Pedro Noguera on PBL & Equity | PBL World 2019 Keynote

it's great to be here I want to thank the buck Institute for inviting me and despite how hard it was to get here traveling from the east coast yesterday I'm I'm excited to be here with all of you I'm glad he mentioned my eldest son cuz he would be really happy about that he's working on his doctorate right now at UCLA and he often feels as though someone who has a strong commitment and interest in practice is not valued in the Academy and I let him know well he's valued here but I actually have five kids and they go from age 36 Joaquin is 36 to Abel who's 7 so it's quite a span and I often tell people if you have more than one child and you're practicing equity at home that's why I'm an expert exactly anybody with more than wild child knows they're all different they sometimes you have to prioritize the needs of one over the other doesn't mean you love them more although some people have favorites I don't have favorites but it just makes sense but as a parent you always focused on the outcomes and the outcomes that matter not simply how well they do in school because if they do well in school but they're strung out on drugs we still have a problem don't work or if they get great scores but are miserable unhappy people that's not too good either so we always have to think in a more holistic manner about our kids and that of our own and I think the kids that we serve in our schools now a lot of this I got early on but I got it kind of intuitively I just it just made sense to me how many of you are first-generation college students or were okay I come from a family let's give a hand to all of us first gen me too neither my parents graduate from college neither them graduate from high school but they managed to set all six of us to college Harvard Brown Cornell Berkeley big deep from coming from Brooklyn New York Brownsville where I grew up that's the part of Brooklyn list I still hasn't gentrified well when I got to college I was awfully intimidated because I didn't feel prepared and I realized I was surrounded by some of the wealthiest people in the world once people in my class was John F Kennedy jr. so I said well I'm in over my head here but I had a great desire to do something practical that is to use my education way to make a difference for others so at first I thought well I'll be pre-med the doctors are helpful and then I remembered you know I hate chemistry so that organic chemistry was really a reminder of how much I hate it I said well there must be other ways to help people and I took a psych course and got hooked into schools working with kids and so during my senior year I did my student teaching in Providence at Central High School which at the time I was told was the worst high school in the city but because I was young and enthusiastic I said let me add it I'm ready so I was asked to teach American history and my mentor teacher tells me American history is very simple you start at the Revolutionary War in September and you get to the Vietnam War in June that's all as far as you go I said okay he says ah here's the book I'll be the back watching I said what about the Constitution he said don't get caught up in the Constitution Constitution is too complicated you got to be at the Civil War by Christmas I said well Civil War is really complicated he said no you don't get it you have to be a Great Depression by Easter and then I got it he didn't care for kids actually learned history all he cared about is if I covered the material well fortunately for me he wasn't gonna be the back watching he was gonna be off drinking coffee which meant that although I was only 21 when the door closed I had the power and because I had a love of teaching I said I know what to do with this power because I loved history so I gotta find a way to make them love history too I have to make it come to life and so I did what came natural to me I use Socratic seminar techniques that because I knew that problem posing education would invite them in to the conversation and then I got an idea I said I'm going to get friends of mine from college to come dressed up as characters from history so my students could interrogate them but before they came in I prepare them I said we're going to have Thomas Jefferson tomorrow and we need to learn about all the things Jefferson did and some of the issues we need to pursue a little further so when my good friend came dressed as Jefferson they wanted to know about Sally Hemings and how old was she when when he started having children with her so to me the idea that we're going to use education to get children our students excited about learning is what education should be about but as many of us know that's not what it's been about over the last several years we've been fixated on how to raise test scores raise achievement and those are not unimportant outcomes but we forgot all about how to get there how do you get kids motivated how do you get them excited so they want to learn I try to remind people you know the achievement data the achievement indicators with the Potomac test score is a graduation rate so grades those are the outcomes now the question is how do we move them how do we get them there if you wanted to lose weight would you focus on getting a good scale and weighing yourself as often as you could well that's what we're done of that education right we focus on the scale but we forget that now we've got to figure out how to get there the equivalent of the diet and the exercise is the engagement how do we get kids engaged and that is fundamentally an equity issue it's an equity issue that's in a lot of schools the only kids who get to do the fun exciting things are the kids we think are college material our best students and the ones we think are not really that smart or not that capable we're gonna give them direct instruction we're gonna talk at it as if that were effective strategy I would say the big problem in a lot of our schools is that we don't teach kids the way they learn we expect them to learn the way we teach and when they can't do it then we blame them we say something is wrong with them or their parents if we just spend a little time thinking about how kids learn things we would realize that product based learning is should have been at the core of what we've been doing for so long how's the child learn to play a new video game alright playing they don't download the lecture first right they get on there and play in fact some kids will cheat they will go to youtube to figure out okay how do you play this game it's not really cheating is it that's called modeling and of course when they're learning they make mistakes because mistakes are part of learning but they stick with it and over time they get better and better so they get to experience mastery ask yourself now how often do our kids get to learn through their mistakes instead of having mistakes use against them how often do our students get to experience genuine mastery in something so they're ready for something more complex you know there is a reason why we have so many kids entering high school still functioning at an elementary level because the learning they've done has been in each an inch an inch deep so equity has got to be at the center of our work and we know that because our society is becoming more and more unequal those of you live in the Bay Area know how the pressures relate to housing and the rise in homelessness or impacting our quality of life that's not simply a Bay Area promise an American problem steadily we think that schools alone can solve that problem we have a lot of evidence schools alone will not solve that problem but schools can do more than they've done because right now what the evidence shows is that a lot of our schools the strongest predictor of how well our students will do is how much money the family earns and if you combine how much money they earn with their race and the education level of the parents particularly the mother because the mothers usually the first teacher you can predict with great consistency how well our students will do well that should you serve all of us because many of us know there are talented kids out there who come from trailer parks and housing projects and Indian reservations whose parents don't speak English but a lot of our schools that's not the kids we see excelling so we need to make equity central which means that we have to recognize the academic and social needs of a child are connected that sounds so obvious right that hungry kids don't do well in schools so if they come hungry we got to find a way to feed them and some of those kids who have trouble reading might need eyeglasses well our policies haven't addressed those social needs now those of you from California I want to acknowledge California's taking a step we now have an equity based funding formula which for the first time is beginning to give us more resources to address higher needs students but we're still what forty third of the nation and per pupil spending so we got a long way to go to get to where we should be but even as we climb out of this hole we still have to do this equity work because the alternative to that is to continue to produce the same results and those results are killing confidence in public education our parents expect more our parents expect their kids to have a chance because for many of them education is the only chance and so as we start to think about equity in our work I want you to think about how you approach your students how do you approach that opportunity to learn you know many people don't even recognize that homework is an equity issue how many of you help your own kids or homework even when you're tired even when you don't fully understand it and how many you know very well you have students out there that have no one to help them may have no place to even get it done but they're being judged by circumstances they don't control once we take equity seriously we start to realize we're gonna have to do things differently otherwise we're going to continue to lose so many people have seen this chart and they get it okay we've got to make the standards accessible because now all the same although I point out to so many people there are so many ways we continue to treat them all the same how many of you have students right now whose job it is every morning to get their little brothers and sisters to school before they go that means they're often late not because they're irresponsible but because they are responsible for their siblings I was explaining this when I was in Bakersfield recently and super dent raised his hand he said I had just had a revelation our high schools across the street from my elementary school but our high school starts at 7:30 elementary school starts at 8:00 and we literally see kids running across the street to get to school on time after they drop off their brothers and sisters and we finally realize maybe we need to stop offering core courses first period what an accommodation instead of setting people up to fail some people are set up to succeed aren't they they start out way ahead of others there's a reason why you know certain kids are on the pathway to the Ivy League in New York City they actually have preschools they call baby Ivy's people line up as soon as they think they're pregnant to get their kids name on a list together me to the baby Ivy that they think will lead to one of the best colleges in the country I have a daughter like that my fifth child is privileged and it shows she could explain global warming if she were here she would one to she would want to be up on stage with me she knows all the words to the Hamilton songs by heart she's reading Harry Potter she's up to book six now and the other parents will frequently say your daughter is gifted and what parent doesn't want to hear that don't we love to hear that about our kids and then I have to remind my wife you know her gift is she has two parents with PhDs that's the gift that's the gift so how do we create the opportunity to the kids who don't have that who don't have all that support at home who come to us needing more we cannot afford to be schools that are only good at serving kids that don't need much help if I told you it was a great doctor but don't go if you really said he's only good when you're healthy this doctors really good with healthy people well I know a lot of teachers out there to say I'm really good with the highly motivated kids with the high achievers that's who I want to teach I've been doing it so long I only want to teach those kids don't give me the strugglers and sometimes I have to actually work harder and so equity works about eliminating the barriers the barriers to learning and what you think about what some of those barriers are think about this how many you had a teacher at some point in your career that got you to like something they got you to be good at something that you once thought you were no good at anybody lots of you that's good think about that teacher what that teacher did for you I'll teach like that it's great mrs. Harris algebra now I didn't like math that much as it was but one day boy X&Y and two SLK forget it this is I thought this was math where are the numbers and Miss Harris first day of class said how many of you struggle in math so reluctantly I raised my hand and she said okay all the kids who struggle are gonna sit up front is that one to be checking on you because she understood if you didn't get it in September you certainly weren't going to have it by June so she was an evidence-based teacher not a faith-based teacher she want to see the evidence that you actually learning and she would check and she said ask me questions if I say something or explain something I understand you let me know stop me miss Harris wore a lot of perfume so if you want to pay attention you what happened you smell just like Miss Harris after a while so you'd better be on it she understood that the goal of teaching was actually to teach the kids she said I'm the best teacher in the school because she actually knew how to teach people so I want you to think about what are some of the barriers that get in the way are the backgrounds of your students determine the outcomes have we provided the opportunity to learn for all of our students knowing full well that some of our kids are going to need more support more time stronger relationships because our students learn through relationships how many of you think kids that work for one teacher same student won't work for another teacher you know the hardest thing to teach a teacher it's our job to build a relationship because we're the professionals with the adults so lots of us like to take great pride of our students the ones who go on to the top universities who go on to do great things are we also willing to take responsibility for the ones who don't the ones who end up low wage jobs who end up not fulfilling their potential because they're our students too you know most of us don't go into this field for the money do we if you do by now you are really bitter right we go into this field to make a difference and so the question we have to keep asking ourselves is are we are we making a difference for whom are we making a difference and that's why it's so important to be also clear that equity is not about lowering the standards is if we lower the standards then we set kids up they used to have this inflated sense of their ability then they get to college or they get to high school and they realize oh and a at my old school is nothing like what's required here it's also not about just slogans and we've lived through so many clever slogans amber we know Chaleff behind that was a good one except we left so many kids behind and I try to remind people when Marian Wright Edelman came up with the slogan leave no child behind she didn't mean to test the kids as frequently as possible she was thinking about health and nutrition and all the things kids need and equity is not only an issue for school serving low-income kids of color I go to lots of schools that serve affluent kids where I see equity issues all the time amongst the kids with special needs amongst the kids who just don't get it because being affluent is no guarantee that you'll get it amongst the kids who come who are stressed out and depressed or who don't get attention from their parents equity issues show up everywhere and so it also can't be about choosing which kids to serve are we going to serve the high achievers or the low achievers this is what makes it hard we got to serve them all we got to serve them all and I realized as an educator myself how hard that is because they come to us with different needs with different degree of motivation so it's not easy but that's the work so how do we make sure we do it in a way that can actually result in making a difference so for a while now I and several others been pushing this idea of deeper learning that deeper learning is the way to equity people learning is actually not a new idea either right just about utilizing your higher-order thinking skills things like the ability to analyze information to evaluate to apply and hopefully to demonstrate some creativity to undertake and learn through complex tasks and challenging text you acquire the skills you're going to need for college and careers to think critically deeper learning is what prepares you - for citizenship how can you vote intelligently if you can't engage in thinking critically about the issues how can you distinguish bring fake news and real news unless you have been prepared to ask questions and so deeper learning has got to be at the center of our equity work which means we've got to recognize that this can't be limited just to the kids we think are high achievers what's the most common question you've ever heard from any three-year-old why why is a higher-order question why do I have to take a bath they're serious aren't they what will happen if I don't take a bath we have to discuss sanitation now why do I have to eat vegetables we have to talk about nutrition and why is the sky blue now we need help because that's a tough one isn't it but our kids are naturally curious and what it turns out is that curiosity can be a driver of achievement so when we get our kids to utilize those higher-order thinking skills that go beyond memorization they can apply what they've learned one of the things we know it's learning becomes more powerful I saw this in the Bronx on one of the coldest days of the year visiting a high school in the South Bronx and minus 10 degrees outside and I see kids bundling up at 10 a.m. I said where you guys go on it's freezing out they said I know but we have to carry out samples from the Bronx River from the Bronx River now anybody from New York knows you don't touch the Bronx River because it's polluted and you certainly don't touch it in January I said why it's because we're monitoring what pollutants are in the river and we're monitoring the plant life the animal life and two kids excitedly told me they'd spotted beavers now in the Bronx River two gay beavers living together in the Bronx River and they wanted to tell me all about it then I asked the science teacher why are the kids staying the Bronx River in their chemistry class is it because I want them to be scientist and I want them to see how science is applied in their world and how it can be used to make a difference in their lives so I said you have higher goals don't you it's a much higher she wasn't just focused on the test this is a teacher who knew that focusing on lecture least effective teaching strategy my friend Roland Thorpe called this the cemetery method of instruction line them up in rows keep them as still as possible deadly for a lot of kids isn't it so one reason why so many kids say school is boring here's what we know when you start teaching through discussion when you start teaching through practice through demonstrations it takes more planning doesn't it it's harder it's the reason why many people just focus on direct instruction that's all they can do but it's not all the kids can do so we have good research now that curiosity can be a driver of achievement because when kids are curious and they remind you it's they're naturally curious they start to take ownership they start to seek it out dr. Shaw says high levels of curiosity can close the achievement gap do you believe it how often do your students come to you at the end of the day and say wow that was a hell of a lesson thank you very much can't wait to come back I need some more of that that's what happens sometimes shouldn't it good teaching it's like good cooking how you know it was a good cook they tell you that was good I want some more let me know when you're cooking again think about the teacher to have impact on you what did they do how come they still you still remember some of you can still even remember some of the lessons they taught curiosity reminds us that our work as educators has to also be creative because teaching is both art and skill and over and over again I see teachers who have figured this out but too often they're working in isolation I was in Baltimore visiting a first-grade classroom and the teacher brings out a hermit crab she's got everybody's attention and the kids are gathered around they'd never seen one before so they've got said what are your questions they've got lots of questions where are the eyes can you tell if it's a boy or a girl how what do they eat where they live and after Askren answering the question she said okay I want you to write a story about the crab draw a picture of the crab and for the next hour and a half these kids were totally engaged kept coming up to look and I asked her why did you bring in the crab she said because it's not good enough to just show a picture and you bring the real thing it just captures their imagination capturing their imagination is what education should be about unleashing the imagination and project-based learning can do that for us the alternative is what we see happening in so many schools kids who get turned off early because they can't read therefore they don't like reading guess what you don't like reading it's pretty much all over isn't it the next thing you know those kids aren't in school and next thing you know they become structurally disenfranchised we have over 5 million adults between the ages of 18 and 25 in this country who are neither working nor in school la alone has 250,000 of them that's a lot of wasted talent isn't it we have a chance to prevent that and we can prevent that by being clear about what it takes to promote that deeper learning so take a look at this image this is a 90 minute algebra class in East LA Hollenbeck middle school anybody here from LA couple okay East LA East Side and the teacher is so good she can stay on the back and talk to me if she wanted to she could stop and do yoga because the kids are in control of learning and because they're learning like this they're not just learning math are they they're learning how to work together they're learning how to listen they're learning how to defer gratification how to deal with conflict because Coughlin's up this teacher teaches this way because she needs to see them learning she needs to make the learning visible so she can see who's getting it who's not this is the only way she can differentiate support in fact she can get some kids to help other kids to make her job easier this is also the highest form of classroom management isn't it not about behavior modification it's about academic engagement and I was so pressed to see that not only were the kids working together standing up on their feet because I taught middle school hum you taught middle school one of the first things you learn we teach middle schools yeah make learning fun right you don't make it fun they'll make it fun at your expense she found a way to make math fun these kids were planning the they were ordering materials for a floor plan for a house they were applying what they learned in algebra to something extremely catchy literally concrete data figure how much concrete too many of them come from families they were the parents to construction so it wasn't unfamiliar this was culturally relevant and when the bell rang they were disturbed they weren't packing up five minutes early for 90 minutes now of course she doesn't start the air doing this because she has to get him ready just to figure out who can work with who and who should never work together and she starts out maybe 10 minutes she because she has to establish the norms about how we're gonna work together so kids can in fact listen and respect each other you know isn't it a great thing when people learn how to work with people they don't like how many you know adults that never learned that one so all that's happening in a math class because that teacher understands the kids can do it the fact that they are English learners the fact that they are many of my undocumented they're all poor that's not an obstacle for them to engaging in deeper learning and she knows they need it because algebra is the gateway to college who gets algebra when will determine who goes to college that's what the data shows so how do we make sure that high standards and challenging learning opportunities are available to all of our kids that's the work that's what you signed up for and that's what I hope is happening in these workshops today because I don't think we provided enough guidance to educators on how to do it some people figure it out on their own but sadly right next door is someone else who has it and the biggest obstacle right now to improving teaching in our schools is the isolation of our teachers we have too many schools where we'll have someone who is really excellent and effective right next door to someone who is not and we don't know how to enable the one who is still learning to learn from the one who's figured it out one of these got to figure out is how do we include the social and emotional learning which is essential in a math class like essential in project-based learning because if you don't know how to do these things like impulse control and defer gratification and they're all positive relationships with other people then you can't do group work so even in a math or science class you got to do this kind of work you've got to have some social and emotional intelligence because that's integral to learning and we're finally realizing it's can't be an add-on it's certainly not something we want to test for but it still got to be embedded embedded in everything we do because we know that when we build a sense of community in our classrooms when the relationships are positive and respectful people can learn it's can't learning an unsafe environment can you place we're afraid of making mistakes and so as we think about how to make project-based learning more central to our work and we have the opportunity now because many districts are realizing what they've been doing hasn't been working so they're open now we also have to realize it could be a lot of teachers who need support in doing this work otherwise they'll go back to the traditional ways they'll go back to the traditional ways not because they work but because it's all they know and people will stick with what they know even when it doesn't work won't they because it's what they know and so we have to give people the opportunity to explore how many know teenagers I'd like to argue anybody knowing Tina I know a few those are all future debaters could be but debate requires they know they do the research because it's not just opinions you would actually have to know what you're talking about so you have to be able to demonstrate critical thinking and you have to communicate your ideas and you have to listen so you can rebut and I'm seeing schools now that incorporate debate in science class and and in literature debate doesn't have to dispute a special isolated class it can be a way we bring material together I was at social justice to monitor high school 100% Latino 100% low-income and Pacoima northern LA and saw a debate about eugenics and students were debating whether or not it was okay to sterilize women who had Down syndrome the ethics of that could that happen in this country and they were passionately debating it so passionately that after the debate they continued to do more research they wanted to know more why it happened how it happened who allowed it to happen when kids get a good education they want more education and that's what we're altima after isn't it not kids who are simply satisfied with their grades or their test scores but who wanted to continue to learn and so that's why project learning project-based learning is so important and essential as a driver for learning because our students have to take ownership and when we provide that opportunity to learn what we start to see as kids even kids who seemed like they were uninterested and bored begin to demonstrate that spark but for that to happen we've got our teachers with strong knowledge of content because they have to understand what are the skills kids are supposed to acquire in this work it came to be a game although games can be part of it as long as we're clear about what they're learning in that game we have to have a variety of skills to reach a variety of learners because one activity might work for some kids but not for other kids who just don't get it aren't interested and by now we've all learned that talking louder is not an effective intervention and we've got to have creativity and patience and an ongoing ability to diagnose learning needs to figure out why they don't get it what's getting in the way so many kids who struggle with math are also struggling with literacy they can't access the word problems and then finally we need cultural competence so we can work with all kinds of kids not just those who are from backgrounds like our own which means that we have to have empathy keeping in mind that empathy is not pity empathy is simply say I understand your challenges but I know you can do it because when we can work across the divisions of race and class and language and age our students start to see us as a resource and as someone that can actually learn from and so I want to acknowledge that this is hard because we haven't given teachers clear guidance on how to do it how to get kids more engaged and engagement as we know is actually complex because it's not just about what you see the behavioral engagement is important are they on task are they prepared are they doing their work but you can be fooled sometimes can't you they seem to be on task but we haven't checked for the cognitive engagement do they actually understand what they're doing can they make connections between what they're doing now and what's coming next or what happened before what does their work tell us about the degree and depth of understanding because their work the work they produce is reflection on our teaching and engagement is emotional it's effective it means that when we tap to that desire2learn when our kids actually expel and demonstrate effort they're gonna produce better work right now I meet so many kids that just aren't working that hard you know why we haven't asked them to we haven't created an environment where they would want to part of the achievement gap is a gap between their actual ability and their performance how do we close that gap how do we make kids care about what they're doing not settle well one of the things we have to start doing that is focusing on the evidence the evidence that our students are actually learning as I said already my mentor teacher took it led me to believe that all I had was cover the material he confused teaching with talking teaching and talking aren't the same are they the difference is the evidence the evidence of learning so for there be evidence we got to make the expectations clear we got a model for our students we've got to show them what high-quality work looks like because many of them have never produced it never seen it we've got to check for understanding make sure they understand what it is they're trying to learn that's expected of them we have to draw on their interest so we can make it relevant to their lives kids have capable of learning everything anything rather if there's a teacher who knows how to be a bridge to the material we have to give them numerous opportunities to revise and resubmit the work because you don't do your best work on the first draft the real learning isn't in the first submission it's in the revision and the real teaching isn't in the grading but in the feedback how do we help that student get from a D to a B or an A that's where the teaching comes in so we focus on the evidence when we are willing to take their questions and their feedback when we're willing to analyze work with our colleagues how many of you doing that in your school is now analyzing student work together most powerful professional development I've seen going on any schools is bringing the work into the room having teachers analyze it to ever on a regular basis because when the work is in the room the connections we teaching and learning become clear and if there's a safe environment teacher can ask questions how come your kids could write that essay my kids struggled what did you do my kids refused to read the book how'd you get them to take it on that's how we reduce the isolation of our teachers and that's how we start to enable our teachers to be resource for each other and so I want you to think about what are the practices that you're going to implement to increase engagement and project-based learning is one of them but there's lots of other strategies out there that work and I want to encourage you not to allow PBL to become the new panacea all right PPI will solve all problems how many of you have heard that about something else I pass will solve our problems and it never works does it is always more complicated it's lots of things that work depending on the student depending on your school depending on the teacher so I encourage you to be creative and to talk about this with your colleagues technology can be a tool that facilitates learning but it's not a panacea not a panacea and I get worried sometimes I go to so many schools that are fixated on buying the latest technology but not fixated on getting to know their kids do you know your students do you know what the challenges they face outside of school do you know how they learn do you understand their strengths and what motivates them and how to make the curriculum relevant to their lives let me close with this a few years ago Roland fryer guy on the right an economist at Harvard was given a bunch of money to do an experiment the experiment was could he motivate kids to achieve by paying them and they tried the experiment in several cities and they pay kids for better attendance they paid them for better grades they paid them to read books they paid them for higher scores and after two years of paying kids they came away and said not working now I always had my suspicions about this is first of all I question how long would they pay him and how many kids were they gonna pay so what were they trying to accomplish anyway but on the same day that the results were announced that this experiment had failed that was the day that Jaime Escalante died and some of you may know about Jaime Escalante he was that crazy Bolivian engineer who taught calculus at Garfield High School in East LA and when Escalante got to Garfield he was told by his department chair you're gonna teach remedial math cuz that's what we offer here and after a day or two he said this is a waste of time he's not preparing kids for anything cuz I won't teach calculus they said these kids can't learn calculus you're teaching kids who are from the poorest neighbors in LA these are gangbangers these are future waiters and waitresses that's what you teach him he said he'll watch me not only did you teach calculus he taught Advanced Placement calculus and had kids take the exam and they passed so they required they thought it was something fishy and they required an investigation required the kids to be retested and they passed again and again 19 years in a row go to Garfield you'll still see the mural up - Escalante and after a while the researchers came and they said well we got to figure out what's he doing how is he getting these kids to pass this AP calculus exam and they came in from different universities and they all came back said the same thing said it's nothing but math in there because they understand what he was doing he called it cultivating ganas in students the desire to learn he was changing challenging the whole frame of reference he said you have the descendants of people who built pyramids calculus part of your heritage not a foreign subject then he took them to places where you use calculus like aeronautical labs he said this is why you need this so you can get jobs like these I met one of his former students she is now the only latina engineer at Boeing in Southern California thorns in trouble though though and on her time she free time she does robotics in schools and she works with kids teaching robotics on Saturdays and I saw her one day at Hawkins high school and she was there explaining I said how come you do this she said do it because of what Escalante did for me so he was there for us he pushed us he got us to work hard he gots to believe in ourselves said he used to come to my soccer games I said he came to your games yeah but not to cheer me on you told me I suck at soccer go back to math and I'm so glad he did because of that now I'm an engineer well at that funeral there was his outpouring of Engineers and lawyers and professionals of various kinds all of whom came from Garfield High School the same neighbor the neighbor to haven't changed what change was that opportunity to learn I fear this because each of us has that opportunity to be a teacher that can motivate that can inspire that can use education to change lives that's what this work is about using education to expand opportunity to open doors to demonstrate the power of knowledge you have that power I hope you'll use it to empower your students thank you [Applause] you

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Length: 45min 21sec (2721 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 12 2019