SPEAKER_00 0:00

You're listening to the Support Ed Learning Podcast, where we challenge the status quo of education and reimagine what learning should be. I'm Dr. Joe Sebastian, and in every episode we dive into critical thinking, Bloom's Taxonomy, educational innovation, and how AI is shaping the future of learning. Whether you're a teacher, parent, policymaker, or lifelong learner, you're in the right place to rethink, reshape, and revive education. Welcome back to the Supported Learning Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Joe Sebastian. I am joined today by Esther Wojski, joining us today live on California. Esther, welcome to the podcast. How are you?

SPEAKER_01 0:43

I'm doing well. Thank you. Happy to report that.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

I'm glad to have you here. So I want to start by just getting your journey through education to where you are today. How did it all start? Where did you always know where you wanted to go? Just kind of walk us through your learning journey for us.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Well, my learning journey began when I was about um 10. I was one of these kids, I was in the Los Angeles public schools, and I was one of these kids that was always done with my work early. So then the question is, what do you do when you're done early? Well, according to Los Angeles Public Schools in the 90s and 60s, you're just supposed to sit there like a little robot. Does not work. So I unfortunately was busy helping all my friends. And I got into trouble for that. I mean, a lot of trouble. They would take me to the principal's office and paddle me. Then they would do other things like whack me with rulers. And then I think the worst thing of all, that one of the teachers put me under her desk for two hours. That was pretty bad.

SPEAKER_00 1:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

So as a little girl, age 10, I said to myself, When I grow up, I'm gonna change the system so that people can help each other and work together. And uh and that's what I did. My central focus of my teaching is collaboration. And by the way, in the 1980s and 90s, that is if you were alive at that point, I don't know if you remember this, but collaboration in the 1980s and 90s was called cheating. You always had to do the work yourself. If you didn't do it yourself, you got into trouble and you got an F. So I've been on this bandwagon to promote collaboration for my whole life.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

So what does collaboration look like today in education? And is it done effectively?

SPEAKER_01 2:53

Well, there is not very much collaboration because what do you do? You take a test by yourself, right? And it's your score versus, you know, the score next to you, the person next to you. And we are teaching all the kids to memorize. And what are we memorizing? We're memorizing the answers to last century's problems. How useful is that? I mean, that's what we're doing in history, that's what we're doing actually all over the curriculum. With the exception of math, although we're still doing math the same way we've done it for a long time. There are other ways to do math and collaboration, by the way, did you notice that all companies collaborate? People in the real world collaborate. So why aren't we teaching kids to collaborate? Why are they doing it by themselves?

SPEAKER_00 3:46

So you've actually built a media arts program, Palo Alto High Media Arts Program from nothing. Um, and it's one into one of the largest journalism programs in the country. What did you do differently? How did you inject the skills of collaboration and how is that true journalism from what's being taught anywhere else?

SPEAKER_01 4:07

So what I was doing, so first of all, I started in the 1980s using computers when nobody else was using computers. I was probably the first teacher in the state of California to use computers, and I didn't know how to use them, so I asked my students to help me. And I'll tell you, they loved it. They were there on the weekend, they were there all the time because they wanted to help get these things to go, and we had to network them. I didn't even know what networking was, let alone how to get on a computer, turn it on or turn it off. And so I built into the program collaboration, using especially using computers. My philosophy was first of all, you should learn how to find the information online. If you can't find it online, second thing you should do, ask your friend. If they still don't know how to do it, ask a second friend. After that, if they still can't figure out what to do, I'm here. You can always ask me. All right, so I was saying how about how kids could the reason kids wanted to join my class is because they never had to worry about their grade. They always got to work with their friends and they got to write write article about articles about things that they personally thought were interesting. So who wouldn't want to do that? So I managed, you know, in the first year I was teaching, I had 20 kids. The following year I had 40, then the next year I had 60, it kept going up. And by the year 2000, I had 100.

SPEAKER_00 5:56

You've been called the godmother of Silicon Valley. How did that nickname come be? How did it stick? And what does it actually mean?

SPEAKER_01 6:04

That's the craziest thing. Well, what that is, is um a lot of the kids that were in my program went out into the real world, got jobs, and they brought a lot of the culture from my program into the companies that they worked for. And the culture of my program was basically just do it and revise, do it quickly. And then Facebook came up with this thing is like move quickly and break things. I never said break things, I said revise. He forgot to put revise after the break things, but I guess they assumed that you would just do it again, and so I think that culture just traveled around and it seemed to have worked. The first company that was using it was just this tiny little company in 1999 called Google. And Google was the first company in Silicon Valley, it's crazy, the first company in Silicon Valley to get do away with time clocks. I don't know, you're too young to remember this. So when everybody went to work. Oh, you do? Okay, well, all right. Well, maybe they had time clocks where you are in Pittsburgh. But I can tell you in Silicon Valley, no one has time clocks now. But when in the 90s and early 2000s, everybody had time clocks. So if you got to work five minutes late, you got docked. You know, not only that, you know, they had a device that measured how long you were sitting in your seat. So if you were not sitting in your seat long enough, you also got docked. And so there were a lot of big companies that had this. I'm not exaggerating. One of them just happened to be Intel. And Intel was where my daughter Susan first worked after she graduated. And she was only too happy to leave that job and go to work for Google. So she was Google's 16th employee. Wow. 16th. Number 16. And her duty, her role when she joined, her number one role was please find a way for us, Google, to make money. Because we know how to find all the information online with algorithms, but we don't have a clue how to make money. So Susan came up with a way, AdSense, for Google to make money. So she basically invented Google Ads? That's basically right. Wow. Correct. That's practical. You have to be creative to do something like that. Is she still with Google? Susan was the CEO of YouTube. CEO of the Stuart. She also bought YouTube for Google. She's the one that developed YouTube into the powerhouse it is today. That's incredible. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

So like you're like royalty. That makes you royalty then, right? Not just a godmother.

SPEAKER_01 9:24

That's how I got to be the royalty godmother, yes. It's really funny. Yes, I'm so busy trying to help other people now.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

So yeah, I mean, talk more about so like, okay, so obviously you're part of you're part of the education, I don't want to say system, but just part of the education experience, right? And you have this very wide and deep impact on innovative technologies. And you spoke earlier about how education, the archaic look of education, what needs to happen for education to change and basically meet the demands of the modern world through the innovative lenses of what you just spoke about.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

Number one thing that education needs to do to modernize and to have an impact on the world is to cut out the force of grading. Grading is number one thing that makes kids feel stupid. And also they have just one shot at the grade. And, you know, they have perhaps they have a bad day. And that reflects, you know, their what they think of as their ability. Grades do a lot of damage. So in order for them to get rid of in my class to get rid of grades, I still kept grades. It's just that I let everybody revise until they could get a good grade. And in that revision process, when you make mistakes, that's when you're learning. You don't learn by watching somebody else or listening to somebody else and copying them. You learn by doing it yourself. And so that's what they could do to make a big difference. Give kids an opportunity to revise and to work in groups, to work collaboratively. So I have this formula, it's in my book, How to Raise Successful People. And that book is in 33 languages, by the way, at the moment. And let me tell you what the philosophy is. It's called TRIC T-R-I-C-K, and it stands for trust, respect, independence, collaboration, and kindness. So you need to trust your students so that they then trust themselves. You trust that they can learn to do whatever it is you're teaching them. Okay, maybe they don't learn it the first time, maybe they do the second or third or fourth. They have to trust themselves that they can actually learn it and do well and respect them by respecting their ideas. You know, some of the magazines that my students came up with at Palo Alto High School, today there's 14 magazines. Some of those ideas I thought were downright wacky, but I let them do it anyway. Because I was like, okay, if that's something you think other kids are gonna like, why don't we try it? So respect their ideas, give them independence to try a lot of things, collaborate, don't dictate. And then the most important, of course, treat them with kindness. You know, people will forget what you said and they'll forget what you did, but they'll never forget how you made them feel. Ever.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

So I love that, by the way, because I think that's a really, a really good message of the educators that impact kids the most are the ones that make them feel a certain way, right? Feel welcome, feel that they actually made a difference. They don't necessarily remember the specific facts that they taught them or the information, right? It's the transformation that actually happened in the in the learning space. You spoke a lot about collaboration, but also a key theme, I think, especially in your book that comes to mind is independence. And just there's been a lot, a lot that's happened in the last 20 years in education. I and just from someone who's inside the system, I see less independence. I see more dependence on parents than ever before when we have more tools that can promote independence. But it's something that scares parents.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

They're scared because they don't think that their child is going to earn the grade that they need to get in order to get into the college that they expect them to go to. That's the problem. So they put tight controls on those kids, and then we have a depression rate today of 54% of college freshmen are clinically depressed. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 14:03

Yeah, and not only depressed, but anxious too, the anxious generation.

SPEAKER_01 14:07

Well, anxious, depressed, eating disorders, you know, afraid to do a lot of things, don't want to try anything new. Why don't you want to try anything new? Because you're afraid you'll make a mistake. Stop being so fearful. And also, if you take a look at all the people that are innovators on the web, innovators with all kinds of companies, entrepreneurs, they are all the kids who did not get A's. They're actually a lot of kids who dropped out, a lot of kids who were doing poorly because they're the ones that actually had the courage to think. So I want to make this opportunity for people to think for everybody. So all kids should have the opportunity to revise. That's the simplest way to go about it. You can revise until you get it right. And I even use this in my math classes. I taught algebra and geometry. So don't tell me you can't do it in math.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

This episode is brought to you by Supported Tutoring, where we don't just help students get better grades, we help them become critical thinkers. Whether it's mastering AP exams, maximizing college applications, or building lifelong learning habits, our expert tutors focus on critical thinking, confidence, and real growth. Head to supported tutoring.com to find the support your student deserves. So have you read The Coddling of the American Mind by John Hattie?

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I did. I I'm sorry to say, I John Hyde is a nice person, but I think that book is terrible. And not only that, it's giving all the parents an ulcer. They're all perf they're just freaked out because they gave their kids the phone too early and now they don't know what to do. So there's all these kids in therapy, parents in therapy, everybody's worried about the phone. Terrible. No, I disagree with that book completely. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

Are you referring- you're referring to the anxious generation, then his latest one about the phone?

SPEAKER_01 16:08

Of course I'm referring to the anxious generation. Is there anything else generation of parents?

SPEAKER_00 16:14

Right. The calling American mind, because there was something you said earlier about being raised in the 80s and 90s. So that's in terms of the safetyism and learn dependence, is that parents are not allowing, just on the global perspective, parents are not allowing kids to experience failure early or failing safely early. That's his theory.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

They don't even want to do that. As a matter of fact, kids will come in and they'll like, I went to this lecture and I was really disturbed by the lecture and I need therapy. Are you kidding? That's what's happening.

SPEAKER_00 17:04

So how do we how do we self-correct? So like it seems like just from a, because I I used if I taught history, it seems like we're in the a little bit of like a death spiral. I don't know how we get out of it because it's almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy. How do we educate our way back to being independent and being successful in what we know as independent children that can collaborate?

SPEAKER_01 17:30

And well, number one thing is cut out the grading in grades kindergarten through grade six. That's why would we ever grade those kids? You grade them and then they get a C or a D, and they're like, I'm bad at math or I'm bad at English. They those self-images are formed when they're young. Why do we do that to kids? It's terrible. How about just saying they need to improve in this area or improve in that area? No grades.

SPEAKER_00 18:02

So as someone that I have three daughters as well, by the way. So I'm you're lucky. I am very I'm very blessed. I'm very blessed. They're healthy, they're 10, 8, and 6. And uh part of me looks at this world that I'm going to eventually put them in as someone that helps kids get it, get some top AP scores and help them navigate college admissions. I honestly, as an educator of 16 years, don't know if I'm going to push them towards college given where we're at right now and what where AI is advancing, but I want them to be successful. I want them to be independent. You've obviously raised three remarkably successful daughters. Looking back, what's the parenting move you got right that you think most parents don't?

SPEAKER_01 18:48

I think I trusted my kids and I did not get upset when they got a bad grade. You know, I was like, it's okay. Just try to figure out why you got the bad grade. Let's see what we could do so that you can learn it, so you can then do better on the next test. And I helped them trust and believe in themselves. That was the most important thing. If you just think about Susan and what she had to do at Google with YouTube, there was no path for her to follow. There was no way for her to say, oh, I'm gonna follow what so-and-so did, because there was no other way to do it. There was no Google before that. She had to come up with the ideas herself. So she had to believe in herself. And I'll tell you a story that shows what she really had to do with YouTube that is shocking. Before YouTube, there was another product called Google Video. I remember it. I never heard of Google Video. I remember, I remember it. Well, it was not good, to put it mildly. And that was Susan's project. And she had spent a billion dollars building it. A billion. And so what she had to do is go to the board of Google and say, I made a terrible mistake, and now we have to buy this other company that I found out there, this little thing called YouTube, which actually has no track record yet. Can you imagine? She did that and she succeeded, and they bought it, and the rest is history.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

And then she created the YouTube that today beats all video companies everywhere in the world.

SPEAKER_00 20:36

I remember I remember the early days of YouTube back in the college. I think before Google, before Google bought it. I remember what a wild place YouTube was prior to prior to Google buying it. Um That's right.

SPEAKER_01 20:50

So I'm just telling you, you know, you have to believe in yourself. You could not do something like that if you didn't believe in yourself. So your daughters, your three daughters, I don't care what grades they get, they're fine. If they don't do a good job, you just say do it again. Doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

Yeah, I I um my wife, so my wife's from the Philippines, and I mean she values education and she's she's a very proud mama. She's been a stay at we've been blessed, she's been a stay-at-home mama for eight years now. And that's what I argue, because like I don't even know. I'm such a bad, I'm a bad educator parent that I don't I can't even open the grade book. Like I I forget that they get grades. I'm I'm so in doing my own thing. And I'm like, oh yeah, but she keeps like every piece of work, all of her grades. Like I'm like, I think we need to let that go too, because that's becoming an issue.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

But I'm just keeps it. Your wife keeps my wife, oh yeah. Your wife does it?

SPEAKER_00 21:42

Yeah, I'm like, we need to let this all the papers, the grid.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

No, no. The kids are in charge, not her. I I always said to my students, you know, you can't take me to college with you. So therefore, you've got to do it all yourself. Everything you're learning, you do yourself because I'm not going to college. I've Already been there. And your wife, your wife has to let them do it themselves, collect their own stuff, do their own thing, be in charge of their own lives. As long as she's in charge, then she has the control.

SPEAKER_00 22:14

Oh, yeah. Well, we're gonna we'll we'll inject you into our couples. Later on, I'll have a little word with her. Well, it is it's so true because watching, I mean, what just watching my three grow up. So my oldest one, she's still afraid of dark in some cases. Um one day she'll watch this YouTube and she'll be embarrassed. But as a 10-year-old, still my the third one is probably the most independent. We call her like a little like a little mom.

SPEAKER_01 22:40

Well, that's because your wife didn't have time to boss her around. That's right. And she needs to stop bossing the other ones around too. You know, she can stop now. The oldest one's 10. There's still hope.

SPEAKER_00 22:55

Yeah. So I'll I'll pass along that. I'll say, hey, the mother of the CEO of YouTube told me that we need to let her experience a little bit of learned independence. That's right. So I appreciate that. So yeah, I mean, the the AI, I'm sure you've obviously heard about it, right? Learned about words where there's those who like thinking about AI. Where where do you so like now I remember three years ago when we first heard of Chat GPT in schools, and within like two days, I think we had our first cheating case of someone plagiarizing using AI and trying to figure out. Now I guess you know, there's the debate in schools if we have kids have use AI, if they don't use AI, where where do we stand? But what I I think is very similar to the social media argument is that I grew up in a world without social media. Am I addicted? Probably. But can I know how to function in life without social media? Most kids do not at this point. AI, there's gonna be a whole generation of kids that grow up with AI that they at the first chance they get to ask a question, they're asking AI for the answers. So, in terms of, I'm gonna frame the AI question around independence and success, where do you see it going and what do we need to do with it?

SPEAKER_01 24:28

Well, so I think, first of all, the number one thing that they should do in the schools with AI is when they have kids working with AI, they should be in groups of two or three, never by yourself. Because what happens then is that you are getting an answer or response, and then you're talking to each other about it. So that promotes collaboration and gets rid of the isolated feeling that a lot of kids have when they're using AI. I don't know why schools don't do it. It's cheaper. It's actually better if kids do it by together as a team. And then the other thing with AI, you need to teach kids how to ask questions so that AI can be like the teacher's helper as opposed to doing the work for them. You don't want the AI to write the essay for them. You want the kids to write the essay themselves and then have AI edit it and make suggestions. That is how you learn. And then you do it again, and then they AI will make edits and corrections again. But if they know they're not gonna get a terrible grade, that's the inhibiting factor, the grade. If they know that they can just keep trying until they get it right and do it themselves, they're gonna do that. The reason that they're cheating and going to AI to do the work is because of the pressure of the grade. That's the pressure. That's the problem. That's what happened to you too, button, is you don't remember.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

Well, I used to tell my parents that I like to have a wide assortment of grades on the report card. I think you want to see the tour of the alphabet. I'm scared. I got these, I think I I was, I I mean, it's hard. I mean, like, I remember parts of my childhood and my high school journey very vividly, and parts of it I don't. Like I think I got decent grades, but in terms of like the effort and trying, like I absolutely could have tried, I pretty much coasted through a lot. But now I look at the kids that we serve and I'm blown away. They're amazing. Like they're they're very, they're into a lot of things. But yes, I speak to parents every day. I speak to a lot that they're they're championing their kids, but there is so much grade inflation, especially on the AP side. Like we have a whole thing of like IA students.

SPEAKER_01 26:52

Why is there grade inflation? Because all the kids are terrified, and all the parents they're gonna take their kid out of your program if you don't give them an A.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

No, no, I'm talking about I'm talking about school. Like they're bullying the teachers into better grades.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

That's right. Well, it's just crazy. We need to do something about the grades. The grades are not helping us. The grades are giving everybody a complex.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

And then I think it'd be kind of let kids revise till they get the grade they want. I had kids that had to revise 10 times, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 27:28

So that was um my doctoral program at Pitt. One class, the first class we had, you should have seen so it's a group of 60 educators across the education spectrum, 11 administrators and people in other environments. And the first class, it was A or redo, meaning you're either getting the A or you have to redo the redo the paper. And you should have seen a group of educators lose their minds. What do you mean? What do you mean? I have to redo it. Losing their minds with that. But I think that is that is actually a great philosophy in edu that it actually promotes a growth mindset that it's not good enough to be of stuff, or you need to keep on revising it. And that way you take all the vacuum out of the grade. But I I do I do you you're telling me you raised three successful daughters without ever worrying about grades with them.

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Did not get that's right. They were in charge of their grades. I was not in charge. They would their life, their grades. So whatever they got, but they've fortunately went to an elementary school here in Palo Alto that had no grades for the first six years.

SPEAKER_00 28:37

And you think that's what we need to adopt universally?

SPEAKER_01 28:40

It has to be adopted nationwide. No grades. Did you see what's going on in Florida? The majority of the Florida residents can't read. Well, why can't they read? They don't teach them how to read using phonics, but the main problem is that kids are afraid to make a mistake. And so they don't read, they just guess until they can get the A or whatever grade it is they want. I mean, it's terrible. The reading level in the US, 54% of American adults read at a fifth grade level. Fifth grade. That's how we got the political situation we did. Most people don't even know where Iran is.

SPEAKER_00 29:24

Well, we uh there's a lot of there's a there's a lot, I think there's a lot to be said for that in terms of where we're we're not a national critical thinker.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

It's easier to do things what people think.

SPEAKER_00 29:37

Absolutely. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 29:38

Anyway, but you know, let's put it this way we need everybody to, if they want to lead a really good, productive, happy life, they have to be able to read, for God's sake. And they also just feel better about themselves. You know, we have so many adults that are depressed. People have therapists, they're always worried. I mean, the divorce rate is out of it's crazy. 50% of the people get divorced. That's a traumatic experience for the parents and for the kids. Oh my God, what a what a world we have today. Sorry, I'm trying to make it.

SPEAKER_00 30:14

Oh, it's okay. It's I we we uh we are um we're gonna shift gears here. Actually, I we'll do lightning round right now. You said you're coming to Pittsburgh, right? How when are you coming to Pittsburgh? Soon? When or how? Yeah, when? No, I know how, probably by flight, right? September.

SPEAKER_01 30:34

September. Okay. I'm actually I'm flying. I'm not gonna I'm not it's no horse and Oregon Trailet. Reverse Oregon Trailer. No, I'm not gonna do that. I'm yeah, flying.

SPEAKER_00 30:49

Well, I would love I would love to link up with you, uh have a longer conversation about this.

SPEAKER_01 30:53

So um I but be happy to do that in Olympicsburg.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

We'll be in touch. Absolutely. Let me move to lightning round. Let's finish it out with lightning round. So basically, no explanation needed, just some rapid fire questions. First thing that comes to mind. That sound good. Okay. That sounds fun. Yep. All right. Most overrated thing in modern parenting.

SPEAKER_01 31:18

The Jonathan Hayes book. I want to have him on the podcast. I want to see if he counters that. Yes, you could. It's a terrible book. It's making all the parents upset.

SPEAKER_00 31:32

Most underrated. How about the most underrated thing in modern parenting?

SPEAKER_01 31:38

Underrated, giving kids an opportunity to exercise some control over what they watch and see on their television shows or whatever. Um, because kids are pretty smart. They're smarter than you think.

SPEAKER_00 31:54

How about one book every parent should read? How to raise successful people by Esther Wajitzki. How about one book besides your own that they should read? That is a great book, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 32:16

One of the authors, her last name is Harding, A-A-R-D-I-N-G. And it's a great book.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

How about one thing parents do that they think helps but actually hurts? Lack of trust. One sentence you wish every parent of an eighth grader heard.

SPEAKER_01 32:36

Whatever you've done in school today is fine with me. Don't worry about it. You can always make it better and redo it. You're doesn't reflect as much as you know. You know more than that.

SPEAKER_00 32:50

Most underrated skill for the modern workforce.

SPEAKER_01 32:59

Personal collaboration and interaction. I mean, I think people think about it as being important, but then they don't teach it.

SPEAKER_00 33:12

If a parent could only do one thing after listening to this, what should it be?

SPEAKER_01 33:18

Read my book and adopt my formula of trick. Start trusting your child. And also, if you don't want to do all the first part, at least be kind.

SPEAKER_00 33:30

Well, Esther has been a genuine privilege to have you here. I'm so glad uh we got to meet. You came on. Thank you for your time. Um for parents who want to go deeper with you and learn more. Um, where should they what should they check out first?

SPEAKER_01 33:46

Oh, yeah, I forgot to say this. This is important. So I have an app for parents called Parenting Trick. It's powered by AI, and it helps parents from birth all the way to 18 or 20. So they have to do a sign up for it, and it's going to give you all the information for your specific child at any time you want. And also, it isn't in 100 languages yet, but it's going to be in 100 languages next week. So I don't care what language you speak, there's no excuse not to use it.

SPEAKER_00 34:20

There we go. All right, we'll put that as well as the parenting trick app plus your books in the show notes and the descriptions. And uh before we wrap, what's one thing you want parents to remember from this conversation?

SPEAKER_01 34:35

That kindness goes a long way. And when you're kind to your children, they remember that forever. And they also learn to be kind. So let's think about treating your children with kindness whenever you possibly can.

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Esther, thank you. We really appreciate you sharing your decades of wisdom with us today. And hope you come back on the podcast as well. We'll have a deeper, longer conversation. Maybe we'll uh we'll have a battle royale with your buddy Jonathan.

SPEAKER_01 35:09

Yes, let's have a battle royale.

SPEAKER_00 35:12

There we go. I'll I'll love to I'll love to moderate that debate. For everyone listening, remember the goal, the goal isn't to manage your kids' life. It's the goal is to build a kind human who can manage their own trust, respect, independence, collaboration, kindness. That's the work. Foundation first, every time. Again, Esther, thank you. I'm definitely looking forward to you coming to Pittsburgh. And uh, we'll see you all next time on the Supported Learning Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

I'm really excited to come to Pittsburgh too. And by the way, it's a great city for those of you that don't know.

SPEAKER_00 35:42

It is a great city. I really love that you do get more sun out in California. So all right. Oh well. Thank you, John. Thank you. Thanks for joining us on the Supported Learning Podcast. If today's conversation inspired you, challenged you, or sparked a new perspective, be sure to subscribe and share with a fellow change maker. We'll be back soon with more voices, more insight, and more ways to elevate the future of learning together. Until then, keep learning and keep pushing the conversation forward.