Chinedum Oji
I have been an Equity Specialist in Mounds View Public Schools for ten years. We had been hitting our heads against a wall on what we, as educators, needed in equity implementation and systems. My supervisor offered me professional learning time to work with Dr. Rev Hillstrom on the I3 tools for professional growth. It was life-changing. The I3 system tools are crucial to my conversations with students and staff to increase our systems capacity [(K+S) X W = C] around equity work. An example of this was when I trained staff in our district around implicit bias:. Through the application of the capacity equation, Dr. Hillstrom and I walked the path to self-actualization. Along with my knowledge and skill increasing through the training, my professional and personal capacity grew as well.
Dr. Hillstrom and I also worked through applying these tools to my personal growth. Once centered, these tools were not just helpful, they were instrumental and have played a significant role in my growth as an educational equity leader in Mounds View Public Schools. There is still much more growth in my journey. This is only step one, but with the application of the CLEAR model and I3 tools, my frame of reference has expanded exponentially in my own life and educational equity journey.