Welcome to The Bored of Ed! In our first episode, Jonathan Santos Silva and Doc Miller introduce some of this season's "Bored Members" by asking Anashay Wright, Kyle Quadros, and Dr. Diana Cournoyer one question: "20 years from now, we could be looking back on the response to COVID-19 as the disruption that led to a vastly different and more equitable education system. How does that system operate and what did we do to create it?"

We have endured countless reforms to the public education system, but what do we have to show for it? Black, Indigenous, and other students of color continue to be left behind by a system that was not designed to serve them. In this episode, we welcome back Anashay "Teach Em" Wright, Founder & Chief Executive Disruptor of Disruptive Partners, to explore the role that parents and communities can play in disrupting systems of inequity.

Educators often discuss trauma and promote "trauma-sensitive" approaches, but what does that really mean? In this episode, Kyle Quadros, Co-Founder & Chairman of Tilo Learning, teaches us what trauma is, what it does to our brains (students and adults), and what we can do to be both proactive and responsive in healing our communities as we look to recover from COVID-19.

While most schools and districts have made major shifts to accommodate virtual/distance learning, no where is the challenge more pronounced than in rural communities faced with limited broadband access. In this episode, we discuss how COVID has impacted rural communities, why internet and device access ought be a human right, and what we can all learn from Indigenous educational thought and philosophy with Dr. Diana Cournoyer (Oglala Lakota) of the National Indian Education Association.

The modern American public school system has never encountered anything like COVID-19... or has it? Within the last 15 years, we have seen schools closed for extended periods due to hurricanes, wildfires, and flooding that forced communities and authorities to partner in finding ways to serve students and families. In this episode, Dr. David Hardy, VP of People & Culture at Education Elements and a former superintendent, wonders how looking closer at analogous situations might help schools and districts return stronger, and more equitably, than ever before.

Inequity may be a feature of the public school system but, as the pandemic, police violence, and social unrest have shown us, our schools are not alone. Inequity, while not as tasty, is as American as apple pie. In this XL episode, David Johns, Executive Director of the National Black Justice Coalition and the former Executive Director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans under President Barack Obama, lends his voice to the national conversation on how the increasingly common stories of the disregard for Black life are impacting our health and quality of life, especially for people with intersectional identities (BIPOC & LGBTQIA+). #TeachtheBabies

As we reach the midpoint of season one, Jonathan and Doc engage new Bored Members Malika Ali, Keina Newell, Ron Rapatalo, Dr. Darryl Tonemah, and Karla Vigil in the conversation that launched this podcast: "20 years from now, we could be looking back on the response to COVID-19 as the disruption that led to a vastly different and more equitable education system. How does that system operate and what did we do to create it?"

When some politicians and media members began referring to COVID-19 as the “China virus” in the spring of 2020, they shattered the Model Minority Myth. Seemingly overnight, Asian American & Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities experienced a rise in racially-motivated violence and aggressive verbal confrontations from people who had taken the bait and were blaming AAPI folks for the spread of the virus. In this XL episode, Ron Rapatalo (Principal at Edgility Consulting) joins Jonathan and Doc in a wide-ranging conversation about the Model Minority Myth, what it takes to build power across lines of difference, and what it means to be a true equity warrior.