MoCo Black Coffee Podcast
MoCo Black Coffee is a platform for intentional dialogue about the Black/African American community in Montgomery County, Maryland. Hosted by African American Community Liaison, Frederick Hawkins, we bring together visionary community and government leaders, dynamic entrepreneurs and cultural champions to build understanding, awareness and strengthen the community. Each episode is brewed strong with insight, intelligence, and intention, centering the strategies, stories and systems that sustain the Black/African American community.
MoCo Black Coffee Podcast
Black Coffee Podcast - Minority Scholars
MoCo Black Coffee is a platform for intentional dialogue about the Black/African American community in Montgomery County, Maryland. Hosted by African American Community Liaison, Frederick Hawkins, we bring together visionary community and government leaders, dynamic entrepreneurs and cultural champions to build understanding, awareness and strengthen the community. Each episode is brewed strong with insight, intelligence, and intention, centering the strategies, stories and systems that sustain the Black/African American community.
Hello, my name is Frederick Hawkins and welcome to Black Coffee. Today we have a special, special guest from the Minority Scholars Program, founder, co-founder, Michael Williams. Before I get started, I want to say this is a great program that has 25 high schools now. They're in 35 middle schools and 25 elementary schools. That is a movement. Thank you, Michael Williams, for joining. I appreciate you, man. Glad to be here. Appreciate you a lot, man. I hear great things about you and the program. I had an intern from the Minority Scholars Program this summer. They were amazing. They represented well. Glad to hear. So thank you for your work. So tell us about the Minority Scholars Program and what personally motivated you to start this student-led movement.
Michael Williams:Yeah, I mean, Minority Scholars Program or MSP, as most of the students uh refer to it, is a student-driven initiative. It is aimed at tackling the opportunity gap and fighting for racial equity and and um ending um systemic uh oppression um in our school systems and community. Um and we started it like we're about to celebrate our 20th anniversary. Um so that was uh a while ago when we started this. Um, and it kind of was personal. Like I came back to the same school district that I grew up in, and um I realized that they were struggling some 20 years later with the same issues um that were affecting kids of color. Um and so it it was very personal to me. Um, but um like a lot of people think that it was something that I, Mike Williams or Esther Adams, who we were both the co-founders, um, kind of did, but from the very beginning it was organically led by the students. We had a problem that our principal, Dr. Garin, had presented to us. Esther and I took it to 15 students, and that's when the magic happened. Like they started coming up with all these ideas and saying, can we create a bilingual newsletter? Can we meet a couple times a week? Can we get involved in the morning announcements? And it it was it was awesome. And it 20 years since is the magic keeps happening every year. Wow, wow.
Frederick Hawkins:What qualities have you seen like emerge from the students after being involved with MSP?
Michael Williams:They are um far more confident in their ability to create change. Um they've seen it happen, they've seen their peers create change. You know, most of the time, kids, I mean, I'm a high school teacher, so most of my time my students just they don't believe that they as students can create change. And so I think that is the biggest thing. Um, secondly, they are confident in um really public speaking. Like they will come up and stand up and talk at any time, um, and they are willing to stand toe-to-toe with with any adult because they understand the power of their voice. Respectfully. They still know that they do it respectfully, but they aren't gonna cower to anyone.
Frederick Hawkins:Yeah, yeah. And part of learning how to speak publicly is how to push back respectfully. Yes, indeed. It's a skill. Yes, indeed. Them learning it so early is powerful. Yeah. They're gonna need it. Yes. So um I hear uh great things about the anti-racist film festival. Can you just tell me a little bit about that? Yes, I can.
Michael Williams:So, like uh actually, I guess it was three summers ago in our internship. Um, like I said, the magic keeps happening. The the kids came up with ideas. We actually had somebody come in to do some training on how to use your cell phones to create change. But then the students were like, okay, well, we should, can we do like a little film festival or something? After so we had two brilliant films that were created, and we were like, oh yeah. So we started organizing the kids' idea, and we're like, all right, let's give them the platform. And we came up with the youth anti-racist film festival to help push for the anti-racist initiatives within our county. And so now we've had our second annual anti-racist film festival. We had standing room only in the AFI theater uh that held 200 um uh people. I think we had about 225 people in the audience, and we featured 10 um student created films um that were pushing for change. Um and um it was amazing. So next year we gotta figure out how we can get into the larger theater at AFI.
Frederick Hawkins:Yeah, yeah, I hope I hope you guys get in there. As a matter of fact, you will get in there. We'll just put that out there. Put it out there, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Um, so I guess what how do the students challenge you? You know, they they're always come with new things, we're from a different generation, even though we we're experienced, we're knowledgeable, how to move, be strategic in our old age. But how do the young people come to the table and challenge you?
Michael Williams:Yeah, I mean, I think when we provide that platform and they gain the trust, um they understand that we believe in them, we trust them, and they then can speak from the heart, honestly, to the point where they can say, hey, Mr. Williams, I I don't think that was right. Like they they or I think this is how we should do it, um, or here's an idea that I think is um uh a better approach. Um and so I think they challenge us in in many of those ways. It's why one of the things that we kind of always argue um and even try to push our county towards, because most adults, yeah, when we think of student voice, we're really talking student feedback. MCPS right now, like they say student voice, they're really talking student feedback. And we, the students have been pushing. No, student voice is not student feedback. It's having a seat at the table, being respected enough to um to play a role in creating the change that is needed. And that's where we're trying to push um our county, our schools towards, uh, among other things, among even standing up um in their belief that we are an anti-racist school system. We're not always seeing that happen. And the students, not only through their films, but through their day-to-day actions, are pushing and calling the adults in the room to task and saying, you know what's happening right here? That's not anti-racist. In fact, that's fostering racism and hierarchies, and we're about to shut that down. That's true. I love it, I love it.
Frederick Hawkins:Wow. All right, some good stuff, brother. Good stuff. All right, so with all of that, with all that advocacy and movement building and pushing the agenda uh for righteousness, justice, et cetera, inclusion, how has MSP navigated pushback from administrators, teachers, and even fellow students around anti-racist movement building?
Michael Williams:Yeah, I mean, it's been a long, hard road uh over these years. Congratulations. In the county, we have now, because we've been doing it so long and and people have seen the results of the minority scholars program efforts, um, we've almost become an institution and recognized within the county. Um that is lessened the pushback, but every year you get pushback. And um the you know, we discuss it amongst the students of like how do you respond when people say this, or how do you respond to even microaggressions, or how are we going to stand up to uh an administrator who um who says this, or a teacher who um, you know, may say something derogatory or use the N-word and think that it's okay. Uh like so we we train that's part of our training is how we navigate that pushback and deal with it, and and the students always rise to the occasion.
Frederick Hawkins:So I love I love the power from these young people. They were on the call last week and just seeing how they presented and just having an intern. Now they're they're they know how to navigate or they're learning to navigate the pushback on that level. What do what is the feedback around what's happening nationally from the students?
Michael Williams:Yeah, I mean, we truthfully we we had to I remember um that we had to take a moment um uh actually after the election and just hold safe space. Um we meet monthly for task force meetings where leaders from all the um schools will come together after from four to six um and we plan and we share best practices. I remember that one of those meetings, it was like three-quarters of the meetings where we just had to devote it to wellness because people were feeling all sorts of ways, um not safe, everything. So, I mean MSP also um one of the big powerful things about it is we serve as a community for each other. Um a safe space where kids can be real. And you know, um sometimes being real means look, we just need to exhale a little, we need to um, you know, we need to let it out a bit, and and that's okay. And then once that's done, we move on, and they were back to business the the next uh the next day.
Frederick Hawkins:I love it, man. Real isn't always pretty, right? You know, it can be ugly, yeah. Um, but real is moving forward too. Yeah, so nah, I appreciate what you do. Um, if what is a message that you would deliver to policymakers or uh young people, anyone watching this episode, what's a message that you would like them to take home?
Michael Williams:Yeah, um I think to policymakers, number one is the whole um student voice. Um like listen to the students. Yeah. Provide them a platform um to share not just their thoughts on issues, but give them a say, a seat at the table. Um that is one of the most powerful things because we adults always want students to like we complain about students do this and students do that, but we notice that when you give them a platform, when you trust them, when you respect them and their thoughts, they always rise to the occasion. And they not only surprise us, but they actually help us. The amount of ideas that you know they come up with, and like I said, like most of from the jump, MSP has been organically student-led and run and their ideas, their ideas fostered our march to close the gap in 2014 when one of the students at our task force meeting said, you know what? We should have, you know how they have those um walk for cancer, we should do that on the opportunity gap. And we were like, ooh, yeah. And we started organizing and we pulled it together, and 500 students strong marched from downtown, uh, sorry, from MCPS headquarters to the downtown county courthouse, right around the corner from here and had a had a rally. Um, and that was the first time we were fully made our mark in the county where people were like, oh, yeah, this is a real movement. Because for the 10 years prior to that, they weren't really paying us much mind. We were doing our things in some of the schools, but that that's the first time that it was like really 500 is a lot. That's right. That's a lot of people you gotta pay attention to 500. Yes, indeed.
Frederick Hawkins:You know, because that 500 really means a thousand. Maybe more than that. Yeah. Um call to action, like how can we support MSP uh in any way? Yeah, how can we support we want to see a win?
Michael Williams:Yeah, well, um showing up, coming out to student events, but I think one of the things that we would love is for people to kind of support financially. Like this movement building, unfortunately it costs, and we keep growing. We are, as you mentioned, in all of the high schools, 30 of them, 35 of the middle schools, um, 15 elementary schools. We've actually even the MSP model has spread to Frederick County. Um we've gone up there to help train them. It spread to Kent County across the bay. We've been to Hartford County to do some training. Um we've been nationally, our students have gone to speak at NEA conventions five times now. And um I just came back from Minneapolis at a conference run by NEA, and they're talking about Minority Scholars Program. We have become a model across the nation. Um, and with that, it costs because our internship keeps growing. Um we trained the students over the summer, the high school students for six weeks, and we've got 30 students now. And um we're hoping people can help support you know the internship. Um www.minorytyscholars.org. Um please uh reach out there. We have uh our 20th anniversary gala that our our teachers union is throwing for us. So reach out to MCEA. That's on September 20th, the gala. Okay. But we would love for people to come to the gala, spruce themselves up, have fun, but also learn about what uh MSP is doing and help support the cause and the movement. Um and uh, you know, we have our annual retreat where we get uh over a thousand students who come out. Um, and what's beautiful about that is it's all planned, organized, and facilitated by the students themselves. Um it's really powerful. And then our anti-racist film festival. Um, as I mentioned, we were standing room only, so now we gotta ask AFI if we can move to the largest theater, and uh that's gonna cost so we're hoping people can support financially and then even just showing up. Like it means a lot for the students when we adults are there supporting them. Yeah, well, uh I believe that you will get the larger theater.
Frederick Hawkins:We're gonna put that out there, you know, to get the larger theater. Let's get 300 in the room next time. Um, I appreciate everything that you do. Thank you.
Michael Williams:Thank you for giving us this platform.
Frederick Hawkins:Anytime, every time. All right, when you guys have something coming up, feel free to jump on. Send some young people over, some some scholars they can talk to. Um, thank you again. I appreciate you. Uh greatly. Um thank you. Uh again, you guys can find out more about the Minority Scholars program at www.minority scholars.org. My name is Frederick Hawkins, and this is another episode of Black Coffee.