Our featured guests this week are Dennis Shirley and Andy Hargreaves, authors of "The Age of Identity." In this episode they share their views on education in our modern era, focusing on how identity influences practices and policies. Together, Jim, Andy, and Dennis discuss the connections between culture, technology, and societal changes, considering what it means for educators globally.
Tune in to this conversation about the role of identity in education.
Curious how to gain insight into coaching as an administrator, clicking here.
To learn more about the Paris Institute and how to attend, click here.
Our featured guests this week are Dennis Shirley and Andy Hargreaves, authors of "The Age of Identity." In this episode they share their views on education in our modern era, focusing on how identity influences practices and policies. Together, Jim, Andy, and Dennis discuss the connections between culture, technology, and societal changes, considering what it means for educators globally.
Tune in to this conversation about the role of identity in education.
Curious how to gain insight into coaching as an administrator, clicking here.
To learn more about the Paris Institute and how to attend, click here.
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:07:23
Unknown
Talk to secondary school teachers. They'll tell you, I'm a math teacher, I'm a chemistry teacher, I'm a Spanish teacher.
00:00:08:01 - 00:00:34:04
Unknown
That's an identity statement. And so helping people to feel secure in those statements and then hopefully their students will saying one day, I'm a Spanish speaker, I'm a mathematician, I'm a historian. Those are very strong identity statements and schools can aim towards promoting those kinds of positive identities with everything that we do, with everything in our power.
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Unknown
Hi everyone. It's ICG consultant Jessica Wise, host of the Coaching Questions on the Coaching Conversations podcast with Jimmy right here to talk about our virtual workshop titled System Support What Administrators Need to Know. We know that the impact coaches have is directly related to how effectively they are supported or not supported by their administrators. For that reason, it is crucial that administrators participate in professional development.
00:01:18:02 - 00:01:42:02
Unknown
That clarifies what coaches do and how they can be supported. Our virtual workshop system support will provide administrators with everything they need to know about instructional coaching. Join us to learn about the partnership principles that guide coaches interactions with teachers. The six specific actions administrators can take to support coaches effectively. The five Simple Truths of Helping and more.
00:01:42:04 - 00:01:45:15
Unknown
Join us or learn more by visiting Instructional Coaching icon.
00:01:45:15 - 00:01:58:11
Unknown
I'm really thrilled to be having this conversation, and I thought I would put you to work right away and have you introduce each other because you know each other much better than I know the two of you. So would you be so kind as to introduce each other? What an interesting invitation.
00:01:58:11 - 00:02:07:00
Unknown
So my friend Andy Hargraves is an absolutely fascinating scholar, friend and human being.
00:02:07:02 - 00:02:35:12
Unknown
He is a visiting professor at the University of Ottawa in Canada and a research professor at Boston College in the USA. Among his many characteristics, some of the more interesting are, first, his undying passion and support for the Burnley Football Club. If you ever want to hear an intricate history of or consider with Randy, Second of all, he loves karaoke.
00:02:35:17 - 00:03:00:21
Unknown
So if you want to join the evening with him and hear him belting out sympathy for Devil by the Rolling Stones, he is always up for that. Third, he is a very devoted grandfather. His five beautiful grand children who he loves so much and would do anything in the whole world for fourth. He has a connection to popular culture, encyclopedic knowledge that is incredible.
00:03:00:22 - 00:03:27:11
Unknown
You can be having a conversation about Karl Marx's concept of reification and he will relate it to some disco song from the seventies and then start singing it to you. And then finally, he's a hopeless perfectionist, which you might have guessed from the writing, because we will go over every single preposition, every single bit of punctuation until the end of time to get it just right.
00:03:27:12 - 00:03:29:04
Unknown
So that's my friend Andy.
00:03:29:04 - 00:03:55:16
Unknown
I'd like to add to that is before we even started working together, one thing I learned about Dennis is Dennis was pretty much the first person in education ever to work with community organizing, like down in Texas, with with all of the immigrant families who were new to the United States from Central and South America.
00:03:55:18 - 00:04:25:01
Unknown
And and so this was where I mean, this is a huge identity thing, But this is where Dennis Dennis got into the business of working with people, not just talking out people, figuring out where to begin. So if it was about getting a traffic light up or a crosswalk, you know, those who don't go yet to Pedagogy of the Oppressed and transformational literature.
00:04:25:03 - 00:04:59:23
Unknown
But if you can get a crosswalk together, then then let's do that first. We can take joy in the success and feel with one another and then move on. So. So Dennis is like, well, like he's had a passion in action as well as theory about social justice. But really, I should never have started working with Dennis because every time I get in with a group somewhere, it all began working with them on my work.
00:05:00:01 - 00:05:32:18
Unknown
You know, they come to like me and they respect me a lot. Yuja I think mainly. But then I introduced them to Dennis A then it's hopeless from then on because although they like and respect me, they absolutely love Dennis Three men, women, all, all genders and species like all Mister Kind Eyes. And so from the moments I've lost, it's completely over to Dennis.
00:05:32:20 - 00:05:45:15
Unknown
Time and again I have a serial failure of, of, of deciding this would be a good thing to work with Dennis on. So then some kind of emotional death wish that I have about myself.
00:05:45:15 - 00:05:47:20
Unknown
Well, see, that was so much better than anything I would have said.
00:05:47:20 - 00:06:16:11
Unknown
So thank you both for that. I have. I wanted to kick off with a question, and as I was reading the book, here's what I was thinking, is that given the polarization of the world today, it took a lot of courage to write this book. And I'm wondering why you wrote it. Why did you why did you say I still have something to say in spite of the fact that people will have their opinions and strong opinions.
00:06:16:11 - 00:06:19:00
Unknown
So where did the courage come from? Why did you write the book?
00:06:19:00 - 00:06:57:23
Unknown
the book began from a standpoint of inclusion. Well, Dennis and I had been working for a number of years with and school districts in Ontario, in Canada, during the period when the provincial government, which is like a state government and in the U.S., was very focused on trying to achieve equity through inclusion and well being slogan was, if you all see yourself in the school or feel like you belong there, it's incredibly hard to say.
00:06:57:23 - 00:07:30:10
Unknown
Before that it had all been about data literacy, math, achievement gaps, interventions. So as we worked with these districts, they were really focusing on what could they do that? And it looked like they pursued this in sequence in different ways. First of all, the focused a lot of learning and engagement, particularly for kids with special educational needs. So we wrote a book called Engagement Culture with this project, and another one.
00:07:30:12 - 00:07:57:20
Unknown
But then they started to focus a lot on wellbeing, on how they could improve their kids well-being. So then we wrote a book on well-being and then they moved on to identity. One of the conversations Dennis and I always remember in one of the schools, the French language schools, it's a minoritized culture within Canada. They said, you know, for us, identity is as important as achievement.
00:07:58:08 - 00:08:21:04
Unknown
And so we thought, well, that's what we'd never heard that before. Then we thought, this is interesting for them. Perhaps this is important for everybody. So we began, first of all, with our technical reports and then the work with the schools, but really from a very positive, inclusive moment, thinking about how identity was important for all of us.
00:08:21:04 - 00:09:02:11
Unknown
Some particular struggles, those who struggled or who were marginalized in schools. Then along came COVID vaccinations, masks and all the polio reservations that occurred around that. And then they moved on to explosions around other aspects of identity related to race and gender and language and books and songs and all the things you can possibly think of. And so this book we started writing from a standpoint of inclusion, now faced a culture of outraged indignation.
00:09:02:13 - 00:09:28:08
Unknown
And and so this is why it took us a while to write it. We were trying to figure out how can we take everything we've learned here working collaboratively with these schools, try to do great things so kids feel more like they belong to get people to the other side of these disputes that are dividing people rather than bringing them together.
00:09:28:10 - 00:10:00:02
Unknown
I'd like to add in a few thoughts. Thanks for that, Andy. I think that's wonderfully historical and concise. Many years ago, Jim, I was in a meeting at Boston College and professors were presenting their research to folks who work in schools, and at the end of one of the meetings, Pat and Natalie, who was what was called a cluster leader in the Boston Public schools, said to myself and other Boston College colleagues, you know, you guys have amazing research questions.
00:10:00:02 - 00:10:39:18
Unknown
You have brilliant methodologies. Your findings are interesting. And then she left this pause and she said, But your questions are not our questions. And that, for me, was like a huge wake up call. And I know that that you promote dialogic coaching. Jim And that's beautiful because a big part of dialog is listening. And so after that encounter with Pat, I swore that for the rest of my life I was going to listen to what colleagues in schools are working on and what they consider to be really important.
00:10:39:20 - 00:11:16:17
Unknown
That, for me, was a big prompt to work with Andy, who is a prodigious workhorse. But I think that part of the impact that we have been able to have together and a part has to do with listening to what people in the schools are working on. And even if we had never written a book on engagement or a book on wellbeing or a book on identity, try to take them seriously and to try and look at what they're working with and then try and look at classical and contemporary theories and see what's going on in this age.
00:11:16:19 - 00:11:32:06
Unknown
And in the book we work with the distinction. We say that we're moving from an age of achievement and effort into an age of engagement, well-being and identity. And when we present that to folks in the schools, they're often like, Yeah, we are. That's really interesting.
00:11:32:06 - 00:11:39:10
Unknown
Okay, we've got to get the kids engaged. Nobody is so high achiever if they're not engaged first, okay?
00:11:39:12 - 00:12:00:00
Unknown
Nobody. So we got to get the kids engaged. If our kids are struggling with anxiety, they're not going to be able to work with the material. So we got to make sure that there's a minimal level of well-being. And if they have a sense that they don't know who they are, that they're in a crisis of identity that also will impede their learning.
00:12:00:02 - 00:12:21:10
Unknown
So I think that part of the challenge and now I'm speaking to two researchers, but also to coaches, school leaders, anyone, is to really pay attention to what's going on on the ground in the schools. And and then if we listen, the students are happy to tell us
00:12:21:10 - 00:12:34:01
Unknown
the students are happy. Well, you know, I'm struggling with well-being or I want to have some spaces in the school that I can go to, where I can meditate or some places where I can go outside and go for a walk.
00:12:34:01 - 00:13:01:05
Unknown
And I want to see some part of my identity reflected in the school. It doesn't have to be all of it, but some part of it. So I think that the courage that Andy and I found to work on the identity book came from a responsibility of being loyal to what students and educators were telling us. And by the way, there were many times when we asked ourselves, should we get out of this?
00:13:01:06 - 00:13:29:13
Unknown
Is this too hard? Or are we putting our our hands into a hornet's nest here? I would say that in general, we have had a very warm response from professionals. I've also presented to high school students who really like to discuss issues around identity. So I think that there is a hunger for that and that we have to make sure that we create those good spaces for deep and meaningful dialogs to occur in schools.
00:13:29:17 - 00:13:55:17
Unknown
And that's part of what prompted us to work on the Book of Pillows for us. We're getting close to the end of this way. We really started to get to learn the identities, not just about them, the others, but I duchess's something that matters to all of us, really. So, so close to we found ourselves and in Norway writing at the same time.
00:13:55:17 - 00:14:23:23
Unknown
So we're two guys appearing in hotels and taxes and various other and people say, what are you doing here? I went, So well, we're writing a book about identity, and nobody recorded that as an interesting thing to do, no matter what our occupation. So we had a Syrian taxi driver who then told us, but two days before to become a Norwegian citizen.
00:14:25:13 - 00:14:47:13
Unknown
Well, how do you feel about that? And I said, Well, so what I'm trying to get a hold of is how can my identity be the best of Norway? I said, What's that? And I said, Well, you know, opportunity and people treated with respect and dignity and so on. So a symbol. What's the best thing about being Syrian?
00:14:47:14 - 00:15:09:11
Unknown
And I said, The thing is this. And in Norway, when people get old, they just put them in warehouses and they forget about them apart from visiting them one day a week. And I said, But in my culture, we feel parents have worked for us and supported us all our lives. And so when they become old, they live with us.
00:15:09:11 - 00:15:41:13
Unknown
That part means sacrifices, but they're they're part of our family. And they've been Norwegian in Syria. It's about bringing those two sets of values together. Then we had a non-binary member of the White staff and we asked them, so they said, that's really interesting identity, a symbol of something for Gerald. And they said, Well, well, the thing is, is of I've come with my partner from Greece and in Greece we feel we feel very unsafe.
00:15:41:15 - 00:16:09:15
Unknown
But in Norway, this is the first country in the world to pass legislation on gender self-identification. And we feel totally safe and included. And then my hairdresser had fled from Brexit. She was punch up tattoos all over the place and fled from Brexit and the UK with fear of outsiders and so on and so forth. And then she felt she was in a different kind of place to deal with those sorts of issues.
00:16:09:15 - 00:16:21:00
Unknown
So, so identity seems to matter to everybody. No, it's not even just an educational issue. It's it's a personal and a social and an existential issue.
00:16:21:00 - 00:16:38:12
Unknown
this April, I'll be partnering with Chapters International to offer the Intensive Instructional Coaching Institute in Paris, France. The institute brings together coaches, teachers and administrators from literally all around the world to consider what our research has identified as the most important information about instructional coaching.
00:16:38:14 - 00:16:59:22
Unknown
We'll have five interactive and fun days filled with learning, practice and community building. Participants at the Institute will get six of my most important instructional coaching books written over the past 25 years. The Definitive Guide to Instructional Coaching Better Conversations. The Impact Cycle Impact Instruction, The Instructional Playbook and Evaluating Instructional Coaching.
00:16:59:22 - 00:17:00:20
Unknown
We'll go through each book
00:17:00:20 - 00:17:05:22
Unknown
and discuss how the ideas in them should be applied to create great coaching or great coaching programs.
00:17:05:22 - 00:17:12:18
Unknown
whether you're a new coach, an experienced coach and educator interested in becoming a coach, an administrator, interested in creating a great
00:17:12:18 - 00:17:14:02
Unknown
coaching program.
00:17:14:02 - 00:17:28:01
Unknown
A really anybody interested in effective professional development. This course should give you just what you need. And it's in Paris. For more information, please go to instructional coaching dot com or email me at Hello ad of Instructional Coaching Duco.
00:17:28:03 - 00:17:52:01
Unknown
It is fascinating, without question. That's why I just absolutely loved the book. I had a experience with a researcher who's a good friend of mine that I like an awful lot. And I was showing him a video of a coach setting a goal with the teacher and the teachers class was quite out of control. And if you want to use that language, the kids weren't on task.
00:17:52:01 - 00:18:16:17
Unknown
They weren't really engaged in the learning. And so they sat engagement goal and the process was where the teacher just answered questions and said, Well, this is really what I'd really like to change. This is what I'd like to see for my kids. They're now doing this. I'd like it to look like this. So they set the engagement goal and shared the video and he said, That's great, But I wish she'd set an achievement goal.
00:18:16:18 - 00:18:36:19
Unknown
So I think that might be what you're talking about. There's much more than simply achievement. And you look at the research on why kids drop out. It's because they don't have a sense of belonging. They don't feel safe. They don't feel they're they have a connection with what they're doing. They don't have hope. All those things that we would call emotional engagement are just ignored.
00:18:36:19 - 00:19:03:02
Unknown
And so to me, engagement is a priority part of it equity. We're not we're not being equitable to kids if we don't make sure they feel like they belong. So, yeah, and I hadn't thought about I think about identity in terms of professional development and how the way we communicate, if it becomes an identity conversation interferes. But I hadn't looked at it anywhere near what the sophistication you've used.
00:19:03:04 - 00:19:11:00
Unknown
My next question, just so we have a shared vocabulary, how would you define identity? What do we mean by identity?
00:19:11:00 - 00:19:24:07
Unknown
So? So what is an identity if we kind of go back into identity studies and beginning the field is really dominated by psychologists who are thinking about a theory of the self.
00:19:24:09 - 00:19:49:16
Unknown
So it's a very personal concept. But pretty quickly we get folks like Erick Erickson, who is mentored by Margaret Mead, who's saying, well, wait, it's also developmental and it's developmental across the life span. And then we get sociologists like Karl Mannheim who is saying, yep, and it's also generational. So he said that there are these crystallizing incidents in a generation.
00:19:49:18 - 00:20:21:15
Unknown
So for boomers, it could be Vietnam student protests, feminism. For Generation Z, it could be COVID 19 climate change, Black Lives Matter. But every generation has its own specific identity. And then you can also look at identity through a lens of societal or political interpretations. So there's theories of intersectionality that look at how race and class and gender all interact with each other.
00:20:22:00 - 00:20:50:21
Unknown
I think we like to think that the personal and the developmental and the generational and the societal all can be mobilized to support educational work on identity, to help our young people, to develop some confidence in their identities. And notice I say confidence in identities, not narcissism about their identities, but that they feel they can be a whole people who are entering into a whole school.
00:20:50:23 - 00:20:55:21
Unknown
So our sense of identity is is very dynamic and it's very social.
00:20:55:21 - 00:21:26:16
Unknown
And by way of background, Eddie and I both have degrees in sociology at different points of our academic career. So we're not interested really in theories of identity that you would find, for example, in Self magazine. J Just very focused on the individual. We're interested in relationships and dialog and a dynamic theory of the self developing in interactions with other over time.
00:21:27:18 - 00:21:53:01
Unknown
One of the most formative books, picking up on what Dennis said about sociological training that I've read was probably top ten books of all time from a was an undergraduate was by a Canadian to America called Irving Goffman in the late 1950s, early 1960s on became the 73rd president of the American Sociological Association. It was a strange guy.
00:21:53:01 - 00:22:14:23
Unknown
Hey, it was a gambler. It was a card counter. He got thrown out of casinos and then he tried to study gambling on the cover, which will be very difficult to do now. So he played around a lot with his own identity and the book of his book, one of several books of his that I read as an undergraduate had a huge influence on me.
00:22:14:23 - 00:22:54:04
Unknown
And it's called Stigma, The management of spoiled identity. And, and this book of Goffman took all kinds of identities, but people helped, which he said were part of many things that they were. But other people kind of picked them up and picked on them for this one master characteristic. But they attributed to them it might be their race, it might be the disability, the fact that they're homeless or an ex-prisoner, for example, and they stigmatize for it, but in all kinds of ways that they beat them in language models.
00:22:54:05 - 00:23:24:00
Unknown
But so too. And then his book talks a lot about how people manage that. So, for example, I'm a bit hard of hearing now and how do people who have hearing loss manage their hearing loss well, sometimes you try to disguise it, so sometimes you adopt other strategies where you become more competent. So if you have hearing loss, if you go to a party and talk all the time, you'll never have to listen.
00:23:24:02 - 00:23:55:05
Unknown
And that's how a lot of people go off hearing loss look like they've become the most boring person in the room. And it's arguable what many of these strategies become becomes self-defeating. I tried to Pasos White or a pencil straight if you're gay, or as he called it at the time, homosexual. So this this I think even from this point I started to think a lot about what it's like to not be made or to not even be like me.
00:23:55:07 - 00:24:19:02
Unknown
But what is it like to be someone else who lives and who lives in this kind of world? And identity helps us get at that. It helps us understand what it means to develop our own identity, including, you know, your own work. Jenn Like people, professional identity, people's people's line of work, what it means to be, you know, a teacher or professor or a coach, for example.
00:24:19:03 - 00:24:30:04
Unknown
But in doing that also to be very attentive to identities that are different than I was in the hurricane. Create a bridge between those rather than set up a barrier between them.
00:24:30:04 - 00:24:39:03
Unknown
I'm sure this is too simplistic, but is it is a simple is a too simplistic way of describing identity as the answer to the question Who am I?
00:24:39:03 - 00:24:42:02
Unknown
I think that that's a really good starting place.
00:24:42:02 - 00:24:51:21
Unknown
lot. Like, you know, one of the most common, what, third grade, fourth grade assignments in the world is. Who am I? I'll off you go. You know, the kids will talk about that.
00:24:51:21 - 00:25:03:13
Unknown
Andy and I in workshops that we do, we we've done things like asking people in the very first 5 minutes, give three indicators of your identity.
00:25:03:15 - 00:25:29:03
Unknown
Write them on a piece of paper or, you know, make a mental note of them and then discuss it with colleagues at the table. And the room always explodes in discussion as people try and figure out what identity do I have actually, right now and what's what I think our book tries to invite educators to do is to get beyond thinking, you know, I just have a settled identity.
00:25:29:03 - 00:25:31:14
Unknown
But your identity is always changing.
00:25:31:14 - 00:25:46:02
Unknown
I think one of the most courageous things I ever saw was a principal in Darwin, Australia, who stood up in front of 100 colleagues and said, I don't know who I am right now. This guy was around 60 years old, so I always could have told you who I was, what my identity was.
00:25:46:04 - 00:25:54:19
Unknown
But I feel like everything's shifted in the last few years. Now that could be really exciting because that kind of confusion can be a prelude to growth.
00:25:54:19 - 00:26:10:12
Unknown
But it does indicate that identity issues don't really go away. They're always with us, and if we can pay attention to them, they can be a source of a flourishing, of self-discovery, of engaging others.
00:26:10:14 - 00:26:33:01
Unknown
If we ignore them, however, and repress them and get stuck in them, then they can be exploited. Our identities can be exploited. And that's part of the problem I think we have with schools and society today. You know, in the 19th century and before, nobody thought about identity, but you were born in a village. You grew up in a village there.
00:26:33:05 - 00:27:17:18
Unknown
You're probably married. Somebody you don't question what gender your work in the May not totally because Shakespeare plays around a lot with that. For example, in Western literature, but mainly you'll know you were who you were, you lived where you lived and you married what was available there. But the job that was available in the village. So you never really thought, I want to be this or I'd like to be that or but, but in the modern world where you have more of a reflective relationship now to who we are, a might be a more of a reflective relationship to other people or a might be.
00:27:17:18 - 00:27:53:11
Unknown
And in the last two years with the subject for that reflection, because of huge movements of people around the world and the fact that some schools have 40, 50 different ethnic cultural groups and languages, for example, although the fact that we come medically on surgically make changes to or will not, we can change our take on those are there's our lips, our cheeks where we can do things about age.
00:27:53:11 - 00:28:19:07
Unknown
We can do things in relation to gender that we're once never really able able to do, but because of social media where we, you know, we can look at everybody else, but we can also look at ourselves in different ways. We can we can narrow, we can thin, we can elongate, we can tongue realize I look very tanned on this presentation, which nobody can say, No, it's not a slip.
00:28:19:09 - 00:28:39:06
Unknown
There's a reflection of the sunset coming onto the screen. But but it makes us more aware almost in every moment of of who we are, of how we look, of how we connect. So identity is kind of a reflective relationship to a self that we once completely took for granted.
00:28:39:06 - 00:28:48:20
Unknown
I think I'm thinking and this is what I was thinking as I was reading, is that it is and this is why stigma is such an interesting point of departure.
00:28:48:20 - 00:29:16:15
Unknown
But I think that it's so related to power in the sense that if I minimize your stigma or excuse me, if I minimize your identity, it gives me more power. I put you one down and you can see it. Like in your book, you talk about the importance of recognizing all kinds of workers as employees, not just professional.
00:29:16:16 - 00:29:41:11
Unknown
And they all deserve the same kind of respect. And, you know, that's a small example of it. And you can see it in terms of a bullying and abuse of people of any kind of identity, really. And so it seems ah, it's it's one of my issues is moralistic judgment. Moralistic judgment immediately kills intimacy and it kills the opportunity for learning.
00:29:41:13 - 00:30:04:13
Unknown
If I say you're a bad person, then the whole conversation becomes about the fact you're a bad person. But it seems that I'm thinking that the impetus for diminishing another person's identity comes from the very same place. A moralistic judgment comes from from the need to be all be one up and you'll be one down. That seem accurate to you in terms of your work on this, because you know much more about this than me.
00:30:05:08 - 00:30:29:18
Unknown
If I could start off for the very small intervention and then Denis, perhaps you can pick this up, which is and in the past, a few years ago, I've written a few things about emotions. So some of my most such papers are on emotions. One of them is about disgust, and disgust is is about a reaction to difference.
00:30:29:20 - 00:30:58:16
Unknown
But it's one of repulsion. One of the prime examples of disgust is racism as as being repelled by being pulled away by something or someone that is different from you. Curiosity is about being drawn towards difference. Such an imagination, in a way. And. And so
00:30:58:16 - 00:31:14:18
Unknown
one of the great tasks of educators of us all, I think, is to create environments where we have more authentic curiosity about each other on the fullness of each other.
00:31:14:19 - 00:31:24:19
Unknown
Not what we see, but always, but the fullness of each other, rather than being instantly repelled by that.
00:31:24:19 - 00:31:34:04
Unknown
And, you know, zoom life during COVID, I think fed repulsion and inhibited curiosity.
00:31:34:08 - 00:32:11:11
Unknown
I want to build on that. Thank thank you for that, Andy. So we have these very powerful emotions and one of the things that gets in the way of successful professional development is when coaches or school leaders or anybody kind of doing assessment comes in and immediately starts with negative judgments, including negative moral judgments. It's a surefire way to have no impact and perhaps even a negative impact to the intervention.
00:32:11:11 - 00:32:42:02
Unknown
And so one of the books that came out when we were finishing our book is by Dobbin and Caleb and what works with diversity and what doesn't. And in that book, those two professors, one at Harvard, one at the University of Tel-Aviv, kind of do a comprehensive literature review and study of anti-bias interventions going back decades. And they find that many of the interventions not only weren't successful, but they backfired.
00:32:42:02 - 00:32:56:20
Unknown
So in terms of measurable outcomes like promotions or hirings of women and people of color, after the interventions, the numbers go down, they have the wrong impact that you would hope for. Why is that?
00:32:56:20 - 00:33:00:12
Unknown
There are so many things that educators want their students to know.
00:33:00:14 - 00:33:26:18
Unknown
They want to understand the solar system. They want their students to understand how plants create their own food. They want them to understand how to conjugate irregular verbs in foreign languages. They want them to understand when to use a semicolon and when to use a colon and when to use a hyphen. There's so much stuff. And so what we have to help educators to do is to build on strengths.
00:33:26:18 - 00:33:49:15
Unknown
And this is something that coaches, I think, know intuitively. And if we're going to kind of bring in some moral judgments, we really got to be careful about how we do that. One one of the classics in the field of educational change that I go back to again and again is by Charles Payne. It's a book that's called So Much Reform, So Little Change.
00:33:49:17 - 00:34:15:19
Unknown
And Payne tries to understand why is it that after decades of efforts at reform, so little actually changes in the culture of our schools? And I'll just highlight two points from that. One is he refers to insider virtue, outsider. Vice Schools develop a culture of we're the only people that understand what's going on here. Nobody else has anything to contribute.
00:34:15:21 - 00:34:44:03
Unknown
It's us against the world and off you go. And if that pattern doesn't get interrupted, we're really in an environment that's hostile to learning. So that's one of Payne's principles. The second one is the the theory of negative interpretation. So he has this great parable, the parable of the nasty pot of gold. A philanthropist comes into a school and says, I've got a huge pot of gold to give you.
00:34:44:05 - 00:35:07:12
Unknown
And the educators say, Well, that sounds really nice, but let's see, there's probably some strings attached. you're going to want us to do this or you don't want us to do that. Da da da da da da da. I don't want your nasty pot of gold. Now, I understand where that comes from because I've had big multimillion dollar federal grants and I understand every pot of gold has a lot more strings attached than than you might want to imagine.
00:35:07:14 - 00:35:31:21
Unknown
The challenge then for coaches, I think, is how do we develop relational cultures where the people that we're working with feel safe, feel secure, can be vulnerable, can try things out Rarely. If you're trying something really innovative. Does it work on the first time? It's not going to work on the first time or the second or the third.
00:35:31:22 - 00:35:49:12
Unknown
It's going to take repeated efforts. So how can we help people through those stages of growth so that they feel like I'm thriving now as a professional? This is what I've always wanted to be able to do and identity is a part of that.
00:35:49:12 - 00:35:57:11
Unknown
Talk to secondary school teachers. They'll tell you, I'm a math teacher, I'm a chemistry teacher, I'm a Spanish teacher.
00:35:57:13 - 00:36:23:16
Unknown
That's an identity statement. And so helping people to feel secure in those statements and then hopefully their students will saying one day, I'm a Spanish speaker, I'm a mathematician, I'm a historian. Those are very strong identity statements and schools can aim towards promoting those kinds of positive identities with everything that we do, with everything in our power.
00:36:23:16 - 00:36:31:15
Unknown
What I just have to say this really briefly that you're really describing how we go about coaching, so I have to put this a little bit in there.
00:36:31:15 - 00:36:54:02
Unknown
Is that the way it works is we take a kind of solution focused approach where we say, what would you like to see? The teacher sets a goal and then if they know what they want to do, then we run with what they want to do. But we set a really clear student goal, a change in engagement or achievement or something related to wellbeing or achievement, and a clear, but it also can be adapted.
00:36:54:04 - 00:37:12:15
Unknown
And then we help the teacher get ready to implement. And then when they implement, we find almost always it doesn't work. And so we have to make adaptations of what Ron Heifetz would talk about adaptive leadership. You've got to make modifications. You can't just take a thing off the shelf and have it work. You can't even do it with one kid, let alone a whole classroom full of kids.
00:37:12:15 - 00:37:31:10
Unknown
So so our process is structured but adaptive and the way we do it. So it's really consistent with what you say and we feel unless the teacher deeply wants to, unless it's an emotionally compelling goal, what Jim Collins would say, a goal that hits you in the gut, unless you have a goal like that, you're probably not going to hit it.
00:37:31:10 - 00:37:49:19
Unknown
So we start with the change in students and then when we sit down to discuss things, the coach has expertise, but they don't act like an expert. They act like a partner. They say, Well, I can share some things. You know, Edgar Shine talked about this and helping. You never say, Well, here's one thing I could do. So here's a bunch of And another big influence would be motivational interviewing.
00:37:49:21 - 00:38:22:05
Unknown
I'm trying to give you 20 years of research here and one minute, but what we're very like motivational interviewing where we say, well, let's let's look at the options where you drive the process, but we're not doing it for trivial stuff. We're doing it to do something that will have an unmistakably positive impact on kids. A year later, they will be different because of this goal we set, and we don't think you'll have that kind of change unless the teacher drives it, unless there and then once they know what they're going to do, we are we have expertise, but we only share where it's helpful and we never impose it.
00:38:22:05 - 00:38:38:09
Unknown
We say, here are some options. Which one do you want? And if they pick something that's not going to work, it's going to come out in the process. Process will take care of it because they're driven to have that change. So it's very consistent with what what you're saying. I think in terms of what we found out about change as we move forward.
00:38:38:11 - 00:39:00:00
Unknown
But I wanted to ask you another question. It's unfortunate that this really should be like a five hour question, so or a five hour conversation, but not about our question. We have a note here. One of that academics asks if that's right. That's right. Usually in the discussion part. Does anybody have a question? Well, actually, I'd like to tell you my dissertation.
00:39:00:02 - 00:39:20:14
Unknown
I did that. So let's face it. So here's what I'm wondering. Given how polarized and triggered the world is, how in the heck can we ever have a conversation about race or gender or class? Sometimes it seems like the best strategy is to not say anything.
00:39:20:14 - 00:39:25:20
Unknown
So, I mean, a lot of what this book is about, people are terrified of these issues.
00:39:25:22 - 00:40:08:13
Unknown
They're they're terrified of the terrified of so, you know, Bolthouse came across this way because is they're terrified of, if a kid backs up another kid and puts them in the hospital and then it's discovered but a lot discovered, it's no the kid has committed the offense as block And so I'm talking in a Canadian context here, but but then you know, the kid is suspended or whatever the consequences in a school normally that the parents respond they think this is a case of racism.
00:40:08:13 - 00:40:38:17
Unknown
So then the teacher and the principal get suspended for eight months while there's an inquiry, and then they bring in they bring in an investigator who is also black, who finds that the principal and the principal associate had exhausted the right thing. There was no racism at all. But for four, eight months everything is put into suspension while while all this happened.
00:40:38:17 - 00:41:04:08
Unknown
So a lot of people are afraid. Whichever way this works out, a lot of people are terrified of doing the real thing. They're saying the wrong thing, all of using a book that they're not supposed to use of singing a song that they're not supposed to sing of making a mistake and and how they identify somebody in there and in that classroom.
00:41:04:09 - 00:41:29:00
Unknown
So they stay away from it altogether. And we we have a metaphor in the book about about the Buffalo kids. So origins are indigenous and it is, you know, when there's a huge storm, when a most of the other ones do, they're on the run from the store, that makes perfect sense and they keep running. But eventually the storm catches up with them and then they're not just running away from the storm anymore.
00:41:29:00 - 00:42:00:23
Unknown
They're running in the storm. That's exhausting. And the differences and the buffalo is the buffalo turn around and faces the storm, puts her head down, faces the storm. The sudden the storm comes past and then they find themselves out the other side. So that in a way, it sounds easy to say that to other people. How how do you be courageous in a time of great, great dispute between different groups within within your school?
00:42:00:23 - 00:42:05:23
Unknown
How how come you how can you do that? And
00:42:05:23 - 00:42:29:22
Unknown
and so we have we set out a set of principles. And in the book there's about 12 of them. There are lots of principles like these in the world, though they're not you know, we're not trying to sell a set of 12 principles. But the point is, is of a group of principles, like, you know, like having a difficult meeting, have some norms for how your meeting will go or how your discussion will go.
00:42:29:22 - 00:42:54:08
Unknown
So these are a set of norms. Like what? Like bravery, like solidarity, soul support each other, like humility. Don't get on your high horse irony. Don't take yourself too seriously. All, all the time. Civility, dignity, to treat other people with respect, empathy, listen, listen to to the other side.
00:42:54:08 - 00:43:17:16
Unknown
So these difficult conflicts are raging on all sides now around a gender identity or around race and nationalism or around religious freedom and the statements of women or gender minorities, for example.
00:43:17:18 - 00:43:36:07
Unknown
And these are very difficult to deal with. But we can't we can't run away from them. We have to face them. We have to face them together and not not be isolated. And then we have to face with people with a social, but with a set of guiding principles.
00:43:36:07 - 00:43:44:23
Unknown
Thanks for that, Andy. So you're really asking a really burning question there, there, Jim.
00:43:45:01 - 00:44:21:13
Unknown
Just today, the RAND Corporation came out with a report. It's entitled Policies Restricting Teaching About Race and Gender Spill Over into Other States and Localities. So while only about 36% of U.S. educators, which is more than a third, are teaching in one of these states, have passed this legislation restricting the teaching of race and gender. The finding of the report is that even in states and localities without restrictions, educators are saying we're cutting back teaching about that.
00:44:21:19 - 00:44:55:13
Unknown
But I remember reading a number of years ago research in the U.S. indicating about 40% of U.S. biology teachers did not teach the concept of evolution because they were afraid of pushback from parents. Now we know educators. You know what? Angry parent can make your life really miserable for a whole year. And and so it doesn't take that much to kind of get educators discouraged.
00:44:55:15 - 00:45:21:08
Unknown
And and there's so many things to talk about or to teach about that. You know, instead of teaching about race and gender, you have to teach about, you know, the Catholic Act or you'll teach about. I don't know, you know, the first person on the moon, you'll teach about other things. But the crisis in the society is that public schools are needed, especially public schools are needed to create a public.
00:45:21:08 - 00:45:44:18
Unknown
If you think of the public as a kind of a verb, it's something that's active, that has to be sustained. It has to be nourished. It can't just be kind of what's left over after the markets and technology have done their bit. So we're we're in a critical moment now where we need to be having all kinds of spirited debates.
00:45:44:20 - 00:46:15:09
Unknown
The debates have moved off in other directions. They happen in pubs, they happen online, they happen in a lot of different places, but not in the schools. How can this be how can this be a good thing? One of the things that Andy really just came out in, what you discussed, that case that you presented, it comes out in this Rand Corporation report is that the leaders at the top of the system are not sending signals that they will support the educators further down.
00:46:15:11 - 00:46:39:08
Unknown
They're not sending the signal. Look, guys, I know it's a contentious time. You get in there and you teach about race and gender the best way you possibly can going on all of your professional expertise. And I can't promise I'll back you up in every single case, but I really want you to know if I can. You've got I've got your back.
00:46:39:09 - 00:47:10:17
Unknown
So there's a crisis a bit, you know, kind of at the very top of this system with people wanting to dodge these issues in higher education. And it's kind of just it's just sort of the converse of the case I described. Of course, everybody well, not everybody knows, but everybody should. Of course, there are wildly disproportionate rates of suspension and exclusion of disciplining as as there apply to black and brown students compared to compared to white students, for example.
00:47:10:17 - 00:47:47:14
Unknown
So so when you see an incident like this, there is reason to be cautious. There is reason to question is, is this just like a behavior or the response? But but all right. Just take a pause. You know, not an eight month olds while there's a lengthy investigation, but a pulse to bring people together. Use that data, use the knowledge, look at it, look at it together before way in the world of social media, rush into an individualistic, legalistic response for which everybody suffers, including the educators.
00:47:47:16 - 00:48:26:03
Unknown
Sorry, that's a no. No, that that's great. Jim, You know, the first two pages of the book are entitled Who This Book Is For. And it's really a book, I think, for the exhausted majority. The exhausted majority who want to have conversations, who don't want to shout other people down, nor do they want to be shouted down, who recognize that there are grotesque injustices in our societies that often do fall out lines of race and class and gender, and that we have to confront those unflinchingly and we have to be able to name them.
00:48:26:05 - 00:48:51:12
Unknown
And where appropriate, we have to have the right sanctions in place. However, our gamble at least I'll put myself out there. And Andy, I know you will, too, is that the majority of the people that go into the teaching profession want to help young people to flourish, wants to help them to thrive. They're not out there to perpetuate injustices, and that is society's.
00:48:51:12 - 00:49:03:20
Unknown
We really have to figure out how we're going to support them or we will end up with nobody wanting to go into this endangered profession. And that's not good for anyone.
00:49:03:20 - 00:49:13:16
Unknown
in complete agreement and I'm feeling that the exhausted majority is a great will, a great point to make and
00:49:13:16 - 00:49:19:09
Unknown
how do you think an understanding of identity could help change agents like coaches be more successful?
00:49:19:09 - 00:49:24:19
Unknown
this is a podcast, all instructional coaching within the book.
00:49:24:19 - 00:50:11:10
Unknown
We're talking about generational identity. You know, a big part of coaching is is coaching people are a different from people, usually people, a younger knowledge. And so the the raises issues about how the way connect with people who experience life differently even than we did at their age and then factor into the race and agenda and other things about identity so that it raises questions for coaching of of trying to how to we coach people whose lives and experiences may and important respects be quite different than ours.
00:50:11:12 - 00:50:40:19
Unknown
Well sometimes it's just about handing them over to somebody else. I think I was a bit closer than we are, but whether you reach that point or not, it is that it has to be driven by the by the mission to support, help assist them to be genuinely curious about the differences. Curiosity is it? I think it's Michael Bungie's tenure who lives in Toronto.
00:50:40:20 - 00:51:07:15
Unknown
He says Be curious a little bit longer, but curiosity? Curiosity is the driving force. If I immediately dismiss someone because of their name or their identity or some narrow perspective on that person, I'm I'm I'm letting Curiosity get the opportunity to learn is gone. And so I think I think that's a really, really great point that that you have to see.
00:51:07:15 - 00:51:21:09
Unknown
You have to see the real person or at least some semblance of the real person, not dismiss the person as a stereotype or a label or some thing just because of who they are. You have to see something deeper inside there, and the deeper you can go, the better the, you know, the more helpful you can be.
00:51:21:09 - 00:51:43:11
Unknown
it's there's so many parallels with the way I see it is see I would say a coach will have a hard time fostering trust and being successful unless they work from a place of benevolence. What erodes trust is self-interest. What builds trust is benevolence towards the other person. And ironically, by being benevolent, your identity flourishes too.
00:51:43:13 - 00:52:10:11
Unknown
You know, I think self-interest is actually self-destructive. Look at Trump. He's the quintessential example of of self-interest gone wrong. You know what? He's probably lonely, Never happy throwing a spaghetti at the wall, you know? Never, never satisfied with what he's dealing with. Because everything is self-interest is, I think, what Paul Ryan or somebody said. He has never read the Bible because he's not in it.
00:52:10:13 - 00:52:34:09
Unknown
And I'll probably go read all the sketches. But the flip side, the flip side is benevolence, though ironically, it's a more selfless approach from my perspective, a more selfless approach, a place of. First off, I want to help you. Help your kids. I want to do its best for you and do it. That's that. That opens up trust, but it leads to a much more fulfilling life.
00:52:34:14 - 00:52:37:15
Unknown
So so that's a big part of this.
00:52:37:15 - 00:52:39:15
Unknown
and to give hope to the exhausted majority.
00:52:39:15 - 00:52:57:07
Unknown
Seems like a good place for us to stop, because I think that's what your your book does it's beautifully written. And to me, the test of a good book is it forced you to ask other questions. Does it have depth to it? And can I actually read the darn thing and yours meets all three of those criteria. Great.
00:52:57:07 - 00:53:15:15
Unknown
And it's a book for the Times. There's so many other things I wanted to talk about. I want to talk about collective identity because I feel collective identity is a concept that helps us bridge. If I see my act as violence to the whole collective identity, not just that one person, it might help me see the others differently and then many, many other things.
00:53:15:15 - 00:53:33:14
Unknown
But unfortunately I think we have run out of time and I want to stop with hope. I think that's a great place to end. But I'm very grateful. I hope this is the first of many conversations. I'm so grateful to both of you. Thank you so much. And yeah, wonderful lecture, Jim. Thank you for the opportunity. I really appreciate it.