This episode explores a conversation with Dr. Kia Darling-Hammond on the importance of centering conversations and practices that support people with thriving and flourishing, especially in light of structural inequality. She draws from her research with LGBTQIA youth of Color to think through a robust and unique framework on thriving.

Kia Darling-Hammond, PhD, is the former associate director of educational programs at Stanford University’s Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate Education. She has more than twenty years’ experience as an administrator, researcher, teacher, consultant, and mentor in education and education-adjacent spaces. Kia’s scholarship explores the circumstances and beliefs that make thriving possible for Black LGBTQ+ and same-gender-loving people.

This episode explores a conversation with Mindy Thompson-Fullilove on living through this global pandemic. We explore this "new togetherness" that we are experiencing alongside the different ways to think, feel, and survive through it.

Mindy Thompson Fullilove is a social psychiatrist. She's a professor of urban policy and health at The New School. Her work primarily focuses on cities. She has written several books, including Root Shock: How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America and What We Can Do About It and Urban Alchemy: Restoring Joy in America's Sorted-Out Cities. Her book Main Street, will be published in October 2020.

Countdown to Mainstreet Blog

https://mainstreetnj.blogspot.com/2020/03/coronavirus-pandemic-and-seven-sins.html

This episode explores a conversation with Stephen Murphy-Shigematsu on his recent book From Mindfulness to Heartfulness: Transforming Self and Society with Compassion. It also briefly dives into his life's work and his commitment to transforming society through education.

Stephen Murphy-Shigematsu trained and taught in East Asian medicine, yoga, and psychology in Japan and at Harvard University and the University of Tokyo. His teaching and research at Stanford University balances Eastern and Western ways of knowing, doing , and being in designing gentle, healing, inclusive educational spaces. His work in crossing borders through community building and mindful citizenship by connecting diverse people, transforming self and society,

This episode explores a conversation on Hip-Hop culture and healing with Christopher Emdin. Emdin is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mathematics, Science and Technology at Teachers College, Columbia University; where he also serves as Director of the Science Education program and Associate Director of the Institute for Urban and Minority Education.

He is an alumni fellow at the Hutchins Center at Harvard University and served as STEAM Ambassador for the U.S. Department of State and Minorities in Energy Ambassador for the U.S. Department of Energy.

Dr. Emdin is a social critic, public intellectual and science advocate whose commentary on issues of race, culture, inequality and education have appeared in dozens of influential periodicals including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post.

Dr. Emdin holds a Ph.D in Urban Education with a concentration in Mathematics, Science, and Technology; Masters degrees in both Natural Sciences and Education Administration, and Bachelors degrees in Physical Anthropology, Biology, and Chemistry.

He is the creator of the #HipHopEd social media movement, and a much sought-after public speaker on a number of topics that include hip-hop education, STEM education, politics, race, class, diversity, and youth empowerment. He is also an advisor to numerous international organizations, school districts, and schools.

He is the author of the award winning book, Urban Science Education for the Hip-hop Generation and the New York Times bestseller For White Folks Who Teach In the Hood and the Rest of Ya’ll too.

This episode explores hope and healing with Dr. Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz.

Yolanda is a Professor of English Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. Yolanda is former Research Associate with the NYU Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, and has worked for Business Week, The New York Times, and New York University in Marketing and Promotion positions. Her research interests include racial literacy development in urban teacher education (with a specific focus on the education of Black and Latino males), literacy practices of Black girls, and Black female college reentry students.

Yolanda’s work has appeared in several top-tier academic journals. Yolanda is co-editor of three books including (with Chance W. Lewis and Ivory A. Toldson Teacher Education and Black Communities: Implications for Access, Equity, and Achievement (IAP). At Teachers College, she is founder and faculty sponsor of the Racial Literacy Roundtables Series where for eight years, national scholars, doctoral, and pre-service and in-service Master’s students, and young people facilitate informal conversations around race and other issues involving diversity and teacher education for the Teachers College / Columbia University community. She is also the co-founder of the Teachers College Civic Participation Project which concerns itself with the educational well-being of young people involved with the juvenile justice and foster care systems in New York.