Speaker: Patty Bates-Ballard
Which session stayed with you the longest afterward & why? What tool or idea did you take from the session & implement?
Hi, I'm Patty Bates Ballard. And I've really appreciated participating in the beyond difference of learning sessions this year, starting with Don Carney and the community building circles. I, I just think that it's so important that we find restorative ways to, to resolve conflict. And uh I really wanna take away is the separating the deed from the doer. I think that's really valuable for students and all of us. And then this concept of non judgment, being able to listen to someone's story, enough of the story of their story to be able to support them even if they've lied or have been hurtful in some way. So I think all of those were really valuable and then the proactive circles I think are really important as well because this is not respond. This is a circle where you're not necessarily responding to an incident, but you're just building relationships so that you have a strong foundation so that when there is a situation that comes up, you, you, you've already got that relationship to call on and, and respond in an, in a powerful and effective way. So those are all I think really valuable pieces that I've taken away from Don Carney and then I just Simmons and the SDL and Equity piece. I also really stressed storytelling and I'm making a space for storytelling for our students. But also being a space for storytelling, I thought that was a really profound way to look at it. And so Shin talked about being able to develop the ability to notice what's going on for us, for students, but also for, for us grown folks and then be able to name that, you know, in the moment, in the heat of the moment when you be able to say, oh, I noticed I'm feeling uh you know, this emotion right now and, and to be able to just talk about it in that, in that um you know, the moment I thought was so important and she talked about the need to practice that and, and do that among colleagues and, and so that we benefit from each other's experience and, you know, just build that ability to say, OK, I know I can do this and we practiced it and, and then finally, um just remembering that change is not always dramatic sometimes is this little incremental process that we may not notice that it's happening because it's these little bits that are happening here and there and that, that collective impact though. Uh at one point, we see there's a change and so, you know, just giving us that sense of being staying around in our, in our own potential to contribute to the change because we're a part of the collective impact. So those are some of my takeaways. I really, really enjoyed it. I look forward to the next opportunity to participate. Thank you.
