Thank You Veterans!! We can never do enough for you. We can do better. We can do more!! @DeptVetAffairs @SenatorBennet @Hickenlooper @RepDianaDeGette @ColemanforCO

I tell people that what happens in our city shows up at our schools every day. That includes the pain and grief that comes with loss. Please pray for the Marrama family as we mourn the loss and celebrate the life of someone who meant the world to us. More than a teacher, for eighteen years she was a friend and our family. That’s how it happens. We teach and raise children together because we believe in their potential and want to see the fulfillment of their hopes. Ms. W influenced the lives of all of our children. Jaymie and I are forever grateful. Until we meet again my friend. I will continue to loudly cheer for our teams!! Will continue to boldly fight for our children!! Will unapologetically love people to life!! That’s how we did it. @dps_k12

Finished our third community circle with DPS school board candidates tonight in NE Denver at @MontbelloHigh! Shout out to @FaithBridgeCO’s SHIFT23 Fellows. Thank you to Montbello’s amazing facilities team (@dps_k12)! Y’all were great!! Thank you to the candidates: @SiaForDPS (SE), @KwameSpearman (AL) @jyoungq (AL), Charmaine Lindsay (NW) and Marlene De La Rosa (NW), who came out to NE Denver to dialogue with us. Special thanks to current DPS Directors @VPAuontai and @MichelleForDPS for joining us tonight. Next week? We are on the Northside at @DenverNorthHigh!! GO VIKINGS!! @denverfamilies @TEN_Colorado @DenverTeachers @COCharterSchool @ColoradoStand @boardhawk @ColemanforCO @baconforco @DrAlexMarrero @ChalkbeatCO

Sowing seeds of fear about a people group has been the tactic of oppressive culture from the start. It sickens me that there are those that continue to sow the fear seeds, generally, and specifically within the education circles that I work in on a daily basis. The “those kids are the problem” rhetoric and “we’d be safer with them gone” narrative is toxic, intentionally divisive, and reflects the position of the privileged, who are okay with violence that takes some children, happens in some neighborhoods, as long as it doesn’t take their children or happen in their neighborhood. This mindset is the problem. This mindset seeks to maintain structures and systems as they are because they work for them and not for everyone. This mindset continues to make us “bigger and scarier” to justify their hate, their generational biases, and the ongoing push out of US from schools, neighborhoods, and communities, that have been our places of being before they arrived. This mindset has no place at the tables that are influencing anything that is happening in our schools, our districts, our city, and definitely not anywhere that impacts the lives of our children. WE do not have to give it space. WE do not have to appease it. WE do not have to protect your comfort. WE do not have to pretend like it’s okay. IT IS NOT. WE will not live in fear nor be made out that we should be feared. #Dealwiththeracism #SafetydemandsamindsetSHIFT #DPS #APS @dps_k12 @aurorak12 @jyoungq @PaulForDPS @KwameSpearman @scott4schools @SiaForDPS @xochitlaztec @VPAuontai @DPSDirectorE @MichelleForDPS @mcdonald_ssg @ColemanforCO @baconforco @SenadoraJulie @MikeJohnstonCO

I’ve worked in schools in @dps_k12 with students that were facing criminal charges. Some of them were found guilty. Some of them were found innocent. All of them were treated as students the entire process of adjudication. There were adjustments that we had to make as a staff to ensure adherence to court mandated requirements and to co-created school-based safety plans. While we did what needed to be done, we never took our eyes off of the fact that we were still serving students, not criminals. As I have said, the challenges, struggles, pains, and problems of the city, show up in our schools daily. From mental health, to food insecurity, to substance abuse, to unhealed trauma, to child neglect, and sadly to violence, all are present. WE (all people) have to do differently, innovate, and proactively meet the needs of students in equitable ways, at every point of need, IF we are truly committed to their total wellness and the actualization of comprehensive safety. #TheWorkIsNotEasy #CannotBeDoneInSilos #DPS #APS #CCPS @DrAlexMarrero @ColemanforCO @MikeJohnstonCO @DenverPolice @baconforco @leslieherod @MomsDemand @ApBridgeBuilder @GregoryHatcher @jyoungq @KwameSpearman @PaulForDPS @SusanaCDenver @GovofCO @GREATDANE80207

Great time this afternoon with the students, families, and team at @FloCritCO. @FaithBridgeCO shares FloCrit’s commitment to ensuring equitable access and supports for all students in DPS, across the metro area, and Colorado. Let’s go!! @dps_k12 @DrAlexMarrero @xochitlaztec @ColemanforCO #ParentingStudents #Equity instagram.com/p/CwRNdmqslmH/…

Folks like to dismiss data. They find ways to invalidate it. They find ways to discount it. Smart people learn from it. They take time to evaluate the messages that the data is telling us about our policies, practices, personnel, and ultimately our ability to keep our promises to our children. The data continues to scream at us that the same behaviors will get us the same results. Yet, people default to insanity, expecting different results. We have much work to do, as a community, moving together for our children. We are not where we need to be. We must get there soon, without delay. Do differently! @NMartinez_CO @BriarSparrow @dps_k12 @aurorak12 @RootedDenver @DSSTPubSchools @codepted @CoHigherEd @RockyMtnPrep @KIPPColorado @MikeJohnstonCO @DrAlexMarrero @Dr_J_Rodriguez @DrLoradelaCruz1 @VanSchoales @COCharterSchool @ColemanforCO @baconforco #cmas #k12 #Data

100%. It is not enough to just report the data. That’s sharing the effect. Definitely necessary, a must be done with students, families, and those that serve them. Transparently, timely, and thoughtfully. What is important to changing an EFFECT (data) that we don’t like or is not aligned with our hopes, is truth about the CAUSES! “This is happening because______so, we must_______if we want a different effect.” #CMAS #k12 #Intentionality #rootCAUSES @dps_k12 @aurorak12 @CCSDK12 #PlantCornReapCorn

“We think we need to change our results, but the results are not the problem. What we really need to change are the systems that cause those results. When you solve problems at the results level, you only solve them temporarily. In order to improve for good, you need to solve problems at the systems level. Fix the inputs and the outputs will fix themselves.” (Clear) We have to be concerned about what the outputs are telling us about the inputs!! We have to courageously deal with inequitable inputs. Without delay. #CMAS #k12 #rootCAUSE @FaithBridgeCO @RootedDenver @COCharterSchool @TEN_Colorado @dps_k12 @aurorak12 @CCSDK12 @CSIColorado @codepted @DenverTeachers Tired of temporary. Our children deserve a permanent positive shift in the paradigm of possibilities!!

Preview - “Hardened hearts, moving by fear and hate, that want to harden our schools are a threat to the total safety of our children. We cannot allow people, no matter their privilege, professional resumes, or personal resources, to dictate solutions that fail to address the dangerous and deadly root of systemic racism, designed structural inequity, and the false ideology of social supremacy. We refuse to be partnered with organizations and individuals who truly don’t want change, and simply seek their continued comfort. We refuse to be silent about those who would continue the narrative that they and their children are unsafe because we are “bigger and scarier” and therefore not welcome. We remain committed to the beloved community that seeks the good of and provides the equitable supports for all people.” @ChalkbeatCO @boardhawk @DenverGazette @CBSNewsColorado @dps_k12 @rmnaacp @FaithBridgeCO @TEN_Colorado @DrAlexMarrero @MikeJohnstonCO @ColemanforCO @baconforco @BriarSparrow @kkhcowgirl @CBWPA @NMartinez_CO @GomezHoward @RootedDenver @GREATDANE80207 @KAE5280 @DPSDirectorE @MichelleForDPS @xochitlaztec @DrOlson4DPS @scott4schools @VPAuontai #DPS #k12 #copolitics

It is clear that folks don’t think that systemic racism is a safety issue. It is clear that folks don’t think that their racism and supremacy ideology conditioning is a safety issue. They just want to be safe from us. Sounds like the same fear that gets us killed. The same fear that gets us placed in AN centers. The same fear that gets us caged. #dps #Safety More on this tomorrow. Some of these parent groups have shown their true mindsets. Sadly. It never was about LG, or two deans’ lives being nearly taken. It has always been about them and their fears and their comfort. @DrAlexMarrero @NMartinez_CO @BriarSparrow @ApBridgeBuilder @rmnaacp @VScotthaynes @kkhcowgirl #Powerconcedesnothing

If you say that you are about safety for all students and you use the umbrella of safety to justify horrendous acts against black and brown students, you are not about safety for all students. I boldly and unapologetically say that you aren’t about safety, you are about continued supremacy. You are operating from a mindset that you must keep “these children” safe from “those children” and you don’t see the root of racism in your position. Light shine and expose it all. #Safety #Supremacy #DPS #k12 @FaithBridgeCO @dps_k12 @boardhawk @TEN_Colorado @RootedDenver

Let me increase the VOLUME. Anyone who has looked the other way, kept silent, or dismissed voices to protect your standing in the enclave of privilege, your behaviors are just as problematic. Your hands are not clean. Your conscience should be heavy. WE have been telling you! Don’t say, “we didn’t know.” You did! You chose not to listen to voices that in your mind are less than. Let’s get real with this.

Let me say it LOUDER! Someone who did right by your child, but does wrong by another child, should be held accountable by YOU because you should expect every child to be treated as well and as equitably as your own child. That’s the problem. Privilege ain’t worried about the “other children” that are being failed, enduring hostile learning environments, navigating micro-aggressions daily, surviving in school rather than thriving. #dps #seclusion #segregation #selfish @NMartinez_CO @LadyTenn @GREATDANE80207 @mayamoo25 @ApBridgeBuilder @dps_k12 @boardhawk

Your greatest resources are your relationships. Take care of them!