The Better Leaders Better Schools Podcast | The #1 Downloaded School Leadership Show

Culture To The Max

Feb 1, 2023

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Culture to the Max

Dr. Shontoria Walker is a graduate from the University of Houston in Houston, Texas with a degree in Professional Leadership with an emphasis in Literacy. Her research focuses on using culturally relevant pedagogy to influence literacy achievement for middle school Black Male Students based on her experiences as a former 8th grade English teacher at an all-boys preparatory academy. She has also served on the Texas Teacher Advisory Board, a Teach Plus Policy Fellow as well as a Senior Policy Fellow with Teach Plus Texas from 2014-2019. During her time and beyond she has advocated for educational policy laws that directly impacted the classroom as well as contributed to policy briefings for the revision of The Every Student Succeeds Act and national policy reports such as If You Listen, We Will Stay: Why Teachers of Color Leave and How To Disrupt Teacher Turnover and more recently To Be Who We are: Black Teachers on Creating Affirming School Cultures.

Show Highlights

8 minutes you must hear if you believe in tapping into cultural responsiveness in your schools.
Do something different with your teacher prep to provide a voice to your new teachers with learning opportunities, not just survival techniques.
Stop putting a bandaid on students falling through the cracks and give them authentic engagement opportunities.
Tips to create culturally relevant content that transfers ownership of understanding to provide opportunity to make meaning from the complex process.
4 domains to form strong community partnerships and responsive teaching to achieve Culture to the Max.
"Real Talk Friday" gives students the opportunity to elevate their voices and actually see each other.
Not classroom management, but culture management.
Gaps in preparing teachers for their students and building connections that transforms the learning process.

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Shontoria Walker's Resources & Contact Info:

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