“We have to do better”… That’s Dr. Almitra Berry’s heart-felt answer when asked about educating children from diverse cultural and language backgrounds.
Dr. Berry has a strong message for educators and school system leaders who don’t understand that cultural differences can profoundly affect the quality of education these children experience…
“You have children with failing test scores. You have teachers who want to teach but aren’t given the freedom or allowed to use the tools and strategies they need. You have teachers leaving the profession in droves.
And you have tax-paying parents who are very dissatisfied with their children’s education but don’t know how to effect change.”
In other words, our education system has a crisis on its hands. And this crisis affects all of us, not just teachers and those in the educational establishment.
It’s a crisis we must address if we’re going to have an exceptional nation with school systems free of systemic oppression.
We need to take it to heart. We need to act on Dr. Berry’s message. It’s a message she’s deeply passionate about.
As an educator, speaker, and author, she focuses on the education of the most historically marginalized: culturally and linguistically diverse learners.
She has worked diligently for over 30 years to help marginalized learners, learners of color, of linguistic and cultural diversity in low-wealth urban school districts, experience higher academic achievements.
Dr. Berry is on a mission. A mission bigger than herself. A mission to change the conversation happening around the topics of education, equity, and intellectual emancipation for culturally and linguistically diverse learners.
But she can’t do it alone. So she’s looking for leaders to join her. Is that you?
If you’re nodding your head and saying “Yes!” as you read this, we invite you to subscribe and listen to The Educational Equity, Emancipation Podcast.
In this episode, Dr. Almitra Berry reflects on the journey of the 3E Podcast over the past two and a half years. She expresses deep gratitude to her listeners, guests, and the behind-the-scenes heroes who have contributed to the podcast's success. Dr. Berry also shares her plans for 2025, which include continuing the podcast, and issues a call to action for listeners to start a daily gratitude practice focused on education advocates and educators.
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If you're a parent, teacher or school leader and you're sick and tired of the frustration, anger and unfair treatment of children at high risk in our public schools, then perhaps it's time for all of us to do something about it. In this podcast, Dr amitra Berry brings you tips, tools, strategies and tactics to build successful solutions while touching, moving and inspiring all of us to transform our schools so that every child thrives. Here's your host, Dr Bay,
Dr Almitra Berry:
welcome back, equity warriors. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the 3e podcast. Shout out to new members on the Patreon channel. Thanks for joining me there and supporting the show. And for the rest of you, make sure that you do subscribe to the show, share the show on social media, because it's your subscriptions that help grow this channel. And if you do know someone who has a hearing deficit who you think might appreciate this content. Just a reminder that there's always a transcript for every show. Just check down in the notes on your player. At the beginning of every year, I like to do a little reflecting on the prior year and this year, in my reflection, one of the things that that really came to my heart was to make sure that I expressed gratitude. I want to thank you for your continued support, your engagement, your encouragement that helps me keep this podcast going, listener feedback, whether it's a note that you send via social media, a text message I get in response to the podcast, a review that you post on iTunes. And thank you for those iTunes reviews. Please, more. Please. They help shape the podcast, even just looking at the data, what gets listened to, what shows are listened to all the way through, versus partially through, you give me indications of what is resonating with you, and so I thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for the feedback, even when you don't know you're giving me feedback. I want to also express my deepest gratitude to all of the incredible guests, and to my two guest hosts that appeared on the podcast this last year, I had a wonderful time engaging with so many different people who are all committed to education, educational equity, to supporting marginalized learners. Guests. Guest host, your insights, your stories, your expertise, have enriched the discussions that we have here and brought in valuable perspectives to our listeners. So thank you. Thank you for sharing your time. Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us, and thank you for being a vital part of this journey towards educational equity. And it's not just the guests and the guests and the guest host. I have to say, there are a couple of behind the scenes heroes, people who really as as partners, have contributed to this podcast, origins to its growth, to its success. First and foremost, I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to Wendy Stevens. She is my podcast whisper whisperer, as I call her Wendy, it is your encouragement, your gentle and sometimes not so gentle, nudges that were the spark that got this podcast off the ground. And so it has been your unwavering support behind the scenes magic that are truly the power behind the production. So thank you for believing in me and for believing in and supporting this journey. And some of you may have heard me say the name. If you ever listen to one of the unedited versions, you may have heard me say the name Edward. Edward is a special shout out to Edward. He is my amazing podcast editor. He is the one who, every week, behind the scenes, gets each episode to sound great, to look great, and gets it out to you, all of you on time. So Edward, thank you for all of your hard work and dedication, and don't you dare edit this out of the episode. And then, of course, there's family and friends who have supported this journey. Most foremost is my husband, who I get to bounce ideas off of, even when he doesn't want to listen, but who has encouraged me and supported me all the way through this journey, along with other friends who tell me, Mitra, you have to keep going. You have to keep broadcasting. You have to keep putting out episodes. Thank you. Sometimes, some of us need a little bit of a kick in the pants to to keep going. Sometimes we don't know. I don't know whether or not what I'm doing is reaching an audience. And so when it's someone who walks up to me when I'm at a conference, and tells me there. For a listener, and thank you the lady in the doctor's office the other day or last week who who looked me up, what because we were chatting, and saw me later on in the office and said, Thank you, I want to say thank you for what you're doing. This is so important, such important work. Thank you, all of you for that feedback. Initially, when I started this out, I wasn't quite sure what direction I would go in other than I wanted to make sure that I was putting out a message that was supportive of marginalized learners in our particularly in our public schools. And as my podcast whisperer Wendy, who helped to help me work through to shape what this was going to be, of course, there were challenges in determining what my voice should sound like, what what are the things that I should cover? And of course, there have been some bumps, and I say road road blocks and speed bumps along the way. A lot of lessons learned, but I think the greatest lesson learned is to stick to it and redo it until you get it right, and so hopefully we're getting it right. I did not envision, I think today is episode number 132, I did not envision 100 plus episodes, and yet, here we are. I did not envision what are we two and a half years in running an running a podcast for two years, it is not always easy, but I am thankful for the opportunity to continue to be a voice for educators, education leaders and advocates for education, educational equity and supporting children of color, children of linguistic diversity, children with special needs, our marginalized learners in America schools and internationally as this audience has grown far beyond the United States and we do have an international presence in a certain way, there's a community that has formed around this podcast. It doesn't have the shape that I would like for it to have, but there is a community I know it from the feedback. I know because I've heard people tell me how something that I have said has made a positive impact on their life, on the work that they do, on how they educate the children in their classroom. So I want to express my gratitude for that sense of connection. I want to express my thanks to you all to taking the time to listen and then using the nuggets that you can to improve your practice or your advocacy. And of course, at the beginning of the year, we all wonder, so what's next? What's coming up? Well, I've given you the 10 things to look for. I think it was 1010, things to look for in 2025 in terms of education, educational equity, policy, what's happening? My plan for 2025 initially was to be retired, I was going to be done. And yet, every time I say I'm going to be done, something happens that says to me, Mitra, you can't stop yet. So while I have eased into a certain phase of retirement, no longer going out to schools directly, routinely and supporting, you know, implementation type support. I am still going out on the speaking circuit. I will still have my book coming out in April, and I am once again, still researching a book on sociocultural languages that I anticipate will come out sometime in 2026 that's a long ways away. But retirement, I guess now is in phases. So phase one does include the podcast. We will still be here all year, God Willing and the and the was it God willing and the creek don't rise. We'll still be here. What I need, though, is for you all, more of you all to tell me what you want to hear. Give me some feedback, because your words will help shape the direction otherwise you get to hear what I decide I want to talk about. So thank you for those of you who have said, Hey, can you do an episode about, hey, can you address? Hey, can you discuss? Thank you. I need ideas, and I'm excited, really and truly excited for what 2025 will bring. Although there are some scary things out there, I know that there are enough of us doing this work. There are. Enough of us we need more, but there are enough of us to be catalysts for change. And so as I wrap up this episode on gratitude, I want to leave you with a call to action that really embodies not only the spirit of the 3e podcast, but the power, the transformative power, of thankfulness. You know, gratitude is is not just a feeling, it's a practice, and it's one that can profoundly change our lives and our communities. Alice Walker, the author, wrote, thank you is the best prayer that anyone could say. I say that one a lot Thank you expresses extreme gratitude, humility, understanding. Alice Walker, so here's my challenge to you, whether you're a parent, an educator or an education leader, school board member, Superintendent, whoever you are, start a daily gratitude practice that's focused on education advocates and educators. Yes, even if you're a classroom teacher, still start that daily practice focused on advocates for education and other educators who are working to improve learning opportunities for marginalized learners. Every day, take a moment, if you've got a journal, pull it out and appreciate three ways that these unsung heroes, often, people just like yourself, are making a difference, no matter how small. This simple act of of taking a moment to express gratitude can shift your perspective and open your eyes to the incredible work being done in our education system. We do have our challenges in education, yes, but let's embrace that power of thank you and we do it together, especially for those fighting for educational equity, we change energy. Share that gratitude for teachers, administrators, policy makers and community leaders, those who are working tirelessly to create inclusive and empowering learning environments. If you're on social media, use the hashtag 3e gratitude. It's the hashtag that we'll post with clips from this episode, 3e gratitude. Use that on social media to highlight your efforts. Your expressions of thanks might inspire some other people to recognize and support the vital work that's being done in education. We need more advocates. Remember that each Thank you shouldn't just be a polite phrase. It should be truly felt a testament to your gratitude, your humility and understanding of the challenges that are faced in improving education for every single child. And when we share these moments of appreciation, especially when we add that to social media, we can begin to create a ripple effect that will amplify the importance of educational equity across communities, not only in the United States but worldwide. At three podcast, we believe in the power of small actions to create big changes. So let gratitude be a catalyst for positive transformation in education and as you cultivate thankfulness for those who are working to improve learning opportunities, you're going to find out that it's not just your perspective that changes. You'll be spreading awareness and support for Educational Equity throughout your community. So let's make gratitude our superpower in 2025 in the fight for better education together, let's create a more appreciative, supportive and connected educational community, one little thank you at a time, and then join me again next episode. Of course, if you've got a question topic you'd like covered a special request, text it to me down in the notes, find that link. I do want to hear your stories as well. And remember, don't worry about the things you cannot change. Change the things you can no longer accept. And that's a wrap for today's episode of the 3e podcast. Now here's how you can make a real difference. First, smash that subscribe button. It's free. It's easy, just do it. Second, share the show with anyone you know who cares about education, and third, consider becoming a supporter of the show together. We're not just talking about change, we're making it happen. Make a donation today to be part of that mission and change, and I'll catch you next time you.
