Transforming Classrooms with Math Superpowers: Kristen Powers

Picture your favorite teacher. Got them in mind? Now imagine if they were given the freedom to teach without the constraints of standardized testing. That’s what Kristen Powers, the founder of Math Superpowers, is advocating for.

With over a decade of teaching experience and a master's in elementary and math education, Kristen is on a mission to transform our education system. She believes in putting the power back into the hands of educators and allowing students to show their intelligences and gifts in ways that standardized tests may not capture.

Join us as we journey with Kristen through her early days in a challenging school district, grappling with social issues that her students faced and striving to create a nurturing classroom environment. She opens up about the struggles and joys of teaching, reflecting on the importance of work-life balance in education. Kristen's own experiences underscore the need for educators to take care of themselves, nurture their passions outside of work, and set healthy boundaries.

Kristen’s inspiring story culminates in the launch of her platform, Math Superpowers, a resource designed to support educators. She discusses the crucial role veteran teachers can play in guiding new teachers, reflecting on her own early days in the classroom and the mentoring that made a difference. Kristen’s vision is bold and transformative, challenging us to reimagine education and the value of a high school diploma. Tune in for a conversation full of insight, passion, and practical advice for navigating the complex world of education.

Follow Kristen:
https://www.instagram.com/math_super_powers/

Chapters

• 0:00 Kristen Powers
• 9:26 Job Market and Challenging Classroom Dynamics
• 17:57 Flaws of Standardized Testing and Misallocation
• 31:20 Reimagining Education
• 44:07 Strategies for Work-Life Balance in Education
• 48:21 Supporting Educators With Math Superpowers

Transcript

Miriam: 0:30

Today we have Kristen Powers of Math Superpowers. Kristen is a teacher, tutor, educational consultant and enthusiast. With 11 years experience in the classroom, she has taught grades two to eight, focusing the last three years in middle school math. She holds a master's degree in elementary education and a master's degree in math curriculum and instruction. Her goal is to help students and families navigate the complexities of school in this ever-changing educational landscape. Kristen is passionate about educational equity, abolishing standardized testing and improving schools for teachers and students by increasing educational support and shifting the focus to learning over testing. Woo-hoo, she's a military wife and mother of two young sons and one dog. What's the dog's name? Ruth?

Kristen: 1:32

After Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Miriam: 1:33

Oh yeah, rbg Yep In the house. Wonderful Welcome to the show.

Kristen: 1:39

Kristen, thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here.

Miriam: 1:43

Absolutely. We're thrilled to have you, so why don't we just start with your origin story? How did you get into education?

Kristen: 1:52

Yeah, I am happy to kind of go through what got me here and where I am today. So my first teaching job I was a second grade teacher. I was in a self-contained, magnet-gifted and talented class in Colorado. My husband was stationed at Fort Carson, so we were living in Colorado Springs. I was in a public school it was a Title I school in a district that served a poor part of the city of Colorado Springs and I absolutely loved it. I did that for two years. We then moved to Georgia and my husband was stationed at Fort Benning. We lived in Columbus.

Kristen: 2:31

I taught second grade again and this time I was at a private independent school, so a different atmosphere. But luckily the content was pretty similar. So I felt like I made that transition pretty seamlessly. I then spent a little bit of time as a learning center resource teacher. I would push in a little bit, I would pull out a little bit. I sometimes had small group, I sometimes had one-on-one. It was just kind of dependent on the kid, on the need and what the classroom teacher needed help with. I then taught third grade STEM for a year. So I had a partner teacher who took ELA and social studies. I taught STEM and then I taught fourth grade and third, and fourth grade was all in Tennessee. I was in Nashville at the time and the last three years I have been right outside DC and I have taught middle school math in Arlington, virginia. So I recently had my second child. This past March he was born and I was kind of thank you.

Kristen: 3:31

I was looking for something to do and I've noticed over the years friends, colleagues, relatives, just different people in my life who would say, hey, I'm really confused by what my child is doing, particularly in math class. What is this quote unquote new math. What's going on? I don't understand common core. Can you help? And I'd say sure, let's hop on a FaceTime together, we'll chat, we'll talk it over. So one of my two of my good friends asked me about potentially starting an Instagram page where people could DM me either homework problems for their kids or just ask kind of general questions. And my attitude is you don't know what you don't know If you're not trained in this stuff. If you don't know about common core, if you don't know about math and focus, if you don't know about Eureka math and you have no exposure to this, you're not in the classroom. I get why it doesn't make sense. It wouldn't make sense to me if I weren't outside or kind of looking in, and so I started with my Instagram page and now I kind of like to say I do it all.

Kristen: 4:39

I will always answer homework questions. I'll also try to explain different concepts, say, hey, this might be something your child's looking at. But I also do stuff like here are some tips for an IEP meeting that you may be going into for your student, or here's a good way to ask your child's teacher about X, y, z, if you're kind of having a question or an issue. So I just want to basically help families, caregivers, in any way I can navigate the challenges of the educational landscape, I think particularly post COVID. Things look really different now and I think, comparatively to what this current crop of parents saw when they were children in school, compared to what their children are seeing in school, it feels quite foreign. So my ultimate goal is just to help offer support in any way that I can, and that was a by trying to be thorough. I was not brief, so there was my very long-winded explanation of my background for you.

Miriam: 5:44

You're a woman after my own heart, don't worry. Verbosity is the name of the game in podcasting. No, beautifully history. And I can sense your passion at helping parents and teachers and students navigate all of the new ways of learning.

Kristen: 6:11

The new ways yeah.

Miriam: 6:13

Yes, what drew you to education in the first place?

Kristen: 6:20

I was the very, very fortunate beneficiary of a really great public education. I grew up in Massachusetts. I went to public schools kindergarten through 12th grade and I had a really robust, comprehensive education and I was very, very lucky in that way. Massachusetts has the best public schools in the country. I believe that that statistic still stands. I will always high tap it out to Massachusetts for that.

Kristen: 6:52

And I always wanted to teach, I think because I had a really positive school experience. School was always a place that I liked going every day. I loved my teachers. I really enjoyed my classes. Of course some classes were harder than others by the time you get to high school, but in general I just really liked school. It was a happy place to be. So when the time came, I'm in college. Figuring out what I want to do, school kind of felt like the most natural fit. I gravitated towards elementary school because I had always enjoyed working with younger children and it just felt like it was the right fit for me and I am quite grateful for my time in elementary. But, as I say now with my own very small children at home, I like being with older students. I'm very happy that I sort of fell into middle school after my first years in elementary school. So I think that's again a roundabout way of saying that basically teaching just felt like a very natural fit for me.

Miriam: 7:57

Awesome, and you've worked 11 years in the classroom. Is that correct, correct, see you? And how do you think teaching has changed in those 11 years?

Kristen: 8:12

It's funny. I was just talking about this with someone else and one of the most noticeable changes that I can think of is when I was first applying for jobs. I was really nervous. I was really scared about getting hired and what the interview process looked like and thinking, oh my gosh, how many applicants did I have? They're not even going to call me for an interview. What am I going to do if I can't find a job?

Kristen: 8:38

And the sad reality now is that, with the mass teacher shortage we have across the country and, from what I'm hearing, in many countries across the world, that's just not the case anymore. It is no longer and oh my goodness, am I going to get hired? It's where do I want to work, which district do I want to be in or what school do I want to be in? Because I can get multiple offers very quickly. And this is not me tooting my own horn here. This is simply a matter of getting teachers into classrooms.

Kristen: 9:13

So that is something that I've noticed in the past decade is just going from feeling like I'm really apprehensive and worried I'm not going to have a job to I got four job offers. You know I'm on LinkedIn and I will get messages really regularly, I would say two to three times a month. I will get a message either from a recruiter from a private school hiring firm, from an HR department within a county public school district asking me hey, you know, are you interested in this? I've gotten offers for overseas jobs. I have gotten offers from healthcare staffing companies to go work. So that is a huge difference compared to when I started is just the much, much more open job market now.

Miriam: 10:05

High demand, for sure, for sure. We're always down subs at my school and, yes, it's so hard to find adequate subs as well, you know, for placement.

Kristen: 10:21

I actually have a story on that. I shared this recently. So when I moved from Georgia to Tennessee, I moved in the middle of the school year it was November. I was crossing state lines. I didn't know anything about where it was moving to in Tennessee. I just said to myself okay, I'm just going to sub for the rest of the school year, you know, and I'll figure it out next year. Fine, my first day I go to get my sub training, great, all done. So they call me literally the next day and they said we have a job for you. I said, okay, yeah, I'll go sub. I walked into the building. I went to the class. The next door neighbor teacher came over. She introduced herself very graciously. I explained yeah, it was a second grade teacher and a learning resource center teacher in Georgia.

Kristen: 11:09

I just moved here and within probably this this had to have been by 10 o'clock that morning. I remember this because the students I was with went to specials. They went down to art, I believe the principal came down and said are you looking for a full time job? She said hi, my name is blank and are you looking for a full time job? And I was literally like taking it back. I had never set foot in this building until two hours previously. She had heard that the sub referring to me had a teaching license. She had had two teachers quit six weeks prior. She had not one single application for those jobs and she literally offered me the job on the spot. Yeah, so the day I subbed I became the classroom teacher in that classroom. I went in as the sub that day and I was the teacher. By lunchtime I was the new teacher. They sent out the parent letter at two o'clock that afternoon introducing me Mrs Powers is the new teacher and that was that. That was that.

Miriam: 12:22

Wow, yeah, wow.

Kristen: 12:26

Yep, the job had been posted. She had two open jobs and again posted six weeks and she didn't have any nipples on the posting.

Miriam: 12:33

And do you have any idea why those teachers had left?

Kristen: 12:37

One of them went to a district that had less demands, so one of them went to a less demanding district. One of them, I believe it, was a family health situation.

Miriam: 12:50

Okay, Got it yeah, and how was that job? I mean, are you still there?

Kristen: 12:58

I'm not no.

Miriam: 12:59

Oh, we know you're in Virginia now, yes, so tell me how was it? Was it? Did you walk into a SHIT show or was it yes?

Kristen: 13:10

I did. I did Because these students had been without a regular teacher for six weeks. The first teacher in that class had only been there. So we started in August, left by Halloween, so like really only a quarter of the year roughly, and this was December. They had been without a class, a regular, consistent teacher, for six plus weeks. It was December. It was fairly close to that holiday break time. It was very, very challenging. When we did return back after the holiday break in January and I really got to know them, it was very sad to see how far below grade level these students were and just how much they were struggling with issues that did not pertain to education but just their home life issues and issues in sort of the personal realm that they were dealing with. These were young kids, these were third graders, but a lot of them were carrying pretty heavy loads. Yeah, we so. Yes, it was very hard.

Miriam: 14:18

It was a hard year, very challenging. How did you, how did you cope that year? How did you replenish yourself and stay with it?

Kristen: 14:30

I Worked with a great group of teachers. We were all very large grade level. There were ten of us, so there was ten sections of this, of the regret yeah, it was a very big school and we all got along. We all lunch together was a wonderful group of teachers and the most veteran teacher on the team, who had had 31, 32ish years experience at that school, left every day at four o'clock. That was her time. It was protected. She went home to her own child. It was her protected time and she would come around to the rest of us in the hall and knock, knock time to go, knock, knock. We say oh no, you know, wait, she's like nope time to go. We're walking out for her.

Kristen: 15:11

Wow, yep, she was very big on that. She would knock on your door and say, no, we're leaving now it's time to go. You can either bring it home or it can wait until tomorrow, but we're leaving and we're all gonna walk out together and I'm not gonna let you sit here and toil for hours and hours. It's time to go. So I followed her diligently. She was the team lead, I was new, I'm I'm. I try not to be a rule breaker. So I was like, okay, yeah, I'm gonna leave. And then I Would walk my dogs in the neighborhood, read, do kind of things that I felt like had me decompress after a day of a Lot putting out a lot of fires all day in the classroom.

Miriam: 15:58

Yeah, what kind of fires come to mind as you're reflecting back?

Kristen: 16:07

That year the group of kids had a lot of social issues with each other. They would bicker and fight a lot. There wasn't a great class culture. Again, I think that this a lot of the stems back to the fact that they had not had a consistent teacher for nearly a semester At that point by the time I stepped in, so the relationship building was not there.

Kristen: 16:31

I think that they were used to probably a pretty punitive behavior management style where they were in trouble a lot and where they had to Kind of what's the word I'm looking for here, where they really had to behave as though they were older than they were, like they weren't. They weren't allowed to kind of have those bigger feelings that 8 and 9 year olds have, and a lot of them again were coming from challenging home lives and so if a kid is coming to school and they're not sleeping well, or they haven't had a decent breakfast or they are not, they're not being, they're being cared for by multiple different relatives and they don't know necessarily when they are spending the night, then I think that there's a lot of anxiety that comes with that and that Certainly interferes with their learning and with their social development for sure.

Miriam: 17:40

So how did you address that? Do you recall?

Kristen: 17:43

Yes, I Remember at the time, again being the new teacher and not wanting to ruffle feathers, I did whatever everybody else was doing and they did class dojo for the behavior, if you know the class doger system. Looking back on it, I cringe now at the class dojo, but I was very diligent on it and I did whatever I was told to do. So they would do the reward points and then on Fridays they could go shopping at the store and buy like little trinkets, candies, pencils, erasers, stickers, stuff like that. We would do the Friday class store depending on how many points that they earned to get money. You know, you give them play money if they received X number of points and then they could go shopping at the class store.

Kristen: 18:27

Do I think that that's the best behavioral management style? Now, I don't, because there were some kids that literally earned nothing all year and and the same kids would earn the points. Therefore the money, get the trinkets week after week, because those kids are gonna behave regardless, right, like those types of kids we're gonna earn the rewards. Those kids are have some sort of intrinsic motivation or they're just kids who can better kind of cope with their, with their emotions and feelings. Whatever the case may be. Those kids are just gonna. They're gonna Be having a more positive and acceptable way regardless. So I just don't think that behavior management system works.

Miriam: 19:12

Yeah, I can see where it's almost like a microcosm of the world and how we perpetuate poverty.

Kristen: 19:23

Absolutely. Yeah, I totally agree with that.

Miriam: 19:26

Yeah, what comes to mind is, you know the system Seems to be. You know the system is a token economy and that's. You know it's an effective system, but perhaps the and and you, being a new teacher, wouldn't have known this, but perhaps the, the target behavior for each student would have been different to set them right success, yeah, I'm just I'm thinking that's great perspective for me as a behavior consultant, hearing that, because, you know I, we want all of the kids to be able to go through the store and be successful and we're setting them up for success in a way that, you know, even approximations were reinforcing that. Or or maybe target behaviors that are specific to that student. And actually I had a.

Miriam: 20:26

My stepdaughter was in a classroom where she completely failed everything. How old she was, a second grader, okay, and she changed schools and she was extremely shy, extremely shy and kind of the same thing as it's like standardized testing, it's like what are we measuring and how important is that? You know? But she was weighted heavily on participation and she, you know, even when called on, would squeak, you know, like she barely had a voice. And she's since come into a lot of, a lot more confidence. She's in seventh grade, going into eighth now. But to see, it's kind of like that analogy of if you, if your measure of success is climbing a tree, a fish is going to fail, right, right.

Miriam: 21:28

And so say that again, einstein said that yes, yes, yeah. So maybe that's a great place to talk about standardized testing.

Kristen: 21:40

This is something that I have felt. I have a very strong opinion on this.

Miriam: 21:46

Okay, let's hear it.

Kristen: 21:48

This goes back to my early days teaching, my initial, my first year teaching right, my maiden voyage, as I call it. Mm hmm, haven't helped those students who had to experience that with me, but I look back on it now and 180 days of school I counted back. My second graders spent 18 of those 180 days either taking standardized testing through the district, go through the state or national testing, or prepping, like learning how to fill in bubbles, learning how to turn the page, not skip pages, so on and so forth. So 10% of their school year was testing. Wow, that's seven year olds. 10% of their year, 18 out of 180 days were spent doing some form of standardized testing or some sort of preparation to complete standardized testing. Mm hmm, that is asinine. That is not helpful to anyone.

Kristen: 22:52

And fast forward now we are really in a crisis in terms of teaching a teaching shortage, school staff shortages. We do not have enough counselors, we do not have enough school therapists, psychologists, school psychologists, we don't have enough admin. We don't even have enough substitutes. We don't have enough of anything. And yet we're paying millions of dollars for testing. The money that is spent on testing is money that absolutely needs to be allocated to helping schools actually help students, period, the millions and millions of dollars that these testing companies are earning, the millions and millions of dollars that go into even setting up the administration of these tests. This actually is interesting.

Kristen: 23:48

When I was in Tennessee, one of our standardized tests was supposed to be done electronically that year, so they had everything prepped. The kids were going to go on a computer, do it on the computer and then when the network or system something crashed, it never picked back up again. The kids never ended up taking the test. So think about how much money went into planning for this, prepping for this, getting these tests out, developing these tests and whatever the issue was. I can't recall this was like six, seven years ago now.

Kristen: 24:21

I'm not a super techie person. It crashed and it never came back online. Kids just didn't do it. Kids just didn't do it. So the waste of money that I see. It feels like we're just lighting these dollars on fire instead of appropriating them where they need to go, which is better staffing our schools, better funding for curriculum development, pd for teachers, mental health awareness for both students and teachers, better support for families. What we're putting money into just makes no sense to me at all and I feel like I'm a pretty logical person I see a problem here. Why are we not solving it? Why are we not allocating these dollars where they need to be?

Miriam: 25:20

Wow, I never thought about the money.

Kristen: 25:25

Yes, I think, maybe because I have a mass brain. Now it comes down to dollars and cents for me. Yeah, and it's the money, it's the money that's going into these tests, that just I don't see why, you know, it feels very illogical. So we're spending all this money to test these kids, to see that these kids are behind. Okay, so these kids are behind, right. So what do we need to do? Oh, okay, we know what we need to do. We need smaller class sizes, we need more staff, professional development, we need some mental health services. We need all of these things. Okay, so how about we now take that money and put it towards that, instead of testing again to see these are areas of deficits? It's like everyone sitting around scratching their head when the answer is right in front of their face.

Miriam: 26:16

Well, and also, what are we doing about intervening on these low test scores, right, Right, every year we're putting more and more pressure on the teacher to make up for the differences. And now we've got a two year gap from the pandemic, the skill deficit right Right On top of whatever socioeconomic, environmental factors were at play in the first place before the pandemic. And then we're not providing the intervention in a, you know, in a targeted way, or intensive way, or evidence based way. And I can't speak for everybody, but you know from what I've heard and seen myself, Mm.

Kristen: 27:03

Hmm, I agree with you 100%. To me, the the the answer is just logical. We see that these kids are behind. Here's what we know works. There is data to back this up smaller class sizes, more school staff, better prepared teachers. That is what works. That is what helps students catch up. That is what helps close achievement gaps. What are we doing? And yet we're dumping more money into tests to see the same problem. It's we're just chasing our tails here Instead of actually going forward and saying we spent X amount of money on standardized tests. No, let's hire more staff. Let's get better training for staff. Let's help families and caregivers of these students better understand what's going on. Let's offer resources and support for those in our community.

Miriam: 27:55

Wow. I just looked up some statistics and this is pre pandemic, but 1.7. This study show that the states spend over 1.7 billion every year on standardized testing and, looking at spending data for 45 different states, they spent roughly 669 million each year on primary assessment contracts. Wow.

Kristen: 28:26

Think about how much staff could be hired on that, on that dime. Just think about that, right. Think about how many more resources you could put into buildings. Think about how you could reduce class sizes. Think about how you could update technology. Think about how we could provide students with laptops and iPads to ensure that when they're going home, they have access to the resources they need. Think about how, perhaps, we could offer mental health counseling and services for students and their families if they need it. Think about how we could offer support staff. Think about how we could provide mental health professional development as well, as well as the professional staff in the building. Think about how we could hire more nutrition services and crossing guards and bus drivers and substitutes and custodians and all those incredibly important people who help keep buildings afloat. We could hire more translators to help our new families, children of immigrants, so that those families feel welcome into the community. Think about how we could be spent in so many ways, hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars that we're just not using to help students.

Miriam: 29:42

So I'll play devil's advocate for a moment and I know no child left behind. Put in place a lot of the testing that we do because, under the claim that it was to make sure to provide accountability for the schools and for the education right For us to look at the growth and the progress and be able to provide funding for the, I mean it was counterproductive. But anyways, the whole API and that, all that program improvement stuff, how do you think we should be measuring accountability or measuring progress?

Kristen: 30:33

This country is big, it's wide, it's vast, it's diverse. I understand looking at accountability, but looking at it at the macro level was never going to work. It needs to be looked at Accountability piece and school success needs to be looked at at the micro level. We need to trust teachers and admin to do their job for their particular school and their particular district and leave it at that. I think that having one vast program in a country that's this wide, with this level of inequity, unfortunately amongst school district districts, I think doing it at the macro level was just not going to work. I think the intentions were probably pretty good. I like to err on the side of people have good intentions. However, a lot of NCLB was written and developed by those not within the education field. I think that that led to it not being implemented properly and, frankly, just not being super realistic for what's going on in the classroom.

Kristen: 31:39

I think under the Bush administration, because there was 9-11, so NCLB obviously came out right around the 9-11 timeframe. There were so many other issues in the world. The United States was entering into wars in the Middle East at that point. I think that a lot of the focus was not directly on education because there was so much else going on in the country, going on in the world at that point that I think a lot of people probably maybe weren't paying super close attention to NCLB and what was happening until all of a sudden they thought and realized oh wait, what's happening here? What are all these tests about? What's happening with my student? Why are they in all these testings? Why are these teachers talking about this? What's going on here? I think it kind of got masked by other major, major world events at that time. I think it was a perfect storm of the Bush administration putting out no Child Buff behind and two simultaneous wars in the Middle East and the biggest terrorist attack in recent American history.

Kristen: 32:49

So now we're what, 2021, 22 years later, and I don't see the need for this level of macro testing when the need is on such a smaller level at this point. We need to just help students small scale. We need to let classroom teachers help their students in a small scale. We need to let admin help their teachers and we need to do it now because it's only getting worse. I don't see it getting better, unfortunately. With COVID in particular, we really saw the difference between students who had a lot of home support students who did it, who did not. We all saw that there were students who literally never showed up to virtual learning, and even the ones that did still fell behind. We're really in desperate times. We need to help students, and we need to do it now, and we need to utilize the funds that we have in a more productive way. Hi.

Miriam: 34:06

So how? Again playing devil's advocate here, I agree Side note, I agree, yes and yes. How could we ensure standard as? How could we ensure that a high school diploma in Massachusetts is the same as a high school, like the kids are coming out with the same level of skill as in Florida, california, virginia, tennessee, you know, kansas? How? Without standardized testing, how do you think we could ensure that a diploma is a diploma is a diploma?

Kristen: 34:52

Well, I'm going to push back on that a little bit, because what is it that we are looking for for high school graduation, right, yeah? So what does that diploma mean? In particular, because I think that a high school diploma should key word there being, should represent a lot more than just taking XYZ classes. What about a mastery based consortium? What about project based learning? What about kids doing internships and on the job training? Why are we not looking at the high school diploma? Why are we only looking at it as one particular path or one route? Why aren't we looking at what it takes to graduate high school as more of a development of skills than checking the box of completing certain classes?

Kristen: 35:44

So I totally understand what you're saying in terms of ensuring that the high school diploma is valid across the states, and I agree with that. But I now think that the world is changing so much and the job market for this current crop of students is changing very quickly. A lot of the jobs that they're going to have in 10 years aren't even in existence right now, right? So I think we need to look at perhaps other ways to show proficiency in development of skills rather than. This child passed two math courses they passed, you know say, algebra 1 and statistics. They passed three language courses. They passed two reading courses, one FISED course. What have you? I think we need to look at expanding what it means to finish high school and focus more on skill set than necessarily completing X number of courses.

Miriam: 36:47

And I can see where the high school exit exam was an attempt at that perhaps, but the real world isn't paper and pencil.

Kristen: 36:57

It's not. It's not. That's why I think project-based learning is huge. That's why I think things like internships and on-the-job training for high school students is so important. I think that we should have the ability to give more students credit for work that's not necessarily the traditional sit in the classroom, sit through a statistics or an AP government class Right? Yes, absolutely, we should offer that, but I think that we need to look at different paths for what it means to complete high school, and I think the focus needs to be more on mastering skills versus completing certain courses.

Miriam: 37:43

And if we were to, if policies were shifted in that direction, how do you think that would affect teachers?

Kristen: 37:55

I think that teachers hopefully, you know, my hope is to support teachers. I think teachers would feel a lot better knowing that for a lot of their students, for whom the traditional route to high school is very challenging, it gives them the ability to guide students into different paths and to give teachers the opportunity to tell a student you know, let's look into an internship for you, let's look into a project for you, in order to show your mastery of this. Let's support you and let's play up your intelligences and your gifts and your skills and let's focus on what you need and ways in which I can help you. I think it would give teachers the freedom to help different students with various needs and also various gifts. Right, every student is talented in some way, shape or form.

Kristen: 38:59

Students blow me away every single day. I'm blown away by the stuff my kids know and what they're interested in and what they love and their passions. And I think that by offering different paths to high school graduation and what that looks like and what that means, teachers can lean into that and we can hopefully even get outside members of the community to engage. So, for example, let's say a kid is really into computer sciences. Right, let's ask a local computer scientist if they would take on a high school kid as an intern. Right, we have a student who maybe really wants to go to culinary school Awesome. Let's contact a restaurant. Let's see if a chef would be willing to hire on and train a high school kiddo who's looking to get into that field. There are so many paths that I think we could include other members of the community to come together and help develop skills that our students are interested in and that passionate about.

Miriam: 40:04

I love that and that's very much what 21st century learning is moving towards in terms of at the level of Google and Facebook and the leading organizations that are making rapid changes and growth and allowing creative pursuits, passion projects on the side for their employees and things like that, and also taking care of basic needs like food and childcare and developing these campuses for well-being, you know.

Kristen: 40:44

Right, right, what do?

Miriam: 40:48

you think needs to happen in education to make that happen? I mean, do you think that we need different kinds of training in teaching programs? Do you think that we need more teachers? Do you think we need different resources or community collaborations? Tell me more about how we could improve the education system.

Kristen: 41:26

I think that we need to make teaching a more appealing career choice for our college students Education majors I read recently the number of education majors in teacher preparation programs in many states has dropped by 50%. Students are literally not producing enough college graduates who are going into the classroom. We need to make teaching a more appealing career and there's so many ways we can do this Right. I know for most people, of course, financially, there has to be more of a financial draw to get into education. There has to be higher pay, greater benefits, better pensions. But also offering teachers a better work environment, telling them hey, we value you and we value the work you're doing. And we're going to show you that in a tangible way by ensuring that your classes are capped at 20 students, by ensuring that you don't have to sub for other staff members who are out because we have enough subs. By ensuring you don't have to work through your lunch or your planning period because there's not coverage in the cafeteria or on the playground. So I think that we can make teaching a more appealing career to get into by making it a more appealing career right, by making it something that you feel like you're helping students, you feel like you're making a difference, but you're also not lighting yourself on fire to keep everybody else warm. So yeah, I just think that there's many ways in which we can make it A career that the best and brightest want to get into, and that they say this is wonderful, I love what I do and I'm confident in my abilities and I'm proud to be an educator in America today.

Kristen: 43:24

But we have to show them this is a good job, right? And if we can't do that, then of course these 20, 21 year olds are going to say well, staying out of education, that's not the major for me. We have to put the work in and show them this is a great place to be, because I love being a teacher. I wouldn't do anything else. I would tell anyone. There's certainly a lot of hard days, but I genuinely enjoy what I do. I feel like it's very important work. I feel like it's meaningful work. But I certainly understand why a lot of people say no way, that's not for me, so let's make it more appealing. I love that.

Miriam: 44:07

Okay, last question what are your non-negotiables for striking that work-life balance so that you can continue in education?

Kristen: 44:23

For me, I think it is having someone in your school life who is going to tell you hey, it's time to go home. You know what? That pile doesn't need to be graded right now. You don't need to switch the seating chart for the fourth time in six weeks. If it is too much work for you, you are okay to leave it at work. You can go home and you can love whatever it is that you love, whether it's a spouse or a partner, whether it's children, whether it's pets, whether it's going and doing a CrossFit workout or baking brownies or walking your dog. Go home, love whatever it is that you love people, pets, places, things and take a break, take a breather. Try again tomorrow. The work will still be there, but not everything is the most important thing.

Kristen: 45:22

My first couple of years teaching, I graded it all, I filed it all. I sorted it all. I did all of the things all of the times. I insured everything was done. My first year teaching, I had the building code so I could go in on Saturdays and Sundays and stay late and close the school. They actually gave me the building code so I could come in. I went into the building every single weekend, except for three, one of which was my wedding weekend. I will say this is a true story. I got married on a Saturday. I got married on Martin Luther King weekend and then flew back to Colorado that Monday night I was grading spelling tests. I got married on Saturday and by Monday I was doing my spelling test and grading. Because that I had to do it all. I had to insure everything was done, all of the things, all of the time.

Kristen: 46:27

I think it is crucial to have someone, especially if you're a new teacher. If you're a new teacher, I beg of you If you listen to nothing else, it's this Find a veteran on your team who is on your side, who you can talk to and who will support you. I promise you you will not regret it. Find someone. If you don't have someone, dm me, I will be that person for you. It is that important. You need to find it Seriously. Dm me, I will do it for you. But go home, have a life outside of those four walls. You exist.

Kristen: 47:05

You are also a human being and you do not have to answer every single email. You are not on call all the time. Think about, in medicine, doctors have certain times that they are on call and it rotates, but they are not on call all of the time. When it's not their turn, they are not picking up those calls, even in an emergency situation. You also are not required to work outside your contact hours. Someone else's email that they, a parent, emails you that they feel like it is the hugest deal, it doesn't necessarily mean it is an emergency for you. They can feel a certain way about something going on in your classroom, even your admin. You can continue to live your life and you can get back to them when you need to. I think 24 hours is very appropriate in responding. I think your weekend time is precious. Hang on to it. Don't respond. You don't have to. You don't owe that to anybody unless you really feel the need to Do it. Protect your time. You're a person too.

Miriam: 48:21

Amen sister, yes yeah.

Kristen: 48:26

It's, it's yes and again, please, new teachers, find someone, find a veteran, go to that person, let them. Let them speak the truth to you.

Miriam: 48:39

Yes, yes, wonderful Kristen, it's been such a pleasure speaking with you. You're a wealth of knowledge and so passionate about your work and supporting educators and students out there. Where can we find out more about you?

Kristen: 48:56

Yes, I'm glad you asked. You can find me on Instagram math superpowers. My last name really is powers. It is my real last name. I get asked that all the time and every year in the first day of school, students always ask it is my real last name. It is powers. So math superpowers. Or my email mathsuperpowersoneatgmailcom. You can find me there, drop me a DM, whatever. If you ever need help with anything, you ever have questions on anything, I am here.

Miriam: 49:25

Wonderful. We'll have all those links in the show notes and a little bit about Kristen, and it's been such a pleasure. Thank you so much for your time and for your wealth of insight.

Kristen: 49:37

Thank you so much.