Join Paul Kuttner as he sits down with Judy Pryor-Ramirez to trace her journey as a community-based, participatory action researcher. From playful beach-themed data labs to virtual story circles, Judy shares a vision of research that shifts power, builds community, and sparks action.

Judy is a Clinical Associate Professor of Public Service at the NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, where she studies and teaches about social justice leadership. Judy is also a consultant, partnering with social justice leaders to facilitate transformation for their teams, organizations, and networks. Her career has spanned government, nonprofits, and higher education.

To find out more about Judy you can visit her website: https://www.judypryorramirez.com

To learn more about the Story Circle Interview Method, check out Judy's chapter in the book Anti-colonial research praxis: Methods for knowledge justice.

For some history on story circles, Judy recommends checking out Lizzy Cooper Davis's chapter, The Free Southern Theater's Story Circle Process.

Learn more about the national network Judy talks about, Imagining America

For more information about critical and community-based participatory action research, Judy recommends some of her teachers at the Public Science Project.

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To subscribe to this podcast, visit https://partnershipwork.org or subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform.

Partnership Work is an independent podcast, produced with the support of Urban Media Arts in Malden, MA. Visit them at https://urbanmediaarts.org/

The music for Partnership Work is Revolution, composed by John August Pregler and Bernard James Perry II.

In this episode, host Paul Kuttner talks with Ze Min Xiao, President and CEO of The Center for Economic Opportunity and Belonging in Utah. Ze founded the center just a few years ago, with the goal of building “a Utah where everyone can thrive and belong.” As you’ll hear, that means bringing community leaders and organizations together with highest levels of state government, businesses, nonprofits, and funders to tackle economic and educational disparities.

Ze shares how her family, and her many years working in immigrant and refugee services, shaped her belief in putting community wisdom first. She talks about what it takes to build partnerships across lines of faith and political party in deep-red Utah, even on major political lightning rods like immigration. She opens up about the emotional toll this work can take, and where she finds resilience and hope when things are at their bleakest.

Ze doesn’t hold back in her assessment of where things stand right now. But she leaves us with what she says good leaders offer us: a future vision we can work toward together.

Visit Ze's organization at belonginutah.org

Learn about Team Democracy's river rafting project at raftforamerica.org

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To subscribe to this podcast, visit https://partnershipwork.org or subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform.

Partnership Work is an independent podcast, produced with the support of Urban Media Arts in Malden, MA. Visit them at https://urbanmediaarts.org/

The music for Partnership Work is Revolution, composed by John August Pregler and Bernard James Perry II.

When we think of school leaders, we usually picture principals, superintendents, maybe the school board. My guest today says that that idea of leadership is far too narrow. The leaders we need if we're going to make schools work for all students are not just the ones with formal titles and degrees – they’re also parents and students, teachers and community members. In this vision of leadership, the role of a principal or district leader is not to figure things out by themselves but instead to work with folks from all these groups to create solutions together. In other words, educational leadership is a kind of partnership work.

Today I’m sharing my interview with Ann Ishimaru. Ann is a professor at the University of Washington College of Education, and a prominent scholar of educational leadership. But she is definitely not your typical professor. She spends a lot of her time out in the schools, partnering with principals, collaborating with families. She's a former science teacher and organizer, a mother, and co-founder of cultural organization based around the art of traditional Japanese drumming, or Taiko.

Ann offers a vision of leadership as a collective effort. She describes what it looks like when families and educators become “co-designers” of education initiatives. And she dives into her most recent book, edited with her colleague Dr. Decoteau Irby, which explores how a new crop of district leaders across the country have been working to build equity into our school systems.

Find Dr. Ishimaru and Dr. Irby's book, Doing the Work of Equity Leadership for Justice and Systems Change at Teachers College Press

Sign up for Ann's newsletter at https://annishimaru.kit.com/9d7b4a623e

Learn more about Ann's work with the Family Leadership Design Collaborative at https://familydesigncollab.org/

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To subscribe to this podcast, visit https://partnershipwork.org or subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform.

Partnership Work is an independent podcast, produced with the support of Urban Media Arts in Malden, MA. Visit them at https://urbanmediaarts.org/

The music for Partnership Work is Revolution, composed by John August Pregler and Bernard James Perry II.