[Music] good morning good afternoon good evening and welcome to another episode of voices for excellence the black Excellence series here in February I'm your host Dr Michael Connor CEO and founder of the agile evolutionary group and of course the proud host of VF and today's guest epitomize black excellence in this month of February Happy uh Black History Month to everybody and yes we are bringing the series back and of course I had to bring on my sister a good good personal close friend somebo
dy that I admire in the field uh she is one of the most recognized superintendant across the country is doing remarkable remarkable work in Westberry New York at for the Westberry Union Free School District she is an author a curriculum specialist a pedagogical Zar I mean I can just go on and on and on about Dr depri Chase she is like I said one of the best superintendance one of the national voices somebody I look up to personally and it is great to have her on vfv we've been trying to you know
get her on vfv for a while right now but we finally got her especially during black history month so it is my honor to welcome Dr Tahir depri Chase from Westberry New York you know I'm up in Rochester so we're about what three four five hours away something like that it's good to see Dr Chase it's good to have you on it is a blessing to be here and thank you so much for bringing me on to your show um you gave me such beautiful accolades as you introduced me but let me just say the feeling is mu
tual um when you and I first met We There was an instant connection because what we shared in common is our tenacity to make sure that all students have access to an exceptional education and so I admire you I admired your work um I still admire your work I ad what you're doing and leveraging the voices of Educators from around the world because you're not just you know doing National stuff you're doing International work and so I've been following you and I've been watching you and I must say t
hat I admire you I admire you for your wherewithal for your tenacity for your ability to pull out the best in Educators and for the hard work that you're doing to ensure that all children regardless of zip code social economic background ethnicity have access to an excellent education so kudos to you my brother thank thank you Dr depri Chase it has um my tell you this journey has definitely um been interesting you know albeit uh one that is just motivating just to keep the work going and I have
seen your work like I said been admiring your work uh from afar near um you have just been doing your thing sis and I just so so so proud of you every time that I see that you're on this you're on that I'm like yes that's it that is my sister uh and yes she is literally my sister yes absolutely you know uh AKA Alpha Kappa Alpha right there we go we had to get that so it's do the pre Chase it is just GNA be a conversation just like picture that we're we're both at napsi and we normally have our o
ur our conversation we W up talking about everything under the sun with education so now um my audience they get to actually see uh a dialogue a discussion between you and I so I look forward to it but Dr depra Chase this is the first question and it's usually a fun question right and and a lot of people know who you are they know your work they follow you you Mentor many many superintendents across this country and New York as well but when leaders across the ecosystem unpack your leadership si
gnature what Excellence an equity song Define the education stance of Dr Dupri Chase I laugh you with the song no I I laugh and I'll I'll share why I laugh I laugh because there are so many songs that resonate that resonate to the journey that resonates to the journey not just as a superintendent but as a woman of color a black woman who's leading a school district as I'm 10 years in which is now an anomaly if you will right there's so many but what comes to mind is what I played this morning I
actually have two but what comes to mind with what I played this morning coming into to work was you can't break my soul right and I know I need to lose my I know I need my day job I know I can't sing but but let me tell you why our sister Beyonce really hit the nail on the head with this one because what she speaks about is no matter your challenge no matter you must find your motivation within those challenges and that song is so powerful to the superintendency to the leadership role that I pl
ay that so many women of color play today because we're faced with challenges that are different from our counterparts let's call it what it is our challenges are much different and that being said we have to find the motivation in each Challenge and so when I am faced with the challenges as a superintendent I try to find the lesson within that challenge and turn that challenge into an opportunity to do something great right to turn it around and so Beyonce really hit that on the head um continu
ing to reinvent yourself that song um speaks to Reinventing yourself through those challenges Beyonce speaks very eloquently about Reinventing herself being the best version of herself and becoming the better version of what she was today um there is a line in that song that is so powerful and the line says if you don't seek it you won't see it and so as superintendence we have to seek out what we know is right for our babies what is right for our Scholars and also too for the Educators who are
responsible for educating the scholars and let's not leave out the families we have to seek those things out because if we don't seek those things out then they will just be a plan and not a dream actualized and so you know that song is very powerful for me and I heard it this morning I was pumping it in my car my windows were vibrating and you know I was like Yay be Bae because Bae really speaks to what so many of us are going through as superintendent the other song too that I feel that's powe
rful and I know you only asked me for one but you know I'm gonna take two you go right in Andre day rise up yes a powerful powerful song she says I Rise up a thousand times again and again and again how many times do we get knocked down as superintendant how many times do we do we deal with challenges again but yet and still no matter what we're so motivated by our vision we're so motivated and passionate about the youngsters the young scholars that we serve that we keep rising up again and agai
n Andre day also says I Rise Up In Spite of the a I Rise Up and all we need is Hope absolutely I still hold on to Hope Dr Connor 10 years later I'm still inspired I'm still looking for ways to motivate myself as ba says I'm still looking for ways to reinvent myself and I'm still looking for ways to become the better version of the superintendent that I am today I'm still motivated I'm still inspired those two women created songs that are so powerful that I believe that as women as superintendent
as black women superintendence we can all relate to the experiences of being challenged dealing with challenges overcoming such challenges and still being motivated and still Rising amazing absolutely absolutely amazing Dr depri Chase um I'll tell you right now you know when I I I think about some of the resonating themes that you highlighted um hope Vision passion motivation re re Reinventing yourself those are all invigorating um notes that we have to continue as superintendant as executive l
eaders you know and and I I I think that obviously you know um what's inevitable within the seat of being a superintendent is that there's going to be a myriad of different challenges but out of those challenges stems op opportunity as you highlighted and I tell you you know Reinventing yourself uh during the challenges as you specifically stated I really love that because um you know that's personal to me right and uh obviously when you um bring up again and again rise up again and again a thou
sand times you might fall but you're going to rise up again um a a absolutely we have to do that in education because you stated it so eloquently uh for our baby right for our families for the individual threads that make up the education ecosystem uh I tell you that you you jamming in the morning right with some Beyonce okay some Beyonce you know I like a little mix right so I I I listen to a variety of music different genres I love everything from ree which is my number one to rock and roll to
soft rock to Jazz to Hip Hop you know I'm born and raised in the Bronx where Hip Hop was born so of course I'm the hip-hop head um so I just love music I just love the words I love words that are just meaningful to me um Elton John I I'm still standing Gloria Gana I Will Survive I mean there's so many like powerful songs and I'll tell you what I did um Dr Connor um this year at the beginning of the year I always come up with a great theme for my teachers to hold on to and my administrators and
my Schoolboard as well and we decided that we would um create a playlist and I had everyone use a platform called thought exchange to identify a song that is powerful to them that is Meaningful to them and that's motivational and give a reason why and at the beginning of the year I had one of my media team members to create a playlist that's on Spotify that includes all of the songs that my staff my faculty and administrators and even my school board created so we have a playlist that is a West
Union Free School District playlist that is our motivational songs and it has well over 200 songs we had custodians we had school monitors our food service folks we had our principls our school board members our teachers our our assistant principles so many different people to contribute to this playlist and it's a growing playlist and I also use that as motivation in the morning and I listen to those different songs in the morning so music is very powerful absolutely absolutely and you know wha
t Dr depri chasa speaks about your leadership right so we all know you're renowned uh superintendent uh across the country Westberry Union Free School District and Westbury New York um but besides that right you are an author a national speaker a national uh motivational speaker a mentor to many superintendant especially um black and brown superintendent when women of color superintendent and executive leaders but for my listeners and viewers right who who do not know you Dr depri Chase what str
ategies have you applied that is realizing the vision of Westbury Union Free School dig District because you are doing some extraordinary things extraordinary things down in Westberry New York so how are you leveraging access opportunity equity and Excellence for your scholars in your District it's a great question and thank you for that question I'm intentional Dr Conor I'm intentional I'm strategic um this is my second superintendency I'm entering my third year here at Westberry prior to that
I was in Westchester County New York where I served seven years as a superintendent so I learned so much from my first superintendency I learned what to do and I learn what not to do um in my second and apply those strategies when I first arrived I decided that I would listen intently to what others say about my Scholars how do they feel about them what is their belief system in our Scholars and I took that information and I began to form a team of like-minded individuals who believed in our Sch
olars who wanted the very best for our Scholars and and let me just say I serve 5,000 beautiful Scholars I call them this District the UN right it's like the my rainbow children they're gorgeous um and they're bright right so we have about 98% uh black and brown children here at Westberry School District majority of my students um qualify for free and reduced lunch yet we still maintain a 90s something percent graduation rate here um and so we're just really proud at least we've had that percent
age since I've been here as a superintendent I will say that and we're really proud of those stats but there is a belief system Dr Connor there's a belief system that I had to address when I first arrived here and like I said you know I put together a team my hiring practices were intentional as well and I'm very grateful that my board allowed me to create a team and from that team we devised a plan and we devised a plan with every single scholar in mind whether you were a unique special learner
learner whether you were an exceptional learner whether you are a learner who um has average results um or whether you are a learner who need additional support we make sure that we devise a plan for each number one we became a PLC we needed to do that we needed to address every learner by becoming a PLC we needed to address what it is that we wanted children to know and be able to do once they leave Westberry Union Free School District how do we know that they've learned it and that means we h
ad to create authentic assessment to constantly assess whether or not children are learning and then once we have that information what do we do with it what do we do if they weren't learning and what do we do once they are excelling and we believe those four questions um will answer the question of what it is that our children are doing and IT addresses the needs of every child then we knew that we had to be intentional about our Dei plus b efforts I know that many times people use use that ter
m that phrase some of it is used negatively some of it is used positively and some of it is used for commercial purposes but we are intentional about our Dei plus b practices so much so we hired a dedicated director for Dei plus b in our school district and we are the only District in Nassau County that has a dedicated Dei plus b director we were intentional about that and I knew that we needed that because I wanted to make sure that there is someone who is safeguarding the access and equity for
every child to have great education I knew that we needed to do that because I need to make sure that the 18 languages that are represented in my school district that all of those families had access to the school district felt comfortable being in the school district having discussions and that we can have two-way conversations with the variety of families that exist I knew that we had to do that because we wanted to make sure that every child every single child had access to a sound education
no matter their learning style also too um aside from the hiring practices and making sure that we had like-minded teams we developed different committees in the school district different committees to speak to curriculum and instruction different committees to speak to facilities different committees that speak to budgetary matters different committees that actually speaks to Dei efforts so there were so many things that we put in place um to make sure that every child had access to Great educ
ation here at Westberry School District here's what we also did we created a superintendent student advisory we wanted to hear from the voices of our Scholars so I meet with my Scholars every month and I did this because oftentimes in education we ask the adults what we believe is in the best interest of Scholars or children how often do we ask the enduser how are they receiving this what do they think needs to happen what it is that they may need so that they will be successful post Westberry e
xperiences so we put some of those strategies in place they are working extremely well we're beginning to see results We are continuing the work in our Dei plus b efforts without any disruption because we are intentional and we make sure we put it in our strategic plan and all of our goals um and we're also beginning to see that we are leveraging some of those things that we're doing doing and we're seeing those outcomes in early childhood we're also seeing those outcomes at our high school grad
uation rates absolutely um Dr depri Chase wow uh you know my uh audience we use this um podcast as a professional learning asynchronous um mechanism uh so that they can be able to adopt the strategies practices uh different methodologies so that they can incorporate into uh their own individual repertoire and um what is critical here is the two words that you highlighted intentionality and being strategic right and I love how you were able to Leverage The Dei plus b work having a director so tha
t access opportunity and Equity uh lies with every single child that's high expectations right when we think about creating a culture for everyone uh 18 different languages right and having uh that I like to say personalized prescription for every single child um it is crucial it's crucial I think it's an educational imperative and then you leverage it with the voice of your students Generation Z generation Alpha I want you Dr depri Chase if you can go uh in depth with the Dei plus b work becaus
e um that work you know nationally we hear this all the time from our our cadres across the country that that brings um some tension to the work right um how do how did you how did you leverage that work uh being intentional being strategic when sometimes that can bring uh a level of tension uh to a learning organization what was the I like to say step functions that you implemented to get to that level where the output is that personalized individualized focus on every single child great questi
on so at Westberry I walked into the school district in July of 2021 and there was a strategic plan that was already in place here at Westberry that already included diversity Equity inclusion we add it belonging so there was already an existing of that here there was already that Minds said but it was the work that was needed well we needed to clean up the work as it related to Dei and we also needed to make sure that every school had a full understanding of what those expectations were so basi
cally I picked up the Bon um here at Westberry school district and I want to credit the school board for having the the the vision to to make sure that Dei was included in the Strategic plan and understanding how it needed in today's society how we needed to make sure that every child has access and Equity that being said um one of the things I asked the board was is it okay if we hire someone who's going to be committed to this work and they were definitely on board um and and allowing me to do
so we underwent Dr Connor an intense Equity audit last year in my second year as a superintendent um we were ready for that work we were ready to look at ourselves and each other about some of our practices and often times in public education you hear so many different districts speak about you know Equity access Dei diversity inclusion and they speak about it because it's a sexy term now but I just didn't want to speak about it at Westberry I wanted to do the work so I needed to see what it is
that we were already doing and what it is that we need to do and I wanted us to be honest with ourselves and I needed us to Humble ourselves to to be able to receive the information that we need so that we can be better so we hired a company who does this work around the country and we underwent an audit I will not tell you it was easy because we had to look at our own practices oftentimes we think we're doing the right thing and we really have good hearts and we really believe that we're doing
all the right things but there may be a population that we may have overlooked or we may have missed and it was unintentional and so we had to have those courageous conversations about some of the unintentional behaviors that are negatively impacting groups of beautiful Scholars where there are opportunities missed because of those unintentional practices and I will tell you it came with some fever a little bit of drama um a little bit of realization that no that's not me that's not who I am th
at's not what I'm doing and it took a while it took some time for people to realize that this audit isn't an indictment of your leadership or your work but this audit is designed to help us to be better this audit is to Designed so that every child will have an opportunity to actualize his or her dream when he or she leaves our school district so from that audit I allowed individuals an opportunity to get in their feelings get over their feelings and then let's move on with the work and we have
done that we're now in the process and the phase of creating corrective action plans and we're just about finished now once those corrective action plans are done we're going to report out and we've reported out publicly where our challenges were that took a lot of boldness that took a lot of Courage from my leaders and my teachers to stand before the public and say Here's what the audit said here are areas that we have to work on and they did that and they formed teams they wrote the corrective
action plans we're going to share out those corrective action plans and we're going to Implement them Dr Connor we're going to implement them and so we're now in the phase of uh finalizing those plans and next year for the 2024 2025 we will be implementing such plans I mean things from what's on our bulletin board we're talking about materials looking at materials looking at resources to make sure that our children are well represented in those resources the language that we use as we speak to
our Scholars our practices and how we speak to our families how we send communication and information to our families so we allowed ourselves to be vulnerable but realizing that it is for the betterment of our Scholars we are now making corrective action and we're going to implement it with Fidelity absolutely um Dr depri Chase I tell you uh when you talk about corrective action plans implementation intentionality uh trans parency with the data that is objective um it goes back to the title of m
y book intentional bold and Unapologetic I absolutely love that and the intentionality behind the language um the review of resources to ensure it follows the benchmarks within the actual audit and the accountability and trans transparency of the action plans uh that leads to implementation that changed practice um wow that right there is an organizational cultural shift yes uh a huge Paradigm uh kudos to you Dr Dee Chase and I want to talk about something right because you and I have this uh ve
ry similar belief right uh yes you are considered one of the most Innovative superintendents Dr depre Chase but I always talk about that if we really want to uh close the achievement Gap the achievement Gap I always say is a symptom to the root cause which is the preparation Gap and that's at the Early Childhood sector now you have done some really creative and Innovative programming to close the preparation Gap so there won't be an achievement Gap that we see in grade two and three kind of like
the uh historical context that a lot of people referenc to research study about grade three um but I I want you to unwrap and highlight your work when it focuses on early childhood education what were your great desires when you were designing these uh Innovative um Innovative systems right what were some of the unexpected outcomes when you were designing these systems and putting these systems in place but more importantly the instructural impact that it had within your learning organizations
and obviously with your uh students sure so thank you for that question you know at Westberry you know we are constantly reviewing our data and constantly doing data Dives uh I'm so grateful for the various committees uh where we can have those courageous conversations about where we are and where we need to be and what we believe we can become right because it's all about the belief and so very early on what we recognized is that we needed to focus heavily on the early childhood and start build
ing up uh we were not happy with the data um from 2021 um when we're looking at the achievement Gap in terms of our Scholars um looking at especially our special education data looking at data of our black males um I found it very very troubling that um knowing that we have these challenges and not doing anything Innovative about it right continuing to doing the same old things thinking that we're going to um have different results so what we decided to do was we looked at our um Upper Elementar
y Middle School High School progress we talked about what we want our children to be by the time they get into 12th grade and we started designing backwards um and what we did was we put a heavy emphasis on Early Childhood literacy and what we realize is that when children do not have the literacy skills they will continue to have challenges access in social studies access in science and now dare I say mathematics because so much in mathematics requires students to be able to read and comprehend
what it is that we read so we put in place a robust literacy uh program from kindergarten all the way through greed three and we did that on purpose um we restructured our literacy block we created a literacy block because that was absent and what we also did was we ensured that each of our four elementary schools had the similar model when it comes to literacy instruction there were different models when we first when I first arrived here and so in doing so this required intense training and i
ntentional training for not only the Educators but also for the supervisors which would be principles right our district-wide chairs um our are literacy Specialists so we were purposeful in doing so what we found is that through this literacy block and including formative assessments within this literacy block we're already seeing marked differences in our early childhood education in fact last year's data showed that the majority of our kindergarteners went into first grade reading we didn't ha
ve that data before we didn't have those outcomes before one of my early Elementary principles remarked oh my God I cannot believe the results that we're seeing at the Early Childhood level well that's because we were intentional we were intentional about the training we were intentional about um not only the training but the intentionality with observing our Educators to ensure that they are following the steps of the training and if they're not then providing them with the support they need it
could be into visitation visiting other Educators it could be um giving them customized training if you will um or just someone coming in and demonstrating which which were where we have literacy Specialists to do that work in our school district so we were very intentional in our focus on early childhood and had yielded wonderful results already our board in our community could not be happier so we don't want that to end at Early Childhood so now what we're doing is now we're chunking the Uppe
r Elementary to ensure that those kids when they come into the Upper Elementary level that that same type of training that same type of focus that same type of model is implemented at the Upper Elementary we're building systems and we started at the Early Elementary and we're continuing to build all the way through high school to my audience uh please rewind that answer because Dr depri Chase it she wow highlighted how to develop how to design a liter y system that coheres with each other when w
e think about organizational coherence alive it and coherence she went backwards right that's reverse engineering and designed the literacy system so that there's that level of vertical coherence creating that common language of instruction that common lexicon around instructional leadership and ener red instructional system that is rooted rooted in attentional professional learning wow now to my audience Frank Dr debris chase that was I would like to say a textbook a textbook answer when we and
and I really want to expand on this because uh a lot of leaders they they they take a lot of strategies from BF creating that vertical coherence of a model right of a system where that now job embedded professional learning is occurring customization in the context of improving pedagogical practices that's hard right that's hard to design it's hard to leverage but more importantly it's hard to implement when you're trying to get to that cheered mental model around common language of instruction
around common uh approaches with leadership how did you design that professional Learning System to ensure there's that level of coherence among your instructional leaders your site-based principles your literacy coach central office but more importantly it is levered in the classroom with your classroom practitioners so this a fully loaded question um it goes back to that belief it goes back to Bringing like-minded individuals together and planning together helping them them to see the vision
and it's also visioning with them right so it's that buy it it's that ownership you have to instill buyin without the buyin um it's kind of Dead on Arrival what I did strategically Dr Connor was I brought in my union unions can be your biggest disruptor or that can be your biggest supporter and so everything I did I brought in my teacher Union leadership because I needed them to be on this team I needed them to not be adversarial but to be my biggest Ally and they have become just that um any ty
pe of training that we attended as it related to plc's as it related to you know literacy I was present also absolutely so as the leader Not only was I present but I also made sure that my union leadership was also present with me and so that we learned together and so to hear my union leadership use the vernacular use the language speak to the language publicly about the work that we're doing I believe we had made strides here at Westberry and so the push back is very minimum because I got my t
eachers on board I got my Educators on board you know your administrators are going to be on board because they want the best for for for our children um so the administrators you know came on board with us and we all learned together and we all you know identified what the common language should be together but the thing about common language is one thing having a Common Language it's another thing Dr Connor having a common understanding right AB we need to make sure there's a common because we
can all speak the language of RTI like right we know about the different tiers but do we have an understanding that every classroom must every child must have access to tier one instruction but it has to be phenomenal tier one instruction even if this child needs additional and instruction near near need tier two or need tier three that child should still have access to tier one so we had to make courageous decisions together about what this could possibly look like we had to change schedules w
e actually Chang start times we Chang everything around in this school district so that we can have sound instructions for our Scholars and again it took bringing the leadership together bringing the unions together making sure that the board was on board and I must say it's working I will not tell you that it's we don't have our challenges and we don't have our bumps in the roads and we don't have our setbacks we do but as my song says we rise up even when we have the setback We rise up a thous
and times again and again and again because we are so focused on making sure that every child in this school district has access to an exceptional education here at Westberry so motivational common language common understand standing well stated well put Dr Dei Chase now during your superintendency right you have implemented an international baloran program you have internships with dual enrollment AI solutions to lever personalization Dei plus b work that's going on curriculum redesign projects
that's prating more Project based learning uh Dr debris chase you have done everything in that district for transformation it epitomizes transformation but I like to call it this Innovation by Design Theory right so for leaders who want to immerse themselves in this Innovation by Design Theory this a process needed in the AC stage of Education what methods or strategies would you recommend to be added in a Leader's toolkit to just emulate some of the outp put some of the Innovative programs tha
t you have Implement implemented in your learning organization so thank you for that question you know we can no longer use the pandemic as a crutch to say we can't do we can't do because of the pandemic we can't you know I will say that the pandemic was an opportunity to reimagine public education as we see it and it was an opportunity unfortunately that we lost now during the pandemic there were so many Educators who talked about real imagining changing the way you know we structure education
and changing the systems and changing how we deliver curriculum and instruction and what we did is we went back to the same old things that were causing our students to fail right at Westberry and even when I was in Greenberg because I transitioned during the pandemic I recognized that I have to be Innovative if I want my babies if I want my Scholars to be at the Forefront of innovative careers and at the Forefront of jobs for the future and jobs that aren't even recognized yet I know that we ha
d to do some Innovative things you spoke about IB in my former District we launched an IB program we were one of maybe 13 districts in the nation that had IB K through2 I brought that same mindset here to Westberry we are embarking upon an IB DP program which is a diploma program where our Scholars will graduate with a diploma that is internationally recognized why is that important well it's important because in my mission statement we speak about preparing our Scholars for an everchanging worl
d it's wonderful to have it written in a mission statement it's wonderful that my students are repeating it and reciting it and my teachers are repeating it reciting we have posters all over the place but it's another thing that we are working toward finalizing that mission and so IB is one the international baloran providing my Scholars with an opportunity to engage in deep thinking critical thinking inquiry based instruction to spark their curiosity and have them be able to answer their own qu
estions through intense research so that they will be on the Forefront of their preparation for college and careers of their choice um what we're doing in our school district for steam at one particular point before my arrival um Steen was only provided to students who have excelled in their academics we've changed that in this District we are now a steam for all I don't care what your academic standing may be you will have exposure to steam why because steam prepares you for jobs for the future
jobs that don't yet exist are Innovative jobs I want every scholar to be able to demonstrate that he or she can interact with steam with science technology you may not be an honor student you might be an average student and I may have sparked or triggered an idea where you become a problem solver well you know a problem solver is nothing but an engineer right so leading our Scholars toward those Innovative careers so what we've leveraged that we also at our school district are not afraid to use
ai ai is not a curse here artificial intelligence has been around since the 50s we've been using artificial intelligence for so long but when it comes to public education we're a little hesitant about it well here at West were not because what we recognize is the AI that we have now is not going to be the AI 5 years from now when my Middle School Scholars are now going out into the world I need for them not to fear AI I need for them not to fear technology I need for them to embrace technology
and use technology responsibly and I need for them to use technology to help them to reach an end result I'll give you a case in point we just launched in our school district an AI platform where we can communicate to all 18 languages in our school district just through the use of AI and we're going to launch this at a board meeting we're so excited on how everyone can get access to information Communications here at Westberry I'll give you another case we just launched a math um Intervention Pr
ogram well it's more of a supplemental should I say program at our secondary level it uses AI it uses AI to identify where a child's um status academic status is as it relates to math and then it creates programs for the child based on how they um interact with the the math program but it uses artificial intelligence to customize the lessons to customize the instruction and continue to move the child forward it also uses AI to alert the teacher as to where the child might be struggling in solvin
g math programs and so we use AI every single day and what I am going to be doing in the next couple of weeks is providing workshops and um and and and and professional development for not only my administrators but also for the classroom teachers the Educators and some of our other support staff so that they could better utilize AI to help with lesson planning with help with customizing instruction because you know how challenging it it is to differentiate when you have about four or five diffe
rent Learners and different tiers in your classroom room well AI can help those teachers to do just that and I want to show them responsible ways in which they can do it my goal and my dream and my vision is by the 2024 25 school year we will be using AI as a tool here to help us to become better Educators to help us be more Innovative to help us use our time more wisely that is the goal for Westberry I will also share with you we open our schools here at Westberry six days a week Dr Conor we're
one of the few districts where we have a Saturday Academy and we're committed to that we call it winds Academy winds is an acronym for what I need on Saturday that's some of the Innovation and creativity that we're using because we know we can't get it all during the week we know that after school isn't an option for everyone but what we're finding is our Saturday Academy is so wildly popular so popular where we had to create more courses and there's a heavy emphasis on Steam for everyone start
ing with our kindergarteners you will see our kindergarteners are creating roller coasters and they're talking about velocity and they're doing all sides of physics at their level but they're doing the work because we sparked an interest it's something that's interesting to them and it's something that every child can do regardless of their academic standing we're celebrating it here at Westberry I'm so proud of the work that we're doing absolutely you should be proud I tell you this right um wh
en you when you started to really unpack AI right Dr de pre Chase and you said to get to that level of personalization I I started to think back to the 1984 study uh by Benjamin Blom you you appreciate this Dr prase um and he highlighted in 1984 was called the two Sigma problem and he stated that this was 1984 884 if we get to this level of onetoone instruction uh students would student achievement would increase by two standard deviations of course now when I think about it and the utilization
the access and the availability of uh different emerging Technologies there is no excuse for at the education ecosystem not to get to that level of onetoone instruction because of AI I like to call it now in 2024 the two Sigma Solution where AI can get to that level of one toone instruction complimentary to the uh classroom practitioner the zone of proximal development that you and I always about Dr to prease but really love how um you created that K through2 vertical sector of the I B right the
primary years program the middle years program and the uh deployment um program uh that theme for all is just absolutely remarkable but extending time time is the variable learning is a constant underscoring that through your Saturday uh program that you have Innovation all around but I think that you stated it right we can't go back to the Legacy practices that exacerbated um inequities and disparities that we see in education far too long Generation Z generation Alpha deserves better but now
I want to get to uh a question right that is near and D to the work that you do your National work um is also near and dear to my heart as well you know we see these egregious egregious metrics nationally with regards to women in executive role right specifically black and brown uh women let's focus now black women right and the CEO and superintendent uh roles in particular what has been your message nationally to focus right to focus urgency on this issue increasing awareness about the uh margi
nalization of gender practices as evidenced by this National Data but how can we move towards greater gender equity in education specifically in the executive roles and what is your call to action for the VF audience in 2024 so metrics become promising in the future so I think the most recent data this this is probably one of your most powerful questions and I wish we could have dedicated this entire podcast to speaking about just this very topic the most recent data shows that 1.8% of superinte
ndant are black women wow that is daunting I am one of them in fact we all know each other because there are so few of us um my sister soups my sister soups I am so proud of the work that my sister soups are doing in their respective school districts but understand that there are challenges in being a woman of color in this position um we are so under represented yet we are so powerful individually and collectively um people always say if you want the job done get a woman to do it if you want it
done really well get a black woman to do it right we're all our own Olivia pop where we're solving problems and we're doing the work and no am not negating any other ethnicity of of superintendent but I can speak to the black woman we're very passionate about what it is that we do we are the mothers of this Earth I mean you know we're g to we can go back to history um where we've always taken care of children you know and even in slavery when we were enslaved individuals we took care of childre
n that is in our hearts and that is in our desires whether we are mothers by Nature we are mothers to the district we are natural nurturers to the district so hiring of a black woman is probably one of the most powerful things a school district can do but I do know that in some school districts um that may not necessarily be an option I think search firms need to um understand to give black women an opportunity to to go before Schoolboard during the search process um many of my sister soups feel
as if and myself included there are certain school districts that we are uh limited to work um most of the school districts look like Urban school districts districts of color um often times sometimes let me say sometimes when my sister soups land positions in districts that may not reflect who they are um ethnically speaking um some of those sister soups do run into challenges they may be opposing um desires from the community or maybe even the school board that may be opposing um philosophies
as it relates to what we share with our with our scholars in terms of um how they're being educated and what they're being exposed to I had the fortune of being in school districts that um resemble who I am districts of color I enjoy working in districts of color for a variety of reasons I need for the young ladies in my district to see me as a possibility of who they could become and if not even more so even better I need for my young men to see that it is normal to normalize female leadership
um I am on quite a few panels I'm on quite a few committees and boards that actually speak to elevating female leadership um um helping to build a pipeline if you will for female leadership I actually Mentor quite a few women who are new to the superintendency um we talk about everything from celebrating small mileston to understanding your pitfalls to building those circles I'm a part of many superintendent circles but my favorite Circle happens to be the black female superintendent Circle and
that is made up of the 1.8% of the superintendent um we need more work in the area of building pipelines and not just building pipelines but ensuring that black women remain in these positions far too often I am seeing Dr Connor women who are exiting the superintendency earlier than they should fulfilling their contract for political societal nonsense reasons not speaking to their um their qualifications I am seeing too often uh we're hiring these women because it is symbolic and not recognizin
g that they are highly qualified for the positions in which they assume and they need to be supported and mentored and sponsored you know I was on the napsi panel for leading ladies and that panel was moderated by The Fabulous Dr Sharon contras and one of the questions she asked was about mentorship and yes black women superintendents need mentorship and even as a 10-year superintendent uh myself I still seek out mentorship I still seek out support but there's a difference between mentorship and
sponsorship black women superintendents and black women leaders as a whole need sponsorship sponsorship means that there is someone who is looking out for you there is someone who is opening up their Network to you there is someone who is saying to you I need for you to go to this conference this meeting to sit at this table because this is going to be beneficial to your career absolutely ABS I yes so so this work is so very important in my school district we have 49 leadership positions leader
ship meaning just not just um um you know uh directors and assistant superintendent and principles but we also have teacher leader positions there are 49 in my District 34 of those 49 positions are assumed by women we have flipped the statistic here at Westberry we know too 80% of teachers are female whereas 20% are male and when it comes to leadership 80% male leadership 20% female leadership but at Westberry as you could see we flipped that statistic and it wasn't intentional it just so happen
ed that I was seeking the best candidate to fill certain positions and it just so happened to be women yeah yeah I will be featuring them for women's history month because I want the world to see these women in powerful positions positions that are typically assumed by males my districtwide chair for science is a woman my districtwide chair for mathematics is a woman you know my business official is a woman you know so I have my security my security leader is female and so I have these powerful
strong women in these positions here at Westberry and I'm hoping to grow even more and I'm hoping that I am normalizing what leadership should look like across this country such a call to action Dr depri Chase to my audience please rewind that you can see why Dr depri Chase is a national speaker you can see why everybody turns to her because that call of action or call to action Dr tpre Chase uh should get everybody motivated right especially when I think about the um statistic that you provided
1.8% of our superintendents across the country are black women and uh Dr depri Chase you know we know most of them we know all of them pretty much I know all of them I'm on a WhatsApp group chat with them and that's pathetic that is pathetic it is it is is as I like as I stated it's Mal vence right it is it is but and I love them all we're pal you know what I love about this group we're constantly uplifting each other and elevating each other we're constantly motivating one another we're consta
ntly you know helping one another and and and and we provide that sisterly love virtually that is so powerful and when we meet up Dr Connor at conferences it's a Love Fest absolutely absolutely and I tell you the panel that you sat on that was moderated by uh Dr ker as wow that was powerful very very very powerful so last question thank you for uh that answer uh to that because it's such an important topic and I know that you uh as well as other women out there will not let this uh question or t
his Focus subside so keep up the rigor keep up the urgency we do need more representation hopefully we can get get that in 2024 and Beyond but what three words do you want our audience to leave with regarding persistency to achieve all in the AC stage of education intentionality is one we have to be intentional we have to be strategic we have to pinpoint and focus we have to keep the main thing the main thing and it's all about the scholars the other word that comes to mind is T it we have to be
tenacious in our approach we can't let go we have to continue to rise up we have to continue to not give up and be resilient in our focus on our Scholars the last word is humility and I say humility because it ain't About Us Dr Connor you know it's not about we don't we don't do this for the money because you know we don't do this for the money because that ain't fa we don't do it for that we don't do it for the accolades and the awards and being able to Showcase this on social media we don't d
o it for that we do it for the outcomes of our Scholars you know most of us understand that we were called to do this work I know I was called to do this work and I believe that I am living out and fulfilling an assignment that was given to me by God and I know that's the case um and so you have to have humility you have to have humility in that you know if you want the buyin if you want you know people to follow your lead and stand shoulder-to-shoulder by you you have to have a level of humilit
y in your leadership yes you're the boss yes you have the fany title but you also need people and that's where the humility comes in you're dealing with other people's children you're you hold in your very hand the lives of not only your children but your teachers your families a community that's a big responsibility and a huge assignment that is not given to to everyone and so you approach it with a level of humility and I think that's what has sustained me for the 10 years I've been the superi
ntendent absolutely and I tell you 10 years remarkable right you are one of the main stains I tell you in education but intentionality tenacity and humility no better way to put it Dr depri Chase wow wow but listen I'm going to have to go back to this episode with my notebook in and listen to about three or four different times but thank you so much for appearance on voices for excellence Dr depre Chase I know that a lot of people are going to email you are going to try to contact you um after l
istening to this episode how would they be able to get in touch with you for my audience sure so um they can definitely reach out to me on LinkedIn I am Tahira dpre Chase there's only one Tahira dpre Chase on LinkedIn so I'm not too hard to find um I also they can go to my website because I have a website um it is Tahir dpre chase.com and they can actually email me through um my website as well so again LinkedIn is a great way to reach to me reach me to her to prease and also www topre chase.com
and I will respond um I will offer any guidance any um anything that anyone should need and is within my power to give um I believe that's what I'm put on the earth to do is to give and to share my gifts so I'm happy to do so Dr Connor and thank you for allowing this platform thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak my truth and to share just a vignette of who I am as a leader absolutely and I tell you you know for the black Excellence series um we are highlighting black Excellence th
is month across the country and I am just honored to have black Excellence here in you Dr dpri Chase thank you so much for the work that you're doing the continued work that you're doing the Vitality that you're bringing into the field but more importantly the mentorship and the sponsorship that you highlighted to leaders across the country happy Black History Month Dr depre Chase happy Black History Month to you as well and thank you for all that you're doing because you are the epitome of blac
k history brother oh man I tell you that that right there that's my nugget that I'm G to take with me Dr depri Chase you already know and and when I first met you I said to you we will be working together in self capacity absolutely and I'm hoping that this is the beginning you are a powerful brother you are what is needed today you are what we need to move the agenda forward don't stop doing what you're doing sister I won't and I will be calling you soon you know that we're going to be getting
together I always love sitting down with you talking and just listening right I get my notebook out just have it open and just here I just asked one question that Dr debr Chase you just go on and on and on and I just got about three or four or five pages of notes so thank you for all that you do and on that note onward and upward everybody onward and upward have a great even [Music] mus
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