Olivia: [00:00:00] What does it take to walk away from a comfortable retirement in Connecticut and start building schools in African school deserts? Dr. Kris Nystrom did just that, and what he found along the way will completely reframe how you think about access, equity, and what it truly means to help. Here's my part one conversation with Dr. Kris Nystrom.
This is Schoolutions, the podcast that extends education beyond the classroom. A show that isn't just theory, but practical try-it-tomorrow approaches for educators and caregivers to ensure every student finds their spark and receives the support they need to thrive.
I am Olivia Wahl and I am humbled to welcome Dr. Kris Nystrom to the podcast today. Let me tell you a little bit about Kris. [00:01:00] Ten years of global research into global literacy led Kris from Connecticut classrooms to African school deserts where children risk their lives just to learn. Our conversation today will focus on the nonprofit Kris founded in 2024 Reading The World Inc., that partners with local communities to provide teacher training, instructional materials and infrastructure. Nobody takes a salary and every dollar donated goes directly to helping children access education. Kris, welcome to the podcast. Thank you for taking the time to have this conversation.
Kris: Thank you Olivia. I am certainly honored to be here and I'm excited to talk with you.
Olivia: Well, and you just informed me you are eight hours ahead, um, of, of time zone in New York, so, um, I just am grateful it's whatever, around 6:00 PM your time right now, you said.
Kris: I'm, so just give context. I'm in Nairobi right [00:02:00] now. Uh, we are eight hours, eight, eight hours ahead. Oh, okay. It is 6:00 PM here. Yeah.
Olivia: Got it. Okay. Alright, well let's kick off part one of our conversation. I'm fascinated to know a piece of research or a researcher you lean on in your work as executive director.
Kris: So I would say that the research that that is important to me is, is kind of foundational stuff. Paulo Freire is huge in what I do and providing, uh, the, the value of reading as, uh, as identity marker and tool for social mobility and change and, and just being, uh, uh, a human - being recognized as a human in your, um, in your situation, in your community, in your, uh, world.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: Uh, but I will also say that from there, I, I moved into, uh, semiotics and I look very closely at, uh, [00:03:00] uh, excuse me, Umberto Eco and before having Charles Sanders Peirce and the work that they were doing led me to an understanding of it led me to a theory of how the brain reads. What was interesting for me about that, and thank God it worked out, is that the theory that I was developing ended up being played out by the work of people like, uh, Stanislas, Stanislas, Dehaene uh, reading in the Brain, uh, Maryanne Wolf.
Uh, that those who were able to do the MRI, uh, research into what's happening in the brain met matches up with, with the work that I was doing. So that's, that's really important foundational work for me in terms of the more academic view of, of, of where, where reading comes from and how we do it, and therefore how we can, uh, help kids, uh, go through that process.[00:04:00]
But it really pushed me into a much more culturally responsive position because I recognize that, uh, that, uh, teaching all teaching good teaching begins with the students’ culture. With the educational culture of the student and anything that bypasses that is a political and moral statement that says. Student and their identity does not matter.
Olivia: Yeah, right.
Kris: So the way that I look at reading is all grounded in context and identity. And so, uh, so I have become very cognizant of the moral dimension of reading and the ways that we go about it and why it's important.
Olivia: Wow. Okay. Well. That gives beautiful context. And I also [00:05:00] wanna offer listeners context around, would you define what a school desert is?
Kris: Sure. So my organization Reading the World, uh, we focus on school deserts. We go to school deserts - places where kids have limited or no access to education. There are, uh, multiple reasons why that can happen.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: You can look at, look at violence and war and conflict. You think about something like Gaza, the kids are not going to school in Gaza or school is extremely limited because the schools have been blown up. Uh, you gotta look at, uh, places like, uh, the, um, South Sudan, uh, where there is, uh, tremendous, uh, violent conflict and then starvation and hunger and, and schools are not, kids are not able to go to school.
That's one of the, that's one significant reason you can look at, uh, climate, uh, natural disasters, floods. Uh, there was one here in Kenya a couple of months ago. [00:06:00] It flooded 7,000 folks out of their homes. Uh, uh, uh, the schools have disappeared underwater and have been destroyed and now those kids are looking for, and families are looking for where to turn to.
Uh, geography is, uh, is a big barrier for many of the places that I go. Uh, kids can't get to school because it's too far or it's dangerous. A couple of years ago, eight children perished, uh, crossing the Volta River in Ghana, uh, in a canoe where they were in a canoe with 20. The canoe capsized, eight of them perished and they were trying to get to the other side to get to school.
Uh, I work in a, in an area in uh, Kenya called Leiki Public Laikipia County, where the children would have to walk, uh, five kilometers an hour or two, get to the [00:07:00] closest school on that walk, they can potentially encounter elephant, lion, hyenas, leopards. It's a dangerous circumstance. So the kids, kids would be leaving at, you know, six 30 in the morning. Sun's coming up at seven. Imagine saying to your six or 7-year-old child to go to school.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: And that's what they have to watch out for. Right? And we can talk more about that project, uh, at some point. So that's geography. And then the, the final one, which is huge here, uh, is, is cost. Is fees. Uh, uh, economy uh, so even though most African nations, uh, promise of pre-education for their children, uh, you know, they, they do two years of preschool through grade 12. Uh, there are still fees that are associated. Many of the governments cannot afford to pay the schools enough to run, so the schools will pass on fees. Uh, there [00:08:00] are instructional supplies that students are required to purchase texts, writing utensils, uh, books. Um, plus the textbooks themselves. Sometimes the schools, you know, have all the schools use school uniforms, and then there's, then there's, um, food lunch.
Olivia: Right.
Kris: Uh, many of the kids are coming from severely um, severe poverty.
Olivia: Mm-hmm.
Kris: And they cannot afford lunch. And the school is not providing lunch. Kids are hungry. You take a kid who cannot afford the uniform or their uniform is going to be extremely ratty uh, and, uh, and obvious that they are in poverty. Uh, they're worried about home because at home they may have been taken care of, an elderly member of the family, or, uh, some younger siblings.
[00:09:00] They may have been required to, uh, retrieve water for the family, which could be a kilometer, two, three kilometers away. And they would have to do that two or three times a day. So now that kid is in school, everybody's looking at them in their view. Uh, they're worried about home, uh, they're worried about the people at home. Are they gonna be okay?
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: Uh, and they're hungry.
Olivia: Mm-hmm. They're not
Kris: They’re not learning.
Olivia: No.
Kris: They're not learning.
Olivia: No.
Kris: We're looking at ways that we can address those. Circumstances and provide every kid access to learn.
Olivia: When I learned more about your mission and this work that you're doing, I was so moved by just the, the care and the bigger picture of the whole human that you take into consideration, and I did think it was fascinating, those four nuances you just mentioned. You deemed the four horsemen [00:10:00] of, I, I wanna make sure I'm saying it correctly, the four horsemen of educational inequity. Correct?
Kris: Yeah.
Olivia: Yeah. And, and I think that is a fascinating, uh, analogy or metaphor for what you're describing. Um. You also just alluded to or spoke to some of the nuances that kids face or realities kids face on their way to school. Take us to the moment you’re retired and Killingworth, Connecticut. What made you go from there to launching this nonprofit focused on Sub-Saharan Africa?
Kris: Yeah, it started a long time before that. I was doing research in adolescent, uh, literacy.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: Uh, adolescents reading, uh, and trying to help uh, I spent 36 years in education in Connecticut on a, in the education system in Connecticut. Uh, and I was working on building literacy programs, especially for the kids who were [00:11:00] reading. Their reading was behind grade level.
How can we propel them across that gap? So as I was doing that research, I did, uh, end up, up down a little bit of a rabbit hole to, uh, global, uh. Global literacy rates.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: Uh, and Africa has the lowest literacy rates in the world. Uh, there are some nations here that they're under 40, 30, 20%. Uh, and so I had decided then I really want to address that, uh, the as best I can. Uh, and I realized of course I wasn't gonna be able to do it while I was working and I wasn't gonna be able to do it until my own kids were grown. And so I retire. My kids are grown. They're young adults, they are incredible, wonderful people who still, I'm there for them. But I can [00:12:00] be also in Africa, uh, three to six - Uh, I come twice a year, three to four months at a time.
Olivia: Wow. Okay.
Kris: That was the, that's, that's how it happened. Uh, not so fast as I retired and said, oh, let me go to Africa. I had actually been working on this for, for quite some time.
Olivia: And so I want to then move to the, the philosophical awareness. And there is a quote that I, I want listeners to hear where one is born cannot be the only reason they have access to education. So that is the philosophical foundation for Reading the World. How does that inspire and drive the work you are doing and all the members of the organization every day?
Kris: Yeah. So, uh, so we're, we're among educators. When you look at a kid, you look in their eyes.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: What did they do to deserve being treated poorly, less than, other than anyone else?
Olivia: [00:13:00] Right.
Kris: They didn’t. They are innocent of that. Uh, and you know, as teachers, oftentimes when we see kids and they're having a hard time, you know, it's coming from somewhere else.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: It’s coming from family, it's coming from home. Uh, and so, uh, and we've all all experienced this, we've all experienced, um, tough, tough oppor - tough moments in our lives that were, were, had nothing to do with us. It had to do with where we happened to be so. I do think about that quite a bit. And, and I think about that not only here in Africa or across the globe. I think about that in America.
Olivia: Do you have a set protocol that you lean on when you're setting up a school and finding the desert in itself that you have, um, that creates that sustainable model?
Kris: Yes. Uh, and here's my protocol and I think that this is very important. It's very important to me. Uh, [00:14:00] from an ethical standpoint and from a practical one, the ethical one is this. I come here and everybody immediately looks at me. I'm, I'm pretty large. I'm six two. I'm heavier than I should be. Uh, and I'm, I'm very white.
So the assumption is that I've got money. Uh, so everybody's looking at me and wondering what I can do for them. I stand out quite a bit. There are many organizations. Africa is littered with good intentions that do not follow through. I've watched countless laptops without any opportunity, without any infrastructure for sustaining those laptops become door stops.
Olivia: Yeah,
Kris: Right. So, uh. So the first thing that I do is I let everyone know I'm not here to tell you what [00:15:00] to do. I'm not coming from a place of more knowledge and better knowledge than you. I just happen to have a place that has resources that I can access, a network of experts that I can access. So I'm not coming in anytime to tell you, here's what you should do, here's how you do it.
I first spend a lot of time. Talking to individuals, talking to the people in the village, talking to the kids, talking to the parents, talking to the elders, talking to the teachers, and I ask them, what do you want? What do you need? And what are your values? And when I can find ways to help them build themselves through those wants, needs and values, then that's what I will, that's what I will implement. And then I always want to, I will. I am always seeking ways to make it sustainable, because if I just come and dump tops at you right then, that's no good.
Olivia: Right?
Kris: [00:16:00] I need you to own it. I need you to be able to run it. I need you to say, this is important to me and this is part of our community now. And when I'm not there anymore, it runs. It goes. Yeah.
Olivia: Yeah. Well, you're also grounding it in their perceived needs. And so it will be a, a shared vision instead of you coming in and creating the vision, because we know how that doesn't work anywhere in, in America or, or Africa. Right. It has to be co-created. Yeah.
Kris: Yeah. And I do think it's very important that, uh, that I step out of the role of any kind of savior.
Olivia: Mm-hmm. It's
Kris: It’s not what I'm here to do. I'm here to provide a bridge over the gap that colonialism has caused and continues to cause.
Olivia: Yeah. Yeah. How long does it usually take you to, once you're [00:17:00] in and you've been introduced and you've taken that curiosity stance to get a school desert more, um, off the ground?
Kris: Uh, well, it depends on, on what I'm gonna do. Sometimes, uh, sometimes it's, it's just some, some training that I can offer. Sometimes it's, I know another organization that can help and let me connect you, and then other times it's, let's really, let's really talk this through and let's work on it. I've got a project that I've been working on for essentially since I started. Uh, so that's a, that's a, you know, a couple of years, three years old. Uh uh, so some of these, some of these can take a fair amount of time. Yeah.
Olivia: All right. Well. So part two, I think it's going to be critical that we get more into the global literacy rates and how it impacts the global economy because someone listening to to this in the states may say, well, why does this matter for us?
Why does [00:18:00] this matter? And it does matter very much. Um, before we jump to part two of our conversation, um, I'd love to do some lightning round questions. Get your first gut instinct. Um, all right. First question. What keeps you up at night most when it comes to this work?
Kris: Kids’ hunger.
Olivia: What would surprise us about, uh, African education?
Kris: How similar it is to American education.
Olivia: What specifically is similar that surprised you?
Kris: Uh, that we are all after the same thing. We want the best for our kids.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: And that, that underlying love, unconditional positive regard and love when we're doing it right. That's what we want. And I'm sorry, the kids are the same.
Olivia: Kids are kids.
Kris: They laugh, they sing, they dance, and they are just as smart and talented and wonderful as anywhere.
Olivia: Yeah. If you had unlimited funding, what would the first thing be that you go for? [00:19:00]
Kris: Health and food. Health and food for everyone.
Olivia: What do you think the are biggest misconceptions Americans have about African literacy?
Kris: Probably capacity. I mean, there's a lot of fear. I've brought a few people here with me to work with me, uh, and it's always the fear of coming to Africa.
Olivia: Yeah.
Kris: We have to first get over there. There's malaria that's gonna kill you. There's animals that are gonna kill you. There's people that are gonna kill you. There's awful things that are gonna happen to you. It's not like that at all. I mean, there, there's realities, but there are anywhere in the world.
Olivia: Yeah. Yeah. Well, we are very blessed to have you in the world doing this work. It is heart work. Um, uh, I'll call it that because it has kids at the center of it, and then there's this ripple effect. We're going to speak to impart two because one literate child can change the trajectory of their entire family, which is mind-blowingly beautiful. Um, [00:20:00] Kris, thanks for this part one conversation and I cannot wait to delve deeper into the global literacy impact that your work has. So take care.
Kris: Thank you.
Olivia: I'm hoping that today's conversation moved you as much as learning about Kris's work moved me when I originally learned about it. As we sit with this part one conversation throughout this week, part two will release on Friday. Let it remind us that the distance between a child and an education is sometimes measured in kilometers, or a walk through wildlife. In Kris's case, sometimes it's just in dollars for a uniform or school lunch.
Kris's nonprofit Reading the World is doing the quiet, rigorous, community rooted work of closing that distance. You can learn more about Kris's work and his nonprofit at Reading the World Inc.com. I will put a link in the show notes. Every dollar donated goes [00:21:00] directly to children. No salaries, no overhead siphon.
You can also find Reading the World on Facebook and Instagram. Please share this episode with an educator, a parent, or anyone that believes that where a child is born should not determine what they get to become. Join us for part two where we zoom out to look at the ripple effects of global literacy and why this work matters far beyond the borders of Sub-Saharan Africa. See you later this week.