Dr. Ramatu Bangura has spent the last 25 years working with and on behalf of adolescent girls in New York city, Washington, DC, and as a Peace Corps volunteer in Costa Rica, and she is committed to decolonizing philanthropic practices to ensure that those most impacted by structural violence and oppression are afforded the tools to create a world we are all safe, seen, and celebrated. She currently leads the design and inception of the children's rights innovation fund prior to working there, Ramatu served as the program officer for the NoVo foundation, Advancing Adolescent Girls Rights initiative, where she co-led strategy development and grantmaking to advance philanthropy's largest portfolio, working to advance the rights leadership and wellbeing [00:01:15] of adolescent girls in the United States and in the Global South. Ramatu earned both a master's of education and doctorate of education in international and trans cultural studies at teacher's college, Columbia university, her dissertation In Pursuit of Success: the educational identities and decision-making of African girls with limited formal schooling utilized African feminism to examine how immigrant girls with limited formal schooling, navigate American schools and make decisions about college and marriage.
Pod Episode 3: Ramatu Bangura
Britt: [00:00:00]Hello, welcome to off-track on purpose, the podcast, where we come together to re-imagine academic and faculty life. I'm your co-host Britt [00:00:15] Yamamoto. And along with Mya Fisher, I want to thank you for joining us.
We're here to have heart-centered conversations with people who have experienced and successfully endured advanced academic training and gone on to have meaningful social impact through their creative pursuits and practical [00:00:30] actions.
For this reason, we could not be more excited to have today's guest.
Dr. Ramatu Bangura has spent the last 25 years working with and on behalf of adolescent girls in New York city, Washington, DC, and as a Peace Corps volunteer in Costa Rica, and she is committed to [00:00:45] decolonizing philanthropic practices to ensure that those most impacted by structural violence and oppression are afforded the tools to create a world we are all safe, seen, and celebrated.
She currently leads the design and inception of the children's rights innovation fund [00:01:00] prior to working there, Ramatu served as the program officer for the NoVo foundation, Advancing Adolescent Girls Rights initiative, where she co-led strategy development and grantmaking to advance philanthropy's largest portfolio, working to advance the rights leadership and wellbeing [00:01:15] of adolescent girls in the United States and in the Global South.
Ramatu earned both a master's of education and doctorate of education in international and trans cultural studies at teacher's college, Columbia university, her dissertation In Pursuit of Success: the educational [00:01:30] identities and decision-making of African girls with limited formal schooling utilized African feminism to examine how immigrant girls with limited formal schooling, navigate American schools and make decisions about college and marriage.
I've had the pleasure of knowing Ramatu too for a [00:01:45] few years now, but have never had an opportunity to explore issues like we do in this conversation.
Please enjoy today's episode. I can guarantee you that there'll be more than one thing that leads you to learn and grow.
[00:02:00]Pre-Flection [00:02:06] Welcome to Pre-flections as we anticipate our conversation. Mya, are there some things that you're particularly interested in ?
Mya: Yes [00:02:15] So her background is fascinating. She's done a lot of work in the nonprofit and philanthropic sector. so it's interesting to me how somebody would use advanced training in these fields. Cause I don't think that's a place where People [00:02:30] with advanced degrees aren't as visible as they are, perhaps in other fields and her work with women and girls in such diverse and varied ways I'm interested in how does she get there? Her bio starts with the idea of, she wants to [00:02:45] change the world into a place for her daughter to be able to live. And so I think about that In my work as well, wanting to live in a world where people are respected and have dignity as human beings. I know how I got to that place. So I'm just very interested hear how she got [00:03:00] to that place.
Britt: It's amazing. The life that she's led and to see it through the lens of purpose and being on purpose as is the title of our podcast, it's just so inspiring to see someone who has clearly assembled a path of [00:03:15] purpose and clarified through a commitment to being a part of creating this world for her daughter, but then also more broadly to create a world that everyone can thrive in. And hopefully our conversation will really engage that depth of [00:03:30] purpose as opposed to simply just the various activities, because. If you look at how global her various activities have been and then being the child of immigrants. I would love to hear more about how that shaped and influenced her thinking. I'm curious too, just [00:03:45] about how her academic training is located on this arc of purpose being driven by purpose.
Mya: Yeah. And the purpose to me seems very clear women and girls have been at the center of it. In her blog, it's very clear that there are times [00:04:00] where she makes choices or pivots and, positions that at the center of whatever it is she's doing, whether it's the organization that she joins and you know how as a professional, you can keep that [00:04:15] purpose centered and also not burn out. Because a lot of us, we have passions and things that we want to do and, We might do something for a few years and then, take a break because we get burned out or, there's just too [00:04:30] much work.
And to see somebody remain so committed to women and girls and the complexity of issues around equality and gender parity, whether it's economic or safety or education. [00:04:45] Because a lot of the work that people who are passionate or purpose driven or mission driven do is hard work and not always rewarded in ways that, whether it be financial or accolades or what have you, it's rewarding when you [00:05:00] see the peoples whose lives you're impacting personally and emotionally.
But, can that sustain somebody's career? And how does she stay motivated? How does she stay committed? What keeps her going is a question that I'm always interested in [00:05:15] people and asking people who have these passions and things that drive them. It's always interesting to hear the different ways that people arrive in similar places.
Britt: Yeah I'm really curious too, about the role that her degree and the pursuit of her degree has played in [00:05:30] her work because Part of me wonders how necessary in advanced degree is, or was in helping to move that along. And so I'm sure that it was, and it's played an important role. But I look forward to hearing her talk about how it shaped [00:05:45] things.
Mya: The last thing too, is that, oftentimes we talk about people as professionals or just slivers of who they are and it's very clear and evident from her writing and the things that she's thinking about that [00:06:00] her family and her role as a mother or as a parent is really important and also central. And so I think for people in academic spaces or people who have pursued degrees oftentimes they don't [00:06:15] feel like they are whole human beings, or they're told that they have to sacrifice things like their family or time with their kids to meet potential tenure obligations and things like that. And so I'd be interested in her stories about navigating [00:06:30] Working back into school and then out, and just how that impacted her life as a human being outside of those things.
Britt: Lots to look forward to. Let's dive in
[00:06:45] Interview, Dr. Ramatu Bangura [00:06:49] We're really excited about this conversation. I've been looking forward to this for a while now. Welcome Dr. Ramatu Bangura to Off-track, On- purpose. How are you doing today?
[00:07:00] Ramatu: Thank you. I'm doing well.
Britt: Great. We always like to open our pod exploring people's academic origin story and what brought you to grad school. where it might fit with where you find yourself right now.
On What Led Her to Graduate School [00:07:12]
Ramatu: Sure. What took me to grad school? [00:07:15] I have to probably start with, I applied to graduate school when I was in the Peace Corps in Costa Rica towards the Caribbean coast. And I applied because I thought I wanted to be involved in education and knew that I did not want to be a teacher, but education felt [00:07:30] like a good place to be for the type of work I thought I wanted to do, which I think was work that was working with young people doing informal training workshops.
What I would later learn is youth work, youth facilitation work and I wanted an excuse to live in New [00:07:45] York. And I was wanting an excuse to. Just being a learning space. I missed being a student and wanted to just be in a learning space and applied to one program from Costa Rica as a peace Corps, volunteer, making no money and [00:08:00] decided to apply.
And so much so that when I saw the test score requirements, they said, recommended test scores. And so I took them at their word and assumed it was recommended, but not mandatory. And so I didn't submit a GRE or anything. I just filled out the application, wrote my essay. I think I applied for a waiver [00:08:15] and sent it in and I got in and found out as I was applying to the doctoral program a few years later that they didn't have any GRE scores and were really confused by that and how I got in.
And I said you said it was recommended. So I. Took you at your word.
Britt: Point number one of top recommended tips for [00:08:30] potential grad students take applications at their word.
Ramatu: Yeah. They said it was recommended, so I didn't feel like I needed it, so I didn't take it.
And so I applied and then got in and then returned from Peace Corps and realized that I needed to work. I didn't have an apartment. I had missed my family And then I got a job [00:08:45] at the DC rape crisis center, which was really interesting to me. As a director of community education, this is a work I want to do. So I'll do that for a little while. I did that for about a year and a half and deferred my admission. And then I went to off to teacher's college at Columbia. And for me it was just a question of [00:09:00] I just wanted to be in a learning space. I wanted an excuse to be in New York city and I have another excuse in my mind at the time then school.
In school for a valid reason to leave my parents' home. So that's what I did. So that's how I ended up in graduate school at a very expensive graduate school. Once I realized that's where I [00:09:15] selected, I just, as I was wanting to do at the time, just flitted about and did what I was interested in.
Mya: And so you started in their master's program and then decided to continue for a doctorate. what was the motivation to stay?
Ramatu: Once I [00:09:30] was there and then I remember going to the orientation and seeing how much it costs and then I had to go home and lay down.
I was like, what the hell. So I went home and I laid down and then I just started the program and I've really enjoyed it. Cause it was a combination of [00:09:45] international relations and I went specifically to that program at Columbia because there was a professor there, Fran Fabrice, who was doing work around gender and development and gender and international education that I found really interesting.
So I just wanted to go there. And while I was there, I was working full [00:10:00] time. I never imagined myself just immersing myself in graduate school. That seemed like not enough things to do. So I was working pretty much. Full-time at a community based organization in Harlem with girls that were coming in and out of the sex trade an organization called [00:10:15] GEMS in Harlem and was working there and attending classes and really enjoyed it. I felt locked out of I didn't realize at the time that it was because I was not really fully participating in immersed in the graduate experience that I had this lab was living in Brooklyn, so I wasn't even living near campus.
[00:10:30] And I was working in Harlem and I wasn't, I felt very locked out of opportunities. I couldn't seem to get a hold of an internship. I couldn't find a professor that would take interest in me enough to pass me opportunities. I had professors that loved my work and loved my writing, but it never seemed to [00:10:45] translate into any kind of opportunity.
And I think in part, because of probably more systemic reasons, but a lot of the reasons I wasn't for a lot of reasons, I just wasn't there. I wasn't that interested in graduate school life. I wasn't that interested in hanging out at cheese and wine like cheese folks, gathered [00:11:00] around, around whoever the free food was and where were, folks would have wine for students.
So that, wasn't my thing. I went there for classes and I went home or went to work. And so hadn't thought about a doctorate at all. Wasn't remotely interested. And then I was coming to the end of my studies. And at that time, I had switched to working for an [00:11:15] organization in the South Bronx that was working with African girls immigrant girls from mostly West Africa.
And I had designed a program to work with them and was looking at really what was there, the educational experience as being students with significantly interrupted formal [00:11:30] education and the particular Challenge of being an English language learner, when you may not be literate in the first language that you learned to speak, which a lot of the way that we teach language, it assumes a certain degree of literacy.
And so that was a particular [00:11:45] conundrum. And at the same time, I was also working with these girls who were really facing a lot of different pressures around, marriage and expectations around marriage expectations, around young womanhood in the U S versus where they were coming from.
And I just, wasn't seeing them showing up in the [00:12:00] literature that I was reading and I had never worked with, and people that I saw in the literature and in any full way, like I was before that, when I was working with kids that were street involved, they were nowhere to be found in the lit, particularly girls, nowhere to be found in any kind of literature.
And I just. Was about to [00:12:15] leave grad school and feeling like I wanted to write about them. Like I wanted to be with them and I wanted to write about them. And I wanted their story to be told because it was like, it was consuming my life in so many ways. There was all I was doing and all I was thinking about. And a friend of mine was like you should apply.
And I was like, I don't know. And she said [00:12:30] just apply. You'll figure it out. And Dr. Alicia, Taylor was another black woman and she was I think adjuncting at that time. And she encouraged me to apply. And so I applied and then I was like, Oh, now I'm in. And I probably had another lay-down moment cause
but I suppose for [00:12:45] some reason somebody might argue that not too bright went ahead and did it anyway. And I just I loved the studying and the researching. I love they're like Finding a place to insert these girls in the Canon. And that felt really important to me. And so that's why I did a doctorate was [00:13:00] because I didn't know what other way to have a platform and a space to really think about it, write about this group, this community of young women that I was getting introduced to.
Mya: So much of your story resonates and I feel also speaks [00:13:15] to my own story. I went to NYU as a grad student but then also, loved the studying, but wasn't as immersed in the department or the culture cause I was nannying to pay for school.
Just, the similarity of that, I'm like, Oh my gosh, [00:13:30] that sounds like me too. Cause a lot of times you do feel like you're struggling or, your story is the only one because you see so many around you with a different one from you, but similar to each other. So it's just really cool to hear that.
On Finding Your People and Speaking to a Canon [00:13:43]
Ramatu: It's cool to have it affirmed because at [00:13:45] the time I felt out of place.
At teachers college, I felt like I was working with kids that were street involved and that felt more like home to me than Columbia. And so the code switching that need would need, I oftentimes failed at that. So I'd be in this space where now the [00:14:00] conversations were a little more aggressive, a little more lively, a little louder a little more colorful language, and then I'd have to transition to a conversation in a classroom.
It did not always go well, like it was always, sometimes I hadn't fully [00:14:15] switched by the time I got. To the class. And I would say something or some word would come out of my mouth. That was not quite what I did. And someone would disagree and I'd be a little more aggressive than you would be in civilized society like in polite company.
So it was hard. And I just, I didn't find myself and then I would find myself, I would take [00:14:30] very personally Teachers College is such an interesting place. Cause it, there's like I was in the department that wasn't necessarily doing like classroom, regular work. You weren't interacting with the classroom regularly.
And I would find so disturbing some of the ways folks would talk about [00:14:45] my communities or the folks that I felt were my communities and that what they would bring to the table is problems and challenges. And I would often feel like I would get very I would take it very personally and very highly annoyed all the time.
So I was like, these aren't my people. I eventually did find my people. Towards [00:15:00] the end of my doc work, but it took me awhile. And I made friends of course, and had folks that I felt connected to and built friendships with, but in terms of the classroom and the content, I just couldn't find my people and I was much more comfortable just being outside of that space.
And it was hard to talk about these [00:15:15] big social ills and problems and abstraction. I still have that problem. Now. the abstraction I find really difficult. And there's a degree of abstraction that goes along with study that's part of the work. That's what this, some of the analysis is, and even when I was doing my doctoral work, it felt that was the hardest piece.
That question. [00:15:30] And then the question about the significance would piss me off. Like, why do I have to explain to you why these people are significant to your larger body of work, which has nothing to do with them. And that's part of the reason why I'm writing is that your work has nothing to do with them.
So you won't speak back to a [00:15:45] Canon that doesn't see these people as valuable and then convince the Canon, why these people are valuable to hear from. And that would just piss me off. And so it was a constant, feeling like having to justify the existence of the folks that I was talking about in the literature, which again, I [00:16:00] found infuriating and how dare you and keep asking me that same question over and over again.
But it was the thing I had the most trouble writing about, I had the most trouble talking about it. Cause I found that insulting.
On Overcoming Being Ignored to Death [00:16:10]
Britt: How did you overcome that? You finished your degree clearly you were able to do something?
[00:16:15] Ramatu: Pragmatism and I was pregnant and I was like, I'm not going to keep arguing with these people. Let me tell them what they want to hear so I can get on outta here. So I was, yeah, I was pregnant and writing my proposal. And I was like, I can't be here with them all day, fighting with them about what's significant or not about my people I'm going to write about and had a [00:16:30] supportive committee and a committee that saw it and helped me through it and helped me find the right language to make the case for the work.
And then I also, like I had a, an amazing writing group of women of color who were also trying to get through, because I think what we were finding was that if we [00:16:45] were not careful, our work was ignored to death of course I think we all experienced hostility towards our ideas and what we were looking to put forward.
But I think more than anything, I felt like it was more ignored to death. If you weren't careful, one would engage your work seriously. Once [00:17:00] you work, your work was about race or gender, or God forbid the combination of the two. It was like, Oh, that's nice. And no one would engage.
You, you wouldn't get pushed on, you wouldn't get challenged or questioned in any way. And then your work would suffer for it. And so the group of us just got together. I think it was like [00:17:15] after I left, there were more folks came, but when I came on, it was like four or five of us and we would just gather and interrogate each other's work and rip it apart and help us put it back together.
So that our work would be pushed and challenged in a way, cause I often felt like very [00:17:30] unanchored. Like I just didn't feel like there was a place that cared even the department that I was in didn't care about really the people I cared about. Or if there just wasn't weren't spaces that, where that was the conversation, people were doing these big meta studies on to kind of development spaces.
And I was doing [00:17:45] this very intimate narrative. With girls that I was in active community with, it just didn't feel like a place for it. So I just found other spaces and I was fortunate enough to have a committee and an advisor and a chair that was like, got it. And I know that does not everyone has that as [00:18:00] a benefit, but I did.
And so that got me through but I witnessed other folks suffer for the lack of that. And I'm, it's I think my nature, I see community I, I'm going to find it some, wherever I go, I'll find other people to be in close relationship with. And so that's what kind of got me through [00:18:15] that experience, because I definitely didn't find that institutionally.
On the Similarities Between the Academy and Philanthropy [00:18:18]
Britt: It's so fascinating to hear you share some of these things, because we know each other through your work in philanthropy. And If I squint enough just about everything you're saying could apply to philanthropy. [00:18:30] And the degree you were prepared to work in the philanthropic sector through some of the things Like being ignored to death and the work right. And the content and the study, but then all of the organizations [00:18:45] and the grassroots work that's being done around the world that is overlooked. And I know that has been one of your priorities in philanthropy is to lift those people up. And so it's just interesting to think about those as being connected. Have you thought about how, what you [00:19:00] learned through graduate school, both intentionally and unintentionally may relate to what you currently do in philanthropy?
Ramatu: Yeah. I feel like it's all the same work. Philanthropy was like a splash of cold water for me. It was both like invigorating. It was like being at having [00:19:15] access to that kind of resource. And I think the particular way that I came into philanthropy and the organization that I came into philanthropy and then the, who my supervisors were, who the leadership was in, the organizations allowed me very particular.
I I think there's every movement to philanthropy's a particular mood because every, [00:19:30] someone told me very early on, like when you've worked for one foundation, you've worked for just one foundation, they're all so different. So in the particular, Space I moved in, which was the Novo foundation, it was the invigorating part of that splash of cold water was that there was [00:19:45] money to move and I could move it. And it took me a while to realize that was a thing. And I was like, Oh, okay. That's what this is. And I think coming from the background that I came from, I felt like once I figured out that was a possibility, I knew where to move it because I knew where the work was and what it looked [00:20:00] like to do it.
And so I, that felt like a really good match to me. And that was invigorating. I think the part that was like the shock was prior to that, the program that had been running for eight years in the South Bronx, I think I ran that program at best on a good year, on [00:20:15] $150,000 a year. And we serve nearly a hundred girls and that 150,000 included my salary.
And so to go from that's the scale that I'm working on. And then to go from that into philanthropy, where we talk about a hundred thousand dollars as if it's nothing, a million [00:20:30] dollars, you're talking $500,000 and I'm like, people have these kinds of budgets?
And what do they do with all this money? Because Lord knows, we had not a dime. And so it was like, I just found myself blinking a lot, like working from abundance. [00:20:45] I just, I hadn't experienced that. And I didn't know, I felt like I know what to do with it. I was like, Oh, you don't give me the, okay.
Then let me, because in my mind the immediate thought is Eventually they going to, not want to give me the money no more. So let me do the most I can with it, which is what happened [00:21:00] . This thing can't last forever. Let me just go ahead and ride it until the wheels fall off. And so I think what it brought is I led with having done the work that I was trying to resource, which felt really important.
And I felt like if I got in, I'm going to bring in all these people. There was, there were relations that I've built [00:21:15] along the way that I really relied heavily on, on does this feel right? I'm trying to figure out how to resource this group of people. How do I get to them? Like I relied on those relationships that I came in with.
On Standing in the Gap where Systems Fail [00:21:23]
And then just my instincts about The unseen parts of the work that no one ever talks about. Especially with girls, because [00:21:30] that's the work that I was doing was work with resourcing and supporting work with girls at grassroots on the grassroots level globally. And one of the things that I knew was true and what I was true, traveled more is that the work looks the same. Young people in crisis, young people [00:21:45] that have been deprived of the resources they need, young people that are pushed to the margins, support for them looks very much the same from place to place. There's not a lot of difference. And the people that choose to either out of folly foolishness, or just like naivete to stand in that [00:22:00] gap are some of the most overworked and under-resourced people on the planet.
But they know when you're talking about young people, they know where systems fail, and they're trying to stand in the gap where those systems fail or where they're not existed. And when, whether those systems, our [00:22:15] families, our schools, our healthcare, our infrastructure the young, the person that chooses to stand in the gap for young people that are in their charge or in their care, whether that's teachers, youth, organizers, other young people, folks that run youth programs, community organizations, [00:22:30] it can look like anyone that chooses to stand in that gap.
They have a unique insight. I know that it gave me a unique insight. It's a thing that's so profoundly imprinted on my spirit is a lot of young people are living very difficult lives and. I don't think we want to fully absorb the [00:22:45] level of deprivation that young people are existing under. And I have been repeatedly inspired by the way, folks maneuver when they're not meant to make it when they're throwaways, when they're discarded, when folks don't see them as valuable enough to support. And I've seen folks [00:23:00] move through that disregard and build lives for themselves and thrive and support other people and that is imprinted on me. And I think that's the thing that I tried to look for in the, in my work and figure out at NoVo, and in philanthropy is figure how to get them money. Those, when [00:23:15] I say one of the things I got clear about at NoVo maybe my second or third year, Regardless of the institution I'm in my work is to move money to my people.
And I see those folks as my people, as those folks that are choosing to stand in the gap when it makes no sense. Some of the stuff that I did as a youth worker [00:23:30] makes no sense that it got a whole lot of people's licenses removed. This is, we got a whole lot of people in trouble, but I stand by it because the systems are meant for these kids to survive.
And so anything I do to help contribute to that survival and even better, if they get [00:23:45] to thrive in any way, then it was worth it. It was well worth it. And so I've always, I looked for in my philanthropic work I want those people to feel seen and I want them to feel supported and I want them to feel resourced and honored for their wisdom and honored for all that they do.
They [00:24:00] deserve at least that even if they're not, may not ever get the money they deserve to have their expertise recognized because they have that. So that's been a huge motivator for me in my work in philanthropy. I see myself as like a mole I'm in here trying to translate what that work looks like.
I'm in here trying to hopefully [00:24:15] conspire with folks to move it. I've survival takes a lot of, it takes a lot of conspiring and work in a system and hustling and I value and honor that spirit.
On Legitamacy and Affirmation in Philanthropy [00:24:25]
Britt: It's interesting again to think about what you just shared through the lens of academic inquiry, [00:24:30] So someone's going to put it into a research question. Someone's going to ask you how it's connected to what other people have done. Someone's going to ask you to situate it in the literature. Someone's going to ask you to make sure that it is unique work on and on. And so Some of those behaviors [00:24:45] to connect it to something legitimate and legitimate I use and in quotes that can be understood.
Ramatu: Yeah I'm not throw the baby out with the bath water. it's not. I think some of what I've taken from academia it offers a rigor to my work and [00:25:00] my analysis that informs my work that I love, I think it's not it's not a common thing. And so I treasure that it's important to me. But some of these hoops that we got people jumping through to say that they know something I would love to run a filter through there. What's what is, this? Is this either? Is this [00:25:15] about maintaining the hierarchy of academia or is this about us knowing what we know? Because philanthropy will do this every time we gotta do something, we gotta do a whole nother report that says the same thing as the last report.
And that says the same thing has the same recommendations of the report [00:25:30] before that. But before we start anything, we gotta do a report. And so what I was fortunate enough in my last role and what I try to take forward in this role is can we skip over that step of having to affirm to the world we know what we already know?
and I think, but being a black woman in this space where folks, I got to the [00:25:45] second and third layer of questioning whenever I say anything anyway. Or whenever I assert anything anyway Having the resources being at the helm of some pot of resources relieve me of that for a little bit, which was exhilarating to be able to say no, we know this, I don't have to [00:26:00] do another study.
Do we know that during a pandemic, girls are going to bear the brunt of the domestic work? Yes. We know this. Do we have to do another study or can we just act from that knowledge and maybe save some of those resources for the people that are actually supporting that girl [00:26:15] rather than spend a couple of hundred thousand dollars on a study to tell us what we already know, because we know how patriarchy works. We know how racism works, we know how adultism works. So we know we can safely say this. So can we act now? And I [00:26:30] think there's a way that this, the rigor, the kind of. All of the hoops we jumped through in the rigor of academia is an excuse to stall and not act on what we know. And so that's where it's not helpful.
Mya: We know these problems are big and they're going to take time, or [00:26:45] generations to repair or address. And, nobody wants to face that reality or, it's okay we can do it for five years, but then in five years, the tide shifts, oh, this is the new thing. Actually it was just having a conversation with somebody yesterday [00:27:00] about higher education access initiatives. And one of the funders was like, okay, now we want to shift to this. And the person on the ground was saying, Okay, but we still have this problem to deal with.
So just because you shift, because that's what you want to [00:27:15] focus on now, doesn't mean that this problem that we've been addressing for the last 20 years is no longer a problem.
Ramatu: Yeah. It's I think it's because philanthropy is, everybody wants to plant a flag. it's a, it's the Imperial kind of colonizing nature of philanthropy is that, you find an issue you want to plant your [00:27:30] flag on it, and this market is your territory. And so with that, you want to be able to then show that like I was right to claim this as my territory and I did this and this is what we achieved. And rather than I think what would be more helpful is that we know that the most likely way that transformative [00:27:45] social change happens is through organizing and movements.
Or through dictatorship and by Fiat, but we know that positive change, even if it doesn't stay positive forever, but any major transformation it's happened through people, mass movement and organizing. And so if that is what we know, [00:28:00] then we resource that to be ongoing. We don't arrive at a place.
Cause sometimes the folks that I'm aligned with, if I'm being honest, I'll, I'm scared of what you might look like when you start leading. So I feel like there's always going to be, I need to resource resistance to [00:28:15] entrenched power because, if folks can commit, if this fucked up system where in saddles, you, unfortunately, you poor thing with all of this wealth.
You also know that there will also always need to be movements, resource those movements in perpetuity. It's not a question of [00:28:30] defining a frame for that movement. And then we're not going to log frame ourselves to freedom and liberation. it's going to be mass movement and mobilizing that's what has it has always been. And so resource that your M&E plan is not going to get us free. And even once we get free, it may not even set up the systems to do it. I think to keep [00:28:45] us free. I think there's a way in which we can, I think Western culture, being of West African immigrants, there's a thing that folks in the West and what I would say like white folks do real is order, you can order the hell out of something. Write down a recipe and institutionalize it and [00:29:00] make it a thing that somebody else can follow, which is not a bad thing. That's a good thing. But it doesn't suit all things. And so I think that's the challenge. I think this moment we're in philanthropy where, venture capitalists assume that if they got wealthy, then they can apply those lessons to movements and everything [00:29:15] else that's the best way to order a society. I think that's an outstanding question. So moments are going to always have to exist even in the most idyllic society, which is just human nature. Folks seek power are the folks that you seek to topple that power and the [00:29:30] vast majority of the folks that are impacted are going to have to view the way that they get powers by mobilizing and coming together. And so we resourced that, that should be the conversation we're having.
On Living on Purpose and in Community [00:29:39]
Britt: I was reading your, relatively new, bio And wow, impressive. [00:29:45] As both a narrative of your arc of life but also the various things that you've been involved in. I see what you've been doing as someone who's been so clearly on purpose and on commitment. I wonder if you can say a little bit about that because the kinds of things [00:30:00] that you've been involved in are what I would consider to be no small things both in what they're trying to accomplish in the world, but also just the intensity of the work. So what's led you to be able to maintain that fire or that purpose and to continue [00:30:15] to maintain that same commitment to what you're pursuing?
Ramatu: I'm profoundly realistic.
I come from idealistic people like I grew up in a community of immigrants from Sierra Leone. In the DC area. I have to claim my Nigerian side too, cause my mom was born in Nigeria, but [00:30:30] I grew up mostly around Sierra Leoneans. And folks who are undocumented, my parents weren't documented till I was like 11 or 12. So I moved every year, pretty much in the same Prince George's County area, but I moved every single year switched schools until I was like 13, 12, 13. And I didn't [00:30:45] realize that was the thing until I was older. I thought my parents just liked to move. And because we stayed in the same area and our community was so tight knit and so loving, I didn't feel like I was missing anything.
Like I always had our community. Like we always, we just moved apartments, but our community was our community [00:31:00] and it was a community that was like highly organized and took care of itself and took care. It was really good at children... now, teenagers.... but children, we were loved. We were loved. We were abundantly, loved and cared for and surrounded all the time by just people.
And I like [00:31:15] folks that don't have a language for a niece and nephew, you're their child. If you think, they still say our children, well into my forties and I'm still our children, so in a lot of ways, they taught me community. They taught me both the responsibility and the benefits of, and then when you [00:31:30] cross the line, I also learned the hard part.
And so I think that's in my bones. There's no, and that's another thing that's imprinted in my spirit is, the importance of community and the importance of taking care of each other. And what you gained from that. And so I feel like for me, [00:31:45] that's been my purpose. It's I just, I always want to be with people like I want to, I'm very introverted, but I really love to gather people and I love to collaborate and be together and figure things out and set up systems like that is what I love to do.
And I think I've always done girls work and [00:32:00] that, I think there's something about girlhood. I don't know if it's my own unresolved pieces of my girlhood, but it's always been central to my work and who I am and wanting to be a safe space for people. And that's that I think is another consistent.
So I, [00:32:15] in terms of being on purpose, I. I think I always lead with that. So the credentials never felt like super important. I was always smart. I think that being smart guy kept me out of a lot of trouble because I'm like, literally in the communities I grew up in, folks were, parents had committed folks and had a lot of money.
And, but I grew up in [00:32:30] communities that would be considered rough. But I felt like people always looked out for me because I was smart. Like it's times when I should have got suspended from school, it'd be like one black teacher pull her aside. No, don't call her mom first. Her mom would kill her.
Second of all, she's real smart. So they would insulate me a little bit. And so that in that, like at every [00:32:45] step it was like, she's smart, protect her. Like she's smart. Look out for her. that was the constant message. And so I always felt like it was incumbent upon me to have that be in service of something.
Because I felt people poured into me. Like I could lift them, like people just. And my mom I've known I'm going to use it wrong, but [00:33:00] my mom would tell us that one of the things that you don't find in the culture here is a thing called Agah which is you know how to take care of people. I think it's a Nigerian word and it's a Yoruba word. And it's like the ability to take care of people and then understanding the reciprocity and doing that. [00:33:15] And I would never tell a story where I got to where I've gotten wherever that is on my own fortitude cause that would be a lie. That would be the biggest lie.
People have poured into me at every level people that shouldn't have, didn't have to, why would they at every single stage? And it's just [00:33:30] been, little twists of luck that put me in positions in places. And yeah, it always feels like it's somebody it's I have to I have to live, I have to live up to that investment.
So that feels important to me. And that feels what's on purpose. And I think the girls work supporting girls. I [00:33:45] just, I love a little girl. That's just rebellious. I love a little girl who just got too much mouth don't know how to act. That's those are my babies.
Like I just, a little ornery doesn't quite do what she's supposed to do. I love the ones that do what they're supposed to do. And I have a little girl. [00:34:00] My daughter is very much she does what she's supposed to do, but I have a special place in my heart for the, was this cussing a little too loud and act just, not just happy their spirit hasn't been broken yet.
They just kinda. Out here trying to figure it out. Like those are [00:34:15] my favorite young people, particularly girls. And so I've always followed them. Like I've worked. So sometimes they locked up. I like that, sometimes they not always in school. Fine. But I just there's that? And it's just been following those young [00:34:30] people and yeah, and I didn't know.
Half the time didn't know what I was doing. I used to think, sometimes when I didn't know what to say and people would tell me the most horrible things, I would just be like, I just gave him a hug. Cause I didn't know what else to do. And I think sometimes you just that's being present and bearing witness.
That's like another thing that feels like [00:34:45] important to me, like I just, yeah, you may not know what to tell somebody or how to help them, but if you can just be present and make and bear witness with them and not make them feel crazy. Cause sometimes when you're going through the most difficult time in your life, you feel crazy.
Cause you wonder why and am I seeing what [00:35:00] I'm seeing? Am I feeling what I'm feeling? And sometimes you can just be with someone and say, you know what, I'm seeing that too. I think that feels important. So that's been a thread I think in my career is just showing up and bear witness to, I think
So I set a kind of a very idealistic, I think the other piece is I'm very, clear-eyed [00:35:15] because of the work that I've done at the level of harm human beings can exact on each other.
And I get very clear about the evil that exists in the world. Very clear on that. I felt that I've seen the worst humanity has to offer to the most vulnerable people [00:35:30] that it offers it to just horrendous forms of violence and that are not done in war. Cause it's one thing to say there's violence and war, but when we're not wearing quote-unquote and peace time, and people are experiencing forms of degradation and violence, I think doing work with girls coming in and out [00:35:45] of the sex trade, the level of violence and degradation that I've seen children withstand. Like I can, I could never be someone who sees the world through Rose colored glasses, because I know the level of the capacity of harm that we're able to exact individually, not just systemically would where [00:36:00] you have some distance, but like looking someone in their eye and the degree of harm that can be exacted.
So I think those two poles keep me where I'm at. And I think that's where the rigor of academia helps because it allows it, it forces me to hold both that ugliness and hold the beauty at the same [00:36:15] time. And then I have to figure out how to reconcile it from time to time okay this person did this and they have a great capacity for doing differently sometimes in the same body, sometimes not.
So I think those two things, I think for me propel my work. It's like I try to hold space for all things, which I think again, doing [00:36:30] sexual violence, advocacy, and listening to people's again, hurt harm that they've experienced. Being able to like, just hold space is all you really all you're doing.
There's no technical other skill. You're just holding space for the harm that's already been created and trying to help [00:36:45] people move to whatever the next step of that processing. It looks like. And so that's always been an innate thing that I do. Not always well, but I think with time I gained experience and got a sense, okay, don't do that, do this, don't do that.
But to wrap it up, that part of the question I think trying to hold humanity in all interactions. I [00:37:00] think that's is part of the other thing that drives me and it's like human beings and all their exalted ideals and beauty and wonderfulness, and then in all of their wretched fucked up shit.
And those all exist at the same time. And then I just try to do my work to like, make it easier for [00:37:15] somebody to do what they, to maybe, someone can point to me. And they're like, moment of greatness and say, she helped me a little bit.
That makes me feel good. Like I'm like, okay, she helped me get there or she made a way or she made space or she opened the door. She was a, what do they call him? Liberated gatekeeper. [00:37:30] Great. That's a space that I like to be in. so that for me, feels on purpose. So I just, at this point in my career, I'm like, I'm just gonna do what I want to do to that end. And I feel like there's a need for it. So somebody's paying me to do it if I can just make the case. And that's really what it is. It's I just want to [00:37:45] be in a position to. To move resources and move love and energy and appreciation visibility to the people that are the audacity to dream up something better than what we're doing right now. And then if I do that's good. And you, and if you pay me to do it, that's even better [00:38:00] because then I can take care of my family.
Yeah. That's yeah, that's what I try to do. I think that's what feels like on purpose for me. I like my freedom to, I want to do what I want to do. And on some level that the doctorate degree, I think helps because I whip it, I can whip it up. I'll be like, [00:38:15] so I'm an expert in something and people will tell me, people, let me do things.
And I'm a firm believer in fake it till you make it. So if that doctor gives me in the door and then I can just do what I do, what I want to do, and that's great. That's the one, I think the thing that it opens up for me is that [00:38:30] people put a lot of energy into it and so they let me do stuff and pay me to do it sometimes, but just let me do stuff.
Britt: Thank you for that.
Mya: Wow.
Britt: I'm glad this is being recorded because I can relisten and let it marinate for a while. You touched upon some really important things.
Mya: Just listening to you [00:38:45] share so many things, just echo, either thinking or struggles or experiences that I've had. And the, the difficulty in being able to balance. Wide eyed [00:39:00] idealism, or just belief that better is possible. And, the other end of that being the reality is so much harder And, how do you balance those in a way that allows you to continue to do the [00:39:15] work that you want to do or invest in the places and the people where you want to do that.
And one of the questions that I had for you too, is that some of your passion being driven by creating a [00:39:30] world that is better for your daughter. And thinking about that, what would you consider to be your vision of that and, or, what part would you like to be able to leave in the world that makes it, better for her?
Ramatu: I [00:39:45] don't know if I know... I get asked this, being in philanthropy, but this is some of the conversations we engage in. I find pockets of it in a lot of different places. It's not as if it doesn't exist. I like. I, for example, I think about my daughter has been pretty ill over this pandemic. And we created a [00:40:00] we part of like a pod of other families in the neighborhood the reason was, school and our kids.
We could, bounce the kids between the houses and they could have socialization and we could have time to work. but really it has been, we have been so cared for, by folks that are not, they're not my family. We [00:40:15] met because our kids go to the same school and I find these moments where people can be incredible, like just profoundly good. And like I said, I know that people can be profoundly evil and I don't know if I ever reconcile it. I think I just, allow for it all to exist, like it's going to [00:40:30] be. And so when I think about the future, I don't know if I dream of a future where that's all gone, all the evil is gone, or if I could imagine a world where I w I worked towards a world where people can then be in full dignity and really don't feel like they have to sacrifice parts of themselves for their survival, both like [00:40:45] actually in spiritually and metaphysically.
That's I strive towards that. I strive in my daughter that she understands what it means to hold people's dignity and treat people, even if you don't like them. Cause you know I don't like everybody. But even when I don't like you, I want to hold your dignity. And I [00:41:00] think the time we're in. On both sides of the political spectrum found lack of that ability.
So allow people, their dignity even I'm not saying I'm not arguing with you about my right to exist or my humanity, but it does mean nothing to destroy you in that process. And what it does [00:41:15] is it shows how much of, how much we share in common, if that's what we're trying to do. Cause I'm no different.
And so I think, there's something, in our one-on-one interactions that has to be, we have to figure how to push forward in our institutions. And I think that's where we're missing a gap. I think people can be nice to each other and [00:41:30] kind to each other. And then we haven't figured out yet how to create our social and public institutions that can do the same.
And I think until we do that, we'll be fighting this fight so I think until we can build into the places where we spend most of our time, our workplaces, our schools the streets, the parks, like if we [00:41:45] can't build an just basic humanity and it's of those institutions, we're going to end up constantly in the place where we're at, where we're fighting these little I don't care if you're racist.
I don't particularly care about your particular anybody's particular racism. Call me all the names. I don't care. What I [00:42:00] care about is are there that you're not infringing on my right to have some dignity that's what I care about. And you can not like the color of my skin all day.
I don't care. I want my dignity though. And that's what I will insist upon. And I think that's where we get lost is that we get caught up. And so even [00:42:15] sometimes I say to, I've been in places where I'm like, No, I've been enough movement spaces to know that we're just as cruel to each other. And so I'm always like, I don't know if I trust you to lead the world that I want to go into.
I think we, I think there's something to be unsettled about the way, the ways we've [00:42:30] taken up interaction. Even when I agree with everything you're saying, there's something just harmful in our rhetoric right now. And so I don't try to reconcile it. I, it makes me unsettled. I don't know.
I don't know if I trust our side to get us to freedom either our side right. In air quotes. I don't [00:42:45] know. I think the world that I see for it, I think it's a world that's gonna need movements. And I think our movements have to continue to strive to be better than the world we're in and the degree to which we succeed and fail at that is going to be the nature of the world that we create when the revolution comes. So I don't know. I don't know [00:43:00] if I have an end point in mind, but I know that my daughter will know how to create community because whatever the world looks like, she's going to need that. And she's gonna know how to be of service because wherever she goes, she's going to need that.
And she's gonna know how to treat people with dignity and she's gonna know how to fight for in the [00:43:15] system on her own. That's all I got. I can't, I don't have a, I don't have a big picture beyond that utopia, but Yeah
Mya: that's enough. That's okay.
Britt: Although it would be nice to see a log frame for that, [00:43:30]
Ramatu: At least keep us occupied for a couple months. Keep ourselves busy.
On A Magic Wand and the Academy: How do you know what you know? [00:43:36]
Britt: We're coming up to the end of our time, but we do like to ask the question if you had a magic wand what are one or two [00:43:45] changes to the Academy broadly defined that you might like to see?
Ramatu: One of my favorite words when I was in grad school, I love this word still. I work in it, all conversations. If I can manage it, is epistemological, the how we know what we know. I love that. That is [00:44:00] my favorite.
Britt: you and me both.
Ramatu: And I try to throw it in where I can.
and why I like it so much is that I, I love thinking about the, how we know what we know, and I would love to see one of the things that, the gift that NoVo was to me in the leadership there at that at the time that I [00:44:15] was there, it was okay for me to trust my instincts, my intuition. And that intuition was informed by lots of experience. So it wasn't like I just came off the ground and said, this is what it is.
Like I had a whole wealth of experience that I brought into that informed that intuition, that gut. And I'm not saying that [00:44:30] the Academy has to be more open to people's gut intuitions, but I do think there is a way of knowing what we know that fall, much of the ways that we know fall outside of the Academy.
And I think the Academy does not do well with multiple ways of knowing what we know. [00:44:45] And not only does it not do well with it, it diminishes it and discards it and dismisses it, which is to the detriment of the Academy. And. I think if there were one more options for people I love the idea of the, Ivory tower in a space for thinkers and people [00:45:00] just thinking research can not be the only way you engage in a community. And it's not the only way most people engage in community, but it's the only way that they are able to bring back into the Academy.
And so there has to be other ways for people to bring in the wisdom so that this [00:45:15] play, the, how much time I spent in my doctoral process, trying to figure out how to separate from myself, from people that I cared about in order to say that I know what I know about them. Like I can't be in relationship with them because then I'm suddenly biased.
And in fact, I believe that I have a clear eyed view because I know this space, [00:45:30] but we devalue so much that positionality, even in spaces where we say they're qualitative and we have different methods and we're using more grounded theories and things like that, even those spaces require a certain distance and abstraction in order to know.
And that can't be the [00:45:45] only way of knowing. I just don't believe that it's not the way most of us move in the world. And so I, that is what I would change. more more deeper, more embodied understanding of what a epistemologyis. That's what I would hope for.
Britt: Awesome.
Ramatu: If anybody wants to get [00:46:00] me an endowed chair so that I can exist across the multiple worlds I have existed in I'm down for that. I do that. I do that. What a beautiful thing to just be able to say, like my dream in life is just to do what I want to do. And I think it'll be a service of all of [00:46:15] us, because I think when everyone, and whenever someone is living their fullest richest, doing what they do well, it will be in service of something.
I just want more space. I want more black women out here just doing it to have endowed chairs and to be able to teach [00:46:30] and learn and be in a lot of different ways. And if I had all the money in the world that's what I would do, I would just say you person over there who has this lived experience that is so rich and beautiful.
Here's some money, go do something, go be free and [00:46:45] figure out what you're going to contribute back to us. And that's going to be great. It's going to be beautiful. That is my dream. So I want that and I want it for myself and I want everybody to have the space, all the brilliant people I come across in my work, both the young people and adults.
I just want them to have space [00:47:00] and like money to go be free and think and do stuff and then bring it back and we'll learn from it.
Britt: When you start that department with your endowed chair, please consider me as a faculty
Mya: me too!
Ramatu: Absolutely.
Mya: There's so much thinking my [00:47:15] mind is exploding right now but then in a good way,
Britt: Wow thank you so much for sharing your deep wisdom around these issues, but also sharing from your heart. One of the main purposes of this podcast is to have heart-centered [00:47:30] conversations. And not only have we met that, but I think we've exceeded that by a long shot. I know I'll be thinking about this conversation for a long time and it's just exciting to know that I've known you now for quite a few years now and to have been able [00:47:45] to have this kind of experience sharing about your background and your perspectives is new and I've just really appreciated.
So thank you.
Ramatu: Thank you. And thank you for inviting me. And I told my partner, I'm like, I'm just gonna get on and talk. He's like about what I said, I'm not sure, but I hope [00:48:00] it's useful to somebody, so
Mya: it was very useful. And honest and from the heart, and also just for me as another black woman who navigated the Academy in different ways than most [00:48:15] of my cohort or classmates or others and
who also is doing passion driven work
It's just very inspiring to hear and to meet, another person who looks like me, who's doing similar things so that I [00:48:30] don't feel alone. And so it was really affirming to hear your story. And some of the things that you say just ringing true with a lot of the places where I am in, in my work and Passion projects. I do appreciate that. And this is how we're [00:48:45] starting off to get to know each other. I'm excited to see what happens after.
Ramatu: I love it. I love it. There's There's there are lots of us though. I've been fortunate enough to meet a few whenever you're needing, that is the, just the, if, a lot of times you're trying to figure out how to live free and in a system that's [00:49:00] not designed for us to live at all.
Some days it feels like I hold on to that and if you ever want to meet some of them, I'm down to no introduce you.
Mya: Great. [00:49:15]
Reflections [00:49:16] Britt: Now we have an opportunity to reflect on our conversation with Ramatu. What's coming up for you, Mya?
Mya: So many words that jumped out at me that I was scribbling down during the [00:49:30] discussion, but Abstraction of the problem of abstraction being ignored to death, standing in the gaps where systems fail, and community.
All of these ideas resonated with experiences that I've [00:49:45] had either in academia or just in, as a professional woman. Trying to do work or make the case for people who are invisible or not seen, or not really considered, for programs or [00:50:00] jobs or any kind of ways who are often excluded.
And so just to hear the different ways those things have shown up in her life and her experience are reaffirming in some way, again, that it's, it's not a singular thing, but in the same way, the fact that they [00:50:15] continue to show up in different places in spaces is also, disappointing. Because it just shows how big these issues are, and they're not just singular. For individuals
Britt: Yeah, that was an amazing conversation. I just appreciate how she openly [00:50:30] shared her perspective and her life and her story and the question that I had. Or that I was excited about before starting exploring her purpose and how those different activities in her life trajectory are knitted together was amazing.
I'm looking forward to listening [00:50:45] to it over and over again. And I know that others will, find a lot of energy from that as well because it's almost just second nature that these different activities assemble around this clear purpose about how one leads a life and how one shows [00:51:00] up for others and how one serves others.
And holding that tension. Yes. Between beauty and ugliness and standing in that gap is what all of us are being called to do in this moment. For sure.
I appreciated too how she. " [00:51:15] Languaged" some of her experience in graduates school. And I think it resonates in a more universal sense with some of the characteristics, the Academy: hostility and just the sort of underlying sense of hostility. It's a very hostile and environment and that aligns with [00:51:30] my experience.
But then the similarity between the Academy and philanthropy it was just fascinating to hear her talk about because so many of those things are just there and it's just huh? Okay. There's a rabbit hole to go down. [00:51:45]
Mya: Yeah. going back to this idea of the tension and just being able to hold the complexity and fullness of. Human beings we can be and who we are in all of our beauty and, evil as well. And yeah, it's rare to [00:52:00] find someone who speaking to your point about language, who can articulate that specific action of holding those two very disparate positions.
In such a way that [00:52:15] still allows her to be able to move forward and still do work, even acknowledging and knowing that, this is the world that we live in, where people can be great. They can be supportive and care for others in community, but they can [00:52:30] also be horrendous and evil and.
A lot of times we'd like to, we hear it as if the world is one or the other and not both. And so how do you navigate hearing her talk about how she navigates from a place of understanding that [00:52:45] the world and people can be and are both, and still wakes up every day and wants to Support and do the work around women and girls and people who are often invisible.
I That's just, to me just amazing and [00:53:00] also, important, I think for people to hear, Because most of the time people are like, Oh, we can do this or this, but not both. And to see and hear somebody who is doing both successfully and impactfully, It's just, I think a [00:53:15] story or a narrative that we don't hear that I think would behoove us to hear and see more of.
Britt: it really resonated with me when she was sharing about One of the things, bringing her to graduate school was, wanting to be involved in education in [00:53:30] some way and really enjoying being part of a learning space, but then finding that she didn't quite fit in with what the conventional either grad school or academic community was offering. And part of it was where she lived, but part of it was just where she was at with life and that she was [00:53:45] working and doing other things and recognize that perhaps the Academy was not the only thing that she was excited about.
And that was very much my case. I was working and doing a lot of stuff related to sustainable agriculture at the time. And I needed that. I love that. I love doing [00:54:00] different things, but I love being able to go and be on the farm and work with the the immigrants that we were working with because it just totally took me out of that academic realm.
And yet at the same time feeling not fully a part of what was happening in school. [00:54:15] And then always being on the fringe. There was a point where she was talking a bit about how it I don't know if it took her a little bit of time to figure out that she wasn't quite her community.
And I had made note that in our graduate program, it was how you wanted to try and be in the light of the [00:54:30] sun of your faculty chair, because it would pass you over at some point, and then you would be out of the light, the warmth. And I remember hearing that, but also feeling that where.
Part of the feeling was that you needed to be around or you needed to, whether it was just at, [00:54:45] in the department or at the conferences or whatevers. And what it took for her to find her people it would have been interesting if we had more time to talk a little bit more about what went into that and eventually find that.
Mya: And as I said, I don't think I've realized [00:55:00] previously how important it is to hear similar experiences. Of your own, even though they've happened in the past, even though I feel like for the most part I've worked through, I won't say just the experiences that I [00:55:15] had in grad school, but, to hear similar feelings of not being able to find community or having to, create your own community or navigating it as a working student not on [00:55:30] campus or through an RA ship, but as, having an outside job that, pays your bills, but may not, connect directly to your studies.
And. The lack of space or understanding or acknowledgement of that in some of [00:55:45] these programs of how people can afford grad school. Cause I went to NYU. Yes. Going home and having to lay down because you're realizing there's no money, in my master's program there was no funding.
And those [00:56:00] kinds of. struggles that are often so insular and so private and so commonly not shared to hear someone else having gone through that, overcome it. And I just don't think I've ever [00:56:15] really experienced or thought about what. Hearing that from someone else would mean to me.
And I don't think I still don't think I can articulate exactly what it means, but there's something about hearing something that [00:56:30] you feel like echoes your own journey of course, with nuance and difference, but there's something there that. Really resonated with me today that I just will have to spend some time trying to make sense.
Britt: Definitely a [00:56:45] conversation where we hit the Mark of why this podcast exists. Yeah.
Mya: And I just want to invite her for a summer. Picnic coffee or something. It's like a stroll through, central park in New York just walking around and talking was love to invite her to do that one day [00:57:00] soon.
Britt: Yeah. I'm looking forward to joining her faculty someday, so
Mya: Yes. The endowed chair.