Culture is important and it's complicated. Our identities and lived experiences shape who we are, but these differences can also create divides when they go unexamined. And for educators, there often isn't the time, space, or communication skills necessary to meaningfully address cultural divides when they arise during the school day.   

For this, we spoke with Markus Townsend, the Director of Culture and Students at Sela Public Charter School in Washington, DC. Sela is a Hebrew dual-language elementary school in Northeast DC. Many of their staff members come to teach from Israel, and many others are native-born Washingtonians, and this creates a truly unique cultural dynamic.  

EmpowerEd worked with Sela from 2021 to 2023 to help them address their cultural divides. After a little trial and error, we finally landed on an educator-led task force model. These working groups were organized around three central themes we kept hearing about from staff (the Hebrew/English divide, staff-led professional development, and creating a culture of professional accountability). They met regularly for small group discussion, and began leading professional development sessions for their colleagues. These groups uplifted staff voice and empowered educators to have difficult and inspiring conversations about culture, race, and identity at their school.  

We share more about our work in this conversation and also discuss:   

- The benefits of and potential conflicts that arise in a school that is so devoted to exploring culture.  

- How the current geo-political dynamics since October 7th have affected their staff.  

- Why human-centric leadership is so important to help staff members grow and heal during challenging moments.  

- And much more.  

We highly recommend this podcast to everyone, but especially hope school leaders  can listen and reflect on how to meaningfully address staff cultural divides and help promote a culture of open diversity in their schools.   

As always, we want to hear from you! If you enjoyed today's episode please rate us five stars and let us know your feedback. Thank you for listening and enjoy the show!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

Vicarious trauma is a term therapists have long used to describe how they empathetically pick up the effects of trauma during their sessions with clients. But lately, we have been hearing this term used more with educators.   

School staff members are recognizing how they have absorbed trauma from their students - which has only increased through the pandemic - during their daily interactions. And unlike therapists, educators are not trained to recognize or care for themselves within a cycle of vicarious trauma.  

For this, we were really grateful to speak with Dr. Perry Camp, a longtime mental health professional with in depth experience in schools, and Mr. Antoine Harris, a licensed social worker who currently works with students and staff at Garnet Patterson STAY in Washington. They have so much experience navigating vicarious trauma in their own lives, as well as counseling educators to recognize the symptoms for themselves.   

During our conversation, we discussed:  

- Why educators are prone to picking up other people's trauma, especially in this pandemic era. 

- How to recognize vicarious trauma and the self-care educators can practice to help themselves if they see symptoms.

 - The trauma-informed policies and procedures schools can have in place to help educators take care of themselves. 

- and more!  

We hope this episode inspires a more open conversation about the vicarious trauma people experience in schools, so educators can get the support they need. As always, please let us know if you have any questions or comments about this episode. We always love to hear from you!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

We are so excited to share our first ever LIVE audience recording with you - an educator-led panel from our EmpowerEd Educator Wellness Symposium on December 1st, an event we organize twice a year to share educator wellness learning in Washington, DC.

A little background on this panel: Lately in Washington, DC we've been experiencing a very tragic and unsettling time of community violence, which is definitely being felt in our schools. There are many city and educator leaders trying to answer the question of how to establish a new sense of safety but we have noticed how rarely educator voices and solutions are centered in this deeply important discussion.

For this, we put together an educator-led panel on the topic of school safety and educator healing and shared it with a room full of Washington, DC educator wellness leaders. These five inspiring educators are Calvin Fletcher from Garnet-Patterson STAY, Katrice Fuller from Monument Academy PCS, Chandler Dennard from Kimball Elementary, and Raynalle Rouse from Friendship PCS.

As you'll hear in our conversation, these educators have so many important insights and ideas that come from working day in and day out with students who are experiencing these traumas. They want to center mental health, student agency, and community investment to help regain a sense of safety for both students and staff in Washington DC.

We heard amazing feedback from our Symposium attendees on this conversation and are so excited to share it with you. Please enjoy and share with someone who may also need to hear these important educator solutions. Thank you!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

As we all know, educators are on the front line of so much stress and almost nobody needs the skills of mindfulness - conscious breathing, mind relaxation, detaching from negative thoughts, etc - more than them.   

But putting mindfulness to work in schools has been a challenge for us! At our partner schools, we've struggled to find time in overloaded PD schedules, had yoga classes interrupted by school needs, and sometimes have experienced pushback from teachers who don't want to participate. For something so important, it's felt pretty difficult to put it into action.   

For this, we were so happy for us to have an in-depth conversation about mindfulness in schools with two long time DC teachers and mindfulness practitioners, Parag Bhuva (he/him) a teacher at Washington Latin PCS and Vipassana meditation practitioner, and Dekebra Crowe (she/her) who teachers mindfulness at Turner ES and also teaches Vinyasa flow and yin yoga.  

Our conversation is super real. We talk about the importance of mindfulness, how it actually works in a school setting and where school leaders can go wrong when setting up a mindfulness program for staff and students.   

For those who are interested in learning more about mindfulness, EmpowerEd has recently formed a partnership with the David Lynch Foundation (yes that David Lynch from Twin Peaks!), an international organization that teaches Transcendental Meditation, or TM, to first responders, veterans, and anyone who is on the front line of difficult situations.  

If you are a Washington, DC educator (or work in education) and interested in becoming certified in TM at no cost please reach out to [email protected]. We're going to start organizing DC educator meditation trainings in the new year, and we'd love to answer your questions about joining one.   As always, please let us know your comments and thank you so much for listening!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

*For DC Locals: Please sign up to testify for educator student loan relief and other teacher retention measures on November 21st (virtual)!!*

At EmpowerEd, we see advocacy as a central component for educator wellness in Washington, DC and beyond. To create an enduring system for both students and teachers, we need to change our system so that educators can more easily achieve real work/life harmony and avoid burning out.

This week's conversation goes deeper into that theme. We were so excited to interview DC Councilmember Robert White about his new legislation, the Educator Retention for Student Success Act of 2023. This proposed bill strives to holistically address educator wellness and retention through innovative measures like flexible scheduling for teachers, better pay for paraprofessionals, and providing more wellness coordinators in schools.  This bill reflects so many great ideas that come directly from educators so we really believe they will be effective!

As you'll hear in our discussion, Councilmember White understands the deep importance of mental health - for students, for educators and for himself. We discuss concrete ways to support mental health and create real equity in schools. As you'll hear, high school was a difficult time for Councilmember White, so the wellness measures of this bill are quite close to his heart.

If you live in Washington, DC, please consider signing up to testify at the bill's hearing coming up on November 21st. We need DC's councilmembers to hear why the measures of this bill would help keep quality teachers in our schools. Please sign up here by November 17th!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

*For DC Locals: Please sign up to testify for educator student loan relief and other teacher retention measures on November 21st (virtual)!!*

At EmpowerEd, we deeply believe in the connection between educator wellness and our ongoing advocacy efforts in Washington, DC and beyond. To us it seems pointless to ask educators to better manage their stress when we could instead be trying to create a less stressful system. For this reason, we are always speaking with our elected officials and other key decision makers to inform them of educator ideas for change so we can make an education system where teachers feel valued and cared for as professionals.

For this episode, we were so excited to speak with Washington, DC Councilmember Christina Henderson. Councilmember Henderson is progressive member of the DC council and we speak with her a lot about our educator initiatives. We were really excited to hear that she is co-sponsoring upcoming legislation to aid educator wellness in Washington, DC. She is also introducing the Student Loan Repayment Assistance for Educators Act act will offer significant student loan relief to DC educators who qualify.

As you'll hear in our conversation, CM Henderson understands that student loan debt is a huge impediment to building a stable and prosperous life for so many educators. In particular, it’s a burden that falls particularly hard on educators of color that are so important to student success. Supporting these educators through enhancing their financial wellness is a great step toward building a stronger school system in DC.

We urge Washington, DC educators (and supporters of educators) to sign up to testify at the bill's hearing coming up on November 21st. Please sign up here soon!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

Our third podcast episode this season is on longevity in the teaching profession. In our work, we watch way too many teachers leave after a couple of years. In fact, we originally started EmpowerEd because we saw how destabilizing it was for students when their teachers kept leaving.

We are very aware of the significant barriers keeping people from staying in the classroom. When other careers offer more flexibility or less stress, why would someone stay in teaching?

To discuss further, we brought together an amazing panel of veteran teachers with a wealth of teaching and educator wellness experience.

Tara Warrington is a longtime educator with experience at every level (classroom, coach, principal) up and down the East Coast. While in DC, she worked at Excel Academy, and currently is consulting in schools around the country.

Gabrielle Dubose is a 30 year teaching veteran who now runs the writing center at Duke Ellington HS in DC, and is the lead teacher facilitator for EmpowerEd. She helps empower the advocacy of DC teachers so they can change the system to support teachers, students, and families.

Terra Jones has taught for more than 20 years, including abroad, and now is an ELA teacher at MacFarland MS (a current EmpowerEd partner school), and is helping us start a mentorship program there to support new teachers.

Together, we discuss:

- the personal and professional wellness practices that have kept them in the classroom for so long

- how they handled the moments when they wanted to quit teaching

- what steps decision makers could take to help teachers in the game right now.

- plus much more.

We appreciated this conversation so much and hope you will too!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

Belonging is such a rich topic. Researcher and author Brené Brown connects the feelings of belonging and love in our psyches and writes about the deep importance of these feelings to the human condition:   

'A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all women, men, and children. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don't function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick. There are certainly other causes of illness, numbing and hurt, but the absence of love and belonging will always lead to suffering." (The Gifts of Imperfection)  

Belonging is also tricky. It's great when a school community provides a space of support and acceptance, but what if it doesn't? A lot of us know from experience that belonging can be a difficult thing to create within a staff culture that veers toward toxic.  

For this, we were so excited to speak with Gab Sussman and Victoria Lebrón from Bmore Transform, a Baltimore-based learning collective that creates and facilitates transformational community experiences for both students and educators.   

As you'll hear in our conversation, Gab and Victoria are both former educators who encountered difficult experiences in their school environments. For this, their transformative approach centers the "B" in DEIB initiatives, and believes deeply in the connection between how much belonging adults feel in a building and positive student outcomes.   

During our time together, we also discuss: 

- The big emotions that come up for educators when belonging is not present in a community

- How can school leaders set the right tone for their staff to truly support each other

- The day to day practices that support belonging for both educators and students

- and much more!  

Gab and Victoria bring so much vibrancy and authenticity to our conversation. We hope you find a lot to relate to and some solid tools to help you build more belonging at your school and in your life. Enjoy and thanks for listening! 

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

As an organization, EmpowerEd has always made important connections between the educator wellness initiatives needed at our partner schools and the policy advocacy we are doing in our greater Washington, DC community. After all, is it fair to ask teachers to better manage stress when we can instead work to change the system to produce less stress while achieving greater outcomes for students?

One of the main ways we advocate at EmpowerEd is through our Educator Fellows program. This program organizes and empowers a representative group of DC educators to lobby lawmakers for the policy changes that most support DC educators like: flexible scheduling, fair pay for paraprofessionals, school safety measures, and pipelines for educators of color.

In this episode, we are so lucky to have two of those teacher fellows join us to discuss how changing policy can be the most effective way to support school staff wellness.

Ben Williams is a former EmpowerEd fellow and current member of the State Board of Educator for Ward 1. He is a high school social studies teacher and a passionate advocate for DC public schools.

Alison Rice is long time teacher and first year fellow who has been working to support EmpowerEd's school-based work at our partner school, Ida B. Wells MS, where she teaches social studies and leads the educator wellness team.

We were also supposed to have Katrice Fuller on our panel, who teaches at the incredibly innovative Monument Academy PCS, but had a last mintue emergency. We look forward to having her on a future episode!

During our conversation, we discuss:

- How advocacy can help us achieve educator wellness outcomes that can't be done at just a school level

- Why having a school leader who innovates policy can breed important professional trust with staff

- How to keep moving when you reach roadblocks in your advocacy.

And much more!

Advocacy is a topic close to our hearts at Empowered. We hope this episode inspires you to use your voice and start changing the system. As always, we love to hear your feedback and appreciate your attention!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]

Hello, and welcome back to Season Two of the Educator Wellness Revolution! We hope you had a great summer!

As we gear up for our next season of the show, Scott and Gracy check in about practicing wellness this summer, the stress and beauty of the back-to-school transition, and what we are excited about for our educator wellness work at EmpowerEd this year.

We also discuss a few of our upcoming episodes for this next season, such as:

1. The confluence between educator advocacy and wellness work

2. Exploring longevity in teaching

3. Inclusion and educator wellness

4. A two part episode on liberation and safety in schools, including exploring the connection between police-free schools and community schools

We'd love to hear your feedback on what other topics you'd like us to explore this season and guests you'd like for us to invite on the show. Hope it's a great start of the school year for you!

Thank you for listening! Please learn more about our educator wellness work in schools at or email [email protected]