When Equity Gets Political: Speaking Up, Showing Up, and Staying Rooted

In this powerful and timely episode of The Equity Hour, Dr. Tami welcomes powerhouse educators Drs. Bre  & Kia to discuss what it really means to create safe, affirming schools for trans and gender-creative youth.

With honesty, warmth, and lived wisdom, the trio digs into the story behind Bre and Kia’s new book, T*is for Thriving, which offers educators frameworks, tools, and community for equity work that doesn’t stop at intention—it builds real infrastructure.

From navigating systemic pushback to cultivating joy in the face of oppression, this conversation explores how educators and allies can stay rooted in justice while speaking up when it matters most.

In this episode:

• Why “just staying neutral” isn’t an option in today’s climate
• The power of curriculum to affirm, include, and protect
• How allyship means removing barriers—not just offering support
• The story of T* is for Thriving and the frameworks that guide it
• Why joy, rest, and community are part of the resistance
• What it looks like to be in someone’s corner (and let them rest)

Resources: 

T* Is for Thriving Book

Mutual Aid & More

Bridge to Thrive Framework

SJ Miller Framework

Goldie Muhammad Framework 

Additional Resources: 

Activism

For LGBTQ+ educators

To work with Dr. Kia: https://drkiadh.com/

Summer Webinar Series 

Coaching Discovery Call

Transcript

Dr. Tami: 0:35

Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Equity Hour with me, your host, Dr. Tami. To say I am beyond thrilled about today's episode would be an understatement, and I know I say that all the time. It's like I have a favorite child, but all of them are my favorite children. But I am super excited about the two guests we have on the podcast. Today I have Dr. Bre and Dr. Kia with me today. Hello ladies. Thank you for joining us. We are gonna dig into their book, which I'm very excited about. We're also gonna talk about, of course, our equity journey and the ways in which that they can both continue to support you and how you might be able to use the book in your own work and your own equity journey. So, wanna do a quick introduction and then I'll let my two guests say, hi. So Dr. Bre is returning to the podcast. Thank you for coming back, Bre. And as you all know, Bre and I had some history together in Illinois, but just to remind you. Dr. Bre Evans Santiago has a foundation rooted in vulnerability, intersectionality, and advocacy. Dr. Evans Santiago exemplifies true leadership boasting over 25 years of diverse educational experience nationwide. She leverage leverages her extensive background to inspire and challenge audiences to pursue just and equitable learning environments for all children. Dr. Bre is dedicated to amplifying bipoc and queer voices, empowering educational leaders to foster a transformational change, her commitment to innovation and inclusion. Drives her to navigate uncharted territories and ensure every voice has a seat at the table. And we also have joining us, uh, Dr. Kia. Dr. Kia is a psychologist, researcher, educator, and coach, as well as the creator of the bridge to thriving. Framework. Co-author of the Civil Rights Road to Deeper Learning, five Essentials for Equity and Co-Editor of T is for Thriving Blueprints for affirming Trans and Gender Creative Lives and learning in schools. She leverages more than 25 years of experience in organizational leadership, education, and youth development to offer research, advising, coaching, and public speaking, as well as designs for professional learning curriculum. Development and organizational growth. Dr. Kia's work is grounded in the knowledge that innovation driven by those furthest from power improves everyone's lives. Welcome ladies.

Dr. Kia: 3:05

Hi. So nice to be here.

Dr. Tami: 3:08

Okay, I just gotta say this like, hello powerhouses in the room. Like collectively, ladies, we have like almost a century of educational experience, which. We are wise. This group is a wise group coming to talk to you today.

Dr. Bre: 3:27

That's.

Dr. Kia: 3:28

I have my moments.

Dr. Tami: 3:31

We're just gonna roll in it, right? Yes, yes. We all have our moments, right? We all have our moments. But no, very impressive ladies. I, I am just thrilled to have you both on the show today because this idea of how we lead transformation and who we speak with and who we're doing the work for, and voices that are privileged versus voices that are silenced, um, really is an important part. Of this work and, and the journey. And so as I like to start off each episode, because as we know, equity, working in diversity, equity, inclusion is a process. We all have a journey. We have a story into how we've come into this work, how we've navigated and moved through this work. And I always think it's important to share that this is a consistent. Learning pathway, right? You're, you're meeting new people, you're understanding new perspectives as you move through and work with other people. And that just makes us better, in the end. And so I would love for you all, and, and whoever wants to go first can go first. Um. To hear a little bit about your journey. I know, and by the way, y'all we're gonna get into this book, but you can also read some more in depth if we don't get too detailed about it in the intro of their book, which by the way, it's sitting right here. And you know what, I'm so special, I just have to show you this because Dr. Bre gave me a signed copy. Okay. I know, right? Heart. Heart. So, okay. Who, who wants to jump in with their equity journey?

Dr. Bre: 5:00

Okay, I guess I'm starting. Um, so I'll just start from, you know, my professional journey, thinking about, that's when I was really heavily involved with advocacy, right? So starting teaching in oh one, 2001, I had legal insurance since the first day I stepped into a classroom identifying as a lesbian. I was always worried about, you know, the idea behind, like accusations of what can happen. So I always, I started off with legal insurance with that fear, right? Of thinking of who I was as a person. Teaching for several years. I taught in California, Illinois, and Washington dc Um, within that journey, learning lots of different things, but in those spaces I could never tell who my spouse was, right? So like. Um, especially in a lot of schools, early on in the early two thousands, there was no, you don't get to, it's a don't ask, don't tell time, you don't talk about it. And so my roommate would always come and help me, you know, set up my classroom and my roommate would come and help with, you know, field trips or whatever. So no one really know that my roommate was my wife. Um, and so dealing with that early on and always having to deal with microaggression or even just the unknown, identify as a cis woman, very femme presenting oftentimes. So everybody's like, what does your husband do? How is your husband? And how's your wife and your kids? And it's like, oh, what do you say? Uh, he does, I don't know. You know, like I had to always pretend or, or not say anything. You know? I ended up having a few friends, but the school wasn't like, I didn't have an affinity group or people to help me go through my journey. Um, as being a queer teacher. So, you know, fast forwarding throughout my, my programs master's program in my legal class, I presented something on laws regarding L-G-B-T-Q, and then I said, it came out in my class, you could hear a pin drop. My partner that I presented with walked out of the room crying because she was offended that I just said that I was a lesbian, a queer person. So that was in oh five. And then fast forward to my dissertation time, and this is when we were in the

Dr. Tami: 7:19

Yes, this is when we met.

Dr. Bre: 7:21

Um, but in that space I met some people. I'm like, cool, you're in education and you identify as queer. They didn't wanna be on my committee. My, my dissertation was looking at just cultural backgrounds influence your decision to be out in schools. Like maybe if you had more support. You feel stronger to do it even in the midst of all the things. I thought that was my prediction, and so I was hoping that I would have some of that support. I had to get people outside of my college to be able to help me with my dissertation, to work through it, because even the own educators in my space did not wanna be, they didn't want their name on it. They didn't wanna be known with L-G-B-T-Q stuff in 2015, 10 years ago.

Dr. Tami: 8:06

Yeah. Okay. So, you know, I didn't know that part because when we met I was just finishing up. My dissertation. And so you were early in the doctorate process and so I wasn't there anymore by the time you started the dissertation, but I remember we talked about what you wanted to study because you know, I was looking at socially just practices, right? Like what happens when, you know, student teachers leave? You know, when we've talked about what best practices, what happens when they leave and try to go into a school district, right? Do they have the supports? Are they able to do that? Because, you know, people always say like, teacher ed programs don't do these things. Mm. That's not necessarily true it can be and it can't be. But also what is the environment we're sending these? You know, folks into were, are they able to feel safe to make those, so those opportunities and decisions and to support all of their students and all the things. So I didn't even know that Bre. Wow. I just learned something today too. But yeah. No, that's so powerful.

Dr. Bre: 9:07

So that started my. Advocacy for myself and my frustrations and wanting to support people. Being a mother of foster children of queer teens, our house was one of the only houses in Kern County that would accept queer teenagers. So I really like, they would call me to have a queer team come and be a part of my space and I'm building it. You know, there were all the, you know. Teen groups and stuff that I was a part of, but that was a big part to me too, where I'm like, oh my gosh. Even in the space that we're living, one of our queer teams was unhoused because of it, you know? And so it's just like this, this is reality five years ago um, and then something else that really stands out to me just in this space was that in the midst of writing my first book, the Social Justice book for mistakes we've made,

Dr. Tami: 9:59

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Bre: 9:59

um. I would do professional development on it, and I became an agenda item at a board meeting. And, you know, then it was the, the critical race theory and the concerns and things like that. And so we had to go through this process of me showing them what I was teaching and me helping them see what I'm really doing, whatever. So cut to the end of it. They had a question where it said, well, why do you, um, say. Nontraditional families should be elevated. And I looked right in their faces and I said, because I'm a nontraditional family. I said, you teach my kids and you don't acknowledge me in your classrooms, and you could hear a penny drop. Because they were like, oh. Oh, well we didn't. I, okay. And I'm like, my kids are contributing to your job. But yet you're saying you can't talk about me as a queer parent. Not just, you know, so those are like my, ah, moments that really fuel me. In between there, of course, the care and love from all the, the college students and teams and, helping teachers with workshops and things like that. Um, to be able to develop, you know, where we are at this point. But what pushes me for justice and to help people have voices is because of some of those really big experiences.

Dr. Tami: 11:19

yeah, yeah. I can totally understand that. Absolutely. Dr. Kia. We're gonna, we're gonna come back to some of the things you said, Bre, but I wanna, I wanna hear, I know, I, I, uh, yeah, I got, yeah, I got some notes here. Uh, but I also wanna hear Dr. Kia's story'cause I'm, I'm sure we're gonna find a way to thread this all together.

Dr. Kia: 11:40

yeah, there's, there's definitely, uh, resonance and, um, I was noticing, I was sort of going up to sort of 30,000 feet and coming back down to the ground and, you know, thinking about these experiences. I think, uh, one of the things about having minoritized identities or, you know, experiencing oppression is that, when we exist in these spaces, in this society, our attunement to equity, our attunement to inclusion are attunement to justice, and the presence or lack of diversity can sort of become. I think it starts in, in an intrinsic way. But one of the things that I was struck by is, landing in graduate school, is it's usually in higher ed that we are first exposed to like the language, the meaningful, philosophical and political thought, the analysis that lets us not only articulate our own experiences with some sense of authority, but also gain greater understanding of how these different. Things, interact, these different sort of nuances around power. So in some ways my journey really began when I began, you know, I have two parents who were both, activistic in their orientations. My father was a telecommunications lawyer who was very focused on minority ownership of media. So radio stations, television stations, cable, that sort of thing. Um, and. Paid very close attention to how the law was being deployed to silence or enable right discourse and opportunity. Um, and minority ownership of media in part was very much a civil rights concern. And this is of course, back in the 1970s, 1980s. And of course, we see it as a concern right now. There's corporate owned media that is of course being deployed to advanced fascism. Then my mother is, I mean, in this audience, probably pretty well known, famous educator who's been very focused on students getting their needs met and teachers being supported and, um, advancing civil rights, and equity through legislation and policy. I mean, some of these fights last decades, right? Some of these fights have been going on for as long as I've been going on,

Dr. Tami: 13:54

Yeah, I was just thinking that, I'm like the, the journey along people's like, oh, this is new. No, no, no, it's not. And the pushback's not new either.

Dr. Kia: 14:04

right, like, and I'm knocking on a half a century. So this is like, you know, this has been going on. So the for, and so. We could get into, being a mixed kid or, you know, and claiming racial identity. Am I black, am I mixed? Am I, et cetera, et cetera. We could get into, queer identity. Um, for me, for me it was, I knew who I was. Went deep into the closet and then started to emerge when I was getting my master's in teaching. And I had a really powerful teacher, um, Michael Sadowski, who created all of this safety and spaciousness. If you're not familiar with his work, he's written. A number of really powerful books, about safety, about representation, about, um, L-G-B-T-Q and same gender loving kids, um, in students in school. So like, we're in the same little ecosystem of recognizing that the classroom is, and Bell Hooks talks about this. So many people talk about this, the classroom is a liberation space. It's really a powerful space. So I didn't see myself represented. But, in a number of ways when I was growing up. I did start tutoring when I was in high school, a lot of my peers, because it was just clear that they, they were having difficulty in classes, but they were brilliant and there was a disconnect between, you know, the, the pedagogy and the student. Um, and so that was really my first kind of glimpse into this sort of inequity, really starting to understand that there was this inequity that was coming into play that was failing to. See the whole student failing to address their particular needs that, you know, and um, I was also a teenager, so like, what did I know? I was like, I can help you with math homework. You know what I mean? But I was thinking, and I was thinking about this, how we're always being and becoming at the same time. Right. You had mentioned that beginning, always sort of on this journey of discovery and and development but that really was, um, my, my parents had had to fight for me when I was in school, fight to give me, like, they'd have to fight the school and the district just to allow me to take a test to see if I could place into. You know, a course of study that gave me more advanced, teaching and opportunity and all these things and everything was gate kept, everything, everything, everything. And, you know, have to go in and fight a teacher trying to punish me for existing instead of, actually paying attention to what I was doing. So it's like, just, it's, it's, the lineage is throughout, but similarly to y'all in graduate school. Well, similarly to you, Bre, but different, when I was in my graduate program, my focus quickly became thriving, at the margins and specifically black L-G-B-T-Q and same gender loving young people. So, you know, being young, being black and being queer, trans, or non-binary. Um, and most of the people in my program really couldn't, like, this wasn't their area of study. This wasn't their area of comfort. Now this was, you know, right at the, I think you, you said it was 2015 for you. That was the very beginning of me and my doctoral journey. So it was just, in that same kind of time period. I was lucky though, because people who didn't feel comfortable in the subject area were still supportive. So I had people who were like, I can't really help you deepen your scholarship in this way, but I'm gonna remove barriers. And that made a huge difference. And I think that's also illustrative of what. What we can do in this equity work, even when we're not, like our identity's not implicated. Right. Um, because I had people genuinely just go, I'm gonna get that outta your way. I'm gonna get that outta your way. I'm gonna make sure you get this funding. I'm gonna give you this assistantship. And allowed me to really focus on what I was trying to study deeply. But I also did have to, you know. People outside of my institution. So I reached out to Ed Brocken Brown. Woo. It was so amazing. And so Ed was not only a part of my committee, but was also a part of my, you know, growth journey while I was in graduate school, even though he wasn't at my university. Lance McCready part of my journey, but not at my university. And then there were some folks who I was introduced to, um, by an outgoing scholar who said, you need to meet these incoming people'cause they're gonna be anchoring you so. That support matters a great deal. It would have been a very different experience if I hadn't had that. I think I'm just like journeying all over the place. But from a diversity standpoint, I would say, uh, education has been crucial. Being exposed to people who are different to me, who had different experiences, backgrounds, upbringings, and so much of that really just happened in college, which to me drives the point home of how important it is to get kids there. Challenges of those spaces, not withstanding. Right. Um.

Dr. Tami: 18:56

Well, yeah, and I, I think, just very timely, right? The fact that people, legislation and decisions are starting to make that an even stronger barrier of access because we're looking at, now, not just. Um, systems that are in place to put in barriers, gatekeeping that's happening. But now we also have financial or a lack of access to financial resources, right? To make this space, accessible, especially higher levels of study, like graduate level, doctoral level. Like where are we gonna get the diversity of thought? That makes us all better. Um. Kia, you said something about removing barriers and I just really thought that that was very powerful. So when we talk about, and people talk about wanting to be an ally or support the work, like, I don't know what I need to do. That's exactly what you can do If you are sitting in a space or have power in a space or have a privileged identity that can allow you to open doors. Remove barriers, right? Provide funding, whatever it is. That is what you can do, right? You don't Go ahead.

Dr. Kia: 20:07

Yeah. So related to that, and coming back to what you were talking about, Bre, um, there so much of that happens in the space of relationship.

Dr. Tami: 20:16

Mm

Dr. Kia: 20:16

I have access to this person, we have trust. I can have this conversation with them that shifts the way they're approaching this situation, that institutional power that's tied to relationship. But then also so much of this is about. Like Bre, there was something powerful about you being in that, you know, board space and forcing them to reckon with your existence and being really courageous to speak up and not only identify your truth, your reality, but look them in the eye and invite them to sit with the discomfort of their bias, their bigotry. And that's a thing too, right? So. All of this. Part of what fuels a lot of what we see is segregation and secrecy, and part of what fuels that is that there are so few of us sometimes in these spaces that like safety is a legitimate concern. Stability is a legitimate concern. So we need coalition, we need each other, and we need to build these relationships sometimes at the level of one person to one person, build the trust, build the, you know me, so that there can be kind of like ripple effects from that.

Dr. Tami: 21:31

Yeah.

Dr. Kia: 21:32

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tami: 21:32

Yeah, the power of relationship, and that makes me also think about that leads to community, and I think that is a huge part of this work. I mean, even just the three of us sitting here today, right, is a power of this community because I met Bre. Bre knows you now you are here with me. And then we get to see and discuss and find these differences, but also commonalities, right? Amongst our experience and what we're here to do. Like what is important to us in this work. Um. I can't remember which one of you said it, but I think it was actually a thread in both of them. But I think it's important to talk about,'cause I think people are feeling very nervous about the current environment, the anti, DEI work, we saw a huge jump of performative DEI statements and all these things after George Floyd, and then we've now seen this like sh. You know, pull back. Um, there's a lot of fear, right? That people have seen executive orders saying that words these words aren't allowed and they're, you know, going through and scrubbing them from spaces, you know, and there's just so much happening, people are afraid of losing, you know, funding. And part of when I'm in some of these conversations is exactly, what we alluded to while you were, while you were sharing, I think Kia, like this isn't new, right? There has always been pushback, there has always been fear around this work. Um, but I would love to hear kind of a little bit about what you all think about this. I don't even call it renewed because it's not, it's just more overt than it has been maybe in a little while. Um, and how that. Can push it back and, you know, and push back against your work, but even enhances the importance of your book that you've put together. And probably a little bit about the why you guys came to putting your book together.

Dr. Kia: 23:41

I mean, I have a lot of thoughts.

Dr. Tami: 23:43

I know, and that was like a huge like question. I'm like, I'm like, I'm like deep. I'm like, let's. Peel back some of the onion. We might not get through the whole onion, but we're, we're gonna get there little places.

Dr. Kia: 23:56

Well, one of the first things when you were talking about performative DEI was thinking about. There were a lot of good intentions and aspirations, and then there was a lack of infrastructure and a lack of analysis. So critical consciousness is important because what it invites is a meaningful engagement with the political and the way that the political is material, right? Not just in relationship to resources like money and funding, but also material in the sense of these, these things have impacts on our body. Et cetera. These things are, you know, you can't divorce the political from the body, you can't divorce that, so there were a lot of aspirations and intentions with a lack of meaningful political, um, grounding and analysis, and that the political grounding and analysis also relies on community. And one of the challenges that we keep, it's a community of people who are willing to be part of your growth trajectory. Hold you in your ignorance and your growth as you become something else. And that's very difficult in a culture of judgment and punitively and ity where there's lots and lots and lots of harm that's happened where there's a history. So now I'm supposed to kind of be in this, you know, growth journey with a bunch of people who I can't actually trust because they've already done harm to me and I may have done harm, and so on and so. But this is some of, so much of this comes back to the interpersonal, so I just wanted to say that because, but the other thing that I thought that was really interesting was you talked about the shift in discourse. There have always been bullies and bullies are bad faith. So I was thinking about Columbia. Columbia kowtow to the Trump administration, to Trump specifically to the administration, and got punished anyway. And so, you know, it was very interesting, and I think this is a lesson to everyone. There is no safety, meaningful safety, long-term safety in capitulating to bullies. And this is again, why we need each other, why we need community, why we need the ACL U, why we need the NAACP why we need coalitions, and you know, because. They will always take more. None of this is actually about race or gender or sexual orientation. None of it, it's about money. All of this is a resource power grab and trans people are scapegoats in this moment and it's easy to scapegoat a community that feels socially or culturally different to the mainstream. And that is so small, right? That, you know, the rest of us who are not trans have to like wrap around the community because it's protecting them because that's the right thing to do, but it's also protecting everybody else. Right? And that is a political analysis thing too. You have to understand that these fools don't give a about. I don't know if I can swear

Dr. Tami: 27:05

You can, oh, please go ahead. No worries. This is not a children's podcast.

Dr. Kia: 27:10

Right. These are spiritually bereft. These are spiritually bereft people deploying power to make themselves feel somewhat whole and just failing completely in the assignment. They don't care. So part of our job is to be really courageous and understand that we're not actually safer when we don't speak up. We are safer when we do,

Dr. Tami: 27:31

Yeah, because they're coming for you next, right? Like

Dr. Kia: 27:34

or they're coming for me now. I mean.

Dr. Tami: 27:36

now. Next, and like, it's not gonna stop.

Dr. Kia: 27:40

That they, these are, these are, these are efforts that are eating everything up in their path. Our planet, our spirits, our children, like they, they will consume everything until they can't consume anything else. And then all they're left with is themselves and that's when they self-destruct. You just kind of wish they would just self-destruct beforehand, but this is how they do that, just. Us all with them.

Dr. Tami: 28:09

Yeah.

Dr. Bre: 28:10

Yeah. I, I see it as an analy. So I'm thinking about right now too, and I'm gonna go on a little bit about my own family, because this hits home for me in ways that is not okay. So, um, but I see it as like in a boxing match. And I don't know if you, you know, even like boxing and it's kind of, it's a lot, but I'm a sports person. But, just thinking about like, by the end it's like you're so damn tired. You still keep getting it left and right, like it's just no matter what. And then it's like, Nope, but you're not done. Get up. You're not done. Get up. You're not done. And that's, this is what that feels like. Um, like we can't stop. We can't, and it freaking hurts. It hurts. We're losing people left and right. There's blood being drawn. There's, there's pain. It's a lot. But we can get up. Get up. Like we have to be, like you said, Kia, that community. Right. Really finding those affinity spaces and building upon. I see it so much within the bullying as like wanting to make us fail, wanting us to quit, wanting us to cry, wanting us to, and Kia's, right. We got cell phones. We're on this, we're, people will find us, people will try. Whatever it is, there are ways that people could be in and out of whatever we do anyway. Right. So when we can and when we have the opportunities to name it, to say it and to smile, I think that pisses them off more than anything. You think about, you know, when it's like someone slaps you and you laugh, like bring it, you know? I feel like that's how we have to be like it's the resistance in that where it's like. Yeah, keep smacking me'cause I'm gonna keep laughing in your face. I'm gonna keep smiling. I'm a but that takes so much, like, I've talked to this takia about this where it's like living hour to hour sometimes. Um, you know, we used to be able to say, oh, have a good day and you had a good day. There's so much, and, and this is kind of separate, but being, in my role as associate dean, we see our student like ice. Like, oh my God, like there's a lot going on in California right now because we fight back. And it pisses him off. And so it's like trying to be violent and pull us down in whatever way is possible. And in all of that space, I'm like, I had a good hour. This right now is a good hour. So it's like recognizing and acknowledging those spaces to continue to build us up to fight one more round, build us up to continue to do that. You know, that work for a while. I went through a hard time. I would probably say what, January to March. Um. My spouse is trans and it's, it's open. I'm not outing him at all. It's, he's in our book, you know, we'll talk about it more in a second, but we live in privilege. We're okay. I got good insurance. My spouse is okay, but I can't But it's the, like, I can't help but think about the space in which he comes from and the space that we have to support and love and care for. And I think about these kids and I think about, you know. Every day that they're fighting to just wake up and to live. Ugh. So I just, any, if anything, it's building my, you know, my strength to, to fight for people that can't, or, or, or are afraid to, or, you know, so it's like this is the time for that, you know?

Dr. Kia: 32:51

Just to add to your boxing metaphor, you talked about boxing. Boxing, you have corners and there's a ref. And there's a point in the rounds, right? And I feel like in a lot of ways, those of us who have resource or power or position, who are, you know, we need to be the corners. We need to be the refs, right? We need to be the crowd. So that folks, because you, it is not an individual thing, right? Um, it is, it is a and I was thinking also about that. Somebody, there's a post floating around the interwebs, of course, about how hope is not like a, a delicate thing. Hope is, you know, uh, you know, scrappy, bloody knuckled, rising from the ghost, spitting out a tooth like that really is it. And, I love that you brought up the, the point about running interference for another sports metaphor, running interference for young people who have less power and are still becoming and need to know how to fight, you know, but also need to have space to rest.

Dr. Tami: 33:56

Yeah. I, I have, I have, oh my gosh, I have so many things going on in my brain right now. Like, um, it's such a good way, right? I love this idea about we, we are in the corners. And because for me, when you said that, that made me think,'cause while you were talking Brea, I'm thinking this is also why rest as a resistance is part of the narrative. Because if we're in our corners, then that means. I, I have support so I can rest. Like we can't always be the one throwing the punches all the time. So maybe another sports metaphor is maybe it's a little bit more of like wrestling where we tag team in and then somebody else hops in for a minute and takes it.'cause I'm tired right now and so I need to rest. But oh, like, yes. I love that idea. Like we're in the corner. So find someone that can support you in your corner or be. Also, I think, vocal, right? So people know you are there to come to you as a, a support, as a someone to lean into, to talk to. Um, I think that is one of the most important things. I had someone on my podcast recently who asked me if I planned on changing the name of my podcast. Because it's called the equity hour and you know, equity is not a, I was like, absolutely not. I said, in fact, this is a time where I need to use it even more. I said, so because, she had been on a pre, a different podcast and they were changing their name and doing all these things. I was like, oh no, that's not me. That is not my style. Like, I'm like, I'm doubling down. I'm like, I want people to know this is what I'm here for. This is what I've always been here for, and. This is a safe space to come and have these conversations and to, to, to share these stories. Um, and you know, this reminds me of your, oh God, what is it called? My brain is, I'm having a perimenopause moment, y'all in the moment. Your book Dedication, Bre, thinking back about to your family, right? Um, and you wrote about Bobby, where we all have a space to thrive, and I know Bobby was the catalyst for the book, so. Um, I think that just fits in so well, right? Like the space to thrive for everyone, having people in your corner. So I would love, and I know it's in your book, but the journey of how you can, you wanted to write this book based on your experience, for your family and with Bobby and coming together with Kia and all the amazing authors. That you guys have inside the book. It is so powerful, y'all. And I'm gonna give away a copy, by the way, because somebody needs this. Yes, we need this book. We need this book out in the world. So I'm gonna stop talking because this is your guys' book and I wanna hear, I just wanna hear about it. I wanna hear about how it came together. I know you wrote about it, but I know the audience hasn't heard, um, about it yet

Dr. Bre: 36:41

Yeah. Um, so yes, so, so Bobby definitely was a main component of this because, you know, as a teacher, and you know, my spouse and I, we've been together for 17 years. So we've grown and learned and, started out as a lesbian couple, and then as time progressed, Bobby came out and we worked through that together and we're still together and, and thriving. And it's, it's changed for me with my identity and, and orientation and things like that. And the same with him. So like, it's been a journey together. But in the midst of that, I asked him, I said, why did it take you so long? Like, why did you wait so long to come out and why? You know, and his response like. It. It fueled me. It broke me and then fueled me because he said, I didn't know people like me existed. And you're what it was. Oh God, so many years ago. He was probably like in his late twenties. I didn't know people like me existed. And so, because in our academia world, we've met more queer people. I was, you know, an advisor for this space and working with the, the students and working with faculty and staff where we met and had a circle of queer, non-binary trans folks where Bobby was like, oh, this is me. Oh, here I am. This is who I am. And I've seen, you know, so I was like, it's about time. Like it didn't. It didn't shock me. Um, you know, I do, I do miss the girl sometimes. Like I, I've been, you know, so there's that. But, but, but personally, I asked him, I said, you didn't learn, like teachers didn't help you see this, or he said, no in school. He never even knew about the word trans or what it meant. And so I was like, oh no, we need to do something about it. And then the second part about that, so. There are people that are allies and wanna do this work, and they're trying to do these like lessons and do these things. And sometimes it's more harmful than helpful, but they don't mean to do that. Right. But it's because they don't have the knowledge behind it or the, the, the empathy or understanding the people and what's really happening when you're doing these lessons. And so I said we need to help our allies. To get these lessons out there because when I did a small survey, teachers told me, um, it's like one of my articles for California, like looking at the Fair Act teacher said, I know about it, I wanna do it, but I don't have the resources and I don't have the materials, and I don't, and I don't know where to go. And so I was like, well then we need to here. We need to do it for you. And so that's where that came from. Um, was thinking like, we need something right now, and something that can help affirm people like Bobby, but then also make sure we're meeting the standards and all the things from top to bottom where there's no question asked, here's an inclusive lesson that you can take right now and use. So that's, that's my like. Idea behind it of where, where some of that came from. And then Kia's like beautiful framework. Oh my gosh. So I'll let her talk too, but um. That idea behind thriving and who we are and what we need to be. Okay. Like we didn't want a book that was about this bad thing happens and there's this bad thing. We wanted to celebrate and talk about the good and how we can make it a positive school environment. So I'll let Kia add on and share as to like why she jumped on or what and what, you know, she contributed, which was so much. Um, but it just became this beautiful, beautiful project that couldn't have come at a better time. Right. So.

Dr. Tami: 40:32

absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, I love that the teachers are like, I want to do this right? And so. I think that's an important message too. If you're, you know, you wanna be an ally and support the work, but you're not sure how, and you, so you don't wanna do that harm asking the question so that you can find those resources so you can do it in a way that is supportive and affirming. I think, you know, that's not always easy for people to do. Like it's asking for help, right. Or saying, I don't know, something. Um. So I love that they asked that. So now we have this book. So, and Kia, I wanna hear about, your part of the journey of the book.

Dr. Kia: 41:11

Yeah, it was wonderful. So Bre, uh, invited me to join the project, which was wonderful, specifically to bring in kind of the thriving work. Before I get into that, I just wanted to say, I feel like the theme of like aspiration versus infrastructure is coming up again where it's like, I really wanna do this, but I'm just not sure how, I don't know how to, you know, deploy it under my specific conditions. Um, and we talk a little bit about this also in the book, just like. How, depending on your context, you might need to approach this work in different ways. And so we brought in some other scholars who have really thought about how to incorporate, transgender, creative young people into classrooms, into schools, into the work. Um, because policies are different in different states because the conditions vary. So we don't go into great depth, but we do touch on it and point people towards other really, you know, powerful work. The what we, in our conversation, I, I, we did decide we had the choice between making it like a super academic book versus, uh, more just sort of like light touch come on in. This is very accessible. You do not have to look all these words up in the dictionary. We did, I don't think we ever used the word ontology, but like, like. We, um, we wanted this book to be something people could really just plug and play. Like, oh, okay, this is, you know, doable. Um, and then we grounded it in actually three frameworks. So one of the things about the thriving, the Bridge to Thriving framework is it's really, um, it's really recognizing that the hardships and the traumas and the harms are real. We do have to pay attention to them. And this is like, uh, Toni Morrison talking about, you know, the work of, uh, racism is distruction. There's a point at which, especially for those of us who are experiencing these things, we can become completely consumed in the survival work and not able to really focus on building the thing that we wanna see instead. Right. And in order to build the thing we wanna see instead, while we're also surviving, we need each other. So that's why community is the foundation of the Thriving framework. So this was a book that was grounded in the, let's imagine, beyond the BS that we're surviving, right? And really give people something that moves us toward the thing that we actually wanna see and build in the world. So that's one piece. But then there were two other frameworks in the mix. One was, SJ Miller's, uh, very menopause moment. Um, I'm not going to say the name of the framework correctly right now, and I am mortified. It is in the book, but it's, uh, essentially a framework tied to gender diversity. I am sorry, SJ. Oh my god. Um,

Dr. Tami: 44:01

Sj, I will make sure it is listed in the show notes for sure.

Dr. Kia: 44:05

Yeah, gender complexity specifically and inviting educators to really understand, um, that, you know, you can't like look at a person and know their gender. That deployment of gender in a human being's experience can be quite complex in and of itself. Gender identity complexities, framework. Oh, thank you brain. I was like, it's in there. I know it's in there. Um, so. There's that piece, and we wanted to bring that in because of course, we're really explicitly talking about trans and gender creative young people, and this framework is directly tied to education and educational spaces. We also, of course, tapped into Goldie Muhammad's, historically responsive literacy framework and goldie's. Anchored into race and ethnicity, and we, you know, took it and translated around gender, identity specifically. But this, the importance of this is where critical consciousness comes into, and it's across all three of the frameworks thriving, uh, gender identity, complexity, and historical, um, literacy. Understanding not only who we are and who we've been and who our forebearers are and what our models are, so we can see ourselves like Bobby needed to. Right, so we can see ourselves, so kids can see themselves, um, and figure out who they are in the broad project of humanity. But also so that we're at tuned into the politics of, as we were just talking about, the way these things keep recurring in human history. This is not the first time trans and gender creative people have been targeted for, essentially scapegoated, um, as a way to get people accustomed to egregious violence. So that a bunch of really greedy people can steal everything they can touch and everything they can't, like, this isn't even the first time we've seen this and there are also resistance histories that are important. So we were bringing that into, again, with the orientation to not only acknowledging that there are survival needs, but also that that is not the whole story and we deserve to thrive, we're we deserve to thrive.

Dr. Tami: 46:08

absolutely. Oh, that's so powerful because we know that. We hear a lot about trauma, like this negative story about a particular group and all the thing, the horrible things that they've experienced. Right? And that isn't what makes up a person or a, a group of people even, like the resilience, the joy, the connection, the, all of these richness of humanity is what makes up a group. Oh yeah.

Dr. Kia: 46:40

And the defiance, which is what this book is,'cause we gonna be popular. And they'll look right. No, but it's defiance. It's the refusal to change the name of your podcast. It's the refusal to be quiet. It's the refusal to allow the ignorance to be the loudest thing in the room. The defiance.

Dr. Tami: 46:57

Absolutely. Absolutely. Oh, this like gives me chills, y'all. Like I just love, you know, we are here to, yes, we are here to thrive and we are here to thrive in community. And even if. I think sometimes we pin ourselves against each other in different, you know, groups, right? Like my struggle is harder than your struggle but, but really it's all grounded in very much what you've been saying here that aspiration in the infrastructure, it's all the same. It's all the same. It what's causing all of these things. Yes. Like, and I think that is the most important part.'cause when we come together. That power, the def. Oh, I love that idea of defiance. I love that.'cause I am a sassy girl and I have tried to not be sassy and people will be like, you know who you were talking to? I was like, I do, but you know what? Mm. I don't work that way. Like you are doing things like. I legitimately got fired from a teaching job because I don't even know if you know the story re, but I got fired from a teaching job because I was standing up for these kids. My principal did not like it was a predominantly low income black student population. Didn't like that the students responded were excelling, the students were excelling. So we tried to shift my teaching role so I could have less impact. That didn't work. Very frustrated, right? So instead he tried to say I was a bad teacher. Tried to fire me while I was on bedrest, by the way, having pregnant with my child. Totally illegal. But anyway, so I sue the district. I'm like, I don't feel bad. I don't feel bad that I'm standing up for the. You are wrong. You're wrong about children. And so I say this all the time. I will always say and do what I know to be right and best for people. And if other people have a problem with that, then whatever that consequence is, I'm fine with it because it usually sets me onto a better pathway. Because when we stand up for each other, when we use our voices for each other, we all benefit from that. And I know people are like, oh, that's really scary. Yeah, it can be scary. Like it can't be scary people like, oh, I don't wanna lose my job. I don't wanna lose, I didn't wanna lose my job. I didn't do it thinking I was gonna lose my job. But at the end of the day, can I live with myself if I'm not saying things that I know are, you know, morally wrong or harming people, that it shouldn't be in any of those things. That's just not. I just can't do it personally. Right. Um, and I think the more we talk about how we do that, I think it empowers people to feel like they can, they can do it too.

Dr. Kia: 49:35

I think that's right. I think there's, you know, there's the moral dimension, there's also material dimension. So, um, there is increasingly, uh, a movement toward building hyper-local mutual aid networks and communities. And I have a link that I'll share with you and maybe it can go in the show notes because I do think, especially if you're, you know, if you're on your own, you don't have community around you, your family's in another state or whatever it is, you know, the moral is easier when the material is more secure and human beings need, we need to know, like, I'm gonna be able to eat, I'm gonna have a roof over my head, you know, I can get care if I need it. And so we need each other for that. So I'll share that resource and hopefully that'll also be, um. Something that helps people feel more courageous.

Dr. Tami: 50:21

Absolutely. Oh my gosh. You guys, like, I feel like I could talk to you for absolutely another hour, and I love that about the podcast, but I know it is time for us to wrap up. I will make sure everyone, one, I'll put a link to the book, watch out for the giveaway. I'm gonna do that on, on my socials. I, I'm gonna put a link for Dr. Bre, for Dr. Kia so you can access their work. Anything we've talked about in this podcast will be in the show notes. Um. I do wanna wrap up. Do you, either one of you wanna share like a quick tip for people that are like looking to maybe start this work, access this work? Before we wrap up,

Dr. Bre: 50:59

I'll share just real quick, it's, you know, a couple sentences. My, my thought is don't not do anything like we're in a space now and everybody may not, like you said, some might be scared to step in the forefront or to say something, but, um, lives are at stake.

Dr. Tami: 51:16

Mm.

Dr. Bre: 51:17

I can't say that any other way. Lives are at stake. So whatever capacity you have, whatever that looks like, whether it's financially supporting a group, whether it's buying books for people to do a book study, whether it's going to a protest, saying the thing, teaching the way you wanna teach, whatever that is, but don't not do anything. Um, I think at this point, like we said, the resistance, the, the, the joy, the care we have to be in each other's corners. And this is a very pertinent time. And honestly, I don't see it getting better anytime soon. It's, we're gonna have to go maybe some, some, what do they say? Like the overtime, like 12 round. Like, I don't know, but I just feel like, um, we have to stay strong and support each other. So just don't not do anything. Yeah. So that's, that's what I could say at this moment, you know? Um, and whatever that looks like.

Dr. Kia: 52:11

the way it gets better is by us fighting now.

Dr. Tami: 52:15

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Kia: 52:16

I'll send another resource tied to that too. What you can do.

Dr. Bre: 52:19

Yeah.

Dr. Tami: 52:20

Well, thank you Dr. Bre. Thank you, Dr. Kia. It has been such a pleasure talking with you both. Thank you all for joining us for another episode of The Equity Hour. You can find everything we've talked about in the show notes and remember to use your voice for justice today.

Dr. Bre: 52:36

Yay, thank you