Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok F Daily with
Speaker 1: me your girl, Daniel Moody recording from the home Bunker,
Speaker 1: which is where I feel like I'm going to spend
Speaker 1: the rest of my life because stepping outside of our
Speaker 1: front doors these days seem more dangerous than fucking ever.
Speaker 1: And I don't say that. I say that tongue in
Speaker 1: cheek kind of, but like also really today I engage
Speaker 1: in a conversation with the president of AFT, the American
Speaker 1: Federation of Teachers, Randy Weingarten, who you have heard on
Speaker 1: this program before, and sometimes I have to like stop
Speaker 1: myself and realize how quickly things have devolved in this country,
Speaker 1: you know, for folks who may be new to listening
Speaker 1: to me, I am a former educator. I have a
Speaker 1: master's in early childhood education. I taught in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: And then I went into education policy, where I worked
Speaker 1: down the hill, you know, and then worked as a
Speaker 1: lobbyist for you know, several nonprofit organizations and foundations and
Speaker 1: you know, think tanks before I found myself full time
Speaker 1: in media. And what I will say is that education
Speaker 1: is one of the most important pillars foundations of democracy,
Speaker 1: and there has not been a time in our nation's
Speaker 1: history where education hasn't been the battle ground for progress
Speaker 1: in this country. You can look at the integration of
Speaker 1: schools right that took place after Brown versus the Board
Speaker 1: of Education, which I just want folks to wrap your
Speaker 1: mind around the fact that if Brown versus the Board
Speaker 1: of Education is challenged at any time in you know,
Speaker 1: the next few years, we will go back to segregated schooling.
Speaker 1: Because that's the kind of supreme court that we have
Speaker 1: that if we had in nineteen fifty four the Supreme
Speaker 1: court that we have now, integration of schools would have
Speaker 1: never taken place. And so when we see the attacks
Speaker 1: happening on schools, on teachers and on administrators for teaching
Speaker 1: the truth, for trying to build empathy and compassion in
Speaker 1: young people by teaching them about people and communities outside
Speaker 1: of their own, we know very well what the plans
Speaker 1: are to continue the hateful indoctrination of white children so
Speaker 1: that they can bear no responsibility and want to change
Speaker 1: nothing because everything is great. Why would you change everything
Speaker 1: if everything is working and as always worked and has
Speaker 1: always been great, you wouldn't. You would remain complacent. The
Speaker 1: status quo would be good enough for you. But you see,
Speaker 1: the more that you know, the more that you were
Speaker 1: challenged about what you have been taught and how it
Speaker 1: has framed your perspectives on the world, the more you
Speaker 1: are activated to change it. But if you remain an ostrich,
Speaker 1: if you remain infantilized by white politicians so that they
Speaker 1: can remain in power, then the status quo stands strong,
Speaker 1: and they double and they triple down on it. So
Speaker 1: in today's conversation with Randy, we talk about her experience
Speaker 1: this past weekend at the sixtieth anniversary of the March
Speaker 1: on Washington, where she sees education has both progressed and
Speaker 1: regressed over the last sixty years. We talk about teachers
Speaker 1: and administrators fleeing the profession because of fascism and authoritarianism
Speaker 1: at the hands of red state governors. Folks, whether or
Speaker 1: not you have children in our public education CYCE or
Speaker 1: in higher ed, what is happening to this system has
Speaker 1: a great emphasis on whether or not we hold democracy
Speaker 1: against a movement of American fascism led by Republicans. We
Speaker 1: are in perilous times, as I know those of you
Speaker 1: listening to me are well aware of, and what I
Speaker 1: ask Randy, and our conversation is what can people do
Speaker 1: who feel powerless? How do they get involved? And she
Speaker 1: offers up some answers. Coming up next, my conversation with
Speaker 1: the President of the American Federation of Teachers, Randy Weingarten. Folks,
Speaker 1: I am very happy to welcome back to wok AF
Speaker 1: Daily the President of the American Federation of Teachers, Randy Weingarten,
Speaker 1: as we began another school year here in America. Randy,
Speaker 1: it was just the sixtieth anniversary of the March on Washington,
Speaker 1: and you wrote a piece reflecting on your speech and
Speaker 1: your time in Washington, d C. Honoring this really important
Speaker 1: march and day in our nation's history. Just give us
Speaker 1: an idea of your mood and your feelings while you
Speaker 1: were there. At the backdrop of it, you know, there
Speaker 1: was a shooting that took place in Jacksonville, Florida, at
Speaker 1: the hands of a white supremacist that took the lives
Speaker 1: of three black patrons and workers at a general store.
Speaker 2: It was well. First off, Daniel, I'm glad to be
Speaker 2: with you, and I'm glad that you do this podcast,
Speaker 2: and I'm glad that you call it what you call
Speaker 2: it in terms of taking back the word woke.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: I'm a history teacher. I'm also you know, a union president.
Speaker 2: You think back to what happened in sixty three in
Speaker 2: the march, and then the backlash after the march, and
Speaker 2: think about what happened after the Obama presidency and the
Speaker 2: backlash after that. Think about what happened after Brown versus
Speaker 2: Board and the backlash after that. I think that what
Speaker 2: we're seeing is that the enabling, the normalizing, and the
Speaker 2: enabling of hate, combined with ready access to guns, particularly
Speaker 2: to weapons of war, create a really dangerous situation, and
Speaker 2: calling it out is really important. Understanding what's going on
Speaker 2: is really important. But the but just like those kids
Speaker 2: in Jacksonville, how many years ago, after that Saturday of
Speaker 2: Fear that was created, you know, after they tried to
Speaker 2: integrate lunch counters and the KKK created that Saturday of
Speaker 2: Fear of the uh Anville fear or March or whatever
Speaker 2: it was called of the KKK a riot, and they
Speaker 2: still won. The kids won, they integrated lunch counters. This
Speaker 2: was a commemoration. This was a continuation, not a commemoration.
Speaker 2: Because there's so much at stake right now and people
Speaker 2: are awakening to what is at stake. What happened in
Speaker 2: Jacksonville is a heenous crime of a white supremacist murderer,
Speaker 2: just like what happened in Buffalo was a heenous crime
Speaker 2: of a white supremacist murderer. What those supremacists want, what
Speaker 2: people who enable them want, is to bully and silence
Speaker 2: the rest of us who are fighting for freedom and
Speaker 2: dignity and basic humanity for all, particularly those who have
Speaker 2: been discriminated against quality and freedom. So I would say
Speaker 2: that we have to hold the families as tight as
Speaker 2: we can in the morning of the deaths of those
Speaker 2: innocent souls and fight on and fight on and fight
Speaker 2: on all at the same time. And yes, that fight
Speaker 2: includes the fight for gun safety and getting assault weapons
Speaker 2: off the streets, which America has done before and can
Speaker 2: do again with courage. But that fight is also the
Speaker 2: fight for freedom and the fight against fear, the fight
Speaker 2: for aspiration and the fight against despair, the fight for
Speaker 2: solutions and the fight against smears, And we have to
Speaker 2: do both at the same time. And so I'm not
Speaker 2: I was devastating and horrible to hear what happened in Jacksonville.
Speaker 2: As you're leaving the march, but it has to spur
Speaker 2: us on to more action and to not be silent.
Speaker 1: You know, I want to ask you, both as the
Speaker 1: president and AFT, but also as a former educator yourself,
Speaker 1: and as you know as a president, what does it
Speaker 1: mean right now to you and to teachers of history
Speaker 1: that telling the truth is a crime. What does it
Speaker 1: mean to librarians that they're having to remove books from
Speaker 1: shelves that teach children about empathy and truth and compassion.
Speaker 1: Can you explain because for those people who don't have
Speaker 1: kids in the school system, who are not as connected,
Speaker 1: but understand that public education connects us all, whether or
Speaker 1: not we have kids that are in the system in
Speaker 1: this moment or not, what it means to live in
Speaker 1: this place of oppression, silencing, and fear as a teacher,
Speaker 1: a librarian, an administrator in these states.
Speaker 2: So I think what I think you know the answer
Speaker 2: by the way in which you frame the question, which
Speaker 2: is that you know it's terrible, and people are and
Speaker 2: people take great umbrage at it, and it has had
Speaker 2: to a certain effect, the chilling effect that people like
Speaker 2: DeSantis and Abbot want. We see that in polling. But
Speaker 2: what it's not doing is it's not crushing the spirit
Speaker 2: of teachers in life variance. What it's starting to do is,
Speaker 2: and this is spoiler alert because I feel pretty optimistic
Speaker 2: that we are going to win. What it's starting to
Speaker 2: do is it's creating activism in a way that we
Speaker 2: didn't have for a while, just like the red for
Speaker 2: ed movement around wages a few years ago and conditions.
Speaker 2: Teachers want what kids need, and they know that this
Speaker 2: is impairing kids education and hurting kids for the long run.
Speaker 2: And they take and they are really pissed about it.
Speaker 2: And the people who and and and it doesn't it
Speaker 2: crosses ideological grounds or or ideal or or ideological lines.
Speaker 2: I guess I should say so. In the Panhandle, for example,
Speaker 2: in Florida, the teachers that had to put tarps cross
Speaker 2: the libraries.
Speaker 1: YEP.
Speaker 2: A lot of the teachers who teach in the Panhandle
Speaker 2: are Republicans, a lot of them probably voters for DeSantis.
Speaker 2: And they were like, what are you doing. This is
Speaker 2: my library in my classroom that I was using these books.
Speaker 2: I may have use saw these books for five or
Speaker 2: ten years. All of a suddenly you're banning them. Why so,
Speaker 2: what we're seeing in terms of teachers, and I think
Speaker 2: you're seeing this in terms of the mainstream as well.
Speaker 2: Is that more and more it is a smaller and
Speaker 2: smaller but very well coordinated and we're very well funded
Speaker 2: group of people who are trying to ban books and
Speaker 2: erase history. And look, I'm not saying that they're not powerful.
Speaker 2: DeSantis is powerful, Abbot is powerful, Huckabee is powerful. They
Speaker 2: also have these, you know, legislators that they have now
Speaker 2: taken control of because of jeremandering. But if you look
Speaker 2: at polling and you look at the reaction, most parents
Speaker 2: and most teachers hate this, and so it's actually activated
Speaker 2: a generation of people to fight it. And so that's
Speaker 2: why for us, we have handed out nine million books
Speaker 2: in the last few years. By July of twenty twenty four,
Speaker 2: it will be ten million. We're working with first book,
Speaker 2: We're working with others. So think about the power of
Speaker 2: a teacher's union working with its members, having these family
Speaker 2: events all throughout America trying to ban books. We are
Speaker 2: distributing books that have diverse titles that kids see themselves
Speaker 2: in and the other thing. And I'm sure that this
Speaker 2: has gotten me in the crosshairs of the right Wing.
Speaker 2: I think this is what triggered them. Two years ago,
Speaker 2: we said to our members, if you teach honest history,
Speaker 2: if you teach history in an authentic way, with authentic sources,
Speaker 2: we're going to expand our our legal defense fund, and
Speaker 2: we're going to represent you, and we're going to make
Speaker 2: sure you are not alone. So you have a bunch
Speaker 2: of things that are now being used in terms of activating.
Speaker 2: You have unions creating community against banning books and against
Speaker 2: the erasure of children. You have now people like Moms
Speaker 2: Rising and Red Wine and Blue and lots of other
Speaker 2: new groups that have been created that have said enough,
Speaker 2: and you're starting to see this kind of activism together.
Speaker 2: The one thing I would say to teachers or to
Speaker 2: librarians who are alone is don't act alone. Let's create
Speaker 2: a community around you. Because the world is too and
Speaker 2: it's too you know, and and and there's a lot
Speaker 2: of haters. So let's create that community and the connectiveness
Speaker 2: around you, and let's fight this together.
Speaker 1: You know, I want to switch gears for a moment
Speaker 1: to talk about the rise of COVID that we are seeing.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: We're seeing lots of headlines about you know, COVID making resurgence,
Speaker 1: not to the extent that it did in prior years,
Speaker 1: but that it's still present. And I saw an article
Speaker 1: about a school that part of their I guess protocol
Speaker 1: now is to keep windows closed because of potential school shootings.
Speaker 2: Right, Okay, it's crazy right.
Speaker 1: To keep to keep windows closed. Kids don't get fresh
Speaker 1: air all day because we'd rather treat schools like prisons
Speaker 1: than deal with guns. And I wanted to get your
Speaker 1: thoughts on a how you think that schools will deal
Speaker 1: with you know, the rise in COVID given the I
Speaker 1: mean extraordinary backlash that we saw, I mean teachers being
Speaker 1: punched and school board meetings going absolutely insane. And this
Speaker 1: is you know, hearkening back to twenty twenty one, but
Speaker 1: this idea that part of protocol in safety is shutting
Speaker 1: windows in places that already lack quality ventilation. So I
Speaker 1: just wanted to get your thoughts on both of those pieces.
Speaker 2: Look, it's completely surreal because what's happening is instead of
Speaker 2: this is what it says, kids are not a priority.
Speaker 2: Guns are the priority. Kids are not a priority. So
Speaker 2: if it means that to maintain weapons of war culture
Speaker 2: and not take on that issue, that you're going to actually.
Speaker 3: Do the exact wrong thing that helps not only kids learn,
Speaker 3: But what we've learned is that ventilation is probably the
Speaker 3: number one change you can make.
Speaker 2: Good ventilation for any kind of respiratory illness, for any
Speaker 2: of the climate issues that we've seen this summer, when
Speaker 2: schools are one hundred and five, workplaces one hundred and ten,
Speaker 2: all this you need air conditioning. So good ventilation, really
Speaker 2: good in terms of respiratory illness, or really good in
Speaker 2: terms of climate issues and weather issues. And frankly for
Speaker 2: those of us who are asmatic or really good in
Speaker 2: terms of those kind of issues too. And a desperate
Speaker 2: proportion of our black and brown kids are asthmatic. So
Speaker 2: and I say that as an asthmatic, So you know,
Speaker 2: so the ventilation that starts with proper air circulation, and
Speaker 2: if you don't have good AC, you know, HVAC systems
Speaker 2: in the school, you've got to open windows and you
Speaker 2: to have a good fan. And so it just says
Speaker 2: that kids are not a priority these and then they
Speaker 2: turn kids and teachers into a pretzel to try to
Speaker 2: figure out how to deal with all of this. But
Speaker 2: that is the irony of that guns are more important,
Speaker 2: just like during COVID, bars and restaurants were more important
Speaker 2: than opening schools. I love when the extremists start telling
Speaker 2: me all about you know, what happened in Europe. I
Speaker 2: mean we and I'm really glad Mehdi Hassan just did this.
Speaker 2: He debunked a lot of the myths. Kids got COVID,
Speaker 2: kids were vectors for COVID. There's lots of people who
Speaker 2: died from COVID. There's lots of kids who were orphan
Speaker 2: because their parents died or grandparents died because of COVID.
Speaker 2: But we from April twenty twenty, we're the first ones
Speaker 2: to put out a report that said we need to
Speaker 2: have schools reopened. They're really important, but we need the
Speaker 2: safety measures. You can't do one without the other. You
Speaker 2: need to do both. And to have American government led
Speaker 2: by Trump that prioritized you know, bars and restaurants rather
Speaker 2: than schools, and then say, look at what happened in Europe. Well,
Speaker 2: Europe prioritized schools being opened. And the problem, the dilemma
Speaker 2: right now is that because of all the conspiracy theories
Speaker 2: and all of the odjita that happened at the end
Speaker 2: of COVID, and you know, on mass and vaccines and
Speaker 2: all of this. We're not going to have an appropriate
Speaker 2: or proper public health system directing us or guiding us
Speaker 2: about what to do. So this is what I would
Speaker 2: say to people, and this is what we're doing. Fight
Speaker 2: like hell to get good ventilation in a school. That
Speaker 2: is the number one thing that we can do. Let's
Speaker 2: make sure that we don't stigmatize people who wear masks
Speaker 2: or who need to wear masks. And let's do and
Speaker 2: try to figure out the other mitigating factors that we need,
Speaker 2: because COVID is still a respiratory illness, and we need
Speaker 2: to make sure both COVID rsv all of these respiratory illnesses.
Speaker 2: We need to make sure that we are giving people
Speaker 2: the best guidance for how to protect their health and safety,
Speaker 2: whether it be kids, whether it be teachers, whether it
Speaker 2: be kids families or teachers' families.
Speaker 1: Last question for you, Randy is this. You know, schools
Speaker 1: like we started out at the top, have always been
Speaker 1: on the front lines for social justice in this country.
Speaker 1: They have always been a battleground and for people who
Speaker 1: want to get involved, for people who see their school
Speaker 1: boards being taken over, for people who see their teachers
Speaker 1: fleeing because they no longer want to teach. What can
Speaker 1: regular people who are not necessarily a part of AFT,
Speaker 1: what can they do to support their public schools, their communities,
Speaker 1: their administrators and teachers and students.
Speaker 2: So I would just say there's one there's one recommendation
Speaker 2: I would make, and I want to kind of link
Speaker 2: it to our new campaign, which is just get involved
Speaker 2: in whatever way you can get involved. You know, lots
Speaker 2: of schools have you know, some open something day night
Speaker 2: for community that welcomes community in. Be involved in a
Speaker 2: local school, do some tutoring, do some reading with kids,
Speaker 2: do something that gets involved in the soul of the community.
Speaker 2: Because the most important thing we can do right now
Speaker 2: is connection and community. That is the most important antidote
Speaker 2: to this hate and division and fear and crossing ideological
Speaker 2: lines and doing the things that really kind of lift
Speaker 2: up communities and lift up kids, and it becomes infectious
Speaker 2: that people then start talking to each other. It doesn't
Speaker 2: matter if they're Republican or Democrat or independent. Most people
Speaker 2: still in America want basic decency and basic humanity. So
Speaker 2: what we've tried to do, and this may sound counter productive,
Speaker 2: counter intuitive, is that as Okay, we're fighting the fights
Speaker 2: as they ban books, we're giving books out. As I
Speaker 2: said before, we're fighting to make sure that people can
Speaker 2: teach honest history. But what we're also trying to do
Speaker 2: is deal with the issues of loneliness, learning losses, reading literacy,
Speaker 2: and bringing together really kind of lifting up solutions for
Speaker 2: the problems of families and kids have, for the problems
Speaker 2: that we see all the time, and really trying to
Speaker 2: lift this up. So this whole year we're doing a campaign,
Speaker 2: you know, and how do you deal with loneliness? Let's
Speaker 2: wrap services around schools, and let's together fight these social
Speaker 2: media companies who could in a day deal with and
Speaker 2: change the algorithm and change and they could actually emphasize
Speaker 2: children's health and safety as opposed to making money, and
Speaker 2: they'd still make a lot of money. So parents and
Speaker 2: teachers together are working on telling and pressuring social media
Speaker 2: companies to change their algorithms. We're working on wrapping services
Speaker 2: around school. We're actually working to make experience or learning
Speaker 2: the norm career tech ed, giving kids lots of different options,
Speaker 2: particularly as this economy creates more and more new jobs.
Speaker 2: Why aren't we doing that? Stop with the testing, testing, testing,
Speaker 2: let's actually work with our hands and make schooling fun.
Speaker 2: And then let's really help teachers help kids how to
Speaker 2: learn to read, so kids have books that they want
Speaker 2: to read. But also what are the tools of the
Speaker 2: trade and doing things like that. So we're really trying
Speaker 2: to get into what are the solutions that transcend ideology.
Speaker 2: What are the things that we can do together as
Speaker 2: a community, because once we do that, these extremists only
Speaker 2: are effective when they can create anger and fear.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: And so let's create love and engagement around schools dealing
Speaker 2: with the issues that people really care about.
Speaker 1: I tell you, Randy, every time that I speak to you,
Speaker 1: I say that you're doing the Lord's work and I
Speaker 1: appreciate your leadership and your voice every time that we
Speaker 1: have the opportunity to speak. Thank you for making time
Speaker 1: to join wokay ass.
Speaker 2: And back at you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: That is it for me today, dear friends, on woke
Speaker 1: a f as always. Power to the people and to
Speaker 1: all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.