"All Skinfolk Ain't Kinfolk" with Nye Trusty

"All Skinfolk Ain't Kinfolk" with Nye Trusty

[00:00:00]

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Alright folks, welcome back to the exit interview, a podcast for Black educators with me, your host, Dr. Asia. It's a beautiful day here in Colorado, unfortunately, 'cause it's supposed to be cold, but I'll take it. Um, I hope everyone out there is doing well. I hope everyone has been enjoying the podcast, enjoying each other, taking care of each other, uh, and we have another amazing guest.

Now, before I go ahead and introduce, introduce my guest, we had a conversation months ago. And I was like, all right, great sign, sign up. My girl dropped in her link for her interview four months later. So I had to me and all my memory had to go back and be like, now when, what are we doing here? So I'm in, I'm gonna unwrap this episode as if I never heard it before.

'cause the way my memory working these days, folks. Yeah. Um, na, welcome to the show. How are you today?

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: [00:01:00] Thank you so much, Asia. I'm

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. It is so awesome. So not trustee. I reached out to her, I think. Well, it's been a while. Like I said, 'cause you were talking about retention conversation. I was like, oh yeah, we gotta have a conversation.

But before we jump into that, tell uh, us a little bit about yourself.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Yes, well, I'm na and clearly I'm a woman who takes her time.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Clearly. Clearly. Okay. Cannot be rushed. Okay.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Honestly, it's interesting because in that space, I feel like I was stepping into perfection and I'm

unlearning perfection and learning presence.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: came up in getting me to schedule this interview was like, no sis step into presence and out, out of perfection.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yes, yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: sticking with me at this time. but I'm not, I am a Black woman in every lifetime. I'm a Black woman of many passions, purposes, facets [00:02:00] of I wear many hats. I have many names. Um, I've been thinking a lot about, I'm in the second semester of my doctoral journey, which is something that

we, in our first conversation. Um, and I've been thinking about what I want to be called when I walk across the stage, what I want my degree to say, and I think that I'm gonna have them. Write out every name that I've been given. I'm like, I'm

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Uh.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Isha by birth. Um, I've shortened it to Na because that's just what fits me in this season. Uh, my middle name is Nicole by birth, and then I was given me a Conde name of Ara, which means Monday born when I visited the continent for the first time in 2021. Um, my last name is hyphenated. It's a mix of my mom's and dad. So it's trustee hyphen creekmore. and then my married name is Elliot, which is my wife's last name. And so I'm like, you know what? I think I might even put Nana on there because that's what the block has called me most

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: I'm [00:03:00] not mad. I'm not mad.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: So that's where I'm, I'm embracing my fullness at this time, and I think being on the podcast is just another facet of that.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. I love everything about what you just said. That's so beautiful. I know that some people really get into their heads about their doctorate, like, oh, don't call me doctor. Don't do this, or, you know, and I, I think I made the decision to be called Doctor for lots of reasons, but one of them is, it's the only name I got to choose.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Ooh, that's good. Dr. Lyons.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. Yeah. You so silly. Yeah. And see, I mean, I born Asia, middle name, last name is my husband. My, before that was my family, you know, enslaved Africans. So this is the only name that I got to choose was doctor. And so, you know, people have their reasons for not, or not using that or to use it, but whatever works for them.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: That is so interesting that you say that because even launching the doctoral journey, and again, I'm only two semesters in so real early,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: It [00:04:00] counts.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I've been saying that this feels like the first degree that I've chosen. Like it feels like the first time I have said, you know what, I'm ready for this. And you know, of course. are the most educated group, uh, in our nation. Of course, Black women is what we do. So, um, following a legacy that's already been laid out, but it definitely feels like the first time I'm, I'm choosing this. So I like the idea of, it's also the first name that I've chosen.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah, doctorate is definitely extra credit. Like at this point you just doing too much. Right. It's fine though. It's totally fine. Um, and, and folks look like we could chop it up all day, but let's get to this exit interview. So yeah, let's start off with one of my favorite questions, which is like, how did you know education was for you?

Tell us about your education journey.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Oh, you know,

really my journey really belongs to my mom. Um. Teenage [00:05:00] pregnancy, teenage Parenthood has kind of been a legacy in my family. My great-grandmother had my grandmother when she was maybe 15, 16. My grandma had my mom when she was maybe 14, 15. My mom had me when she was about 17. Um, and so my mom. is really my legacy. I was my mom's third pregnancy, but her first child, um, she lost one child to miscarriage, one child to abortion, and was literally prepared to abort me. But God intervened. Literally, she was at the doctor. Prepared to let me go and a nurse said, you know, I could really lose my job for this, but look at your daughter and turn the sonogram around, or turn the monitor around.

My mom says that she looked at the sonogram, she rolled her eyes because why is this lady getting all of her business?

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Started to [00:06:00] cry, picked up her stuff and walked out of the doctor's office. And that moment literally changed the trajectory, obviously, of my life. 'cause I wouldn't have been here but of her life and of the generations to come.

So I always say that my mom was breaking generational curses before it was popular or before. We like had the language to describe it as that.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, and she really latched on to education as a form of economic mobility. So. Growing up in Far Rockaway, Queens, New York. always, it is one way in on the a train and one way out on the a train.

And I'm like, that's it. It's, it's just, it's what it is.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, but my mom really just latched on to the power and the promise of education as her way out of the hood. By the time I was in middle school, my mom had. A bachelor's and a master's degree. She was the first generation in her family to go to college.

And I'm always kind of like, dang, you were kind of selfish 'cause you took [00:07:00] all the first generations from me.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Listen. Yeah, same with my mom. I'm like, come on, I can't take the box off and get no extra funds or nothing.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Gosh,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: My gosh. Alright. I see.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: But she

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: But she really just

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: way. But

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: but interestingly,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: as most adolescents or teens. that my mom latched onto and preached to me, I kind of ran the opposite.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: as she was championing education as the way for upward mobility, I was running away from it. Um, and so I was that student that was like carrying attitude in her book bag with her pencils.

Like you weren't getting me to not go to the bathroom. If I wanted to go to the bathroom, I was. I was in sixth grade in Catholic school eating fried chicken in the back of the classroom. Like just a ridiculous demonstration,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: a ridiculous student. Um, but my mom just really believed, again, in the power of [00:08:00] education.

And when I was going to high school, she moved me and my little brother from. Uh, far Rockaway, New York to Maryland so that I could attend Eleanor Roosevelt High School, which was consistently identified as one of the best high schools in the nation.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And moving from far Rockaway to the suburbs of Maryland.

One culture. Shock,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: two, it just showed me sites of privilege and poverty and where I stood at the intersection of it.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And that lesson or like that understanding was so pronounced when. My brother and sister started to navigate their own school careers. So my parents both had kids at the same time by different people.

And so I have a little sister in Queens, New York with my dad, who is 12 years younger than me, and then a little brother who grew up in the household with, uh, my mom's [00:09:00] stepdad and I, who was also 12 years younger than me. So same footing in school and when they were in the fifth grade. It was the first time that I saw educational inequity play out. In my house. Um, my brother was in the suburbs of Maryland and they had like, uh, flash drive bracelets and they were exploring like

3D printing when he was in the fifth grade. And my little sister had ragged textbooks and long-term subs as teachers.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: know happen as we navigate education, but seeing it play out in my own family. It was a wake up call for me. Um, and it was the first time that I started to take education seriously. I graduated high school with like a 2.3 GPA, but then in the experience of my brother and sister, recognized that I needed to stand in the gap for really my own family members. [00:10:00] Um, and so by my junior year of college, I had decided to become a teacher. I changed my major from just English to um, English and secondary education, but I took one education class and hated it. It was so boring. It

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Oh no.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I just

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Oh, no.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: it. I could not do it. not do it. And so I became a double major in English and African American studies.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Okay.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: wanted to teach Black kids to love reading and writing.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Well, I'm gonna pause you for a second. So, so folks, if you not watching this on YouTube, I need you to go YouTube and watch this video because everything about this, her background. It say African American studies. It's saying incense. It's saying

like, listen, it is giving. So in case you were like, I wonder what No, the whole vibe. Okay. Down to the jewelry. [00:11:00] So it is it, it was already there. It was already there. Smart move on your, on your part. Yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And literally was there and it was my first time. I've always had like a, even as a, a kid, like a, I saw Africa as like a fantasy land. Like it felt like a Disney world for me, even as a kid with, no, I am of the African diaspora and now know that my lineage comes from West Africa. But as a kid we didn't know that we were from New York through it, through,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: but. As an African American studies major, I just got a glimpse and an understanding of like pre-colonial Africa and the richness of

the African diaspora, and it changed everything and

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: really what confirmed for me. Like, I have to be a teacher because not only do I have to teach my kids how to love reading, how to love writing, not only do I have to close academic gaps, but I have to close identity gaps. [00:12:00] I have to like stand in the center of that puzzle so that my kids know where they came from so that they can have a deeper understanding of where they're going and who they are. Um, and so that's, that's a, a little bit

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: my journey into education

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: So let me ask you a question. Seeing that you, like you said, carry your attitude in your backpack and you were eating fried chicken, doing all these things,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: that is

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: and then you decided like I would actually go and and choose education as my career path. What was the conversation at home? Was your family like, well, at least you're doing something where they like, oh, we knew we saw it in you.

What was that like as they saw you kind of navigate that decision making around your major and deciding to be, go into education?

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: It's weird because my decision to become an educator was. Understood by everyone but me. It felt like I was the only one who was surprised by that

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: [00:13:00] My family was like, oh yeah, that makes sense. And I don't really come from a family of educators though. My mom has always worked education adjacent.

So camps, nonprofits, mentorship, always been in a world where she was filling someone else with knowledge and identity. Um. But I never saw myself as a teacher.

I didn't like school.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: but everyone around me, friends included, were not surprised. I can remember. So because I didn't do, because I hated the education major classes, I had to seek alternative certification.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Okay.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And so I was interviewing for. A spot in a national Alternative certification program.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: and we had to go through a few rounds where we had to like do a lesson and then do a group interview and then a personal interview.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: can remember in my personal [00:14:00] interview, so there, the interviewers had been with us all day, so they had seen kind of like the trajectory unfold. At the end of the interview, the interviewer says, you know, is there anything else you wanna say? And I say, well, I'm gonna be a teacher. And again, audacity, I'm gonna be a teacher regardless of whether it's with this program or another program out there. I'm gonna be a teacher. I would like to do it through this program, but it's not the only option. And I will never forget this woman who had known me for at that point, about four hours. Starts to cry Asia and she says, I know you're gonna be a teacher. I can see

it. I can feel it. You're gonna be a teacher and you're gonna be a good one. And so it

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: So it

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: like everyone that I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: everyone that

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: had this understanding that I would

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: I would be

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: great at what I was seeking to do. Um, I just had to kind of sit into that knowledge myself.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: sure. Sure. Thank you. I love that. [00:15:00] So you wouldn't be the first person who comes on to the show to talk about their journey going through the national organization that supports people with emergency. Um, oh, I got you. No, we got you. So tell us about getting into the classroom. Um, I know that there was sometimes like a trial by fire.

It's like you get some training and all and then, but you're in there. So tell us about those, those, those first couple years and what that was like for you.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Ooh. So the process was that we started in the summer.

We started with a, um, preparation program that spanned about six weeks, and it was meant to kind of be like a teacher's bootcamp where you got to get your feet wet with lesson planning, with waking up super early, with staying after school, with classroom management, with executing lessons, with being coached and getting feedback. so I was tasked with co-teaching a group of about maybe [00:16:00] 17 students. In Philly at a all boys school, so I had a classroom of 17 Black boys. I come in there fresh outta college, so excited, and I completely bomb. I completely bombed. Students had zero respect for me. I probably have zero respect for myself.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Fair. That's fair.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: but I did horribly. I did

horribly. Classroom management was nothing. My lesson plans were good in theory, but the execution was choppy.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: ability to, or my confidence in navigating relationships and getting to know the communities that my students were in, especially on such a, such a chopped timeline, Whack, whack, whack. I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: feeling like, what did I sign up for? How am I actually going to do this? I need to be what my students deserve me to be. And

what I just did in [00:17:00] these six weeks was not that,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: but I was determined to be a teacher. And so come August, I'm still stepping into that classroom

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I had decided that I was just gonna do the opposite of everything that I did in the summer. And it worked. I said, you know what? I'm coming in. I'm setting very clear expectations. I'm not focused on people being my friend. I am going to take some of the advice that I had gotten from my elders about. It's a little outdated, but don't smile till November.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: knew you were gonna say Don't smile. I knew it. Everybody says I was a smiling fool my first year.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I really.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: I cannot, I couldn't even, but I had fifth, I was fourth grade teacher. That's a whole different, yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I started seventh grade. I started with seventh grade.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Uh, sis, anybody who listens to this PO and I know we probably talked about this, I got a seventh grader at my house. My whole, my child is a [00:18:00] seventh grader. I didn't, I have a case, I had a K six license. I was, I said, you will never get me to teach seventh grade. I have seen grown people cry off of 12 year olds meanness.

You will never So bless you. Bless you, sis.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: seventh graders are, so I always say like once you had them, you had them,

but to get them, you are pouring in and they are going to peel back every layer

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: didn't even know you were navigating. I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: my seventh grade classroom. Navigating a queer identity that had been closeted for years.

Even closeted to myself

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: and tr some deep seated like insecurities and just unhealed traumatic experiences, really from my own education. No upbringing.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And trying to put on a mask and enter into the day-to-day without unpacking those [00:19:00] things. Your seventh graders are gonna unpack it for you.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. Quickly.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: those things that you are pushing down, and they are going to help you surface them.

And

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: you are in a space where you're ready to come face to face with, you know, your wounded healer for a little woo woo. Um, but

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Not the wounded healer. Not the who. Oh, we had talk about that later.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: every time.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: It really is. So I really went into, I went into that first year with my seventh graders content on being the best teacher that I could be on reversing the mistakes that I had made that summer

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I try not to smile until November. It didn't work and it got to a point in October where I literally, she was my best friend at the time, but she's my wife now. I recall just crying and saying, I love my kids so much, and they listen to [00:20:00] me. They respect me. They're complying, but my room does not have the flavor and the joy that

I intended for it to have. They dunno that I laugh. They don't know that I'm silly. They don't know. They don't know my sauce and my juice because I'm just like this robot to them.

'cause I'm so scared of losing control. And she was like, well, let it out since like, let it out. Let yourself be known. And I did, I, I brought, I mixed what they had come to know in terms of expectations, routines, and procedures, but allow myself to shine through. And it transformed everything. Those kids are still my babies to this day.

Because that group of students got the OG Mistrusting. Mm-hmm.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: I love that. So how long did you spend at that school? Was that one year? Several. Like we wanna know like all [00:21:00] the parts of your journey.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Yes. Okay.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Okay. So I would,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: was in, uh, Baltimore City. I was there for three years and then my wife and I got married and she's, um, in the Air Force.

And so we got stationed out of Baltimore or out of Maryland and in Louisiana. So after Baltimore, I went to Louisiana. I thought that I needed a break. I was praying for a break.

I was asking for a break. I poured so much of myself into those three years, and I thought that I wanted to step away from the classroom.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And so I did, I went into, um, higher education on like the federal grant side. I worked for TRIO programs.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Oh yeah. Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Mm-hmm. I worked for, uh, talent search and it was

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: It was beautiful. It

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: education adjacent. I still got to be

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: was.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: kids, but speaking of names, there was a moment where we took [00:22:00] kids on a field trip. And my, my government name is Trustee hyphen Creekmore, but since high school I've just been going by trustee.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: when I was a teacher, I was miss trustee, and we're on the bus and we're going and they give me my, um, name tag and it says, miss Trustee Creekmore. And I was just like. That's not my name. I'm mis trusty through and through. And it was at that moment that I said, oh, I can't be here. Like I need to go back to the classroom. I miss my babies. I miss

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: That was that. That's what did it.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: because it just felt like. I'm not even bringing my full self here because again,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I'm Louisiana, so it's a culture shock. I'm in the deep south for the very first time. I told you I was originally from Far Rockaway, Queens, New York. Went to Maryland, which was a culture shock in itself,

going from Maryland to Louisiana.

It felt like I went back in time. [00:23:00] I had finally accepted my queer identity that kind of was trying to force me back into the

closet. So I was struggling a little bit with like where I fit in Louisiana, especially the small city that we lived in in Louisiana, struggling with where I fit, and having the name trusty Creekmore when I hadn't gone by Creekmore. Since junior high school just felt like, oh, y'all don't know me at all.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: to my kids, back to my kingdom where I felt safe and like myself.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And so I did. I found, um, another middle school. I went back to teaching seventh grade English. I went back to being Miss Trustee and I was there for about two and a half years. And that's actually the story of my exit. SI taught in a, um, predominantly [00:24:00] Black school. It was on the east side of a small city in Louisiana. And in my second year it was taken over by the district. Um, and so there's so many different restrictions and guardrails and challenges that come with that. And I had a leadership of Black women, an assistant principal and a principal who are both Black women. But Louisiana is very interesting among, um, on its color line. So I come in as

a Black. Dark skinned queer woman from the East Coast. You talked about my background. This is how my classroom looked.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: maps of Africa in my classroom. I had posters and photos of Beyonce of Chance, the rapper of Malcolm X. I also had a little Harry Potter in there 'cause I'm a nerd.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: But just the full gamut of identity because I [00:25:00] believed and believed that my job as an educator was mind, body, soul for my student.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, and so we are of the African diaspora, I taught three white students.

That was one white student for every period that I taught. So I knew who I was there for

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yes, a hundred percent.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: and one day. assistant principal and principal come into my room. It's pretty, it's uh, maybe October, November of the school year. So it's not at the very beginning, but they come in and they walk the walls of my classroom, and when you walk the walls, you're looking at the posters, the anchor charts, all of the things on the walls in order to see what teaching and learning looks like from a static perspective. They walk the walls, they leave. They invite me in for a debrief and a feedback meeting The next day in that feedback meeting my principal shares, you know, we had a chance to walk the walls of your classroom the other [00:26:00] day, and we were really trying to think of. The perspective of our white students and whether your classroom was a space where they felt comfortable, and we realized that if we were a white parent coming in for a back to school night, your classroom would not make us feel welcomed.

And so we have a list of the posters that we want you to take off of your walls. I look at the list. I look at the list, none of my Harry Potter posters are up there. It's and by name, Asia Map of Africa, back right window photo of Malcolm X, um, photo of Beyonce, any semblance of Blackness. They had written it down on this paper and asked me to take it down.

It had a deadline by when the posters needed to come off, and they were requesting my signature. On the paper, and [00:27:00] so I read it. I'm immediately taken aback and I can feel the anger rising up in my spirit, and they're like, do you have any questions? And I don't even remember what I asked. I don't remember the rest of the conversation. I just remember leaving and feeling so defeated and depleted. I felt like I had. Given so much to an education system that had done so much to reverse an understanding of self in my students and I was just trying to like be a cog in that will, but in that moment I felt lonely. I felt isolated and I felt it's a term that I've come to know after demoralized

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: and what let me know that it was time for me to go though that's not enough. I didn't fight back. That's how I knew [00:28:00] I didn't fight back. I went in the next day and I took down those dot damn posters. I took down the posters at the beginning of the day. My first period walks in and my room looks completely different. It looks like I'm leaving because, and symbolically I was, but my room looks so different and they're like, miss Trusty, what happened? And I'm like, they asked me to take these posters down they were enraged. What? Why would they ask you that? Why those posters in particular? Man, that's wrong. That's so racist. So you're just gonna take them down. What you gonna do? And I had no fight. I couldn't even demonstrate for my students what it looked like to stand up against that because I was

so depleted and I had no energy to give to that.

And so I allowed them to have their say, their talking about what could possibly be done. I don't mock them or [00:29:00] like simmer down their anger. I give them the space to be angry. I share that I too am angry. And then eventually we move on. We go on with a lesson that happens in every single one of my periods.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: time a student walks in, including the white students, they are so shocked by what they see. We engage in a full conversation about why that is, and they give their understandings of what is happening. I nod. I give them the space to talk about it, and then we move on with the lesson. And so of course, the next day there's no more conversation.

Now the room is what it is, but there I knew that I couldn't continue to give of myself if I wasn't giving. The fullest version of myself, because I feel like, and even now I carry the understanding that that was a, that's a pivotal experience for my

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah, a hundred percent. And

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And in [00:30:00] that

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: in that moment.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: the opportunity to demonstrate for them, or at least empower them to stand up against a system that they were recognizing in that moment was unfair and inequitable. And I, I didn't have that to give to them. And so how could I continue to think that I'm, you know, teaching and filling in the gap that I came to fill if I can't. Empower my students to use their voices in their bodies in the way that they feel compelled to.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: There's so many, so many pieces, so many directions. This conversation could take. Um, wow. One thing I want to talk about is you talked about colorism

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Hmm.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: and you said that you felt like, you know, you coming in as a dark-skinned Black woman. [00:31:00] And for those of folks who've never seen me in person, I'm also a dark skinned Black woman.

What. Did you feel like as the year was going on, 'cause you said you were there for two and a half years, could you feel this conversation or something like this was coming down the pipe? Could you, would, did you sense that in your spirit or did it come to you as a, as a surprise?

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Ooh, that is good. There was an understanding that I was different in that space. There was an understanding that the way that I carried myself was [00:32:00] different in terms of. My ability then to speak out to acknowledge aspects of racism that I've navigated spaces of the South more and more, it is, there's so much ingrained in the soil of the South that people pick up on and may choose to acknowledge and choose not to acknowledge, but again. fresh eyes and coming from a space where we didn't really play that. I can remember in my first year at that middle school, they had a book fair, same school. They had a book fair maybe in October, November, and we're on our way to the book fair and my students say, oh, we have to leave our book bags here. And I say, wait, why you gotta leave your book bags in the classroom? And they're like, oh, we can't bring them into the book fair. They think we're gonna [00:33:00] steal. And they say, it's so nonchalant. I say, what?

think you're gonna steal books from your school? And they're like, yeah. And I'm like, that's interesting.

But okay, come on. to the book fair. The librarian is white. And again, my school is like 97% Black. The librarian is white. Our, my students are navigating the book fair. They're joking, they're laughing, they're engaging with the books, making jokes about the covers, seeing what books they wanna buy, and at some point there's a congregation of maybe five of my students who all happen to be Black boys in that congregation. The librarian had a few volunteers from the community who were all white women that were there, uh, chaperoning the book fair with her. Suddenly she shouts at that congregation of boys Stop standing together, and I'm like, [00:34:00] Are we good? Because suddenly, you know, I'm thinking about so many spaces in American society that put those same rules on our kids.

The danger of congregating, the danger of community, the danger of belonging. She says that and I say, oh, they're just talking about the books. They're good. Keep going. The book fair continues to go. And this same woman starts to do inventory live. did we have two diaries of a wimpy kid or one? Hey, are we missing a mad next? I thought I saw this book here. I don't see it anymore. I said, ma'am, again, I'm from the North. I you see something? You say something.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: like, ma'am, must you do inventory live while the kids are shopping? And she says, I just wanna make sure that nothing goes missing, because if something goes missing, we have to pay for it out of our pockets. I said, [00:35:00] but ma'am, this is their school and they're here for a book fair. They're not interested in stealing from you. And if that is a fear that you have, then you might not be the person who should be in their space

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Sacar owning this book. Fair. And tears start to come to my eyes because I'm so angry. At that point, we end up leaving the book fair.

We have a conversation about it when we get back to the classroom. Of course, that afternoon, my principal, assistant principal called me into the office with the librarian who is crying and just sharing that she felt attacked, that she wished that I had chosen to talk to her on the side. That they just wanted the students to have a safe experience.

And they have, there have been a, there has been a lot of shoplifting in the past and they have to pay for those things out of their pockets, so they really don't want it to happen. And I'm like, okay, like let's talk about some of the ways that we can help avoid, I can, we can get some of my eighth [00:36:00] grade football players to come in and chaperone students.

Like I'm like, we

can make the experience inclusive without making it racist. And what you're doing right now is criminalizing my kids before they even have a chance to do any of the stuff that you are proactively accusing them of thinking to do.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: So. I an energy in a sense of interacting that was quite different for the culture of the South. And so to carry that mouthpiece in a body that is dark skinned with a gender expression that is quite queer. They just wasn't ready for me. They were not ready for me

at all. And so while I didn't see it coming to that level where you are literally walking the walls of my classroom and seeking to strip my space of [00:37:00] any identity marker whatsoever and blaming it on, seeking to speak up for the minority group of my classroom, I would've never called that.

I definitely. Knew that there was increased eyes on me for the ways that I carried identity. And maybe I'm, I'm in my twenties, like I was in my twenties at that time. And so maybe there was space for me to learn how to navigate different, uh, experiences with. I'm shutting it.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Can, can I pause you for a second? I was gonna let you say whatever he is about to say and go and say, don't do that, sis. I was just gonna let you, I'm gonna let me see what she say and then I'm gonna crunch that all the way down. I'm so glad you did yourself.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: no ma'am.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah, [00:38:00] exactly. No, we are not doing that. We are not doing that. Not on, not on the exit interview. No. No.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: need the big mouth. Somebody gotta have the big

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: babies

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: It's so interesting that you talk about in this one scenario with the, with the librarian, like just like you said, this voice, the chi, the attitude in the backpack, the fried chicken cysts was right there,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: right

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: but it feels like to me, and stop me if I'm wrong, that time wore you down.

That's what it feels like because that same, that situation to me would've been even more fierce two year and a half years, or year and a half down the line, but it wasn't there. And so I just wanted to, you know, I don't wanna make any assumptions, but that's what it sounds like to me.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: No, that's not an assumption, sis. That's just active listening because that's a fact.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: fact. I think

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I think that the, the, the walking the walls. Was kind of just like [00:39:00] the culmination of me realizing that I was really fighting up against a system. I think that prior to that I was taking isolated incidents and recognizing the inequities in those incidences and feeling like a champion for acknowledging or standing in the gap of those incidences. But I feel like the walking the walls, and again, the symbolic and literal stripping of culture a space that like my home, it was the first time that it was like, oh, you are up against a system, an entity, a machine

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: that systemically and intentionally. Strips identity and culture away from your kids. And while [00:40:00] you are well-meaning alone and you can't battle this machine alone. And I think, you know, that with just the general burnout and fatigue of a career that's as stressful as teaching. It just got much for me to handle. It got too much for me to handle. And after, so after leaving, I was able to spend a few months in sabbatical.

So we actually transitioned from Louisiana to Texas, um, to San Antonio, Texas, and I was able to take a few months off to search for a job and to kind of just. Get my mind in order. Um, and it was then that I realized that because I was up against a system, I needed to take a more systemic view of what was [00:41:00] impacting our students. Um, and that's what got me into coaching teachers. allowed me to be in a variety of schools, in a variety of contexts at the same time to kind of give voice to the things that I was seeing. Whereas before, it felt like. Oh, this school does this and that is wrong

because

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: no, no, no. schools do this.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. I wanna pause you for a second. Because I wanna make one more point or talk about one more thing that I think is important to mention from your situation in in Louisiana, which is that you said that the principal and the vice principal were Black. And I wanna make sure that the audience heard that because we are really quick in education to say all you gotta do is throw a few of these in and a couple of these and two of those and it, they should all get along and they should all be on the same page.

And we're all gonna be [00:42:00] for, for Black struggle, we're gonna all support. Right? And that is false.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: That is false and it's dangerous. It's a

dangerous.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: extremely dangerous. Yes. And so I had to just point that out because, uh, this is not the first time, nor will it be the last time that we hear about Black folks in particular, Black women, whomever causing harm to other Black educators. And those same folks will be invited to the table to ask or to help investigate why Black educators are leaving.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Yeah.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: And no one is pausing to think that it could be them.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Mm-hmm.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: ' cause it's an assumption that we're in solidarity with each other and it, that is just not true.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: That is just not true. As and scary as it is, you

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: all skin folk are not kin folk.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: No. No, not at all. Not at all. And like you said, when you're coming in with your, your, your full, [00:43:00] authentic self and you're showing up how, you're showing up in dark skin and All right. Locks are not, I know for some folks that is definitely like a, like we can't be, that is not the way you come into a space is wearing locks and all the things.

It really, we have to examine that in education. It's not as simple as. More Black people in the space or a move, move in or signing bonus or it's so much more complex. So I just wanted to say that piece before you continued on.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Yes. Because

it's like what space are we creating? And I think at the start of your episodes, you talk about it being not just a recruitment problem.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: problem of retention is deep seated and multifaceted.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: if you only stick with bringing bodies into a space, then you know, if we think of it from a DEI perspective, we might be doing the D, but we're not doing the E and the I

and that. Leaves a hole. It leaves a hole. We can't [00:44:00] Black educators into spaces where their identity is not cherished and uplifted and expect them to be able to craft spaces for their students. Where identity is celebrated and uplifted. I did a, I do restorative conversation PDs for schools, and I did a PD recently and in the pd, um, it was a predominantly, predominantly Latinx school.

There were two teachers of two Black teachers and. Yeah, one of the prompts that I gave was, what do you need from your school community and what are you willing to commit to your school community? And one of the Black teachers shared, you know, I need, uh, my fellow teachers to stop getting me and the other Black teacher confused. We've been here for three years and I need you to stop calling her my name and to [00:45:00] stop calling me her name.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: That is an example of what happens when spaces are not curated with identity in mind,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: not, when we're just bringing. Bodies into a space and forcing the bodies to conform to the space instead of the space to conform to the bodies or to make space for the bodies. Then we're not creating the sense of belonging that it really takes to transform education and get our teachers to feel empowered to provide the level of achievement and success to our students that they deserve.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah, a hundred percent. Thank you for sharing that. Um, well, let's backtrack a, a tad. So you talk, talk more about you, you left the, the school and then you said you went into coaching teachers. You're still doing that now. So give us some [00:46:00] timeline about like, when did, what year did you leave the school in Louisiana and then going into the coaching part of it?

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Love that. Um, so I taught in total from, uh, 2013 to to 20.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Okay.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, I taught in Louisiana from 2016 to 2019.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, and then I went into coaching in 2019, and of course that's a journey in itself, but I actually became a leadership development coach for the very same national alternative certification program that bought me into the classroom. So I was coaching, uh, little miss trustees or

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Got it.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: trustees. Mm-hmm. So

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: And.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: obvious first and second year teachers.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: You wouldn't be the first person that was on the show that did that, kind of like full circle. So tell us now, you could tell us please about that experience and what you, like you said, going [00:47:00] and thinking about preparing with, with the story that you had in mind on your heart and what your own experience was.

Tell us about how you, that supported you in the way that you coached others, the way that you saw others, the way that you were helping them navigate situations for in their classrooms.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I went there, I went into coaching again, fresh out of the experience where. I carried a high level of guilt for not being able to again, demonstrate to my students what it looked like to use their voice or their bodies to stand up against racism when they

saw it. and so I went into coaching. Ready to have teachers examine equity and justice and to use their mouths and their bodies to advocate for it

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: in their classroom, but then funneling out into their school, their district, their community, et cetera. Um, [00:48:00] and fortunately enough, the region that I worked for was really big on culturally responsive pedagogy and identity development. so much of my conversations with teachers dealt around what does it look like to bring a level of authenticity into your classroom in order to make space for students to bring their authentic selves into the classroom? So we were having conversations about the intersection of, uh, lesson planning and content with.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Identity in self. And so

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: really juicy, like breeding ground for people to explore who they are, why they are, and to use that in order to create space for identity in the classroom. Um, and around my, so post COVID, so. 2019. I'm a brand new coach, 2020 COVID hits.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: [00:49:00] Yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: now my coaching looks quite different. One, because I'm having coaching conversations with people which means that like they're kind of inviting me into their house and so I'm seeing a different facet of them. Their day to day looks different. Um, they're also navigating. The national turmoil that popped up at that time. They're navigating having a different vantage point into their students' lives and compassion fatigue and what it looks like to like advocate for the wellbeing of their students in a very different way and how to deal with their own wellbeing, which I think is something that we were all dealing with at that time.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: can I stay well. With all of the things now. We didn't know that in 2026 we would be dealing with all of the, all of the things back

then. We were just dealing with all of the things.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah, no. Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Um, and so

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: and so I saw him[00:50:00]

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: I saw my coaching conversation start to become something else. Um, they were leaning more out of the pedagogy and content lens and going more into. The holistic wellness lens

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: it became, are describing digestive issues to me, or you're describing insomnia and I can't just look over that and instead only talk about, you know, this book that you're reading and how you are helping students annotate the text. We gotta talk about this digestive issues because that's directly related to how you're able to show up as a teacher.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: and so that kind of just started to cue me in into the needs for holistic, a more holistic approach to coaching. And while I'm. I'm a coach personally, I was also, I've also, I've always been a, a yogi since about 2016 I've been, uh, doing [00:51:00] yoga. And so around this time I started to get into Kemetic yoga, which is an understanding of yoga as a Afrocentric principle and understanding

that, uh, it was Black people, uh, created and built, uh, the practice of yoga as we know it today.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: And so I started to get into that understanding, that deepened into this, um, understanding of like spiritual life coaching and what it looks like to integrate the understanding of indigenous principles of wellness and healing into our day-to-day and into our institutions. And so mixing all of that just became this. Unique style of holistic coaching that didn't really fit into the leadership development trajectory that this particular organization was, uh, pushing toward at the time.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: Yeah. Or,

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: Yeah,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_151208: probably not now either. Not [00:52:00] Neville. No. Yes.

nye-trusty--she-her-_2_03-18-2026_161208: exactly. So yeah, so the coaching has, has emerged over time and like you identified it is, um, Elaine, that I am still very much in and exploring what it looks like to empower educational leaders to bring their full selves through coaching that focuses on mind, body, spirit, all together.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: So we're already on this path of talking about the coaching, so continue that conversation. What are you doing now?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Ooh. So I have a nonprofit called the Tie the Wealth Foundation, and we empower educators to embrace, ease and elevate their energy. this spring we launched the inaugural cohort of the Tubman Project. Tubman Project, and I see Black Moses [00:53:00] all up in your screen.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah, I.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: So the Tubman Project is a global leadership fellowship for Black educators that culminates with a seven day retreat in Ghana, west Africa. it's a.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: let me go ahead and get my suitcase. You playing around sis. Listen, I'm already half packed. Okay.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Yes, we'll be leading our first cohort in July, but it's a part of a nine month cohort experience. So through nine months of virtual programming, educational leaders are given the space to rest, to reconnect with their identity, to reclaim their heritage, and to reimagine what's possible for their communities. We do. Bi-monthly virtual gathering centered around the tide Wells four s, um, fellow four s framework, which is self synergy service and systems. [00:54:00] Um, fellows will go to Ghana for seven days, connect with other educators through the diaspora, uh, and really take the journey of the ancestors from Accra to Elena or Cape Coast, which is where our West African ancestors would've been abducted and then brought to, um, the Americas. And then they'll return and complete a legacy project, which is something they plan to put into place to. transform their communities and take the learning and the knowledge that they experienced over the nine month journey and put it into something really tangible for their students, their faculty, their parents, and their community at large. I'm really, really excited about it. Like I said,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: First cohort of many. So I'm excited for what's to come. By the time this episode airs, we will be three months into the cohort journey and we'll be [00:55:00] preparing for our community sendoff. So this cohort is from Wendell Phillips High School in Chicago.

It's the first, um, integrated school on the south side of Chicago.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Landmark in the city and we'll be hosting a community sendoff, uh, that's designed to kind of bring Ghana to Chicago before Chicago goes to Ghana.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Got you.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Hmm.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Oh, wow. That is amazing. And tell us what was the transition between going from working for someone else and working for yourself? Like are you, you're, are you still working for the org or are you working completely by yourself now or for yourself I should say?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Love that. So the Tidewell Foundation is mine and like many projects start off, it is a passion project at this time. And

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I mean, that's some, that's some great passion. That is not something small. Okay. I don't want you to, I don't want [00:56:00] you to be out. You never, you didn't say little, but you did not little 'cause it is not folks, my eyebrows are all the way up. Okay. I'm trying to get my, the suitcase. Okay,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Let's bring it

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: let's go.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: the vision is really, so when the, the idea came, I, I, we talked about my love for Africa.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: so I've been to the continent a few times and on my last visit, I brought my mom. It was my first time bringing someone with me.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Mm-hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: my mom, um, and I went to the continent with. Some really specific questions. I'm like, what should I be focused on at this time? Where do you want me to put my strengths? Um, and how should I be? Where should I be placing my energy in order to make the impact that you've called me to make?

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: and my ancestors, I was on LA Body Beach in Accra, and ancestors just started dropping these gems, dropping these gems, and it ends up being the skeleton for this program that I continue to [00:57:00] develop as I come back, which then became known as the Tubman Project. But the idea is like, what is possible if we take educators from the same local context? Invite them onto this transformative journey and then ask them to come back and use that transformation in order to solve problems that have already been here. I think then we try to invite educational leaders to apply expired solutions to emerging issues, and it does not work.

So the idea is. What does it look like to cultivate change where people of the same team are experiencing something that's dramatically different? And so the project, the Tubman Project, actually sits as a tier three initiative. The Tithe Well has created a multi-tiered system of support for adult. [00:58:00] Um, and at tier three, we're creating really customized personalized experiences for teams. At tier two, we're partnering with districts in order to try radical design principles to again, apply new solutions to educator workforce sustainability. Um, and then at tier one, we're providing on demand PD that really focuses on wellbeing and healing for educational teams.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I need to understand how the, the team in Chicago was selected. Like how did that come to be and how did it come to be that you said the leadership, like that idea of having leaders come didn't, wasn't working. Help us walk through, and I know I'm taking up a lot of space on this because I'm just so fascinated about this work and what you're doing, not trying to do what you're doing.

So walk us through that piece please.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Thank you so much Asia. You are asking so many great questions.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I mean, I've been doing this for a little bit,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: [00:59:00] This is what I do, but okay.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: right?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I've seen the awards. I get it.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Listen, listen it, girl, it's right here. There she go. That stage she go. But yeah, yeah. We wanna know. Please tell us. I'm curious. I really am.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Absolutely. So there was an application process, um, and this was the first round and it yielded applicants as far as Massachusetts. So throughout Massachusetts, uh, Chicago, the Baltimore area, dc New York. It people were interested, which was very validating for me. Um, and the application rubric assessed a few things.

One, it assessed team alignment on challenges, so it asks about some of the challenges that you are. School community faced, and I really was looking for teams that were able to align on a shared definition of that challenge. So every teammate filled out their own application, whether they did it [01:00:00] together or not.

Not sure, but I'm really, I was really looking for a team that had a level of synergy and how they were defining the problems that they're seeing. Two, I was really excited to get multi-tiered impact, and so I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: for teams that were bringing a variety of different vantage points to the work.

So the team in Chicago is a principal, an assistant principal and athletic director, and an instructional coach. And so they're all bringing a different vantage point through which they can attack. Similar challenges, but the way that they go about it and the stakeholders that they choose to focus on are going to be dramatically different.

So, um, alignment on challenge, uh, diversity of roles or impact. IT connection to the goals of the Tubman project. And so the Tubman project is really based on embedding a sense of rest, [01:01:00] heritage, and identity into the work that we do in order to make professional development or leadership development more. Embody the principles of radical design. And so the challenges that they were naming needed to be connected to some aspect of those goals. Um, and then

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Finally

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: availability. I had

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I had seen,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I put

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I put out,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: the ask that we were traveling in, uh, either July or early August, and I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: that were like, oh, well, we're only available for these three days in July.

And I'm like, dang it. Well,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: come on trip.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Availability. So those were kind of the, the biggest points of criteria. And Phillips and their leadership team just blew it out the park.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Mm

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: really just met every metric through my conversations with them and our cohort meetings, I'm starting to see why over and over this

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: [01:02:00] sure.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: meant for them at this time.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Sure. Wow. I'm really excited to hear about how it goes. And like you said, by the time this episode airs, you know, we'll be down the pipe some, so hopefully you'll have some updates for folks, you know, as we put this out and post this. Uh, how awesome. That's fantastic. So, you know, I love that you're going, your, um, your work focuses on folks that are in the space, in the classrooms, in the, the, um, main offices doing the work.

You also talked about. Retention strategies and like your work with retention along with, I could see this also being obviously a, a form of retention as well, and there the strategies that they come up with.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Yep.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: there some for folks who are sitting and listening to this who are able to participate for whatever reason with your work or, you know, for whatever situation, are there strategies that you've thought about that you've heard?

And I, now, let me be very [01:03:00] clear. This is like we just talked about, this is very complex. So like a, a five step list on how to retain Black educators is not going to get it. But do you have some ideas just being in the work for all this time that you feel like folks should hear when they think about retaining Black educators?

Like things that they should consider, should, should try, should ponder on.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Yes. One we gotta put on our design caps. So there are so many different radical design theories that school districts have to get comfortable with in order to move from the messy middle into an emergent strategy that works. I think that, and we talk about this to no end, how outdated our education systems are.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: We consistently try to apply expired. Solutions to emerging problems, and we will consistently [01:04:00] up, brush up against a wall, trying to do that order to make radical change in your community. And I'm even about using the word radical because some of the changes are just not that radical.

They're actually just things that should have already been put into

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Just common sense.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: They're just

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Just common? Yeah.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Um, but in the world of education, even the most foundational changes be felt as radical. Um, but I think we need to create more spaces where educators are naming the challenges that they're seeing. Educators know what they're experiencing. They know what keeps them coming every day and what pushes them away. And so creating consistent surveys where educators are giving voice to the challenges that they're seeing, and giving feedback [01:05:00] on what might solve those challenges, and then partnering with experts.

Like my organization for a little Plug

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Just saying.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: experts to iterate on those challenges that educators have pointed out to iterate on small incremental changes that schools and districts can make in order to get closer to the solutions that educators are suggesting. That's the way that is, the way to One Center educator's voice. Two, to come up with fresh solutions to emerging problems. Three, to create sustainable solutions to the problems that we're seeing. And four, to kind of reverse the systems of inequity that design have been ingrained into our education system.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Mm-hmm. Thank you so much. It's cool. You listen. We'll take 'em all. We'll [01:06:00] take the four and a half to two and a half. We're desperate at this point, folks. We're desperate. Um, thank you so much for that. Uh, and like you said this, this is not so revolutionary and I know that education systems love to run away from words like radical even before this current climate we're in.

Um. It was just like, oh, we can't do that. This is just scary. Right. Um, but I appreciate you saying that because it needs to be a part of the chorus of folks who are saying exactly what you're saying in so many different ways. Like, there's nothing that people are not here on this podcast that someone else has not said before.

Just do it. Just do what been suggested over 80 times. Like good grief. Right. Um, so. We've talked about where you've been, we've talked about all these pieces of retention and, and education. Tell us in your time, in the classroom, in your time now, in your time as a chicken eating child, [01:07:00] are there Black educator,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: vegan now.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: you said what?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I said What's funny is I'm a vegan now. I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Your childhood self would not even recognize you.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I done left the chicken alone.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Alright, well your deep fried tofu state or whatever it is that you love to eat, like are there Black educators from your time early on talking about your mom, talking about community always to now, is there, are there folks that you'd like to shout out on the podcast?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Oh, absolutely. Hmm.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: So first, mentors who have become my favorite ancestors. Uh, Ms. Dixon was my first ever AP in Baltimore City, and she poured so much life into me and my work. No matter what I was doing, how I was feeling, she let me know that what I was doing was worthy and just held a light. [01:08:00] To the impact that I couldn't see. Um, and it just really gave me the fuel to keep going. Um, Ms. Dixon passed a few years ago, but as an ancestor that I consistently shout out. Another one would have to be Dr. Carbo, who was my African-American Studies 100 professor, was the first person to teach me of Africa as a rich place. I had fallen victim to this narrative of poverty that the world signs to Africa and had no idea of its richness, both in like literal richness, like in the soil, but then also its rich, uh, symbolic history and his. teaching and demonstration of both pre-colonial Africa and how Africa kind of resisted and, [01:09:00] uh, reclaimed its space in the worldview. Just really transformed my understanding of the African diaspora, which made me the teacher that I ended up becoming. And so I'm gonna give it to, to, uh, Ms. Dixon and, and Dr.

Carbo.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Thank you. Shout out to them. Um, it's so, yeah, I, I, you know, I, I always think about do these, I hope these educators know.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: How much influence that they've had on folks that have long been outta their classrooms or outta their spaces. And it's just, I love to hear every time someone's name is different, different people all, every single time.

I love that. Uh, last question for you. After all of this, tell us what does it mean to be well,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Hmm. For me to be

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: well.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: means to be connected. In all of its facets, [01:10:00] so connected to a higher sense of purpose and promise, connected to my favorite version of myself, connected to my voice, connected to my why, and all of those things, informing what my now and later looks like for me to be well means that am deeply. Rooted in who I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Who

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: why I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I'm,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: and the world that I'm seeking to accomplish, or the world that I'm seeking to see. So if I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: if I had to,

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: boil it

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: down

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: of the things, I think that to be well is to be connected. And both in my personal journey and in my work, I see that the spaces

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: where

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I not been.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: have been spaces of disconnection in spaces where I have been, well have been mantles of [01:11:00] connection and belonging. And so that's what I'm seeking to fill my life with and that's what I'm seeking to, to help others, especially Black educators throughout the diaspora, fill their lives with a sense of connection.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Thank you and I, I lied. I have one more question for you.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I love your question.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: So if you had a chance. To talk to that seventh grade class one more time.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Ooh,

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: What would you, as adults, they're older now, they should be 18 ish, what would, what would you say?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: teacher.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Hmm.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: I was an English teacher, not a math.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: No, they would be 18 by now. Oh, you so silly. What, what would you, what would you say to that, that that class of seven, that that group, that entire 7, 4, 3, 4 5 set to kids, what would you say to them on this side of who you are?

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: That is [01:12:00] such a powerful question. Can I curse on here?

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Go.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: Because I think I would curse to them. I think I

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: I think I would say fuck.

nye-trusty--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_170621: that shit. Mm. Do not allow anyone to strip away any aspect of you that feels like you. No one has the right to dictate, to add, to subtract, to divide the aspects of yourself that feel. Ingrained, I would tell them to use their voice in their body to stand up to systemic inequity and racism by calling it what it is, and then forging a space for themselves no matter what or who has pushback against it. I would [01:13:00] tell my seventh graders that they belong and that any space they say, any space that tries to tell them that they don't belong is likely unworthy of them being there, but that they can decide to, what is it, to bring a folding chair to the table if somebody hasn't made it, or to throw that table out the window and sit on the carpet if they choose.

dr--asia-lyons--she-her-_3_03-18-2026_160622: Well folks, another fantastic episode. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Thank you for ging us with your presence and your wisdom. Folks, take care of yourselves, take care of each other, and we'll see you on the next episode. All right, peace.