Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Psychology Podcast. In this episode,
Speaker 1: I talked to Julie Lawson Davis and Deb Douglas about
Speaker 1: gifted education. Specifically, we identify the underrepresented population of gifted
Speaker 1: students and the unique cultural barriers they face. Joy and
Speaker 1: Debs share their definition of what self advocacy is and
Speaker 1: why it's a skill everyone should have, and they give
Speaker 1: helpful tips and resources for educators, parents, and advocates on
Speaker 1: how to find and nurture gifted potential. We also touch
Speaker 1: on the topics of equity, test preparation, IQ, special education,
Speaker 1: and intersectionality. This was a very personal episode for me,
Speaker 1: as you will see toward the end, I got quite
Speaker 1: emotional in this episode, both because I think this is
Speaker 1: an extremely important topic and too many kids are falling
Speaker 1: through the cracks due to our misunderstanding of human potential,
Speaker 1: but also because of my own personal experiences growing up
Speaker 1: with a learning disability. This was a really meaningful episode
Speaker 1: for me. So without further Ado and I'll bring you
Speaker 1: Juli Lawson Davis and Deb Douglas. Julian, Deb, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for coming to talk to me today on
Speaker 1: the Psychology Podcast. Thanks for inviting us. Glad to be
Speaker 1: here with you. So congrats, thank you so much, thank you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: congrats on this new book. It seems so timely right now,
Speaker 1: even more timely, especially in the light of the controversy
Speaker 1: about New York education cutting. Well, they they are going
Speaker 1: to have accelerated programs, but they cut their prior kind
Speaker 1: of pull out programs for for young children, right based
Speaker 1: on the grounds, Yeah, that it's the inequities and gifted education.
Speaker 1: So this sets up your book just perfectly, right. You
Speaker 1: know what, what who are the underrepresented gifted? Who are
Speaker 1: what is that population? Right? Right? Well, Dev and I
Speaker 1: worked very hard to ensure that we spoke to the
Speaker 1: experts across the country who who told us who these
Speaker 1: students are? We looked at the data. Of course, we're
Speaker 1: talking about black students, LATINX students, low income students twice,
Speaker 1: exceptional lgbt Q populations, the rural students. Uh, even highly
Speaker 1: gifted students. Uh. We don't speak specifically to them, but
Speaker 1: there is conversation there in our book. But yes, there
Speaker 1: are a number of students, Scott who, despite what's happened
Speaker 1: across the country, who continue to be underrepresented in gifted
Speaker 1: programs nationwide. Nationwide, Well, what what falls within the purview
Speaker 1: of that Who are who are some of the most
Speaker 1: underrepresented that we got out there? You know, not think,
Speaker 1: but we know because of the data that we are
Speaker 1: referring mostly to black students, UH LATINX students and poor students,
Speaker 1: students who live in poverty, we continue to not be
Speaker 1: able to identify them provide appropriate services for these groups
Speaker 1: of students. They don't have the resources, they don't have
Speaker 1: the teachers who have the right kind of training to
Speaker 1: understand who they are. So those three populations, in particular,
Speaker 1: our ones that we believe will be supported by this
Speaker 1: great book, this great project. It's so hard to be
Speaker 1: specific about the populations too, because gifted education varies so
Speaker 1: much from district to district, from state to strait across
Speaker 1: the country. What's defined as gifted education varies greatly, Who
Speaker 1: is chosen for gifted education programs varies, The identification process
Speaker 1: varies so much. So I know, we really try to
Speaker 1: collect data, and we really try to say these people
Speaker 1: are underrepresented or these people deserve their needs to be met,
Speaker 1: But we as a country don't have a good way
Speaker 1: of analyzing whose needs to be We can look at
Speaker 1: a large city population like New York and say, well,
Speaker 1: we know who's missing from this. You've got ex population
Speaker 1: of black students in your district and you have a
Speaker 1: fraction of that percentage in your gifted programs. We can
Speaker 1: look at that, but it's really a more invasive, pervasive
Speaker 1: problem across the country, and especially, like Joy was saying,
Speaker 1: in rural areas and areas of low social economic where
Speaker 1: there's there are no programs, there is no access, there
Speaker 1: is nothing for kids to be enrolled in. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: this I think actually puts you to in a quite
Speaker 1: unique situation because a lot of people in this debate
Speaker 1: want to throw out the baby with a bath water.
Speaker 1: You know, they will say, well, because African Americans are
Speaker 1: underrepresented in gift education, we should cut gifted education. But
Speaker 1: you two are taking a kind of a unique position.
Speaker 1: Maybe not within the obviously not within the field of
Speaker 1: gifted education, because obviously within the field of gift education
Speaker 1: they believe in gifted education, but broadly in society, right,
Speaker 1: you know, it's kind of hard for your wrap their
Speaker 1: heads around the fact that we can have equity and
Speaker 1: excellence at the same time. You know, and yes, and
Speaker 1: you two are saying you can absolutely to go to
Speaker 1: but that's the kind of a unique position. Yeah, yes,
Speaker 1: we are, we are. We are all about this, you know,
Speaker 1: we're all about us, Scott trying to demonstrate that we
Speaker 1: can't have equity and excellence at the same time. We
Speaker 1: can because there are gifted children in all communities. We
Speaker 1: and when we, as you say, throw the baby out
Speaker 1: with the bathwater, what we're doing is restricting these students'
Speaker 1: access to just the kinds of programs they need. And
Speaker 1: it's really unfair. It also suggests, and this is the
Speaker 1: piece that really cuts at me a lot, it also
Speaker 1: suggests that when we say we have we can't have
Speaker 1: gifted programs and have equity, it suggests that those students
Speaker 1: can't be gifted. But that's not true. We know better,
Speaker 1: We know so much better by now that we have
Speaker 1: found these children everywhere they demonstrate how creative, how bright
Speaker 1: they are, how scientific they are. They have they've shown
Speaker 1: it to us everywhere, and so we can't we can't
Speaker 1: say to anyone that in order for us to achieve equity,
Speaker 1: we have to we have to cut out these programs.
Speaker 1: We know it's Scott, you and I and Dad, we
Speaker 1: all know that those children whose parents have means will
Speaker 1: always find a way to get resources for their kids.
Speaker 1: They will always find a way. Those parents who are
Speaker 1: the strongest advocates, the ones who can go out and
Speaker 1: buy whatever they want. But these children don't have those
Speaker 1: same kinds of means. They need advocates to say, we're
Speaker 1: gifted too, we're gifted too, and we need to show
Speaker 1: and demonstrate that. And I think our book, you know,
Speaker 1: like you say, uh, it puts us, you know, out
Speaker 1: there to say that this can be, this can work,
Speaker 1: we can do this, but we're gonna do it in
Speaker 1: a different way. Deb is a deb is a self advocacy. Genius, Scott,
Speaker 1: I want to tell you. I want to say this
Speaker 1: before she says another word. When I came upon her
Speaker 1: work a few years ago and I read what she
Speaker 1: was proposing as a as a way to get beyond barriers,
Speaker 1: I thought about it twice and I felt like, it's
Speaker 1: not fair for kids to have to advocate for themselves.
Speaker 1: It's just not fair. And then I thought the second
Speaker 1: time about it, and I said, but you know what,
Speaker 1: if we listen to the children, the very persons whose
Speaker 1: lives we expect to change, then maybe we can do
Speaker 1: something about this equity issue. Maybe we can do something
Speaker 1: about this. And so I dug in and I listened
Speaker 1: to this woman and I listened to her talk about
Speaker 1: the changes that she's seen come about through her advocacy model.
Speaker 1: And I think we have a you know, we have
Speaker 1: something here that we first of all, we know that
Speaker 1: no one else is designed it in this way. Well,
Speaker 1: we definitely have something here. I think they can help
Speaker 1: us a great deal in gifted education. Wow, thanks Joy
Speaker 1: that well. And it's true Joy and I we found
Speaker 1: each other. I needed a way to look beyond the
Speaker 1: traditional gifted kids that I was serving who also needed
Speaker 1: to self advocate, but I didn't have the expertise and
Speaker 1: other populations. And when Joy and I met, she just
Speaker 1: provided so many answers to me and so many new
Speaker 1: questions to look at. And yet as we began to
Speaker 1: put our projects together, we knew there were other populations
Speaker 1: that we didn't have the depth of understanding of ourselves.
Speaker 1: And that's why we brought together so many contributors to
Speaker 1: our book. I do want to say one thing, just
Speaker 1: going back to what Joy said a minute ago about
Speaker 1: affluent families will always find a way to get the
Speaker 1: resources their kids need. I often check on Amazon for
Speaker 1: what are the top fifty books in gifted education, and
Speaker 1: every time I look, the majority of the top ten
Speaker 1: are test preparation ability test preparation. Because parents who want
Speaker 1: to get their kids into gifted programs have the means,
Speaker 1: the resources or whatever to buy these things to help
Speaker 1: their kids prepare for it. And so that's why one
Speaker 1: of the major things we need to do is change
Speaker 1: our identification processes and look at kids who present gifted
Speaker 1: characteristics in non traditional ways. So we can get back
Speaker 1: to that in a little while too. But that's an
Speaker 1: important reason why we shouldn't dump gifted and talented programming.
Speaker 1: Why we need to broaden the recognition of what giftedness is.
Speaker 1: And our society in general has a very stereotypical vision
Speaker 1: of what giftedness is. It's those high achieving, high test scoring,
Speaker 1: high grade achieving, successful students who do well in school
Speaker 1: and our college bound from the beginning. How do we
Speaker 1: erase that stereotype and how do we help everyone see
Speaker 1: the giftedness and the students beyond that stereotype. Do you
Speaker 1: want me to go on about self advocacy, Well, I
Speaker 1: have some I still have some questions from some things
Speaker 1: you just said. Good. So, first of all, it's been
Speaker 1: my reading of the literature that test preparation you really
Speaker 1: can't you can't like boost your IQ score, for instance,
Speaker 1: substantially through test preparation. Iq' is not that malleable you know,
Speaker 1: IQ does is measuring some important set of cognitive skills
Speaker 1: that are you know, abstract reasoning and things that you know,
Speaker 1: a parent can't just pay, you know, money for their
Speaker 1: child to just walk in and get a perfect IQ
Speaker 1: test score. So that's been part of my reading. Well,
Speaker 1: it does help to prepare, It does help to prepare
Speaker 1: students for testing and what kind of questions they'll be
Speaker 1: having and what order things might come in or what
Speaker 1: especially with young children, to prepare them for the types
Speaker 1: of things they will will be experiencing in the testing situation.
Speaker 1: And it's also true that in some schools that initial
Speaker 1: testing is not a full IQ test achievement test, I mean,
Speaker 1: ability test score. It might be something like the Kaufman
Speaker 1: Brief Intelligence tests, or it might be you know, there
Speaker 1: are very early screeners that children in very early grades
Speaker 1: or even in kindergarten, if they haven't been exposed to them,
Speaker 1: might be confused by them. So I agree with you.
Speaker 1: We can't pay to have our kids have high or IQs.
Speaker 1: And obviously certain we know the importance of early childhood
Speaker 1: and preschool education and early experiences that allow kids to
Speaker 1: demonstrate their gifts earlier. And so if we do screening
Speaker 1: using only ability tests and achievement tests at a very
Speaker 1: early age, we eliminate a lot of people right from
Speaker 1: the get go. Doesn't even give them a chance. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's because not everyone is out of the gate in
Speaker 1: the same opportunities, same educational on Richmond, same Yeah. So no,
Speaker 1: at that point is very well taken. And then the
Speaker 1: second thing I wanted to bring up about what you
Speaker 1: just said is expanding the notions of giftness beyond just
Speaker 1: achievement test scores in IQ. I'd love to get some
Speaker 1: of your thoughts on what what other things would you
Speaker 1: want to include in the definition of giftness, because I
Speaker 1: don't think that you're saying that every child's gifted in
Speaker 1: their own way? Right are you saying that? No? No,
Speaker 1: because it's because some people say that, But I roll
Speaker 1: my eyes when people say that. Quite frankly, No, not
Speaker 1: everybody's gifted. Sorry, And I rolled my eyes as well. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't believe in that, and I and
Speaker 1: you know, we want to have we want to make
Speaker 1: that clear because then we're in another camp all together,
Speaker 1: and we are fighting another battle that you know that
Speaker 1: I really don't want to spend time fighting. But but
Speaker 1: we do believe that there are other ways that students
Speaker 1: candemn its rate their their giftedness. In many cultures, students
Speaker 1: who are perhaps more more verbal, more orally verbal, they
Speaker 1: can talk to you and tell you things that you
Speaker 1: can't pick up on any ability or achievement tests. And
Speaker 1: so that when schools take the time to uh to
Speaker 1: set up interviews with students or sometimes just observe students
Speaker 1: and instruction, they can see students responding to one another,
Speaker 1: and you know, if they can measure that response over time,
Speaker 1: then perhaps they'll be able to pick up some students
Speaker 1: that they would not have necessarily seen, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, just by saying, okay, today we're going to
Speaker 1: do this this big test. We're going to test everybody.
Speaker 1: Even universal screening or you know, local screen and local
Speaker 1: normy may not pick up these students. And so we
Speaker 1: have to provide other ways that we that we begin
Speaker 1: to look for gifted traits. So if teachers understand the
Speaker 1: trade number one, then they'll be able to see those traits.
Speaker 1: But they won't see them if they don't understand them,
Speaker 1: if they don't understand that there's a kid that comes,
Speaker 1: you know, out of a out of a very say,
Speaker 1: a very poor community. But this kid has a vocabulary
Speaker 1: that that will rival any child coming from anywhere because
Speaker 1: they pick up on language. You know, they do it
Speaker 1: so quickly, so easily, and they can tell you those
Speaker 1: things if you if you take the time to listen.
Speaker 1: So I think sometimes we just have to have a
Speaker 1: better sense about what giftedness looks like in children across
Speaker 1: population groups. And then you know, what can we do differently?
Speaker 1: You know, how can we listen to these children? How
Speaker 1: can we set up instruction that you know, we can
Speaker 1: they can demonstrate what their gifts are. But it is
Speaker 1: it's time consuming, it takes money perhaps, But I think
Speaker 1: we do a lot of students a great injustice when
Speaker 1: we don't train teachers, and then teachers come in with
Speaker 1: a perception that they if those kids are not like
Speaker 1: the kind of kids that they spoke about a moment ago,
Speaker 1: then then they're not gifted, you know, So we have
Speaker 1: to change our understanding of what gifted traits are. And
Speaker 1: you know how they're manifested in any classroom setting with
Speaker 1: any group of students. So teachers have to be a
Speaker 1: part of that. But we also, Scott, have to engage parents.
Speaker 1: You know, we both work with parent groups all the time,
Speaker 1: and parents can tell you some very unique things about
Speaker 1: these kiddos that mirror their research. You know, I've talked
Speaker 1: to parents who told me about the kinds of things
Speaker 1: that child did when they were toddler, you know that
Speaker 1: was so different from the other children perhaps in the
Speaker 1: family or other children in the community. And again we
Speaker 1: just have to expect that any parent almost can say
Speaker 1: there's some things about my kid that makes them different.
Speaker 1: But we want to be able to give parents a
Speaker 1: chance to tell us, you know, those kinds of things
Speaker 1: as well. So, yes, there are other ways. We just
Speaker 1: have to invest a little more time and a little
Speaker 1: more energy and sensitivity and sensitivity you know, into looking
Speaker 1: for those kinds of traits across population groups. And no,
Speaker 1: not all children are gifted. No, not all children are gifted.
Speaker 1: That's not what we're saying. I'm not what I'm ever saying.
Speaker 1: I am suggesting though, that they're children almost in any
Speaker 1: community that can demonstrate giftedness, and not every child is
Speaker 1: gifted at a single moment in time. Is possible to
Speaker 1: be ungifted like I was as a kid and to
Speaker 1: become gifted? Is that possible? Am I gifted now that
Speaker 1: I got a YELPGD? Does that count? I would absolutely
Speaker 1: say so? And I think or am I just like?
Speaker 1: Am I just faking it? Am I faking it? Well?
Speaker 1: We tend to think of giftedness as being connected with
Speaker 1: the educational system, right. I've had students say to me,
Speaker 1: do you think my mom was gifted? She was in
Speaker 1: a gifted program when she was a school. Do you
Speaker 1: think she used to be gifted? It's like if a
Speaker 1: gifted individual is a gifted individual, and an educational setting
Speaker 1: provides more struggles, more complications sometimes than the outside world.
Speaker 1: But giftedness does evolve. Do you know the work of
Speaker 1: Francois Gana and how gifts yea, how they grow? Yeah,
Speaker 1: through all of these the process that goes through growing
Speaker 1: into talents and all of the effects that we bring
Speaker 1: to that process, but all of the environmental effects that
Speaker 1: come in that process. So, of course giftedness arises at
Speaker 1: various times and is nurtured and is better understood at
Speaker 1: various times. But I also must say put on record,
Speaker 1: I do not believe that everyone is gifted. I believe
Speaker 1: that everyone can have gifts of various kinds their own
Speaker 1: personal strengths. But if you think in terms of let's
Speaker 1: on the grade level, for instance, the educational setting, a
Speaker 1: third grade class, the vast majority of kids are going
Speaker 1: to have third grade abilities, They're going to have third
Speaker 1: grade social and emotional abilities, and then they're going to
Speaker 1: be these outliers. These kids in whatever direction have less
Speaker 1: than third grade strengths and have more than third grade strengths,
Speaker 1: and gift to kids who have more than third grade
Speaker 1: strengths vary as much from each other as they do
Speaker 1: from the grade level kids and the grade level kids. Fortunately,
Speaker 1: in our society we have tons of help in the
Speaker 1: educational setting for those kids who struggle below third grade abilities,
Speaker 1: their grade, social emotional awareness, that sort of thing. We
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of in place nationally for those
Speaker 1: kids who are above, and we don't have a lot
Speaker 1: in place to help teachers understand. In fact, most teachers
Speaker 1: breathe a sigh of relief. They got some kids who
Speaker 1: are above their grade level, because that means they don't
Speaker 1: have to struggle so much with those kids. But often
Speaker 1: that leaves those kids without an appropriate challenge or enriching
Speaker 1: and without an appropriate challenge, our brightest kids won't develop
Speaker 1: those kind of skills they need to struggle to achieve
Speaker 1: something that's difficult, they don't develop. We like to call it,
Speaker 1: you know, the grits and the resilience and that sort
Speaker 1: of thing. So that's why it's vastly important for us
Speaker 1: to identify those kids who have needs beyond where they
Speaker 1: are in the school setting and figure out how to
Speaker 1: provide those those challenges that will allow them to grow,
Speaker 1: because every kid needs to grow in school, that's what
Speaker 1: they're there. Every kid deserves to learn something new every day,
Speaker 1: and even those kids who already know what we're about
Speaker 1: to teach, there are ways that we can help them
Speaker 1: expand beyond that. Yeah, this stuff is really tricky. You know.
Speaker 1: The NYGC defines giftedness as involving either potential or high achievement,
Speaker 1: so it can come from either path. How do you
Speaker 1: but that's so tricky in practice, especially with the kind
Speaker 1: of populations you're interested in, because a lot of them
Speaker 1: are not high achieving. So how are you finding their
Speaker 1: potential when they're focusing just on getting like food on
Speaker 1: the table, you know, or focusing on you know, they
Speaker 1: have so many other concerns that are in their head,
Speaker 1: you know, especially if they're very dangerous violent environments, right
Speaker 1: with gangs and things like that. You know, it's how
Speaker 1: you finding their potential. I mean, kudos to you for
Speaker 1: caring and to even say that we should look there
Speaker 1: are those with gifted potential, but how do you find
Speaker 1: it at such a young age when, especially in those conditions,
Speaker 1: it's particularly hard? Right well, Scott, that that's again you know,
Speaker 1: we you know, we can take away from the importance
Speaker 1: of teacher training, of teacher training from the very you
Speaker 1: know day that a student will into a school. There
Speaker 1: has to be there have to be teachers in that school,
Speaker 1: in that environment who understand those kinds of things are
Speaker 1: going on in their lives. Like you just spoke about that,
Speaker 1: that they are having to navigates, as we say, multiple worlds,
Speaker 1: and we do speak about that, you know, in our
Speaker 1: book we talk about intersectionality for example, using that same
Speaker 1: the same term, the same you know construct that kim
Speaker 1: Rii Crenshaw came up with when she was a law
Speaker 1: student and she and she first wrote about race and
Speaker 1: gender and the law and how all three of those
Speaker 1: were impactful, you know, to her as a as a
Speaker 1: young woman studying studying the law, young black women studying
Speaker 1: the law. And so, you know, we've adopted that theme
Speaker 1: for looking at these children as well, because we're not
Speaker 1: just talking about a mind of someone with cognitive students.
Speaker 1: We're talking about someone who has a family, and within
Speaker 1: that family, they navigate through that world. They also have
Speaker 1: a community, a neighborhood. They have to navigate that world.
Speaker 1: There's also the perception that they have to live through
Speaker 1: what people perceive of them just because they happen to
Speaker 1: be from a difficult neighborhood, people happen to be a
Speaker 1: child of color, or happen to be a student who
Speaker 1: speaks a second language or even a third language. You know,
Speaker 1: So we have language, we have family, we have community,
Speaker 1: we have their ability. You know, these are multiple worlds
Speaker 1: that these students have to navigate every day. And so
Speaker 1: we believe that it's critically important for classroom teachers god
Speaker 1: not just to know about I mentioned it earlier, not
Speaker 1: just to know about what gifted traits are, but to
Speaker 1: know about these children as whole people, you know, to
Speaker 1: understand you know, who they are and what it is
Speaker 1: they live through. You know, this is a this is
Speaker 1: a whole person coming into you every day. And unless
Speaker 1: you can understand those multiple worlds at any given time
Speaker 1: that this child is focusing on, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: helping a family put fluid on the table, or being
Speaker 1: the child who comes home early in the afternoon to
Speaker 1: take care of his and her siblings, you know, or
Speaker 1: being the black male student who knows he's bright, who
Speaker 1: knows he's different than some other students are, but he
Speaker 1: knows when he hits the streets he's being perceived as
Speaker 1: a threat to society. So these kids know these kinds
Speaker 1: of things about themselves. They know it early, They know
Speaker 1: earlier on who they are and what others think about them,
Speaker 1: and they carry all this with them every day. So
Speaker 1: the piece around teacher training can't be any more critical
Speaker 1: than we can. I mean, how many times we can
Speaker 1: say it, but this is a part of what we're
Speaker 1: you know, we're attempting to do this in this book
Speaker 1: as well, making sure that teachers understand as much as
Speaker 1: possible about each of these populations and then about you know,
Speaker 1: the ways that their worlds intersect. That piece. It is important,
Speaker 1: and you know we're working on that, and we're seeing
Speaker 1: more and more culturely responsive coursework come up. We're seeing
Speaker 1: more and more people talk about about how students social
Speaker 1: emotional needs impact their their cognitive needs. But you know,
Speaker 1: we have to make sure that the people that these
Speaker 1: students see every day for seven eight hours a day,
Speaker 1: you know, have a clear as clear as possible understanding
Speaker 1: of who they are, of who they are. I think
Speaker 1: often our educational system focuses on disabilities of students before
Speaker 1: they face on before they focus on their abilities. It
Speaker 1: happened for so long with twice exceptional children that districts
Speaker 1: were really quick to help them with whatever limitations they had,
Speaker 1: but often that was in place of acceleration or Enrichmond.
Speaker 1: I had a teacher tell me once this particular child
Speaker 1: had so many times pulled out of the classroom for
Speaker 1: speech work and for dysgraphia and dyslexia and all sorts
Speaker 1: of things that they were dealing with, And I said,
Speaker 1: he really should be in our junior Great Books Discussion
Speaker 1: group because he has such a great interest in literature,
Speaker 1: and they said, well, you know, he probably can't read
Speaker 1: all the literature, and I said, well, we could read
Speaker 1: it to him. But the focus was on helping him
Speaker 1: get to the middle as opposed to helping him expand.
Speaker 1: And I think the same thing happens frequently with other
Speaker 1: underrepresented gifted kids. I do workshops for kids on self
Speaker 1: advocacy gifted kids, and I approached two large urban districts
Speaker 1: and volunteered because I wanted to work with more urban kids,
Speaker 1: volunteered to do workshops, and the response in both was simply,
Speaker 1: we have so many other concerns. Our gifted kids have
Speaker 1: so many other concerns. We don't have time for this.
Speaker 1: Now we have to deal with it. And my response is,
Speaker 1: so those kids who are ready to self advocate and
Speaker 1: need to self advocate right now will not develop those
Speaker 1: skills or be introduced to the concept because not everybody's
Speaker 1: ready for it now, or because there are so many
Speaker 1: other issues that are first. And I think what Joy
Speaker 1: and I fell on was maybe self advocacy comes first.
Speaker 1: Maybe we say if people aren't meeting your needs, if
Speaker 1: your district if your school, if your teachers, if your
Speaker 1: parents aren't helping you find the challenges that make school
Speaker 1: interesting for you, Then how do you find your voice
Speaker 1: and ask for what it is you need and what
Speaker 1: you want and even to understand what it is you
Speaker 1: need and want? So what is self advocacy in as
Speaker 1: simplest terms, It's it's asking for what you want to need.
Speaker 1: Isn't it my first definition of Lord? Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think all of us things like Wess. Advocacy is
Speaker 1: is a skill everybody should have, and it's great to
Speaker 1: speak up for what you want and need, whether it's
Speaker 1: in school or at the college level, or in relationships
Speaker 1: or in the workplace, in marriages and families. But it's
Speaker 1: critical for gifted kids in an educational system that doesn't
Speaker 1: recognize their outlier status and believes that they okay just
Speaker 1: where they are, and especially critical as Joy and I
Speaker 1: have determined for those underrepresented gifted kids to find a process. Well,
Speaker 1: can I read the definition? Joy and I came up
Speaker 1: with yes because this is more specific to our underrepresented kids.
Speaker 1: And we worked really hard and long on this to
Speaker 1: figure out what we wanted to say. We feel that
Speaker 1: self advocacy it's a dynamic process. That's one of the
Speaker 1: key things, right, It's not a one and done. It's
Speaker 1: a dynamic process that enables high potential students, not high
Speaker 1: achieve high potential students, to claim their right to an
Speaker 1: education that addresses their unique intellectual and academic, psychosocial and
Speaker 1: cultural needs, cultural needs without endangering their self esteem or
Speaker 1: that of others. And we love that last phrase too,
Speaker 1: because we know that inappropriate ways to self advocate don't
Speaker 1: end in the desired effects. Right, kids saying this is boring,
Speaker 1: I hate this. We study this every year. Why do
Speaker 1: we have to do this again? I don't like this
Speaker 1: doesn't get them anywhere? So and yet, and also we
Speaker 1: don't want kids to ask in a way in which
Speaker 1: they get shot down and their self esteem is injured
Speaker 1: in that way too. So the second part of our
Speaker 1: definition is it's a compilation of culturally responsive, so important
Speaker 1: and inclusive empowerment strategies. What are those strategies that open
Speaker 1: opportunities for these students for to have positive academic and
Speaker 1: life outcomes? And we added that these outcomes are previously
Speaker 1: have been precluded for some students due to stereotyping, systemic biases,
Speaker 1: and limited access to resources. Oh wait, I want to
Speaker 1: write that down. That's key. That's key stereotyping. It is
Speaker 1: limit limited resources and what limited opportunities stereotyping systemic biases
Speaker 1: and limited access to resources. Well, well, I have a question.
Speaker 1: You know, you talk about cultural differences or considerations to
Speaker 1: what extent could certain cultural differences in appreciation for academic
Speaker 1: success cause some of these differences? You know, for instance,
Speaker 1: in the Asian community, there's a very high proportion and
Speaker 1: gift education programs. I mean, they are scoring better than
Speaker 1: the test. African Americans are not scoring as well in
Speaker 1: the test. There's like a fifth there's still like a
Speaker 1: standard deviation difference on IQ tests, so they're not actually
Speaker 1: getting the scores. So is part of the reason like
Speaker 1: cultural differences at all? Like, I know, so you didn't
Speaker 1: mention that, like in the African American community community, do
Speaker 1: they do they put as much emphasis on young children?
Speaker 1: And for instance, if you're like a really nerdy black kid, like,
Speaker 1: are you going to be more prone to bullying than
Speaker 1: if you're a really nerdy Asian kid within the Asian
Speaker 1: community And you know, blah Scott, that's a that's a
Speaker 1: big question and we have answers that could take us
Speaker 1: another eight hours responding to. But but I want to
Speaker 1: I want to give two examples of a black kid.
Speaker 1: For example, a black kid who is and this is
Speaker 1: a two stories of someone using names, but a black
Speaker 1: kid who is a very high achiever identified as gifted young.
Speaker 1: He's attending the specialized high school half day and the
Speaker 1: other half day he's in his his back in his
Speaker 1: home high school. He's also star athlete. So this kid
Speaker 1: is on the bus riding to the specialized school for
Speaker 1: half day, is the only black kid on the bus.
Speaker 1: The others are white and Asian students. There are no
Speaker 1: black females. He's the only black kid on the bus.
Speaker 1: He was attending the school for his tenth, eleventh, and
Speaker 1: twelfth grade years, so he was going for a good
Speaker 1: time to that particular school. He was repeatedly bullied on
Speaker 1: the bus by his white and Asian peers and said
Speaker 1: and by calling by saying that he was too black
Speaker 1: to be gifted, to be gifted, it is up, pardon me,
Speaker 1: you're right, yeah, So this is what was said to him.
Speaker 1: And after in the morning, going going to this high
Speaker 1: level you know, science technology, science program and the after news.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, he was going he was going
Speaker 1: to practice athletic practice with his predominantly black peers, some
Speaker 1: that he knew from the community he grew up with
Speaker 1: and all that, and they would say to him that
Speaker 1: he was he wasn't black enough. He was acting white. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's talked like a white boy. He was hanging with
Speaker 1: the white boy was he can't you can't win. So
Speaker 1: what what pulled this kid out? What pulled this kid
Speaker 1: out was the support from home. He did have a
Speaker 1: mom who went to a gifted program. He he his
Speaker 1: mother understood on a very personal level what that kind
Speaker 1: of taunting could do to a person's soul. And between
Speaker 1: the mother and a very large extended family, the support
Speaker 1: they gave him enabled this kid to uh to get
Speaker 1: through the high school experience and get into college and
Speaker 1: get out in three years. Interestingly, you know enough, this
Speaker 1: kid had had his choice of attending pretty much any
Speaker 1: predominantly white university on the East Coast because his scores
Speaker 1: were high, he was performing, you know, he was a
Speaker 1: big besides he was he was an athlete too, of course,
Speaker 1: so but he chose to go to a small HBCU,
Speaker 1: go to a small HBCU, so he he says, a
Speaker 1: historically black college and universities. We have a number of
Speaker 1: them across the nation, and the majority of the students
Speaker 1: that attend HBCUs or black students. Matter of fact, I
Speaker 1: worked at one for about five years, not too long ago.
Speaker 1: But anyway, his experience there, he said, enabled him to
Speaker 1: uh to be himself, to be him self. So that
Speaker 1: what he found at the HBCU that maybe he didn't
Speaker 1: have in his own school. He found other scholarly black
Speaker 1: students that he could walk with on campus, talk with.
Speaker 1: They didn't tease him, they didn't taunt him, and it
Speaker 1: was okay to be smart. It was okay and cool
Speaker 1: to be smart with this particular group of kids and
Speaker 1: then also do all the other kinds of things he
Speaker 1: wanted to do in his life. So now he felt
Speaker 1: like he was whole. But it took him that experience
Speaker 1: to get beyond the hate and the aggravation and the bullying,
Speaker 1: the taunting that he was going through in his in
Speaker 1: his high school, doing those three years of high scho school. Again,
Speaker 1: had it not been, you know, for that support of
Speaker 1: that family, the strong mother, the father, the grandmother. It
Speaker 1: was a huge family and they circled around him. They
Speaker 1: circled around him and gave him the support that he needed,
Speaker 1: and he was able to pull out. Because not every
Speaker 1: kid can pull out. Not every kid can pull out.
Speaker 1: I've read stories. I know, students. Not everybody survives in
Speaker 1: this in this world that we live in, where we
Speaker 1: are told so often you're too black to be gifted,
Speaker 1: or you're not black enough, you're not black enough. But
Speaker 1: then there's these other kids. I'm gonna tell you about
Speaker 1: three more kids, and I'm gonna let I'm gonna get
Speaker 1: this back to death. I sat in on a I
Speaker 1: guess it was an advisory meeting with with three students
Speaker 1: not too long ago. All three of the students had
Speaker 1: a chance to go to one of these same kinds
Speaker 1: of schools, and they decided they didn't want to. They
Speaker 1: pulled out. They all three pulled up pretty much at
Speaker 1: the same time, which was very unfortunate because the school was,
Speaker 1: you know, prestigious, you know, high performing, get that on
Speaker 1: your resume, you can pretty much go wherever you want
Speaker 1: to go. Well, each of the girls came in and
Speaker 1: told a group of US adults why they wanted out
Speaker 1: of the school. But there was one kid and this DEV.
Speaker 1: You would you would if I could have taped it,
Speaker 1: I would have said, oh my god the whole time
Speaker 1: I said, Dev. Douglas needs to hear this girl. DEV
Speaker 1: needs to hit this girl. There was one kid who
Speaker 1: I guess they were tenth grade. I have to say
Speaker 1: ninth or tenth grade. One of them was very, very mature, though,
Speaker 1: but she spoke as if she had written our book
Speaker 1: on UH on self empowerment, on self advocacy. She said
Speaker 1: to us that there were people in her school who
Speaker 1: looked down upon them, stereotype them, stereotype them, and said
Speaker 1: things to them that made them feel as if they
Speaker 1: were less than the other students and didn't have a
Speaker 1: sense about what it meant to be a black female
Speaker 1: in that kind of an environment. So this kid says
Speaker 1: to this group of adults, by now, it should be
Speaker 1: normalized that classroom teachers understand what it means to be
Speaker 1: black and gifted. It should be normalized that classroom teachers.
Speaker 1: When she said normalized, I was like, wow, you know
Speaker 1: I was called oh dad, But I I didn't make any
Speaker 1: faces or she was clear that she felt as if
Speaker 1: the teachers in that environment did not understand what they
Speaker 1: were going through when they felt as if they were alone,
Speaker 1: they didn't belong. They were being called out because of
Speaker 1: the particular school districce that came from. They were being
Speaker 1: called out because of their ethnicity, being called out because
Speaker 1: of their gender, and she felt as if the teachers.
Speaker 1: She said, by now, and this is by now, she means,
Speaker 1: she means in this century, that they should be it
Speaker 1: should be normalized that teachers would know better, would know better.
Speaker 1: So there are these kids out there, you know, Scott,
Speaker 1: who have this self advocacy thing down path already because
Speaker 1: some of them are just a little more outspoken than others,
Speaker 1: perhaps a little wiser. But then there's other kids who
Speaker 1: probably are in the same situation who need the skill
Speaker 1: set that we promote in this book. They need that
Speaker 1: skill set. They need educators to understand how to teach
Speaker 1: them how to speak up for what they need and
Speaker 1: what they want and what's going to help propel them forward.
Speaker 1: But you have to know these kids in order to
Speaker 1: do that. And that's why I think it's really important
Speaker 1: that we call on these experts in these particular areas
Speaker 1: to say, these are the skills that teachers need to have.
Speaker 1: If you're going to work with a twice exceptional the
Speaker 1: kid for self advocacy, if you're gonna work with lgbt
Speaker 1: Q student, if you're gonna work with black students, ELLL students,
Speaker 1: if rule you know, these are the skills you need
Speaker 1: to have. They can all come to the same end.
Speaker 1: They can all be good better at self advocacy, but
Speaker 1: you need to be You need to know these kids
Speaker 1: in order to in order to move them, propel them forward.
Speaker 1: So there's a great need out there, Scott, I'm glad
Speaker 1: you asked that questions. There's a huge need out there,
Speaker 1: you know, for educators to better understand and, as this
Speaker 1: kid say so eloquently, to normalize this kind of behavior
Speaker 1: that teaches no better. Yes, normalize it, yes, hash tag
Speaker 1: normalize it and get rid of these situations where kids
Speaker 1: are being said, you're to this and you're you're not
Speaker 1: enough of that. You know you're to this and you're
Speaker 1: not enough of that. It's it's just wrong. It's wrong,
Speaker 1: but it happens every day. So we're going to try
Speaker 1: to staff some of that. Well, it's wrong that you
Speaker 1: have more white language than I used. You said, it's wrong.
Speaker 1: I said, that's more polite. You're more polite than me.
Speaker 1: Oh fucked up? Okay you No, you're you're very classy.
Speaker 1: You're a very classy woman. Joy. Okay, so let's keep
Speaker 1: this line of thought going. We're talking about the barriers
Speaker 1: to self advocacy. You know, you just you just mentioned, uh,
Speaker 1: we just talked about some cultural but you just mentioned
Speaker 1: some others to me, deb you know, you said, women opportunities,
Speaker 1: systemic biases, limit access to resources. Do you want to
Speaker 1: kind of riff on that, expand on that at all, well,
Speaker 1: a little bit more, and also both the cultural barriers.
Speaker 1: Joy and I didn't understand the specific barriers that different
Speaker 1: populations might experience, and that's why we turned to experts
Speaker 1: in the field of gifted education, you know, who have
Speaker 1: done the research themselves, but also grew up as members
Speaker 1: of that those special populations and had personal experiences and
Speaker 1: understood from many perspectives what kids might be going through.
Speaker 1: And one of the interesting things we learned, for instance,
Speaker 1: because I learned so much from what our contributors added,
Speaker 1: is that if you think, for instance, about Latin x
Speaker 1: or as she liked to call them, Hispanic families, the
Speaker 1: cultural setting is you do with what the school says
Speaker 1: you should do and you family is important, so you
Speaker 1: certainly wouldn't want to send your kids to a school
Speaker 1: somewhere else it's not your community school. There are those
Speaker 1: some of those beliefs, and so I won't go into
Speaker 1: all the various cultural differences, but those are some of
Speaker 1: the barriers to kids getting the education they need. And
Speaker 1: so in cases like that, what we've found is, how
Speaker 1: can we help the students who have begun to understand
Speaker 1: themselves and theirs and their talents and what that means
Speaker 1: for their education. How can we help them work with
Speaker 1: their families to better understand How can we communicate better
Speaker 1: with the families about about their child's needs and how
Speaker 1: we hope to address them, and how do we how
Speaker 1: do we help that child take the lead in that
Speaker 1: conversation between the school and their families. So that's that's
Speaker 1: one of the barriers, but it's also one of the
Speaker 1: ways of addressing those barriers, those cultural barriers. Good good,
Speaker 1: So well, what are their resources? What are the resources
Speaker 1: do educators need? You know? What else is valuable here
Speaker 1: too for people who are listening to this and want
Speaker 1: something quick they can institute in their school. Number One,
Speaker 1: I think when we recognize children with gifts and talents,
Speaker 1: we need to help them learn how to self advocate.
Speaker 1: And that's, as we said, as a dynamic process. How
Speaker 1: do we how do we help them assess and reflect
Speaker 1: on themselves as learners and what their strengths are and
Speaker 1: accept the fact that they may not be brilliant across
Speaker 1: the board, they may have some struggles and they may
Speaker 1: have to work at some things. Their interests, their preferences,
Speaker 1: their intellectual ability, their academic strengths, all those things. And
Speaker 1: once they recognize that was, how do we help them
Speaker 1: understand that they have a right to something different? Because
Speaker 1: that's even what our federal definition of giftedness says, that
Speaker 1: these are students who are potential and in many different
Speaker 1: ways and may need something beyond the regular classroom, and
Speaker 1: so they have a right to that and we want
Speaker 1: to provide them with that. We're just not always aware
Speaker 1: or able to do that. So when they aren't getting
Speaker 1: what they feel they need to be challenged appropriately challenged,
Speaker 1: they have a responsibility to work with us to do that.
Speaker 1: I think gifted kids often think we can read their
Speaker 1: minds and we know when things aren't going right, but
Speaker 1: nobody knows better than they do. When they're at school
Speaker 1: every day, walk in the hall, sitting in classes, interacting
Speaker 1: with their teachers and their peers. No one knows better
Speaker 1: than they if they are getting the education that they
Speaker 1: know they want and need, and that can change from
Speaker 1: day to day, from teacher to teacher, semester di semester,
Speaker 1: subject to subject. They have to they have to be
Speaker 1: able to feel they have a responsibility to come to
Speaker 1: us and say either this is this is okay right now,
Speaker 1: I'm happy not having the challenge I need, or this
Speaker 1: isn't going right for me. I need some help in
Speaker 1: changing this. They need to know the other part of
Speaker 1: that dynamic processes. They need to know what options exist
Speaker 1: or could exist, and they need to know who the
Speaker 1: adults are around them, the advocates who can help them
Speaker 1: make those changes. And once they have those those kind
Speaker 1: of that information and those insights and those those strategies,
Speaker 1: then they feel empowered to take charge of their own
Speaker 1: education to make it be what they want it to be.
Speaker 1: And as I said, sometimes that maybe to say to us,
Speaker 1: no now right now, thank you, I don't want to
Speaker 1: challenge in that area. I'm quite happy with this, but
Speaker 1: I want to challenge here, but that assumes that we
Speaker 1: as educators have built a relationship with them so that
Speaker 1: we and we can follow them through where we can
Speaker 1: help educators next year, follow them through and when the
Speaker 1: time is right for them to pick something more challenging
Speaker 1: or to design something more enriching or whatever it is,
Speaker 1: their goal is where they're listening to them and empowering
Speaker 1: them to make their own decisions. Beautiful, you know. Obviously,
Speaker 1: self advocacy is important for any child of any race,
Speaker 1: of any background who is overlooked in an education system.
Speaker 1: It could be someone with the neurodiversity, with autism that
Speaker 1: their gifts are not being recognized. It could be you know,
Speaker 1: so many different, so many different things. I'm obviously very
Speaker 1: very very passionate about what you all are doing, and
Speaker 1: it's I've been trying to stay as impartial as possible.
Speaker 1: But I must also say that this is also very personal.
Speaker 1: You know. As a kid, self adacy was the only
Speaker 1: thing that made anyone pay attention to me and my potential,
Speaker 1: you know, to even be college bound. And when I
Speaker 1: went around, you know, my book on gifted came and
Speaker 1: I went around to special ed schools talking about my
Speaker 1: story and self ABSKU is the one thing that I
Speaker 1: told the kids that they should have. So I was
Speaker 1: so delighted to read your book. It was so emotionally
Speaker 1: resonant with me. But I've been trying to stay very impartial.
Speaker 1: But it's very hard for me to not be emotional
Speaker 1: when it comes to this topic, and I very rarely
Speaker 1: get emotional in this podcast. So how did you develop
Speaker 1: that skill? Let me just collect myself for a moment.
Speaker 1: I think I developed that. See, I had something within
Speaker 1: me that I think I got genetically from my mother,
Speaker 1: and that's called grit. I do think I My mom
Speaker 1: is a very strong world woman. It drove me crazy
Speaker 1: growing up because she was very overprotective of me. But
Speaker 1: but I think I recognized similar characteristics. I there was
Speaker 1: something within me. You know, people, a lot of people
Speaker 1: came asking me why did I fight my way out
Speaker 1: of special and the other kids in the special bedroom?
Speaker 1: Didn't you know? Why? Me? Why? And I just think
Speaker 1: there was something within me where I saw an injustice.
Speaker 1: And I also saw an injustice with the other kids
Speaker 1: in the classroom, which is why I when I was
Speaker 1: a very young age, I said I'm going to grow
Speaker 1: up someday and change the system. You know, it's just
Speaker 1: it's a perceived injustice that just again, for lack of
Speaker 1: a better word, I was like, this is fucked up. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: yeah yeah. And you know, Scott and I you know,
Speaker 1: I read your book as well, and I could see
Speaker 1: so many people that I knew in that book and
Speaker 1: that story. You know. But like I said about that
Speaker 1: girl and that meeting, she was just so different than
Speaker 1: the others that nobody had actually coached her into speaking up.
Speaker 1: She just spoke up, and she, you know, two minutes
Speaker 1: into the meeting. It felt as if she was another
Speaker 1: adult at the table because she was just clearly, you know,
Speaker 1: aggravated about the situation. But she but graceful and also
Speaker 1: the language that she used made it clear that she
Speaker 1: knew exactly what was needed to change the conditions. And again,
Speaker 1: she was not just speaking, like you said, she wasn't
Speaker 1: just speaking for herself. She was speaking for every other
Speaker 1: kid that came along behind her who may have had
Speaker 1: to have the same kind of an experience. And they're
Speaker 1: just those people on the earth, and we're so grateful
Speaker 1: for the Scott Barry Kaufmans, you know, on the Earth
Speaker 1: and so grateful for this young lady and and and
Speaker 1: others who who will model that kind of self advocacy.
Speaker 1: But for those who don't have the skill set and
Speaker 1: can't model it, we need we need people like you,
Speaker 1: like this girl, like some of the others that would
Speaker 1: come across. We need them to speak up by all
Speaker 1: avacate kids. And we need this, this, this whole group
Speaker 1: of stakeholders to be a part of this process. Teachers, counselors, administrators,
Speaker 1: We need everybody who is anybody in the system and
Speaker 1: even outside of the system, to be a part of
Speaker 1: this process and and enable and allow these kids to
Speaker 1: speak up. First of all, some of us and I
Speaker 1: and I say us, because I was one of those kids.
Speaker 1: I was a spokesperson for the whole world growing up.
Speaker 1: You know, I haven't changed the whole lot, I guess
Speaker 1: over these years. You know I was, Yeah, I was
Speaker 1: a student counselor person. I was the one who there
Speaker 1: the march out of the school. I was the one
Speaker 1: who went to the board meetings at fifteen and you
Speaker 1: know I was that you know, I was that one,
Speaker 1: and I encouraged I hope I did. I encourage others
Speaker 1: who came and whispered in my ear, who were afraid
Speaker 1: to say anything out loud, you know, but you know,
Speaker 1: we need to build a world, build a world like
Speaker 1: this where and this is why I think this project
Speaker 1: is so important, that I think we need to build
Speaker 1: a world where all of these kids are self empowered,
Speaker 1: where all of them understand what advocacy is, and they all,
Speaker 1: you know, feel confident that they have the skills they
Speaker 1: need and that there are other people you know, who
Speaker 1: have gone before that have done this and it was
Speaker 1: it worked, you know. In our book of Scott before
Speaker 1: we close out, we do have a chapter by students,
Speaker 1: a group of students that we met in Florida, and
Speaker 1: those kids blew me away. They literally blew me away
Speaker 1: when I went to their conference. They had a symposium
Speaker 1: that they planned and invited me in as a keynote speaker,
Speaker 1: and I spoke for a few minutes and then sat
Speaker 1: down and listened to them for the next forty five minutes.
Speaker 1: And as I listened to them, my face was just
Speaker 1: a wash with tears. I was so taken, you know,
Speaker 1: by their strength, by their willingness to tell their stories,
Speaker 1: even per stories, in front of a whole crowd of
Speaker 1: people and why it was important for them to have
Speaker 1: a chance to tell this story because they wanted to
Speaker 1: pay the way for other kids coming behind them to
Speaker 1: make it better. And so if we give kids this
Speaker 1: kind of we build a culture, I would say, where
Speaker 1: they have the opportunities and they and they can speak
Speaker 1: out and speak up. I think we can change things.
Speaker 1: And this is what this is why I got hooked
Speaker 1: up with Dev Douglas. I have to say it again.
Speaker 1: I got hooked up with Dad because I saw an
Speaker 1: opportunity here for us to take a different look at
Speaker 1: the equity issues and how can we really make some
Speaker 1: some significant changes that are sustainable. We can come through
Speaker 1: Student Voice and do it. We can go through student
Speaker 1: agency and do it. We've been we failed at it
Speaker 1: miserably in other ways. And I you know, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to use the word you use, Scott, but that's
Speaker 1: the way I feel sometimes about this equity work. You know,
Speaker 1: we've failed that. It's just really you know, and and
Speaker 1: it's still fighting. We're still fighting, but this this way
Speaker 1: is different. This way we come at it from a
Speaker 1: different angle. And maybe people will listen now because the
Speaker 1: kids are going to speak up, They're going to tell
Speaker 1: it the same things we were saying, but it's gonna
Speaker 1: come from their voices, from their hearts, and I think
Speaker 1: that's really really important for us to listen to them.
Speaker 1: Thanks Alaska, we appreciate you so much. I appreciate you
Speaker 1: guys as well, so so much. I'm gonna end here
Speaker 1: with a poem by Langston Hughes called Harlem. What happens
Speaker 1: to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a
Speaker 1: raisin in the sun, or fester like a sore and
Speaker 1: then run? Does it stink like rotten meat or crust
Speaker 1: in sugar, or like a shirpy suite? Maybe it just
Speaker 1: SAgs like a heavy load, or does it explode? Well? Well,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for the incredible work you're doing
Speaker 1: to not defer dreams. You know, it's it's really uh
Speaker 1: so important, and and especially now with a gift education
Speaker 1: as a field under attack, you know. So anyway, thank
Speaker 1: you so much. And I'm going to lost for words here.
Speaker 1: Thank you for this chance to share our passion. We
Speaker 1: can't change the system, but the kids can change the system,
Speaker 1: and that's where we want to empower them. I love it,
Speaker 1: I love it, Thank you, thank you, Thanks for listening.
Speaker 1: To this episode of The Psychology Podcast. If you'd like
Speaker 1: to react in some way to something you heard, I
Speaker 1: encourage you to join in the discussion at thusycology podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. We're on our YouTube page, The Psychology Podcast.
Speaker 1: We also put up some videos of some episodes on
Speaker 1: our YouTube page as well, so you'll want to check
Speaker 1: that out. Thanks for being such a great supporter of
Speaker 1: the show, and tune in next time for more on
Speaker 1: the mind, brain, behavior, and creativity.