Is it possible to take on these challenges and obstacles?

Where do I even start?

What should I do with my life?

Sometimes, the only way to find out is to go see what's possible Since 2001, we've been sharing the stories of people who ventured out and explored different career paths and different possibilities for their futures.

This is one of those stories.

This is Roadtrip Nation.

>> Robin: [CLOCK ALARM] Okay three, two, one.

[MUSIC] >> Robin: So I have the lowest bunk.

Really, I feel like I have the best spot cuz cuz there's this little shade that I get to pull, and then it's like I'm in my own little aquarium, or coffin, whichever way you wanna think about it.

[MUSIC] >> Katerra: RV living, my bed is the couch.

Very tight, cramped, not comfortable.

[LAUGH] [YAWN] [MUSIC] >> Barrington: It has been quite a trip.

It's also given me the opportunity to just kinda take advantage of some of the free time, there's a lot of space, a lot of space for reflection.

I am by no means an artist.

[LAUGH] I think at the start of the road trip, school year was just getting over, but I was at this point where I was a little burnt out.

I'm more energized, I feel more invigorated.

I'm in a space where my energy is different.

>> Katerra: We're all passionate educators just trying to figure out how we can be best for our kids, but also what does that look for us?

>> Barrington: We're taking a road trip about to interview a bunch of people that we find inspiring.

>> Robin: We started in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

We're now in Oklahoma.

And we are trying to discover the meaning of expanding students' success.

So instead of just academics, how are we serving all of their needs?

>> Katerra: There's a holistic approach, you cannot teach a child who is traumatized and who goes home to an empty kitchen, or not a warm house.

>> Robin: As we've traveled, hearing how people build relationships first and really listen to the needs of their students, their staff, and their community, that's huge when thinking about my next step.

>> Katerra: And it's like, what do we need to be whole, and then to support them?

Cuz how can I educate the whole child if I'm not whole myself?

[MUSIC] >> Katerra: It sounds crazy to find your own road in life, but, oh my gosh, why am I about to cry already?

[LAUGH] Um.

Just being okay with not having a traditional path at all, like, ever.

My mom died when I was a baby.

My grandmother, she took over, amazing woman.

Got Alzheimer's when I was like twelve.

Between her and my mom, I have so much of them in me, they lived courageously.

And I think experiencing loss after loss and just figuring it out as I go has also been hard, like, yes, I figured it out, but at what cost?

But knowing that I came from such a strong village.

And most of my teachers didn't look like me, but they poured into me in a way that I will never forget, and I just always wanted to be the same for my kids and create that environment for them.

And while I'm great at it, while I love it, there's still more, there's something else in there.

All right, I'm here with my sisters.

>> Katrina: Three daughters at it again here in NOLA, celebrating one of the three daughters' special opportunity with traveling across the world.

>> Katerra: There was a nonprofit that I wanted to start about ten years ago.

You see my chain, Three Daughters.

So it's really the Three Daughters Foundation, working with motherless youth.

And it didn't get off the ground.

That was a strike to a very fragile spirit at the time.

It's hard to voice your dreams because we've been let down a lot.

And that's why I'm even a reluctant educator, yeah, that's me because I was reluctant like there's other dreams I have, and I'm trying to figure out how to make them all happen, so.

I'm about to try to get in contact with T'erra Estes, she has this organization where they are all about the whole child.

That's right up my alley.

I'm so impressed by her, especially because she's around my age, it seems.

>> T'erra: Hello.

>> Katerra: Hi, is this T'erra Estes?

>> T'erra: It is, is this Katerra?

>> Katerra: Yes, it is.

We got on a call, and it was just an immediate connection.

[MUSIC] >> Barrington: We're here at the Teach Not Punish headquarters.

>> Katerra: We're interviewing T'erra Estes.

She's fully trained in different spaces around education, which I guess supported her.

And then shifting outside the classroom, which I'm really intrigued about, eventually I'm like, that's kind of what I wanna do.

>> T'erra: It's certainly a pleasure to have you all, I know I'm in good company cuz you're teachers.

>> Barrington: [LAUGH] Right.

>> T'erra: The heart of a teacher is golden.

And so basically Teach Not Punish is all the things that I'm passionate about.

We support parents who are new, trying to figure out this thing called parenting, helping them with resources.

When I was a young parent I didn't know where to go for basic needs, I didn't know where to go for education, I had to navigate all of that on my own.

And then as a teacher I was new, and yes, I went to professional development and all.

But I noticed how the teachers that I supported needed that in-class, ongoing support.

I knew how hard it was to collect where the resources are in the community to make sure that your families have access to it.

So that's what Teach Not Punish is, we are created to motivate families and professionals.

And we fulfill our mission by teaching and providing vulnerable people experiences to learn and access replacement behaviors that foster trust and resilience through community relationships and self development.

>> Barrington: I love that, it's absolutely beautiful.

>> Katerra: So you mentioned Teach Not Punish basically was in your heart before you even knew it was gonna become the nonprofit that it is, it was your passion project.

>> T'erra: In 2013, that's when I encountered PBIS which is positive behavior intervention support, and learned about how positive reinforcement is how we best shape behavior long term.

I encountered a quote that talked about if a child doesn't know how to read, you teach, if a child doesn't know how to swim, you teach.

If a child doesn't know how to behave, do you teach or punish?

By then, I was a parent of two children.

And I was convinced that as a parent that I'm just a terrible mom.

>> T'erra: I just thought that I was so terrible, because I felt like I really did not give my children the opportunity to learn expectations.

And I started a Facebook page called Teach Not Punish.

I wanted parents to have access to the information that I had.

It just built from there.

We started developing partnerships with schools.

Raise your hand if you've done this before.

>> Robin: What kinda growth have you seen in yourself by being part of this?

>> Meghan: You're gonna make me tear up.

[LAUGH] I'm a strict parent, I'm really, really, really about education, right?

But I'm so strict sometimes, too mean, and she teaches me how to be patient with them, you know?

And a game changer, because what I noticed is my hard words were pulling my son away from me.

And she taught me how to communicate with my son, with all my children, but she really taught me how to communicate with my son.

It's just been really life changing.

She doesn't even know how much she's helped me, for real.

[LAUGH] Real talk, so she's a beautiful soul.

>> T'erra: It energizes me so much, because Teach Not Punish started as a Facebook page.

>> Barrington: [LAUGH] Exactly.

>> T'erra: You know?

And so it's like when you follow your passion, for children specifically, I believe that things will fall into place, for the most part it pans out.

Not all the time.

So you do have to be agile.

>> Barrington: Right.

>> T'erra: But if you have people around you who support you and believe in the mission, then you'll be able to work it out.

Awww.

You got this, Katerra, I'm telling you.

If I can do it.

[LAUGH] Y'all, if I can do it, you can do it.

I tell our staff all the time.

We have such responsibilities on us.

There are gonna be times where you're gonna feel stagnant.

If you know that you have a larger purpose to impact more students on a larger scale, you develop a plan to do that, you can.

>> Katerra: T'erra Estes, like, similar background.

It was a powerful connection.

I think it just all aligned for me to really settle my anxiety and just be open to possibilities that I had shut out.

The program that I wanted to start, my target is motherless youth.

Then I let ten years go by, and going on this journey has reinvigorated me to really think about what is that program and how should it look, what resources and what places and spaces would it benefit people?

[MUSIC] >> Robin: We are now sitting in Nashville, and so we have a few more states to go.

Barrington, I have sneaky birthday in a bag- >> Barrington: I like that.

>> Robin: Stuff.

>> Barrington: I like that.

>> Robin: Yeah.

>> Barrington: So on the count of three, let's go on and get it.

One, two, three.

[SINGING] Happy birthday to you, cha, cha, cha.

>> Katerra: It's my birthday everyone made me feel special, of course.

We're like a beautiful spectrum.

You have Barrington on the extreme extrovert side.

And Robin, she's just so sweet.

I'm a Golden Girls fanatic and she gives me very Betty White.

>> Barrington: We've met so many dynamic leaders.

>> Robin: All of our interviews have given something unique to all of us.

>> Barrington: We're becoming more confident in our abilities to become our future selves because we're breaking through some of that uncertainty that we came into this road trip with.

[MUSIC] >> Barrington: I'm a big nerd.

My students know when I start talking about things that I love my hobbies, my passions, I start lighting up and I get a little silly.

And they start relating, and then it's like, okay, that's who I wanna be.

And so we out here.

It's hiking time, a little LA nature.

Can't believe it's still gloomy like this, though, what's up LA?

If it was an option, my dream situation would definitely be, I wanna become, I don't know if it's a foundation or this program, but just getting a bunch of kids together, unifying them and making community through a singular passion.

For me, it's anime.

Creating a space where all these people can come in, we expose them to where this single hobby can take you.

The noise in my head is there's too many barriers in the way.

And I'm just trying to figure out how I walk this pathway and make it work.

I'm not gonna lie to y'all, I'm pretty excited.

So today we're gonna see Tony Weaver Jr, really cool manga artist.

He puts identity at the forefront, making sure that students have the opportunity to see characters that look like them.

Maybe unlike some of the leaders in here, I've had an interaction with him before.

I had the pleasure of him coming to my classroom one time.

[MUSIC] >> Tony: My name is Tony Weaver Jr. and I'm just a weird guy.

I really like telling stories.

And I really love the ability that stories have across mediums to kinda shifts people's views.

The way that they look at themselves, the way that they look at the world.

Those are the stories that resonate with me most.

As a child, I also dealt with a lot of mental health issues in school, a lot of things around depression and anxiety.

Things that children are dealing with at a much larger scale today, but there were even fewer resources to deal with back then.

So I run an organization called Weird Enough Productions.

We create original series, we have an original manga series called The UnCommons.

What we do is we take The UnCommons and we partner it with lesson plans, curricula, activities in order to improve student literacy, mental health, and also just get them excited about telling their own stories.

>> Barrington: I'm on this road trip because I'm at this point in life where I've loved the last nine years of being in the classroom, but I'm currently trying to find ways to bridge both my hobby for anime and my passion for teaching.

Can you talk to me a little bit about what does it take to take your curricula, put it in front of an educational leader like a principal, and market that and get them to buy it?

>> Tony: Well, I think to find success in any business, you have to be clear and honest with yourself about what you wanna do.

Beyond the business, beyond the industry, even beyond the impact, what do you want?

And I had the opportunity to answer that question for myself really early on.

While I was in college, I spent a semester in Japan.

During the six months that I was there, I feel like I experienced this freedom for the first time.

Freedom over my time.

Having the autonomy to say, that's cool, I wanna go over there and do that.

And what I told myself when I came back from Japan was, I'm never giving up that freedom again.

I never wanna feel like I can't do that anymore.

I wanna keep that feeling.

It was something that brought immense joy to me.

So, Weird Enough as an organization, as an entity, was developed as a way to tell stories with freedom.

I wanna be free to make the stories I wanna make and impact the communities that I wanna impact.

And what I encourage you to do is, no matter what the solution is or what the answer is, I think you'll get there faster by being really honest with yourself about, what do I want?

Not what sounds good for the Forbes interview or what would be cool doing the Nobel Prize acceptance speech, what do I want?

>> Barrington: And I think that's interesting because for me, what I want is I wanna make an impact in my community, right?

I know that I want kids to feel the same joy that I felt from anime.

But also I'm struggling with this idea of, how do I get it off?

How do I take it from here?

>> Tony: I feel like my advice will help, but it might take the wind out of your sails a little bit.

>> Barrington: That's okay.

>> Tony: You talked a lot about the impact that you wanna make.

I didn't hear you say anything about you.

I was taught is that you give from where you're abundant.

The only way that I am able to give is because I have an abundance of.

I have joy in my life, so I wanna give kids joy.

So when you think about what do you want, it's what do I have an abundance of?

What do I want an abundance of?

What would I give if I had an abundance of that thing?

What does it look like for Barrington to live a life and walk a path where he has time to give these kids what they need because he has the time to give himself what he needs.

If those two things aren't balanced, somebody gonna miss it [LAUGH].

>> Barrington: For so long I've always talked about what I wanna do to improve other people.

But I think that this was an opportunity to put myself in a position to figure out what I want.

I'm still thinking about ways in which I am gonna make an impact.

If it's aligned with what I want, then I can be more confident in the way that I present it, I can be more strategic with the way I present it.

At the end of the day, I'm gonna want to get up to do the things that I want to do, not get up to do the things that I have to do.

It's something I wanna continue to put effort into developing.

[MUSIC] >> Robin: So we are in Washington, D.C. >> Barrington: I don't know what's going on here but it looks like they doing some renovations to old Abraham Lincoln.

>> Katerra: Scrub scrub a dub dub.

>> Barrington: Give him a little fade, a little lineup.

[LAUGH] >> Katerra: There's a little bit of bittersweetness.

>> Barrington: I don't think I could've ever really pictured this road trip and how much it'd mean to me and what I really got out of it.

>> Robin: This whole trip in general, I learned so much from everyone.

>> Katerra: This is exactly what I wanted it to be.

And this is exactly what I was hoping, and I got it.

[MUSIC] >> Katerra: It's bittersweet cuz this is the last interview.

>> Barrington: With Dr. Procope at the middle school on Howard's campus.

>> Katerra: Well, we're at the mecca.

>> Kathryn:I did system development in IT for about 25 years, and loved it.

When I turned 50, my mother got sick, and it was pretty serious.

And so she was in the hospital and we were talking, and she says, you know you need to teach.

I'm like, what, mother, what?

>> Kathryn: My husband and I have always had an agreement.

We don't really - We have conversations about career, but we don't tell each other what to do.

Some months passed, about a year, and he came to me and he said, you need to do what your mother told you.

I was like what?

[LAUGH] >> Kathryn: So I went back to school at 50.

I got a master's degree in education, another one in middle grade mathematics.

And I was here in D.C. and I started teaching middle school math.

It was and has been incredibly rewarding.

I tried to stay in the classroom, I kid you not.

I was [LAUGH] hiding, but I got a call about this.

Now, the interesting part about it was the call came right after some really rocky things had happened here.

The school leader left, parents left, teachers left.

On our way home I said all this to my husband, he said, why are you doing this?

I said [SOUND].

>> Barrington: [LAUGH] >> Kathryn: Remember what you told me my mother said I needed to do.

So we came in and because of wonderful people and the university support, um we were able to get school back up and running.

And we've got kids who really want an opportunity and so we give them that.

And it's been a little bumpy, but I think the key is that I didn't tell you all this.

So I was probably the worst seventh grader on the planet, all right?

So I know how horrible it is to be in the seventh grade.

And I see these young people, I see girls give me the side eye, or whatever, and I'm like, yeah, I was that.

And I believe in them because I know how it is to be that.

Too tall, not looking like whatever people think you should look like, and not having any confidence.

But I know that it doesn't last forever.

And I can see past that cuz I know I was that.

That's what they need.

>> Katerra: Mmhmm.

>>Kathryn: And so, every time they come in here I'm like, there I am again.

[LAUGH] But because you are able to communicate with them, that makes you guys the best leaders possible.

>> Robin: I live and work Alaska.

As I move into this place of leadership and navigate a state where culturally >> Kathryn: Yeah.

responsive teaching to someone maybe >> Kathryn: Yes.

in your shoes looks different.

Those words are really scary to people because of a lack of understanding, right?

>> Kathryn: Yeah.

That causes me extreme anxiety to try to have this.

>> Kathryn: I don't want you to be anxious, let me tell you why.

>> Robin: Okay.

[LAUGH] Because of where you're going to be.

And you've got not only a rural population, you've got Native American, and they need somebody brave.

You've got people who don't know anything about the Indigenous population.

And you've got the Indigenous population who have been oppressed and haven't had anything and you need to bring both those things together.

And it's really they're afraid cuz they don't know.

And it's really about saying you know what, I'm gonna help you understand this.

>> Robin: Yeah.

>> Kathryn: We're not gonna treat you like a colonizer.

You're part - this is where you live and you need to know the history of where you live and of where you live and let them tell that history and bring them together.

>> Robin: That's culturally responsive, I saw myself in that, I need to be in a headspace that I believe that change is possible.

And I heard that.

>> Katerra: I feel like we're ending on a powerful note.

She was amazing.

[MUSIC] >> Barrington: We've been a walking billboard in this thing, okay?

>> Robin: I know.

>> Kathryn: Says that you are more powerful than you realize, and continue to use that power to change the world.

And y'all are making that change, cuz you've already inspired me to keep doing this.

Not that I was gonna stop, but.

>> Robin: [LAUGH] [MUSIC] >> Barrington: This is the end of the road trip.

Right now I'm in a place where I'm excited to go back to school.

I wanna really help out my school community, but I also wanna take it a step further and I really wanna double down on myself this year.

It's amazing how many people have seen my potential throughout this trip.

I just want to keep that momentum and then do something great with it.

>> Robin: As I transition to the space of being an educational leader, and even just a leader within my own building.

Impostor syndrome I get to shed that, like you are supposed to be there, you are exactly what a leader looks like.

>> Katerra: Ready to get back to the day to day, cuz there's a lot of things that I have to give my attention to, finally feeling a little more settled.

I'm leaving inspired, I'm leaving challenged.

>> Robin: You know, we keep saying we are discovering what it means to give students this whole child education.

In order to do that, we have to give ourselves permission to be whole adults.

Just the nature of being on the road, it does that to you.

It brings you back to your core and what you value and what means most and what you're going to dedicate time to.

But also it gives you a chance to reflect on what you need to then be able to give to everyone else.

[MUSIC] Wondering what to do with your life?

Well we've been there and we're here to help Our website has some awesome tools to help you find your path And you can check out all our documentaries, interviews and more Start exploring at roadtripnation.com