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

Welcome advocates to another episode of the leading Shell podcast podcast. Podcasts and focuses on supporting educators with the cleaning and resources necessary to looking for an engaging speaker for your next event. Whether it's webinars, workshops, keynotes for 101 coaches. I'm here to help your time live out aiding a decent world time. I'm more podcast innovating and resources in there. Stay on over to. They offered in our dotcom. I gotta For more information, go to leadingequitycenter.com/consulting. Thanks so much for calling. Okay. In the show notes. No problem. Thanks, man. And let's work together. I I give you a lot of credit for you and I have not talked about this. OVA. You are the one that pitched OVA to me and Ron. Welcome to the leading equity podcast. My name is Doctor Sheldon L aegis. And for over a decade, Asia, I've helped educators been advocate date for their services. What is an advocate? But I gotta give you a lot of advocates because my experience is obviated. Don't live at just really Like, advocates held my he noticed that his quotes, and I'm willing to speak those that I have right now. I give a lot of credit. No matter where you are, your journey towards ensuring all of your are you with with the resources, they need a chance to drive on the mic or I'm here to help you build your knowledge. Thank you so confident. Man, thanks for having me, really. I I I'd see a bunch stuff on on on on the interwebs. And I'm like, yo, Sheldon's doing it. So have an opportunity to come on here and and chop it up with you as Good times, man. Absolutely. So I know who you are. And, for those who have not, if if folks aren't, I mean, I just I doubt it that the the audience that I have that they have never heard tool. But if there are a few, like, that one hand full person, could you share a little bit about yourself in which you currently do? Yeah. My name is doctor Tum Toya. I am a consultant.

Toutoule Ntoya [00:01:49]:

I worked in schools as a teacher for 8 years. I was an administrator for 2 years, and, I always tell the story. I got I found out that I got laid off of my admin job the same day that I got accepted into the EDD program at USC. So that that shifted. It shifted my entire trajectory. So I went into consulting And that's what I do now. I consult makerspaces. I'm a science head science geek. and I do makerspaces. my wife and I started a business, kind of out of the blue, fixing fitness equipment. So now I'm kinda splitting my time between building this business and maintaining my, consulting business. So that's what I do. Just work on makerspaces,

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:02:36]:

man. Yeah. We're gonna have to talk offline about that fitness equipment thing, man. That's that's that's kinda my niche nowadays is is is the fitness. That's why you be commenting on my face. Look. Oh, that

Toutoule Ntoya [00:02:46]:

makes sense. Just call them Suale. Oh, so I'll call him you now, bro.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:02:51]:

That makes sense. Okay. Okay. Alright. Let's get on to the topic because you and I go, this is gonna be 3 hours later when you need to talk. So okay. So here here's the thing. you reached out to me, I don't know, a week or so ago, a few days, a few days back, and, you know, you're fresh off the isty. and you have some thoughts and you wanted to bring it on the microphone. So I'm gonna I'm gonna throw it out to you. I mean, let us know. I mean, what What drove you to reaching out to me?

Toutoule Ntoya [00:03:16]:

So I was, came from ST like you said, and there's so much that happened. I'm just thinking about, like, how do I think this through? How do I how do I just run it through my brain? How do I debrief this? So I reached out to you to see what what, what we can do and if I can come on here and kinda just talk about it and talk about the situation and what led to it. And, you you accepted, and we exchanged. It wasn't even text. It was just, messages on on Facebook and and and here we here we are. We're here doing the show.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:03:50]:

Alright. Well, give us a little background in regards to what happened because I wasn't at Iasty. What do you say is I'm a get there? but, let us know what what will will happen. We'll get you there, man. So,

Toutoule Ntoya [00:04:03]:

OVA, our voice is Academy. It's called back then, was this thing where we got invited. Someone had to, put in a referral for you. So you accept it. You go as a cohort. And one of the big things we were prepping for was getting our key noting chops up and setting up keynote speeches and getting that as well as forming community. And there's always a strong community that came out of it. Well, after I did my my OVA session, there was a 3 of us that decided to write a an article to Istee. It was a doctor Desiree, Alexander Natalia, Lemoyne Hernandez, me. yeah, it was 3 of us. So we submitted it to Istee. They accepted it. We put it through this is 2019. No problem. Well, this year, Isti decided that they were going to release, re release that the article we wrote. Well, Doctor Alexander wrote me and she said, who is this? So I look at it and it's someone else's face. next to my my article, and then my article wasn't misspelled. They didn't even put doctor in front of it, nothing. I spelled everything I was like, woah. I thought it was funny. It was hilarious. I was laughing. I put it out on Twitter to the fam, and The network found it, and they went haywire. So people were upset. Istee's at it again. Oh, I can't believe it. It went off for, like, 2 or 3 days. And Istee finally got wind of it. they reached out to me. They reached out to doctor reached out to doctor Alexander, and they wanted to know, you know, they They agreed that someone had messed up royally. They apologized profusely, and they said, you know, what can we to? What what do you have to do? And I gotta give it up to my man, Doctor Randall Sampson. He was like, wow. They should they should like you know, put together a the the some kind of keynote or speaker or something so he can talk about what he has to do. I was like, okay. That's so I gave him the first idea. So I was like, yo, I was working on a speaker series with OVA, which got Eakins derailed because of COVID. And I was like, well, I got a speaker series we're working on. why don't we bring some of our OBAs along to the main stage and they can tell their truth? They love the idea. They're like, yeah. Let's Let's do it. How can you set it up? I was like, wow. That's cool. Doctor Alexander participated in a affinity group a TCA. She's like, let's do an affinity group at Istee. Let's make it a session. Great. Let's do it. And let's do a panel. Great. So it gave us 3 sessions. They were on the regular schedule, not something that we had to put to the side. Yeah. Our session was on the main stage, which was a big deal. because we were like, oh, we're gonna get a room. We're gonna get they said, no. We're gonna put you on the main stage. Is these full resources there to record and all of that good stuff. So That was a big win. We got our folks together. our team team was fantastic. Brian Lewis was my cohorts were up there. There were 8 speakers. They came up. Sarah was behind the scene. Jenny, Jody, We were just there, and we set it off, and it was and we wanted to make it something that that was never on their stage before. We didn't wanna make it like a regular, you know, or whatever, but it was So it went off. And I just couldn't believe that from that negative situation that I could have probably pouted and been mad and with my forget is the is the ain't nothing. But, like, they came to the table, and then we came to the table. And they were like, yeah. Let's do it. and it opened up so many different opportunities. So, you know, there's just so much that came out of it, and I was is fortunate that I can share that experience with you all.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:07:40]:

So it was one of those things where, you know, you had a, obviously, it was a bad situation. And, you know, what I really do appreciate is the about is that they came humbled and said, you know, we messed up. We we made a mistake Some folks will be on some. This is inexcusable. Like, how how in the hell did you get my, you know, I see we here we go again. We all look alike type of mentality and you put the wrong picture up. Who is this person? You know, we see these type of things, and it's it's easy for us to to get upset, get triggered, microaggressions, those kind of vibes, and and not listen to someone when they say, listen. I made a mistake. I messed up. how can I make this right? And as a result, you were, you know, your team, rather, we're we're able to put together an opportunity for a lot of voices to be on stage that probably would not have been on stage had this situation not happen. So I'm excited about that and and and and the impact. So I I'm I'm curious. After this event, so you get home. after I see you get home. What were some of your thoughts going forward? The first thing I I I just couldn't believe

Toutoule Ntoya [00:08:52]:

that we actually pulled it off, and we pulled it off the way we did. And it was you know, we did a lot of saying a lot of behind the scenes stuff. We had to have different sessions where we're supporting the keynote speakers and just giving each other encouragement. and the day of it was, like, clockwork. Everything went. So I couldn't believe that it went better than we had anticipated. So that was the first thing. And I couldn't believe that we were on, you know, Istee's is probably one of the the the the top conferences in the country in terms of its reach, you know, isteys at just about every district. They have Icedi standards. They're doing whatever, and we were able to represent 4 people of color. We're able to like, give all those people who saw us, like, representation that they can do this too. So, And then next year, they're talking about we haven't meet with them this week. Next year. Okay. What's come next year gonna look like? And, you know, people were buzzing. And everybody that I met at the conference, they're like, oh my gosh. It was I got so many ideas when I go back to my and that's that was the biggest part for me. They're like, I met I met these 3 sisters from Georgia. And we were we went to the poultry slam, and I met them outside. And they're like, oh my gosh. We've been thinking about doing something like this. We're taking it back to our schools. I've just been empowered to just like whatever. Like, you've given me so much, you know, so much hope that we can make happen, and maybe one day I could be able to write all this stuff, and that's why you need representation. And the fact that we could have had a small part to plan that And then I just wanna, like, say how much we piggy backed off of the people before us, you know, refinance, refinance is like a she's like an OG, and she's been trying to do this forever. can Shelton's. We've been out there trying to do whatever. And everyone else been out there, and they've been trying to get istey to move around and do what they wanna do. And, I mean, this is just part of. And, hopefully, someone can take what we were able to do and just carry the baton because that's what it's about, man. It's about being the collective and how much more impact the collective has. And with that collective, man, you can make anything happen, bro.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:10:54]:

So that leads me to the thought of you had 3 women that came up to you, 3 sisters that came up to you, and and said, man, I got I I I've been wanting like, I've been wanting to see this. This this motivated me. This impacted me. I wanna get on stage. And when we think about conferences and and I know probably a few years ago, I mean, I'm you know, I don't think I hear I haven't had a lot of conversations recently. but the conversation has has often been we don't have a lot of representation when it comes to keynote presentations when it comes to folks of color, for example, on stage. And I I wanna know if we have folks that are out there listening, That's no. I have a skill. I I haven't I'm an expert in certain areas. I am a person of color where I'm I'm not part of the dominant culture. whatever that looks like. What is your your thoughts or maybe let me ask you this too, tool. What type of tips which you give to an individual who has some sort of spark. They wanna say something. They wanna get on stage. What type of experience or or what type of,

Toutoule Ntoya [00:12:05]:

advice would you get to someone like that? I think the first thing you have to know is that you have a story. And there are so many dope educators that I know who think they don't have a story. And I'm like, what? You know, that that story right there needs to be told because that story is the story that our kids are going through. And I was talking to a really good friend of mine. She told me her story. I was like, woah. That That's amazing. And she does. Nothing. It was just I just did it to get through. Right? So, like, thinking that you don't have a story, thinking you don't have a leg to stand on, And, and I'm fighting this myself, but and this is something that just after this whole isty thing, you know, we always feel like we need permission. to do these Eakins of things. Like, someone has to, like, write a green green light us or write a check or whatever the case is for for me to to be okay to go do this when, no, you have as much a right as anyone else to tell your story, and no one's story is like yours. And if we heard more stories like yours, how would that resonate with our teachers how that resonate with our students, everyone that's in your atmosphere. So that's the first piece of it, getting over that hurdle. Then the second thing is finding your I'm gonna say tribe. I don't mind saying tribe because I'm African, and we come from a tribe. So I know a lot of people have a fun way of saying that, I'm a say it. Like, like, find your tribe. Find your people. Find the people who are doing some of the things that you're interested in. And you'd be surprised just reaching out to folks how receptive people will be. And you'll be surprised that someone just needed someone to, like, bring it up somewhere. And that could be you. Like, oh, yeah. We've been thinking about it, but we know how to do it. We need the teacher to be interested, and you might be the person to get it started. So, yeah, find that group me PLN or whatever you wanna call it, but you gotta find people to help you along in this journey because there's so many things out there that are barriers your way. And some of it is is stuff that we create on our own. So, if you can get around the mental piece of it, know that I got a story to tell, I'm doing great things in my district. I need it out there. But then the second thing is finding your people, right, because it's hard to do it on your own. Like, Sheldon, Sheldon, he's he's anomalies. He's like, you're killing it. Right? So, like, how can sheldon the inspiration? How can I be like like Sheldon? How can I be like this person? How can I be like like that person? How can we, like, Okay. They're blazing the trail. Let me do the same thing. And it's it's it's out there. It is out there. It's just a matter of a step forward in getting it.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:14:36]:

I'm gonna touch on that story piece because I I'm a storyteller. Folks that listen to my show, folks that listen to my kinos, I I'm gonna give you I'm gonna hit you with a bunch of stories. because I I think that's very powerful. The way that she can move someone based off of how you can set up a story. Like, I I've gotten to the place where I can tell the exact same story. five different ways and give you sad laughter. You know, I can take you through the same different emotions with the exact same story. Just tell it different. Yeah. I think some of the conversations I've had with individuals who wanna get on stage, who want to do presentations, keynotes, things like that, and the idea of the story. We're we're we're hung up on that. A lot of folks, especially folks of color will tell me. Well, I don't have the typical grew up in the hood single parent, drugs, you know, all the stereotypical like, I don't have that story. Oh, I have my my Hispanic fault. Oh, you know, grow up in immigrant, like, paid documentation. Like, I don't have all of these stereotypical experiences. and they feel like they need to have that background in order to be validated on stage. Yeah. And when we think about what that looks like in our Oscars, and, like, you know, you think about, okay. Who's one, for best actor who's well, what was the story about? It's always about some sort of negative triumphs, you know, civil rights, whatever type of stories in order for us to get that validation. I feel like that internalizes oppresses ourselves. and we're not really thinking about whatever your background, whatever your history is, you have a story that needs to be shared. Yes.

Toutoule Ntoya [00:16:11]:

Absolutely. And, you know, Leticia Citizen, her story, she told and I've heard that story before, but she told it again, and for some reason, it hit me different. on that main stage. And I I don't fit she switched it up or whatever, but it was about giving her some voice. And I was like, woah. Like, the fact that someone gave her a voice allow her voice to actually come back. And I'm like, yo, I've I've heard that story before, but it was more impactful. And, like, it it wasn't, like you said, the typical single mother, whatever whatever the case is, it was just her upbringing and just some something that happened to hers, her own situation, and what happened because of it. and you never know. Yeah. And you'll you never know what your story is until you start telling it, and folks were like, you did what? Mhmm. And you came back from what?

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:17:01]:

It's amazing. It's amazing. You know, I I've I've been in trainings where, you know, I've had folks, you know, raise a hand. You know, I I always create a brave space and say, this is a brave space, raise your hand. Feel free to share. and I'll I'll hear people tell me. This is insignificant. you know, I I know this doesn't really matter or this doesn't count, and it'll tell you a story to them or have you crying. Yeah. And you're like, yo, are you serious? Like, that hit me very hard. I can only imagine what you went through in this experience. but a lot of us will downplay our experiences. A lot of us will feel like no one needs to hear this or who cares or this is so saturated. There's so many voices out there already and you know, who am I? Like, we make a lot of excuses -- Yep. -- as to why we can't be on stage, why we shouldn't be on stage. I I'll be honest. Look. podcast has really helped me, but I remember the very first time I was asked to speak on stage. I was asked to do a a graduation ceremony keynote, and I was terrified to the point where I had it written out, like, literally worth where exactly what else was. And I was reading my I was reading my my, point, my, script on stage. Right? I'm just reading it out. And I remember getting lost in the middle of it because I was there was one part where I was, like, calling out the estudent's name and say, Johnny, you wanna be a lawyer when you grow up at such a session. I remember looked at looked up, and I looked back down, and I totally lost my place. And I was like, I don't know what I I wanted to sit down for a second, and but I powered through. I powered through it. But I'll say that. Nowadays, I can put kino's together rather quickly. I I do just, you know, the more repetitions that you have, the more opportunities that you have, it it gets better, but you have to start somewhere. I always tell people, don't be 5 years from now saying, man, I wish I had started 5 years ago. Yes.

Toutoule Ntoya [00:18:48]:

Yes. Those are great words, man. Those are great words. And then just to add to that, whether because our speakers only have 5 minutes. They have 5 minutes on stage. And I'm thinking to myself, oh, man, in 5 minutes, like, how much can you put in there? But these these people, they came with it in that little 5 minutes that they had. So whether you have an hour 45 minutes or 5, you can still kill the stage with whatever they're gonna give you up there, you just you just fill fill it with your truth, and you'll be alright.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:19:18]:

Yep. Alright. So that's your story. And he said, find your people, find your tribe, Tell us a little bit more about it. Let's let's touch on that piece for a second. So is that socially? You know, I live in rural Idaho. and me personally finding my tribe is, you know, that that's tough. Right? So -- I know. That's the story. How you do it? That's the story I got here. But okay. So so folks like me, maybe that that live in rural places or maybe they just feel like they're the lone wolf. They're the only persons in their in their space. What kind of suggest do you have?

Toutoule Ntoya [00:19:51]:

So, you know, the pandemic really illuminated how much we can still connect over just Zooms or whatever. and, like, you don't have to be in person with folks anymore. You could meet someone on a Twitter chat or Someone made a post and you're following them and you put something together or maybe you put a proposal and you met some people at this conference and let's meet. Like, if I know I'm living in rural Idaho, I'm gonna if I go someplace and I meet my people, I'm gonna I'm gonna find a way to keep up with them, right, because Facebook groups, Twitter chat, Twitter groups, text messages, Foxer, there's so many different tools out there. Stay connected. I have a group now that so we presented last week. Probably the last time we saw each other, I can't even tell you when the last time we all saw each other. Right? So we probably see each other maybe yeah. We probably see each other once every 2 or 3 months. Right? But we stay connected. Just on chats. Just on Text messages. The technology has eliminated the barrier for connection. Now it's our job to do the work to meet the people out there, to make those connections, and then find out, man, I live in I live in Central Valley. and you live in Washington. How do we stay connected? I'll text you. Great. Oh, I'm in a group. I'm a text you, add you to the group. Right? And it just starts to grow. But, like, once you start to get with people who are doing something similar, man, the the the possibilities are endless. And as long as you you're willing to to to do the work and put together the people, like, the possibilities are endless. Whatever you wanna make happen in your space, and I think a lot of times a lot of times, We don't really see that piece of it. The possibilities being endless. So if you're to ask someone, like, if you could have it out your way, what would you do? Like, oh, don't do it. show up to work a little bit later. Like, you know, but whatever you wanna do, I want the district to to open up a equity space in my in my school district. Great. How do we get there? or I wanna be able to go to Istee, and I wanna present on the main stage. Great. How do we get you there, or I wanna be able to be a part of this group? so I can, like, do more great. How do we do it? Right? So it's it's out there, but what? The limitation in, sounds cliche, but limitation is is is all in your brain. It just where do you start? And you just continue to progress.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:22:17]:

But what I'm hearing is set set a goal you know, one day, I won't be on it. Now, obviously, you're not gonna just get on the it's the stage without putting in some rep. Right? You gotta get some taxes. You gotta do some some local stuff, things like that. so, okay, which leads me to my next question. You and I Eakins talked about this before we hit court. Paid versus volunteer work. What are your thoughts on, let's say, my goal, my dream is one day. To to get on the iste states, grand stage. What what what what are your thoughts on on, on gigs? contracts and maybe even, like, should I do stuff for free? Should I do, like, what's what's the trajectory suggestion that you have? I think you

Toutoule Ntoya [00:23:05]:

should find where your niche is. Like, what is it that you wanna be good at? What do you wanna be able to talk too. Like, if you did a presentation today, what would that be on? Right? And then how do you get good at doing that? Yep. And, like, I love your sports analogy. Where do you get the reps? Is it the local, you know, just your school district has a bunch of things that you can present at? Great. Let me do that. Or does those small conference that you could possibly put in and do some presentations there. Do that. But once you get comfortable doing this, Then if someone calls you to do, like, if if if Sheldon, you get called to do a a main stage, you you you got your stuff in the bag already. You ain't tripping. Like, yeah, let's do Right? Because you've had the experience, but, like, someone else who may not have the experience, now it becomes, like, this big. I don't know if I could oh, this is positive syndrome and blah blah blah, but If you're if you've already had the reps doing it and you're doing little things here, doing little things there, ah, don't even worry about getting paid yet. like, the money will come. The money's there. Believe it or not. The money is there. So get to a point to where okay. I'm good. Wow. I got paid for this. Oh, I got paid for that. Well, I'm getting paid for this too. Oh, shoot. They're paying me for that too. Okay. Now now you can start to make those decisions on things you do, things you don't do, but until you get to that point, Just just, you know, find some things you're passionate about, things you wanna talk about, things you could talk about. One of my buddies when I was in grad school gave me the best advice I got from grad school hands down. He said, we have to be able to talk about these topics at the highest level, that's what we that's just doctorate. So wherever you're at in your space, you don't have to be a doctor. You could just be whatever. Make sure you can talk about that topic and be comfortable talking about it at the highest level and go out there and do it. And then find your people and do it with them too. I always tell folks

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:24:57]:

Think of a topic that you can talk about for 30 minutes without doing any research or prep ahead of time. Yes. Yes. That's good. And I think if you can start there with a topic that you can speak on for 30 minutes without no prep, no research, Go hard for a half hour. That's your niche. That is in there, like and then you can hone that craft. And it could be so broad. It could be brought in to where, like, say someone asked you to do a keynote and you say, okay. Alright. What are the outcomes? Alright. So when I when I when your audience leaves or when I'm done with my 45, my hour, whatever it is, what do you want the folks to know? And you could bring that you could con there's so many ways that you can connect your your niche with those topics or whatever the the outcome is just by the way. Again, the way that you tell a story or the way that you present that information. But I I think you have to at least find some we all have something that we could talk about for at least a half hour. And you know what? I don't and and I think we like, our educated brains want it to be super technical. Like,

Toutoule Ntoya [00:26:01]:

how do you increase achievements for -- Yeah. -- 5th grade students in rural Idaho. Right? That's very specific. It could be as specific as, yo, these black kids in my class driving me crazy, and I figured out how to engage Oh, how'd you do that? Or you know what? these these Chinese kids were in my school and they needed a representative to so they could have an affinity space, and I was there for them. Woah. How did that work out? Right? So, like, there are all these different and that was actually a thing that happened to me. Chinese kids asked me to do it and I had to set it up. But, like, there are all these different things that you do at your school, that probably no one even notices you do -- Yep. -- that you can talk about for days for days. Kids walk in your hallway, And kids always walk by your class to give you a pound. What does that mean? They feel comfortable with you. You have relationships. You have no problems building relationship with kids. Talk about that. Right? So whatever it is you're good at in your space. Talk about it. If it's technical, talk about it. If it's like you know, social emotional stuff, talk about it. But but then what starts to happen is you have to build on top of it. Mhmm. Right? Yeah. I could talk about, you know, black kids and hip hop, Okay. I could talk about engaging pedagogy. Oh, okay. Well, I do the same things in my science class. Okay. Well, I got these 5 right now, you building your different topics -- Yep. -- off of that one topic that you were very, very passionate about. So don't think it has to be anything super technical or whatever district

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:27:33]:

puts out there. Just something that you're good at in your class that you know that, yo, I got that. And then you hone your craft. And then as you as you go around, like, you start small, start local, maybe present something at your school, present something at your, you know, city level, state level, regional. And then by the time you've done it ten times, 20 times, you're at a place where you have -- Right. -- on a a 5 minute iste speech or a 45 is nothing because you've put in those reps. So -- Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Let's let's do this. So, you know, again, you and I could chop it up all day every day. And and then you know what's funny because we were kinda talking about finding tried. You and I had not met each other physically, but yet, I've known you for, what, 4? Wow.

Toutoule Ntoya [00:28:16]:

Yeah. You're like my dude. I see you in this street. I'm like, yoach. what you drinking. Whatever he wants. I got it.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:28:22]:

We've never met him personally. And it's and it's funny. Like, there's so many people I I I keep in touch with all the time, Facebook friends, whatever friends, you know, we we text him. You mentioned Ken Shelton. Ken Shelton. Wish me happy birthday the other day. Him him hour techs and, you know, hey. We gotta get caught up. We need to work out together. All the like, all these folks that I've never I've met Eakins once in person once, but There's a lot of folks that I've never met in person, and that's just the piece or the beauty of, I guess, of social media and being able to stay connected I mean, these these opportunities weren't available 20, 25 years ago. So I wanna I wanna get you to to to close out What's your final thoughts? you know, final word of advice to our listeners out there? I've just seen so many things,

Toutoule Ntoya [00:29:07]:

just kinda materialize. and just the importance of just not doubting yourself and stepping into whatever your destiny is. So if if if it's your destiny, step into it no matter how big or how small it is, because you don't know where it's gonna lead you. So, like, this situation with Istee, like, who would have known when 2019. We're thinking about doing the speaker series. Like, ah, it'd be nice to do it at istee. But think about we did it at the main stage. So have that belief in yourself. And if eve even if you're like, I don't know, it's kind of embarrassing. Share it with somebody. and that energy they give you is gonna be enough to push you forward. So believe in yourself as a first step, once you start believing yourself and knowing that you've got a story to tell, And then you would you're that's that's the first step when you're able to go on to the next thing. So reach out to me, reach out to Sheldon. I'd be more than happy to talk to about this. This is starting to turn to a passion of mine. Tell them, finding people's stories and putting it out there. So okay. Alright. So if we got folks that wanna reach you, what's the best way to connect online? Yeah. You could, get me on Twitter. holler me on Twitter at Tatul and Toya. Probably the best place to to get me, trying a new thread. I don't know if you've you've hopped on. I don't know. I I I I'm I've I've signed up. I think everyone's the same way. We're just like whatever, but holler at me on on Twitter send me a message, say, hey. I heard you on doc on on on Sheldon, Doctor Sheldon's show, and it was great. And, we could chop it up from there. You know, I love running my So reach me that way. So is are you still in the OVA board? Yeah. I'm still OVA board. We have a meeting coming up soon, and we're gonna start to roll out a couple of things because we haven't engaged our alumni in such a long time, and it's it's it's about time. As far as, like, if we have future folks that wanna connect or want to be a part of the upcoming cohorts. Is that still a an option available? It's an option. We held off on having a cohort this summer because we're working on this engagement thing and this. Mhmm. So we we think we're gonna have a cohort 5 next year. So we have to there's some things we gotta we have to figure out. But just just stay tuned. if you're interested, again, reach out to me. I'll make sure to get you to the right channels to make sure we can get you up to speed on what's happening and get you going on on some things. We have a black teacher network. I think it's called on Facebook. You I'm I'm a send you an invite. I'm a send you an invite, Sheldon. It's kinda cool. We're trying to set up just an affinity space for for for for black educators in tech. So I'm a send you an invite. But, yeah, there's all these different things that that that we're gonna that we're doing. Reach out to me, find out more information about OVA, know, we can update you on some of the things that are coming. We have a second iteration of the speaker series that we're we're we're trying to put out there. So just stay tuned. Got a lot of things coming.

Dr. Sheldon Eakins [00:31:54]:

Awesome. Great work that you're doing over there. It's always a pleasure. Thank you so much for your time. Folks that are listening. I'm gonna leave links in the show notes so you can Get your hands and get and get connected with the tool as well. He's definitely somebody you should be following if you're not following him already. Thank you again to tool. Thanks, Sheldon. Appreciate you, brother.

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