An Interview With Jake Frankel
Natural, authentic, and meaningful family engagement. Parental and family engagement is the linchpin to student achievement. As Dr. Debbie Pushor advocates, it must be natural, authentic, and meaningful. I often hear students saying they will ask their parents to buy something we use in the classroom. Students leave my classroom thirsty to continue learning outside of school hours. They want tangible things to show their families and continue building at home. I plan and balance challenges with a take-home product and those without. I want to equip them to share the prototype or model with a family member. This sharing time may lead the student to proudly teach the person about the design process and the related academic vocabulary. It fosters dual learning opportunities and shows parents that there are high-interest unplugged options to consider providing to their child.
As a part of our interview series about “5 Things You Need To Know To Be A Highly Effective Educator”, I had the pleasure to interview Ekuwah Mends Moses
Ekuwah Mends Moses is a national award-winning educator, published author-illustrator of two nonfiction picture books, and an international keynote speaker. Ekuwah is a specialist who teaches K-5th grade Engineering to approximately 700 students on a six-day rotation. She was selected as the 2023–2024 National Life Group Life Changer of the Year Grand Prize Winner. Moses is the 2023 Educator of the Year at D.L. “Dusty” Dickens Elementary School and received the 2023 City of North Las Vegas Mayor’s Innovative Teaching Award. During her 23 years of teaching in the Clark County School District, she previously worked as a: Performance Zone Instructional Coach, K-5 Literacy Specialist, Learning Strategist, and an elementary classroom teacher. Her debut children’s book, My Name is an Address, is featured in the School Library Journal. To learn more, visit, www.ekuwah.com.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share the “backstory” behind what brought you to this particular career path?
The mango didn’t fall far from the tree. My grandfather was a former speechwriter for the political party that fought for and won Ghana’s independence in 1957. His eldest son, my father, immigrated to the United States via a track scholarship with a passion for teaching and helping others. He is an avid reader and captivating storyteller, and my mother was a gifted art educator and commercial artist. Our family’s home felt like a library, cultural museum, art gallery, and visitor’s center. I was immersed in authentic Ghanaian storytelling, African-American history, and global exploration. My parents taught at the local university, and through them, I learned how attainable, rewarding, and impactful education can be. I naturally developed my passion for teaching by practicing with younger cousins, at church, and volunteering at a nursing home.
Warrensburg is a small town, and I had one Black teacher during my K–12 education. Mr. Collins was my art teacher, and I remember the day he showed an Akwaaba doll on a film strip and said it originated in Ghana. I could not believe my eyes! That art history lesson connected with my family and our heritage. In seventh grade, my social studies teacher taught me to mispronounce the capital of Burkina Faso. At a young age, I recognized this as a missed opportunity to invite my father’s expertise into the classroom. I was raised to be a generational thinker. I want my legacy to build upon the lessons I learned from my ancestors, parents, and the examples of educators in my community.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your teaching career? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
During my 23 years in education, I have worked in various roles. For the past three years, I have been an elementary specialist teacher facilitating an engineering class for 700+ Kindergarten through fifth-grade students. I never imagined I would be teaching in a classroom at this stage of my career, but it has been more rewarding in several unbelievable ways.
In October 2021, our district eliminated all the Project Facilitators (PFs) and reassigned them to vacant classroom teaching positions. PFs are certified teachers who work outside of the classroom and coach teachers, write curriculum, or, in my case, forge partnerships with families. I loved the seven years of creating academic-based family learning workshops and facilitating them at our 350 schools and throughout the Las Vegas community. Yes, I cried over the sudden loss of my beloved position. I had not been in a classroom teaching job for fifteen years, and I had not planned on teaching in a classroom again. Although initially devastated, hours later, I looked through the list of vacancies and narrowed my choices down to the best fit for my family and me.
I called Principal Carolyn King, who had posted a vacancy. (My mother’s first name was Carolyn, and I thought this was a good sign). The principal told me she was seeking an engineering teacher to revamp the class and help the school attain the Governor’s STEM designation. I told her that I have never taught engineering, but I have a passion for facilitating hands-on and minds-on learning experiences for (all ages). I assured her that I would continue seeking opportunities for my continuous professional learning and would do my best to create conditions for learning that would equip and empower a child to impact the world.
I chose to make lemonade from the lemons I was dealt, and the past three years have been the most rewarding of my career. I was nominated or selected for multiple awards, including Teacher of the Week, Teacher of the Year, Innovative Teaching Award, and the national LifeChanger of Year award. We collectively attained the governor’s STEM designation, and our school was renamed. This statement is true — it’s not what happens to you in life that matters most; it’s how you respond.
I could have quit teaching and left the district (as many PFs did then). I could have chosen a job that was not the right “fit” and taught those students with a disgruntled attitude. Instead, I chose a position with creative autonomy that utilized my literacy, mathematics, science, arts integration, and classroom management expertise.
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
On July 13, 2021, I became a published author-illustrator of a nonfiction picture book — My Name is an Address. It uses the alphabet letters to help (readers of all ages) connect with my life experiences, understand the meaning of my name, explain how my parents chose the Ghanaian day-name, and illustrate how my first and last name trace their origin back to a specific house in Cape Coast, Ghana.
In October 2021, I started teaching at D.L. “Dusty” Dickens Elementary School (when all of the Project Facilitator positions were eliminated districtwide). I introduced myself to the students and staff as a Ghanaian-American educator and an author. From the day I arrived on campus, I immediately felt that I profoundly impacted students. Students asked me about being an author, requested my autograph, and shared personal stories of how they relate to my book.
Students and staff members cheered when they learned that my second nonfiction book would be published on Mother’s Day, 2022. I received a flood of interest-based questions about the publishing process and heard words of affirmation from all stakeholders. Both books are displayed in my classroom and available for check-out in school/classroom libraries. Families, teachers, and students around the world are reading my work.
Educators frequently request that I be a keynote speaker and guest reader, conduct author visits, and facilitate family learning workshops. I have received positive online reviews, social media testimonials, and heartwarming photographs from people who are connected with my work. It gives me joy to continue writing and sharing my work with others.
Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the main focus of our interview. From your point of view, how would you rate the results of the US education system?
The US education system has a complicated network of stakeholders and layers of complexity. Test scores do not accurately convey the complete picture of all the positive and negative results throughout the country. Commercial education companies and vote-seeking lawmakers can measure success by many metrics. I focus on the opportunities our education system generates for families and students. Despite inequities and opportunity gaps, our US education system supports the fulfillment of parents’ hopes and dreams for their children. It lays the groundwork for students to pursue their path to self-defined success.
Can you identify 5 areas of the US education system that are going really great?
There is not a day that goes by in which I do not feel privileged and blessed to be a teacher in the United States of America. I have traveled to other countries and seen heart-breaking inequities. Various positions I have held required me to visit hundreds of schools across the fifth-largest school district in the U.S.
My frame of reference has shown me that schools, teachers, and classrooms vary. All students do not have access to the same experiences and choices in their education or have their voices heard. Although there are exceptions, these are five areas in which I feel US education is doing great.
- Accessible school facilities
Americans often take for granted a school with walls, electricity, classrooms, tiled or carpeted floors, desks, chairs, bathrooms, accessibility ramps, and an array of learning materials. When you see that in 2024, students worldwide sit on dirt floors, do not have access to furniture, or are crammed into one-room schoolhouses, you realize we are doing great in our country.
2. Access to transportation and food services
There are many things outside of a child’s control. Access to school transportation and daily meals are two of the most important necessities that U.S. schools provide, significantly boosting achievement for all demographics. Exemplary school districts have found ways to wipe out school lunch debt and provide free (breakfast, lunch, dinner, weekend, and summertime) meals to all students who may need them. These districts understand that hungry and starving children cannot learn without ensuring these basic needs are met. Additionally, children do not have to walk uphill in the snow, across a desert, or unsupervised for an excessive number of miles.
3. Community partnerships
Educators realize our time, budget, and staffing limitations. Most seek opportunities to create robust student learning experiences by inviting community participation from businesses, organizations, and volunteers. Partnerships may provide eyeglasses, dental health, shoes, meals, clothing, diapers, childcare assistance, counseling, language access, guest speakers, and more. Attendance matters! Together, we can reduce the causes of chronic absenteeism.
4. Field Trips
Although the legal paperwork and time-consuming approval process can be a barrier, U.S. educators find innovative ways to bring the world to their students. Whether virtual or in-person, field trips are planned to break down abstract learning objectives, expose students to career pathways, connect with industry experts, and ultimately make learning applicable to the real world for all students.
5. Career and Technical Education programs
Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are growing as national priorities. Opportunities to participate in career and technical education programs rapidly expand in K-12 education. STEM efforts are diversifying and expanding from magnet school options to before/after school extracurricular activities, specialist STEM teachers/coaches, family learn workshops, the Next Generation Science Standards, and grants and funding allocations.
Can you identify the 5 key areas of the US education system that should be prioritized for improvement? Can you explain why those are so critical?
- Focus on the whole child and family
An educator’s purpose is not to help a child pass a test but to create a lifelong learner equipped to handle life’s challenges and possibilities. Teachers cannot do this humanizing work alone. Support from parents, caregivers, and community partnerships is essential to addressing chronic absenteeism, low achievement, behavioral challenges, and mental health issues. Educators need easy access to wrap-around services like Communities in Schools, school counselors, school nurses, social workers, and other support staff personnel.
2. Increase salaries for all school staff
Each person who works on a school campus is vitally important and must be adequately compensated significantly above the cost of living. Custodians, food service workers, bus drivers, teachers, support staff, and administrative office staff are overworked, unsung heroes who keep the school in operation. National staffing shortages create unsustainable conditions where all employees overcompensate to cover for the missing workers.
3. Adjust the school calendar and hours
Adequate research indicates the optimal hours for learning. Unfortunately, transportation issues often take priority over school start times. Educators get exhausted from long periods without mental health breaks and sufficient planning/preparation time. I would love to see more frequent breaks for all educators to recover, given time to plan for instruction and behavior adequately, and for everyone to return to school refreshed.
I truly enjoyed my years of working in a year-round school. Teaching on Track 3 was my favorite. My class came to school for 6 weeks and then had a three-week break. This consistent cycle repeated throughout the calendar year (while the other four tracks attended school and took breaks at other times). I saw a calendar year’s growth in my students. I felt rejuvenated after each break, and parents felt supported by the school and community partners for additional educational opportunities during track breaks.
4. Differentiated professional learning
Educators vary in expertise and experience. All educators want to feel valued, appreciated, and treated like professionals. Planning and preparing for impactful lessons require a time commitment extending well beyond contractual hours. When administrators expect and enforce teachers’ participation in universal professional learning during the short time before school or planning periods, planning time is diminished, and an educator’s personal family time will be impacted. Protect teachers’ planning time by providing differentiated options for professional learning, finding ways to honor and acknowledge expertise on campus, and targeting additional support individually.
5. Leverage social capital
Isolationism robs educators, families, schools, and communities of their wealth. Leveraging the gifts, talents, skills, and resources within them is imperative. Every person who steps on the school campus has something to offer, and all it takes is the courage to invite participation.
Super. Here is the main question of our interview. Can you please share your “5 Things You Need To Know To Be A Highly Effective Educator?” Please share a story or example for each.
- Reciprocal relationships
My mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis before I was born and fought breast cancer while I was in high school. I watched her persevere through multiple medical challenges without ever complaining. She spent the last 17 years of her life bedridden. My father was recognized by the MS Society for being her extraordinary primary caregiver. Mama’s health troubled me as a child, and as an adult, and, as I say in my second nonfiction picture book, I did not always handle it well. Like me, many students grapple with challenges educators often do not see. Genuine student-teacher relationships are built on trust and reciprocity. Trauma-informed educators are more prepared to address the learning needs of their students with mutual respect.
2. Natural, authentic, and meaningful family engagement
Parental and family engagement is the linchpin to student achievement. As Dr. Debbie Pushor advocates, it must be natural, authentic, and meaningful. I often hear students saying they will ask their parents to buy something we use in the classroom. Students leave my classroom thirsty to continue learning outside of school hours. They want tangible things to show their families and continue building at home. I plan and balance challenges with a take-home product and those without. I want to equip them to share the prototype or model with a family member. This sharing time may lead the student to proudly teach the person about the design process and the related academic vocabulary. It fosters dual learning opportunities and shows parents that there are high-interest unplugged options to consider providing to their child.
3. Unplugging from classroom technology
Each day, today’s children spend excessive hours (between home and school) on digital devices at the cost of time spent on other academically beneficial and brain-friendly experiences. Engineering is not only about making things. It is a creative problem-solving process that empowers students to think critically, collaborate, and persevere through challenges.
You won’t see any Chromebooks or iPads in my classroom. Instead, you will see students co-creating models and building prototypes with cardboard, wooden planks, Lego bricks, Play Doh, and more. You will see them testing their prototypes with marbles, blocks, stuffed animal test dummies, and robotic bugs. You will see them naturally and automatically improve their models. You will see them writing (by hand) and reflecting on their experiences before they leave with their classroom teacher.
Whether or not students pursue engineering as a career, the skills they develop in my class are transferable to the seen and unforeseen challenges life will present them.
4. Asset-based teaching
My parents gave me a blueprint for how to be fully present to help my own son battle brain cancer at the age of 2 and a reoccurrence at age 4. Almost losing my son before he even started school changed me as a teacher from 2007 to the present. I teach with the brain in mind.
Learners need a hook to latch on to when connecting learning new to prior learning. They search for personal relevance (“What’s in it for me?) and wonder if success is possible (Can I do this task?). Educators must consider these questions and make the answers concisely explicit and visible.
I frequently use interest surveys and consistently read their reflections on design challenges. The results are quantified and categorized to align the student interests with the engineering practices, core ideas, and cross-cutting concepts identified in the Next Generation Science Standards. I (anonymously) display exemplar student papers at the start of each new experience to establish relevance, amplify student voices, and build upon their assets.
5. Integrating components of S.W.I.R.L. (speaking, writing, interaction, reading, and listening) in every lesson.
My award-winning teaching philosophy is simple — “make do with what you’ve got.” I use a mix of explicit instruction (with anchor charts and realia), read-aloud, and brief video clips (1 to 5 minutes in length) to introduce the design challenges and showcase engineers in the field. My whole group teacher-led introduction is timed to take 10 minutes or less! I reserve most of the 50-minute class period for collaborative learning and hands-on design time. Engineers need to know how to ask questions, imagine solutions, draw plans, create prototypes, conduct tests, make improvements, and communicate the results.
Engineers do not work alone. My class is unique because I do not have a seating chart. I allow students to choose their seats and groupings. Naturally, they learn that choices have consequences and rewards. I encourage them to build on the ideas of others. I tell them to look around the classroom and see what other students are doing well. I teach the students ways to give their peers feedback and acknowledge/celebrate the success of others. There is no “cheating” in my classroom. There is no “test.” I encourage them to learn as much as possible from their peers, books, videos, family members, and other sources. They are used to working alone while taking tests or writing papers in their grade level classroom, but in my classroom, they are supported in problem-solving multi-step challenges and encouraged to seek help. Repeatedly testing and improving a plan or prototype in this type of punishment-free and failure-expected environment feels safe to them.
As you know, teachers play such a huge role in shaping young lives. What would you suggest needs to be done to attract top talent to the education field?
Career options abound for talented and educated professionals. These individuals may have families to support, dreams for the future, and want to build a legacy. Teaching is a legacy. It’s a way of making the world a better place than when we got here. You plant seeds in the students you teach, the people they love, and the future generations those people love. Most adults seeking employment compare options and decide which career pathway helps them reach their personal goals efficiently, respectfully, and in a family-friendly manner. To attract top talent in education, radical systemic change must occur in these areas to make the legacy-building work sustainable, enjoyable, and profitable.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” — Lao Tzu
This quote applies to students of all ages. Thinking of all people, places, events, and experiences as learning opportunities is important. Teachers create conditions for students to learn from various sources — peers, lab experiments, reading materials, videos, family members, and more. Learning is not confined to the school walls — it happens everywhere, with anyone, and at any time. The “teacher” may be your last mistake, an artist working on a masterpiece, a tutorial on YouTube, a classmate’s straw bridge, or a basketball coach’s whistle.
We are blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
Fourteen years ago, National Life Group created the LifeChanger of the Year program that has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to schools and K-12 school employees. This year, out of more than six hundred teachers and school employees who were nominated nationally to receive the Life Changer of the year prizes, I was selected to be the 2023–2024 Grand Prize Winner. I received a $5000 gift, my school received a $5000 donation.
I am honored and grateful to have my work nationally recognized in such a spectacular way. I truly appreciate the work it took to orchestrate the heartwarming surprise ceremony at my school. There were so many profiles of outstanding LCOY nominees, and I am humbled to be selected for doing what I love.
My love languages are words of affirmation and acts of service. Reading the 54 testimonials of my past and present community touched my heart and renewed my zest for teaching. The nomination process and profile page are solid documentation that my labor is not in vain. I will repeatedly read these words to keep the energy flowing for years.
Students, parents, teachers, and administrators are rejoicing alongside me. The $5000 donation for our school will enhance our STEM instruction and provide robust learning experiences for all students.
We don’t have anything like the Oscars or Grammy award ceremonies in education. The LifeChanger of the Year award has been the pinnacle of my career thus far, and I hope the other powerful partners will also reward and amplify the work of educators.
Could I pose this question as a challenge to the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment? I challenge those individuals to reach out to a teacher like me, a school administrator, or a district partnership office and offer their valuable time, financial support, and continuous partnership. I challenge them to fund teachers’ Amazon wish lists and those posted on Donor’s Choose.
How can our readers follow you on social media?
I actively use Facebook (Ekuwah Mends Moses, Author), X (@ekuwah), and Instagram (@ekuwah_m) to share what I learn and gather new ideas from others. Readers who choose not to use social media can also follow my work on my website (www.ekuwah.com).
Thank you so much for these insights! This was so inspiring!
Author Ekuwah Mends Moses On 5 Things You Need To Know To Be A Highly Effective Educator or Teacher was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.