To Hum is Human

The Intuitive Classroom: Harnessing Insight to Shape Student-Centered and Real-World Learning

• Donnabelle Casis

Share episode

What if classrooms were built on intuition, curiosity, and trust? 

In this episode, I sit down with Jeromie Whalen, a passionate educator at Northampton High School, reimagining what learning can be. We explore his unconventional path into teaching, the impact of technology in the classroom, and how intuitive, real-world learning empowers students to find and use their voices.

Jeromie shares his approach to creating engaging, student-driven experiences, such as the innovative The Transcript program, while offering honest insights into what it takes to build a safe, authentic, and collaborative learning space. From community engagement to creative risk-taking, this conversation is a blueprint for heart-centered education that truly prepares students for life.

✨ Tune in to hear how education can become a space for growth, purpose, and connection—one classroom at a time.

🎓 Update: Since the recording of this episode, Jeromie Whalen has officially earned his doctoral degree. Congratulations, Dr. Whalen! 👏✨

Find me on Instagram @ToHumisHuman and www.sonorouslight.com

SPEAKER_00:

Hi, friends. Welcome to another episode of To Hum is Human, the podcast where we explore the transformative power of tuning into our inner wisdom to express our passionate purpose. I'm your host, Donabelle, and today we're going to explore the intuitive classroom, harnessing insight to shape student-centered and real-world learning. into our instincts to be innovative and engaging. Today, we are joined by a wonderful, incredible teacher. Jeremy Whalen is a PhD candidate in the College of Education's Mathematics, Science, and Learning Technologies program. Jeremy also has an MED in Learning Media and Technology from the University of Massachusetts College of Education, and he is currently a technology teacher at Northampton High School in Northampton, Massachusetts, and works on connecting students with meaningful educational opportunities within the local community through innovative project-based learning. Welcome, Jeremy.

SPEAKER_01:

Thanks for having me. Listening to all of that right there was like, oh man, that's a lot of title.

SPEAKER_00:

That's you. That's you. And that's all you. Well, not all of you, actually. But I learned about you when my sons went to Northampton High School a few years back. And of course, one of them took your Communications and Media Production class, otherwise known as CAMP. And he couldn't stop raving about how exciting, challenging, but fun, you know, that this class was. And in fact, this is a common sentiment about your teaching practices. I mean, you've been nominated for several Teacher of the Year awards. So congratulations on that.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you. Yeah. And your son was an amazing student. You know, that's, you know, time and time again, that's why I'm so passionate about it. You know, what the students bring to the table is just so inspiring in and of itself. So, you know, makes my job a lot easier when it comes to

SPEAKER_00:

that too. Well, you know, you started teaching at Northampton High School. Was it around 2014, 2014, 2015 school year. Yep. Okay. But your path to teaching was not the conventional route. Could you speak a little bit about that?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So, so I started out in community media and actually to even step back even further, I always had a passion for media. And I remember when we were building, I graduated from Belchertown high school, which is right down the road from us. And I I remember the new school was asking for input for students on what they wanted. And I was really passionate about building an AV studio. And I went to all the meetings and I was on the student council and I brought the organization stuff up, just tried to really advocate for getting equipment. And so what ultimately happened was we got these great new cameras and they were very expensive in this brand new school. But we didn't have classes that were available. And the other problem was there wasn't anyone that wanted to take accountability or liability to rent out these cameras. So they kind of sat in a cabinet locked. And I did all the advocacy to get these equipment, but I couldn't use it. So I went to UMass and I pursued undergraduate history degree. And from there, I started looking at, you know, how can I do media and how can I bring the stories that I'm hearing in our local community? I did a documentary on the Belchtown State Schools because I knew the camera equipment was there. I was like, okay, I know where their cameras are. Like, I can go get these cameras from Belchtown High School. I can make this work. And I remember going... and saying that I was doing this project on the Bustard State Schools. And can I use these cameras? After kind of a back and forth, the principal allowed me to use the cameras. We opened up the case and the camera was gone. And it had been sitting there for years and no one wanted to take any accountability or liability for renting them out. And so they kind of sat there and because no one was paying attention to them, it was ultimately stolen. From that point, two things happened that really changed my life. One, It changed my philosophy on if I'm ever in a position where I can offer access to equipment or to having people just tell their stories and just, you know, living their true identities, I'm going to take every opportunity to do so. And two, in the practical moment, I said, I need to find cameras and find equipment and, you know, and tell the story that I'm trying to right now. And so that got me started volunteering at North Hampton Open Media. Back then it was called North Hampton Community Television. I was a UMass student and I could get stuff out from UMass, but their camera equipment was a little outdated and the things that were going on at North Hampton Open Media were just, I was able to take courses there and take out gear. And eventually I created the documentary that I did, Purgatory. on the Belchtown State Schools with the stuff that I learned from Northampton Open Media and with the gear that I was taking out. And I kept on saying to myself, you know, what's the catch? You know, they were educating me and they were giving me, you know, at times thousands of dollars worth of equipment for free to lend out. And I said, you know, what's the catch here? And there really wasn't a catch. It was just a really proactive and progressive nonprofit organization that was providing education and access to equipment. I really thrived there. And from there, I said, they're doing a lot for me. I want to give back to them. I started volunteering on city council shoots and school committee shoots and anything that they really needed. Eventually, that led to my employment at Northampton Open Media. That was really my kind of footprint. in the door to creating a career in media so a lot of things that we were doing were kind of like cutting edge tech but done on the cheap and so we're using digital slr cameras and a whole bunch of ways that we could create high quality stories and experiences while at the same time do it in a budget conscious way and provide that to the community and so for a few years i I was working at Northampton Open Media. I went to the West Coast for a year and I was a director of a nonprofit media center over there. I came back and that's when the teaching opened up. I had previously been collaborating with the school when I was working at Northampton Open Media because it's physically attached to the school. And so during that time, I was... working and interacting with students. And I was also interacting with some of the administration there. The vice principal became the principal and remembered the cool things that we were doing and all of the passion and enthusiasm that we all had. And remembered that when I applied to the job at Northampton, this was my dream job. really. And, you know, I let them know that. I put a lot of time and energy into the community and the community gives me a lot back too. So it's a special place in my heart. And so that's what I expressed in the job interview. I told them all that. I said, you know, whoever gets this job, I hope that they take it seriously because community media is a big part of this community. My interview, I walked out the door, I shut the door. I walked three feet down the hall and the door opened up and they offered me the job on the spot. And from that point on, I fell in love with the school. I fell in love with the students. I fell in love with the work that they were creating. And every year gets better and better and better. Better mindsets for the students, better production quality, thinking critically about things. It's just, it's an amazing experience. I'm just very blessed.

SPEAKER_00:

I want to just backtrack a little bit because what I've read about you is that you had a history of degree and you also studied film, but what was it really your interest in media? Was there something when you were younger, like what tapped you then?

SPEAKER_01:

So my brother and my friends and I, when we were really young, we used to make skits all the time. We used to take the big old AV, you know, VCR recorder. I remember those. And we'd just make funny skits. And from there, it was really thinking about Thinking about just media in general, I think that it was so inaccessible when prosumer stuff was so out of budget and out of range to create really authentic and high quality productions that Wow. That's cool. Right. when I started to think about career and also just think about adulthood in general. Documenting the things in my life was important to me, but also that was a platform for me to express myself. But there's also ways to develop and express those stories of others as well. And at the time when I was in college, I was working with a young adult with autism. I was doing tech consultation with them and they're a very dear friend of mine. They were actually my best man at my wedding. And I could see how the stories of his life were intertwined with mine and I wanted to tell that story and intertwined it into the history of that, you know, was right down the road for me in the state schools, you know, the heartache that was experienced there, you know, and also just the triumphs of individuals with developmental disabilities. I wanted to kind of bring all that around and it transitioned from just me telling my story to helping others tell their stories.

SPEAKER_00:

That's so beautiful and so valuable in these days when most of the time we're sort of taught to assimilate and not really speak about our differences, where you're really giving people the opportunity to shine in the individual ways that they are. And that's just such a powerful statement in both expression, but also in your teaching. So I want to go back to thinking about technology and education. Do you feel like these new technologies are influencing our educational system in general?

SPEAKER_01:

So my studies in my master's and my doctorate, I really have been observing how educators interact with technology. I think that there's good and bad, and it's a spectrum of everything that we're trying to grapple with in society. The thing about technology that's difficult is that it moves at such breakneck speeds, and we as a society don't necessarily have time to sit back, reflect, and discuss what's going on with these technologies. And that can be really difficult. It can be really difficult for production. It can be really difficult for analysis of it and the implications of what happens. I think that when we're thinking of technology and education, we can often see it through the lens of the mandatory use of technology in unprecedented shift from COVID in the pandemic. A lot of teachers had to adopt things really quick on the fly, try to kind of patch things together. And that left a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths, unfortunately. It wasn't the best introduction to how to use technology effectively. That being said, there was a lot of skills that were learned during that. And I hope that educators don't abandon those skills. I think that even though it was trial by fire, I hope that we actually think of how technology can be leveraged in the classroom. The idea that, for instance, We can have an expert from across the world be in your classroom via Zoom. That's just so powerful. It's so empowering. The idea that you can take your phone and with your phone, you can record a message that can be seen globally and tell your story. These things are really powerful. And again, if used inappropriately, can create unfortunate situations. But overall, I think that the education in general, is moving towards a way where you can use technology in a really elevated ways, in ways that supports learning rather than become an ultimate distraction or detracts from it.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. And also just another way of connection, like speaking about stories, culturally significant stories from other parts of the world, different roles in society is such a powerful tool. Now, your focus in the classroom is on experiential learning and real world experience. Why is that so important to you?

SPEAKER_01:

I think that somewhere along the way with standardized testing or the pressures of college, the idea, the philosophy of education has lost its way a little bit. The idea that you need to produce certain things for a grade. Anybody that takes my classes knows that grades– I don't hide the fact that your grade is based on your efforts. It's not on getting something right because life is about slowly moving the needle into the right direction and progressing. It's a lot of accumulative knowledge. It's okay to make mistakes. Shout out to Steve Eldridge. He was a wonderful theater teacher at the high school. He used to call it failing gloriously. The ability to be in a situation and make that mistake and then learn from that mistake is something that is really embedded into my teaching. And when it comes to the real world elements, I think what's important is when the students are watching their media or having the entire school, sometimes It's not just the school, it's administrators or it's people outside of class. It's people in our local community. There is a level of accountability for them and a level of this goes beyond just getting an A. It's something where if they screw up the lighting or if they ask a question that's a little off or something like that, there's much more power in the learning experience when you have a healthy critique from an outside source rather than a letter on a piece of paper. And I think that time and time again, the students understand that. They gravitate towards the idea that we don't ever really talk about grades. What we talk about is the implications of what they're creating and how it's perceived by the larger community.

SPEAKER_00:

Now, it sounds to me what I'm hearing is that moving into the world and taking accountability for what you're doing in the world or even just how you process navigating what you see is happening in the world. How did this come into your teaching philosophy? Because this seems to me like something that you've learned yourself.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, for sure. I mean, going back to the, the idea of, of helping people tell stories, um, and connecting and grouting with your own personal experience. I think that, especially with the transcript, it's a weekly video news magazine that the students produce. One real example of this that sticks out in my mind, I had a young woman come up to me, and this was several years ago, and she was a black student, and she came up, and I didn't know her well at the time, and she said, are you Jeremy? I was like, yeah. She goes... I don't think that we have enough black perspective shown on the transcripts. And I love this. I love it because what she is doing is saying, when I'm watching the transcripts, I don't identify with everything that's going on here. In fact, I think that there should be a segment about this. And I just looked at her and I said, I absolutely agree. So what should we do about that? She ended up taking the class. She ended up having a awesome, awesome segment called Hit It or Miss It. It was kind of an intertwining of pop culture and fashion and reference, but with Black identity. And just being able to ground yourself in your self-identity, realize that one, your voice is not being heard, but two, using the platform that you have in order to tell your story and to share your experiences, that's powerful. And it's a thing thing that I really hold sacred for these students too, because it takes vulnerability to do that. It takes some bravery to get in front of the camera and say, this is my culture. This is my identity. This is what I want to show you and share with you, especially when you might think that, you know, that you don't necessarily have somewhere that is fitting in or you're telling your story. So just grounding that in my own personal experience, but having students do that is really awesome to watch.

SPEAKER_00:

And so empowering for the student in ways that they probably would never have imagined had they not even trusted their own instinct to even say that to you. Now, what I find really fascinating, well, not fascinating because I imagine this is how you work, is how open you are to receiving quote unquote criticism or opinion because being a student-centered teacher you're very much aware about all the individual, unique perspectives of each and every student. And the fact that you are willing to take the risk and just say, well, how can we address the situation is so compelling. And I probably would think that perhaps most teachers may not be as open. Would you think that's a fair statement to say?

SPEAKER_01:

I think that for teaching, it's a very difficult profession because what you're always trying to do is provide parameters under the learning conditions while at the same time opening and expanding opportunities for students. If you come in with an idea for something and have too many restrictions on it or you're involved too much, then you're going to take away from the learning aspects of that student. For instance, one of the things that it's a very small thing, but it really matters. Whenever I'm teaching and whenever the students are teaching others, I say you can't touch the mouse for the person. Do not ever touch the keyboard or the mouse for the person. And it can be frustrating, right? Because the parameters that you're setting are that they need, they're going to expand their, you know, it can be frustrating, you know, go to file, save as, and you know, they're going around and doing all this stuff. But if you set those guidelines, one for yourself, but to give the opportunity to the student to do that, there's going to be learning involved. I think it's easy because the other part of this is that there's so many anxieties as a teacher, you want to succeed. And it's so easy to get stuck in the mindset of I'm going to do this for the student or I'm going to make the instructions so rigid that there is little room for creativity. And that's where, if you do that, it removes the idea of making the mistakes that we were talking about. It removes the idea of what that student wants to do in that creative product. How do they want to tell that story? The story can be told in many different ways. And so just going back to your question, I think that most teachers want to give that leniency and to give those open-ended parameters to students. I remember when I was a younger teacher, I would say, okay, we're going to create this film, not have some of those parameters set, and there would be chaos because you also need to have those guidelines and guide rails for the students. And as I progressed as a teacher, I could take those, you know, take the bumpers, you know, the bumper lanes, and I could just slowly peel them back and let the ball go into the gutter because that's a learning experience, right? So my advice to younger teachers or or individuals that are interested in doing this, but have anxieties behind what actually, if it all falls apart, is just try it, you know, just to have that ability to put the students in control, put them in the driver's seat, see what happens. It's all right to, like I said, fail gloriously, even for teachers. It's okay, you know, not every day is the best day in my classroom of my practices, you know, that's just the way it goes.

SPEAKER_00:

Can you tell us a story about when you thought to try something really unique and exciting, but it sort of felt flat?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, yeah. Right now we're working on scripts, right? As a young teacher, I remember we went extensively through the formatting. There's a very specific way that you need to format scripts. And I thought, you know, once I show them the technical aspects of this, they're going to run with it, right? And so I was very excited. rigid. I was teaching very specifically to all the technical aspects and everything like that. I forgot to tell them what the three act structure was. I didn't give them any prompts to it. So I said, you know, here's how you write a script, go write a script. And I just have a lot of blank stares, right? They're just, you know, anything, anything. Dealer, dealer. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. It's not like they're not good writers. It's not like they don't understand. But given that right there and. Understanding the dynamic between the teacher and the student and understanding that it's an adult, an authoritative figure that's telling them to do something without really clear instructions, because in the traditional educational frameworks, you're told to do very specific things, you know? So it was good and it was bad. I mean, it was good in the sense of, you know, once we got the juices flowing, once I understand, so now I do the same thing, but I go, here is the parameters. We have to shoot these films in child's park. It's a local park. We're going to shoot in the park. That's your scene. There's the parameter. You have that location. So now you can take and run with, I'm going to give you a couple of characters. We're going to do a spy film. There's spy one and spy two. And it still gives them the creative license to create what they want, but it gives them a little bit of a push along the way. And then the other part is, I have students that go, oh, I don't want to make them spies. I want to make them friends. And I'm like, yes, okay. I can work with this. This is not a hard and fast thing. And so there's certain times where things can fall flat for either being too strict or not having enough parameters. And it's a kind of constant give and take. And it's what I call educational jujitsu. The minute that you see the passion in the student, you just roll with it. You just want to take that and you just want to keep on going. ongoing. Going back to the idea when I was working at Northampton Open Media before I started as a teacher, one of my favorite things was we were going to create a television show, but I gave them the opportunity to pick what they wanted to do. These kids, they don't have any relationship with me at this moment. It's just this young kid that's across the hall because that's where the studio was. They're taking out a class. I said, what do you want to make a television show about? They said, Video games. And they all started laughing. And I go, I love that idea. That's what we're going to do. So we created a video game version of the administrators playing students on Wii Bowling and things like that. It was like one of those things where they were like, We're going to play video games during class. But then it was, OK, we played video games for 15 minutes. And now you're all editing this thing for a week, you know, and it was video games that excited them. But you could take that run with it and then create that into a passion or into something that make it great work.

SPEAKER_00:

It sounds like almost anything goes to some degree in your classroom, but not every student who comes into your classroom may be necessarily savvy or versed in anything that you're presenting to them. So for example, when a student is struggling to find their passion or their purpose in a project, how do you use your instincts to help them find a connection to something that excites them or inspires them?

SPEAKER_01:

The other part of this is that there's a couple of different connections that they need to create or may not have when they come into the class. The first connection is obviously with technology or the skills. We have the really awesome thing about the class is that it's student-centered learning and it's different tiers of knowledge. If you are brand new to the class, we call you a newbie. You might have taken my video or photo class, and you know some of the settings, but you haven't been introduced to journalism. We're going to pair you with somebody that has taken the class, which is the veterans. So you can take multiple renditions of this, and it's a tracked path of classes. On top of that, when we pair the veterans with the newbies, there's associate leaders. And associate leaders are responsible for checking in with different groups, with understanding what part of the production process people are at. The veterans and the associate editors are working with somebody if they don't know how to set up the camera or need a refresher on how to move files. That person, it's not me. They're not coming to me. You know, I'm there to supervise and facilitate and look at some of the larger order interpersonal things, but they're going to each other. And then there's the senior leadership, which is looking at larger picture things, helping out in the general class, making forward to what we want to become or what things are down the line. So there's the technical aspects that they need the connections for. On top of that, you also have to think about it's high schoolers in social environment. And we operate in a newsroom environment, but there are certain students who will come into the class without necessarily a friend group that they're with. And where are they situated within the social dynamic of the class and the school and their identity in general? That can be even more challenging than the technical. The technical is, you know, here's how you put the lens on the camera, but where are your passions and Where do they fit in and into the larger group? And I find myself trying to foster those relationships quite a bit for students. And once they take, it's really amazing to watch because you see that the catalyst can become the passions of students that might not know each other, but then they start working on something together. And they're both passionate about that segment topic. For instance, a segment on food review, right? Student... is trying to find a place. They're a foodie and, you know, putting them in with that group, getting them trained with that group. There's a bonding experience that happens in class. And there's a, and there's, they're developing not only their confidence in technology, but their confidence in interpersonal dynamics of the class and finding themselves. But you have that catalyst, which is the actual production, you know, and this production, oh, we're going to film on Saturday or we're going to film on Sunday at so-and-so's house. And now that's an invite over to their actual house. And now you're eating, you know, you're, you're, you're filming for class, but you're in, you're eating food together. And now you're going to watch a movie together afterwards. You know, it becomes an excuse for students to hang out and it becomes a reason for students to bond. And I think that that's what I really like too. A lot of people will say my room is a safe space. And it is. And I laugh when people say that, too. They're outspoken. They're joking. They're laughing. They're asking me if they could put this joke in. No, it's inappropriate or something like that. It's very real. It's very raw. It's very authentic. I think that the general society has of the idea of safe space is that everybody's walking on eggshells because they don't want to offend anybody or things of that nature. This is the best of America. This is the best of society. It's just people being... themselves in bonding in ways that is just really beautiful. So I think that that's where the connections that are established, having the excuse to be in the same room, to work on the same things, to follow the passions together, all as a class too, because it all comes together in the same episode.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, and of course you've created that environment. Let's just say that too. The students do one thing, but when you become the catalyst for this type of space where students feel really free to be, who they are, that in itself is an inspiration. I'm wondering, have you ever had any students come back to you, perhaps after they've graduated, saying that they put something into practice, something that they learned in your class, not necessarily towards media production or anything, but just something that they learned in your class that helped them in their real life?

SPEAKER_01:

All the time. I think that that's the best perk of being a teacher is that you form relationships that go beyond the classroom. you know, your son in particular, you know, reaching out, whatever, whatever, whatever he needs, I'm there for him, whatever, you know, I'm, you know, sending me stuff, looking at different, Oh, I created this for school. Um, I, I've been working on this, you know, project. Here's some of my photography that I've been doing on the side. You know, I have, I have students that come through that are, you know, go into entirely different careers. I have a student that is, uh, is on their way to being a medical doctor and they still check in and I still check in because I always tell my students, you know, you may forget shutter speed, aperture, and ISO, you know, you, But I hope that you never forget to be a good person. and to connect with people and have good intent and be compassionate. These are the things that you're learning at that age. If you make a mistake, you can apologize and you can say sorry. And I think that accountability, self-awareness, all of these other skills that are so fundamental that are being learned along the way, that's what I like to hear from students that check in. In addition to all the awesome awards that they're winning, I get students are making stuff, media products in college and I'm sponsoring them for different awards and festivals

SPEAKER_00:

and things. That's incredible. I'm

SPEAKER_01:

like, if you don't have a professor, just come back to me. I'll vouch for you. I'll sponsor you. And they're winning awards. And it's just awesome. It's awesome to see them succeed.

SPEAKER_00:

That's how the learning continues beyond the classroom, which I feel like any good teacher does for a student. But I want to talk a little bit about the transcript because most of the stuff we're talking about here really goes towards the transcript. Is that fair to say? Yeah. So how did you come up with that program? Because it feeds so much of the

SPEAKER_01:

school's culture. So the best part of it is that I didn't come up with it. The students did. So we had two students. Shout out to Elena Frogermini and Joe Marks. I'm still very, very close to them. They'll appreciate that shout out. They came up to me one day and they said, you know, we want to do student news. I was like, absolutely. Like we can, we can really make this work. I had previously been doing that at Northampton Open Media. So this is about two years into teaching at Northampton High School. I had my feet on the ground. I was learning how to be a young teacher, new teacher, do all this stuff. Now I have everything under my belt. Okay, let's do it. They said, we want to read the school bulletin and dress in a suit and tie and a green screen. And I go, no,

SPEAKER_00:

really.

SPEAKER_01:

And I go, I will, I will do that with you if that's what you choose. But there's also other ways that we can get out of this building and we can tell stories and we can be authentic without having to key out the background. And do you, you know, We can tell these authentic stories and tell the news in a way that you come to school every day dressed as you are. That is absolutely fine. If you're sticking to your journalistic integrity, doing your research, conducting yourself in a professional manner, that suit is not doing anything for you and it's not connecting with the students. You're creating student news for a student audience. And from there... They said, yeah, let's try it. Let's do some field journalism. Let's do some stuff that's outside of the classroom. And it started as an extracurricular activity. And bless that first crew of students because they were in my room until 9, 10 o'clock at night getting ousted by the janitors because the school was getting alarmed. They were doing everything. Everything that we do day in, day out in a classroom environment after school. I appreciate the hard work that they put in because that was very difficult. Seeing how successful it was led to it being an actual class. And from there, the class was small. We probably had our first crew about 12 to 16, depending on the semester. But students started watching it. And when students start seeing things, they want to do that. So now... We have 37 kids in the class. And I say, if I have a computer, if I have a camera, I will take a student because it operates in such a nice kind of chaotic, fast-paced environment. Yeah, it was all student-originated. Once they saw that vision and once they saw how to present to their peers, it took off in a really cool way.

SPEAKER_00:

It's such a successful program. I've watched several episodes of the transcript and have been floored by the quality and the investigative reporting that has come through these students. And it's hard to believe that they're high school students. I mean, they're so professionally done. And it's been nominated and awarded several of the Student Emmy Awards. That's a big deal.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. What I always tell them is... Bat your eyes as students and bare your teeth as journalists. What I mean by that is that there is a outside perception that because they're students, they can't do really professional or intriguing work. And it's not always the case. But the general perception is a high schooler is a high schooler and they're immature and they're kind of still learning the world and they're naive and all of this stuff. I remember a time when we had the Secretary of Education for Massachusetts was visiting Northampton High School. And again, shout out to Amelia Samayo, amazing student. She reached out to the Secretary of Education and said, hey, can I interview you for our student news? And of course, you know, part of the Secretary of Education coming was little PR, mingle with the students, all this stuff. Amelia spent two weeks researching in-depth school budgets, how the budget impacted our local community, our minority students. She went above and beyond in the questions that she created. And when the Secretary of Education came in and sat down, he was thinking, oh, how do you like your job? Right, no. She's got a book of questions just ready to go. I love it. And it was a room filled with our state representatives, who are amazing too, by the way. They're just super accessible. Oh, yes. And they're always getting interviewed by the students. And everybody in that room just walked away with, wow, that was real journalism. That was not a student saying, how do you like your job? It was real. And they do that day in and day out. They get these big interviews. There's students last semester, especially before, interviewed Rachel Maddow. Just going above and beyond and taking it really seriously in ways that go really in depth to the stories. Sometimes we cover stories. They have three minutes for their segments. OLP or our local news affiliates, they usually run 60 to 90 second things. There's usually whatever gets out of the Western mass community often gets manipulated in the news. You know, if it leashes a national stage and it's used in punditry and things. I remember an example. There was a big uproar in conservative media news when Northampton made the news for High Five Friday, which police were giving high fives to the local middle school. The conservative media took it and they took a soundbite and they blew it out of proportion. The students went back and they actually talked to the police chief. They talked to the principals at the school. They got to the bottom of it and At the end of the day, the story in the national media, no one actually had any journalistic integrity and research at all was completely different. And it was brought to light by the students, you know? So just being able to, you know, go and share that and be able to research and do that in an in-depth way, in a factually correct way, you know? Media, news in general is difficult, but for students to do that, it's just super impressive.

SPEAKER_00:

It just teaches them real critical thinking skills and to deliver information in a way that is non-biased, factual. Like right now, I know a lot of people are having problems even watching the news and trying to discern what's being presented to them. When you can teach a way and inspire students to deliver the real stuff in a really informative way, it's just next level. And I think, you know, when you raise the bar in the class to say, anything goes, whatever you can make possible, show me. That just... brings such a different level of curiosity into the classroom. Now, if you were to talk to an aspiring teacher or maybe a teacher that's just now beginning, how would you talk to them to explore different ways to inspire and innovate in their classroom? Just some small accessible changes or practices that they can use.

SPEAKER_01:

If I were talking to younger me is one, leave room for a little grace for yourself. I think that I wanted to be the best teacher straight out the gate so bad. And that passion was there, but there was a dissonance between that and my actual practices because I was still learning how to have the relationships with students, just the technical aspects of curriculum, things like that. Give yourself a little grace in those situations. And with that, give yourself room for experimentation. Give yourself And the students, the ability to say, okay, we're going to be learning this today. But if you want to, you can, you know, if you finish, experiment with this, you know, sometimes my younger self was so excited. stuck in the idea of, okay, this is what we're going to learn today and everybody's going to learn this. But that's not the way every single person learns. There's so many different ways and ways in which you can spark that passion. You also don't want to limit the passion of somebody as well, being like, okay, well, we're only covering this today, so you can't do this. You have to wait for this. Go off to the races. If you see a button that you don't know, let's Let's sandbox it. Let's press it. You can't break this software. The grace, definitely. The experimentation. And also the connection... the connections with students. I think that that was something that straight from the get-go, I was really blessed to have. The hard part was changing the culture. I think that for a while at the school, it was expected that it was a easy class. It was something where there wasn't really high demands or expectations for students. In fact, And this is to no one's fault. There was a long-term sub before I was there. The students that first signed up for the classes that I taught were coming in thinking that they were going to get an EZA for playing video games all day. To change that culture takes four years because you have freshmen to seniors. And to really change the expectations and to have that while at the same time doing so in a way that's fun and engaging and students want to be there for that. That's what what I would probably tell younger teachers too, is that the culture takes a while. There's a lot of teachers that leave the profession within three years. It's a stark number. I hope that, especially at the high school level, you give it some time and you give yourself a little bit of, you know, able to take the mistakes and do that, do that in a kind of graceful manner.

SPEAKER_00:

I know you spoke about teaching being like educational jujitsu. Like how much do you trust your inner wisdom? to guide you on what to do in class? Like, do you feel like it's a certain percentage?

SPEAKER_01:

So my thing is that I trust the, I trust myself to trust the students. if that makes sense. There are times where a student, because they're making student news. The interesting part of the transcript is that they often will intertwine what we call narrative news. They'll make skits based on the news and things like that. And some of them, they're teenagers. They cross the line sometimes and they're never trying to be mean or offensive, but we're still producing something for the school. So you have to work within the guidelines of that. At this point, I trust myself to trust those students. And if there's something that they say, I have this discussion. Okay. You want to make this joke or you want to say this, or you want to have this on at the end of the day, you know, I might have a conversation with administration about it, but I'm going to turn your right one, your right to cover what you want. They cover a lot of oftentimes controversial things, but two, the consequences of that are going to be you more, more so than me. Right. passionate, with good intention. And sometimes it's unintended consequences too. You might say something or somebody might be interviewing and then they don't want you to interview or things of that nature. I've built a lot of trust in that and confidence in myself to have that trust in students. And I think ultimately when given the opportunity and given that freedom of choice, of executive decision makings, they make the right choice more often than not.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, you lead by example. So I imagine that has some aspect to it as well. So what's next for you? Is there anything exciting on the horizon that you're particularly excited about?

SPEAKER_01:

I'm excited about finishing my doctorate. Yes, I have it. I have it scheduled. It's the fences next month. I'm really, really grateful for the support from both the district in Northampton in general, the academic support, interviewing teachers, getting perspectives. All of this is intertwined with my teaching practice, but also my academic perspective and the writing of my dissertation. All of that is just an amazing experience. So When I'm thinking about the next steps or the next phases, I don't know exactly what that's going to be, but I know that it's going to involve taking care of my community and taking care of my students, both present and former students, staying engaged with them and making some positive change in the world. I think that everybody would agree that we're living in times that they just don't feel the best. And when we're talking about It's easy to get discouraged when you open up the news or when you, you know, have these interactions, you know, in the community. I think that the next steps are taking that to the next level of, you know, hopefully that love overcomes any of the hate or anxieties. I get to get to do that with 100 students in my classroom, 900 in my building every single day. I hope that, you know, that can even expand in the future, but I'm pretty happy right now. You know, I have, I have a lot of love and support and yeah, we'll see what's next. Wow.

SPEAKER_00:

I mean, one student at a time, right? It really comes down to that. Jeremy Whalen, thank you so much for sharing your story and your insights about teaching. You've really shown that innovation comes from inspiration and passion. There's no shortage of that in you. I could just feel it as you speak, and I'm sure that emanates in your classroom. And I love that the classroom is more than just a place for teaching. It's more of a hub for where students can connect and learn and engage and most of all really contribute to the community because it's like we're not just in school we live out in the world and how do you present yourself in that way and how do you show it with compassion with love with thoughtfulness with empathy it's been such a pleasure speaking with you today i

SPEAKER_01:

was i mean what we were talking about giving this in and of itself is a great platform to bring up people instead of tearing them down you know that we just need more of this it's been wonderful your creativity and Your positivity just shines through and I appreciate it. The minute that you sent me that email, I was like, yep, I'm

SPEAKER_00:

going to go. Oh my gosh, you said yes. So thank you. Thank you so much. I wish you the best of luck on your doctorate. Congratulations on another milestone. Thanks so much for tuning in today. I'm so glad you spent this time with me. If something in this episode resonated, feel free to share it or pass it along to someone who might need that little spark. Until next time, keep humming.