A Queer Understanding

The Sound of Inclusivity: Creating Classrooms Where Every Student Belongs with Bryson Tarbet

• Dr. Angelica & Cassy Thompson • Season 7 • Episode 3

Share episode

What does true inclusivity look like in today's music classrooms? Bryson Tarbet takes us behind the scenes of his remarkable journey from rural Ohio music teacher to worldwide instructional coach, revealing the profound challenges and unexpected joys of creating spaces where every student belongs.

Drawing from his personal experiences as a neurodivergent educator and his professional expertise in music education, Bryson shares candid insights about navigating conservative school environments while staying true to his authentic self. His stories highlight both the progress made and the significant work still needed to ensure classrooms welcome students of all neurological differences and identities.

https://www.thatmusicteacher.com/ 

hello@thatmusicteacher.com

https://www.facebook.com/ThatMusicTeacherBlog/ 



Contact the hosts of A Queer Understanding


Like, subscribe, & follow

Angelica:

Bryson Tarbett, a passionate advocate for inclusive music education, transitioned from a career as a pre-K through 6th grade general music teacher to a full-time instructional coach. With a bachelor's of music and music education from Ohio Wesleyan University and a master of music and music education with a Cote d'Alais emphasis from Capital University, bryson brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to his work. University Bryson brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to his work. During his tenure as an educator, bryson spent a transformative year as part of an elementary school intervention team where he discovered his passion for working with students with disabilities. Drawing from this experience and his personal journey as a neurodiverse individual, bryson advocates strongly for creating sensory and emotionally inclusive classrooms. Now the founder of that Music Teacher LLC, bryson channels his dedication to music education into sharing diverse perspectives on issues relevant to educators nationwide. He hosts the popular that Music Podcast, caring specifically to elementary music teachers, and spearheads the Elementary Music Summit, a platform for professional development and community building. Here's our conversation. Bryson, thank you for joining us.

Bryson:

Hello, thank you for having me.

Angelica:

Thank you. I think you are the first teacher that we've had on in all these years. It's only been a couple, but I think you're the first teacher, so I am definitely interested in hearing about your experiences. You are specifically a music teacher in Ohio, correct? Yes, what grade level?

Bryson:

I was a pre-K through sixth grade, general music teacher. So a little bit of everything.

Angelica:

Okay, different instruments.

Bryson:

We did a lot of vocal. We did dancing movement. We did play the recorders which please don't come at me. They're my favorite thing. They probably a lot of vocal. We did dancing movement. We did play the recorders which don't please don't come at me. They're my favorite thing. They probably just weren't taught. If you don't like it, that's where everything was just creating an explorative way to get kids involved with music.

Cassy:

All right, Awesome, Just so you know. So I grew up in Jamaica and the recorder was a huge part. I remember the first song we had to learn was Mary had their little lamb. I can't play that song on the recorder to this day.

Bryson:

I love it and that without getting too far out of base. Already I have that conversation nearly every single time. I get a haircut or get an Uber and it comes up and it brings up a recorder and everyone has such great memories. So, as much as I know that a lot of the parents are like, why are you doing this to me? It's for those conversations right there.

Angelica:

I don't even know what the recorder is. Seriously, I'm so serious.

Cassy:

Oh my God, you don't know what I record. You haven't played a record. Oh my God, I'm going to buy a recorder. I'm buying a recorder and I'm going to play it for you. Okay, yes, so my marriage probably weren't ruined, but we'll see I need a recorder for christmas. I can't play that recorder.

Bryson:

That's the only musical instrument I know how to play I'm honored to have been able to start that journey for her so you say you started out pre-k through sixth grade.

Angelica:

Yes, okay. And what were you always interested in? Music, were you always interested in teaching? What was you always interested in teaching? What was the convergence of those two things?

Bryson:

Oh, that's a real question that I've done a lot of thinking about lately. My parents were both teachers. We were long I'm a third generation educator and that made it a little bit easy to go into education. I've been really into music and singing from a very young age. My parents basically said that I've just been singing from the moment I woke up and here we are. I took a lot of different winding journeys to get to where I am. I always thought I was going to go into the music performance route and be an opera singer, and then I thought I was going to be a high school choir director before I ended up in the elementary world. And just recently, at the end of this past school year, I left the classroom to run my instructional coaching program full-time, which is incredibly wonderful, but also never where I thought I would be. So it's been interesting to see the path that has led me here.

Angelica:

Wow, okay, now that you've said it, I'm dying to hear you sing. Can you like give us something operatic? That would be great.

Bryson:

I'm not quite sure what we would do, or, honestly, if my microphone would even let it not just peek out that's very robust.

Angelica:

It's very yes all right, I got you. What were experiences like as an elementary school teacher? I we don't have. There aren't a lot of men in that field, first of all, and then also, I honestly I would is. I don't know if you see yourself as presenting as gay or not, but I would imagine that there are, just from things I've seen on news and TikTok, but yeah, that there may be some parents who have an issue with that or have who are ignorant and have concerns about that. Have you had those experiences?

Bryson:

Unfortunately. Yes, that's one of those things that I, when I first started teaching, I was still very fresh in figuring out my identity and going into the classroom, especially elementary, where, for one, like you said, there are very few men that work in an elementary classroom, so that alone I was already this odd man out. But I also worked in a very rural school in Ohio and unfortunately there are some lines that are very tricky to cross without a lot of support in your corner. I will say I've had the vast majority of my administrators have been very supportive, but sometimes I've had administrators that were trying to be supportive maybe and things didn't quite go as planned and, like you said, there were parents that did not like the way that I presented in the world. I think the big thing that people had problems with me were some parents was that I was talking about inclusivity.

Bryson:

I've done a lot of work in differentiation and inclusion from the disability and neurodivergent side of things, but the reality is human, children are human. We are all so multifaceted. So while I've never had any explicit lessons on sexual identity or anything like that in the music classroom, I've always made sure that it was a place where everyone can be there. When we say music is for everyone, we mean that, and sometimes that rubbed some parents the wrong way, especially as I started transitioning into the dual role of running my company in the evenings and on social media and getting a following there and then also being a teacher during the school day.

Bryson:

Sometimes those things did not super interact pretty well and I don't know. That's still something I really worry about, as just the shape of education is teachers who don't feel like they can be themselves, and that is really scary, especially when we are coming up to an even worse teacher shortage. Things like that and things like the laws and the bills that we're seeing come in about education here in Ohio. I just really worry about the ripple effects of that and how my experience which by all means was not a terrible experience how that might be so much worse for others down the line, and that's something I have genuine concerns about and that's part of the reason that I feel a little bit more comfortable doing things through my company because I'm no longer a public servant, so I get to make my own rules a little bit more and attract the people that I want to attract.

Angelica:

So you mentioned that you work with students with disabilities or, and you mentioned, neurodiverse individuals.

Bryson:

For those who don't know what is neurodiversity, First of all, that's one of those labels where everyone might have a little bit of a different opinion on that. For me, as someone who has ADHD and sensory processing disorder, my working definition of neurodivergence is essentially when our brains work differently than the mainstream. So things like ADHD, autism, sensory issues, things like that, can fall into that realm.

Angelica:

Yeah, I think most people think about autism or being on the spectrum. That has become a pretty popular topic and pretty mainstream. I don't know if you watch a lot of Netflix Atypical is one of my favorite shows and then they have Love on the Spectrum in the US and Australia. I don't know if that was an intentional thing to bring more light to neurodivergent individuals or what their participation behind that was, but I think they did a pretty good job of showing the spectrum that people can be on and that people who are neurodivergent are regular people with just slightly different ways that they process and experience the world or see the world through.

Cassy:

Yeah, and so you spoke about the bill that they are passing. In Ohio. On November 27th, the governor DY. He signed a transgender bathroom ban bill into law, which restricts transgender students to use the bathroom that they were assigned at Byrd. How is that impacting students in your district or your classroom?

Bryson:

I think the biggest thing that comes to mind is that place isn't there for people who need it and when that's the case, for anything, for any sort of you know inclusion or ability to have, I don't know. I'm really struggling with this because I've only had a few, a few experiences as a teacher where this would have been a direct issue for the students that I served. But I think that even when there aren't students that are served by something like this Because one, it doesn't matter, it's just the bathroom. That's all that's going on.

Bryson:

That's one of the things that frustrates me is this fixation on things like this that are clearly just vilifying and scapegoating. And especially, there are so many bigger issues and bigger fish to fry in education, especially education in Ohio, that it really does bother me that this is where we're deciding to put our focus. This is the man we're putting manpower behind, creating laws, having committees for this, and meanwhile we have so many other issues in how these schools need to work and it just it's really frustrating because it doesn't need to be that way and it's just not what we should be focusing on. It's just not that big of a deal for the people that aren't affected by it and the people that are affected by it. It is a huge deal, and that is what bothers me so much.

Cassy:

In my previous organization. We work with HRC and there's an initiative called the Welcoming School, which has done a lot of great work around equality in the schools. What that does? It not only protects students but also protects teachers from being discriminated against in the classroom. And it was really enlightening because during my advocacy with the school board in Preachery Wisconsin, Maryland and you will be surprised, you know Preachery, Wisconsin, right next to DC or Progressive, I'm sure that no, it's socially conservative, it's a socially conservative county and I had a transgender teacher that testified about what they experienced in the classroom, both from students and parents and our teachers, and why this initiative is important. And, Bryson, I would encourage you to probably create a partnership with Welcoming School.

Cassy:

We know with this current administration the upcoming administration we may have some challenges there, but it's very disheartening to know that we have students and teachers that will have to go back in hiding because of these bills that are turning into laws in some of these states, Because what's going to happen is that bullying is going to get back on 10. Teachers are going to lose their jobs, Students are, suicide rate within the LGBTQ plus community is gonna be escalated and people may think that these things are, they'll be okay. No, when you, when the worst thing is not able to be a true, authentic self, you get in that space where you feel so claustrophobic and it's disheartening yeah, I.

Bryson:

So I had not heard of that organization before, but you mentioned it right before we started and I'm really interested to look into that more because it reminds me of the NEA, the National Education Association. A few years back, they tried a very similar thing to help bring the teachers and get resources in front of students but also be visible in it, and they created essentially, badge buddies that would go on and had a qr for more information, but it was more of a I'm a safe person, this is I'm, so I'm here and you are too, and that's okay. Um, and it was a huge deal. It got picked up on the right wing media and it I don't know. I just I'm gonna be really honest.

Bryson:

I don't have the words to describe what I, what my concerns are for education, especially when it comes to lgbtq teachers, students, families, because that's that's another thing that we don't talk a lot about. We have students whose parents are lgbt, lgbt and we're supposed to include them, but we can't talk about them. It's this whole thing of I don't know it's. I promise I'm usually much more well-spoken than this, but I'm just, I really struggle with the concept as a core, so I'm really excited to look into that Welcoming Schools and see how I can support it and how I can signal, boost it and get it in front of more teachers.

Cassy:

Yes, it's very important. So I had a, so I'm not going to mention the school or the teacher's name, but in Prince George's County, maryland, we were the GSA Gender Straight Alliance. Do you have that in your school? Not where I used to be.

Cassy:

Okay, so we, there was a GSA and there was a student that was a part of the GSA and her mother didn't know and we were having an event and for some reason the mother pulled up and told her that's what was going on, and it was a whole charade because her mother was pissed off. Her daughter was a lesbian or bisexual, whatever she identifies and the mother didn't know. She didn't know. She didn't know. All she knew was that the daughter was participating in stuff at school and she phoned out what it was and she showed up. She didn't know what GSA was.

Cassy:

They were from Africa and she phoned out what GSA was. When she came here, she said she was going to call the police on us. She was going to call the police on the school. She was going to call the news and school. She was going to call the news and she said she'd rather see her daughter in the grave than being a part of the lgbtq plus community. I have no idea what happened to that child because we were not allowed to actually even get in contact with that child anymore because the parents said no way and my organization was partnering with the school to bring welcome in school to be a part of their GSA.

Bryson:

Yeah, I understand parental rights and there's something to be said about the fact of parental rights are about your kid, not my kid. We see things like library books and things like that, but there's also something to be said about in a case just like that I've had. I had a student at one point where we were instructed by the district to not call them by the name that they wanted to be called by, because mom said that and we were about we had like by the code of ethics we had to do that. And now, with that being said, I just didn't use the name.

Bryson:

If I can't, so I just would find other ways to get attention and things like that, things like that. Where it's again, it's really not a small thing, it's not this big thing for those that aren't involved, but for those that are, it really is. And those suicide rates are scary and we do so much work in the schools of how do we identify this, how do we get them resources, but the reality is sometimes just like the situation you were talking about they go home and that support system isn't there and, even worse than that support system is working against them a lot of the time and that's really scary.

Angelica:

So, bryson, how did it look for you to promote diversity in your classroom?

Bryson:

My biggest thing was just getting kids exposed to things in general different genres of music, different activities that we were working on. You know, in music it can be really easy to just talk about Bach and Beethoven and what I lovingly refer to as just the old, dead white guys, but there's so much more to that in music and things like that, and I think there's also really good opportunities for us to be inclusive without being that being the center. For instance, I love using picture books in my classroom and sometimes it's as simple as a picture of someone wearing a hijab or a picture. It's not the main thing, it's not the whole story, it's not about this. In the background, when they go to this big market, there might be a family with two dads, things like that. Again, they're not going to be a huge deal for those people that it's not a huge deal for, but for those students that it does impact, it will mean the world and it will show them that it will be so impactful for them.

Bryson:

Where I was teaching which is always a great place to have your name brought up but it was all about how to be inclusive for students who basically LGBT inclusivity in classroom. The entire thing was not about how to make lessons about this, but how do we just make people feel included? And it was like simple stuff, like I had a rainbow mug on my desk. I had you know, I'm very conscious of the language that I'm using rather than moms and dads and things like that. You would have thought that I had made everyone call their mama. Everyone was mad. There were a lot of people that were mad and it was brought up thing where I think it comes from a place of fear and a place of being stuck in a wind tunnel, of hearing the same types of rhetoric. But the reality is I wouldn't be doing this episode with you if I was still in the public schools, because I know exactly how that would go and it would end poorly, or at that would go and it would end poorly or at the very least it would end neutrally, but I would be completely drained at the end of it

Bryson:

and that's not a great work environment. I love talking about how can we make our schools more inclusive for students that might feel like they're part of this community, but the reality is there are teachers that are part of that community as well, or, at the very least, teachers who might have siblings or cousins or people that they love that are part of this community. But the reality is there are teachers that are part of that community as well, or, at the very least, teachers who might have siblings or cousins or people that they love that are part of this community, and that's where visibility is just huge. And that was my biggest thing when I was in the classroom. I never made it a hey, guess what? I'm gay. That was never a thing.

Bryson:

But I also made it very clear that if one of my middle schoolers asked me straight up, I wasn't going to lie. That was what I said, like I would say if they were to at any point, if they were to say, hey, are you gay? I'd be like yep, move on, I wouldn't make it. This whole thing wouldn't make this conversation. But I also wanted to be very clear that I'm not going to lie about this, because I played that game and I'm done with it and I'm not. Life is short and I'm going to. Even if it makes my life a little bit more difficult here in the workplace, especially with parents, I think it matters more to the students than it would to be a hindrance to me, and for me that was just really important.

Angelica:

Right. So you had instances where students asked if you were gay. Yes, did you. Did you feel like that came from their own curiosity, or maybe parents suspecting that you were? And parents were talking about it and they heard and they were like what is this thing called gay? Are you gay?

Bryson:

there are two main instances that come to mind, and one of them was when all the tiktok drama was going along. So I'm sure I was the topic of conversation at some point or another and with that student we'd already a really good relationship and it wasn't like he just yelled it out in the middle of class. He said hey, people are saying this like almost like I think they're making fun of you, but like like just wanted me to know which was really. First of all, I just love that, um, but unfortunately I I've also had it where I I've had a family where their dad explicitly told them not to listen to me in the classroom because I was gay. Now, granted that family, the kids are wonderful. Unfortunately, there was just a lot going on in that home. So honestly, I wasn't surprised by that. But you're going to see it all and the reality is, for everything you hear, there's likely more that you don't, especially in this kind of role.

Cassy:

But what it does when you encourage a child not to be inclusive and adverse, it limits their potential in the real world. Because the real world is the real world and there are people from different backgrounds everywhere and if you're going to limit yourself on who you, if everybody that you're going to encounter looks like you love like you, talk like you, you gotta not. You gotta miss out on a lot of opportunities. And inclusivity is so important and we have to get to a place where it's probably never going to happen, right, because you're always going to be conservative. People are extra conservative, that things that this is not a man. This is what it is. It's one track.

Bryson:

You're on this one chart mind, and that's what it is yeah, and I I think that you brought up a really good point where I don't think we'll ever see the end of this. My, my goal is to at least make enough noise that when people in the world hear hate, they also know that there's more out there, and that's one of my missions, and one of my hills I'm willing to die on is just being a signal of there's more and there's a different option. You don't have to do that. You don't have to accept that.

Cassy:

All I say is I grew up in a homophobic country. I grew up in Jamaica and when I came to America I never thought that it would be something that I would have to advocate for people to have equality.

Bryson:

Yeah, like a lot of us, I, with the understanding of what this next presidential administration may or may not look like, I'm still processing a lot of that and that understanding and also knowing that in Ohio we doubled down on the conservative things in our state, and I think this is a conversation, that and dilemma that people that are in the majority don't necessarily always have.

Bryson:

And I say that as someone blatantly aware that I do also have the privilege of being a white man, and I think that's something that I wish. I don't wish more people understood this feeling, because that's the opposite of this, but wish that there was a way to be able to show how really frightening it can be sometimes to just not know what's coming next and not know if the fight that you fought so hard to get in with your rights and things like that, are going to be gone tomorrow. Or how do I say this nicely? Sometimes people like, oh, you're crying about things that aren't happening yet, but the reality is look at, look behind us and see the steps that have gotten us here, and the reality is we're not at the end of a story, we're right, smack dab in the middle. So sometimes I don't know, sometimes we have to. There's a bigger picture that we don't see and we could be wrong 100%. But I'm not going to sit here and just hope everything's okay, because there's just too much at stake.

Cassy:

You mentioned, Bryson, about being. You have a privilege of being a white man. Do you think, based on the results of the last election and being a white human? Do you think, based on the results of the last election and being a white human, do you think, living in a state that's so conservative, you probably would have to use that privilege a little bit more to get through? Oh, that's a really good question?

Bryson:

I don't know, and I guess that's the real answer is I guess we're going to have to wait and see. I'm lucky that I do live in Columbus, which is a little enclave here in Ohio. But the reality is, with the way our districts are all gerrymandered, it's not necessarily. That doesn't necessarily mean I'm safe, that doesn't necessarily mean that the people I care about are, and there's definitely a way where I can present in this world without drawing attention. But I don't know. That's a really good question? I hope not. Because I hope that? Because in to some degree I feel like that would be not being authentic, because there's there's more to me too that would would rub people the wrong way too if they, if you have the experience that any of your peers being open to promoting diversity in their classrooms.

Bryson:

I am very thankful that the community that I worked in I think I was part of a bigger change. It was a very small community where everyone knew everyone and you grew up, you graduated, you stayed and then repeated, and it was on the outsides of Columbus. And as Columbus is pushing out, change is coming in, new people are coming in with new ideas and I really do hope that the reason there was so much friction here and there around these types of topics is because we were in the middle of change.

Bryson:

I'm very thankful that the vast majority of the teachers that I worked with were on board with promoting inclusivity and diversity and living the same values that I do, and I would not have gotten through that many years in that district had it not been for colleagues that supported me and made it very known that they supported me, but also the vast majority of my administrators, who were in my corner and were willing to go to bat for me when they needed to. But the reality is there are teachers that are just like me that don't have that support and they just get thrown under the bus so quickly and they'll never teach again, and that's whether it's their decision or not. It's a shame, because clearly there was a reason why they wanted to do it in the first place.

Angelica:

So, bryson, we've been talking a lot about the experiences of your students, as well as other teachers talking about inclusivity. I don't know if you grew up in Ohio, but what was your experience, or what have been your experiences, with acceptance, as you were discovering who you were?

Bryson:

Yeah, that's. I did grow up in Ohio. I grew up in a smaller city here in Ohio, very red, but I was also raised Catholic, so that kind of throws in a little loop, a little wrench in there too. My journey was a lot longer than I feel like it needed to be. Here we are.

Bryson:

I did have the privilege that my older brother did come out as gay eight years before I did. He had to do the hard, the heavy lifting, and it was the point where, when I came out it was, I think it was the vast majority of people were okay, yeah, and that was that and which, I have to say, is an incredible privilege that so many people do not get. Does that mean that everybody is completely in? My family and my community are fully on board? Not necessarily, but I also think that, thinking back to my own school, we didn't really have, we didn't have a gay-straight alliance. That wasn't a thing that was in.

Bryson:

Even in the zeitgeist of my community at least. The internet was still a very different place than it is now, so we didn't have the ability to get connected in that way. So I don't know. I do sometimes think back and think what if I would have come out in high school Like how different would my life be? What would have that path ended up? Because the reality is it took me a good three, four years into undergrad to finally start putting the pieces together and put into words what I likely knew for a lot longer than that. I don't know.

Angelica:

Start putting the pieces together and put into words what I likely knew for a lot longer than that. Did you have any role models or was there any representation? Did you see anyone?

Cassy:

My brother. He owned a brother team.

Angelica:

How old were you when your brother came out?

Bryson:

I was like in eighth grade, I think early high school, I did have that. What was interesting about that is he had already moved away from school so I didn't really get to see him much or interact with him much during that process. But honestly, I think the biggest thing during that whole process was watching my parents kind of grapple with that and having to see that character arc from them of I just want to understand all the things. They went to PFLAG meetings and things like that. Just how do I support? What do I do? What does this mean?

Bryson:

And I'm sure there was a lot of internal work that went on that I didn't see, but it was just really interesting to see as someone who was fairly young at that point. People can change and people can change their opinions. And there are good people out there that just don't have all the information or don't have the life experiences that would allow them to see things that quite fully. And I think that was really good for me because I was able to see that you can change people's minds sometimes. You just have to do a little bit of work for it all right is still involved in p flag I think that was.

Bryson:

I'm not sure if even it is a thing where we're into the same kind of group. But that was more of just initially, when he first came out, just to figure out what their role in that whole process was.

Cassy:

Yeah, PFLAG is an amazing organization. Parents for Lesbians and Gays Amazing organization. I've done some work with them in the Maryland area.

Angelica:

But yeah, bryson, what you mentioned before, that you are no longer an educator in the public school system. What led to that transition and tell us a little bit more about what you do now yeah, there were definitely a lot of things that that went into that process.

Bryson:

Teaching during covid, especially in a rural red community, was rough. That definitely did not help the situation. But it also realized that what I'd wanted for my life wasn't necessarily what I thought I wanted and that took a lot of work to undo and I also, you know, to some degree just wanted to be a little bit more me. I was never hiding anything necessarily, but I still felt like I was always walking on eggshells. And then my company evolved completely by accident and one day I looked around and I realized that I was creating an impact on classrooms from around the world through virtual summits and professional development. And I just realized I was ready for something new and I jumped in headfirst and I now run a company called that Music Teacher.

Bryson:

I am an independent instructional coach and an elementary music specialist. Still, I work directly with schools, I work with the teachers, I help facilitate events to create accessible, content-specific professional development. But what might be my favorite part is, as my team grows, I'm able to be the boss and create a company culture that I had always wished that I had been a part of, and I think that was really cool to be able to see it from that side too and see how we can really not only be aware and understanding of neurodiversity, but also mental health and sexuality and gender identity and just like awareness of differences. And that has been really special and I still have a lot of work to do to keep building that, but it lights me up to be able to do that work.

Angelica:

That's amazing. So on that music. What kind of. How does that go? What do you cover there?

Bryson:

Yeah, we dive into the realities of being a music teacher lesson ideas, but also how to get organized and how to structure things and how to juggle all of the things, because there's so many different things involved and we take it so many different directions. But really the main goal of that podcast is to get what we refer and we refer to as to get off of music teacher island, because music teachers are likely the only music teacher in their building, sometimes even in their district. So, building that community so we can support each other and that we can build each other up, because it's so much easier when we're not doing it alone.

Cassy:

Definitely.

Angelica:

Yeah, that's true In a lot of different areas. Having community is very important. So where are you going with that music teacher? What, ultimately, would you like to accomplish with your business?

Bryson:

Oh, I always struggle with those big picture because I never thought I'd be here. My big goal is to just keep growing our events, get more professional development in front of more teachers, but also sprinkle in the how can we make the classrooms of the teachers that we work with for everyone? The phrase music is for everyone is thrown around so much, but it's my life mission to make sure that we mean it, and that requires doing some work and that requires teachers to know what that work is. So that's the journey that I'm on is to start them on their own journey.

Angelica:

Okay, and do you feel the inclusivity in both dealing with student with disabilities as well as dealing with clear students, or do you keep those things separate, or how do you? How does that work for?

Bryson:

you. I definitely. My graduate research line is more on on the disability side of things but what I do think is really interesting is, at a foundational level, when we're talking about creating an inclusive environment for, let's say, neuro, break those down or at least to give that, give people the tools to work with those barriers and start breaking them down and working around them. But it's the same tools and I I haven't explicitly done a lot of work with that the sexuality side of things but I'm also not shying away from it anymore because if that's not something that you're willing to talk about or understand that there are differences out there, I'm not the coach for you because our values aren't aligned and that's okay. Like all my people are out there and the teachers that are ready to do this work are out there.

Angelica:

Are you primarily serving teachers in Ohio or nationwide?

Bryson:

What's wonderful about my company is we are somehow a worldwide business. We are. We do a lot of work in North America, but we have a growing contingency in Australia and the United Kingdom because a lot of what we do is asynchronous and virtual. So we get to really spread the work around and do a lot of work a little bit here and there.

Angelica:

That's amazing. So if someone wanted to get your instructional coaching into their district, how would they go about doing that?

Bryson:

If you want to start a conversation with me, instagram direct messages is a great place to start, also sending an email Hello at that music teacher dot com. Or you can check out our website at that music teacher dot com. We have a section where we talk a lot about the different offerings that we do, but any of those ways will get you into contact with either myself or someone on my team.

Cassy:

And we'd love to figure out what would be a good fit for you. You can sell, all right, bryson. What are your last words of advice, or just your last word to our listeners.

Bryson:

Oh, it's a really good one. I'm gonna do it. I'll do a little too, a little too firm. The first is for anyone that doesn't likely these types of people aren't listening to your podcast, but I'm gonna shout it out anyway. There are gay kids and trans kids in the schools in your community, whether you know it or not yeah and, on the same flip side of that, the same thing goes with teachers.

Bryson:

There are teachers that are part of that community as well, and we need to make sure that we're making it a place where they feel welcome and safe, because if you don't't feel welcome, you don't feel safe, you're not going to learn and you're not going to be a great teacher.

Cassy:

That's right. Bryson, you mentioned that there may not be those quote-unquote people listening to the podcast and for Demetre, those people sometimes pay more attention to what's going on in the LGBTQ plus community. Okay, listeners. There you have it, bryson Tarbett, an advocate for inclusivity in the music industry. He is a founder of that music teacher and a former pre-k teacher, and currently he's also a music teacher. He's an advocate and a change maker. Thank you, bryson, for being on a Queer Understanding Podcast.

Bryson:

Thank you so much for having me.