Episode 28: Transforming Education to Transform the World

Here we are Change-maker, our last episode of the Winter season. What a powerful winter it has been! I don’t know about you but I have gained so much clarity in all aspects of my life and the pieces are all coming together. I am having a lot of fun witnessing the power of the Universal laws in action!

To end this season of settling in, taking stock of our resources (including our own wisdom), resting and gathering together around the fire, I’d like to leave you with a good friend and one of my business besties, Lani Donaldson.

I have been deeply touched by Lani Donaldson’s work to reform the education system and her passion for ensuring students get the education that will most serve them and this world. This storytelling circle is thought-provoking, funny and educational. We are sitting with a visionary who is doing the hard work required to change systems so we don’t repeat the past. Hang on to your seat!

What’s in this episode for you:

• A funny and profound analogy of inclusiveness

• Lani’s personal journey with dyslexia and how it fuels her paradigm-shifting work today

• An empowering definition of education that allows for human expansion

• The four skills every kid needs to learn to thrive in this world

• Heart-felt guidance for parents who may be feeling alone in their kid’s education journey

• Wisdom gained through the pandemic and why we need to act on it now

Tools for Change

Join me on March 11th for my Communication for Conscious Leadership Masterclass, where I give you the foundation you need to lead new conversations with grace and ease.

Click on this link for more information and to register.

Poem

A Dreamer by j.r.

She was a girl

who grinned at the unknown

and tried to capture the stars

just to see how brightly 

they would shine

Who’s in circle with us:

With over three decades as an educator, administrator, speaker, and most importantly, real-life in-the-trenches classroom experience, Lani Donaldson’s view of education can be radically different from standard definitions. Known for her practical, humorous, street-savvy style, Lani appreciates, and shares with others, that education is so much more than current definitions allow.

As President, CEO and Chief Visionary Officer of the Engaged Educators Corp., a company whose mission is to innovate education on a massive scale, she has now opened: UP Academy. A 100% independent, private school that offers every student an individualized education program. Lani has known for years that there are places where the system supports the system and not the student. She is considered an educational innovator because she studies ‘the fit’. The fit for how minds learn, how education works, how systems work and most importantly how children are best taught. Education should ignite all learner’s curiosity and encourage learning as a lifelong process.

In short: “Education Success Made Simple!”

Connect with Lani through, www.upacademy.ca, www.engagededucators.com, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

Pick up the talking piece: 

What came up for you as you listened to this episode? I'd love to hear your experiences with any of the reflections and exercises. Send me an email at podcast@humconsulting.ca or leave a voicemail (click the voicemail button on the right).

Transcript: (Some words may not be accurately recorded. Please let us know if something seems off.)

[00:00:00] Ame-Lia: Change begins from within. As easy as it is to look outside of ourselves and want the world to change, the truth is, it never will if we remain the same. This podcast was created for change-makers like you who want more love and connection in your community. Today you are going to hear stories that will inspire you, and also challenge you to be the change. We are going to go deep, my friend, so take a deep breath and settle in. My name is Ame-Lia Tamburrini - Welcome to the Circle of Change.

Here we are at Changemaker, our last episode of the winter season. What a powerful winter it has been. I don't know about you, but I have gained so much clarity in all aspects of my life, and it feels like all these pieces are coming together. I'm having a lot of fun witnessing the power of the universal laws in action all around me.

Here on the Circle of Change, it's also been a really powerful season. We began in early January with Aileen Crowne, Heather Rose, and Pam Blanshard talking about the new consciousness, an episode that brought me to tears with its heartfelt message of the power of finding each other. And then we had Jeanell Greene and her relationship coaching episode, which is one that many of you are still talking about and listening to over and over again. This episode really gave us the opportunity to reflect on our role in relationship challenges and the power in claiming that to restore intimacy and connection.

Then we had Brett Macdonald and Lizzie Allan, two comedic artists that are bringing light to the essentialness of humor in our healing and personal development journeys. And we learned a new adjective “wobbling.” And then Sarah Francescutti joined us to speak of the role of self-care in leadership and her transformational summit, which just happened last week and it was awesome. I also sat with you in the circle to explore topics of reestablishing our relationship with the natural rhythms of the season, the powerful role that responsibility plays in our roles as changemakers, and creating a new relationship with failure so that we can really stretch our comfort zones and do the work that we are being called to do.

Thank you so much for joining me in circle for these dialogues. And if you have more thoughts or insights that are arising for you after listening to these episodes, please feel free to leave us a voicemail or an email.

To end this season of winter of settling in, of taking stock of our resources, including our own wisdom, of resting and gathering together around the fire, I would like to leave you with a conversation with a good friend and one of my business besties, Lani Donaldson. I have been deeply touched by Lani’s work to reform the education system and her passion for ensuring students get the education that will most serve them in this world, which you'll learn is not the education system that the majority of kids attend in North America. This storytelling circle is thought provoking, it's funny, and it's educational. We are sitting with a visionary who is really doing the hard work required to change systems so that we don't repeat the past.

In this episode, you're gonna hear a funny and profound analogy of inclusiveness. You're going to hear about the roots of our education system and how it's not serving 21st century kids. Lani shares her personal journey with dyslexia and how it fuels her paradigm shifting work that she does today. She gives an empowering definition of education and talks about the 4 skills that every kid needs to learn to thrive in this world. She gives really heartfelt guidance for parents who may be feeling alone in their child's journey through the education system. And she leaves us with wisdom gained through the pandemic and why we need to act on it right now.

[0:04:48]

Let me introduce you to Lani. With over 3 decades as an educator, administrator, speaker, and most importantly real life in the trenches classroom experience, Lani Donaldson's view of education can be a radically different from standard definitions. Known for her practical, humorous, street savvy style, Lani appreciates and shares with others that education is so much more than the current definitions allow. As president, CEO, and chief visionary officer of the Engaged Educators Corporation, a company whose mission is to innovate education on a massive scale, she now has opened up UP Academy, a 100% independent private school that offers every student an individualized education program. How amazing is that?

Lani has known for years that there are places where the system supports the system and not the student. She is considered an educational innovator because she studies the fit – the fit for how minds learn, how education works, how systems work, and most importantly how children are best taught. How revolutionary is that? Education should ignite all learners’ curiosity and encourage learning as a lifelong process. To sum it all up, Lani’s focus is education success made simple. Enjoy this delicious conversation.

Lani, it is so amazing to be with you here sitting in circle. Thanks for joining us.

LD: Welcome. My pleasure.

AT: I have no doubt this is going to be a thought provoking, and funny, and educational conversation. For the listener, Lani and I met in a mastermind program through a community we’re both a part of, the e-Women Community. It's this wonderful organization where we, as entrepreneurs, get to lift others up as we ourselves climb. And through that experience together, I have learned more and more about Lani’s work and am so deeply touched by the work that you're doing to essentially reform the education system. And what I love most about it is this deep passion that you have for ensuring the kids get what they need to really thrive in this world. It's exciting work and it's bold work. And I can't wait to bring this story and what you're up to into circle today.

LD: I am so excited.

AT: To begin, I'm going to read a poem. This is a quick poem. But when I saw it today, I thought “Oh, yeah, this is cool.” And I'm curious to see what lands for you with this poem. This is an opportunity for us to really transition from wherever it is we're coming from into this space, into the circle and really get ourselves present for the wisdom that we are about to receive. So, the poem is called A Dreamer. And the author's name is JR.

She was a girl who grinned at the unknown and tried to capture the stars just to see how brightly they would shine.

I'm gonna read that again.

She was a girl who grinned at the unknown and tried to capture the stars just to see how brightly they would shine.

This phone really reminds me of you actually, Lani, ‘cause I can see you smiling of the unknown in this challenge of being like “Oh, my gosh, how can we do something better” and then capturing the stars, i.e. your students, to see how brightly they can shine. I was like “Oh, gosh, this is the perfect poem.”

LD: It is. It is. It could describe my entire life.

AT: Well, I’m curious about that question and I’ll see if it crops out in our conversation. The first question I want to put out into circle is: Who are you? And if you do have a talking piece with you and you want to share what it is you brought or the significance of it, feel free to do it in this section. So, Lani, who are you?

LD: A soul having an absolutely magnificent human experience because I choose to. And I did bring a talking piece. I brought a stress ball that's shaped like a peanut. And years ago, a friend of mine asked me to do an icebreaker for a conference and asked me like probably an hour and a half before the conference started. I hummed and thought about it. And I'm really big on value. So, I wanted to do an analogy because I teach a lot of analogy. So, I wanted to do analogy. So, I stopped at a grocery store because I had this idea about a peanut. I went into the grocery store. And you know, it was busy and I went running to where all the nuts are.

[0:10:01]

Not people, but the actual peanuts. I grabbed a bag and I started scooping peanuts in. And I thought “What am I doing?” One of my daughters is allergic to peanuts. So, I thought I only need one. So, I took one I ran back up to the front of the store and checked out with all the cashiers. And there’s one that had a person just unloading their cart. And I went “Okay, that’s perfect.” So, I went in behind this lady who was unloading her cart, and she got all her groceries on the cart and put the divider down. And I put the peanut down and then I realized there was a guy behind me. So, I went “Oh.” And I put the divider down behind the peanut. And this attracted a ton of attention.

The lady ahead of me thought I was absolutely bonkers, and the gentleman behind me put his kids behind him because I'm sure he thought there was a crazy lady there, but I went through the cashier. The cashier looked at the one peanut and looked at me and said, “Did you find everything?” And I said, “Yeah. I just need a peanut.” And she puts on the weighing scale. Guess what? It doesn’t weigh anything. So, she said, “It doesn’t weigh anything.” I said, “That must be free.” She goes “Man, this is Safeway.”

So, she phoned the manager. She phoned up to the office and announced “You know, there’s this lady here who wants to buy a peanut. No, just one. No, just a peanut. Well, I did put it on the scale, but it doesn’t weigh anything.” She goes “Okay.” So, she looks at me and she goes “Apparently, it's free.” And she puts it across to where the bagging guy is. And he looks at me and he goes “Do you like a bag for that?”

AT: Oh, my goodness.

LD: So, I got to the conference, I put the peanut in my pocket, and I said to people “I have something in my pocket that I've never seen before. Can anybody guess what it is?” And so, people were guessing in the audience and I pull it out and I said it’s a peanut. Actually, it's the shell of a peanut. I assume there's a peanut in there. I assume that there's a value, there's nourishment, there's protein, there's something of value in there and wouldn't it be lovely if we all saw the value in every person we saw just like a peanut and assume that they're kind and have kindness and love within them.

AT: Yeah. Beautiful. I love that. I love your use of analogy as well.

LD: I use it a lot because kids learn better that way.

AT: Yeah. So, we're talking about learning. We're talking about kids and education. And you've been in the education system for quite a while. Clearly, you've seen that there's an issue. So, I'm curious to hear your story, your journey that led you to this work that you're doing now where you've realized that there is an issue with the education system. So, when did you first realize that?

LD: Back when I was a rookie teacher, I noticed that there was where the system supports the system and doesn't necessarily support children. You know, first things first before we get into this whole thing about the education system. The fact that our current education system doesn't work very well has nothing to do with teachers. As a matter of fact, great teachers are probably the only glue that's holding it together. I spent almost two decades as both a teacher and administrator in the system and let me tell you, being in front of a classroom is a very challenging place to be. So, kudos to all my colleagues who are teachers.

But the system is built on a system that has passed. We have 21st century kids going to 20th century buildings. Not a problem, but they're going to those 20th century buildings getting an education that's still based on a 19th century model, which is not serving our kids at all. We're teaching to the masses. We put as many kids as we can in a classroom, and we teach at them because that's what the curriculum states that we should be doing. Teachers just don't have enough time in the day and kids fall through the cracks. And these children are our future, and we had better not let them down now.

AT: What is the result of that system?

LD: Well, we have kids that don't fit the norm especially when you have 35 kids in a class or 30 kids in a class. You kind of teach down the middle. If you have one kid that reads at a grade 4 level and one kid that reads at a grade 9 level, when you're teaching a junior high class, that's considered average. So, you teach in the middle and hope that the kids that read really well aren't too bored and get enough and the kids that are struggling don't check out. So, it's really a system where we need to step back and go “Why cannot we not individualize education for kids?”

[0:15:01]

Why can't we do that? It takes a little more effort. It takes a little more ingenuity and innovation, but it's not impossible. And our kids nowadays need a different approach. And I always tell people, you know, if you look back at your education outside of the fundamentals of learning, so really strong reading and writing skills and really strong mathematical fundamentals, the rules are the laws of science and the rule of law. Outside of those things, most of which you learned in school, is now irrelevant or proven to be incorrect. So, why aren't we teaching kids how they learn, how to learn, how to access information, critical thinking skills, all those things that as adults we need to have to master anything?

AT: I would love to take this to make it maybe a little bit more personal in terms of what is really driving you to be doing this work because what you're doing is amazing and I know it takes a lot of effort. You no doubt are coming up across a lot of barriers as well. I'm curious about like the underlying driver of what brought you here. Like do you have a personal story of going through the education system that gives you the fuel that you need in moments where it might be difficult?

LD: Yeah. Actually, I have two. When I went to school, school was cool. It was what it was. My mom realized that I didn't read very well. And so, my mom read everything to me, like everything. If I had a novel at school I had to read, she read the novel to me. If I had a report, she read the encyclopedia, she read the articles. She did all of the reading because even though she wasn't an educator nor was she a psychologist, she did understand that reading is a two-part process. One, turning code to speech and, two, understanding speech sounds.

So, I didn't have problems understanding speech sounds. I had problems with the whole decoding piece. And when I got to university, I was shocked that I got into university. I thought someone made a clerical error and I got in. I lived in fear and I actually went to university by accident because it was the only way I could figure out to get out of that small industrial northern British Columbia town and save face. So, I went to university, lived in fear my first year and struggled until I sat in a linguistics class.

And in the linguistics class, the professor started talking about how the language goes together and that letters have sounds, and combinations have sounds, and there's rules to control the language. And I sat in that theater and went “Huh, this would have been handy to know.” And I had a lot of baggage because I was angry. So, I went and got tested. And when they sat down to tell me the results, they said, “Okay, you're dyslexic.” And I went “Oh! Thank heavens.” And they went “What do you mean?” And I went “Oh, well, I thought I was stupid. I mean, dyslexic we could do something with, can’t we?” And they went “Umm… Kinda. Maybe. I don’t know.” And then that made me really angry.

So, I had to teach myself. And then fast forward a number of years when I had my own children, my middle daughter is very dyslexic because it tends to be a genetic trait, and she was bullied by a grade 10 teacher and absolutely destroyed her confidence as a learner. Up until then, she had awesome teachers and it took one teacher, one minute to absolutely shatter my kid. And I went “It will not happen anymore.” And so, I went on speaking tours and trying to speak to teachers and get them to understand the differences.

And now, you know, with the school systems the way they are, I started a company. When I was still with the school board, I sat in a meeting with superintendents and said “Why do we lower the bar for kids? Why do we do that? Why don't we just leave the bar where it is and maybe jack it up an inch or two and just teach kids how to get over it?” And I was met with “We can't do that.” So, I had to make the decision that I could not fit the school system in my social schedule anymore. And before you make that decision, you should probably talk to your spouse. Anyway, I'm still married to that same person actually. But I learned from that if I'm going to make a change, I have to be the change and I have to go out

[0:20:02]

So, I started a work at a reading company that was phenomenal and bounced kids’ grades in hours and then I went “You know what? I need to start my own school system and develop a system to educate all children regardless of whether they have a learning challenge or not.” Kids are smart. I never meant stupid kids. Stupid adults, on the other hand, tends to be lots of those, usually on the freeway at 6:00. It's like they have an association meeting.

AT: Oh, gosh. Okay. Thank you for sharing that story. It really helps me see the heart and the passion, and where it comes from, and why these kids are in such good hands when they come to you. So, I do wanna get into more about what is different with your school versus others. But first, I wanna better understand who's arriving at your door. Like when these kids or these families show up at your school, what's going on for them? What are their pain points that you're seeing?

LD: We offer families free no obligation reading assessments, and screens, and stuff like that because you have to pay a lot of money for it to find out some answers of why your child is not performing well in school. And my assessment room, my staff has dubbed it the crying room because 9 times out of 10 when I sit and I assess a child and then the child goes off to do some computer testing with one of my assistants, in my discussions with parents, they will break down in tears simply because someone is listening, someone cares, someone has some answers for them. And the most heartbreaking thing for a parent is when a child comes home and says “Mom, I'm just stupid. I can't learn.”

And I had that call from my daughter when she was in grade 10 where she was sobbing on the other end of the phone saying “Mom, I'm wasting everybody's time. I just can't learn the way they want me to.” And that's heartbreaking. I don't want that to happen to everyone else. So, the parents that come here typically come because their kids are struggling usually in elementary, junior high, some high school students and they found us. And so, they come in for a free assessment and then they're under obligation to put their kids in any of our programs. I leave and tell them how to fix it at home. Now, can they do it as fast as I can? No. They can’t, but they could do it.

AT: Yeah. There's a real theme of empowerment that I'm picking up on with you, is that there's a desire to give the power back to the people, the kids, the parents so that they can thrive. I think it's beautiful. I would love to hear a story of transformation so somebody that has arrived at your school in your program, what was it like for them. First of all, what would they have experienced that was different at your school versus the schools they were in and what happened? What was the transformation?

LD: Two come to mind. One is a child we have in our private school at UP Academy. When I first assessed her, she was in grade 4. She was in a very expensive private school. Her mom brought her in because she couldn't read. And then when I did the assessment, I noticed she couldn't do math either. And when I asked her what 1 + 1 was, she had to use her fingers and then questioned whether 1 + 1 was actually 2. So, the whole concept of what mathematics is she didn't have nor did she have the ability to read. I said to the mom— I said, “Well, you know, this is where the difficulty is.” And she said, “Well, I have parent-teacher conferences tomorrow. I will tell the teacher this information.” And I said, “Oh, would you like to know the questions you should ask at parent-teacher conferences?”

So, I gave her those actual questions that she should ask. The mom called me the next day and said, “So, the principal sat in on our conference meeting.” And in my head, I'm thinking that's never a good thing. And she said, “The principal said to me that we will keep your daughter safe and entertained, but we can't teach her.” So, the mom was very upset and said, “Please teach my daughter.” Ergo, UP Academy started a lot sooner than it was supposed to. And so, in 4 years, we have moved that student from kindergarten ability— we've moved her eight grades, so two grades a year really if you wanna average it out. That student could hold her own in any school because she now has the fundamentals and she understands the concepts. And now, she can learn and believes she can learn, which is more important.

[0:25:04]

And we have had instances where kids come for a one-on-one to learn study skills. And I had a student at 16 drive in 4 hours to my office, came in on study break before final exams and had a basketball scholarship on the line. And I had 4 hours to teach that child how to write an exam, how to study for it, how to make information sticky enough so she remembered it so that she could get her basketball scholarship and no pressure.

AT: Wow.

LD: So, she did get her scholarship by the way, but it's amazing. Kids are smart. They just don't know it because the system makes them feel stupid.

AT: So, if you were to define education, how would you define it?

LD: Fundamentally, to teach a child is actually to draw them out, not to stuff their heads full of facts and figures. You know, I often say I can tell you what happened in history in 1066, invention of the longbow and William the Conqueror conquered England. Never made me any money. Can't tell you why I know that. Is it important to know history? Yes, because we certainly don't wanna repeat this. We've made some massive, massive mistakes.

When it really comes down to kids learning, we have to remember that there's things that they want to know and there's things that they need to know, and you need to balance that out. So, education is to instill the magic of learning, to excite kids about consuming information, but also excite them to analyze it at the same time and to critically think through things before they make decisions. So, instead of reading, writing, and arithmetic, we have to help parents create the best human beings we can. That's our responsibility.

AT: I'm just thinking about history that you brought up, how we learned about history in school. And it was literally just here's the “facts” of what happened and then we were supposed to memorize that and repeat it back in an exam. That's how I learned history. There was no questioning about it. You said it's important to know history because we don't want to repeat the past, but we're not learning about what brought that history about and how can we learn from this and not repeat the past. It's just like this is what happened. But again, there's no critical analysis. And obviously, we know now that so much of what we learned wasn't even true or it was through a certain lens and that's caused a whole heck load of damage in our world to not be able to really question what we learn.

LD: And you know, I grew up in northern British Columbia. I always, always— which got me into boatloads of trouble in school— I always said, “What if that's not true?” And I would have teachers saying “Are you calling me a liar?” And I go “Not at all. What if that's not true? What if what you're telling us is not true?” And I could say it about anything. One, I went to university and one of the things I studied was Canadian history. And I remember sitting in a class saying to the professor “What if that's not true? What if you're totally off in another planet because when you drive past the First Nations reservations, you can see something has gone massively wrong?” And again, it wasn’t. And I went “No, no, no, no, no, no. This isn't the end of it. Something has gone massively, massively wrong.”

AT: Yeah. And what a world we would live in if more people questioned and that was acceptable like we actually had conversation about the things we're learning and questioning our realities. And I can see that looking at the world today with all the conflict around COVID, and vaccinations, and people's rights and there's different world views. A lot of people standing there saying “my view is right” and not questioning. Well, is that true? Is that right or is this right for me and that reality over there is right for them and both realities exist are true, you know?

LD: Yeah. That's why you teach critical thinking skills. That's why you teach analysis. That's why you teach people to dream big, but think hard so that they put perspective. Everybody has a different perspective. If you and I are sitting across one another and we're looking at a board, but your side of the board is black and mine is white and I say “well, it's white” and you go “no, it's black”, it's because I'm not seeing what you're seeing.

[0:30:05]

It's a case of go in the other guy's shoes. Move 6 degrees. Move 30 degrees. Move 90 degrees. Just take a look from a different perspective before you make a decision, or a choice, or a judgment. And you shouldn't make judgments anyway because it makes you look stupid.

AT: When I've talked about education and your approach at UP Academy, it seems to me like that is what you're doing. You're getting inside the student's mind and saying “Hmm… How is the student seeing this right now because clearly it's different, it's not wrong?” And then you find ways to work with that way of viewing the world. Like am I right there because that feels like what you do?

LD: Yeah. Well, before students come into UP Academy and UP stands for Unlimited Possibility and Unlimited Potential— Before kids are accepted in school, we test them and not to see if they're smart enough. I don't care what your IQ is. It's irrelevant. What we test for is to find out how best you learn, what the executive functioning skills are. So, those are all the non-academic sub-skills that drive academic success. We test those so that we know how best to teach a child. Not everybody learns the same. Popcorn doesn't all pop at the same time, you know. It's in the same pot. But why are we looking at people and expecting them to all learn at the same time? It's ridiculous.

Kids here, everybody has an individual program. And we teach you the way that you can learn and make information sticky so that you can retain it, but we teach a lot of critical thinking skills, how to analyze the situation, perspective, understanding. Our cornerstones are respect, responsibility, resilience, and results. If you don't have those four, nothing's gonna happen much.

AT: I wanna go back to school. I wanna go to your school.

LD: I get to go to school every day, you know.

AT: How fun is that?

LD: It's so fun working here because I just get to be a kid all day, then I go home and my husband is just like “Oh, really, you're still in kid mode? All right.”

AT: So, there might be a parent out there right now that is struggling. They're that parent that is brought to tears in your room. What do they need to hear right now or what message do you want to share with them in this moment?

LD: I've been in that position where, man, your heart is just broken, but I think parents need to know that there are people who are willing to help them. You know, parents are always welcome to call me. You know, I get parents to call me. I had a parent call me from Hong Kong one day, had to pull off the road real quick because I wasn't expecting a call from Hong Kong. You know, I take calls from parents all the time and give them the best advice that I can, but parents need to know that they need to trust their instincts. I'll have parents come in and they'll go “I knew when they were in grade 1 that something was wrong, but they told me it was all good.” And I went “You are the expert in your child. I am not. I'm an expert on how the brain works, and how students access information, and how people learn. I'm not an expert in your child. You're the expert in your child, so trust your instincts. If you think that there's something wrong or something's not quite right, investigate it. Check it out. Make some phone calls. Build a team around you because it takes a village.”

AT: Thank you. I got shivers when you said that. For me, it relates back to this process that we've been in in life of being taught not to listen to our instincts, being taught that book knowledge is better than what is in us and what we know through ancient wisdom.

LD: Listening to the voice within. Yeah. Our culture tends to go “Stop it.” But man, that little voice inside is seldom wrong.

AT: Yeah.

LD: Especially when you're talking about children too. That instinct is there so your children live longer. You know, I used to say to my kids when they're really little “Good thing you're cute.” They were never too sure. Instinct is a huge thing. In many cultures, it's honored. And unfortunately, in a lot of cultures, it isn’t. And we need to learn to get back to that. To get quiet, to get centered, and to listen. Cut out all the noise and just listen to that internal voice.

AT: Thank you for that. This has been such a juicy conversation. My eyes have been opened and I know the listeners will too just rethinking about everything that we take for granted and also challenging—

[0:35:01]

For me, I've been challenged to think about the changeability of the education system and that that is possible especially with leaders and visionaries like yourself out there. So, just keep doing the work that you're doing please.

LD: Sure. Thank you. I will.

AT: Yeah.

LD: I will.

AT: I have one last question as we close out, and you've touched on this in various different ways in my mind. For me, we're here sitting in circle and I created this podcast to support people to be the change that the world is asking for right now. It feels to me like you have full-heartedly stepped into that. What does that mean to you? What does it mean to be the change?

LD: I think it was Martin Luther King that said a genuine leader is not a searcher of consensus, but a molder of consensus. And I think I am the latter, pointing out where the flaws are. If there's one thing the pandemic did, it taught parents the value of a great teacher, and it also showed parents the flaws in our system and the unsustainability of it. And that message has to get out that there is a better way. We can't sit in a top-down government dictated system. There's so much more at stake here. Our current school system was designed to create workers for the industrial system. When Rockefeller wrote the first check to the first school board, he said “I want a nation of workers, not a nation of thinkers.” And guess what? You know, we need more thinkers and we need more people to see people as peanut shells and know that there's value inside.

AT: Thank you, Lani, for joining us today in circle.

LD: Welcome. Thank you.

AT: Yeah. I'm deeply touched by the care that you have for the students, and the parents, and our world. Humanity really. And I'm cheering you on and hope that more and more parents give you a call.

LD: Well, thank you and thank you for all the work you do. I love listening to your podcast. It is enlightening and encouraging.

AT: Thank you.

LD: You're welcome.

AT: Hey, changemaker, before you go, I wanna let you know that on March 8th International Women's Day, I am speaking at the Voices of Women's Summit at 5 p.m. Paicific. This is a live conversation that will delve deep into conscious leadership skills required in today's evolving world. I’m so honored to support this event that celebrates the resurgence of the voices of women, a journey that has been so important to me and the work I do today. I would love for you to join me and the 100 other women that will be speaking on this stay on topics close to their hearts. This is a celebration of how far we have come and a look to where we are headed. So, please join us to acknowledge the healing that has happened. It's not over and that doesn't mean we can't celebrate. The link is in the show notes to sign up for free. I will see you again on March 31st here in the Circle of Change where we kicked off the spring season. I love you. Ciao!

I'm now passing the talking piece to you. If you feel called to put your voice in the circle, please head to humconsulting.ca/podcast and share your story there. I cannot wait to hear what has come up for you as you have listened to what has been shared here today. I wish you love and joy beyond your wildest imagination. Thank you so much for being here in the Circle of Change.

I also wanna express my gratitude to the following peeps: Circle of Change is recorded on Lekwungen territories and I am so grateful to live on this land. Our opening and closing music was created by the talented E-Rol Beats. You can find his creations at erolbeats.com. And special thanks to my coach, Mary Chan, of Organized Sound Productions for bringing this podcast to life. Until next time, Ciao!

Gratitude: 

Circle of Change is recorded on lək̓ʷəŋən territories.

Our opening and closing music was created by the talented E-Rol Beats. You can find his creations at www.erolbeats.com

My fabulous podcast coach, Mary Chan of Organized Sound Productions, brought this podcast to life www.organizedsound.ca