Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:00:00]:

Welcome advocates to another episode of the Leading Equity podcast. Podcast that focuses on supporting educators with the tools and resources necessary to ensure equity at their schools. Today's special guest is Dr. Evisha Ford, author of the upcoming book Benches in the Bathroom, leading a physically, emotionally, and socially safe school culture out of Solution Tree. So without further ado, Avisha, thank you so much for joining us today.

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:00:30]:

Thank you for having me, Sheldon. Super glad to be here and excited to be on your show today. Oh, the pleasure's always mine. I'm excited about this topic because we're gonna be talking about

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:00:40]:

inclusivity and leadership. And so folks, we want you to make sure you're paying attention because get your pen and paper ready, or make sure you save this episode if you're driving. But we want you to get as many tips as you can. But before we get into today's topic, Avisha, I'd love for you to share a little bit about yourself and what you currently do. Absolutely.

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:01:00]:

Thank you so much. I started my career working with homeless youth and was recruited to Chicago Public Schools to work with young children. And I really got this insight about the opportunities for services to be more robust for children and young people in more marginalized communities. From there, I went on to become a director of special ed. And oh, I got such an education about the needs of young people in high school. In Illinois, our high school, our school districts are sometimes split between elementary and high school districts. And during that time, I had an opportunity to really build programs for young people to help them to be successful out after high school. I think I built probably 4 or 5 programs, but it was in the midst of that that I saw this gap in services for young people who were probably not going to make it to the finish line for high school. And I really started to dream and imagine a program that would allow them to complete high school, but also with dignity, not being fifth year seniors, but dignity, and also to go on to vocational training and to exit high school with some vocational skills. So at that time, I took the idea to my superintendent and I said, hey, I have this idea. This is really going to help our students. And mind you, I have this track record of building programs. I've saved the district millions of dollars. The entire department is much happier and lighter and we're really on a path. I was super surprised when he told me no and he said it's not the right time because of negotiating. Well, I was finishing my doctorate program at that time and who was on the negotiation team as part of an internship? Me. So I had firsthand knowledge that negotiations had nothing to do with it. So I pressed a little bit as I do. And finally, he said, we're not going to start this program this year because I don't want to look, I don't want it to look like it's a program for only the Black and Brown students. So that was disheartening. And I sort of processed through that and what that meant. Because what was happening is I was also the chair for mediations and for expulsion hearings. And too many times I was looking across the table at these parents and these students, and I didn't feel, I felt complicit in this process of this, you know, pushing students out of school. Long story short, Sheldon, I put in my resignation at the end for that position. And about 6 months later, I opened the I Can Dream Center. So I am the founding executive director of a school in the south suburbs of Illinois that services young people who haven't been very successful in high school or who have maybe been through multiple therapeutic settings and haven't experienced success. So that is what I'm doing now. Along the way, I also served as assistant superintendent and as a full-time assistant professor of educational leadership. Thank you. And I'm sorry to hear about, you know, your experience, but

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:04:11]:

silver lining, I guess, is you had the opportunity to create a school that was dedicated. Would you consider your school, ICANN, as an alternative school?

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:04:24]:

I think that's how the state designates us for sure. I am very reluctant to use those words because I'm not confused about the fact that often alternative schools are the 2 in the school to prison pipeline. And so I've been very deliberate about our environment, about the way things are set up, about the feel. And anyone who steps foot in here knows very quickly that it doesn't feel anything like a traditional alternative school. It feels much more like a family and you're being invited into home, even in the setup of the classrooms and the colors. We really work with students who come from a variety of different experiences. This is, I'll share this, this is kind of funny. I popped into a classroom this morning before we got on. And 1 of the, we were debating, the students were debating the government discretionary spending. And I guess military gets exponentially higher percentage than education. And so they were debating the merits of that. And 1 of the students said, he felt like that was appropriate. And I said, well, wait about education. Isn't party or freedom education? He said, well, no, I don't really need education. I said, really? Tell me more about this. And so we're just talking. And I made the comment that, well, most folks will learn how to read and write and do ABCs and 1, 2, threes by 9 years old with no formal education. So that is true. You probably will just absorb how to read and write without going to school. I said, but school teaches you how to think and how to process things. And 1 of my students chimed in like right on cue. And he said, no, this school teaches you how to think. The other schools I've been to taught me what to think. I was like, what? I just all I could do is just start snapping my fingers. It was great to hear this morning. So our approach to students is really project-based and 1 that allows them to lean into their own interests and to be successful. So I will very proudly say that we have a 95% graduation rate for our students who come to us. Nice.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:06:23]:

Nice. Which goes to my next question I was going to actually ask. When you first started talking about the work that you're doing and you said something about you wanted your students to learn how to finish with dignity. I'm curious, can you unpack that a little bit more for me?

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:06:41]:

Absolutely. So, part of when I was thinking about our students at the school district where I was working, at the high school district where I was working, they did have opportunities because they had IEPs, the ones who had IEPs to come back a fifth year. But think about how that feels for a young person as they're watching their peers get ready for proms and try on graduation caps and gowns and taking pictures and they know that sometimes by their own choosing but oftentimes just based on circumstances that they're not going to be included in that and I could feel the weight of that pain and I'd watch some of my students who are homeless and CPS go through that, and it did not feel okay to me. And so what I proposed was let's put, I had actually worked with our local junior college to gift us space for our students to finish there. So at least they had a transition period where they were out of a high school setting and they were into a different setting that their peers might also be in, but they didn't necessarily know what was happening in that space. The dignity piece, I'll talk a little bit about our environment here. We don't have any student resource officers. There's no deans, there's no book bag checks, there's no metal detectors, there's no walking the straight line. There's all these things that are associated with like institutionalizing young people. It just doesn't exist in this space. I've also been very deliberate about the adults that we bring into the space and that they're really understanding our mission. 1 of our core values is grace, which means that we're loving our students through our transition. And so I'll often ask teachers and team members, which we're a mighty team of 50, to come in and say, if they have a proposal or a thought process, I'll often ask them, is this an expression of love for our students? And I love being able to say that. And Sheldon, this is actually the basis of the book that I wrote, Benches in the Bathroom. It's really about how do we build an environment where folks can really show up and do their best and innovate on behalf of our students. And so as a quote unquote alternative setting, We know we often see high rates of turnover of staff because of, you know, our students come in with some pretty intense things that we have to carry for them or with them. And we just haven't seen that staff turnover. It's because the environment is 1 that everybody gets a little bit of space to be human, right, to have a human experience. And it's OK. Author of the bestselling book, Leading Equity, becoming an advocate for all students, Dr. Sheldon L. Aiken is a highly sought after speaker and trainer. I would know because that's my dad. For booking, check out leadingequitycenter.com slash consulting, or use the link in the show notes.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:09:25]:

That sounds amazing. You sound like you're very qualified to have this conversation in regards to inclusiveness. So I want to start there as far as because inclusive can be can mean a lot of things right you guys 10 people you get 10 different answers. You know I was a director of special ed as well in the past so when I think of inclusive that's 1 of the thoughts I come through with, you know, are students with IEPs and 504 plans, are they included within the general population as far as school? And then is there paraprofessional support in those classrooms, those kind of things? So that's 1 lane that I'll think about. But then sometimes when I do episodes, then the idea of inclusiveness might be centered around, okay, we have individuals who are not part of the dominant group. We wanna make sure that they feel included within a space. Then I've had a conversation with an individual who shared, well, do we want to make sure that we understand what they're being included into? Like what type of environment are they, are we pushing for the inclusion to be in? Because if it's not conducive for their success, either socially or academically, do we want them to be inclusive? Or is there something, a bigger conversation that we need to have? So I want to start with your take when you're talking, when we're talking about inclusiveness,

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:10:42]:

where, where are your thought process there? Yeah, Thank you for that, for qualifying all that. And I'll say that I agree with everything that was stated, for sure. The irony is that alternative or therapeutic schools are by design excluding them from the public setting. We as a practice don't take students that can be successful in a public setting. We just don't. Particularly in our elementary program, which just started a few years ago, we have actually gone in and observed students and said, you know what, let us actually come back. I'll send my BCBA and my lead social worker. Let us help you put some things in place so the student can be here. So we've done that probably a half dozen times this school year already, because I really do believe in students being with their peers as much as possible. The students that we serve have had multiple experiences of not succeeding, and we were able to push them to the finish line in a different way. So additionally, the bigger picture for me is that we spend 12 years, maybe 13 or 14 years in primary and secondary education, and then we have a whole life to live, right? So the folks with autism or learning disabilities that are school sort of, that can be school sort of categories, they matriculate into adulthood. And so my question is then what becomes of them? My big picture goal, and I like to think that we're making some impact on creating work environments or opening up people, opening up the mindset or thought process for people in the marketplace to really embrace neurodiversity in the workforce. So our students, we do place them in internships and we pay them because my thought is I want them to get accustomed to going to work and making a wage. And so we do place them in work environments and we work with our community partners on how to build environments that will support them. We have folks who go into the environments from the Ike and Dream Center to support their success in those places. And what's almost tough is that our students don't necessarily have visible disabilities. A few do, but by and large, 97 of 100, when you look at them, you don't know that there's something that is different or requires a different level of care, right? And so I would like to think that the partners we've had over the years are now more open to the thought process of hiring a person who may need accommodations, different accommodations. What's saddening for me is that the highest number of folks that are unemployed are individuals with disabilities or underemployed. That is shameful. And there's no good reason for it, except for we haven't invested in making sure that they can be successful, not just preparing them, but preparing the work environments that they're going to. The other piece is that we want to make sure that our students who, that young people who are not finishing or who are not in employed, gainfully employed, don't end up in the criminal justice system, because that's often what's happening. If you look at the number of folks who are incarcerated, I know you probably know this already, the numbers, the who have disabilities and different reading deficits, it is tough. And I don't want that for my students. And I hope that we're making an impact in a meaningful way. So thank you, You know, and it's interesting. I interviewed

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:14:07]:

a woman, Dr. Ujija Dean, and she talked about how the employment rate or unemployment rate was just so high for folks with disabilities. And it kind of just listening to you kind of reiterate that it kind of made me think even in our schools, like I'm trying to think of maybe teachers that I've had in the past or even staff that I've seen in the past that might, Again, maybe on the visible side, right, with disabilities. I can't really recall a lot throughout my own educational experience. So I'm curious what is, if we're, if I'm a school leader from principal assistant principal whatever it might be even on a district level as well. What have you noticed, or do you have tips maybe for recruitment, maybe? Or I mean, what are your thoughts in regards to employment there?

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:14:59]:

So there, I have twofold actually. So on the first hand, I think we have to make sure we're preparing students to go out and be gainfully employed, right? And oftentimes what I've seen in public schools and often why parents will elect us as a transition program is that the schools, very well meaning, will bunch students up and say, okay, you guys are all going to work in the cafeteria, or you guys are all going to work doing maintenance and picking up around the school. And to be clear, I believe that there's inherent dignity in so many fields and professions. But just because a person has a disability doesn't mean that they want to clean dishes or pick up trash, right? So what we really do is invest in and what any, every, all school leaders can do is really set up programming to really get to understand who that person is, what their unique talents are and abilities are, and sort of start to cater internship experiences and work experiences to that. Now we know 16, 17 year old boys, they want to be basketball players. OK, so just pass that. What is it that you love about that? Right. Like, let's get just past just beyond that. Let's start to think about what are some secondary things and how do we create experiences that aren't the school cafeteria or cleaning out school vans that really acknowledge the uniqueness of the individual. We have, I'm sorry go ahead. I was gonna say we have 30 different community partners that are as unique as you know you and I from pet groomers which we have a student who's doing an amazing job there, from pet grooming to comic book stores to, we actually have hospitality programs that we're training students in hospitality and tourism. As we have a 12 week program, we have some funding for us. We have them placed at convention centers and hotels doing several jobs in hotel. So we really start to think about like, not only what can our students do, but what can they do that's going to get paid them a living wage? There is this new understanding now about students with autism and how awesome they can be in technology fields that require so much focus and structure. So we should tap into that, right? We should

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:17:05]:

definitely tap into that. So those are things that schools can do. Raise your hand if you buy that book, by Dr. Shelton L. Akins. Put your hand up. Put your hand up. Put your hand up. Looking for an engaging speaker for your next event? Whether it's webinars, workshops, keynotes, or one-on-one coaching, I'm here to help you. Our students live in 2 different worlds often. The norms in their community and then the norms within their school. And they often aren't the same. For more information, go to leading equity center.com slash consulting, or click on the link in the show notes. And let's work together. So I remember when I was director of SPED and I would have students come up to me, or I would have teachers come up to me because 1 of the things I really appreciate about the local institution of higher ed out here was they would do the dual enrollment program for the students and typically, it was only an option for our general ed kids. And so my kids that had IEPs, they weren't getting those same opportunities and so working with the counselor and working with administration we shifted that language and that narrative. And so we started promoting our students that were in my program. I said, let's let's get them to college as well. Let's give them the support in your school. Is that also an option as well, as far as, you know, tapping into local, maybe community colleges or four-year institutions, and giving them support, and if so, what are some of the things that you have been seeing in regards to that? Absolutely.

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:18:43]:

1 of the things that my very first program that I built when I was a director special that was a program that was in in the local community college and it was specifically we had a space for our students with post secondary students with disabilities that allow them to take an audit some classes or take classes if they had the capacity to do it. So I love that opportunity. We have worked with students who we serve in Illinois, probably 30 or 32 different school districts. And so our students come from all over. And Illinois students feed into a certain community college based on where they reside at. So we have probably 4, maybe 5 different community colleges that are represented. However, what we have done is supported students who are dually enrolled in our program and enrolled in a community college. And so we help them to be successful. Sometimes we've been the liaison between them and their professor to sort of get them connected with the Office of Disability Services. Sometimes we really just help them with their schoolwork here. And sometimes the support is really more on a executive functioning level, right? Like how do you manage all these different irons in the fire? This is what adulting is, right? It's not just eating dessert first and going to bed when you want to and doing what you wanna do. It's really learning how to be successful when you have several things happening at once. So how do you manage your internship, your classes, and your areas of study here at the Aiken Dream Center? So we do offer students and we encourage students to be dually enrolled. And we often transport them to make sure that they're successful being dually enrolled.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:20:21]:

Yes, remember those days, bringing the kids on the reservation and bringing them to campus and then introducing them to the disability center and making sure that they were all set up. I worry though I used to worry about like so they were still in my care as a high school kid doing a dual credits, but then I worried about like okay so now that they've graduated. What type of support are they going to get when they're, you know, college age or whatnot and they've graduated in and so sometimes I worried about the support that they were going to get outside of that. Do you have any experience or tips for people like me that were kind of in those situations, like, okay, it was great on the dual credit side, but once they've graduated, is there any support or maybe, I don't know, tips you can give the students or any of those kind of recommendations so that they can feel

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:21:15]:

prepared once they're in that higher ed setting? I think the best gift that we can give to the young people in general, but specifically those who are neurodiverse, is the ability to advocate for themselves, right? To be able to articulate exactly what their needs are and how they struggle. And I say that, it sounds like a, what's the word? Like a, just a throwaway kind of a thing. But I have had students come to me and talk to parents who had no idea that their students had an IEP or what that meant because we're so nice in school, say, oh, he learns different or, oh, he just needs quote unquote speech class or these sort of things. It's like, uh-uh, after age 14 or 16, we don't have time to play with that. Little Billy needs to understand exactly what the nature of his disability is and be able to articulate that in order to advocate for himself. So time out for this, you know, rose colored glasses, sugar coating. We need to disability is not a bad word. And we're only going to be able to overcome it to the extent that they understand themselves enough to say it. And so I think that that's number 1. But I also think making sure that they understand disability services and what their rights are, right, because the disability service office is open to anyone with a disability across the lifespan. And so making sure that they understand what resources are available to them. So and that they have someone, a significant another person who's willing to help them and advocate and sometimes be a voice for them if they need help. I mean, we have students who, I mean, this March is our 10th year. And so we have students, gosh, that have left us a long time ago who still call and say, hey, I need support with this. And we've said, we're always here for you. We're always a resource for you. And so we help them. Sometimes it's with a resume tweak, sometimes it's as a reference. Sometimes it is navigating some issues on a college campus and the parents aren't necessarily positioned to be that voice for them. So. Absolutely. Good, good tips

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:23:19]:

for folks like me. That's helpful. Just, and I think you bring up a good point. You know, I remember IEP meetings with guardians and even with the kid there, not necessarily, because I was so worried sometimes about jargon, like, okay, I don't wanna say stuff that's, you know, just gonna not necessarily, they're not gonna, I could tell, like, just kind of looking at the guardian, I'm like, okay, they might be a little confused with how I'm trying to present this. And so I'm trying to sugar coat in some sense. But it sounds like what I'm hearing from you is once they're like juniors and seniors, or at least, maybe we need to kind of switch our language and just be like, okay, we want them to be successful outside, you know, out of your care. And when they get, become 18, we want them to be successful. So we need to have these, maybe a little bit tougher conversations.

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:24:14]:

Yeah. And I think the more we talk about it, it doesn't feel tough. It just feels like it is what it is. So the more we normalize it and destigmatize it, it doesn't feel like a thing. This is just my reality. I have autism. I have a student who comes to mind and I could just see his face. He was hilarious to me, but he would always say, I have autism, I don't really understand sarcasm. And I love that he would advocate for himself because he knew once he could sense when someone was being sarcastic, Maybe with the laughter he could feel that, but he would always advocate for himself and say, I don't understand sarcasm. I love that. And that is a level of sophistication and ability to articulate their needs that all of our students, that's our goal for all of our students. I do have to say we have, we've had a few of our students to, on more than 1 occasion, to sit on panels to talk about what it means to live with a disability. And they are so articulate and enlightening for folks who are listening. And I feel proud of them. We have a few that are sort of our regulars but we're starting to work some new students in because we're often requested to do these sort of talks and things and the goal really is for them to explain what their needs are. I do wanna say 1 thing when I'm talking about the marketplace and lifting up and being willing to hire folks who are neurodiverse is that as a school, I actually put my money where my mouth is and I'm grabbing my impact statement. We have 27% of our team here at Icahn Dream Center are neurodiverse. So it's not that we're just saying it, we're actually living it. And 1 of my favorite stories is I had, in our very first cohort of students, I had a young woman who was working, who was enrolled. And her internship was in a childcare agency. And I remember this PowerPoint that she did on what she wanted to do. And she said, I wanna work with young people. Again, she went on a junior college, ended up getting an associate's degree in early childhood. And she was actually our first teacher's assistant in our elementary program. And so I love to say that because I tell our students, you might be working here too down the line. So make sure you keep this environment, the environment you may wanna work in someday. And so it's a success story. And again, it's not just something rhetoric or something I say you all should do. It's something that we're doing. Absolutely.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:26:47]:

You're living by what you're saying. And I think that's really important. I will say this, Abisha, I definitely have, I mean, you've taught me some stuff. And so I know our listeners out there probably feel the same way as well. I'd love for you to share maybe a final thought or word of advice that you want to give to our listeners. I think a final thought is that

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:27:08]:

anything that is going to be worth doing that will benefit our students and have long term impact is going to be a little bit disruptive and shake things up. And it can often be uncomfortable, particularly if you're, you know, new in a role, new to a circumstance, I mean, to a district or to an environment. And what I will say is that our students are always worth it. I had a mentor who actually used to be my high school principal, and he found out that I got a leadership role in a school district. And I can remember his face. He came to my desk and he kneeled down beside me and he said, I'm not surprised you're doing this work. He said, but 1 thing I want to tell you is that if you have to err, always err on the side of kids. And so that's my closing thought. It's my mantra. I think maybe if I get a tattoo, that's what I would put on me. But I just really, that's my thought, is that being uncomfortable, moving outside of our comfort zone is worth it for our students. Yeah. Yeah. If we have some folks that want to connect with you, What's the best way to reach you online? I am on LinkedIn and my friends told me to stop saying I'm active on LinkedIn because it makes me sound too mature. But I'm often on LinkedIn, I'm on Instagram and I have a website which is DrAvisha.com. There we go. So once again, I am speaking to Dr. Avisha Ford, author of Benches in the Bathroom,

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:28:40]:

leading a physically, emotionally, and socially safe school culture. Avisha, it has been a pleasure. Thank you so much for your time.

Dr. Evisha Ford [00:28:49]:

Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Key Words:

students with learning disabilities, alternative/therapeutic school, public school settings, transition into adulthood, workforce, unemployment, underemployment, internships, inclusive work environments, criminal justice system, neurodiverse, advocating for themselves, IEPs, disability, disability services, resumes, references, college campuses, post-secondary students with disabilities, community college, dual enrollment, transportation, low-level jobs, individual needs, unique talents and abilities, work opportunities, community partners, autism, technology fields, homeless youth, Chicago Public Schools, program for young people, I Can Dream Center, traditional alternative schools, family environment, project-based learning, graduation rate, stigmatization, self-advocacy, neurodiverse team, disruptive change, leadership roles, mentorship, Dr. Sheldon Eakins, community colleges, fifth year of high school, institutionalization, "Benches in the Bathroom", staff turnover.

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