Today on Beyond My Years, host Ana Torres learns all she can learn from the life stories and lessons of Khamphet Pease. While other teenagers might have been sneaking around to go to late night scary movies, Khamphet was applying for scholarships and submitting college applications. As a refugee from Laos, Khamphet shares the difficulty she experienced navigating a home culture that did not encourage education or career ambitions for women. Despite that, she laughs over her stubbornness that she sees as an integral part of what has motivated her to chase her dreams, spend over 20 years as a STEM teacher, and what earned her the presidential award for excellence in mathematics and science teaching. Due to gendered norms and expectations, she almost lost out on the future she truly wanted. Since then, she has made it her mission to champion a learning environment where young girls feel they belong and can thrive in STEM fields.

Khamphet takes Ana on a journey through all the lessons she learned along the way of managing work/life balance, creating a classroom culture of trust, and the importance of finding a mentor during the hardest teaching years of your life. Once back in the classroom, Eric Cross and Ana check in on Eric’s first two weeks of back-to-school and discuss practical ways to take care of yourself first so you can then take care of your students.

Show notes:

• Connect with Khamphet Pease on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/phet-pease
• Connect with Khamphet Pease on X @PhetPease
• Watch: California Teachers Association commercial (short version)
• Watch: Steve Hartman’s On the Road series
• Subscribe to Beyond My Years https://amplify.com/beyond-my-years
• Follow us on Instagram @amplify.education
• Connect with Eric Cross: https://www.ericcross.org/
• Connect with Ana Torres: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anayansi-ana-torres-m-ed-26a10654/

Quotes:
“This next school year, she told me I'm up at 60 percent girls in my intro to coding classe,. and that's huge! I want to make sure that girls have access and they feel wanted and included and they can see themselves in these fields.” —Khamphet Pease

“I remember one class that I had [with only] one female student, and she was just looking around and I could see in her eyes that she just felt like this is not a place for her. She dropped out of that class and after that I was like, no, this is unacceptable.” —Khamphet Pease

“We just need more women. More of their voices. They need more seats at the table because if we all hear [only] male voices, then 50 percent of the population isn't going to have their problem solved as easily or as efficiently.” —Khamphet Pease

Today on Beyond My Years, host Ana Torres learns from Fawn Nguyen, a math educator with over 30 years of classroom experience! Fawn tells Ana the story of her near-death experience being lost at sea while escaping Vietnam, and explains how it shaped the sense of gratitude she leads with in the classroom. She also discusses what it means to be yourself in the classroom, the importance of sharing your mistakes with your students, the merits of advocacy vs. authority with students, and how she has dealt with feeling dismissed as a minority working in education. Taking all those lessons back to the classroom, Ana and Classroom Insider Eric Cross then discuss connecting with students through shared struggles and challenges.

Show notes:

• Connect with Fawn Nguyen: https://www.fawnnguyen.com/
• Subscribe to Beyond My Years https://amplify.com/beyond-my-years
• Follow us on Instagram @amplify.education
• Connect with Eric Cross: https://www.ericcross.org/
• Connect with Ana Torres: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anayansi-ana-torres-m-ed-26a10654/

Quotes:
“We spend so much time [in the classroom] day in and day out. For some of us, it's actually more interaction than we have with our own family. And it is family. So be yourself. You're going to make mistakes, but what's nice about it if we think of it as family, is that we get to apologize and tomorrow is a new day.” —Fawn Nguyen

“It has to be an exchange. We can't be just receiving, asking kids to be [themselves], and yet we ourselves are not.” —Fawn Nguyen

“[Seasoned educators] are experienced and experience means good and bad. We want to learn from both. I certainly didn't want a mentor who never made a mistake, ‘cause I'm not gaining anything.” —Fawn Nguyen

“It's about separating the behavior from the person. And another thing, separate what they don't know at the time from what they're capable of.” —Fawn Nguyen

“I don't mind telling kids the mistakes I've made because I'm hoping that they're listening and that, then that’s okay. To move from it, to learn from it, and not repeat it is the whole idea and to admit when we're wrong.” —Fawn Nguyen

“In my next lifetime, I would still teach, I would go back to teaching. That's how much I love it.” —Fawn Nguyen

“The mistake that you make today, what would it look like if somebody else made that mistake, for example, when people share something they did that they're not so proud of, what would be my advice to them? And so I want to give myself that advice because we're hardest on ourselves.” —Fawn Nguyen

Today on Beyond My Years, host Ana Torres becomes a student of Eric Jones, an educator who came out of retirement at 80 years of age to help with a national teacher shortage—thus becoming the oldest paid teacher in Britain. Eric shares his insights with Ana about building a collaborative classroom and what it means to teach children, not content. He also reflects on how the trajectory of his life changed when one man recognized and encouraged his desire to be a teacher. He delves into how going to school in the ‘50s shaped his teaching style, his experience of retiring before the smartphone era only to return when every student has one, and how his work in anti-bullying contributed to the passing of a national law. He also discusses why his love for teaching has lasted a lifetime.

Taking all those lessons back to the classroom, Eric Cross and Ana discuss how they would apply the tenets of respect and collaboration in their own classrooms.

Show notes:

• Connect with Eric Jones: https://ericjones41.wixsite.com/website
• Subscribe to Beyond My Years: https://amplify.com/beyond-my-years
• Follow us on Instagram: @amplify.education
• Connect with Eric Cross: https://www.ericcross.org
• Connect with Ana Torres: LinkedIn

Quotes

“You've got to love teaching, you've got to love the kids, and you've really got to want to do it. Almost, dare I say, in your blood.” —Eric Jones

“I collaborate with my students about what the rules are, and that's their creation as well as mine.” —Eric Jones

“It's nothing to do with, ‘I'm a teacher, you're a student.’ It's, ‘We are human beings together.’” —Eric Jones

“I like teaching kids things they didn't know before and now they're excited about. I love the idea that they will then move on into realms of industry and economics success that I would never dream of.” —Eric Jones