Action & Advocacy

This interview originally aired as part of Inspired Teaching's Curiosity Challenge. Learn more and join the Challenge here: https://inspiredteaching.org/curiosity-challenge-2025/

Xochi Cartland helps to lead Operation Understanding’s year-long Social Justice Fellowship, a program for high school juniors. Throughout this conversation, she offers a lot of valuable insight into supporting young people as they discover their own voices and learn to respect those of their peers’ – a lot of which mirrors the work Inspired Teaching does with our Speak Truth students. And a lot of which adults can apply to their own interactions in the world. 

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter to review resources and important information about upcoming Inspired Teaching programming and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

Learn more about Operation Understanding DC: https://oudc.org/

March 24, 2025: Hope is a Discipline

As part of a recent online Inspired Teaching Institute, Jenna and Meag spoke with Mary Brown and Aikta Suri of Life Pieces To Masterpieces (https://lifepieces.org). Mary and Aikta shared strategies, guidance, and real-life examples for conflict resolution and recentering ourselves. 

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday Newsletter for weekly resources and important information on upcoming Inspired Teaching events and programming: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

March 31, 2025: Cultivate Your Inner Peace

This week's Hooray For Monday features a conversation Jenna and Meag had with Deepa Iyer, a lawyer, activist, and author, who shares the framework she's developed that helps us all find our role in building community and advancing the causes we believe in.

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter to receive weekly resources and information on upcoming Inspired Teaching events and programming: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/



June 16, 2025: Everyone Can Play a Role in Resistance

Every teacher CAN have the agency to take the reins of what’s happening in their schools.

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September 29, 2025: Everyday Advocacy

Listen to this week's podcast episode to learn how to use the Everyday Advocacy framework in the face of book bans and censorship.

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter for weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programming and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

October 6, 2025: It's Banned Books Week

Over more than 260 issues of Hooray For Monday, Inspired Teaching has featured the voices of leading activists, educators, and changemakers. Revisit those conversations in the Action & Advocacy playlist today: https://soundcloud.com/inspiredteaching/sets/action-advocacy/s-fAXv2NEd0Gu?si=7182f89e945849b2ba7941b06af5cba2&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing 

October 13, 2025: Inspiration to Action

Revisit Inspired Teaching's October 2024 conversation with Rebecca Winthrop, author of The Disengaged Teen, to understand how young people engage--and how to support them in doing so authentically. 

October 20, 2025: (From the Archives) What Does Engagement Look Like?

Jenna and Aleta discuss cultural traditions around, personal experiences with, and classroom approaches to navigating death and loss. 

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter to receive weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programming and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

October 27, 2025: Dia de Los Muertos: A Beautiful Way to Talk with Kids About Death

Cosby Hunt, Inspired Teaching's Director of Instructional Design and a long-time history teacher in Washington, DC, speaks with Jenna Fournel about teaching history in this city, at this moment in time. He shares his advice for centering student voice and experience.

Sign up for the Hooray For Monday newsletter to receive weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programming and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

Mentioned in this episode: 

Mikva Challenge: https://mikvachallenge.org/
Speak Truth: https://inspiredteaching.org/youth/speak-truth/
Looping: https://inspiredteaching.org/looping/

November 3, 2025: Teaching in this Moment

Even with the long list of instructional objectives you need to address, each day you spend with your students is just one day out of a whole year of learning. And the whole year you spend with your students is just one out of over a dozen years those students will spend in school.

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter for weekly resources and information on Inspired Teaching programs and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

November 10, 2025: Operationalizing Curiosity

Each week at our Inspired Teaching staff meeting, we begin with a brief exercise. This past week, each of us responded to the question: “What are you curious about?” The question connects directly with Inspired Teaching’s work to promote the kind of teaching that fuels—instead of stifles—curiosity.

Conversation with Helanius J. Wilkins on curiosity: https://soundcloud.com/inspiredteaching/january-26-2023-curiosity-is-everything

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November 17, 2025: (From the Archives) The Opposite of Curiosity

As you celebrate Thanksgiving, consider the many unique traditions around the country--and celebrate that diversity, as well!

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter for weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programs and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

November 24, 2025: Thankful for Our Differences

Curiosity bridges divides among us, enables us to implement AI productively, and fuels student engagement. This means fueling curiosity should be high on your priority list.

Join the Inspired Teaching Curiosity Challenge: https://inspiredteaching.org/curiosity-challenge-2025/

Subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

December 1, 2025: Are We Curious Yet?

Aleta speaks with journalist, professor, and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism Dr. George Miller for his insight into watching, reading, and listening to the news today.

Subscribe to Hooray For Monday for weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programs and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

December 8, 2025: It's All About Exploration

Jenna and Aleta reflect on what they've observed in the classrooms of Inspired Teaching Fellows this fall, and how those lessons can apply to classrooms everywhere.

Subscribe to Hooray For Monday to receive weekly resources and updates on Inspired Teaching programming and events: https://inspiredteaching.org/subscribe-hooray-for-monday/

December 15, 2025: What Our Teachers Are Teaching Us

Hooray for Monday is an award-winning collection of resources from Center for Inspired Teaching, shared at the start of every week. These resources feature questions, ideas, reflections, and actions we can all take to remodel the school experience for students. Hooray for Monday challenges teachers to hone their skills as Instigators of Thought©, includes instructional ideas from our #Inspired2Learn collection, and provides links to other useful tools and opportunities.

About Us
Creating radical change in the school experience — away from compliance and toward authentic engagement. Center for Inspired Teaching envisions a future in which every person is prepared to thrive in and contribute to our complex and rapidly changing world, through an education that teaches students how to think, not what to think.

March 24, 2025: Hope is a Discipline

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