Donuts in the Lounge: A Podcast for Educators

What does it mean to be a storyteller in education?

It’s a bonus episode of Donuts in the Lounge! I got to chat with two of my favorite education creators, Mathew and Green and Dr. Julie Schmidt Hasson. We talked about why storytelling turned out to be an important part of our creative projects.

I got to hang out with Tiffany Lee, who is a School Psychologist in northern Virginia and a YouTube content creator. Thousands of viewers tune in to learn from Tiffany’s experiences as a school psychologist. She’s made videos about a day in the life of a school psychologist, resume tips from school psych grad students, what it’s like to be a school psych intern, administering school psych tips like a pro, and more.

On this episode, I chat with Data Visualization expert and one of my data heroes, Dr. Stephanie Evergreen. Stephanie has done keynotes and workshops for Fortune 500 clients, like MasterCard and Facebook. She also works with mission-aligned clients, like the United Nations, the Boys and Girls Club, AARP, and The Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium. She has three books and a popular blog about data visualization.

Grab a coffee and your favorite donut and let’s go deep on data visualization in Stephanie’s trademark style—authentic, practical, funny, and social justice-minded. Enjoy the episode.

Links

In this episode, I got to hang out with Graciela Flores who is a teacher, content creator, and one of the first teachers I talked to while researching for The K–12 Educator’s Guidebook.

Do you ever wish someone with lots of experience in the classroom would open up their bag of tricks and talk about how they work? If that’s you, you’ll want to settle in and check this out. It’s like a mini-workshop on dual immersion instruction. It’s also a mini-workshop on practical data use, whether you teach in a dual immersion classroom or not. 

In This Episode:

• The beauty of learning more than one language
• An explainer of dual immersion programs
• Examples of what data Graciela looks at and how she uses it
• How Gracie uses reporting + observations + conversations to understand her students’ thinking and plan her teaching

Links

In this episode, I got to hang out with Megan who was one of the first teachers I talked to while researching for The K–12 Educator’s Guidebook. I really like Megan’s story because of her drive to refine her craft. That’s really inspiring to me. She even has a surprise plot twist in her career journey that we talk about.

When I interviewed Megan for the book I wanted to know what resources teachers liked. Megan showed me a book, which would influence how I wrote the K–12 Educator’s Data Guidebook. Or rather, Megan’s relationship with the book influenced me. That’s because I saw how a book that was practical could fit into the tool kit of a highly motivated teacher like Megan.

Listen on to find out what that book was plus a whole lot of practical data tips directly from a teacher in the field.

I got to hang out with researcher, author, and educator Dr. Julie Schmidt Hasson! Here's what we talked about: 

• Why using data is very rarely black and white and what it’s like to be brave enough to explore in those grey areas
• We explore the question Can we quantitatively measure teacher impact?
• How educators can use stories more in their every day work

Links from the Conversation 

If you're reading The K-12 Educator's Data Guidebook, this episode goes great with chapter 7, “Student Level Data” and chapter 8, "Accountability Data.”

Hi, I’m Ryan Estrellado and this is Donuts in the Lounge: A Podcast for Educators.

I’ve worked in public schools since 2001 as a school psychologist and as an administrator. I’ve met a lot of educators over the years and they all have one thing in common: they want to create the best possible experience they can for students. But the truth is, that means something different to everyone. And there are challenges along the way. On this podcast, we talk about those challenges honestly. 

You’ll hear from teachers, leaders, and researchers about what they’re up against in their education jobs. We don’t always have the solutions. But we definitely have each other and the chance to talk about our reality.

Season 1 of Donuts in the Lounge is about how we use data in schools. I care a lot about this topic. I’m fascinated with the human elements of data use in schools, the reasons people love it, the reasons people can’t stand it, and how people’s beliefs have changed about it.

Many of these stories are in a book I wrote, The K-12 Educator’s Data Guidebook: Reimagining Practical Data Use in Schools. It’s available for preorder now or if you’re listening to this after March 22, 2022, is out on virtual shelves as we speak.

And if you join my email list you’ll get a discount code for 20 percent off, plus other free resources like podcast episode summaries.