Luvelle Brown is an experienced educator who has held positions as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, school CIO, and Superintendent of Schools. Currently, Dr. Brown is serving as the Superintendent of the Ithaca City School District (ICSD) in Ithaca, New York. During his tenure in Ithaca, the Ithaca City School District has experienced unprecedented levels of success.
Dr. Michael Conner
Good morning, good afternoon and good evening and welcome to another episode of Voices for Excellence. I am your host Dr. Michael Conner, CEO and Founder of the Agile Evolutionary Group, and for this episode of VFE, I got one of my close brothers on the episode. So really quick just to say, Hey, you know, Luvelle, I want you to be on my episode. They need to hear, my audience needs to hear your strategies, your thinking, your methodologies with regards to culture and education as well as innovation and education. So to have my close brother, Dr. Luvelle Brown on VFE is an extreme honor. Just to give you a background of Dr. Brown, Dr. Brown is one of the most recognized superintendents across the country. Numerous awards that he had won nationally, too many to to announce on VFE. And he is the proud superintendent of Ithaca Public Schools in Ithaca, New York. We live roughly about two and a half hours away from each other, so we’ve got to connect much more frequently. So I want to bring to you on today’s episode, Dr. Luvelle Brown. Dr. Brown, big brother, how are you today?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
I am outstanding. Thank you, thank you, thank you for including me. Dr. Conner. This is an honor and whenever you and I are in the room together it’s fun, so I’m looking forward to this conversation as well.
Dr. Michael Conner
I need some more Dr. Luvelle Brown, in my life, man. I’ll tell you though, when we get together, whether it be this, connecting with education, just hanging out, I tell you this man, if you have not been to Dr. Luvelle Brown’s residence, you have to. The bourbon collection is for real.
Dr. Luvelle Brown
We work hard, but we also play hard. You know what I mean? We have a good time around here.
Dr. Michael Conner
Man, Luvelle, it’s so good to have you on here so, to start the podcast, this kind of Segways perfectly into the first question. And I ask everybody this question and specifically pertaining to you, I cannot wait to hear your response, my brother. Now, when stakeholders engage with you nationally, you go around the country speaking about culture and education, your stakeholders, your leaders in Africa, when they engage or listen to Dr. Luvelle Brown as a superintendent or a national speaker, Dr. Brown what equity song comes to mind when they first meet you or hear you speak?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Okay, I got you. Thanks for that wonderful question. I’m thinking about my walk up music. What would it be? And yes, I’ve had a chance to be… privileged and honored to be in every state, probably 17 different countries now over the last few years. And I would say that that song would be a smooth operator. You know, I call it Sade, I know there’s people who call it Saudi, but it’s Sade for me. And I say that because being in so many different spaces and being an educator, my role and my job is to differentiate based on where people are on their journeys and when able to use language in ways to engage everyone, when able to make all folks feel comfortable, when able to do things people can choose not to, it takes a level of competence, expertise and talent, but also a level of smoothness, as I call it, so I’m a smooth operator. Having folks feel comfortable with these oftentimes uncomfortable conversations is is a superpower of mine. And I’m just honored to have an opportunity engage with so many different people.
Dr. Michael Conner
Yeah. And you know, I’ve heard you speak nationally. And even within your district talking about your superpower, we’re going to elaborate on that as we start to get into the podcast. But, you know, I got… I’m gonna tell my audience this, I got a nickname for Dr. Luvelle Brown, Dr. Luvelle Brown is the Tyson Beckford of education. So when he said his song is Smooth Operator, absolutely. But here’s the thing, the vitality with the content, which makes it so smooth, when you hear about differentiation, when you hear about engagement, when you hear about using your superpower to be able to positively change and also curtail culture, as I said, we’re going to get into that. The way that Dr. Brown does it is just very, very smooth. So that is an appropriate song for you, my brother. When you said that I just started singing “smooth operator.” But Dr. Brown, getting into the next question. You are the proud Superintendent of Ithaca Public Schools and Ithaca in New York. And New York has always been perceived as the innovation hub in the United States. But you’re consider a Czar, specifically in the area of organized national culture and the way you unpack culture makes that simple. It looks like it’s simplified but at the same time, it is very arduous to change. You have lamented these progressive policies with regards to culture change and how to limit equity through your work of love. Creating that culture of wealth now from a systems and classrooms perspective, right? How do you democratize that change over time in a teaching and learning organization that is underpinned by a culture of love using your theory and research?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
I know I’m in the presence of brilliance and excellence when I’m asked a question that deep. So thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to reflect and to learn and use the word. I love the word democratize. And you know, the best democracies are those that are stable and those that have stability and leadership and those that are committed. And I would say it starts there. You know, I’m coming up on finishing my 13th year as a superintendent in this amazing, beautiful town, Ithaca, New York. And we’ve been on a beautiful journey together. So just that alone, 13 years, close to 13 years through all of this struggle, through all of the resistance, through all of the successes, that’s a long time. And what I and my governance team and my community have committed to was to partner on this work and this journey together. We’ve grown up together. And when you grow up together, that requires a significant amount, as I mentioned, of love. And that love involves forgiveness, that love involves trust, that love involves a deep level of caring, empathy. And what you don’t hear is ego. You and I both, because of the gift and talent we have, we’ve had opportunities to be anywhere. And I have chosen to stay in this community and make it my own. I have a 50 year vision for this community and the school district. And to get there is going to require me to stay for a long time. So this democracy is strong because it’s stable and it’s committed to the work. Now, we’ve also, throughout my time, we’ve had to develop some common understandings and mental models for language. And language is important. We’ve used the language throughout the history of our species to dehumanize. We’ve used it to exclude, we’ve used it to divide. We’ve used language to build, to construct, to collaborate. Now you’ve got to have a lot of common mental models around what language is and what words are worth, like equity and inclusion. And diversity means something to us. Now we spend a lot of time defining those terms and coming up with what those terms mean for us. And what we landed on is it’s good for… what I’m talking about here is good for everybody, it’s not polarizing. It does not create us versus them. It’s not a zero sum game. This work that we are about here is for everybody. And we had to come. We had to get real tight about the words we were using to describe it, because we truly reflect in real ways about language and come up with common understandings. Nobody can tell you what you’re saying, you know what it is. So I would talk about the language first. And in the process, we’ve been very clear about a process, and we’ll get into that a little, I’m sure. But we define the process we will go through together. And it’s an iterative and ongoing process. And we’re very clear, again, with language about where we are in that process. We’ll come back to it in a little bit, I’m sure. But we talk about where we are when we’re reflecting, we talk about where we are when we’re building and engaging in the friction and the conflict. We talk about where we are when it’s time to sit down and write a new policy. So we got to be clear about where we are in the process, how long said processes will take. And we celebrate when we navigate through those stages of the process. So I hope I’m giving you a sense of that democracy. We’re very clear.
Dr. Michael Conner
I’ll tell you this, Dr. Brown, I’m just capturing all of your sentiments, highlighting. And you perfectly contextualized how to be able to change a culture at its root. When you talk about this mental model alignment, that is the biggest shift of culture. And I want to reference, because you highlighted, I mean, perfectly contextualized what a lot of executive leaders do is focus on the structural aspects of the culture. You are going deep into to the content aspects of the culture where now you’re looking at these laten and manifested, I say, notions in a culture where you’re aligning mental model with the two most critical elements – language, sheer language, common language, as you talked about brother, and dealing and then defining processes around culture. I mean that right there. See, I explained it… I would explain it like that, Dr. Brown, but people who come to you would be like, How do you do this? Like, oh, okay, it’s like that because you simplified it. You simplified culture where now it’s addressing a very big theoretical frame. So I appreciate that brother, because it could be easily deteriorating. What we see in education around equity, inclusion and justice work. But the intentionality around the language development and the processes that are focused on this mental model, it underscores what you stated – democratizing culture. But again, you talk about this high level of commitment. Commitment needs to be embedded within the organization around this. And 13 years man, I tell you, everybody should look up to you, brother. I mean, if you make it past two these days, you’re considered a vet – 13 and one. If you want to find out what the strategy is of how to apply this to a mental model around some of the most contentious work, equity, inclusion and justice go to Ithaca, New York, and reach out to Dr. Brown. But, Dr. Brown, I want to now talk about your national work. And congratulations, because right now you’re currently campaigning for the National Association of Black School Educators, NABSE National President. Okay. Okay. Making big moves. Now, we know NABSE you know Dr. Atiba who is the executive director, a lot of the the state affiliates… I’m a part of G-NABSE, the Greater New England chapter of NABSE. But this organization has a rich history supporting black superintendents, leaders, teachers and educators across the country. Now to my audience, I have a big audience that you know, is a part of NABSE, I have a big audience that you have votes for NABSE. So if you are elected president of NABSE and this is going back to now, you got to go back 13 years ago with this entry plan. What would your first days look like as president elect and president of NABSE? And also how would you achieve a vision that would impact all NABSE affiliates across this country?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
And thank you for that question. And it has truly been an honor to be a member of NABSE and it would be a privilege and an honor for sure to be elected into this very important role at this very important time. I think through my leadership, what I have done as a superintendent, what I’ve done as an educator, is most importantly honor the past. I know that we stand on the shoulders of giants. We are here because of the work that our elders have done to put us in this position, to have this voice and these opportunities. I will honor the past and, you know, lead us to the new future. To… you know NABSE has a bright future ahead and it’s going to require someone, myself, frankly, with my talents as a leader that’s able to assess very quickly current state, very quickly, establish some relationships, particularly the relationships that are needed for very strategic partnerships and work, and then implement. Us Superintendents, as we know, you survive the Superintendency one year and then 13 years by assessing the current state, providing a vision for the future, building relationships and then implementing very effectively and efficiently and we have some work to do. with NABSE. There is financial stability that needs to be achieved. Most national organizations have had struggles, particularly most recently with the pandemic. What we do now and what we do next will allow for us to survive and create a sustainable future, irrespective of future pandemics and other issues, other crises. Financial stability is important, and as a leader, this opportunity, I’ve been fortunate to be a part of some redesign and overhaul and saving institutions in need of financial support. And then I would also say because of my work nationally and my connections to corporate partners and strategic partners, I think NABSE needs to think more, do more to partner with some of the biggest and best organizations in the country, corporate partners, but specifically as we look to be sustainable, do more and more work, bigger events, a more sustainable conference approach and professional development. I’ve seen other organizations that have done much to spearhead and provide professional development and additional support for leaders. NABSE should be the leader of that work. And so I see us and NABSE doing some work, particularly with my professional development background and connecting with folks like yourself. We should be the primary source for the best professional development, particularly when it comes to engaging and teaching our young people, black and brown students all over the country. So financial stability, corporate partnerships and professional development would be a big part of my entry plan if given this wonderful opportunity.
Dr. Michael Conner
Yeah. No, that is compelling, right? Because NABSE is near and dear to my heart. Right. And obviously honoring the past is essential, is critical with anything that you do. But also I love how you said to propel to the vision right and corporate partnerships that strategic intent behind it implementation of financial stability, absolutely professional development and support to leaders. And Dr. Brown you know more than ever we’re seeing and this is a rapid change of leadership. Especially with black leaders across the country at the executive level, even at the state level. I heard a statistic, I believe it was roughly a year ago which caught my attention that the black male superintendent is at a rate of eight months. And within the next, I believe, 5 to 6 years, there’s a potentiality that the black superintendent, male superintendent will become extinct because of the rate of turnover that we’re seeing that like you talked about professional development or to leaders and this is kind of a sub very question to this What would be your strategy or sustainability approach to ensure that the black male superintendent does not become extinct?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Thank you for bringing up a topic that too few people want even mentioned. Their extinction happens by design from my perspective. That’s just some world changing event. Most likely the extinction happened because folks that purposely tried to make something extinct and I have seen it throughout the nation, folks have come for a black superintendent in a very strategic, grimy is another word I like to use… So yes, what you’re noting is real and particularly the black Superintendents who are having a significant impact on the access and opportunity for all of our young people. And like myself, like you and me do that work. Well, people want to find all kinds of reason for you not to be there anymore, and it requires a lot to survive it. One, it requires a community that’s truly committed. It requires a board governance team that gets it and is truly committed and loving. And more importantly, it requires a network. From that perspective, the key to the blacks who attended surviving and then thriving will be the network that we’re able to cultivate. This work cannot be done in isolation. This work cannot be done without a support network. This work cannot be done without the influence of an affinity group that includes black males who witness. And I’ve been, for the last four or five years, I’ve done everything in my power to bring together the folks who look like us in leading in these ways, just to support each other, to break bread, to laugh, to be by that mental, social, emotional, physical support that we need to do the work and to bring numbers in when the work is hard or when people are coming in for one, they can’t pick us off one at a time if we come in at this work together. So I hope… the affinity group is going to be, from my perspective, the most important thing going forward. We need to rally and we need to rally together in order to survive this thing together in isolation. We’re going to be too easy to pick off. It’s going to be too easy to pick us off one at a time. And I’m committed. And I also say I don’t know many black males Superintendents who have survived this, having done this for a long time, where I made the outlier. So what I also know I’m humble enough to know that at some point your time is going to come. But what I hope I’ve done and what I hope I’m cultivating is someone to take my place when I’m gone. We’re here only for a short amount of time. Who will be inspired to pick up and take this on? Because you can choose to do a whole lot of other stuff and make more money and have a whole lot less stress. You feel me? Who is going to pick this up and do it when we’re gone, when they can choose not to, that’s the work. So I hope that wasn’t too long winded of an answer, but that’s how I feel about it.
Dr. Michael Conner
Yeah. No. And I’m happy that you unwraped that and unpacked that because I know that this is near and dear to your heart and you want to bring this to NABSE and you are the outlier across the country. You’re kind of like the gold standard. We’ve seen some really, really good superintendents, specifically African-American male superintendents. I’m going to speak specifically. I’m not leaving out our black and brown, our black sisters that are out there are brown brothers and sisters. I’m just isolating this specific, I like to say coefficient. This specific focus around African male educator, specifically in the superintendent role. And Dr. Brown is the gold standard – 13 years. When we come together, we look at actually who’s out there that’s still in the position and the constant is Dr. Luvelle Brown. So your perspective, your voice, your ability to, I’m going to have to put in this word, survive because the best of the best don’t survive as long as you, you bring that perspective and could bring that leadership to NABSE. So I appreciate that and I appreciate you talking about who is going to be the next generation of leaders to continue the work, the shoulders that we stand on. In my book, Intentional, Bold and Unapologetic: A Guide to Transform in Schools and AC Stage of Education, I talk about the shoulders that I leaned on or I was on that helped me get to be the youngest Superintendent in the state of Connecticut at the time. And black male superintendents, I get that. Who are the next shoulders and Luvelle, you’re building the shoulders for somebody who’s going to be able to stand on them and appreciate that for the work that you do nationally. So I want to get to your book because it kind of ties back to a couple questions ago. Culture of Love has been used by many districts, by leaders across the country, internationally, you’re speaking about it. It’s just a magnet for change. But it’s a magnet to know how to do the work from an organizational standpoint. So using your book as a guidepost to affect and enact culture change in this continuous improvement process and the AC stage of education is hard. You know, like I said, you present an unorthodox, albeit innovative, approach in your book to become a culturally responsive change agent, I should say. Now in a snapshot. If my audience have not engaged with you with regards to the major themes from Culture of Love, what are they? And just as again, a high level abstract snapshot of how would it apply to my district if I was a leader, if I was a principal or even a classroom practitioner?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Thank you for that question. And I’m remiss for not beginning with congratulating you on your wonderful book. You have a you have a bestseller on your hands. Yeah. So congrats on doing such a great job with that text and I hope it gets into the hands of every educator in America. So thank you for your leadership.
Dr. Michael Conner
But I appreciate that. Dr. Brown, so on that not, I’m just letting everybody know, the podcast show is over. Dr. Brown shut it down. That‘s it, that’s all I need. I just needed my endorsement. Goodbye, Dr. Brown. Nah, I’m playing. Yeah, well, thank you. I appreciate it, my brother.
Dr. Luvelle Brown
It’s inspiring, beautiful, awesome book and I love how your fraternity colors are embedded throughout. Oh here we go again. Because mine are embedded throughout mine. So this is a lot, I take this lesson from the young people I serve who say, you can’t learn with me and you can’t teach me unless I know who you are. And so it’s pushed us to embed identity work in all that we do, every lesson, every assessment, every unit, every meeting we do some type of identity exercise so that we’re very clear about who we are as leaders before we can begin to be culturally responsive for the young people and learn as we serve. Now, saying that my book explores who I am, I do a bit of a self-reflection about my identity. How did I get here? Who am I? And I do that every single day, But I did a little bit of that in the book, so you will know who I am because unless you know who I am, the book won’t matter because you won’t learn with me. So the book gives a… you get a sense of who I am, where I’m from, and how I got here. And then I quickly jump into the process, the process I describe as the process to build a sustainable model of excellence particularly around equity and access for all. How do you build that? And so I go through the three different stages, three distinct stages. I mentioned earlier the first stage of the round reflection. Who are we as individuals, and who are we as an organization? And we really talk about the way in which we can be critically self-reflective. What data do we look at? What questions do we ask? What lens do we use to evaluate our current systems, structures, policies? Who are we? What’s happening? That reflection is important because if we do that in a real way, if we do that in a strategic way with some of the props, some of the lessons from my book and my other work, you will then shift to the next stage which is, I call it a conflict, but see, some states don’t like using that word conflict. They like to refer to it as intellectual friction. But if maybe we reflect in a real way, broadly reflecting the real way, it’s going to lead to some friction. And that’s the capacity building. When you truly reflect, we know we can’t continue to do what we’ve always done, which has been exclusive, which has marginalized, which has been oppressive. So then we engage in it oftentimes a long period of time, of truly engaging and compelling… What do we need to shift? What barriers need to be removed, what development needs to be in place? That’s an important stage because then and only then can we lead to that last stage of policy. And I describe in my book the way in which we must look at the policies, the Board of Education policies, the school handbooks, the rules on the wall, the syllabus. See, there are so many habitual actions that are done onto someone or something that had been written down. And when you do this work in a way that I’ve done it for so long, the words that speak to inequities and oppression, those words literally jump off the page for me. But you can’t truly do it… You can’t look at that policy and change it unless you’ve gone through the reflections and the friction first. So my book sort of walks folks through that process because I say if you go through that process, you’re cultivating a culture of love. See, the culture of one organization does not change until you have a true understanding of the existing culture. And then, when you apply antidote, i.e., policy… See the culture of our organizations currently have been designed by design through the policies we implement. Now we can go back hundreds of years, if not thousands of years, and look at organizations, governments, systems and see that the policies have created the culture, the culture of exclusion, the culture of racism, sexism, ableism. I speak to how if we’re going to change and have access and opportunity for everybody, we need to be cultivating a culture of love. And then I go through and I define the principle of love. And once you define those principles, those habitual actions done unto someone or something… See, love is not a love fest. Love is a struggle. And as Martin Luther King said, I’ve learned it as the Superintendent, if you’re truly cultivating love, love can get you killed. Love can get you fired, because love is not the default. And when you truly know what it is and what I’m about, the work I am about every single day is about cultivating a culture of love. And this journey is tough. So I thought folks through that process, the lessons learned, the struggles we’ve had on that journey, but most importantly, how to use about it in a way where it becomes sustainable. I hope that with a bit of a snapshot and actually inspiring a movement.
Dr. Michael Conner
Well, that was that was the $8 version from your book. So now people only got to pay about $25 now, right? But no, no, I appreciate it because Luvelle, oh, wow. As you were going through this, and I want my audience, I try to use this as a professional learning tool, a mechanism for them to go back and aggregate, reflect, ideate, go back, listen to your content or whoever’s content. And then reflect and implement. Right. Because I want to use this as an asynchronous tool of learning. And to my audience, please, that last answer, that unwrapped specific aims around the culture of love, take that in. Because Dr. Brown was saying a lot about who we are, self-organization before you can get into any radical stereo change management process, continuous improvement cycles with systems of structures around strategy. You’ve got to look at culture, but before that you have to assess the culture from this diagnostic lens to be able to fly. What I like to say, the antecedents for change, and as Dr. Brown was going through this morning, he’s talking about policy work, when he’s talking about reflection as important in conflict, Right. Importance of conflict. I remember right. And Dr. Brown, I must share this with everybody, you and I sat on, and you know what I’m about to say. We sat on the learning 2025 National Commission. I’m gonna bring that up. And this national commission was comprised of I mean, it was a who’s who. And I saw the Luvelle in there and I remember I DMed Luvelle and said, you ready to cause some trouble and Luvelle just smiled. So as we developed this report for the United States Department of Education that was disseminated to, I believe it was Dr. Cardona and his team. With regards to that, you are in 2025 National Commission report. We actually, Dr. Brown and I was trying to push the group to include language around anti marginalization because in order to really start lamenting the change that we wanted to in our report, we didn’t just want to be a report that had specific action items, we wanted to go deep into the genetic structures of an organization. So that reached this level of anti marginalization. And I know the policy work that Dr. Brown has underscored in Africa and also being a mentor to other superintendents across the country with regards to reaching that level of anti marginalization. This is another sub variant, Dr. Brown. So how do we now… we know that you have to be able to push towards this level of anti marginalization. The advocacy that we were doing as we were developing or constructing the Learning 2025 National Commission report. If equity is still a taboo in education, are we ever going to reach that level of anti marginalization that you’ve been highlighting for years?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Yeah, we’re going to get there. I’m an optimist and I’m hopeful. That’s why I’m still an educator and a superintendent. If not being optimistic and hopeful, I should probably be doing something else. So I do believe we will get there. I also, as I mentioned earlier, I have a 50 year vision for the work. It’s going to take time. It’s going to take different generations of leaders like you and I to lead this, because what I do know is that we have still… today we have too few leaders who are taking the authentic journey that you and I have. And the authentic journey is very, very different from what I describe as the academic one, the academic one. We’ve been doing very well in our industry, particularly the leaders where we we talk a lot. We send out a lot of articles, we write a lot of articles. We write statements in response to some of this work. We tend to talk about holiday names and statues. I see the folks all the time up in Charlottesville, Virginia. We have folks talk about those statues for generations. And when it came down, nothing really changed around here. So I’m done with this academic work. See, the academic work can get you awards. The academic journey can get you recognized, but it doesn’t really disrupt the existing system. It doesn’t really eradicate the inequities. You may see some incremental improvements at best. See this authentic journey that I’m on, which I’ve seen too few people decide they want to take this approach. And frankly, too few people survive it because the authentic work results in access and opportunities to everybody. When we start talking about our schools being laboratories for social change, you can go into a classroom and really significantly experience agency and efficacy and you can change what’s happening in your local community, particularly around issues around ableism, classism, sexism, racism. When you can truly do that by going through school, then you know you’ve done something when you changed the pedagogy. See, I know what culturally responsive teaching strategies look like. I know what pedagogy looks like when it’s culturally responsive, and it looks different than what we see most times in schools. It’s loud. It’s if there’s movement, there is differentiation, there is giving over the voice and a choice to young people. So we don’t see that very often. See, when we were on this authentic journey, we are changing policies. We’re changing policies that have been designed to produce the inequities that we say we want to eradicate. So those three things I just mentioned, I can go on, get people fired every day because when you start to do that, people feel uncomfortable. People push back. People have to give up privileges. And giving up those privileges result in folks wanting to stop it. See the academic journey. People have heard me say that before. The academic journey can win you awards, you know, the authentic one will get you fired and too few people are willing to take that risk.
Dr. Michael Conner
Right?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
And until we get a critical mass or we have people, or we have a significant number. When we can scale that authentic journey, then we will see what you and I have imagined and dreamed up. I don’t see it happening in the next two, three, five years. I hope in the next ten, 15, 20, if that makes some sense.
Dr. Michael Conner
Absolutely. And you know, I’m with you on this journey because the rationale that developed my text or book was a new approach to penetrate and interrogate the current construct of the system for educators to use universally so that we can create that coalition, Dr. Brown. Because you’re right, we’re losing kids and what I mean by we’re losing kids is that, A. There is an outdated and archaic model that we’re continuing to implement. I want to underscore your statement because you are 1,000% correct. Culturally responsive pedagogy is different from traditional pedagogical practices where you see this misnomer of people saying they’re culturally responsive because they’re integrating resources into the curriculum. There’s a… there’s a whole construct of research and theory and practice around the culturally responsive practices. But I love how you used the laboratory of change, Dr. Brown. But you highlighted one thing that I think a lot of leaders become apprehensive of doing this work is because people feel like when their privilege is compromised in education, that they’re losing something. And you know, that losing something, whatever it may be, creates a resistance and opposition kind of like that cause and effect. But I want to go out to this next question because it kind of nicely, seamlessly goes into it and I want to be intentional when I frame this question from the analytical context, but I want you to put it in your words. And please, taking words from my book, answer boldly, and unapologetically, my brother. But public education by 2025. Statistically, 50% of public education is going to be black and brown right? There’s great discussions that we have about excellence and equity occurring across the country. But again, I want to say, you know, kind of going back to your last answer, leaders and stakeholders are apprehensive. And when we talk about it now, I want to talk about focusing on an alignment of that 50% metric for black or Brown students in education. We have to start talking about racial equity. I don’t know why we don’t have a conversation about racial equity on a consistent basis nationally when in reality the demographics of our student population… we have to talk about it. I mean, half our students are black and brown, Dr. Brown. But it’s just like just kind of push it to a side. It’s kind of like this, it’s there… implicitly, we acknowledge it, but explicitly, what are the actions and implementation steps to move beyond this? This is because racial equity has been polarized in the education ecosystem. So we’re at this inevitable time frame. And the AC stage of education, that demographic data coupling various outcome metrics that we’re seeing. You know, I don’t want to talk about the outcome metrics that we see nationally with regards to black and brown students, but we must talk about race in education and the transformation process that’s embedded within the ecosystem. How do we leverage that within this continuous discussion about race in education to truly create an equitable and emergent business or education model that is aligned to the cultural needs of Generation Z and Generation Alpha?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Man, you may be the smartest guy that I’ve talked to in a long time, but thank you again for a great question. It’s therapeutic in many ways to talk to someone like you, but it’s also just educational and inspirational. You mentioned a statistic… you mentioned a statistic that 50% of… soon 50% of our young people in this country in public schools will be black or brown. But I think the… what we have not uncovered at scale and it’s a stat that everyone is talking about is that stat around how many school districts in our country have black or brown students. So now while most of the students will soon be kids of color in our schools, they only are in about 500 districts out of the close to 13,000. So I want folks to fact check me who are hearing this and I don’t know, maybe I’m off a little bit, but it’s not much. Think about our kids only in a few or a fraction of the schools in our country, which means that most schools in our country, school districts, in our country, young people will go through their entire academic career and will never be in a class with or have an educator of color. That’s why… because I have told my policy, policy must change before the culture changes. The policy must change first before the culture changes. That’s why today people are writing laws to say we can’t even talk about race in schools. How does that happen? How did that happen across the country where it’s become taboo to engage in conversations about our history and particularly the issues around oppression that we navigate around the country each and every day? I would go back to because too few people… what most folks and most school districts in our country can do so without having anyone pushback. Now, when it becomes normal to have students who are not black or brown in our country have resources in front of them, that includes black and brown histories, joy, excellence, and the struggles when it becomes normalized for young people who don’t look like you or me to engage in this conversation every single day when folks aren’t around them who look like you and I, that’s when we’re going to win. So I hope I’m making some sense here because I’m in beta form of my thinking here. But what I do know is we’ve been having a real conversation and I have seen how folks have used policies to make sure we continue to have the wrong conversation when the white folks in our country see that the future of our country, the economic future of our country, is dependent upon us understanding what it’s like to live in a multicultural society, in a multicultural economy. When we finally realize that, hopefully they realize it before our country does and the economy doesn’t fall apart. But when we realize that this is good for everybody, then we will see some shifts. But right now, instead of reflecting in a real way and recognizing that the future of our country is dependent upon us having this conversation, we write laws to make sure we don’t talk about it that way.
Dr. Michael Conner
And Dr. Brown, this is a sub variant question. And this is coupling your data metric. We know that 50% of our students by 2025 are going to be black and brown. And there’s roughly about 13,000 districts across the country that are only concentrated to 500 districts. Then there are roughly around, what, 12,500 districts that are going to say, we don’t need this. How do you reverse that conversation?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
You used the word earlier. We were very strategic with our language. We developed our anti marginalization curriculum. There were a lot of folks who wanted to talk about anti-racist curriculum and there are a lot of districts do an anti-racist curriculum work. We call it the anti marginalization curriculum, because we need to have everyone understand and feel what it feels like to feel oppressed. But one stepping back and make sure everyone understands this notion of identity and that there’s a significant amount of diversity in every space we go into. This conversation is about ethnicity, but it’s a lot more than about ethnicity. Issues around gender, class, orientation, religion. We need to talk about how our bias, our invisible spots have contributed to us as a species by becoming comfortable with marginalizing and oppressing, segregating and excluding. So yeah, we’ve got to have every young person engage in the dumb conversations and the education that looks like… that requires us to push back against oppression and marginalization. When every young person understands, what that feels like to be oppressed, what it looks like to shift practices and beliefs. Then we will at scale take on issues around ethnicity and race, if that makes some sense.
Dr. Michael Conner
Absolutely. Because I think that you clarified the misnomer. And I can say this is an egregious misnomer where they are, they have… a lot of people have a linear scope on what anti marginalization work is. It is beyond just race, I want to focus on racial equity. But what Dr. Brown contextualized so eloquently is that it is gender. It is is beyond race. There’s multiple inequities and disparities that we see within our organizations. And there are there are groups that are continuously being marginalized, again, outside of the black and brown community. When we talk about gender equity, when we talk about equity in the context of our LGBTQ plus community, those are marginalized groups that we see within our teaching and learning and organizations. And again, you can fact check me on this, but I believe Generation Alpha represents 10% of the community that come from nontraditional homes. So that’s another level of excellence, equity, justice, as well as anti marginalization work that we have to move into in the AC stage of education to be aligned with the demographic demands that are coming into our schools today and in the future. So, Dr. Brown, thank you for that. And this is the last question. And I’ll take it how it is. I always, I try to limit educators to three words, but they just elaborate and I just say keep going because that’s more for my audience. So take it as it is my brother, what three words do you want today’s audience, today’s audience that’s listening to this podcast, what do you want them to leave them with regarding leadership? The… I like to say the overall arching 25,000 foot lens on every specific key variable that you provided my audience with today. So what three words should our participants always lean on within their leadership signature when it is challenged or confronted with what they’re doing in the context of equity to change their system? What does that leadership signature look like?
Dr. Luvelle Brown
In your… in your subtle way, you challenge me, but I’m your best guest so far. So I’m going to keep it to just three words now. Here they go. One, two, three. All right, check it out. But this is one, I mean the first one is hyphenated, the first one is a hypehenated word. They were critical self-reflection, conflict and love. That’s the process I’ve defined today. Those are the three things we must do over and over again. Those are the three things we must lead our communities through.
Dr. Michael Conner
Dr. Brown, you have to because everybody spent about 10 minutes on this answer you have to… you have to repeat those three words again, because that right there captures your whole change management process around culture that underpins the anti marginalization work that is necessary to reach all. So if you can just say those three words, I would like to say three and a half.
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Yeah, I got you, self- reflection, conflict, and love.
Dr. Michael Conner
Absolutely. And Dr. Brown, if my audience wanted to get in touch with you with regards to this cultural change in regards to self-reflection, conflict, because again, as my as my audience reviews this podcast, I want them to really unwrap candidly what conflicts look like in order to achieve that level. But, you know, obviously there might be more questions. How would they be able to reach you, Dr. Brown.
Dr. Luvelle Brown
Oh, easy man. www.LuvelleBronw.com, pretty simple. And I’m an old guy so LuvelleB@gmail.com. You don’t know many people who have LuvelleB with their first and last initial, so either www.LuvelleBrown.com or LuvelleB@gmail.com.
Dr. Michael Conner
On that note Dr. Brown, Dr. Luvelle Brown who is running for president of NABSE, the proud superintendent of Ithaca Public Schools, thank you for being on Voices for Excellence.
Dr. Luvelle Brown
It was an honor. Thank you for inviting me.
Dr. Michael Conner
Man, it was an honor to have you on, Dr. Brown. I’ve got to call you. We got to talk. We got to catch up. Obviously, we know in the summer. I got to head over to the Browns estate. But on that note, everybody, onward and upward. Have a good day.
