MAHPERD "Voices From The field"
In this podcast, you will hear from educators and professionals in the field sharing their insights and experiences in the HPE (Health Physical Education) and allied fields. I hope you find this podcast informative, and inspiring. Learn about best practices and tools that you can implement in your teaching practice. We want to know not only what you do, but also the action steps you took to get you where you are. The Status Quo is not in our vocabulary folks, my guests are leaders in the field who are taking action to make an impact in their respective fields. If you have any questions or would like to be a guest on the show email mahperdpodcast@gmail.com
"If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got" Henry Ford
MAHPERD "Voices From The field"
From Rugby Coach to Professor: One Educator's Route to Success
What makes an extraordinary physical educator? For Dr. Jenny Linker, it begins with relationship-building—a foundational skill that precedes all technical knowledge. In this compelling conversation, she reveals how her unconventional journey from psychology major to rugby coach ultimately led to becoming a respected professor and School of Education head at North Dakota State University.
Dr. Linker's innovative "Let's Move in Homeschool" program showcases the power of experiential learning for both future teachers and the community they serve. For 13 years, this initiative has connected undergraduate PE students with homeschooled children, creating a laboratory for applied teaching methods while providing crucial movement opportunities for participants. When COVID struck, rather than abandoning the program, Dr. Linker pivoted to an online format that unexpectedly reached families worldwide—demonstrating the adaptability essential to modern education.
Beyond technical teaching skills, Dr. Linker emphasizes how modern physical educators must understand trauma-informed practices and social-emotional learning. Her research on comprehensive school physical activity programs reveals the cognitive benefits of movement throughout the school day, reframing "brain breaks" as "brain boosts" to highlight their purpose. This subtle but significant shift exemplifies how thoughtful language choices can transform student understanding and engagement.
Whether you're considering a career in physical education, seeking to enhance your teaching practice, or simply curious about how movement education is evolving, Dr. Linker's insights offer valuable perspective on creating meaningful learning experiences that extend far beyond traditional sports instruction.
Connect with her directly to learn more about NDSU's affordable, flexible master's program designed for teaching professionals seeking to advance their practice.
Contact:
jenny.linker@ndsu.edu
Resources:
NDSU M.Ed in Leadership in Physical Education and Sport Coaching
Center for Reaching and Teaching the Whole Child (for Social, Emotional, and Cultural Anchor Competencies Framework)
SchoolaAlive! Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/SchoolsAlive and we also host one called Fun Brain Boosts! https://www.facebook.com/groups/656030477802545 (to encourage classroom physical activity)
JOPERD/Strategies Articles
Prevention, Recognition and Treatment of Common Recess Injuries
Integrating the health.moves.minds. Program into PETE
Venturing Online: A Delivery Model for University Homeschool Physical Education Programs
Hello and welcome to Voices from the Field, a MAHPERD podcast where we talk with educators in the field to hear about their insight and what they have to share. My name is Jake Bersin, advocacy Chair for MAHPERD, and today I have the pleasure of speaking with Dr Jenny Linker. Dr Linker is a full professor at North Dakota State University, where she serves as the head of the School of Education. Concurrently, she serves as a program coordinator for the health and physical education area and oversees their undergraduate programs and online master's program. She completed her PhD in physical education teacher education at the University of Illinois' Urbana-Champaign in 2011. Prior to completing her doctorate, she taught middle school physical education in Massachusetts and coached collegiate rugby. Welcome, Dr. Linker.
Dr. Linker:Thank you for having me, Jake.
Jake:It's so exciting to be in this space with you. Thank you so much for saying yes to the podcast. Before we get started, I'd like to ask my guest this question what's making you smile these days? Podcast.
Jake:before we get started I like to ask my guests this question what's making you smile these days?
Dr. Linker:Well, we're here in Fargo, north Dakota, so I'll pull up my little accent that I've gathered since living here 14 years. But what's making me really happy is we've been getting some sunshine and some warmer weather, and also my students. My students recently just went to a future professional conference in our state for PE and health that our SHAPE organization facilitates and they came back super fired up. They're very excited and actually one of them was just texting me today that they want to host a booth in our union and start recruiting more students into our program. So I mean, when you see that enthusiasm and your passion in your students, that definitely makes me smile.
Jake:Definitely. I agree 100 percent. That's really unique. Is that something that's common for your students to go to these conferences, or is this something new that just got developed?
Dr. Linker:I would say this conference has been in place maybe four or five years.
Dr. Linker:And it was something that one of the institutions great guy, chris Mahoney. He's at Jamestown. He decided he wanted to start something for our future professionals and try to get all the college programs collectively together in one part of our state which is, you know, north Dakota is pretty far, it's about a four hour drive from the west side to the east side and so it's pretty centralized and we invite all the college and university professors to give presentations. The students can give presentations and we usually bring in a guest speaker. So Chris has done a really great job. It's well attended and our students really enjoy it. It's kind of like their first conference experience and then it gets them excited to attend our state conference as well as our Shape America convention.
Jake:It gets them primed at a younger age. That's great. Get them involved early. So, dr Linker, tell us more about who you are and how you started your education journey.
Dr. Linker:Well, I don't have like the straight path. It was a crooked road to get where I'm at today. I'm currently serving as the head of the School of Education for North Dakota State University, so I oversee right now our higher education program, our all of our K-12 teacher licensure programs. We also have ed leadership programs for the people who want to be principals. So this was a role that I took on because we had a need for that and then kind of voluntold myself to do it. So I'm in this position for this year and then we'll go back to what I normally do, which is I'm a professor in physical education teacher education. I primarily teach methods courses for undergrad students. I teach a class at the first, second, third and fourth year, and then I also teach classes in our online program, but I also coordinate all of the undergrad and master's programs that we currently have. But yeah, the reason why I'm here is because of professors that I had along the way, my original degree.
Dr. Linker:I went to UMass Amherst and I was a psychology communication disorder double major and started a master's program in speech and language pathology and found I was still playing rugby.
Dr. Linker:I played collegiate rugby my entire undergrad years and just was not really enjoying my grad program that much and what ended up happening was I had a little bit of a snowboarding accident and after that I had to take some time off from school and in the meanwhile someone said, hey, I got a rugby team, can you come coach it? That needs some help. Started coaching, loved it and then went on and decided I'm going to go back to school and I'm going to get my physical education teacher ed licensure. And so I did that at Westfield state and Dr Catherine Stan at one point said you're going to do this for a little bit, but then you need to go get your doctorate degree. And I think I laughed at her at that moment. But she saw something that I didn't see yet and she planted that seed with me. And, sure enough, I went out and taught middle school for four years and was doing my master's at Bridgewater State. And another professor, Dr. Pagnano at the time, but now it's Richardson- oh, yes, I know her.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, yeah she. I'd asked her for a student teacher. I said would you ever send a student teacher out to the central part of the state?
Jake:Okay.
Dr. Linker:And she said well, I don't know why I'd send you a student teacher. And I thought, oh my gosh, she thinks I'm a terrible teacher. She's not going to send me someone. And she goes you should just be going on to get your doctorate. And that's what it took. It took a second person to say go do this. And I did it. And so, I went to University of Illinois. I got to study with some of the best people in our field Dr. Amy Woods, Dr. Kim Graber, Dr. Darla Costelli and, yeah, I did my PhD in three years and found my way to North Dakota State. Been here 14 years, wouldn't trade it for anything.
Jake:Wow, what a story. Sounds like a couple of professors who you had a made a key impact in how you saw what you wanted to do next and they really motivated you and inspired you to take that next step. And here you are, so as far as your PhD can you tell us a little bit?
Dr. Linker:, So it's technically. I have a PhD in kinesiology, which sounds so much more fancier than what I do, but it's really a concentration in physical education, teacher education. So I was able to take and study research in our field on the art of teaching physical education and really get some in-depth classes around that. So it's not just a generic, you know hey.
Dr. Linker:PhD in kinesiology or PhD in education, where there's a focus on curriculum instruction. I mean, it was actually focused on physical education and teacher education. So I feel very blessed, because that's not always the experience that folks have.
Jake:So what would be? That's interesting. What would be the difference between what you do and then what another professor might do? Is it the classes that you teach or the classes that you took? Because your focus is just on physical education, right?
Dr. Linker:So you're looking at the teaching styles, instructional models, that type of thing, Yep, and then research in our field yeah, I mean within kinesiology, like you might have someone who's a professor in exercise science or biomechanics, um, and we are really just honed in on physical education, teacher education and preparing future teachers that's awesome.
Jake:So, dr lincoln, can you take me through a typical day? What's that look like for you? And then and then, maybe an atypical day too. You start with a typical day.
Dr. Linker:Yeah Well, I'll say okay. And in the head role, every day is almost scary. You don't really know what's about to happen. You're just looking out for the next. You're trying to be as proactive as you can.
Jake:So I might be.
Dr. Linker:you know I still teach classes, so I might teach a class in the morning and then I have meetings with faculty, or maybe I have advising appointments with students, meetings with leadership, or maybe around program development or external stakeholders. You know, like our schools in the local area, so it could be I mean a whole range of things going on In my professor role. It's a little bit more predictable In the fall. I usually teach four classes in a row on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I love that schedule because it reminds me of being a middle school PE teacher. Again, back to back to back.
Jake:No break
Dr. Linker:you know, run into the bathroom in between grabbing lunch, and in the spring I don't actually teach classes because we have well, I have a four class load per year. Oftentimes a professor would have maybe like a two, two or three, three load, usually classes across the semesters, but just the way our schedule works out. I just happen to teach four in a row on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Jake:Okay, so do you like that? You like the way that works, that pattern, that schedule?
Dr. Linker:I love that. It's just I. Yeah, some folks like to have breaks in between. You know, to like recoup and, I guess, prepare, but to me I don't need it. I love the. I feed off the students and their energy and. I'm just like let's go.
Jake:Yeah, I'm the same way. I need to get going If it's too much of a break. It kind of makes the thing drag on a little bit. So yeah, I'm the same way. Get going.
Dr. Linker:Well, it conserves my time too, right? So then my Monday, wednesday, fridays are more open to do other things. If I'm not in the community or trying to do some professional development with teachers or something to that effect, I have a lot better scheduling.
Jake:Right. It seems like it gives you more flexibility, too, when you want it, so, so that's great. What are some essential skills that students need to learn when going to NDSU, or or skills that you would like them to learn once they leave? Once they leave, you and your program?
Dr. Linker:Yeah Well, number one is relationship building, absolutely. I mean, if you don't have the skillset to build relationships with your K-12 students, then forget it. Anything else I teach you or we learn together about is going to be useless.
Dr. Linker:You have to be able to build relationships right um, once we do get into the x's and o's, I think, understanding backwards, design and curriculum development, being able to create your own assessments or find assessments that are aligned to the standards that you're teaching. You have to have those skills because, a the standards are always changing, they're evolving, right, usually for the better. B you might be the only person at your site. C you can't depend on any district having a curriculum already in place. Right, you might be the person that needs to come in and create the curriculum. So I think if you can do that, it doesn't matter what's what new activities come up parkour, you know, chute ball, all those fun things right, there's always going to be something new. And if you have the those curriculum building skills and, alongside with the instructional skills, appropriate practices, you can really introduce anything in your classrooms.
Jake:That makes sense. Like you just talked about the backward design and having the assessments aligned. Yeah, that's so important. Like I know there's so many teachers wanting to introduce new ideas and new content like archery, skateboarding. But where do you start? And a lot of these places they don't have a curriculum that goes with it, so you would have to make up your own curriculum. There's no like kind of cookie cutter. Like sometimes you can buy a program or curriculum, but a lot of these instances there's not, so the teacher would have to create their own.
Dr. Linker:So yeah, and I think along with that I mean something that we're understanding better, and I think Massachusetts is a little bit ahead of the curve when we think about whole child approaches. I mean making sure that you're not only wearing the teacher hat, right, but you're also thinking about how trauma impacts children and what does that look like in your classroom, right, and being able to use trauma-informed practices helping students build their social-emotional learning skills, and so I think there's a lot of things that we have a better understanding of now than we used to, and so are we going to be able to get our initial teachers to that level? Probably not all the way, but they should have foundations in SEL and trauma.
Jake:Totally agree. That's so important. Every person I've talked to has said what you said about the relationships and about the trauma-informed, but they haven't mentioned it about teaching it in the or learning about it in their pre-service years. So that's great that you're able to teach students these skills. So they have that foundation, they go out and we don't know where they're going to be right, they could be in a public setting, private setting, so it's really good to have those skill sets.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, A little plug, for I went to an institute a couple of years ago. Actually it was online because of COVID but oftentimes I think, when we think about SEL, we're pretty familiar with CASEL and the CASEL 5.
Jake:Sure.
Dr. Linker:But I would highly recommend listeners.
Dr. Linker:Google Center for.
Dr. Linker:Reaching and Teaching the Whole Child, and they've got a really interesting framework that I think would be highly valuable for folks to look at.
Jake:The Center for Reaching and Teaching the Whole Child. Did I get that right? I got to make sure I've got it right Once you do if you could email me that link, I'll make sure to put it in the show notes so listeners can access
Dr. Linker:Yeah, so they've got an anchor competency framework that I think is super valuable. They break it down into teacher moves which are kind of like teaching strategies that you use. So I think, you see, it's the overlap with castle. It just helps define things a little bit further. I, I think and um also offers the cultural lens, which is super important okay, yeah, I'm gonna look into this myself.
Jake:That sounds great, um is this is the curriculum or a model? You would say.
Dr. Linker:It's just, it's a framework model for professional development and whatnot, and so yeah, so a colleague and I went and did this and then we introduce it into our um, our courses here at ndsu that's really awesome.
Jake:Dr. linker, what are your thoughts about AI as a way to support your learners?
Dr. Linker:oh my, gosh, oh man, I get a lot of questions ai makes me nervous.
Dr. Linker:I that's part of my plan here in the next over the summer is to get better with AI. I've only started to play with it and see all the interesting things it does. Some things are great and some things, you know, maybe not so great right. But when it comes to my students, I think it's really intriguing right. And it's a great resource, as long as you're using it for good and not for evil.
Dr. Linker:And you know, if when we have an interesting question arise in class or there's something that I don't know, I'm like let's just toss in AI, let's see what it says, right, it's a great resource to go and try to get some initial ideas and foundation, but you have to have that critical eye still to know what's good, what's not good. If we're using it for you know, to help to plan a unit or lesson plan, I mean, we still need to bring our expertise to the table and be able to decipher what's best practice and what might or may or might not work for our students. So I think it has some really great features to help with, like efficiencies, but I worry about students getting too dependent upon it and not thinking for themselves. But that's what. That's what my job is right like. I need to be able to navigate that and help them in that process right.
Jake:Well, like you said, it could be used as a tool, but then it doesn't have the human side. You know, the, the social stuff, the, the. It spits out information and, as you know, the, the more, the better input you put in the social stuff, it spits out information and, as you know, the more the better input you put in, the better input that comes out. So you know, I mean you started to use that in my school a little bit, something called InstaLesson, but I'm still playing around with that and seeing how it fits in with everything. Like it doesn't give you the standards, but you'd have to know the standards anyway. So I think there's definitely pros and cons.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, I mean it definitely can be used for a variety of things. It's just a matter of is it high quality?
Dr. Linker:and just as, and again, as long as people are using that critical eye and not just abandoning our working brain and just giving themselves to the ai, because there's a lot of things that you know, the output isn't correct because of some of the false inputs I've gone in. So, yeah, I think it's gonna be really interesting to see what we, what we do with it, um, in education. But I again, I don't ever think it's going to replace the human being, although that movie iRobot back in the day, it's scary. I'm like, oh gosh, this is what's happening now. Where's Will Smith when I need him?
Jake:I know right. No, I know that was a crazy movie, like it's just everything's getting so automated and so technology advanced, so it's like it's something else. So what advice would you?
Jake:give someone new entering the field, so entering K-12?.
Jake:Yeah, entering K-12, physical education.
Dr. Linker:Well, number one, I'd say they got to know the names of their students. That is. That is top notch. You have to know the names of your students and make sure you're saying them correctly and don't be afraid to ask repeatedly if you are saying their name correctly or you need to work on the pronunciation right. Names are so powerful for people.
Dr. Linker:So I would say that in building relationships, I think for our newer teachers, depending on what kind of situation they find themselves in in their first job, it could be a great setting where maybe there's a lot of appropriate practice going on We've got standards-based lessons, we're using appropriate practice but it could also be a situation where it's not that right and if you find yourself in that situation, you have to be strong-willed enough to not let all the good things you learned in your undergrad education wash out right, and you have to be able to stand your ground. I also think it's really important to seek out mentorship. Don't forget your professors from your undergrad degree. They're always going to be there to help you and not be afraid to ask questions. You know like you're going to have a lot of questions and that's totally okay. As Judy Rink Dr Judy Rink you would say it's okay to be a beginner, right?
Jake:Absolutely.
Dr. Linker:So you have to be that, that willingness to be vulnerable. Technology you don't know everything, and I've been in this field now for over 20 years and there are still things that I do not know that amaze me.
Jake:It's okay to be a beginner right absolutely keep learning, keep learning take advantage of all the pd, all the opportunities that come your way.
Dr. Linker:Say yes when those things knock on your door great advice.
Jake:Great advice say yes, find a mentor, keep asking questions, keep learning. So I was looking on your site a few weeks ago and I there's a program. Correct me if I'm wrong. It's called let's move Move in Homeschool. Is that right?
Dr. Linker:Yes.
Jake:Can you tell us a little, our listeners, more about that program, what it is, what the goals of it is, how it got started, things of that nature?
Dr. Linker:Yeah. So I think somewhere along the way early on in my career I was at a SHAPE convention and I stumbled upon somebody doing a presentation about hosting a homeschool PE program on their campus and I thought, geez, that is genius. And then when I came to NDSU, that was one of the things that was high on my list of things I wanted to do. I'm really community oriented. My fear of coming to NDSU, knowing it's a high intensive research institution, was would my service, learning style, contributions to the community be valued, which they absolutely are here?
Dr. Linker:We're a land grant institution, so right away I got in touch and with homeschool families and gauge some of their interest and kicked off a program. And so what happens is on Tuesdays, 10 times a semester. So we did this in the fall and the spring, homeschool families with children ages four to 12 years up to like 13. They come to our campus and our undergrad students teach their classes, so they actually have their own class. It would be three or four undergrad students and they have their own class of like 20 students. We bring on about 80 to a hundred students onto the campus every year. Wow, yep that attend, and we've been doing this for 13 years.
Jake:Is this something they apply for or how do they get chosen to be?
Dr. Linker:Yeah, its open registration and it's first, first serve, and it's first first serve, and um in the fall we do a psychomotor um uh uh focus with the, with the kiddos, and then in the spring we actually use um shape America's physical best curriculum and do more of a fitness based education uh program for our uh, for our families. And then it evolved so we have a health undergrad degree as well as our.
Dr. Linker:PE degree and our students, 95% of them double major in both, and so we added the health component. So now when they come to campus, they get a health lesson and a PE lesson.
Dr. Linker:And it's really been advantageous for our undergrad students to get that. So every undergrad in our program will teach in that program in their spring of their junior year, in the fall of their senior year, and so that has been a game changer, I think, as far as building their autonomy and their skill sets and whatnot. So it's been really interesting. When COVID hit it was really devastating because, like, what are we going to do? We can't let go of this. It's such a valuable experience. And I said to my health ed colleague I go okay, here's the deal. Our schools locally are using Seesaw and I said can you and I learn Seesaw and teach it to our undergrad students in like two weeks and do this? And he said, let's do it. So he did and it was crazy. We had people from all over the world enrolled in our online PE program.
Dr. Linker:It was crazy. I don't even know how people found us. They were people from Malaysia, Japan, England.
Jake:Wow Word of mouth. They heard about the good program.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, it was nuts, so we did that for like a year. Yeah, we wrote an article about it. I can't remember if it was in Joe Porter strategies, but we called it online PE like 2.0 or yeah, something to that effect. It was pretty funny.
Jake:I'm going to try to. I'm going to try to research that article, cause I definitely want to link that in, if possible. That sounds really interesting. So this is a really unique program. Are there any other institutions doing this or are you the only one?
Dr. Linker:Nope, there's quite a few um country Yep, even just coming back from Baltimore. Um, I know there was, uh, I think, a group that did one there, but I know there's some in Kentucky. Uh, years and years ago I presented with somebody from the Salt Lake area um that they have a program.
Dr. Linker:So it's, it's grown a little bit. My colleague in Jamestown, he um, after hearing about what we were doing he wanted to do that for the homeschool families in his area as well. So I mean, we don't really have a good gauge as to exactly how many are going on, but you just anecdotally find people at conference or you start going around, you can kind of find some of them.
Jake:Okay, kind of gravitate toward each other, right.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, exactly. I mean you just find, like you know, folks and they ask you know, a lot of people reach out to us and say how do you, how do you do this, how did you start it? How much do you charge All those things?
Jake:How do you? What happened at this? Covid Seesaw. You know Zoom, so Seesaw is that's. That's for. I've heard of the platform, but it can be to any level, right K to 12. Or is it mainly for younger students?
Dr. Linker:It's mostly used at elementary level.
Jake:Elementary level.
Dr. Linker:Elementary level. Okay, yeah, but what I love about Seesaw is that it really embraces universal design for learning, because if you were to post some sort of assessment, the students can respond by typing, recording, drawing. I mean, it's pretty nifty. So it philosophically fit in with what we do, and so it was an easy ad for us. It made sense and, yeah, our students started doing things with it that they were teaching me what to do.
Jake:Yeah, I mean, you know how it is. Students pick up stuff so quickly. So multiple options, multiple means of representation, I love you. I could talk about that all day, oh yeah. It's actually. This isn't on the script. Let me ask you how does obviously you incorporate about? How specifically do you incorporate udl at your institution, or how do you specifically incorporate it into your class structure or lessons?
Dr. Linker:yeah, um, well, I personally will integrate it, um in all, in little ways, like planting seeds, or like our students will be teaching each other and I'll say, oh see what they just did there, like they just allowed you to use a variety of responses. You know, know you, you had the choice between this or this, or look at all the different equipment we can use, right? So I kind of pointed out, and then, more so, get they, get the framework, they get into multiple places. And as we talk amongst ourselves as faculty, we realize more of us are doing this than we think but, for sure.
Dr. Linker:In our adapted class we have it, my junior methods course. I go through it, but then they also take a core of education courses and we have a class, education 489, where one of our professors that's what it starts off with, and I love that textbook that well, it's not a textbook, but a book came out for UDL in PE. Oh yeah, yeah, I have that one too.
Jake:I have the digital copy of that.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, it's a great book.
Jake:Yeah, it is a great book.
Jake:Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, we did in our district a few years ago. We did some work and teach us and we've had a lot of pd on it. But, uh, we, we went into the elementary schools and middle schools and video recorded the lessons and pointed out well, this is where they're using this, this, uh, you know options, this is where they're using engagement. So it's really interesting. So, um, dr linker, in your work with stakeholders and other professionals, what are are some common questions you might get
Dr. Linker:I mean, I would say we get probably more questions about the master's programs. Um, usually the questions are you know, is your program fully online, which it is? Um, we offer it asynchronously because we have people who are primarily coaching and teaching or doing the 500 hats that we all like to wear and offering that flexibility. That's another question. You know, do I have to? Do, you know, take classes? You know two classes every semester? No, you can take them whatever works best for your schedule. When can I start the program? You can start summer, fall or spring.
Dr. Linker:Is the curriculum prescribed Like? Is it these 10 classes and you're done? Nope, it's. We have three required classes and you get to choose the other seven electives, and I'm really proud of our electives. We offer some really cool classes that you know will appeal to people who are looking to be in leadership roles and they're enhanced, their coaching, enhance their teaching. There's a little something in all the areas that it's kind of like the masters. I wish I had no offense to Bridgewater. They did a great job. This is what I really would have wanted was this.
Jake:Can you give an example of some of the options they might be able to take?
Dr. Linker:Yeah, so we do a sports psychology class, we have a society and sport class, we have S? Sel via adventure education oh, wow uh, psychology of teaching physical education. Um, I teach a class. It's based off cispaps comprehensive school physical activity programs. That's actually the class I'm teaching this summer. It's that's. That's my wheelhouse, that's my, my jam, that's my love. I am super passionate about having as much physical activity as we can possibly put in the school day available to students to parts taken.
Jake:So in that program there's other stakeholders or other kind of partners you work with right in that program, or is it school-based? What's the best way to describe that program?
Dr. Linker:school-based. What's the best way to describe that program? That master's program is pretty much practitioner-based. It's really for the current teacher professional or coaching professional that's looking to advance their knowledge in their field or advance at the pay scale. Sometimes we like to think, depending on what state you're in. So really, in that program I mean we don't cross over too much into the other areas. But with our undergrad program I mean we definitely have more partnerships, right?
Dr. Linker:So you know, our homeschool families are one of our stakeholders. Our local schools are clearly stakeholders, whether our students are going out and doing observations with mentor teachers or we have cooperating teachers that take our student teachers, you know. So we work with them. You know as far as, like, what's going on your district, what can we do to be helpful? Um, and then again around the sysvap, um, my colleague who's across the river, or actually she's in minnesota at concordia college.
Dr. Linker:We do some consulting work called schools alive, and we started schools alive I it's got to be 13 years ago. It was the year after I moved here because we were very passionate about the SISVAPs and we wanted to help this become more of a priority in our schools, and so we had gotten some grants, gotten equipment for folks. We've provided training in active recess, active classrooms that's actually probably the one that's most popular is professional development for classroom teachers and how to integrate more physical activity across the school day. And so you know, you think about your stakeholders and your partners, and I think about as a parent. What do I want my child's experience to be? He's only in first grade, but I want him to have opportunities to move throughout the day. He needs that right. It helps his brain. Um, so just sharing that, that passion for what it can do for our kids, why it's so important um, that's really probably been the biggest piece with our stakeholders um, that we've invested in that's fantastic.
Jake:So that's called Schools Alive schools alive yeah okay, we'll link that in the show notes too. So we've got about five or six.
Dr. Linker:We don't have any fancy web pages, we just have some, you know, Facebook stuff. We're kind of old school. It's kind of like this thing that we do on the side that we're excited about. But you know, we haven't like turned it into this like full functioning business by any means.
Jake:No, that's okay. It sounds like it's pretty valuable, so we'll definitely link that in. Do you have any research interests that you currently are in now or have you done in the past, or what's going on in the research end on your end?
Dr. Linker:Yeah, from a research perspective, I would say most of what I've done is around comprehensive school physical activity programs, a lot of practitioner based articles and Jopard or strategies, certainly our homeschool program. We've written a couple articles about that, like how we facilitate it, but probably, you know, the biggest one would be like the active recess and active classrooms and how do you facilitate that and what to look for and how do we make sure that every child's having a good recess experience, right and when? The funniest pieces of our research study that we were doing we were interviewing fourth grade students. Now we had previously worked with their schools in regards to some of the appropriate practices around sysvaps and at one point these fourth grade students had told us that you know when they need to move, they just tell their teacher and they say we need to do brain boosts and that's the terminology that we use. We say brain boost. We don't say brain break, because break sounds like you know it's a time out. No, we want to boost up that brain and get it fired up right With some cardio.
Dr. Linker:And so they started telling us like we say, well, what's a brain boost? And they did this active learning definition thing that we do in our trainings and they did it in front of us and we were just laughing because, like it's coming full circle, like it's, they get it Right. So that was really gratifying and exciting to kind of see in the moment. And you know, with students, if they don't understand why they're doing something right, sometimes we just do it and we want them to assume that it's good for them, right, because we're the teacher and we're telling them to do it. But you have to go back to the why, like why are we doing this? What benefit does it have?
Jake:Yeah, that's so important. I agree a hundred percent, you know. Just, it's one of the things that when I was in my prior role, I was trying to tell the teachers like you have to have that why in there. You know what, what, what, what are we doing, why, and how you apply it, you know. And then when you, they're not going to be with us forever, obviously. So when they, how can they um be active outside of the school day as well, or with their caregivers or grandparents? You know their family members.
Dr. Linker:So well, it goes to experiential learning theory. You're talking dewey and cole, but what happened? So what does it matter? And now, what like? What are we going to do with us?
Jake:right, exactly, so, exactly, so, yeah, no, it's so important we're coming down Dr Link to the close of the podcast, but just a couple more questions. So what do you hope to see in the future? This can either be personal or professional, and what goals do you have? Again, personal, professional.
Dr. Linker:Yeah, this is a really interesting question at this time because I will be stepping down from this head role and I'll go back to being in my professor role and program coordinator role. And it's kind of interesting when you're in higher education as a professor, right, you kind of come in and your your first goal is automatically prescribed for you, like I gotta get to the associate level. And then, once you get to an associate professor level, you're like, okay, I gotta get to the full professor level. Well, I reached that. Now I'm like what I get to make my own choices about what the goals are. So I think you know, for me personally, it's it's.
Dr. Linker:This year has been really good for me from a learning perspective. But to get back to my roots and my why, right, why do I do this? I do this because I want to see K-12 kiddos active findings and that they enjoy feeling competent in what they are doing. So they do it outside of our classrooms and for me, I think that means going back out into the community and getting back involved with the things that I was doing, you know, probably four or five years ago, before I was trying to chase. You know, do I have enough research publications. Do I have enough of this? Do I have enough grants? It's sometimes what's driving those goals Isn't necessarily always what you want it to be. And so what's your passion? And the now, what it's kind of exciting. It's like I can do anything.
Jake:That's great. Yeah, like you said, there's some hoops you got to jump through to get to that level, but then once you're there now, you have everything's open right now for you can make, you can choose what you want because you've reached that level right. So no one's saying you have to do this, you have to do that. So you're going to go back and help, like you say, the kiddos out K to 12. That's great. You definitely hear the passion in your voice and so that's totally fine.
Dr. Linker:I mean, whatever ways works for you yeah, you know, I have just not kept up with all the tweeting and the, the, the social media. That probably the way I should, um, but the easiest way is to call me or to email me okay, so emails, great email.
Jake:Sure I can put that in the show notes yeah, absolutely all right, yeah, awesome.
Dr. Linker:I do a terrible job of self-promotion. So it's, um, you know, I feel like if you, if I, was tweeting all the time or doing some of these other things to help promote, like the cool things we have going on, which I should do more of the advocacy piece, where everyone needs advocacy skills. The problem is I just I'm more about the doing.
Jake:So that's what it is. I mean, it's, it's. You got to get those action steps in, right, it's, it's. It's one thing to say it, but it's another thing to do it. So it's that kind of action philosophy, right? How are we?
Dr. Linker:going to get there. So yeah, I mean I'd love it if anyone's contemplating a master's degree that's flexible, highly affordable. All in 30 credits, you're just about 14,600. I would love to chat with our program.
Jake:Yeah, it's that is reasonable.
Dr. Linker:Everyone gets in-state tuition and in North Dakota you know, growing up on Massachusetts, I mean, I think when I finished my master's degree at the time it was about $11,000, and that was many, many moons ago. So the fact that we're at about 14, six all in, I mean super competitive and I think it's a high quality program. Of course, but I'm biased.
Jake:That's okay. And you and you. It's a variety, right, it's not? It's. It sounds like it's really unique too, with the, the courses you offer and and all the benefits. So, and they get you, they get to see you yeah, and you know dr deutsch, um, he's the incoming.
Dr. Linker:He just was handed the gavel at this shape convention, this last um convention here in baltimore. So he's, uh, he's my colleague. And then we also got another massachusetts. Uh, here, dr Brandon Foy. So there's no you can be in classes with a lot of people from all over the country and even the world, but you're still going to have some people there, you know, raving about Tom Brady and the Boston Red Sox.
Jake:Oh yeah, that'll always happen. Right, you got the Sox.
Dr. Linker:You never let go of those things.
Jake:Yeah, no, we love us, we love our sports teams.
Dr. Linker:We sure do.
Jake:Dr Linker, thank you so much for sharing your experience with us. It was great chatting with you, definitely learned a lot, and I'm sure our listeners learned a lot too. If you have any questions, you could always email us at mahperdpodcast@ gmail. com We'll have this episode uploaded soon and we're also asking our listeners to leave a review if this podcast has been helpful in supporting you in any way, as it does help other folks find it. Thank you all for listening. Have a great week and we'll be back soon. Take care, Dr. Linker.
Dr. Linker:Bye, jake, thank you.
