S2, E8: Building Belonging with Superintendent Kristi Dominguez

A pioneer in Early Learning in Washington State, Ferndale School District Superintendent Kristi Dominguez believes passionately that all children have the capacity to thrive in education, they simply don't all have the same opportunities to do so, and that those years before kindergarten are among our best opportunities to begin addressing those inequities.

"When you teach to the heart of a child, their mind will follow," she says. By working to build a sense of belonging for all her students, staff and families, she hopes to  create an equitable, district-wide learning landscape where every child can thrive. In this episode, we talk with Superintendent Dominguez about how she does it and why belonging consistently rises to the top of her priority list as a school leader.

"Outliers in Education" is a project of CEE, The Center for Educational Effectiveness. Find out more at effectiveness.org.

Produced by Jamie Howell at Howell at the Moon Productions.

Transcript

AD VO: 0:00

Outliers in Education is brought to you by CEE, the Center for Educational Effectiveness - better data, better decisions, better schools. To find out more visit effectiveness.org.

Eric Price: 0:14

As humans, we have a fundamental need to belong for students, aka young humans, that sense of belonging or the lack of it can make all the difference between thriving or failing in school. Well, you're right where you belong right here right now for another episode of Outliers in Education.

AD VO: 0:32

I think we really need to change how we look at what we do in schools, Everything that we do, as educators, it just comes back to people, I love it, even when it's hard, especially when it's hard. Ultimately, I mean, this is about what's best for kids.

Eric Price: 0:48

Welcome, everyone, to another episode of Outliers in Education. I'm Eric price here, alongside my co- host, Eric Bolz, from the Center for Educational Effectiveness. You know, we'll see when I look back to 2021, when we first started doing this stuff, I felt like we were kind of bumbling through it, Jamie kind of stitched us back together our producer. And now I feel like we've kind of started to get our legs underneath this a little bit and kind of know where we're going and kind of feel like we sort of belong in that space. Have you had a similar process?

Erich Bolz: 1:19

Well, I feel like Jamie is still stitching us together. But it was clear to me early on, and to my parents as well. And my close friends, including our producer, Jamie hell, that I probably did belong in an institution. It just so happened I found my way to an institution that turned out to be public education. So belonging is a theme that we're going to explore in depth in this conversation. In my experience as a 21 year school administrator, we as casualties of the No Child Left Behind experience focused on raising achievement by mucking around with achievement data and not focusing on who we served, and what they needed to critical components of belonging. We also learned in our outlier study, that ensuring all kids belonged was one of the 11 common conditions of high performing schools. So I'm really excited to have this conversation with the through line of belonging today, EP.

Eric Price: 2:05

Yeah, myself as well. Well, today we have with us a very special guest who wasn't always exactly sure where she belonged in her educational career. Right up to the moment when they handed her the keys to the Ferndale school district last year. Let's say hello to Superintendent Kristi Dominguez. Kristi, welcome to the show.

Kristi Dominguez: 2:23

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

Eric Price: 2:25

I know that sometimes when we ended up where we ended up in our educational careers, it wasn't really exactly where we thought when we began. So when you kind of started looking at the superintendent seat, and that's not an easy one to sit in, especially post pandemic and during Is it is it kind of true that you feel like you didn't belong there? And if so, what kind of changed your mind about that feeling?

Kristi Dominguez: 2:50

Yeah, that's a great question. And actually, I would say I didn't feel like I belonged in administration at all. So that was not my path. When I decided to be a teacher, I was going to be a kindergarten teacher, early learning person. I never want to leave the classroom. In fact, when I moved to Bellingham school district where I was previously, and they asked me to consider coming to central office, literally, in my interview, I finally just applied because they kept asking, and I wanted them to quit asking, but I, in my interview, I told them, I don't really want this job. I've kind of figured out who the other candidate is. And I think you should hire them. They hired me anyway. I said, Oh, I'll give this a year, maybe two. And that was about 14 years ago. So if you would have asked me ever going to district office? No. If you asked me if I was ever going to be an administrator, absolutely not. And superintendent was definitely not part of my path. But I, I can say that this has been the greatest job I've ever had right alongside kindergarten teacher.

Eric Price: 3:53

And plus, it sounds like you did a fantastic sales job to them as well.

Erich Bolz: 4:00

convince them not to hire me. It sounds like you set the bar appropriately for illustrative career entry. And I can relate I don't feel like I ever really belonged in the 21 years I was in administration 16 of those in the central office as well. So can you tell us from your perspective, why is student belonging so important?

Kristi Dominguez: 4:18

You know, when I just when I actually came to Ferndale, one of the pieces that I asked the board about during my interview was what were they hoping for the new superintendent to accomplish? And it was a sense of unifying the community. And so when I thought about what they were asking of this new leader, I asked to see the belonging data here in Ferndale and you know, their COVID was complex. It was complex in many ways, and I am a mother of three so I saw it through the lens of my own children, but just kids not knowing what their place was at really critical moments in their lifespan. And so, I asked to see the belonging data for Ferndale in only about 30 to 33% of our students were feeling connected. That that was alarming to me. Because what I know is I have a saying it's my educational philosophy. When you teach to the heart, the mind will follow. When people feel really seen and valued, it doesn't matter how hard the work is, right? Like we can all think of those, those educators that we would do anything for in our own lives. Because we, they meant so much to us that we wanted to make them proud. And so I knew that if we were truly going to get the achievement outcomes, we had to first help our students feel connected, and have a sense of purpose of why they were there, and what they brought to the table. So we met, I met with my Executive Director of Communications, Selena Rodriguez, and I just said, this is alarming data, we have to do something about it. And we have to tell kids every single day, you matter you belong, and hence that move forward. I think in Maslow's hierarchy, we often talk about educational outcomes. And we forget those key steps that come before. And you know, part of it is because state data puts out, you know, the output. And there's so many factors that fall into that number, that's just a snapshot of a moment in time. And it never tells the whole story of a child and so but belonging does.

Eric Price: 6:21

And those numbers of feeling like they're belonging was that during COVID Christi,

Kristi Dominguez: 6:26

it was coming out of COVID. So it was the year after, you know, that first year kind of back. But you know, it wasn't just our students. And I think we have to remember that staff was wondering, What's their purpose, and the job has changed dramatically, how we identify as educational systems, you know, we took we took a hard hit in the press, and, you know, national context. And, you know, not many careers don't get at least 48 hours to figure out how to redo their job. And we had an expectation that we were going to maintain the same level of performance. And everyone was gonna learn how to do it on Zoom, and not every one even had a computer in their homes. So we learned a lot, and we're going to be better for it. I think the thing that I appreciate about COVID It caused us to pause. And we were doing a lot of things in education that weren't making us better, but we were doing them because we had always done them. And it forced us to stop and say is this really the right work. And so that's what we're busy doing in Ferndale and what the test mark for me was where the students going to start talking about belonging. And they do. And I love it on Wednesdays we have you belong Wednesdays and we had a community couple of community members who bought a shirt for every staff member in our district. And so if you work in Ferndale School District, you have a you belong shirt, and on Wednesdays, that you belong Wednesdays, and everyone wears their shirt. And the power in that is every one shows up and is reminded about who we are. And my saying one team one town, we're all in this together. It's not about what school you work in what job you do. We were an ecosystem. And so we have collective ownership over our students educational outcomes.

Eric Price: 8:07

Well, Christi, that kind of is moving right into my next question actually probably answered it. But I wonder like as you move further from the classroom, and you know, as you move into central office, in my experience, you feel further a little bit more distal from students. And maybe even it seems like it takes longer to have an effective change. How do you foster that belonging sense as a superintendent?

Kristi Dominguez: 8:31

That's a great question, because I never want to go into administration, I'm still a teacher, just my my classroom was the whole district, you're gonna find me in classrooms all the time, I wear tennis shoes to work almost every day, because you never know. I might sub I might, you know, whatever, before December. So I started in July, and before December, winter break, I spent time in every single classroom in our organization. And then I made an expectation of everyone at Central Office that two full days in schools. And so the district office is often empty. Now, at any given time, we're really intentional about when we meet and why we meet. And anytime we have a meeting, I think this was something I because I keep thinking about what I imagined central office to be like so I'm kind of using that mindset of how to break down that but I add up anytime we have a meeting I add up the salaries of everyone in that room. And then I asked Did we get that much out of this meeting? And if we didn't, then we need to redo this structure. So

Eric Price: 9:35

Oh, I wish I would have had you as the leader of our meetings my entire life Christy. Oh, gosh,

Kristi Dominguez: 9:40

we just Yeah, death by meetings a real thing. So anyway, I just we work in service of kids. I think the other piece too is every space is a teaching and learning space. So we talked about the bus is a classroom. So you know, I spent a lot of time down and transportation. I'm writing the busing. How does that classroom work? How does the classroom of the cafeteria work has the playground as a classroom work. So it's not just the traditional classroom, but really thinking about the organization as a whole. And making sure that we're spending time in all those spaces. So

Eric Price: 10:11

anytime that adults are interacting with kids, yeah, yeah.

Kristi Dominguez: 10:15

And I grew up in an organization like that. That was how my school was, it was more of an ecosystem type, thinking that everyone was collectively responsible, including the students, they, you know, as a teacher, I remember my last classroom, I taught kindergarten, I had 30 students. And I would always say to them, there's 31 teachers in here, and there are 31 learners. And so making sure that I use that same mindset. So I don't think I'm the most traditional superintendent, because I don't I don't love to be in meetings. I don't love to sit in and do that. So I make sure we're out in schools all the time.

Erich Bolz: 10:51

Well, Christy, you said so many things that resonated with me. In fact, I've often said the same thing. Sitting in 16 years of central office meetings, I would often look and estimate salary and benefits multiplied by time in the room and wonder what kind of investment was that in the taxpayers? Were we doing our level best to help folks in the field so appreciated that

Eric Price: 11:10

because you were so you were so focused on what the meeting was about bowls, I imagine I have

Erich Bolz: 11:15

never met a meeting where I was a solid participant. I want to harken back to this whole notion of belonging. And I know that you've started a couple of initiatives. You know, you mentioned the shirts in the Wednesday in response to the the baseline data that you looked at when when you came on board. You've done you've done obviously, some other things. Tell us a little bit about your social media campaign, how you've implemented let me language in the district and other initiatives that you see is, you know, really moving forward to combat what feels like that lack of sense of belonging and students.

Kristi Dominguez: 11:46

Yeah, I would love to take credit for all of that of all the amazing things happening here in Ferndale, but they were happening the problem was, we weren't telling our own story. And so the first order of business I did as a superintendent was I elevated our then director of communications, I made her an executive director and Selena became my right hand person. And we started an entire campaign to tell our story. Because if you're not telling it, somebody else is. And so we just began to capture the moments that every day moments and so we reorganized our communications team. And so we have a specialist to him. He, he manages the social media account, I believe in social media, because it's the magic of the small moments that tell who we are as an organization. And so making sure that people know about the day in and day out, people always ask, you know, what are you even doing education? Even my own husband used to say to me when I taught kindergarten, what do you do all day. So, you know, people need to understand all the amazing things happening and so that that caught on, and then the you belong awards, we started that. And that really was because staff belonging was low. It wasn't just our students of a staff to and they were seeing awesome things that were happening of their colleagues. But sometimes it's just remembering to take the time and acknowledging it. So the ubelong Awards were just by staff for staff and and I have the beauty of I got to go out present them. But a staff member could nominate another staff member for the intentional things they saw them doing to create a sense of belonging. So that happened, the social media piece, and then the students started to do it. You started to see them create opportunities, one amazing students that we have her name is Jasmine. She wanted to create an event at the high school that honored the belonging of different cultures in our school. So she kicked off and I think about 303 150 people came where she highlighted the different cultures just in our high school and she took off and ran and had a multicultural night. And that came out of the belonging campaign you start to see wall hangings in the schools that said here at you know Vista we belong at Central we belong and students pictures were up, the students started to talk about it. This summer. We have a campaign that as they travel around the world, I even just got a picture about three weeks ago of somebody standing in Paris with their ubelong shirt. So capturing that around the world but so it really wasn't about anything I did it was really about just acknowledging what was happening in and the lemme language has been going for quite a while but we weren't telling anybody about it. So making sure that people know about the amazingness that Ferndale already was and continues to be

Eric Price: 14:43

the Christie way before you became a soup. You were really vested into these early learning pieces. So when you reflect on that, do you think that those early learning pieces do they support that belonging and K 12 Education

Kristi Dominguez: 15:00

You know, it's funny that you asked that someone said, What's this? What's it like to be a superintendent? And I said, it's like being a kindergarten teacher of adults. Yeah, that is it. It's, you know, it's about acknowledging the whole child or the whole person. And I've always said, if we ran education, like a high quality early learning program, we would be blown away by what can happen for kids, right? Like,

Eric Price: 15:27

and when you when you contrast that with what we're doing what what do you mean by that?

Kristi Dominguez: 15:31

Well, when you're in an early learning classroom, it's play based or inquiry based, children often get to decide what they're curious about. And then the teacher really serves as the guide instead of the instructor. There's a lot of movements, you have the arts, you have science, math, no one stays on any one topic for very long, it's into it's integrated. And then you start to get up and what happens? Less student voice, less choice. Adults are standing in front of the room directing, and so yeah, why do we do that? Yeah, exactly. I'm asking, Why do I do that? Because we

Eric Price: 16:12

don't have that much fun. Like as adults either. Like, I mean, that we like to do those other pieces. And the further up we get, we just get further away from that.

Kristi Dominguez: 16:20

Well, it's funny when I was early learning specialist, I would travel around the state and do early learning audits on districts. And I would hear from people saying we don't have time for that play. thing. And I'd say, Well, let's talk about CTE then, you know, do you have robotics? Do you have culinary arts? Oh, yeah, we have all those things. And I'm like, isn't that play based learning for the appropriate agent stage. So we do believe in it. We just we don't recognize that blocks actually lead to robotics. So we're getting there though.

Eric Price: 16:52

Wow. So many great ideas there. Let's take a short break and we'll be back in 60 seconds. For more with Superintendent Christy Dominguez right here on outliers and education.

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Eric Price: 17:46

Welcome back, everybody. We've been talking about the importance of a sense of belonging in schools with Superintendent Christie Dominguez from the Ferndale School District in Washington State.

Erich Bolz: 17:56

Christie, I'd like to stay on the on the Early Childhood piece and, and move out of Ferndale a little higher up to the policy level, you're probably maybe singularly responsible for the whole Transitional Kindergarten movement really being legitimized in this state. And I personally believe that early childhood is the closest thing we have to an equalizer, if that's within the scope of our control as as public educators, can you talk a little bit about that legacy? Your your path to it? And what do you think those ultimate impacts were not only in Bellingham, but beyond?

Kristi Dominguez: 18:24

Yeah, it's interesting to me, when we think about early childhood, we're a system of reaction education was built on a system of reaction, right? Like we are totally fine paying for students to, if they don't graduate at 18, we'll pay for them to go to school till they're 21, or a child didn't, you know, we're worried about them in second grade, so we're fine. Nobody's really questioning retention. But boy, when you want to talk about paying for early learning, the the proactive stance, we, boy, people get up in arms. And the interesting thing is, if you really follow brains research, the impact of a student or the development of their brain, the the most malleable their brain is is between prenatal and age nine around third grade, but yet we wait till they're five and not even in Washington State, you do not even legally have to come to school in Washington until you're eight. That is crazy to me. And we wonder why we're getting the results we're getting. But right like if you look at the history of education, we have continued on a model of funding education in a way that it was designed from the very first school. It was designed for middle class, upper class white boys who were going to go into and we've never questioned the the federal model of funding. And I often wonder what if we just started paying for education. We just started at prenatal and you just fully funded it. You'd probably run out about nine For our 10th grade, maybe, and look at how many kids are doing Running Start or different options in 11th and 12th grade, it is fascinating to me that the science is on the side of starting early, but the policy is not. And so we we built education around reaction instead of proactive kindergarten is not the beginning, I call our early learning system, the greatest equity issue we have, because every child was born with the capacity to learn and grow. But they haven't all been given the same opportunity. So children who come to school in kindergarten who have had access to, you know, field trips, or a lot of vocabulary, or books, or lots of math opportunities. Those are the kids who come into kindergarten, which I cannot stand the term k readiness, because there's no such thing, every child is ready for kindergarten, what we need to start talking about is System Readiness or adult readiness. And I have a saying it's never a child's job to be ready for school, it's 100%, the system's job to be ready for the child. And so high quality early learning systems do that. And, and I do laugh a little bit, because Headstart kind of takes a beating in the press about, you know, Headstart results. You know, kids who are in full time Headstart weren't ready by third grade, well, that has nothing to do with Headstart, right. Like, it's not an inoculation. That's not a one year, you had high quality preschool, you're ready for third grade, it's the system, it has to be high quality, pre K K, high quality first, second, third. And then those are the kids who are showing the results. But I worry sometimes we look at third grade test scores or whatever. And we say, Oh, this is a predictor, actually, the end of kindergarten is a predictor for those third grade scores. So we've got to back the train up. And so I'm super proud of transitional kindergarten in the state. And when I'm proud of its put the conversation of the importance of early learning at the legislative level, amen. That took forever, amen.

Eric Price: 22:05

So if you if you had the magic wand, and you are going to say there's superintendents, and there's district administrators listening to you, and you said, Look, if you could do these things in early education, what would you tell them that would have the most bang for their buck or their time?

Kristi Dominguez: 22:23

Yeah, there's a few things. One, you know, we know that teachers are the number one direct variable to student outcomes, right? Well, who's the first teacher, it's the parent, but we don't always acknowledge the parent and, and for parent education, you have to be able to pay or qualify. So every family should have access to parent education starting right away. And that begins in prenatal being able to have so I would make sure that a community is ready for that, I think to school districts are not the answer, where one part of the solution. So there are many, you know, we need to think about the mixed delivery system. There are a lot of organizations that do this. Well, and families should have a choice. But school districts have to be at the table. And I think sometimes we think school districts You stay out of it, because we're going to solve it. And it's no, it's going to take everyone at the table. So I think that's another piece is what role and then school districts have to understand. Because we are funded with state and federal funds. Sometimes we dismiss our private providers, child care providers, nurse family partnership programs. And so school districts have to be aware of that. And so I think every district should have an early learning focus. I think they should be thinking through their community partners, how they manage that. When I first began the work, I actually followed a researcher Dr. Christie cowers out of the National p3 Center. And I've been so fortunate to learn under her. And she has an incredible framework. And I think every district should know about that framework and be following that, because that really is a guide talks about principal effectiveness, teacher effectiveness, that community partnership, but yeah, every district should be at the table. But they can't do it alone. So I think that arrogance that sometimes we are as K 12 education, we have to remember we're one member of a much larger, comprehensive landscape.

Eric Price: 24:14

I keep hearing you talk about adults in this belonging picture, right? Why do we miss this with adults? Because I think we saw that in COVID. Right? We saw that not only kids were struggling, but we saw our adults were struggling. What do we need to do with our adults in that belonging piece?

Kristi Dominguez: 24:30

Yeah, what is it about us that we think once we get the degree we have all the answers. I think we have to remember right that we went to education because we love learning. And what if teachers thought about themselves as lead learners, and they always were the head of the learner and so in that we have to remember that we have to take care of all our learners and everyone has, whether you're five years of age, or you're 45 We all have the same needs is just me. Being sure that those needs are being met. And so I think sometimes we hold an expectation that teachers haven't figured out. Every year is a new year when you meet your new class every year, you become a new teacher.

Erich Bolz: 25:13

Well, Christy, two short follow ups really interested in taking this to the personal level. So you know, in your first year as superintendent, can you share a couple of impact stories, you know, where, you know, your leadership's made a difference in the life of a child or a staff member?

Kristi Dominguez: 25:26

Yeah, that is, that's a good one. And there are a lot I get kind of choked up. I think one of the students I'm thinking of today, probably because it's, it happened recently. His name's Tommy, I love Tommy and Tommy is going to be a sophomore at the high school. And Tommy has been part of our life skills program for his career. And his mom made a post that he's in summer school, and he went on his first field trip ever. And so when you talk about how we're remembering to see our students for who they are, what they can be and who they are. So we've been talking a lot in the last year about noticing everyone for their strengths. Like I said, Education is a reactive system. And so we tend to look at it through a deficit mindset. But what if we saw everyone for what they can do or who they can be, and we become an system of hope and possibilities and stop talking about children at risk, but start talking about children of hope. And so then it begins to shift the mindset of what can become instead of what isn't. And so, that's one of the pieces and then just listening to my, our students talk about the ubelong campaign. I'm getting all sorts of feedback this summer, you know, a student went to camp and they were sharing, oh, in Ferndale, we have a ubelong campaign and in Ferndale, we're striving to belong. I had another one of my student board members who was just interviewed by was deaf at the organization for the school board. And he just said every day, his goal is to make sure that another student feels a sense of belonging. So that idea of an ecosystem, it's now not on the shoulders of myself or the board or the adults. But everyone is starting to own it. The fact that today our mayor and our city council held an event where they were serving hot dogs down at City Hall because they wanted the students to know that they're cared about and even in the summer, that they matter and the community sees them. So it's not even just the district movement. It's become a community movement. And, and the thing was, it was there all along. But I go back to that goal of unification. And that's been the most powerful piece. So I think those are some things today I'm thinking about today.

Erich Bolz: 27:49

Well, thank you for sharing those stories. And then what will your legacy impact as an educator be Christie, you've done quite a lot.

Kristi Dominguez: 27:55

You know, I went to education because I had a remarkable there. I had remarkable teachers. And my own personal story was not I did not do well, in school, school was really hard for me, I had a learning disability, I spent most of my student career thinking that, Oh, you're not smart. I knew how to follow the rules of school so I could blend in. But I knew I remember taking that state exam when I was a senior. And just filling in the Scantron bubbles I got denied to every college I applied to because my state test scores were so low. But I stayed with education because some teachers made an impact and my second grade teacher probably the most. And that's where I develop that idea of when you teach to the heart, the mind will follow. It didn't matter that I could not spell or read at the end of second grade. But I knew she that I mattered to her. And so if I can do half of what she did for me in my educational career, then I had a career well lived.

Eric Price: 28:58

And she was the one that really made you feel like you belonged and that you had a place.

Kristi Dominguez: 29:02

Yep, yeah, I actually she had a clawfoot bathtub in her classroom. And I remember spending a lot of time in there, just trying to you no kind of escape, I think. And every year I ever taught and 18 years in the classroom, I had a clawfoot bathtub in my classroom in honor of her. So

Eric Price: 29:21

that is awesome. Christy, I think that if we could take some of these lessons about a not being reactive, and starting early and really looking at relationships with kids and everybody in that, like you described ecosystem. So in our ecosystem, Bowles is the alpha summarizer. And so we're going to flip it over to you bosey What do you got for a summarization today?

Erich Bolz: 29:46

Well, like I often say this is just a test by the rest of the podcast after to see whether I've been paying attention i i see through those meetings. I see through this. Yeah, it's a it's a it's a it's a it's a management strategy. Christy you If you would appreciate that I really

Kristi Dominguez: 30:01

like it, I might implement it.

Erich Bolz: 30:05

Well, great. So I just want to start with the notion that when you teach to the heart, the mind will follow. So consistent with so much that we believe our friends chuckling and Suzanne Gertz and episode 10 have a lot to say about that. The you belonging campaign really elevating student voice. You took me back to my retirement your COVID and COVID really caused us to both pause and innovate. So there were some really positive consequences, not only in education, but I think across a number of industries, because we were forced to make that pause and pivot every space is a teaching and learning space. The bus is a classroom. This is a critical mindset for for us as educators and thank you for that reminder. Dr. plucky, who says says a lot about school culture and episode 10 would say you control your narrative and it sounds like Christie landed in a in a spot that was a gem. And her biggest impact maybe is in really seizing control that narrative using these modern tools we have around social media to really change that communication paradigm in Ferndale student led initiatives. You know, your initiatives are making a difference whether you're a teacher or a coach when students start to really emulate that behavior. And so the idea that students are are taking pictures of shirts that that you belong T shirts from Ferndale have gone global now they're all the way out to Paris, as we heard is a pretty cool thing that students are planning multicultural evenings and really honoring each other's backgrounds. You know, coming from this campaign, when it's when it's owned at the student level, it's truly owned. Being a superintendent is like being a kindergarten teacher of adults. I never had the courage to be a superintendent. But I would say being a central office administrator is like being a kindergarten teacher of adults so resonated for sure what would happen if we really kept those play based aspects of early childhood education all the way through our K 12 system? How different would that education experience be? I think that was the biggest takeaway for me. I feel like I know a lot about early childhood. It's been a real life focus. And you know, when you're on with somebody smarter than you, you learn something every time which is another great benefit of the wonderful guests that we have on these podcasts. Christie clearly no exception. We're a system of reaction have said it over and over and over again. And in early childhood, is that ultimate ProAction? That policy, leg science how how many different ways can we say that in different contexts policy legs, science, I think that was a, that was a great notion for us to think about. The greatest equity issue we have is the what happens in early childhood. And I love the way Christy phrased that all kids have the same capacity. Not all kids have the same opportunity. So whatever we can do across our ecosystem, school systems, just being one positive player in that respect, we can absolutely make a real difference. If if we're committed to that homework. I think for our podcast consumers, you know, check out the Christie cowers framework. It might be something that we could port from early childhood all the way through K 12. Educators are lead learners. That's the proper mindset and noticing strengths and abandoning the deficit mindset. Christy is leading an organization really flipping the narrative to children of hope and Ferndale is fortunate indeed,

Eric Price: 33:02

how'd we do Christie? Anything to add to that one?

Kristi Dominguez: 33:04

Wow, I sounded really smart on that.

Erich Bolz: 33:09

I think it's because you are

Kristi Dominguez: 33:12

just, I care deeply about this work. And it's, it really is an honor to be able to sit in the seat. So

Eric Price: 33:19

well, Christy, thank you for the wisdom that you've shared. And I think that the more that I think particularly bowls he and I have here from this perch, I think we hear this less of the academic push and more of this listening relationship, heart, part of education, that that may have gotten a bad rap kind of in the open education version, you know, in the 70s. But I think really coming back to it's about people, and I don't care how you slice it. When you look at systems and schools and districts that are successful. They care about people, there's trust there. And that's exactly what you're having to say. So, thank you so much for your wisdom that you shared with us and I and I'm gonna ask you to be president, you'll probably say no, thank you. No, I'll

Kristi Dominguez: 34:04

never do that job.

Erich Bolz: 34:07

You've said that before.

Kristi Dominguez: 34:08

I know. I'm being really careful. Now. Thank you so much for having me. This was a lot of fun.

Erich Bolz: 34:14

And thanks to all you for joining us today on outliers in education. You can find this episode and more everywhere you listen to your favorite podcast, or visit us online@effectiveness.org. Until next time, this has been outliers in education.

AD VO: 34:32

If you'd like to find out how to gather the data you need to help drive positive change in your school or district take a moment to visit C E The Center for educational effectiveness and effectiveness.org better data, better decisions, better schools effectiveness.org