Creating a Culture of Honor in Education: An Interview with Andratesha Fritzgerald ~ 1102

Tim Villegas
Hi friends, I’m Tim Villegas from the Maryland Coalition for Inclusive Education, and you’re listening to Think Inclusive, our podcast that brings you conversations about inclusive education and what inclusion looks like in the real world. It’s good to be back with weekly episodes of Think Inclusive. Last week, we talked with Dr. Shelley Moore about the five P’s of inclusive education with a focus on what inclusion looks like in secondary schools. Make sure to check out episode one of season 11 after you hear from our amazing guest.

Andratesha Fritzgerald is the founder and lead consultant of Building Blocks of Brilliance, an educational consulting firm. As an international speaker, Fritzgerald exhibits an audacious perseverance that calls organizations to evolve into inclusive, anti-racist safe zones for all learners. With over 20 years in education, she has served as a teacher, curriculum specialist, administrator, and director. Her award-winning book, Antiracism and Universal Design for Learning: Building Expressways to Success, has been a catalyst for UDL to ensure safety and radical inclusion in every learning community.

For this episode, Andratesha discusses the importance of creating a culture of honor in educational spaces as opposed to a culture of power. She explains that codes of power are rules created by those in power that limit the access and opportunities of marginalized individuals. In contrast, codes of honor empower all members of the learning community and invite their voices and experiences to the table. Fritzgerald emphasizes the need for intentional efforts to break down the limitations of the culture of power and create inclusive environments where every learner is seen, heard, and supported.

Thank you so much to our incredible sponsor for this week’s episode, Changing Perspectives, an international nonprofit that partners with schools and districts to create inclusive and equitable learning communities for all students. They offer customizable teacher trainings, family workshops, and curriculum resources. They’ve already helped over 300,000 students, 12,000 teachers, and 500 schools. Visit their website at changingperspectivesnow.org to learn more and schedule a free meeting.

Oh, I am so excited for you to hear our conversation today. And just for a little bit of context, Andratesha and I recorded this interview on June 30, 2023, the day that the Supreme Court issued its biggest rulings of the year. So just know that the weight of those decisions influenced our conversation. Make sure you hang around till the end of the interview with Andratesha, where we both answer this episode’s slightly morbid mystery question.

And for free time this week, we have our very own Carolyn Teigland, CEO of MCIE. Carolyn and I talked about working with partners who are in states and districts where there has been an effort to stamp out language like diversity, equity, and inclusion.

After a short break, my interview with Andratesha Fritzgerald.

Tim Villegas
Andratesha Fritzgerald, welcome to the Think Inclusive podcast.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Thank you so much for having me, Tim.

Tim Villegas
I just want to address the elephant in the room: we’re recording on a not-so-great day, news-wise. So if you hear a little bit of that in our tone, that’s probably where it’s coming from. I just want to acknowledge that, however this plays out in our conversation.

Andratesha, I had the pleasure of listening and watching your keynote at the 2023 Supporting Inclusive Practices Conference, Inclusion from the Ground Up, and it was fantastic. The first time I heard you speak—it was amazing. So thank you for your thoughts. You talked specifically about the distinction between a culture of power and a culture of honor. I know our audience doesn’t have context for that, so I was wondering if you could share what you mean by those terms, because I thought they were really fascinating.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
I’m so excited to speak with you today. And I know that, as you said, the elephant in the room will no doubt make its way into the conversation when we think about codes of power versus codes of honor.

Codes of power was a term from an article written by Lisa Delpit in 1988. What breaks my heart about what I’m about to share with you is that I wish this 1988 article was out of date, that it was no longer contextual, that it didn’t make sense for educational spaces—but it still does.

From this article about codes of power, I propose creating intentionally codes of honor. Codes of power are where issues of power are enacted in the classroom, where those who have the power create rules that those who are not a part of the culture of power may or may not have access to. If you are a participant in the culture of power, then you know the rules, and it makes it easier for you to navigate—not necessarily to gain power, but easier to navigate. Those who have the power will be less likely or less aware to acknowledge that this power or this culture of power even exists.

With the codes of honor that I propose, we have to be intentional. We have to put in effort and time to break down the limitations of the culture of power and create a culture of honor. How do we do that? We are purposeful and intentional, explicitly naming where the codes of power place limits on those who are marginalized historically and traditionally. We have to empower members of every learning community daily in our supports, choices, and structures. We have to make an effort to ensure that every member of the learning community is invited into positions of power.

In a culture of power, I make the decision for you. I decide the consequences, and you just have to deal with it because we’ve made the rules. Everyone plays by the rules, whether you know them or not. We hold you accountable to those rules.

In a culture of honor, we co-create the environment that we are holding ourselves accountable to. There’s a humility—even as a teacher, I take myself out of that power position and allow you to make decisions for yourself that govern your best outcomes. Of course, I facilitate and support and create structures, but there is an element of co-design that invites your voice powerfully to the table—not just your voice, your experiences. What you know for sure, what you struggle with, is all welcome in a culture of honor.

I don’t want you to have to decompartmentalize the most important aspects of yourself to be the picture of success because of my power. I want you to bring everything about who you are, what you want, and what you need into this space because I honor you. Together, with that honor, we co-create a learning community where learning is safe, welcoming, inclusive. Those are the only kinds of environments where the brain can actually learn anyway.

Tim Villegas
Where do these codes of power even come from? Is it just historically how we’ve run schools—you have the one teacher and your 20-ish students, and whatever the teacher says, that’s it? There’s no more discussion? I mean, where does it all come from?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
When I speak to teachers, professors, designers of learning experiences around the country, the number one area of pushback I get when I introduce this culture of honor as a way of shaping instructional experiences is: What if I’m not taken seriously as a teacher? What if they take over? What if they take advantage of the structures or being able to make choices?

When you unravel all of those questions and those what-ifs, there is fear. In a culture of power, there is comfort in knowing that what I say won’t be challenged. If it is—if it’s a nail that sticks up—I hammer it down. I will be in control. I will be in charge. I will be the authority. Power that operates that way is comfortable because what they like, what they need, and what they say is the moving factor in their learning environment—not what the students need, not what breeds learning, but what breeds their comfort.

Fear is not a good driver. It’s a great indicator to let you know, hey, there’s something going on, something to look into, something to lean into. But it is not a good driver. We’re in educational spaces where fear of the students we serve has been a driver. And when those students have been historically and traditionally marginalized—our Black students, our Brown students, our students with disabilities, students who identify as LGBTQ—there is a fear of who you serve. And when you are afraid of your students, you can’t truly teach them. There is no transmission of content where fear is a barrier.

Instead of addressing that barrier of fear, it’s a lot more comfortable to just say, it’s the students, or they haven’t done this, because it maintains my power. But in a culture of honor, it requires humility by those who are charged with the responsibility of creating the learning environment. That humility allows us to create this inter-accountability that lets us co-design so that each of us has what we need.

Usually, when I’m thinking about honor and power together, I think people can hear the difference. On the first day of school, when we are sharing our responsibilities—whether it’s a syllabus or those little sign-off forms we have in K–12 that we send home for parents to sign—there’s a very different environment when I say, “Hey, it’s the first day. Here’s what can happen here. Here’s what can’t happen. This is what I’ll do if you don’t. Here are the rules. You either follow them or you must go.” That’s power.

But if on the first day, you come in and say, “Hey, there are some things that I would love in order to teach. There are some things that each of you will need in order to learn. Let’s co-create a set of expectations that we can hold each other accountable to for the entire school year. If we need to revisit them, we will. But we need to make sure that—what happens when I step on your toes? What happens when you step on mine? How can we create some expectations together to make sure that we are a community?” That’s honor.

Honor and power sound very different. They play out very differently in creating an environment that lets the brain know: You are safe here. You are welcome here. You are wanted here. And you don’t have to be perfect to exist here and become the picture of success for yourself and for others.

Tim Villegas
That’s the kind of class I want to be in.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Yes, please. I really—I took a course last summer in a subject area that was not very familiar to me. It was one of the first times I’d been in a classroom that was not universally designed or really from that education viewpoint in a very long time. What I found is that when I have the tools as an expert learner—meaning I know what I need, I know how I learn best—even if the environment is not created for me, I was very aware that this course was created as what higher education loves to brag about as a weed-out course.

I can universally design the course for myself to ensure that I’m successful in the end, even if the course was not universally designed. I had to put in a lot of extra time and effort to make sure that my outcome was successful, but I knew how to do that.

Anytime I’m working with students, whether they are in ninth grade English or teachers who are furthering their education, I help them learn more about how they learn so they can be their best advocate in any learning space. Even if the classroom is not universally designed—we hope that it is—but even if it’s not, and many of our students, especially Black and Brown students, will go into places that are designed for their failure and not for their success. But if I know what I need, then no one can take that away from me.

When we talk about expert learners, those are learners who are empowered with information, with resources, but also know how to ask for support and where to find it—even if the course is not engineered for you to succeed.

Tim Villegas
So how do we get expert learners then? This sounds like these are the kinds of learners we want, especially in higher education. But we have to train them or we have to support them to get to that place, right?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
We have to train and support them while we push the system to become what learners need. I believe we have to work on both sides. With Universal Design for Learning—and you know that UDL is a framework that takes over 30 years of brain research to protect how humans learn—instead of having students walk into the room and expecting self-regulation, we design our courses to build the self-regulation muscle.

To have students know what helps them focus, do they notice what happens in their body when they’re not focused? Are they able to bring themselves back quickly? If we are not designing courses for learners to begin to think about who they are as learners, and we only design courses for them to think about who they’re not as learners, then the failure is on the instructor.

I love that Universal Design for Learning has this research on how humans learn. We have to be diligent to match that with an anti-racist approach to protect the humanity of those humans who are learning with us. Anti-racist strategies require humility, require us to look at the barriers, to look at racism and ableism as barriers to learning and instruction.

When we are more aware of our biases, more aware of the lack of diversity in our scholarship, more aware of where we can set up structures that will lead to success for students—it cannot be cookie-cutter. Every term, even every day, the students who are in front of us, the learners who are with us, are different. That means the barriers are going to be different. What they need in order to learn and grow from our content is going to be different.

I cannot prescribe to you what you need, but I can certainly learn more about how my design impacts your success and your outcome. That is an inter-accountable exchange that has to happen in learning. I find that the Universal Design for Learning framework invites us into that conversation when we acknowledge this dynamic of power and intentionally move towards a culture of honor.

Tim Villegas
So you’ve written a book called Antiracism and Universal Design for Learning: Building Expressways to Success. You touched a little bit on it, but how are antiracism and UDL connected?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
When we look at that body of research in Universal Design for Learning, the three principles of UDL are multiple means of engagement, which really means that there’s more than one way to experience support. We design our lessons and classrooms around helping learners know what they need to keep focused, to stay motivated, to find purpose—even in things that are not necessarily interesting to them.

So how can I take what I know about myself and apply that in a classroom setting to keep myself moving toward the goal? Universal Design for Learning asks us as instructors to think about how to design those aspects into the core. Recruiting interest means that what you’re interested in has value here.

Now, from an antiracist lens, what that means is—even if our cultures are different, or our backgrounds are different, or interests are different—my interests are not supreme to the learners in the classroom. I have to be intentional about mining for what is of value to you, what is important to you, and allowing that to be brought into the classroom in a way that enhances your learning and also enhances mine.

That means I’m constantly learning how to reach you, how to bend the curriculum toward you intentionally and purposefully. Who you are matters here—to your focus, to your motivation, to your purpose. That means I need to know a little bit about your outcomes. Where do you want to go?

My book Antiracism and Universal Design for Learning has a subtitle: Building Expressways to Success. In this book, I encourage teachers not to determine the outcome for students, not to choose the destination for them. But kind of like driver’s ed—once you learn the skills to drive for yourself, then you choose the destination. You know how to get there. You know what you need. You know what comforts are important to you, what music you’ll select. You get to decide when you’re in the driver’s seat.

But without the skills to do the driving, you can’t get to your destination. I don’t want to choose the destination for you. I want my instruction to be powerful enough for you to learn so much more about yourself as a learner that as you take and apply this content, these connections, this motivation and purpose to your overall goal, you have a “why” in mind and a purpose that I come alongside to make sure you get to where you need to go.

So multiple means of engagement really pushes us to focus on the student and the barriers that the student identifies, as well as the ones we can perceive along with them, to help them figure out: How do we decrease these barriers? How does my design eliminate the barriers to make sure you’re on the road to where you want to go—not where society thinks you should be, not where someone else has decided for you, but where you truly want to go.

Every learner, whether they’re in Pre-K or a GED program or higher education, they know where they want to go. That may change, that may evolve as they learn themselves. It is our responsibility to yield to the learner and engage them in ways that will push them toward their future.

Tim Villegas
I love that. I love that analogy. I’m a former educator, former special education teacher. I worked in public schools for 16 years. In my teacher ed program, you had a mix of authoritative and authoritarian styles of what you should be portraying. And I feel like in the special ed education field and sphere, I was most often instructed: never let them see you cry, never let them get away with all of these things. It was much more that you were the ultimate authority in the classroom, and you had to make sure that your students—well, that’s why we talked about classroom management, right? Behavior management. We are managing the students’ behaviors.

But the longer I was in education, the more I realized that dynamic wasn’t really positive. It was fear-based, which is what you’re talking about. Why is building relationships with your learners—figuring out what they like, what their passions are, figuring out where they want to go—why is that really important?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
It honors them as human beings to say that there is something of value that you bring just because you’re present. When you come into the room, I think there has been some schools of thought that see students as empty vessels waiting to be filled. I believe that our minors come to us fully human. It’s up to us to design an experience, to engineer solutions alongside them, that really brings forth cultural funds of knowledge—the things that they know—that help parents connect powerfully with the curriculum in ways that they can see those connections at home.

I remember my son had an assignment. It was just a cutout of a right angle: find as many right angles in your home as you possibly can. So here we are all around the house with this right angle cutout. It gave us a chance to say, “I know what a right angle is.” Of course, we knew, but for my son to say, “I get it. I know what a right angle is. I know where to find them. And if they’re all over the house, I get the fact that there’s something important about them.”

We can connect powerfully to experiences and backgrounds and culture and humanity if we are intentional about doing so. That means we have to be diligent to place ourselves in the position of learner. Just as we expect our students to come in and place themselves in the position of learner for content, we also have to reassure them and create systems and structures that say: you are also teacher here, you are also expert here.

When we stop trying to be the expert on others—I am not an expert on who you are, or how you’re experiencing today, or what you went through last night, or how you feel in this moment. What I am an expert on is myself and helping to design this experience so that your expertise and my expertise are not in battle, but that we can honor one another—even on days when we aren’t getting along the best—that we have a way to honor one another.

I invite your brilliance into this space. I believe that you are competent, and you show me those competent ways. We’ll find ways to blast any barriers that are holding you back from moving forward in your learning, your leading, your teaching, and your growing. There’s a destination that you have, that you want to get to. Even if you haven’t shared that with me fully, we have to first have a relationship so that we understand the roles that we hold in each other’s lives and how we are expecting each other to grow together this year.

The role that is not just most important between teacher and student, but building a community so that students get to see other students as experts on themselves as well as on the content area. We can share that space of expertise as a community. But it doesn’t happen by accident. It happens with intentionality and effort. That means we have to be cognizant of the barriers that exist. We have to be honest about history and marginalization. We have to be honest about where systems have not been built for all students.

Inclusion is not an option. It’s not something that you opt in or opt out of. Every student not just feels included, but is actually included in decision-making, in policies, in classroom organization, in setting up the expectations, in navigating how they attack assignments or which assignments are most salient to them. This is what Universal Design for Learning is.

But we have to attach that Universal Design for Learning to an intentional effort to be honest about what schools have been—particularly for students of color, for students with disabilities, for anyone who has not been the norm in any way, shape, or form. We must disrupt normative language in that way to make sure that every student sees themselves as the picture of success and that the possibilities to the destination they choose are endless and supported in ways that traditional education has not done. With Universal Design for Learning and antiracism, we are intentional and putting all efforts knowing that this must be done—no action.

Tim Villegas
Inclusion often gets characterized as a one-size-fits-all solution. And I’ve also heard UDL—and it’s mostly just from people who don’t understand what it means. I love how you talk about the three aspects of UDL. How do you respond to this critique?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Inclusion cannot be one-size-fits-all. And neither can Universal Design for Learning, because part of Universal Design for Learning is being very crystal clear about what the goals are. Once we are clear on what the goals are for the learning, the second step is to really be honest and diligent to study and research what the barriers are.

The barriers cannot be one-size-fits-all because we have variability in our classrooms, which is our strength. The barriers to learning for one student may be different from others. There are some that may overlap. But once we get smart about the barriers together as a learning community, then we begin that process of designing, which keeps in mind the individual barriers the students are experiencing.

Here’s the part that I think people either misunderstand or misrepresent: learners get to make the choices. They get to make the choices. The more we learn about the barriers, the more our design is informed to eliminate those barriers. As we eliminate those barriers, students are free to make choices about how they take in information, make choices about how they show what they know, and even make choices about what they use as supports on their learning journey.

This is the part that makes it individual—that is not one-size-fits-all. Of course, the more we learn about the barriers, the more options we have to have available. The more options we have available, we don’t prescribe. It’s not like medicine. We don’t say, “Hey, here’s your barrier, I have engineered a full set of solutions for you.” No. Every learner gets to say, “Hey, there are some strategies that I would like to try.”

Even if there’s a strategy that I may have in mind—because honestly, there’s like, “Oh, I think this will be good for this one”—even if there’s one that I have in mind that the student does not choose, they have the freedom to try different strategies, to try different supports, to try different seats in the room. Always through the lens of: Did it bring about the outcome that you were hoping for? What would you like to do differently? What have you learned about yourself as a learner?

Again, that is always individual. What do you learn about yourself as a learner? How can we put that into play? Are there strategies that meet your needs? Are there barriers still in the way? This process never ends. We constantly learn and we grow as a community.

Again, it’s not the teacher learns about the student and then makes it happen for the student. We’re a community of learners where I’m learning about my instruction, you’re learning about yourself as an instructor for yourself. And along with me: Is my teaching meeting your needs? Is the curriculum bending toward you? Is there a disconnect? Is it culture? Is it background? Is it support? Is it strategy?

These questions become second nature in a universally designed learning environment where support is normalized and not villainized. Everybody takes the space they need to be well. This is inclusion in the most powerful way.

I don’t have to come into the room and announce, “I cannot hear well, please turn on the closed captions.” Universal Design says there are some predictable things that people will need. So I’m going to use closed captions. I’m going to use pictures. I’ll use stories. I’ll use words. I’m going to use experiences. You may be able to stand up when I’m talking. You may need a chair. There are roles. There are a number of decisions that you can make for yourself. Why? Because I trust you to be the expert on you.

And in those areas where you don’t have language to articulate, or maybe you don’t know what it is that you need, this is where we enter into partnership. And we grow together until you have answers for you that show up in your outcomes. The outcomes tell us if we’re growing together as a community. This is honor in action.

Tim Villegas
So this—I can imagine someone listening to this conversation and being like, you know, this sounds great for middle school or high school. But what about an elementary school? These kids don’t know what they want. They may choose the wrong kind of support or—going back to what you said before—what if they take advantage? Help educate or talk down an educator who may be thinking those things right now.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Assuming the students don’t know what they want is assuming that students are not human. I have seen preschoolers articulate with pictures and words where they’ve met the learning outcome, whether they would like some more help, or whether they have no idea what you’re talking about. They’re able to share the level of mastery they’ve experienced. They are learners, no matter what the age.

We can structure our classroom in a way that gives learners an opportunity to try different strategies, to learn more about what they want and what they need, and to be able to articulate that. If those early learning years are all about executive functioning—meaning they learn how to make a plan, use a strategy, and evaluate the outcome—that empowers them in the higher grades to know how to organize information, how to advocate for themselves, to say, “I don’t know” or “I don’t understand.”

We create these communities where it’s safe to not be perfect, where it’s safe to need something different than the person next to you, where it’s safe to try something and say, “This works for me” or “This doesn’t work for me.” This is what we’re building. This is what expert learning is.

If we are doing the cognitive heavy lifting—as Zaretta Hammond says in her book—at those early grades, but we never give learners space to make decisions for themselves, we actually disrespect them into compliance. We say, “I decide what is best for you. I decide what you want. I decide what you need.” We can hear it in this conversation—it sounds like power.

But we give ourselves a pass when we make those decisions for our early learners in those spaces and say, “They don’t know what they want. They try.” I would ask every educator to think about those areas where you’ve decided for or about someone else without giving them a chance to decide for themselves.

There is a podcast I listen to from time to time, and there was a young man—his name was Nathan—and he said, “Nothing about us without us.” That has been a mantra that has stuck with me. So when you’re tempted to make decisions for and about the students, I would ask you to just cue up my voice and Nathan’s voice in that moment and say, “Nothing about my learners without my learners.”

Give them a chance to decide for themselves. Give them a chance to try. How are we refining failure? If this is a strategy that doesn’t work for you, or you chose it because the person next to you likes it, look at the outcome. Did that work well for you? How would you like to try something different?

This is the time—in that Pre-K through second grade—where students can explore and try, but also have the space to have those conversations or those moments of reflection to see what works for me, what brings about my success. Am I proud of how I’ve moved through this? Is there something I’m not proud of? How can I fix it?

Even if there’s not language, if there’s pictures, if there’s words, if there’s a happy face or an emoji, that can communicate: Here’s where I am with this. Here’s the skill I’m trying to build. This is what I know. This is what I don’t know. How do we build that bridge together—with them, not just for them, not just about them, but with them?

Tim Villegas
That’s important. I’m just gonna let that sit for a minute. So I want to talk about equity, and I want to talk about equality. I want to know your thoughts about the difference between those two words in educational systems. Sometimes the conversation goes, “Well, I believe in equity of opportunity, but I don’t know about equity of outcomes.” I’ve heard that before—you probably have too. How does equality fit into this equation, if it does at all? Is there a place for both of these terms? Or how should we be thinking about this?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
I’m so glad we’re talking about this today. Ketanji Brown Jackson, Supreme Court Justice, has a quote: “No one benefits from ignorance.” She was talking about this country and the work that has been done in the past, and the present experiences that have been disrupted with this decision on affirmative action.

I bring that up to say that when I think about the school context—higher education, K–12, preschools—we know that there has been a dichotomous experience for learners of color in a number of ways, for learners with disabilities. I highlight those because this is fresh on my mind most of the time, but particularly today.

When we think about this word “equality,” what stands out for me is that I have two children, ages 16 and 15 right now. There have been moments when equality was what I was seeking—just to view my children as humans. Just give them the education they deserve. In that sense, every human being deserves to be seen as a human, to be respected, to have the space to have different emotions, to be happy and joyful—even in learning spaces and in school.

I wish my children did not have to be fierce advocates for their education, even as early as three and four years old—that they had to learn to fight for the equality that should have been afforded to them. But that is our reality.

When I think of equality, I think about what every human life deserves: dignity, respect, honor. When I think about equity, equity means that there is a mutual acknowledgement of the barriers that are keeping me from getting to my best. When there’s a mutual agreement on what those barriers are, then there’s also a mutual agreement to begin to demolish those barriers, to tear those down so that my goal—and the goal that you have as you see it with me—is met. There is a mutuality in equity.

Equity means that systems and individuals see their roles, and that we fight for that equality in humanity that I just spoke of before. Equity shows up in different ways because the barriers will be different for each of us, for every person. When there is equity, there is agreement between systems and individuals—particularly in the educational context for the learners that we serve—that we will be diligent to hear and believe the barriers, that we will be diligent to listen to and believe the data and the outcomes, and that the road from where every learner is to where they want to be and should be is one we work together on with mutuality and respect to break down those barriers wherever they may be—in every system, in every classroom.

I love that there’s an organization, CAST, that started the Universal Design for Learning guidelines. Their tagline is “Until learning has no limits.” I love that. Until learning has no limits, equity has to be our focus.

Tim Villegas
Are you ready for the mystery question? After a short break, Andratesha and I answer a very strange question.

So the mystery question is—oh, I just did that one. So I get to pick another one. I guess I should take out the ones I already did. If you decide to get cremated, where would you want your ashes spread? I didn’t make it up.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
I know that I will not decide to be cremated, so I just want to let my family know—if you’re listening—don’t you dare. Don’t do it. Don’t you do it.

In the spirit of the question, if I was, I’d want my ashes sprinkled—oh goodness—in beautiful Lake Erie, so Cleveland could feel me and experience me over and over again. I’m a Cleveland girl, okay? So shout out to Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. They just might be nice and clear. Way books. So yep, Lake Erie, so that Cleveland could benefit from my spirit over and over and over again.

I love where I’m from. We are lifers here in Cleveland. My husband’s family is here. We have a long legacy. My great-grandmother migrated from Bessemer, Alabama, in 1924. And when I tell you we put down roots here in Cleveland—I love this place. I always want to see it grow and change. I know that Cleveland sometimes gets a bad rap, but I would encourage anyone to come and visit and see the changes in the way that the city is growing and changing. So shout out to Mayor Bibb—fantastic leadership there. Lots of changes coming. Lots of innovation in education. The best is yet to come.

Tim Villegas
Oh wow. That’s you. What about—gosh. Well, you know, I was thinking about this just as you were talking. And it’s going to sound really cliché because I’m wearing my Dodger cap, but you know what? Might as well just go for it.

So I’m originally from Southern California. I grew up in the Arcadia, Pasadena, San Gabriel Valley area. I still consider it my home even though I don’t live there. We try to go back every year. But listen, just sprinkle me at Dodger Stadium. That’s what I’m saying. Chavez Ravine. Just sprinkle me all around. As long as the Dodgers are there, maybe I’ll be experiencing—just be at the ballpark every day. You know what I mean?

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Yes, yes.

Tim Villegas
Home.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Home. Exactly.

Tim Villegas
Yeah, LA certainly priced us out, but we have a lot of roots there. My dad still lives in LA. Actually, both my parents still live in LA County. LA County is huge—mountain to the ocean. We try to get back there and visit. It’s always home. But Atlanta is where our family is and where we’re raising our kids. It was definitely the best decision.

But listen, don’t put my ashes around the Braves stadium. Sorry, y’all. Dodgers all the way. Okay? You heard it here. All right. I don’t have it written down, but it’s on audio, so I can’t take it back.

Andratesha Fritzgerald, thank you so much for being on the Think Inclusive podcast. We appreciate your time.

Andratesha Fritzgerald
Thank you so much, Tim, for having me. And I hope all the listeners remember that allyship requires action. So get in the fight.

Tim Villegas
That means it’s free time. And this week, I have Carolyn Teigland, CEO of the Maryland Coalition for Inclusive Education. I caught Carolyn after a week of working with one of our amazing partner school districts. Here’s our conversation.

Hey Carolyn, how are you?

Carolyn Teigland
Hey Tim, I’m good. How are you?

Tim Villegas
So I had this kind of burning question on my brain. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I want to run it by you. We’re in a strange educational climate, right? With our partners—the districts and schools we work with—but also just all across the country. If you’re paying attention to the news and education news, there’s a lot of talk about what you can and cannot say—specific words.

I’m just wondering, as people who are working in school districts and school districts that want to be more inclusive, how do we navigate not saying certain words like “equity” or “inclusion” or “diversity”? How do we do our work without using these words?

Carolyn Teigland
Well, that’s an interesting question. What I’m finding—because we are all over the place now, as you noted—we’re not just in Maryland. Maryland tends to be a little more liberal in terms of the ability to use certain words, but not everywhere.

What I personally am finding is that when I’m going to be speaking to a new audience, I always ask the question of district leadership: Are there certain words or phrases that are going to cause people to shut down and not be able to hear the message?

Because for me, while I don’t agree with the idea of trying to mask certain words that mean real things—like equity is a real thing, diversity is a real thing, disability is a real thing—if we can’t get the message to the audience because they can’t hear it, then we’re stalled in our ability to get anywhere with a district or a school or whomever it is that we’re speaking with.

So I think there’s a balance between knowing your audience and avoiding certain words until you develop that sense of stability and trust, where then maybe you can begin to introduce words that cause division. If we want to have a seat at the table, we have to know who our audience is and how to get that seat and be able to remain in that seat.

Because if we do something in a situation that causes us to not be invited back, then the work in that space is not going to happen—or at least we’re not going to be given the opportunity to make that work happen.

So I have an aversion to being told that I can’t say certain words because they’re not politically correct in that environment. I do think we have an obligation, if we want to get this work to advance—particularly in places where there is reticence to acknowledge the fact that there are marginalized groups—we’re doing a disservice to the people that we’re there to support. And honestly, the marginalized groups in that space.

Tim Villegas
You’re right that you develop a relationship with whoever it is—whether it’s an educator or a district administrator—and there’s a level of trust that needs to be established before we get into hard conversations. I can imagine a scenario where officially things are not written out with certain terminology, but in conversation—which is a lot of what our work is anyway, just having conversations with people—those words and the explanations of those words are part of that conversation.

Carolyn Teigland
Right. So it’s being able to read your audience and know when you’ve established the level of trust that allows you to be more forthright. You know, I talk about—we talk about, not just I, we as an organization—talk about children who are educated in separate settings. When I become comfortable in a space, I use the word “segregation,” because that is what it is.

But that’s not always the first—depending on the relationship I have with folks, I don’t necessarily go to that description of what we’re doing when we isolate children away from their age-appropriate peers to educate them. It is segregation. But that is a word that causes people to have a reaction. Sometimes we use it because we want to get a reaction. We want to highlight what it really is.

But we have to be careful that we’re not using words that then cause us to create a negative reaction that stalls or even stops our ability to further the work and the conversation with folks.

Tim Villegas
Anything else on your mind?

Carolyn Teigland
There’s a young girl in one of the districts I’m in. She was in a segregated setting from the time she was in preschool until this school year when she was in fifth grade. It was all because her IQ score showed 49—a full-scale score of 49. She comes from generational poverty. She’s a Black girl who does not use the same language that we would use. She doesn’t have the same life experiences that we have.

The more you get to know her, you know that 49 is not an accurate IQ score for her. But she was being measured based on an assessment that is largely biased against how she was raised and how she was spoken to and the language that she uses. So decisions were made about her educational journey that segregated her—all because of that number.

Then when she became included, all of a sudden there’s all this competence that no one knew was there. Because all of a sudden, she’s actually being asked to do real math.

Tim Villegas
It’s really amazing.

Carolyn Teigland
What’s interesting is when the educators see it, and then they’re able to acknowledge, “Maybe I shouldn’t be putting so much weight into these IQ scores.” That’s huge for educators. We rely so much on those intelligence tests, especially in special ed.

Tim Villegas
So what do you think? What are your strategies for talking about diversity, equity, and inclusion in places where those particular terms are being suppressed? Send me an email and let me know what you think. You can reach me at tvillegas@mcie.org.

For more information about inclusive education or to learn how you can partner with us in your school or district, visit mcie.org.

Thanks again to our incredible sponsor, Changing Perspectives.

Love Think Inclusive? Here are a few ways to let us know: rate us on Spotify or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Become a patron for extra stuff. This week, I’m posting about six minutes of extra audio from my interview with Andratesha. We talked about the recent firing of a Georgia educator for reading a picture book. Don’t miss it.

Speaking of patrons, thank you to Carol Q., Aaron P., Jarrett T., Joyner A., Kathy B., Mark C., Gabi M., and Kathleen T. We appreciate your continued support of Think Inclusive.

Think Inclusive is written, edited, designed, mixed, and mastered by me, Tim Villegas. Original music by Miles Kredich. Additional music from Melody.

Thanks for your time and attention, and remember: inclusion always works.

Tim Villegas
So she’s a senior and she’s taking an AP Research class. Her research project is on banned books.

Carolyn Teigland
Interesting.

Tim Villegas
Yeah. And the only reason why that is her research project is because of what’s been happening.

Carolyn Teigland
Exactly. My daughter—a group of students from my daughter’s high school—spoke out at a recent Board of Education meeting in my district. She helped write one of the speeches. She was very concerned about this whole notion of banning books and what that does to people who are represented in those books. The characters represent some of her friends and how concerning that is to her.

Tim Villegas
Yeah. Yeah.

From MCIE.