Belonging and Empathy: Insights from Dr. Derrick Gay

Belonging and Empathy: Insights from Dr. Derrick Gay

00:02
Danny
Welcome to the front lines of the revolution in education. If you’re passionate about reshaping the landscape of learning and carving out a future where every student thrives, you found your tribe. I’m Danny Bauer, and you’re listening to the better Leaders, Better Schools podcast, the premiere show for Ruckus makers who do school different. Thanks to Ruckus makers just like you, this show leads the way in the global conversation on educational leadership, ranking in the top 0.5% of podcasts worldwide. Now on today’s show, I speak with Doctor Derek Gay, who is a globally recognized belonging and intercultural competency strategist dedicated to fostering cultures of dignity and respect. 

00:50
Danny
With multifaceted expertise as an international speaker, authorization, researcher, educator, and university lecturer, doctor Gaye empowers individuals and organizations to deepen belonging and empathy by cultivating shared language, raising awareness, and fostering inclusive personal behaviors and organizational practices and policies. Today, we cover in general what is this thing called diversity? And Doctor Gaye approaches it and reframes it in really some mind shattering ways. I learned so much from this conversation. We also dig deep into how to create spaces that are truly fostering belonging, where people feel that they’re seen and heard, that they matter, and how to create spaces too, where everybody can experience dignity and respect again, to the challenges, the pitfalls of implementing spaces like this and what your first few steps should be as a campus leader. 

01:55
Danny
Thanks again for listening and we’ll be right back after some quick words from our show sponsors. Hey ruckus maker, I’ll make this quick. If you’re listening to this message right now, you’re missing out. When you subscribe to the Ruckus Maker newsletter on Substack, you get access to microbooks focused on how to do school different tools and other resources that will help you make a ruckus and do school different stories and case studies of the worlds most legendary Ruckus makers of all time. Access to my calendar to schedule coaching sessions and youll also get bonus podcast content that wont be released on the main podcast feed and podcast episodes without any advertisements. 

02:49
Danny
So if you love this show, if it’s helped you grow and you want access to more tools and resources that will help you make a ruckus and do school different and become a paid subscriber at Ruckusmakers dot substack.com. That’s Ruckusmakers dot Substack.com dot. The truth is, most leaders weren’t taught a robust way to set their goals. Everyone knows how to choose a goal write the to do list and pick a due date, and as a result, theyre not optimizing their potential. When you download the Ruckus maker eight step goal setting tool, ill send you the tool in a short eight minute coaching video that shows you how to work smarter, not harder, and create more value for your campus. Are you ready to accomplish more with less effort and in less time? 

03:39
Danny
Download the Ruckus maker eight step goal setting tool by going to betterleadersbetterschools.com goals. If you could differentiate instruction in 20 minutes or less, would you do it for your students? Well, you can with IXL. Over 1 million teachers use IXL because it empowers them to use effective, data informed instruction. Get started [email protected]. Leaders that’s ixl.com leadership Leaders question would you serve your own kids the same food you serve your students in your cafeteria? Now? Quest food management Services elevates the student dining experience, serving scratch made meals using high quality ingredients that are sourced locally and responsibly. Now that is food you can be proud to serve. Learn more about Quest food Management [email protected] or follow questfood on social media. That’s questfms.com. All right, ruckus maker. 

04:51
Danny
We are here today with Doctor Derek Gay, who is globally recognized as a belonging intercultural competency strategist dedicated to fostering cultures of dignity and respect. With multifaceted expertise as an international speaker, author, researcher, educator, and university lecturer, doctor Gaye empowers individuals and organizations to deepen belonging and empathy by cultivating shared language, raising awareness, and fostering inclusive personal behaviors and organizational practices and policies. Doctor Gaye, welcome to this show. Great. 

05:34
Dr Derrick
So great to be here. I’m looking forward to our conversation. 

05:37
Danny
Brilliant. So last time we spoke, and I know it was just for the, I think the 23, 24 year or something like that. So over a year you traveled. This is wild. And I love the stat, 23 countries, right? 45 cities, all these keynotes, I think 450 plus workshops. I mean, you’re doing tremendous work interacting with all sorts of individuals, and I think that becomes maybe part of your superpower, right? Like being able to interact and see how people do this thing called life traveling around the globe. And I’d love just to start off there in terms of what are some of the biggest lessons you’ve learned traveling the globe? 

06:21
Dr Derrick
Well, I’ve learned a lot of lessons. One I think is there’s amazing food everywhere. So I really spent a lot of time going in and out of cultures and breaking bread more than a metaphor with people and learning about different cultures, different backgrounds, ways in which we are seemingly all very different and very unique, but also, surprisingly, even across all of those countries and languages and regions or religions, and you name it, seeing some very interesting ways that were all just very similar. Particularly, I think, as it relates to this work, one of the questions I often ask parents and teachers, administrators, I ask them, what do you want for our kids? What do you want for our students? 

07:11
Dr Derrick
And it doesn’t matter if I’m in New York City or Huntsville, Alabama, or Panama City or Hong Kong or Paris or Buenos Aires, it really doesn’t matter. They all say the same thing. It’s something about something where we want to provide them with the content, skills, and knowledge, where they’re going to be able to be good people and have choice filled lives. And I hear that across the board, and I think about, specifically, I think about the work that I’m engaged in around really fostering these cultures of respect and dignity for all that. It really boils down to that no matter who you are, that you’re given a fair shot and you’re provided the skills that you need to thrive and flourish. 

07:55
Dr Derrick
So that’s something I thought that, you know, traveling all these countries, I would hear different versions of these things, but folks are saying the exact same thing. 

08:04
Danny
My wife and I had an incredible opportunity. She’s a public health expert in epidemiology, and there was some sort of international event that was in Marrakesh, Morocco. So we spent two and a half weeks, started there. She did her thing, and then we traveled all over Morocco, which was incredible. First time in a predominantly muslim country. So here in the call to prayer, which was great, you know, and interesting and unique and doctor gay, I think I ate so much tagine right by the end of the trip, I just had to find a burger or some tacos because I couldn’t have any more tagine, for sure. 

08:40
Dr Derrick
It’s funny, as soon as you said Morocco, I thought, tagine, how incredible. How incredible it is. 

08:46
Danny
It’s amazing. 

08:47
Dr Derrick
You know, I have a quick story. I was, as a student, I lived as many students in the United States, I wanted to have my experience abroad. So I was living in Spain. I was living in southern Spain, in Adelusia, that part in Cordova, which is just incredible city in the south of Spain, and the mosque is there, the mesquite, and all these wonderful things. And I was really, you know, diving into the culture and really proud of myself, you know, I don’t want to date myself. But this is pre intern. And there was this moment where I just. I don’t know. I had panic attack. I don’t know what it was. I’m just home. I’ve been here four months. I just need something american. And we all went and had Burger King. That was my fix. 

09:33
Dr Derrick
My friends, who know how much I love just eating fruits from different cultures, like, we couldn’t believe it, know the thing? The one thing you needed was Burger King to get back, to feel back at home. But no. Food and culture are wonderful. And again, across all of these cultures, again, there are. While there are seemingly many differences, there are some just human characteristics that bind us all together. 

09:55
Danny
Sure. So a great entry point for sure. But your work focuses on these cultures. I’d love to hear. I’d love to hear more, just, you know, about how you serve in that way and help folks. Right. Experience dignity and respect for all. 

10:11
Dr Derrick
That’s a great question. And often when I say, people say, what do you do? I say, oh, I’m a belonging strategist, or, I’m a belonging intercultural strategist. I’m fostering these cultures of dignity and respect. And they’re like, well, isn’t that like a diversity guy? Let’s quote, yeah, it is like a diversity guy. But let me tell you very specifically why I’ve chosen to frame the work that I do in this way. And I’m a TEDx talk from about ten years ago, that’s called the double edged sword of diversity. And what I found was having done this work as a teacher, having done a Delaware, New York, and Chicago and other places, and seeing that schools wanted to do the best, seeing the schools want to provide a space where all students were able to flourish. 

10:53
Dr Derrick
But seeing also that when were doing this diversity work 2025 years ago, and certainly the case now, but it just wasn’t resonating. It wasn’t resonating with everyone. And initially, I think in my young age, I thought, well, Vince is because, you know, people just don’t get it, or this is because there are a lot of bad people. But as I dug a bit more and reflected a bit more, it took some time, I realized that part of the challenge around this work, again, Foster. Fostering cultures of dignity, respect for all. Part of the challenge is just the word diversity, and people understand diversity in radically different ways. So often when I work with the school, one of the first questions I ask is, what are some of the things that you’re doing around diversity? 

11:41
Dr Derrick
And it’s interesting because depending on where I am, people have very specific understanding of what that means. That means that they are doing anti racist work only, or that means that they’re doing something around LGBTQ only. But then some people say, I’m doing nothing. And I say, it’s impossible that you’re doing nothing. So I asked them other questions. Are you doing work around social emotional learning? Oh, yes, absolutely. Are you doing work around character? Oh, all the time. Are you doing responsive classroom? Oh, yes. But that’s not diversity. Wait, wait, wait. How is that not diversity work? 

12:15
Dr Derrick
And so it became apparent to me that one of the challenges and opportunities of this work is that we need to reframe diversity in a way that resonates with everyone and in a way, quite frankly, where it no longer serves as a proxy for historically marginalized groups, a way that is inclusive of people from all backgrounds, while also recognizing the work that we need to do to provide a space where people from all backgrounds are able to thrive and flourish. And I’ll just flesh that theory out a bit more. There’s this whole idea. I talk to people again about diversity, and they say, they give me numbers. I mean, schools are great at quantifying this. They’ll say, our district is 33% diverse. I say, I don’t know what that means. And they say, well, no, we have 33% diverse students. 

13:14
Dr Derrick
And then it becomes a bit awkward because I ask again, I say, can you tell me what this. I don’t see an asterisk about what that means. And so finally we get to it. Essentially what theyre saying, depending on where I am in the US, what theyre really saying is we have this amount, black and brown students, this amount non white students, this amount of free and reduced law enforce students, this amount of people getting IED, its some group. Thats not the normal. Thats how we, thats how largely we talk about diversity in the United States. And so what does that mean? It often means that when we then think about framing diversity, we think about belonging programs. We often think about how depending on who you are, how can we support the diverse people? 

14:07
Dr Derrick
And if you don’t fall into one of those categories, you don’t see yourself as being diverse. So many schools, I ask people, do you support diversity? And the numbers are super high. These are anonymous polls like, do you support diversity? I think the school should continue with this work around diversity. And there’s really high numbers. But then I asked them different to if you support diversity, do you feel represented by the term diversity? And the numbers comet, depending on where I am. And that disconnect is super important to understand how we do diversity in schools. Who feels as if they can be part of diversity efforts, who feels as if they have something to contribute to diversity, and ultimately, who feels as if they are benefactors of this work around diversity. 

15:03
Dr Derrick
So what I’ve seen is that when people don’t feel as if they’re part of diversity, that often it’s deprioritized. Right. It’s not urgent. It’s done sort of noblesse oblige, right. I’m doing this to help those people and not necessarily in a bad way. Often it becomes office condescending. All of that’s not the intent. But we really need to help these kids, our kids who need the IEP, our kids who have learning differences. We’re doing this for Zoru’s kids over there, our black and brown kids. They need this work. And it resonates, often in a very condescending way. And then it doesn’t become integrated into the normal practices of school. It becomes this discrete thing where you have the diversity week, for example, or you bring a diversity speaker and it’s a big trumpet. 

16:04
Dr Derrick
And then when those weeks are over, then we go back to what we always did. So getting back at your initial question, I think that a large part of the work that I do around fostering these cultures of respect and dignity is first interrogating how we understand the term diversity and reframing it in meaningful ways to actually drive belonging. 

16:31
Danny
Yeah, that’s fascinating. I really appreciate that. Reframing. So powerful. And the idea of it being inclusive and driving participation and ownership and representation. Right. For everybody around that term, the motivational speaker zig. Ziglar used to say pre Internet. Right. So when we listen to radio, pre Spotify, everybody’s favorite radio station is Wii FM, which is what’s in it for me. Right. So if you’re not answering that core, sort of like human need, like, how do I benefit or how am I represented in this thing that we’re all doing? You know, that’s almost a very simple way potentially to measure if there is going to be ownership, buy in, and integrity in terms of implementation. It looks like you want to add to that. 

17:19
Dr Derrick
Yeah. So this idea of the ownership piece, people are invested in things they help create. And if you’re not part of the construct, then you don’t see yourself as a benefactor. It’s almost human nature with competing interests. This will go to the bottom of the pile. I also want to say because earlier in my career, when I said this, and it really is only. Well, not only. It’s about really about 20 years that I have really had this idea around some of this specific challenge of diversity, that it’s a product of historically marginalized groups. But often, when I would say this, sometimes people get upset with me, and I understood why they were getting upset because there was a miscommunication when I was saying that we need to expand our understandings of diversity to go beyond historically marginalized or under Mister groose. 

18:13
Dr Derrick
What they were hearing was that here’s this black man saying that racism doesn’t exist or sexism doesn’t exist or discrimination or bias like these, things like this. Let’s be clear. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m saying 100% they exist. But if you frame these efforts in a way that’s exclusive from the onset, then the very people that you need for implementation are going to opt out. In a very paradoxical way, the onus is in place on the people who are the most marginalized to do the work. So what does that mean? That means that we think that people of color should solve racism, but only people of color. We think that women should then are the only ones who should be at the forefront of the work around gender equity, for example, and that men should. Note I. 

19:07
Dr Derrick
When, in fact, men absolutely should be engaged in this work. But again, the way it’s framed as is that if I’m not part of the group, then it’s not important. Does it include me? I can’t do anything. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard good people. When I say good people, these people I’ve known for many years, these are people who are still dedicated their lives to education, say things to me like, you know, I really. I really want to do some work around race, but, you know, I’m just white, right? I’d really like to do some work, you know, to help the LGBTQ community. But, you know, I’m just straight. I really like to do it some work. I like to help the kids with learning differences, but, you know, I don’t have a learning difference at all. 

19:50
Dr Derrick
So what do I know about this? So, in a very interesting way, the framing, again, it undermines the work of diversity because it won, because people understand diversity in different ways, but largely because it’s famous. Only a subset of people, often the most marginalized people. 

20:10
Danny
Yeah. You know, and I think it’s problematic, too, when people use that word, just, you know. 

20:15
Dr Derrick
Yes. 

20:15
Danny
So that seems like part of the issue, too. Puts an upper limit challenge there, allows people to sort of hide or lets them off the hook, so to speak. What you share there, doctor Gaye, was. Was really interesting, focused a lot on the US, too. Do you see that word diversity and how we complicated in the US? Are you seeing that globally as well, or, you know, obviously, it’s hard to generalize, you know, all the countries, but can you give us a flavor of what’s out there? 

20:45
Dr Derrick
Yeah, that’s a great question. And a large part of my work is outside of the United States. And for as much as I saw these challenges around the word diversity in the states, again being a process restored through marginalized groups outside the United States is even more complicated because, one, it’s viewed as an american issue, and that’s challenging because, I mean, we can make an argument that the construct of diversity as we know it now is american. It came out of a civil rights movement. It came out of the civil rights around race in particular, and it was expanded around gender, around LGBTQ. And I would hope that 60, 80 years later. 1960s, sixties. 

21:27
Dr Derrick
Yeah, 60 years later, that we have a more expensive understanding of what diversity means here, notwithstanding what we see international communities is there wasn’t that civil rights movement from the 1960s, and so the idea of diversity came to the international community much later, and it was often coupled with LGBTQ issues. It came with pride parades, it came pride and rainbows. And so often when people think about diversity outside of the United States, the first place they go is LGBTQ and exclusively there, which creates some challenges, particularly in more socially conservative or religious areas, where they feel as if the only focus is around LGBTQ, to the exclusion of other forms of diversity or other forms of marginalization. So that’s a very unique challenge to international schools. 

22:27
Dr Derrick
And the other piece is just that, really, to be honest, before George Floyd, international schools were not talking about diversity because, one, it was viewed as an american issue. Two, is often viewed as racism. And there’s this fallacy that racism doesn’t exist outside of the United States. And then there’s this idea that international schools, that we conflated internationalism, international mindedness, rather, and. Or having lots of flags and passports in a school, we conflated that with being belonging. And so folks would say, we have 25 countries, we have 33. Bahavus. We don’t need to do this work. The Americans need to do this. George Floyd happened, and there was this, as you know, this watershed moment, not only United States, but around the world, including international schools. I can recall in 2015 I gave the opening keynote to the AEIE Leadership conference. 

23:32
Dr Derrick
So this is the association for the Advancement of international Education around diversity. And I was brought in specifically to talk about diversity and the response and heads of schools and superintendents and leaders from around the world. The response was polite, but it was clear to me that people thought, you know, this guy’s intellectually sort of curiously presenting, but this isn’t relevant to us because we’re international schools. Fast forward 22 years ago, whenever it was two years ago, 2020, what year? It says 24 2022. I presented the closing keynote, the same organization, and it was completely different. You know, when you’re the keynote, the final keynote, often you’re chosen to be the anchor, right? To keep people at the conference. People stayed and they came. They had their pads ready, they had their computers ready. 

24:25
Dr Derrick
And we’re taking copious notes because there’s a shift in the international community that this diversity work, this work around belonging, this work around inclusion, is also relevant to us. And so for the international community, this reframing of diversity is important as well for some of the reasons I mentioned earlier, but again, largely because one is viewed as an american issue or was views american issue. Two, because there was a conflation of an international community and a community of belonging, and three, because for so long these issues hadn’t been spoken about, and again, largely I’m seeing in all of the major organizations that there is conversation in the international community around these issues. The question now is how? How do we move this work forward? Brilliant. 

25:19
Danny
Well, I’m really enjoying our conversation, Doctor Gaye, and we’ll pause here just for a moment to get some quick messages in for our sponsors. You know, something that drove me nuts as a ruckus maker was hearing teachers say, I taught it and the students should have learned it, but really some teachers just don’t know how to reteach so that all kids get it. That’s where I Excel comes in. IXl’s diagnostic automatically identifies knowledge gaps for teachers and provides them with a personalized growth plan for each individual student. Teachers can step into the classroom every day knowing what their students know and what they don’t. IXL’s adaptive platform makes differentiating instruction easy. As students learn, IxL adjusts to the right level of difficulty for each individual. Close knowledge gaps and accelerate learning with IXL. Get started [email protected]. Leaders. That’s ixl.com leaders. 

26:25
Danny
Here’s a few reasons I love quest food management services. Quest provides high quality, scratch made food in k twelve schools and universities across the country. Quest provides solutions for school cafeterias of every size, including multistation dining halls, cafes and coffee shops, marketplace grab and go catering and events, satellite programming and more. The quest food philosophy is to prioritize the health and wellness of students by cultivating chef crafted recipes containing high quality ingredients and using scratch made cooking techniques and responsible product sourcing. Learn more about Quest food management [email protected], or follow questfood on social media. That’s questfms.com. All right, and we’re back with Doctor Derek gay, who’s a globally recognized belonging and intercultural competency strategists dedicated to fostering cultures of dignity and respect. And sort of where you left us off the cliffhanger was, how do we do this work? 

27:34
Danny
So let’s say I’m a ruckus maker, wanting to implement and create a space right where people really, they feel it. They feel the belonging, the connectedness to each other. You know, they experience that dignity and respect. What are some of those first steps that I might take as a campus leader? 

27:53
Dr Derrick
One of the first steps as a campus leader that you’ll need to take is first to just define what it is we’re talking about. And so it’s really important that people have shared understandings of what diversity means, for example, or what inclusion means, for example, or what belonging means. I’ve worked at many schools where I go to their website and I see diversity, and I see what we typically see. We see, as I mentioned earlier, those historically marginalized groups. There’s a black kid, there’s a jewish kid, there’s a muslim kid, there’s a kid in the wheelchair. There’s a kid who presents this gay. There’s these, and that’s the page. And coupled with some what I call the food fun Flag festival events where they have flags everywhere and samosas and tacos and spaghetti, and that’s how they define diversity. 

28:41
Dr Derrick
And then I see all of these programs. And so if you don’t define diversity, then there’s no way that you can strategically move this work forward. So one way that I have offered to frame this work around diversity, really is to recognize the uniqueness of each individual, which is super important, but also recognize the connectedness across individuals. And so both components are important. Tell you why. Because often I hear people think about diversity only as how unique and special they are, particularly in the United States, which is more egocentric, and that’s not in a pejorative way. But it’s more about the eye, and it’s an individualistic culture. It’s really about me and what I’ve done. 

29:29
Dr Derrick
And so we’re very much an identity focused culture where people can name off all of their identities, but the danger in that is that either one identity becomes destiny, right? So that because you are x, you have to conform to or be this way, or we think that we are so special that we can only connect with people who are just like us, right? And not think about the other. Part of the definition of diversity is around these common human characteristics that we all share. But there’s also. It’s like water. Too little water is a bad thing. Too much. Why is a bad thing? There’s also a danger to only thinking about the shared human characteristics, which we hear often. You know, we’re all just people. You know, we should only be about respect. You don’t have to use other things. 

30:26
Dr Derrick
If you only think about our shared human commonalities, then you don’t really have analytical tool to understand how these differences are forming, how people are navigating the world and informing their life chances. Again, this isn’t my personal opinion. This isn’t my personal perspective. There’s research around this. Don’t believe you me, go try to buy a car as a black person, as a white person, the man, there’s a woman, etcetera. 

30:53
Danny
And you see outcomes, all sorts of. 

30:55
Dr Derrick
Stuff, all of these things. So the definition around diversity needs to both acknowledge the uniqueness of the individual, but also highlight across those differences that there are some shared human characteristics as well. And we mentioned some of the differences in the United States and outside in the international space. That’s super important as well, because many of the cultures outside of the US, tend to be more collectivist, where the SnaP membership is more salient. And so, strategically, if you lead with the definition, it’s only about the individual and only about how special I am and how different I am to the group that’s going to be culturally misaligned, where it is the nucleus, the family, the community is so important. So if you were able to. 

31:47
Dr Derrick
To marry the two who both acknowledge the individual and the group will ask who, strategically, you’re positioning this work for success. So, again, that would be the first thing I would recommend to leaders who want to really engage in this work is to define your terms. The first one is diversity. The second one is belonging. And belonging really is the emotional outcome of being seen, being heard, being validated. It’s not something for me to say that you do belong, right? Because we see that offered, this is an inclusive school. So, of course, Debbie, you belong and write, don’t you? That’s not my place. 

32:25
Danny
It’s, do you feel the belonging? 

32:29
Dr Derrick
But it’s hard for students to create a counter narrative to that, right? It’s the bread. We all belong, yet I don’t belong. How can I speak to that? So, belonging, again, is the personal feeling an individual has the emotional outcome of these efforts and these efforts. I would call that different to how often we use the term. I would call that inclusion. The inclusion are behaviors that show people that they are seen, that they are heard, that they are validated, that they have access, that they have dignity and worth. And so when you combine those three definitions, it’s powerful that diversity is our unique individualities across these shared human differences. Inclusion is behaviors, actions that show people that they’re seen and heard, and that we’re acknowledging their dignity and that belonging is the emotional outcome of inclusion. 

33:28
Dr Derrick
Then you have a nice little framework there in which to work, in which everyone is included. Everyone has a right to this idea of belonging, and everyone is compelled to act when that is not the case. 

33:43
Danny
It’s a powerful vision of what school could be, especially if those are sort of guiding questions, what would need to be true to make this the reality? 

33:51
Dr Derrick
And when that’s not true, what do we need to do that? Also, that framework aligns with every mission of every school. Right? Every mission of every school says essentially the same thing. This is 100% alignment with that. It’s alignment what we know from research around the impact of belonging. Higher engagement, less anxiety, less depression, people are able to flourish. I don’t have to do research to understand that. If you’re worried about being. That you can leverage your full cognitive energy towards doing and towards learning. And this framework also is not. It’s not a perspective. I mean, the only perspective or opinion around this that you could argue is if you think that not every human has equal worth. Right. So that’s challenging. Right. But believe that to be the case, then this framework is not political. And that’s one of the challenges. 

34:49
Dr Derrick
Certainly, we’re seeing not only the United States, but also outside of United States, around the politicization of this work, that this work is somehow an agenda. I think the only agenda around this work is that every child has a right to belong. And every right, every child, no matter their background, has a right to be supported in a way, that child is going to flourish. But again, there are political ways to frame this, and I’ve certainly seen that. But within this framework, you can say that this is a Democrat agenda, this is a republican agenda, this is about the primary goal of education. 

35:27
Danny
Right on. I’d love to ask you, Doctor Gaye, last three questions that all our guests get. And so the first one would be, if you could put one message on all school marquees around the world for a single day, what would be your message? 

35:41
Dr Derrick
You said twelve messages. 

35:42
Danny
I can put one today. You could do eleven later. 

35:46
Dr Derrick
How big is that poster? I would say on that poster that one message. It’s very simple. I’m going to qualify what I’m going to say with the stories that I have for many years now, I’ve been fortune to serve as a senior advisor to Sesame street. Essentially means that I’m one of the advisors that reads the scripts to make sure that they are developmentally appropriate. What we know a three year old, for example, understands about themselves, cognitively, emotionally, psychologically, all these things. So that’s part of the work I do. What I so love about this work, besides my deepest and long standing relationship with Elmo and all these people, is it forces you. As Einstein said, you don’t know it well enough if you can’t say it simply. 

36:36
Dr Derrick
So having to say things and describe things in a way that Dreol understands makes go to the core of what the message is. And so if I had one message, it probably would be, you are seen, you referred, you matter. So important. And all the research is clear around this belief that one has about oneself, about their inherent value and how that can help in times of adversity, resilience. Life is going to throw challenges at you. If you have this fundamental sense of your worth, then there’s a higher possibility that you’re going to get through it. And it’s our, certainly our job as educators and curators of a learning environment that everyone that walks to that building feels that way. 

37:26
Danny
Let’s say you’re building your dream school, doctor gay. You’re not limited by any resources. Your only constraint is your ability to imagine what would be the three guiding principles of this school. 

37:38
Dr Derrick
So I think I’ll go back to that framework I mentioned earlier around my work supporting individuals to build and sustain these communities of dignity and respect. So those three pillars, I think, would be important to me. One of dignity and respect would be of pillar. I think another would be one of empathy and another would be one of action. And I’ll explain those a bit more when I think about dignity. As I mentioned, earlier. It’s really the inherent worth of all individuals. And as a human, you have it, and we all have the same amount of it. And that respect is really thinking about ways in which we show people that they matter. That is fundamental to learning, but also fundamental to, as Doctor King talked about, just somebody ness. But coupled with that, I think another pillar would be empathy. 

38:30
Dr Derrick
And again, going back to how we define empathy at Sesame street, is understanding and caring about the feelings of others. And so there’s a cognitive piece, which is perspective taking and getting outside of yourself, putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, and seeing the world from the perspective of someone else, that so often we don’t do, because we live in silos and the Internet and the curation of algorithms and all these things, it’s not helping that, which, of course, is feeling deeper polarization. So getting outside of yourself, but the other part and bit, it’s caring. And so there’s emotional. So developing your own EQ, your own emotional intelligence to acknowledge and understand your feelings, and then to be able to perceive emotions in others and then take care because you don’t care, you’re not going to do anything. 

39:21
Dr Derrick
And that’s, you know, that’s the difference between a group of people in a community, is that interconnectedness. So empathy is underrated and super important. Again, empathy doesn’t mean I have to feel the same thing that you feel, but it means that I have to care enough about you that when I see that you’re not thriving, you’re not flourishing, you’re not feeling well, that it compels me to do something and to act. And I think that third pillar I mentioned was really action. Again, I’ve seen lots of people who’ve done all the intellectual work, and I think in school, sometimes we do too much intellectual work, being in the thought, right. All these things. But at the end of the day, you know, if you’re not doing anything, it really doesn’t matter. 

40:03
Dr Derrick
And so it’s not what the school is going to do, it’s not what the district is going to do, it’s not what the division is going to do. It really is within your purview of power. What are you going to do to make a better world? 

40:17
Danny
That’s right. Yeah. You can see above my head here. Create results, not a resume. Right? 

40:21
Dr Derrick
Yes. I love it. 

40:23
Danny
And then over here, ideas are great, but not the greatest. The only thing greater than an idea is taking action. So thanks for that masterclass on building a dream school, doctor gay. So, hey, we covered a lot of ground today, and it was a really fruitful conversation of everything we discussed. What’s the one thing you want a ruckus maker to remember? 

40:44
Dr Derrick
The one thing I want a ruckus maker to remember is a wonderful quote. And I may paraphrase this from Roberto Clemente, who was a wonderful puerto rican baseball player, and he sent something to the tune of Dave, you have the opportunity to make the world better and do something for others, and you don’t do it, then you’re wasting your time on the earth. We then join education. We’re not bankers. We’re not lawyers. We’re not stockbrokers. I mean, these are all wonderful professions. But we joined education. This is our vocation. This isn’t a job. This is our passion. Because ultimately, we want to make the world better for students today than ours was. And so, you know, for the ruckus maker, it starts with you. What are you going to do tomorrow? 

41:37
Danny
Thanks for listening to the better leaders Better Schools podcast, Ruckus maker. How would you like to lead with confidence, swap exhaustion for energy, turn your critics into cheerleaders and so much more? The Ruckus Maker mastermind is a world class leadership program designed for growth minded school leaders just like you. Go to betterleadersbetterschools.com mastermind, learn more about our program and fill out the application. Well be in touch within 48 hours to talk how we can help you be even more effective. And by the way, we have cohorts that are diverse and mixed up. We also have cohorts just for women in leadership and a BIPOC only cohort as well. When you’re ready to level up, go to betterleadersbetterschools.com mastermind and fill out the application. Thanks again for listening to the show. Bye for now and go make a ruckuse.