has felt difficult to like really invest locally until now. Obviously I was always, um, part of my kids' school community, always like volunteering when I could and just making sure that I was connected.

And especially in our current society, it's easy to be connected to places outside of the one you are currently in, right? You're connected to your family in a previous city or to your community that you had in college because we have the ability to do so. But we also have to choose to be invested in the places where we live if we want them to thrive. And I think that came out very clearly from the Tobins.

Andrew: Yeah. Absolutely. And you know, I do think about like there, there are certainly plenty of people who live in places that are highly segregated and, and maybe are, living in places that have a high concentration of Whiteness and wealth already. And I think there's still value in people of goodwill investing in wherever they live and kind of pushing their communities to be more open and inclusive and welcoming communities to anybody. But the idea of just go to your neighborhood school doesn't always result in your kid going to an integrating school.

And so I think there's also, value in thinking about like, how do I invest in the place that I am and also put my kids in an environment where they're gonna be exposed to the wide swath of, of people that Jon and Amanda were really looking for as an experience for their kids that I was certainly looking for.

Dr. Val: Yeah, and again, I'm inspired by scholars, but I'm deeply inspired by regular people. And obviously Jon and Amanda are wonderful people and they're also people that I can relate to because they are parents just trying to do their very best. And, I'm hoping that's what our listeners take away from this episode as well.

Andrew: Yeah. That this is an example of somebody who is thinking about their values and thinking about how they want to live into those. And again, not like the path, not like the one way to do it, but, an example of it that hopefully can inspire folks to, to figure out their own path that is, you know, also a way of living their values.

Dr. Val: Because what I've learned in this work is that you do need examples that are more aligned to like your lived experience so that you can know what's possible, right? You can be inspired by these others, but you need a community of folks who also understand your lived experience. So, I am begging our listeners to tell us your stories because we think they are important enough to have conversations about and we think that they are models in ways that you might not even know that you are inspiring someone. Right? And, be open to that ‘Yes’.

Andrew: Yeah. Send us your voice memos. Uh, tell us your stories. Go to integratedschools.org. Click on the send voicemail button or just record us a voice memo on your phone. Email it to podcast@integratedschools.org. We would be grateful for those. We are still hoping to collect some Brown V Board stories. Whatever your connection is to the case, send us those stories. We would be grateful for that as well. And of course, we would as always, be grateful for your financial support of this work, which is not without its costs. Patreon.com/integratedschools. You can throw us the cost of a coffee every month to, uh, help us keep making this podcast. We would be grateful for that.

Dr. Val: Yeah, continue to listen and share. Thank you so much for sharing all of our episodes so far this season, we've gotten great feedback from the listeners, so keep that up. We appreciate every comment, or like, or five stars. It gets the podcast into the ecosystem and we would love people to, to be a part of this conversation.

Andrew: That's right. Well, Val, thank you for bringing Jon. Um, and Jon, I guess thank you for bringing Val, uh, in this, this beautiful, beautiful circle here. Uh, it was really a lovely conversation and as always, I am grateful to be in this with you as I try to know better and do better.

Dr. Val: Until next time.