K-12 Confidential
Even before the pandemic lock-downs, American teachers from sea to shining sea reported a critical shortage of teachers within their ranks, and have watched in horror at the crippling levels of greed, arrogance, apathy, and ignorance at every level of K-12 educational governance. While embattled teachers have continued to try in vain to draw attention to the issues, our leaders have failed to acknowledge the problems at all. But since covid, the nation’s teachers have borne witness to a break neck hastening pace of this downward spiral–and a total avoidance of a conversation from our leaders.
This a-political podcast, created and produced exclusively by teachers, gets into the nitty gritty details of why teachers are leaving the profession in droves, and uncovers huge contributing structural problems baked into the teaching profession which are not discussed or understood even within the K-12 educational world, which also explain why so much of what is done in K-12 is ineffective. These desperate, passionate, highly qualified teachers use this podcast series to insert teachers forcefully into the national conversation about the critical issues plaguing K-12 education, because no one else was letting them in–a fact which belies a central thesis about the roots of the problems discussed throughout the episodes. Listeners will be gripped by the reality that without substantial reforms which empower teachers to lead the work, the inevitable result is a collapse of our very ability to effectively self-govern–a process which they argue is already well underway.
Listen as they describe the problems in teacher pay, teacher preparation requirements, special education, climate and culture, reading instruction, the false promise of existing DEI based frameworks in K-12, and the problems inherent in outsourced canned curriculums. Become a part of the solution as they outline a framework to authentically fix these problems, which require all hands on deck from both inside and outside of K-12 education.
K-12 Confidential
Episode 0. K12 Confidential--Episode 0: We Don't Need Another Hero
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Our short scripted description of our podcast!
Welcome to K 12 Confidential, a podcast crafted by veteran K 12 teachers for the American people. This introductory episode outlines the podcast's mission to uncover the harsh realities and systemic issues plaguing K 12 education. Highlights include deep investigative journalism, a call to action to center teacher voices, and themes focused on the structural problems in the education system. The podcast promises apolitical, bipartisan discussions that cut through the surface to address real issues and propose solutions. Despite expected controversies and challenges, the hosts emphasize the urgent need for a national governing board for teachers to reclaim control over their profession and improve education for all children. This episode introduces the format, key themes, and the pivotal role teachers will play in the dialogue.
00:00 Introduction to K 12 Confidential
00:58 The Realities of K 12 Education
02:21 Creating a Teacher-Led Space
03:43 The Fight for Public Education
04:41 Uncovering the Messes
06:22 The Call for a National Governing Board
07:39 The Power Structures in K 12 Schooling
08:30 Podcast Format and Goals
09:18 Conclusion: We Don't Need Another Hero
We need more teacher voices to this this justice! Visit us at k-12confidential.com to request to speak on the podcast.
Sign the petition to join the movement to save K-12 Education!
Welcome to K 12 Confidential, a groundbreaking, hard hitting, rebellious, yet hopeful podcast made by teachers for all of America. It is our love letter to the American people and our wake up call to you all as well. Things are bad and you are not getting accurate information about it. After two solid years of deep investigative journalism and over 40 years combined in the K 12 teaching biz, we have uncovered major themes which encapsulate the messes in our world.
In fact, we refer to them simply as that messes. But we have also traced it back to its source way back to what all of the problems in K 12 education all have in common. You won't hear anything else like this. We promise you that every single mess we dig into is either uncovered by the media and K 12 scholarship, or is covered in a painfully cursory and ultimately inaccurate way.
But first we wonder why did you press play on this podcast? Were you hoping for culture war porn? Were you hoping for political vitriol to either love or hate? We hate to disappoint, but that's not our podcast. We are intentionally creating a space for descent. Yes, that is true, but not in the ways you may expect because the whole red, blue and purple divide thing, it doesn't line up with the huge problems we talk about, which are endemic in K 12 education.
And if you're not in our world, and by that we mean not a current veteran K 12 teacher. Let me say again, current. Veteran, a K 12 teacher on the ground floor in a classroom, and you think you know what's going on, you're wrong. And that's the problem. Folks outside of our world, politicians, NGOs, superintendents, they all get to control of the narrative and act like they know what they're talking about.
And the teachers have just gotten very used to rolling their eyes and rolling up their sleeves and quietly cleaning up the messes made by their bad decisions as best we can. But the reality is that the messes they have made have gotten so bad that this isn't working anymore. And really it never actually did and landed us in exactly the place we are today.
So we're creating a teacher-led space, which honors all of us public private school, pre-K through 12th grade teachers in absolutely every corner of our nation. Get to call this podcast home. It is your podcast and your chance. Tell the American people exactly how it is and how it needs to change in order to save our kids and our very ability to effectively self-govern.
And while this podcast is apolitical and bipartisan, individual teachers are not so to pretend to be otherwise isn't honest, but the work here is to figure out how to create a space for everyone. Regardless of our politics. So what we've got here, folks are incredibly opinionated. People who are used to saying exactly what they think.
So are we gonna mess up? Yeah, we are. Are you gonna hear things that cross the line and offend you? Probably, yeah. You will. Uh, but we're gonna keep coming back to the table to keep trying to get it right 'cause we refuse to give up. There's just way too much on the line. So if you're tired of hearing the echo chamber of your own beliefs.
And long for something that cuts through what you wanna hear and gives you what you need to hear, then this show is for you. We stand united against anyone who devalues teacher expertise and attempts to defund or dismantle public education. And while that may sound like a politically loaded statement, we assure you it is not.
We have seen folks on both sides of the political divide on the wrong and right side of this battle. So we will be calling out the right, the left, and the center on this podcast. The fight to save and preserve public education is beyond our party politics. We've created something hopeful and brave out of all the ugliness around us.
We don't pretend to have all the answers. In fact, we know that no one person does our world. K 12 education is bizarre. Operates in darkness and is run entirely by non-experts. And those of us who are experts, veteran, K 12 teachers are very intentionally sidelined from any positions of leadership.
And we're not here to dish about our specific school districts or sites that would be career suicide. And look, we're not making a dime from our podcast, so we need to keep our jobs. But it's really more than that. We're really not here to assassinate individuals caught up in this mess. 'cause even though outsiders are gonna be horrified to know a lot of the ins and outs that we discuss on the podcast, yeah, it's really shocking.
Uh, we also know that group psychology and careful indoctrination and oppression in our world really carefully and subtly manufactures everyone's complicity. In short, no one person or institution is to blame for the mess. And although this podcast must be for everyone and it is, we need everyone to listen.
It's always gonna center teachers. Our podcast is investigative journalism, which aspires to allow everyone to see a real and honest glimpse of our world, warts and all. We are teachers. We love all teachers. Red states, blue states, private school, charter school, public school, pre-K, preschool, multiple subjects, single subject, special ed, all teachers.
Our defacto stance is one of utter support of all of us because we've seen that our voice is missing from all the big decisions being made in our world, and we have seen the huge costs our nation is paying as a result. What you are about to hear is a series of discussions which unpacks our argument for a national governing board for K 12 teachers, one which operates like any other credentialed body of professionals in America today, which allows us to lead our profession and speak up for our nation's children who are being shortchanged and sold out by the status quo.
We dug bravely and tenaciously into the problems in K 12 schooling, which we noticed the outside press could not cover due to the hidden nature of our world. And have uncovered major themes, which all flow from the same structural problem in K 12 schooling, which is that teachers do not get a say in how teaching is delivered to our nation's youth.
It's demoralizing and infuriating that we are the only body of professionals which do not have this sort of power over our own profession. It is why the messes exist and is at the heart of what must change. In our podcast, you will hear teachers from all over the nation come on in a true investigative journalistic manner and bravely blow the whistle on the messes.
In our world, it is beyond scary. To do this, it's actually terrifying. And some teachers have asked us to disguise their identities, and we do. Why is it so scary? The thing is K 12 schooling in America today is like a hydra with extremely powerful heads. There's big money and big politics tied up in our world.
Home real estate values are tied into this beast. Multi-billion dollar textbook companies with their hands so far in the taxpayer cookie jar that they are up to their armpits. Your money. And finally, the politicians in our bizarre world, local politicians, they get to run everything without experience or education in our field.
Our discussion of these culpable parties and the messes in our world are the major themes, which is our evidence of how bad things are and why we need our solution framework. So each theme contains a number of episodes, and by the way, we refer to the themes as messes, and it all follows the same basic format.
To begin with, I'm interviewed by my sister and co-host, Mandy Walker. She's a non-teacher, and so the beginning of each thematic category. Somebody outside of the K 12 world and I are gonna talk and we're gonna unpack things at a high level, um, to really make things comprehensible to the American people.
Uh, we've tried out a variety of formats and the feedback we kept hearing was we needed someone outside of our world to make it comprehensible. So we listened, but we also kept our experts on providing the evidence to back up everything we're saying. We're calling this very first short scripted episode.
We don't need another hero because teachers are not asking to be saved. What we are asking for is for the ability to save K 12 education ourselves, and in so doing the American people, we are the only ones that see the messes for what they are and have the solution to fix it. This entire podcast is our evidence of that statement.
We love you America, and we know how to fix it, all of it. All we need from the American people is the chance to do so. Welcome to the K 12 Confidential podcast. This is a very short, scripted introduction to the entire podcast, which really outlines what makes this podcast so groundbreaking and so necessary.
The research and groundwork for this podcast is about three years in the making. We've been working on this behind the scenes, not promoting it or publicizing it this whole time, and we sort of expected that there would be an existential threat to K 12 education, but we had no idea that we would be facing the very dismantling of the US Department of Education.
So we feel very fortunate that we've curated this content in advance so that we can create a space that stands toe to toe. Against anyone who's attempting to dismantle the US Department of Education and now we don't need another hero.