S10E19 – Reflections On Season 10

S10E19 - Reflections on Season 10

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

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

Andrew: And this is Reflections on Season 10. Val, we made it. The end of the season.

Dr. Val: We made it. Um, I know season 10 might sound like it's been 10 years. We do some fun math here, but you and I are going on almost three years of co-hosting this conversation together.

Andrew: Yeah, it's crazy. Hard to think about three years. Yeah.

Dr. Val: And how so much can change in three years. I remember earlier episodes when we were like, is this the first year of normal?

Andrew: Yep.

Dr. Val: You know, the first iteration of the pandemic as people are still, you know, grappling with how we move forward and our kids are growing older. Here I am now, I am going to have a junior and a sophomore.

Andrew: Crazy. Yeah, I will have a fifth grader and an eighth grader, they're certainly in a different place than two and a half years ago, three years ago.

Dr. Val: Yeah. So outside of our personal cool things with our young people who are thriving and doing well, and we're still very proud of the decisions that they're making, as far as young people and the choices that we made in terms of their schooling, we also had a season full of very powerful conversations.

Andrew: Yeah, 19 episodes. Some great stuff. All the way back to kicking off the season and laying out our themes that we were planning to focus on from the season all the way up to the very last episode, which was our first ever live show, that we got to share with the audience. It's been, there's been so much great stuff along the way.

Dr. Val: Yeah, absolutely. All right, so let's, let's revisit those things 'cause I think it's really important to highlight where we hoped to go in our conversations this season.

Andrew: Absolutely. We set out with this goal of talking about the importance of public schools, which certainly feels even more relevant than nine months ago when the season started. The attacks on the institution of public schooling are ongoing and serious, and we had to take those seriously.

The power of storytelling. And we've had some incredible storytellers along the way from John Blake in the second episode of the season, your friend Jon who talked about his own parenting journey, which was beautiful. The local stories that we really dug in on Denver and on Charlotte. Lots of personal storytelling.

The power of proximity, being in community, and then stamina, the power of hope. And what do we do to keep up with this work, even when it feels like it's going slower than we would like.

Dr. Val: Those are themes that are relevant throughout all of the work that, that we aim to do together and in our communities.

Andrew: Yeah. When you think back on the 18 episodes of this season, what things pop to mind as kind of highlights? They were all good.

Dr. Val: They were all good. I have not cried during an interview before. I've had lots of feelings in interviews, but since Dr. Porter like made me cry during an interview, I think that is one that really stands out to me.

Andrew: Yeah, that was Dr. Shanette Porter, The Importance of Belonging. Who gave us that unforgettable definition of belonging, as you know, a space being different because you were there, that you have changed that space.

Dr. Val: Yeah. I think it's because all of us have a desire to belong in our spaces. And Dr. Porter's definition of it, to be able to influence and have impact in that space. To say like, it belongs to me and I belong to it. And I don't know that we are good at doing that in our schools for our young people. I don't know that we all share that definition of belonging, and so if, if I had any hope with that particular episode, it's that it radically shifted what people think about belonging and how they can create spaces for young people to feel like they belong.

Andrew: Yeah, that's certainly one of the highlights for me as well. That thought about belonging. I feel like I explain to people all the time in conversations since then, I've referenced that I've sent the, clip of that, of her explaining it to so many people along the way because it really does get at this, and it's so simple and when she said it, it wasn't, it didn't feel profound. It felt like uncovering something that I knew but had never had the words to say in that way. But it was such a beautiful and succinct explanation of what belonging means and what I want for my kids, what I want for all kids.

Dr. Val: That's fascinating because I cannot say that I felt like I knew that definition in my heart but didn't have the words. And I'm wondering if this was like a White man thing, like, because you always feel like you belong and you can't influence in the. And the place belonged… like that is not something I would've ever been like. Yeah. I knew that to be true. I just didn't know how to articulate it.

And so I'm just curious about that because I think there are spaces, obviously, primarily all Black spaces, and we can connect that to the conversations that we had with Dr. Fenwick and Mr. El Mekki around the spaces that Black educators created for Black students historically and continue to create. But yeah, that wasn't that sense of belonging. Like I don't feel like I can influence or belong in every space, and I didn't recognize that I needed and wanted that until Dr. Porter put that out there for me, so yeah. That's interesting. Yeah. Yeah.

Andrew: Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure that that is tied to a like lived experience of most spaces being created for me to belong in.

Dr. Val: Yeah. I'm glad we, I'm glad we paused there. I'm glad we, I'm glad we uncovered that, that thinking. And you just sharing that helps me understand why some people might be confused why other people don't feel like they belong.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: Right. Like if some people walk into that space knowing that they belong and they never question whether they belong and they don't feel like anything needs to change cause of course they belong and they can influence. Then when we try to engage them and say like, ‘people don't belong here.’ It's a real paradox for folks. Like, why, why don't you feel like you belong?

Andrew: What's wrong with you that you don't feel like this place, space feels perfectly welcoming and like open to influence What's wrong with you that you don't feel like you can influence it? Yeah.

Dr. Val: Yes. And then if it's designed with someone other than, the most privileged or the most dominant group, that is a signal that they don't belong.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: Right. Like, Hey, this place is open to everyone. We're like, what do you mean I don't belong here?

Andrew: Because this doesn't feel like my experience of belonging, right? This feels different somehow from every other space that is how I have experienced belonging in the past.

Dr. Val: What I love and what I hope continues to happen for people is that, you know, even revisiting the, the episode in our reflections gave us an opportunity to uncover something else.

Andrew: Yeah. That was not in the outline.

Dr. Val: That was not in the outline. But I think that shows the importance of, not just being a listener, but really reflecting on it at different places in your life. So where we were when we first recorded that episode, we've had lots of life experiences since then. And of course when we think back to it and what we learn and what it means to us now, it, it adds.

Andrew: Yeah. Thanks for that.

Dr. Val: Yeah. Thank you.

Andrew: Other highlights from the season. Other… I mean, we had some incredible guests. We had…

Dr. Val: We have.

Andrew: We had Richard Rothstein with his daughter Leah, which was amazing. You know, I've been so impacted by his work along the way. Dr. Leslie Fenwick, Jim Crow's Pink Slip, and, and then, Sharif El Mekki just like such powerful, visionary people who were willing to come on and share their stories. I feel so privileged that they were willing to do that.

And Jade Adia, our you know, YA author, There Goes the Neighborhood, the book she wrote and, and sharing her story about that was amazing. And John Blake, a journalist…

Dr. Val: Oh my gosh.

Andrew: Like such incredible people.

Dr. Val: Man. We had some bangers. We had some bangers this season.

Andrew: For real, for real. But then, you know, your friend Jon, just sort of another parent sharing, his story was also so powerful. So yeah, I feel a constant sense of gratitude for people who are willing to not just come on, but then also kind of open up their hearts and their stories and, and willing to share with us.

Dr. Val: Yeah, they, they trust us, which, which we do not take for granted. We feel a deep sense of gratitude that folks are willing to come onto the show, and feel like they can trust us with their research, with their passions, with their stories, with their, with their family stories.

That, that feels really important to revisit, the conversation with Dr. Fenwick. You know, once we started talking about the, the 80 to a hundred thousand Black educators loss, the way I was able to really make that real for me is think about some of our largest college football stadiums.

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: And so I always think of that image, of a full stadium of qualified educators. Imagine a Beyonce concert full of people and all singing the lyrics to a song and chorus 'cause we know what the goal is. We believe in the goal. We are prepared to do the work, to help our young people create the future that they deserve. For that to just go away. And I say go away as if it was not like systemically decimated. Right. So for that to be destroyed and decimated is the correct way to, to talk about that. That continues to sit with me. As you know, we listened to Mr. El Mekki talk about all of the efforts he is going through to get teachers back into the field, like to get Black teachers back into it. And it feels like it's just such a loss. And I, I, I, I want us as a country to stop taking these L’s on purpose, right? Like we should stop choosing to take these L’s on purpose.

Andrew: I'm so glad we had both that Dr. Fenwick and Mr. El Mekki were willing to come on, but then we had them kind of back to back because, you think about an entire football stadium of Black educators. It's not just that we lost all of them, but they weren't just another set of educators, right? Like they brought a unique perspective, a unique skill set, a unique focus on education is liberation. A unique focus on the role that Black teachers play, not just in teaching math. Yes, in teaching math. Not just in teaching writing. Yes, in teaching writing, but also in preparing students to make the world a better place to become activists themselves, to lead the world into something bigger and brighter. So not only did we lose just the number of people, but we also lost 80,000 people who are deeply committed to that vision of education is liberation is just, yeah, it's tragic.

Dr. Val: Yeah. What I'm thinking about now and, and making connections to the other episode are our local stories, which also touched on that thread, right. Where we had opportunities as a country to make some choices that really would push us forward. And yet the local stories show us it's, it was kind all over the place. Right. Um, you wanna talk a little bit about actually doing a show about your community where you are leading that conversation?

Andrew: Yeah. I mean, that was really special. I'm glad we got to share it here. Really glad we got to share it locally. Putting that whole event together was a chance to really go deep on Denver and like what were the specific choices that were made? Who were the people involved? What were they thinking at the time? Where were the sort of good intentions? Where were the unfulfilled promises. Where were the barriers, the things that got in the way of maybe doing it in a more helpful way.

And it certainly helped me, I think, understand the national context better cause those same sorts of things were happening in so many different places. And so then to go deep in Charlotte and hear a similar timeline, a similar story of people really fighting for this change, the change happening, and then getting to this point where the government just sort of threw up its hands and said, all right, we've done all we can, let's, give up on this endeavor. You know, I think there's a similar story throughout the country in, in local places. And so it was really great, I think, to go deep into those local details in both of those places.

Dr. Val: Yeah, absolutely. During the time where we were recording those local stories, I had a chance to listen to Ruby Bridges, who is, is the model of what we think about when we think about Brown V Board, right? Like she is the image that we all have stamped in our memories and our hearts when we think about school desegregation during that time.

Ms. Bridges, if you are out there listening and you wanna come on the show, we would love to have you. . We officially have celebrated the 70th anniversary of Brown v Board, but the work continues and so the stories and really keeping those front and center continue because we are not too far off at all of that generation.

Andrew: Right.

Dr. Val: Right. And those stories are gonna be vital for us to continue to learn from, to not make the same mistakes. So please tell your story because if it was not for Dr. Fenwick digging back into the archives, I wouldn't have known that story. Right. If it was not for the Rothsteins and their work, I wouldn't have known the stories and, it does not have to be one that is like rooted in some academic study because I also need John Blake's story and I also need my friend Jon’s story, right? And I also need the fiction stories that are rooted in like a real experience like Jade shared with us, right? We need these stories in order to, to learn and to connect and to not forget.

Andrew: Yep. Yeah, absolutely. So, unsurprisingly, the next thing I'm gonna do is ask you to send us voice memos, because that's…

Dr. Val: That's right.

Andrew: what we do. So send us a voice memo, speakpipe.com/integratedschools. Go to the integratedschools.org website and click the ‘Send us a voicemail’ button on the side. We want to hear your stories, share them. They are important. And speaking of voice memos, Val, we've got a few to share. Some people have called in over the past couple of months reflecting on some of the episodes, and so let's take a listen to Susan from Lancaster who called in after that episode with your friend Jon.

Susan from Lancaster: Hi, this is Susan calling from Lancaster, PA, and I just wanted to let you know that I listened to the latest episode and it was awesome. It reminded me of like old school Integrated Schools podcast. It was so, it was so much fun, and I left with a couple of thoughts and one was the impact of grandparents on the school decision, because that's something around here that happens a lot where grandparents have offered to pay for their grandchildren's tuition at the local prep school and you know, saying like, don't send your child to this school. We'll pay the $25,000 or $30,000 for your child to go here. So I thought that was an interesting comment that he made around their families not being supportive.

The other thing I wanted to say was our children are now older and in high school. I had a really amazing moment the other day where my son randomly said, ‘thank you guys so much for sending me to the school district because I wouldn't want to go to any other school in this county.’ He's on a sports team and he goes to schools all over the county and sometimes beyond, and he can't stop commenting about, you know, how White the schools are and how awful he feels like it would be to go to those schools. And it's just interesting now that our kids are getting older and they have thoughts and opinions about our decisions that we made for them, and then thanking us for the decision, like it really was such a validation.

So I think it would be interesting to have a conversation with these kids. Like my son would be probably willing, I don't wanna say he would do it, but he’d probably be willing to kind of talk about what his school has been like. He's now a freshman. And he's gone to the school district, which is still, after all these years, only 11% White. So, he has gone to the school district since he was in kindergarten and now he's in high school. And I think that parents who are going through that decision, it might be interesting for them to hear from kids themselves now whose parents made that decision and how much it's impacted them. So those are the things I wanted to say. Thank you so much.

Andrew: Thank you Susan. Lovely reflections.

Dr. Val: Oh, and it sounds like we have a guest for next season, Susan and her son. Susan, please pick up the phone when we call you. Um, I wanna touch on the grandparent comment. And that's interesting because where it took me was me as a grandparent having an opinion about where my grandkids should go to school and I think what felt easy for me and my situation, and I, I'm assuming it's the same for you, it was kind of a no brainer, like, you are going to the local public school. We'll invest in the public school. We believe in public schools. There wasn't the pressure of feeling like this school isn't good enough. But I can imagine that would be a lot of pressure. Because, I mean, hello, we can't even have like Thanksgiving dinner sometimes with families, right?

And now I have all this pressure. You're gonna give me money and, and I'm not gonna feel like a good parent if I'm not following through on your suggestion for school. That has to be a lot. So for anyone who's out there, trying to navigate that relationship with your parents and what they think is best for your kids' school, I, I, I just wanna recognize and name that. I see that that's a hard decision. And once we get Susan on the podcast with her son, who can let you know it's gonna be okay. Um, I hope you have, the strength that you need to say this is, this is the decision we're making and why.

Andrew: Yeah. Thank you for calling and sharing. Susan. Let's take a listen to Sarah from New Haven.

Sara from New Haven: Hi Val and Andrew all at Integrated Schools podcast. This is Sarah White mom from New Haven, Connecticut. I have been following integrated schools even before you started the podcast, and I really appreciate your work. My family's journey to this, to actually public school has been a rather twisty journey. My husband and I met as Peace Corps volunteers, and one thing that we had in common is that we both graduated high school from, uh, fancy private prep schools, boarding schools. So when it came to thinking about having children and how we were gonna educate them, we had this plan that we were gonna actually work at boarding schools. So we could do it that way.

Well fast forward many, many years and, we started to really think deeply about what we believed in schools and what good education meant. And, Nikole Hannah Jones's work on schools was one of the kind of prompting things that really kicked our asses. I spent the majority of my career actually working in independent schools, IE private schools, and we had children in the private elementary school. So as we were kind of undoing and trying to figure out this idea about public schools as public good, which was not something that either of our families, we really talked about, and you know, how we felt about community, how we felt about anti-racist, anti-bias work about racial equity. We were really growing more and more uncomfortable. Because things were not aligning.

And ultimately we made the choice to move our three sons into New Haven Public Schools, which is a district that is a global majority district because the majority of White families, White and or privileged families opt out of the public school district here.

So, I'm curious about others who maybe were raised with similar backgrounds to my husband and I and how they came to integrated schools or how they're making different choices for their own kids. But the other piece that I think would be interesting, for exploration, is that our youngest son is a senior in high school. So we're kind of at the tail end of the pre-K 12, and we are gonna be looking for ways to remain in the work as non-current parents.

So I just wanna thank you all and , for your work and this exploration of very different choices from our own backgrounds, and then also, how to be in community and advocacy when you actually don't have kids in the school district anymore. All right. Cheers. Thank you for the conversation.

Dr. Val: Sara, thank you so much for listening. Being a follower before the podcast. So thank you for being around and in the work for so long. I'm with you with the how to remain engaged in the work. And I think, you know, Andrew, we've had a couple of different interviews at this point now where I'm like, oh, I can definitely do that once the kids…

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: …school lunches I'm in. Right? So I invite any listener who is at that, that space where your kids are no longer in school, that there are still ways that you can get involved and you might even feel like you are able to be more involved because you aren't…

Andrew: Shuttling kids around to activities.

Dr. Val: Right. I think we have to be intentional about staying engaged though, because it's easy to say, okay, I, I'm, I'm no longer doing this. Or I've aged out. And I know for me personally, it's something that I think about, like how do I remain engaged.

Andrew: Yeah.

Dr. Val: And I'm actually looking forward to that part.

Andrew: Yeah, I think getting into schools is such a key piece because I think it's easy to get caught up in the kind of external conversations about education and feel like the way to get involved is, you know, to join the Facebook groups or whatever. And I do think that, if you've got time and you can dedicate an hour a week or two hours a week to actually show up in a school building and go and, you know, help some kids with some extra reading or help some teachers with some lunchroom duty or whatever it is that that school needs, that that kind of being in the school and being part of the school community feels like a way to stay connected to the actual community and what the real needs are, because I do think that sometimes the, the chatter about education can get divorced from what's actually happening in the schools.

Dr. Val: Yeah, I can imagine there's, it's very easy to get caught up in an old narrative if you haven't spent any time there. And we don't want that.

Andrew: Thank you for calling and sharing that, Sarah. We've got a couple more here, Mary from Madison. She had just listened to the Dr. Porter episode about belonging.

Dr. Val: Let's do it.

Mary from Madison: Hi Integrated Schools. This is Mary from Madison, and I just listened to the episode about the importance of belonging. It was wonderful. Um, it reminded me of a metric that my district used to record, which I can't seem to find anymore, but they would actually ask every child, do you feel like you belong in this school? And that information was then publicly available for every single school throughout the district, and it was also broken down by race. So they were able to better understand, are children feeling like they belong at school and hopefully, making it so that children do feel that way if they are not. And I just thought that was a really interesting metric that I hadn't seen in other districts before. Thanks.

Andrew: Thank you, Mary. Dr. Porter, she's done a lot of work on this, what does it mean to actually try to capture data about how kids feel regarding belonging. But it made me think of Anna Cole from our live show talking about their school district where their Latina families felt like they belonged because they were half of the school, but they didn't feel like they had power. And so, you know, how do we capture both? Do you feel like you belong, like this space is for you, but that, to take that next step of Dr. Porter's definition of belonging, is the space different because you're there? Are you changing the space while you're there? Do you have the power to make the space different?

Dr. Val: Yeah. I think asking the question whether or not you belong is a great first step and then we have to continue to get to know our young people and their families about what that actually means.

So you mentioned the power example, but I might feel like I belong 'cause I have a really good group of friends, right? I might feel like I don't belong 'cause I don't really have a group of friends. But it's not because it's anything the school has done necessarily. Right. And so, I hope that any systems who are using those types of surveys, that they aren't stopping there, that there, there really is a commitment to understand what someone means by that when they say that they belong.

Andrew: Yeah, that's such a great point because I think, Dr. Porter's definition of belonging felt so important. And I think so often, like everyone's looking for the silver bullet. So it's like, oh, well maybe belonging is the thing, if we just get belonging right then, everything else will sort itself out.

And for one thing, like even if you nailed belonging in the most true way, still gonna probably be other issues. You still have resource issues, you still have curriculum issues, those sorts of things. But how do we measure belonging? Well, let's ask kids if they feel like they belong. And if we don't do that next step of really getting to know kids, so what does that kid mean when he says he belongs? Versus what does that girl mean when she says she belongs? Is that the same thing that we're actually getting at? Which requires those relationships, which requires knowing people, which requires seeing kids as fully formed human beings who bring their own full sense of humanity into a school. You've gotta get to know people to know, like, are we actually capturing the thing that we, we wanna be capturing?

Dr. Val: Right, right.

Andrew: Thanks for that Mary.

Dr. Val: Thank you so much, Mary.

Andrew: All right, we've got two more. Liz, who was at the live show. Woohoo! Here’s what Liz had to say.

Liz: Hey, Val and Andrew. This is Liz. A White non-parent and former teacher, current grad student who was able to attend the event last night. I had a lovely time, learned so much about the history of Brown, how that's shaped the modern context, and really how we can rededicate ourselves as a nation to pursue true integration.

My homework is to do some more research on how abolitionist practice can be interwoven, not only into my research, but also to hopefully be embodied in how I show up in the everyday world. Thank you all again for all that you do. I really love listening to your podcast and can't wait to hear this episode.

Andrew: Thank you, Liz.

Dr. Val: That's exciting. That okay… One, I hope that we would revisit our live episode, which was so amazing.

Andrew: So amazing.

Dr. Val: So I couldn't really put our live episode in the list of episodes because it deserves…

Andrew: It's owns. Yep. Yep.

Dr. Val: It deserves its own category. And obviously I'm super thrilled that Liz, thank you for not only being there in the audience, sharing that you learned something, but calling us to talk about your next steps in the work.

And I think what Liz just modeled for all of us is that one, we have things to continue to learn and how do we apply our learning so that it becomes part of our identity, right? And so if we are identifying as an abolitionist of oppressive practices, then how do I show up that way?

Andrew: How do I embody that? I love that. Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Val: That's right. And Liz did it from a non-parent perspective. So just touching on some of the other callers, right? You don't have to be a parent to be all in and I love that.

Andrew: Yeah. That was lovely, Liz. We appreciate that call and appreciate you having been at the event. You're one of the fortunate 300 or so people who got to see it live. Now everybody has had a chance to listen to it, but that was, yeah, certainly a highlight of the podcast, a highlight of the season, highlight of my year, being able to be in the historic space of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in the Oprah Winfrey Theater to be able to, you know, engage in these conversations that we get to do, just you and I behind the microphones alone, um, in front of an audience with incredible panelists. That was yeah.

Dr. Val: Oh my gosh. Dream come true. Dream come true, and we hope to invite some of those panelists onto their own episodes. So stay tuned. You'll get to hear more from them hopefully soon.

Andrew: Yes. Um, one final, very touching voice memo, from Emily after we replayed Courtney Mykytyn’s final episode. Just two episodes ago, we replayed her episode called, All I Want for Christmas is 3.5%, and Emily was moved by that and called in to share this voice memo.

Emily from Charlottesville: Hey, Andrew and Val. My name's Emily. I'm a White mom living in Charlottesville, and I just listened to the podcast rebroadcasting with Andrew and Courtney. Um, her last podcast and I'm just really moved and wanted to send you guys a voicemail. Um, I forgot that she and I share a birthday, which is also the anniversary of Brown versus Board.

Um, I wanted to let you know, I'm just really moved by the work that you guys do and um, I wanted to make sure that you knew that because I know as you guys talked about in that podcast, it can be kind of slow work that's so important and um, I just really appreciate all that you guys do, and I'm here with you on this journey here in Charlottesville. Thanks.

Andrew: Thank you, Emily.

Dr. Val: Yeah. You know, um, part of the very special experience of doing our live show in DC is that we got a chance to convene face to face with many people in the Integrated Schools community. And I don't remember at what point in the weekend that I leaned over and said this to you, but I, I said like, ‘Courtney would be so happy.’ So happy of the work and how it's growing and just. I never had a chance to meet her. I feel, such a, such an honor and responsibility being in the seat and continuing the conversation and, and doing what I can to, to help the work move forward.

Andrew: Absolutely. Yep. Thank you for that, Emily. Thank you for that Val. Yes. I think, yeah, that would've, would've been quite special for Courtney, I think, to see all those people that she gathered together many years ago all sharing space and all continuing to move this work along.

So speaking of moving this work along season 11, we'll get started in the fall. We'll be working over the summer, recording some of those episodes to have for you, but we will be back in the fall. And, what are you looking forward to for season 11, Val?

Dr. Val: Well, I'm looking forward to the record number of voice memos that we'll get from folks because that's gonna happen. Um, I'm looking forward to continuing to identify guests who have something to share. And I, again, I wanna emphasize that you might not think it's a big deal, but we absolutely think every story matters. So we want that to be you.

I'm sure there'll be some powerful pieces of, of research and literature and art that we can grapple with, in this next season. I think the beautiful part is like we don't actually know what the world is going to give us. Oh wait. I just realized this is our next season will be like in the middle of election season, so that should be fun too.

Andrew: That’ll be something. It'll be something for sure.

Dr. Val: That’ll be something, yes.

Andrew: So yeah, keep, keep sending us your voice memos. There's stuff that I'm excited to talk about, stuff that's come up that we have not, yet fully dug into that we need to, I know we are due for another special ed episode. We kind of scratched the surface of back in season nine and probably need to revisit that.

We've had a number of people write in about, couples who aren't aligned on this choice and, and what to do about that. And so if you're out there, if that's your story, if you and your partner were not necessarily aligned and you got to a better place, call in share. We'd love to hear that story and be able to share it with some other people too.

I think, you know, student voices always, always important. As Susan mentioned, getting some kind of kids who are on the, the tail end of their integrating school experiences and having them tell their stories, something we're definitely looking forward to. So if you've got a kid who'd be willing to share their story, definitely let us know.

Book bans, science of reading, more local stories. There's all sorts of stuff that feels, exciting to potentially talk about. And like you said, who knows what the world will throw at us between now and then. So we are always open to your ideas. So definitely send us an email or a voice memo and let us know what you'd like us to talk about next season.

Dr. Val: Andrew, this has been one for the books.

Andrew: It has.

Dr. Val: You know, I'm, I'm, I'm not good at goodbyes. And for, for the listeners, uh, Andrew and I will continue to talk all the time. You don't have to worry about that. But there, there will be a break where we don't get a chance to, to engage with you, but know that we're working, and we're excited about whatever is gonna come our way. So Andrew, thank you. Thank you for your friendship.

Andrew: Thank you, Val. Yeah,

Dr. Val: No thank you. Yeah, this…

Andrew: It's, it has been, yes, we have, we have gone a lot of places this season. We got to see each other in person. It's been great to develop our friendship even further. It's something I'm constantly grateful for and also grateful for all of the other people who make integrated schools turn.

So a big shout out to all of our volunteers, our new board of directors. So excited about the work that's coming out of the board of directors for the organization, our chapter and network leaders. If you have not connected with your local chapter, head over to the website integratedschools.org/chapters and figure out if there's somebody in your neighborhood. If there's not, maybe it's you. Um, shoot us an email and let us know. Hello@integrated schools.org. We'd love to continue to grow our local chapters. There's so much great stuff happening there.

All of our guests who came on, who shared their stories, who shared their research, who shared their personal histories and what brings them to this work, deeply grateful to you all. To the Century Foundation and National Coalition of School Diversity, American Institutes of Research for giving us the privilege of facilitating the panel conversations at our very first live show. So grateful for that opportunity. That was really a treat for us.

And for all of you listeners out there listening, sharing, those of you who have joined our Patreon, patreon.com/integrated schools who are supporting this work, we are grateful to all of you.

Dr. Val: Keep listening, keep sharing, keep revisiting and reflecting because you will continue to grow throughout this process. Your young people will continue to grow and your ideas will change.

Andrew: Absolutely. Well, Val, my biggest thanks is to you for joining me in this journey. It is a true honor to be in this with you week after week, as I try to know better and do better.

Dr. Val: Until next season.