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Welcome to the Classroom Narratives Healing and Education podcast,

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The Space where Education Meets Resilience.

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I'm Joey Weisler, and in each episode, we dive deep into the personal stories of

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educators, students, leaders, and front-line advocates

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who are navigating the complexities of modern education.

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Whether you're just starting your teaching journey or are a seasoned

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professional looking for inspiration, we'll explore how to foster meaningful

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change, prevent burnout, and build trauma-informed communities in our schools.

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Now, let's take a seat at the front of the classroom and get started.

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All right, well hello everyone. Welcome to the

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inaugural solo episode of Classroom Narratives Healing and Education podcast.

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I'm Joey Weisler, your host, and I am thrilled to have you here.

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Whether you are an educator, a student, or someone

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passionate about the topic of education, this podcast is going to be for you.

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In this podcast, we're going to be exploring stories of resilience,

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trauma-informed education, and the human side of teaching and learning.

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This is going to be a space where educators, students, and mental health

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professionals will all come together to share stories of survival,

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transformation, and even hope as we explore trauma-informed education

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and ways to help foster resilience within classrooms everywhere.

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So a little bit about me as your host to begin with.

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I am a scholar, I am a teacher, and I am someone who has spent years in education

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both as a classroom educator and a postgraduate researcher.

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I've had firsthand experiences with the pressures and emotional tolls of

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education, especially in post trauma, which have inspired me from the very

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beginning to start this podcast. I'd like to go ahead and share three very

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personal examples that have deeply shaped my journey in this podcast.

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The first example that I would like to illustrate is that I am a native to the

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city of Parkland, Florida, with my alma mater being Marjory Stoneman Douglas

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High School. On February 14th, 2018, Marjory Stoneman

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Douglas, or MSD as we call it, experienced a mass shooting that killed

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17 people and wounded 17 others. I spent that

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tragic Valentine's Day right next door to MSD at the adjourning feeder

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middle school where several victims of that shooting had attended years prior

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and it was my true honor to get to know some of these individuals as their

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day-to-day substitute teacher as early as spring 2016.

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Together my community faced both ongoing and uncharted trauma as we all

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attempted to navigate through what was an anguishing sense of a new normal in

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the aftermath of that event. I was actually one of the first subs to go

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back to MSD in March 2018 after receiving the grief counseling in order to do so

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and I chose to go back very quickly in order to

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what I coined as transforming my post-traumatic stress into post-traumatic

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strength and I felt that being visible for the students really helped me do that

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because at the time presence was something that all of us needed to have

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in order to move forward. The second point that's important for me to share

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with you is that as an adolescent at Stoneman Douglas

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I deliberately chose to be a separatist and outcast myself for my peers.

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In my senior year I was actually very fortunate to be friend to classmate who

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really helps me see beyond that. This person allowed me to acknowledge my

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choice to be a separatist and told me that I had the willpower to carry out

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the two goals that I had really cared to achieve even at that time as a high

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school student which was to become an educator

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and a writer. I had worked tirelessly to show post-traumatic strength throughout

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the schools in the Parkland community until my friends passing

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by suicide just a few short months after the tragedy.

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This friend was a person who has and continues to hold great meaning to my

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life and when you lose someone who has touched you so deeply

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you begin to cycle through as we say in literature

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the five W's and a how and thinking about those

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who, what, where, when, why and how questions. Specifically

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thinking about where or the science that I missed. What could I have possibly

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done to extend this person's life and of course just a singular question

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why. I found my W statements or the where, what, and why to be very

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guilting on me and harming my ability to find any sort of resilience and the

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aftermath of my friends passing. Instead I could only carry forth once I

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began looking at the how. That is, how can I operate and educate in a

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manner that will allow this person's memory to remain blessed

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and sacred for others. Being that this person had always believed in me so much

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in life and remarkably advocated for my dream to become a teacher and a

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writer. How can I use this gut-wrenching loss, I

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thought, to ensure my future students feel happy, healthy, and safe.

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And what are the signs for me to now look for in doing so?

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Immediately after my friends passing I received training in

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ASIST which translates to applied suicide prevention skills.

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And ASIST is a training that enables someone

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to notice when someone else is in the crisis and become a

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how or a P-A-L for that person in order to provide a pathway or assisting

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life, P-A-L. And being trained in assist is like being trained in CPR

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but for suicidal ideation where we keep a subject sustained until

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he or she can be professionally revived of life,

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very literally. And as someone trained in assist we are taught to be there and

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keep our subjects safe for now until the next

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trained medical professional can properly help them.

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So after my friends passing I trained in ASIST

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and held a vow to reach as many students as I possibly could

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or as I said at the time never allow myself to have

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blood on my hands from a student. I made this promise while still subbing

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throughout MSD and now also transitioning that fall semester

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after the tragedy to an interim position at the feeder middle school

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feeling as if every single day I went to work that I was standing on the ashes

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and dust of my city trying to go back to the roots and

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live out what I expected to be my dream job.

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In her 1999 article, "Narratives of Pain", Professor Lisa Tyler says that healing

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is not the primary responsibility of a classroom teacher

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but if an institution of learning has real-life students on its hands

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then its hands are already dirty. And the purpose of this podcast is to

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acknowledge the controversies and the dangers of allowing emotions to play

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a part in the classroom. And my goal during these episodes is to offer

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solutions through the use of helping you form a mindset in order to suggest

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safer measures that can be both reliable and effective

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to working alongside students.

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The third thing that's important for me to tell you is how those two events

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together reshaped and even sustained the concept of what I

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thought my classroom should look like when I began teaching but before I

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even officially started my first year of teaching and having my own classroom.

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Inspired by my late grandmother as a New York City School principal

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as well as an upbringing of phenomenal Parkland instructors as early as

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kindergarten my childhood inspiration was rooted in no

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other place in the classroom. Now before moving forward I do want to

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give a very sincere shout out to each of my former Parkland

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teachers for it was their presence and the way that they've

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led their classrooms that has left a very enduring impression on me even

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long after I've graduated and though I don't express it as much as I

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should I am so incredibly thankful to each of

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them and I reflect on their influence during challenging times and this is

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also very applicable to each of my undergraduate instructors at Florida

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Atlantic University as well and of course even in postgraduate studies at

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St. John's University in Queens, New York a big thank you to each of you

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who have helped this vision come to life and have sustained it for so long.

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So this podcast is going to advocate for a trauma-informed curriculum that

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works to teach the hearts over the brain. So I was an English professor I always

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tell students that on my first day of class that they are not taking what we

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would call an English class or even the language arts class

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but rather my courses tends to blend in combination with what those look like

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and by that I mean that I choose to be an instructor for the art of language

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and for me that's attempting to study the power of language

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in a way that helps us heal ourselves, heal others, and make ourselves stronger

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individuals and in my classes we work each day

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towards our class theme of our moments matter.

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So what what I was not prepared for was the additional PTSD that I would

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acquire in my opening years alone as a

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 "caregiver" for my students including those immediately after the

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Parkland Tragedy and even others who are visibly

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showing signs of the same signs that I felt I'd missed in my late friends.

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Before the end of my first year teaching I came to find that I

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had neglected my own wellness as a result of investing so much into the

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well-being of my students and as a result of both additional

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and unchecked PTSD I ended up burning out

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after my first year teaching and this was a realization that had

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entirely shattered the fantasy that I had held on to since I was a child.

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So my research focus as a doctoral candidate

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emphasizes that we need more stories of mental health that can reach

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mass audiences and like our teachers that work to teach to the hearts of our

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students these stories should reach the hearts of our

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audiences and maybe you found this podcast because you too

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have felt the solutions by the education system or you're struggling with the

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emotional toll of teaching and that's why you're here and this is a

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space where we can acknowledge those struggles and really try to work through

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them. Your presence here on this podcast as

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a listener is going to be the first step in showing the necessity of having

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conversations that break the stigma around mental health, trauma, and burnout

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in education while creating spaces for healing, growth, and meaningful

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change in our classrooms and communities.

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In one of my favorite novels, The Help, by Catherine Stockett,

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narrator Abilenne says telling our stories is what makes us free.

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So in each episode I'll be having deep conversations with teachers,

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trauma experts, and even students who have navigated the hardships of the

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classroom. You'll be hearing stories of survival,

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courage, and practical strategies to help you avoid burnout.

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Rather you're a new teacher trying to find your footing,

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a veteran teacher who's burned out by the system, or someone just curious

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in the intersection of trauma and education, even if you're a student or

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leader or a mental health counselor, this is going to be the podcast

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that will give you the tools and the stories and the hope

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for exactly what you've been looking for. I plan for these episodes to be about

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half an hour and I'll be mixing it up between solo episodes where I dive

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into personal stories and also having interviews with

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guests from all areas of education and mental health as well.

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So I also wanted to mention real quick how if you were to go into

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literature, literature also tends to take a great big focus

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on the broken dream and we see this quite evidently

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through John Steinbeck's Of MIce and Men, Edgar Allen Poe's 
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Short, El Dorado, and Dr. Seuss's book, I've Had Trouble and Finding My Way to

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Solla Sollew. And when you look at this holistically,

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it becomes very little wonder as to how society is coming to

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terms with destigmatizing exhaustion. It's become my belief

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that we live in a society where we value exhaustion

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but don't quite know how to care for the exhausted

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and this leads to a series of consequences including

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the broken dream. So with urgent attention to exploring this phenomenon in

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education, this podcast is also going to discuss the emotional

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and mental toll of burnout on both educators and students.

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By highlighting stories of resilience, trauma-informed approaches,

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and practical solutions for reform, the classroom narratives healing and

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education podcast is going to aim here to foster conversations that help

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reshape the future of education making it a space where teachers and students

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can thrive without losing themselves in the process.

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When I was in my undergraduate years of college, still honey-mooting with what I

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anticipated to be this approaching perfect start to my forever after career,

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I would have never expected that my city would experience

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mass violence while also losing my very close friends to suicide

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so close together with two events completely out of my control

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yet significantly shifting my image as an educator.

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Since you're here I'd love for you to subscribe, leave a review,

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and share this podcast with anyone you think that might benefit from it.

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I'm also always open to hearing from my listeners so please don't ever hesitate

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to reach out with your thoughts or your questions or comments in general.

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This podcast strives to provide its listeners with what I consider to be a

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break glass if needed toolkit when dealing with trauma in the classroom.

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I've learned from my own story and this podcast pays homage to making your

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story better. Hey thank you so much for listening

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and stay tuned as we transform our scars into stars

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here in education. Take care, thank you very much.

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Thank you for joining us on the classroom narratives healing and education

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podcast. If today's episode inspired you or made

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you think differently I'd love to hear from you.

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Drop a comment or review wherever you listen to podcasts

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and stay connected with us on the at classroom narratives podcast over

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Instagram and Facebook. Remember together we can transform our scars

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into stars in education. One conversation at a time.