Raising the Bar podcast.
Episode 13: Oakland school board elections open to young voters age 16 and older
Families in Action for Quality Education and Families in Action for Justice co-hosted a candidate forum for the 2024 OUSD School Board & Oakland City Council election. It took place on September 12, 2024 at Learning Without Limits School and provided a chance for over 250 educators, students, parent, and family members to hear directly from the candidates seeking to take office.
Episode 12: Raise the Bar Podcast with Ignite Readings' Jessica Sliwerski
In episode 12, we talked to Jessica Silwerski. She is an educator, early literacy coach, CEO and Co-Founder of Ignite Reading. Throughout this podcast we cover her upbringing, educational background, and her ignite programming that’s happening nationwide.
Episode 11: Raise The Bar Podcast with Damon Grant and Jasmine Mack
In episode 11, we interviewed both Damon Grant, Oakland Unity Middle School’s Co-Principal and Jasmine Mack, Oakland Native and Humanities Teacher. Throughout the podcast, we covered important topics such as positive school culture, achieving math proficiency and how Oakland Unity Middle School was able to get there.
Episode 10: Raise The Bar Podcast: with special guest Kimi Kean
In episode 10, we talk with Co-Founder and CEO of FIA, Kimi Kean and learn about about her twenty-five year journey in public education in the Bay Area.But what the podcast highlights is Kimi’s personal story growing up in Oakland – and the impact that dropping out of high school had on her education journey – that motivates her commitment to raise the bar for Oakland’s students.
Episode 9: Prop 51 & Why COX Families are fighting for it?
On episode nine of our FIA Talks Podcast, we have a conversation with two of our amazing Cox Academy Leaders, Viveca Ycoy-Walton and Stephisha Ycoy-Walton. COX families share with us the amazing advocacy work that they are leading to make sure their school community receives Prop 51 funding and renovate their facilities so it is safe for students to learn.
Episode 8: A-G Family Communication-The Problem and Why we Need to Act
In our eighth podcast episode, we welcome back our partners from Energy Convertors to hear more about their current findings in regards to A-G. Marquis and Javier also go deeper into FIA’s A-G Family Communication Campaign, and highlight the problem currently surrounding family communication and why we need to act.
Episode 7: Introducing our Quality Campaign w/ Baytech
In the seventh episode of our FIA Talks podcast series, we open up our platform to talk about Oakland’s most recent SBAC & A-G Data, while also highlighting important upcoming dates for our Quality Campaign.
Episode 6: Welcome FIA’s New Parent Organizer
In episode six of our FIA Talks podcast, we welcome our new Parent Organizer, Susan Singleton. Susan talks about her upbringing and what inspired her to do this work. Susan works with both Spanish and English speaking parents throughout the Oakland community.
Episode 5: Candidate Forum Debrief
In our fifth episode, “Candidate Forum Debrief ”, we debrief the FIA Candidate Forumat Castlemont High School. We discussed our learnings, what stood out to us, and candidates talking points.
Episode 4: College Talk
In our fourth podcast episode, we open up our platform to discuss with our FIA Leaders about what it means to be in college as a first generation student. We hear from some future first generation college students and current UC Berkeley student, Karla Bonilla.
Episode 3: Importance of Voting w/ Latitude High School Leaders
In our third podcast episode, we focus on the importance of voting and how such a small percentage of our Black and Brown community in Oakland are voting. We dive into Measure QQ and how that would allow 16 & 17 year olds to vote for local elections in the future.
Episode 2: A-G with Energy Convertors
In our second podcast episode, “A-G with Energy Convertors”, we speak with Marquis Evans of Energy Convertors to talk about the latest developments in the FIA A-G Campaign, and how we are pushing for college eligibility for all Black and Brown students.
Episode 1: Thoughts on School Closures, March 4th 2022
Our first ever podcast episode, “Thoughts on School Closures”, Oakland Youth Leaders voiced their thoughts on the OUSD School Board vote to close some district schools. As a direct result of the vote, we saw the community answer back with protests, marches, a hunger strike, and other demonstrations against school closures.