DEI Must Not DIE

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Created: 04 April 2025

A Broadway Show Reminds Us: DEI Must Not DIE!

by Chuck Cascio

chuckwrites@yahoo.com

     What do some people think is gained by hiding, rather than emphasizing, diversity?

     Why do some people think children today must be “protected” from knowing that there are other children growing up with less...or more...than they have?

     What is gained by keeping today’s students from learning the full reality of USA history?

     Every day, actions are being implemented to the detriment of society and learning. But a Broadway show recently brought a piece of reality rushing home to me. Hell's Kitchen is the gripping story of brilliant singer/songwriter Alicia Keys, who grew up in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan. A young woman with a White mother and Black father falls in love with music and her community at an early age. She listens intently to street singers and learns music formally and informally from various sources.

     The live-theater show featured a number of Keys's songs, including hits like “Girl On Fire”, “Empire State of Mind”, “No One”, and 21 others. Hearing the songs in the context of the young woman maturing magnified their already significant meaning, and the superb choreography added emphasis to each song’s lyrics and overall impact. The combined elements of the show conveyed messages that everyone must keep in mind and that today’s youth, in particular, need to be made aware of.

     In the show that I saw, practically all of the actors and performers appeared to be minorities. Mostly young and young-ish people who have clearly devoted their lives to art...no doubt continuously hoping to have the opportunity to perform in a show like "Hell's Kitchen." As I watched those incredibly talented performers, I could not help but think that at some point in their lives someone probably asked them, "Why are you pursuing a career in that field?" But they stuck with it. They valued their love of not only their particular art--be it singing, dancing, musicianship, acting, writing, producing, etc.--but also of the potential impact that their art could have on others.

     We are increasingly cheating the youth of today out of the opportunity to recognize that passion, intellect, and absolute genius come in many different forms.

     Theater helps convey that.

     Reading classic books helps convey that.

    Music--current and past, popular and classical--helps convey that.

    Seeing, reading, hearing, and learning stories of people who have grown up in various situations but have nevertheless pursued their passion convey an important reality--life is different for everyone. Just because an individual matures in a different environment or pursues a different passion or is of a different culture does not mean they should be erased! Erasure limits the scope of thought throughout society, and limiting the scope of thought narrows thinking to focus only on self-specific beliefs and actions.

     If I could, I would take young people to see Hell's Kitchen and afterward I would encourage them to chat about the powerful reality of the story—how some people grow up in very different environments, yet they too possess the desire to succeed and, given the opportunity to do so, they will use their commitment and unique genius to do so in ways that may seem different to many others.

     We gain nothing as individuals or as a society by limiting our exposure.

     We gain nothing as individuals or as a society by narrowing vision, opportunity, and appreciation.

    We grow stronger as individuals and as a society by exercising in multiple ways, by seeing that creativity is another form of genius, and that intellect can be expressed in many different ways.

     Many lyrics from “Hell’s Kitchen” made an enormous impact on me, but the following two songs resonated most because they capture so much of Alicia Keys’s story, a story that some “leaders” seem determined to negate. These lyrics from the song “Empire State of Mind” remain in my head weeks after seeing the performance:

"In New York,

     Those words can apply to anyone anywhere who is given an opportunity that they might not otherwise have when opportunities are taken from them. And the following words from “Girl on Fire” capture the inner spirit waiting to be released, to be given the opportunity that exists in the dreams of everyone everywhere, but that too many people today seem determined to crush:

“She′s living in a world and it's on fire
Filled with catastrophe, but she knows she can fly away

Everybody stares as she goes by
'Cause they can see the flame that's in her eyes
Watch her as she′s lighting up the night
Nobody knows that she′s a lonely girl
And it's a lonely world
But she gon′ let it burn, baby, burn, baby
This girl is on fire
This girl is on fire
She's walking on fire
This girl is on fire”

     Diversity. Equity. Inclusion. They must not die! We gain nothing by taking actions that extinguish those fires. Politicians, educators, religious leaders, EVERYONE has a responsibility to fan the internal flames so people can grow, experience others, recognize differences, and see that whether they come from Hell’s Kitchen or someplace else, they are accepted, and welcomed, and understood.

Copyright: Chuck Cascio; all rights reserved.

Contact: chuckwrites@yahoo.com

THE IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION ORGANIZATIONS TODAY!

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Created: 17 February 2025

 THE ROLE OF EDUCATION-RELATED ORGANIZATIONS IN THE USA HAS NEVER BEEN MORE IMPORTANT! TIME FOR THEM TO BE RECOGNIZED, SUPPORTED, AND URGED TO JOIN THEIR INITIATIVES!

(With that in mind, I will periodically be featuring blogs by education-related nonprofits who do ground-floor work that is extremely important today, as we see federal and state-level education initiatives being marginalized or eradicated. The following blog was recently posted by the Urban Schools Human Capital Academy, an organization that focuses on the increasing needs for hiring, supporting, and retaining education-related staff in school systems around the country. See more about USHCA at https://ushcacademy.org/  or write to me at chuckwrites@yahoo.com. Copyright for this piece is owned by the Urban Schools Human Capital Academy, all rights reserved.)

Earlier this month, our team had the privilege of presenting at Arizona State University's Strategic School Staffing Summit, part of the Next Education Workforce initiative. The energy in the room was undeniable as education leaders across the country confronted a shared challenge: with NAEP scores at historic lows and teacher shortages reaching crisis levels, school systems are being forced to rethink how they organize and manage talent to better serve students. The traditional staffing model—one teacher responsible for everything in a single classroom—can no longer meet the diverse needs of today’s learners. This approach is placing unsustainable workloads on teachers and not delivering the results students desperately need. Whether it’s academic struggles, mental health challenges, or social-emotional needs, our students require more than a single teacher—they need a well-supported team of educators who can collaborate and provide the expertise necessary for success. It's time for a fundamental shift.

Strategic Staffing Models: The What

Strategic staffing models offer a solution by moving beyond the traditional one-teacher-per-classroom structure. These innovative approaches align staffing with the needs of students by creating flexible teams of educators who bring complementary skills and expertise to the table. While there is no one-size-fits-all strategic staffing template, effective models typically include approaches like co-teaching, specialized roles, and partnerships with community organizations. The goal is to match the expertise and capacity of your staff with the unique needs of your students, rather than forcing talent into rigid, predetermined positions. For HR leaders, this requires working closely with instructional leadership to understand and co-design staffing solutions to meet student needs.

Getting Your Department Ready: The How

Adopting new strategic staffing models also demands that HR departments build new capabilities that support the transformation of existing systems. Traditional HR structures—designed for a world of standard teaching positions and the classic one-teacher classrooms—often lack the flexibility needed to manage team-based, non-traditional staffing models.

To succeed, HR departments must upgrade three core areas of operations: data systems, policy and regulatory expertise, and internal processes. Here’s what HR teams need to focus on in each area:

1. Data Systems and Analysis To support strategic staffing, HR must expand its data collection beyond basic certification and years of experience. New systems must be implemented to track specialized skills, certifications, and capabilities. Additionally, HR should map out talent distribution across the district, which helps identify potential gaps and opportunities for innovation. To aid in this, HR will need to build data visualization tools that help principals and school leaders track staffing assignments and optimize team structures.

2. Policy and Regulatory Expertise One of the biggest challenges in strategic staffing is navigating policy constraints. HR leaders must understand certification flexibility, "teacher of record" regulations, and class size requirements. To be effective, HR must develop creative solutions within existing frameworks, working closely with state education agencies, teacher unions, and other stakeholders to ensure new staffing models comply with policy. Moreover, documenting successful models and best practices will be invaluable as your system looks to scale strategic staffing.

3. Internal Systems and Processes HR systems must be adapted to support more flexible staffing arrangements. This includes developing processes for managing shared staff, such as co-teachers or specialists who serve multiple schools or classrooms. HR departments may also need to create alternative pay structures and performance management systems that recognize specialized skills and contributions beyond the traditional classroom setting. In addition, HR must adjust its professional development and support structures to ensure teams of educators are well-coordinated and equipped for success. Furthermore, creating templates for non-traditional roles is essential for ensuring consistency and clarity across the district.

The Bottom Line

Strategic staffing isn’t just an innovative idea—it’s a necessity for improving student outcomes and creating sustainable careers in education. HR departments play a critical role in this transformation. By preparing now, HR leaders can help shape these conversations, driving change in a way that better serves students, staff, and the broader community.

Common Pitfalls to Avoid As you prepare for the shift to strategic staffing, be mindful of some common pitfalls that can hinder progress:

●      Don’t wait to be invited. HR must request a seat at the table and be an active participant in the planning and design of new staffing models.

●      Avoid starting with "no." Challenge assumptions and look for creative solutions to overcome barriers.

●      Don’t assume principals know what’s possible. Many school leaders may not fully understand the potential of new staffing models, so HR must be proactive in educating and guiding them.

●      Move beyond compliance. Transition from merely meeting regulatory requirements to being a true strategic partner in the transformation process.

Ready to Transform?

If you’re interested in learning more about how to prepare your HR department for strategic staffing initiatives and assess your team’s readiness for transformation, we’d love to help. Contact us today to explore how we can support your district’s shift toward more innovative, effective staffing models that can ultimately lead to better student outcomes and a more sustainable workforce.

Immigrants Deserve a Lamp of Welcome, Not of Hate!

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Created: 15 October 2024

IMMIGRANTS DESERVE A LAMP OF WELCOME,

NOT OF HATE!

by

Chuck Cascio

     Wake up America and embrace the reality! We are a nation of immigrants, and the constant barrage of anti-immigrant rhetoric spouted by bloviating politicians (most of whom are also from families who migrated here decades or centuries ago) does a disservice to what we have accomplished as a country and harms the latest immigrants seeking a new life in the USA. For me, as for so many, it is personal, and I urge everyone to look at their own history and to think about how the people in it contributed to where we are today...and to recognize that most of the people immigrating here today share similar goals.

      My grandparents were immigrants. They came to the U.S. from Italy on their own. Two were married as teens just before they boarded a ship for America in the early 1900s. Two others met and married here. For my grandparents, theirs is an immigrant story that I have always loved hearing. 

     Italian was spoken throughout the tiny Brooklyn apartments where I and my family members all lived just a few blocks from the other. My grandparents went through the necessary processes at Ellis Island to enter their dream country, and they pursued that dream aggressively. They took jobs--printer, seamstress, apartment manager, and others--whatever was needed to establish themselves and the families that they eventually raised. They started with nothing. They developed their families with little. They made do, created happy scenarios, encouraged their children--my parents, my aunts and uncles, who all had Italian names as kids: Modesto, Bianca, Giuiseppe, Salvatore, Luigi, and others--to achieve, to contribute, and to stay together.

      Naturally, it did not all turn out that way, with some of the family moving out of Brooklyn, others in the family staying and creating their own lives in their own ways. But the bottom line is that there was always a profound sense of family and a realization that everyone was supposed to contribute.  

     When I hear politicians today denigrate immigrant families, it angers me because it is so narrow-minded. Sure, that type of vitriol existed in the past too--my grandparents and their families heard the smears and taunts about their heritage. However, the constant blast of social media to amplify the hatred and the lying rhetoric did not exist then. As a result, in the past, the achievements of those immigrants and their families had the opportunity to speak for themselves and to blend into society. They showed what they could do, how they belonged, how they could contribute to this vibrant country.     

     Today the hateful vitriol erases the current and past achievements of the people who have come here to improve their own lives and to embrace life in America. 

     Now I know there are people who are spouting disgusting versions of the lies: "Oh yeah, well what about the illegals, the undocumented immigrants ruining our cities." Well, to that I say: 

1) Provide more opportunities for these people to become legalized citizens rather than hurling obstacles in their way.

2) Acknowledge that once they start paying taxes they are actually paying into the growth of America and, in return for that, their citizenship should be a simple process. 

3) Recognize that the kinds of jobs they perform--like the jobs that my grandparents and their children took on when they arrived here--are often ground-floor jobs that contribute directly to the overall economy. 

4) Stop the lying, exaggerated stereotyping claiming that immigrants are prone to violence, cheating, stealing, etc. Those lies are as old as this country itself, and we should recognize that the root cause is NOT simply because they came here from another country. It is completely unfair to castigate an entire group of people based on some outliers.

     We are all familiar with these words on the Statue of Liberty from the poem "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, a Jewish poet whose parents' families migrated to America from Spain and Portugal:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...

     Those words certainly deserve the recognition they have received, but the rest of the brief poem captures the emotional reality Lazarus experienced as the persecution of Jews in Europe persisted and grew. Taken in its entirety, the poem captures the full spirit of welcome that the U.S. represented then...and should represent now:

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

     So when you hear the lies, stereotyping, and xenophobic slurs aimed at immigrant communities today, reject them by remembering your own ancestry, the stories that precede you, and the contributions that immigrants have made to build this country, a country that is to be "The Mother of Exiles" the country whose acceptance of others should make us "lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

     So lift the lamps in welcome…rather than lighting the lamps of hate!!!

Comments? write to chuckwrites@yahoo.com

copyright: Chuck Cascio; all rights reserved.

Has Hope Lost Its Perch?

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Created: 02 July 2024

Has Hope Lost Its Perch?

    The direction in which we are headed has become more clear everyday. As a nation, we have to choose between a bloviating liar who is a convicted felon 34 times or an elderly, though productive, man who has difficulty articulating views he has developed during several decades of government service. We are also faced with a Supreme Court that is nothing more than a political lackey of the bloviating liar. And then there are the members of Congress who reiterate talking points without caring whether those points are based on lies or purposely misconstrued facts. 

     Nor can we avoid those hatred-spewing fakes in the "news media" who use purposely use language to fuel anger. And we never know if the angry person sitting next to us in the local coffee shop is carrying a loaded weapon. And we hear about how the minds of the youth of the country are rotting due to their reliance upon social media technology that continually distracts them. 

     So where do we look for hope? Where is the core of good...the capable...the caring...the people who can lead us to respect the nation of immigrants that we are, the "thing with feathers/that perches in the soul/and sings the tune without the words/and never stops at all" as Emily Dickinson described it?

      Don't tell me that it is through religion. There is far too much extremism in the name of religion to make it the core savior we need. Don't tell me that we simply need to shut down technology usage among young people; doing so would ignore the obvious--technology is not going away so we have to use it positively rather than destroy it. Don't tell me that it is by having confidence that our institutions will reform themselves, because the corruption and hatred that has, and will, infuse them makes them unreliable. 

    So where do we look? 

    Well, for me, a proud Boomer, the answer starts with looking inward. At ourselves. At the core beliefs upon which we were raised. By objectively questioning what we have learned and experienced as we have aged. And then to share as much as possible with the younger generations. Not those members who spew hatred--they have been compromised hopelessly. No...we need wherever and whenever possible to talk to the open-minded youth, the members of those generations who show respect for themselves, and for one another, and for the guidelines that have led them to be the people they are. 

     We all have grown up making mistakes, doing things we have regretted, and making commitments we believed could not be broken but have been broken. There are some in high-level political offices and businesses and religions who believe that they do not have to apologize, nor do they have to reconstruct themselves. Sadly, they are not the answer to reconstructing the core values that this country needs because they are the ones who have destroyed those values. 

     So we must look beyond them. 

     We must discover those of younger generations who can think broader than themselves. They are out there. They exist. They are of a different thought process than those of us of older generations. They have witnessed more hatred, more exclusion, more threats at a much earlier age than other generations. Many of us are too old to fully understand the source of those thought processes, but that does not mean that those people do not exist. They do. 

     We must find them. We must work with them. We must help them to see beyond themselves, beyond ethnicity, beyond levels of wealth, beyond technology, beyond vacuous hatred and directly into the everyday actions that are supposed to make this country exceptional. 

     Right now, we are not exceptional. Right now, we are in a dangerously transformative state. Right now, we must do whatever little--or large--things we can do to make the transformation a positive experience for all. To find that “thing with feathers” and to not let it disappear.

Copyright: Chuck Cascio, all rights reserved.

Opinion? Send to chuckwrites@yahoo.com

The Sounds of Progress in Reading

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Created: 29 November 2023

Recognizing the Sounds of Progress in Reading Fluency

(Comment by Chuck Cascio, owner of Blog On!: This piece is extremely important to consider in the ongoing discussion about how to creatively address the ongoing challenges of engaging students in reading and measuring their progress. I am honored to reprint it here. For more information about the unique work being done by Riveting Results, go to https://www.rr.tools)

Jessica Tess is the Assessment and Student Work Coordinator at Riveting Results. Prior to joining Riveting Results, she was a teacher and teacher-leader for 10 years in the Milwaukee area. 

In her role at Riveting Results, she directs a team of former teachers who score Fluency recordings in which high school students read complex text aloud. Within 24 hours, Jessica and her team of scorers return quantitative and qualitative feedback to students.In this post, Jessica discusses what happens to a student’s understanding of a text when they practice emphasizing certain words as they read aloud:

At Riveting Results, we score each recording based on just one feature of reading fluency. One of these features is the ability to emphasize certain words. We have found that students need to be able to show emphasis in order to ultimately read complex text with prosody, or expression. 

When teachers first utilize the Riveting Results Fluency Tool with their students, they are often confused by a positive score on an emphasis recording: “This doesn’t sound fluent to me—she overemphasizes the words—she sounds unnatural.”

That’s a totally fair comment. Teachers are used to looking for mastery—and, its opposite, any sign of a mistake.

Yet at Riveting Results we have found that practicing emphasizing words—even to the extent of overemphasizing them— helps high school students recognize how to change and manipulate their voices in a way that allows for more nuanced expression later on. 

Take, for instance, what we hear in Nicole’s First Recording, when she reads from page 304 of Langston Hughes’s The Big Sea. In it, you can hear her emphasize three words: “book,” “dormitory,” and “characters.” She emphasizes these words in a way that her teacher initially saw as signs of disfluency. 

But, if we aren’t so worried about Nicole’s mistakes, we can hear her start to show signs of expressive reading. Hear how she adds a syllable to “book” by rippling her voice. Hear her volume surge when she encounters “dormitory.” Finally, notice that her pitch heightens when she gets to “characters.” 

Nicole’s experimentation and practice, like jotting on scratch paper in math class, isn’t pretty yet, but it enables her to understand the impact of modulating her pitch, pacing, and volume. Over a couple of weeks of practice, she gains more and more control over her breathing and more ease in her expressive choices.  

Listen to this later recording in which Nicole emphasizes the words “ill,” “hated,” and “stomach.” Her confidence draws you in. She almost sounds sick herself when she emphasizes the word “ill.” Nicole’s bitter tone shows that she understands how much Langston Hughes hated his father. 

Practicing emphasis has enabled Nicole to build a bridge between reading the sounds of words on a page and the feelings that these words and phrases evoke in her. 

So let’s revisit that question: “What if the emphasis doesn’t sound natural?” My answer is: Practicing emphasis is part of a longer process of experimenting with reading aloud. Making these sometimes awkward recordings help students connect the sounds of the words to their meaning, and ultimately to their impact. Students who keep practicing reading with emphasis soon become better able to read fluently in a way that reveals the meaning and power of the text.

Copyright: Riveting Results, all rights reserved.

Questions? Comments? Write to chuckwrites@yahoo.com