Cancer Clear and Simple
Welcome to 'Cancer Clear and Simple,' the podcast dedicated to simplifying cancer. Join us as we discuss the world of cancer, breaking down complex concepts for our listening audience. One of our goals is to equip individuals and families dealing with cancer by providing clear, and concise insights. Through personal stories, expert interviews and practical tips, listeners are enabled to make informed decisions. Whether you're a patient, caregiver, or just simply wanting information, tune in to 'Cancer Clear and Simple' for a easy-to-follow guide on understanding and coping with cancer.
Cancer Clear and Simple
Mrs. Andreal Davis │ Educating with Purpose and Passion
Join us for a compelling episode featuring Ms. Andrell Davis, an inspiring educator who has profoundly impacted her community and beyond. As the recipient of the prestigious Milken Educator Award, Ms. Davis shares her extraordinary journey of teaching her son and his classmates from third to fifth grade, revealing her unique insights into fostering academic growth and engagement. Discover her pioneering work at the African American Ethnic Academy, where an Afrocentric curriculum brought subjects to life through culturally relevant themes, leaving a lasting legacy for students and educators alike.
Explore the transformative power of cultural relevance in education through Ms. Davis's groundbreaking role in the Madison school district. As the first instructional resource teacher for cultural relevance, she developed the CPR initiative—Cultural Practices that are Relevant—offering educators immersive experiences to enhance their instructional methods and cultural understanding. This work expanded to include youth tours of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, opening new educational horizons for young people and reinforcing the importance of diverse learning experiences.
The episode also delves into Ms. Davis's personal battle with pancreatic cancer and the birth of AfriCancer, an initiative dedicated to raising awareness about cancers affecting the African-American community. Through collaborations with organizations like the UW Carbone Cancer Center, AfriCancer empowers youth to take leadership roles in health advocacy and cancer research. As we wrap up, listeners are left with a message of hope, inspired by Ms. Davis's vision of a brighter future and the potential for collective action to create meaningful change.
And joining us today is Ms Andrell Davis. Welcome.
Speaker 2:Thank you. I'm so happy to be here. I'm very honored and humbled that you felt it was important enough to have a conversation with me this morning, so thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 1:Of course. So let's just jump right in. Can you share a couple highlights from your career as an educator?
Speaker 2:Well, there are many. One that comes to mind right off the bat is that I was able to have my oldest son in my classroom for three years straight, and I'm also happy about the opportunity that I had to teach that entire class from third grade, fourth grade and fifth grade and so to witness their growth but, more importantly, witness how they were able to take their learning and apply it back to our learning environment and be able to show their learning and show what they were able to obtain over the three years. By the time we got to fifth grade, they were helping run reading groups run reading groups. They met me at the school to set up our bulletin boards and have input in how we were going to execute each of our content areas and how we were going to add information that was reflective of their multicultural backgrounds, and so that was just amazing to be able to watch them from third grade through fifth grade, and many of them I still have contact and relationships with now when they're adults.
Speaker 2:I also was honored one year as the Milken Educator, which is kind of the Grammys of education, and they only choose two teachers from every state to receive that award. We were given a cash award of $25,000 to use as we pleased, and of course, I poured into my own children as well as children in my classroom with those monies. But to be honored in that way was amazing. I was able to meet President Obama at the time. I was able yeah, I'd actually chased him in the Capitol and had the Secret Service kind of putting the eye on me, but President Obama was so he was just the most wonderful person. He allowed me to enter his space and he allowed me to ask him questions, give him a hug, and I went to Tammy Baldwin's office and a lot of different people at the time and we didn't have a lot of money, so we did a foot tour of all the different monuments and all the different places that you should go and see in DC with our children. We wanted to expose them. So that was another highlight.
Speaker 2:And being able to implement work called CPR and it basically was breathing new life into instructional practices.
Speaker 2:So creating that at a Saturday program my husband and I ran and then being able to move that out across schools across the district in Madison and ultimately, at the end of my career, across the state. So implementing that model with a team of people who were just as passionate about their work, and finding people across the state who were successful in their practices. That was another highlight. And then, finally, my husband and I ran an academic and cultural enrichment program called African American Ethnic Academy. We did that for 12 years, where we had students from pre-K all the way up through eighth grade and we taught science, social studies, self-esteem, math, art, reading and technology, all from an Afrocentric perspective. And to see the children flourish in that program and again see some of the adults as I move around the city who still remember their work, hold on to it, have still had it incorporated into their daily lives, those are some of the highlights that I really think about when I review my career.
Speaker 1:So you, touched on something that. So you touched on something that has a lot more within it, and I'd like you to just talk a little bit more about that program, because the impact that I'm hearing is reverberating, you know, way beyond that time that you were able to spend. Can you talk a little bit more about some of the activities that you were able to do through the African-American Ethnic Academy?
Speaker 2:Yes, one of the things that I would like for the audience to know is that the staff at the African-American Ethnic Academy most of their staff members stay with that program for 12 years and what you have to understand is they work throughout the week at local schools and some of our parents were instructors as well, and people were there every Saturday from 830 until noon and they were leading classes in, like I said, science, social studies, self-esteem, math, art, reading and technology. Everything was from an Afrocentric perspective and everything was taught thematically. So, for example, if we were studying Harriet Tubman, we would talk about what does that mean from a scientific standpoint of how does she use the stars to navigate slaves to freedom. We also talked about what were the medicinal properties. We would take them to ProMega, what were the medicinal properties of some of the plants that she used to quiet the babies, and we would have students actually extract some of the medicines from plants in a summer science program at Pearl Mega.
Speaker 2:But also during the year for the African-American Ethnic Academy, we would in the music classes. They would sing, you know, songs, the songs, some of the songs that the slaves used to get to freedom, and they also would read about Harriet Tubman from various levels, again, from pre-K all the way up through eighth grade. They had a computer class where they would actually have different games, where they would navigate in the underground railroad on the computer programs and what kind of math was being used. And so we would do all of that from September until December and then in December there would be a huge showcase for the parents and community, teachers, different schools, powers that be from DPI, to demonstrate what did all of that thematic, connected, identity development work, culturally responsive, what did that look like? And we may have been able to touch on maybe two or three themes from September to December. So all of that was showcased in our December Kwanzaa celebration where we would invite everyone to come in to see what we had been embarking on throughout the entire semester.
Speaker 1:That makes me think about the things that lead into what inspired cultural practices that are relevant. Can you take us through because I'm hearing that that was a 12-year program, right, and things transform, you know, just with the energy and things like that Can you take us through the transition from that type of programming to cultural practices that are relevant?
Speaker 2:I sure can so. So once we were no longer with the academy, we decided that from the data that we were collecting and sharing with the school district, we began to notice that the work that we had done had powerful impacts and we wanted to try to see what is, what are the ways that we could translate that work into a more diverse setting where you didn't just have African-American students? How could you translate that work into a classroom? So we had two classrooms at Lincoln Elementary School, led by Kim O'Donohue and Kira Fobbs at the time. They were teachers at the academy for those 12 years, so they were fully aware of what did that culturally responsive practices work, look and sound and feel like. And now let me take some steps to integrate this into my multicultural classroom setting. And they did that over a number of years while I collected data.
Speaker 2:By that time I was downtown and they had created a special position for me because of the work at the academy called I was the first instructional resource teacher for cultural relevance in the Madison school district and that position was created because of what happened at the Academy and because of the outcomes, and so we tried I work out in some classrooms the next thing. You know, I'm moving my instructional cultural relevance work out from that district position, moving it out throughout the district, and so they gave us four schools to work with, and we were able to work with those schools and collect data over a five-year period, and so that work was called CPR, and what I did is I took the teachers at those schools through a process where they had to embark on seven experiences.
Speaker 1:So I noticed that you had mentioned CPR twice now. Is that cultural practices that are relevant, or is it something that preceded it?
Speaker 2:You got it. It's cultural practices that are relevant and the tagline for it is breathing new life into our instructional practices. So CPR was born out of what happened. I just kind of retraced my steps around what happened at the African American Ethnic Academy for those teachers, for those family members that were leading work in our Saturday program, and what we landed on is we did book studies. We read a lot of books, so we did book studies. That was one experience. We combed the country looking at best practices and models around African-American student achievement. So we went to places in DC schools that had an Afrocentric focus on science and we went to community centers and we went to conferences. That was another experience. You got a chance to go to conferences and workshops.
Speaker 2:I would try to leave that towards the end. We would go to different community events, like we might go to a Raiders practice and we might watch all the people that are at the game or at the practice and what are their management techniques? What kind of management techniques do you see? What managed techniques are you seeing the coaches use? What managed techniques are you seeing the grandmothers who are out there or the aunts who are out there or the aunts who are out there, what management techniques are working and what kind of translations can you do, given who you are? That might give you the same results and the same outcomes. We also took them to schools where they would see the use of Black communications, where they would see cultural images all over the building, where they would see the impacts of students seeing adults in front of them who look like them and so they would. They would have these seven experiences the school visits and the conferences and workshops and the book studies, and we would give them a research article and they would go visit different schools and conferences, and so it was a series of seven experiences that all connected to.
Speaker 2:By the time the teachers got done with those seven experiences, literally, you would see people break down and cry or they would go down to their knees and say I never knew what I didn't know. And now that I know, I would say now that you know, what are you going to do with it? And you have the option to do nothing or you have the option to do something. What is your action plan? What are you going to do now?
Speaker 2:So that model became very big across the Madison school districts. We had guest speakers. As a part of those experiences as well, we brought in a national consultant named Dr Sharaki Holly, who he basically got his start from working with one of my group of 25 teachers. We went to go visit his school and from there he went out on the circuit and he became one of the biggest things since sliced pie. After our visit he has presented all over Wisconsin. Visit, he has presented all over Wisconsin, and so from that I got a call from the state level and was able to move that work out across the state as well before I retired.
Speaker 1:Within all of that, I'm hearing a lot of benefits that the teachers were able to glean, and so also in a bit of my research around your career and the things that you've done, it mentioned that you led youth HBCU tours. So the historically Black colleges and universities, what colleges did you visit?
Speaker 2:So I just that is the newest branch of what I call four arms of cultural practice that are relevant my business, and so we have the AfriCancer work. We also have the HBCU tours, and then we have breath bags, and so the HBCU tours are the newest branch of the business, and what I saw was I had a lot of people in my family who I felt like they just needed a couple of more experiences to be able to make some decisions about what they were going to do post high school. And so In the first year I took two of my nieces to Southern in Louisiana and to Dillard, and when they went, you know, I made them watch movies ahead of time that featured Southern, that featured Dillard. We had some debriefings about the movies they watched. They had little swag bags, or their breath bags with their notebooks in their background, information about the places they were going to be visiting, and I tried to incorporate some of those seven experiences into what they were doing as well on the HBCU tour. And so they had book studies, they had articles, all of this stuff before they left.
Speaker 2:And so, um, what they started saying to me on the, on those visits, on that particular visit, um, it's too hot, like I just never knew that any place could be this hot. Or one said I do want to attend school here. Or they would say things like look at what kind of food they're serving. And they, we got the chance to go to a step show and they were all. They mesmerized. It solidified for the both of them. They used to come to my house every Christmas and half of the group would want to be a part of one sorority and the other group half would want to be a part of another sorority. So they were like about four or five years old and they would come in every Christmas. They would have studied on the internet the different steps, come in and have a step show, competition against each other, the two different groups, and now one of them is very, very, very, very, very, very close to being becoming a part of that particular sorority that she's been interested in since she was three or four. Um, they said stuff like oh, that's too far away from my mama, or one of them is now in high school and getting all A's and diligently telling her mama.
Speaker 2:Another place that we went was Spelman. I'm going to Spelman, mama, I'm going to Spelman, my grandson has interest in going to Morehouse because we also went to Morehouse. So it's created some interest. But it also has helped some of them understand I'm not going that far, or it's too hot or I like the food. They understood that different world was filmed on certain campuses and that excited them. So they also have become very interested in some summer programming that's been offered at some of those campuses. So it's had some really profound effects.
Speaker 2:I just it makes them think about things that if you were guiding a young person, things you would want them to think about. Do you want to do in-state tuition out-of-state? One of them, or one of my nieces, said I love everything about Spelman. They just don't have track. And that's my number one, like she's really really good at it, and so she, you know she started making some decisions about what they don't really have my extracurricular that I'm, that I'm looking into, so I need to take that into consideration that is a lot of self-actualization, and hearing that you were able to foster a path to understanding those decisions yeah, that is, you know, top notch.
Speaker 1:And so I heard you mention briefly the Afrocancer Project. Can you talk about that in the scope of the work that you're doing?
Speaker 2:Sure. So I had a hard time accepting my own diagnosis. I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in December of 2019. And I had a hard time accepting my own diagnosis and my friends and family were trying to be so helpful. They researched and they were bringing me information back and you know you should try this and you should try that. And I heard this about this and this was successful for this person. And I found myself just being quietly resistant.
Speaker 2:And one morning I woke up and I have a sitting room in my bedroom and I went to the sofa and I sat there and I said to myself over your career, what has really been pivotal in your buy-in to many of the things that you've accepted to be a part of, to lead, what has been pivotal in that? And I I realize it goes back to what I talked about before the identity development, the connection Like how do I see myself, like what does this all have to do with me? Different African-American people who pancreatic cancer had impacted their life in one way or another. And I ran across Aretha Franklin and I ran across Lorraine Hansberry and I ran across John Lewis and I ran across Joe Jackson, the father of the Jackson Five, and I just Dizzy Gillespie and Cab Calloway and I'm like whoa all of these people had pancreatic cancer and I started reading their stories and that day was the day that I accepted that I had pancreatic cancer and so I said I want to share this with other people because it might be a blessing to somebody else's life. It might have an impact on somebody else's life in a way that it's had on mine.
Speaker 2:It has had on mine, and so I created that PowerPoint and I began to share it out during the annual Black History Education Conference, and I was happy to report to my audience that I had accepted it and I wanted to do more. So I started thinking about how, in the same year 2019, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer, and so I wanted to do something about awareness and education for breast cancer, and I wanted to do something about awareness, education and even possibly screening with pancreatic cancer, with prostate cancer and with colon cancer. Those were the four types of cancer that I had been hearing was having really profound impacts on our community. Incorporate something, a strand in the conference that again created awareness, provided education and screening. I didn't feel like I could leave that out, especially since I had decided in that year that I was going to share out with the entire audience what I had learned and how I had come to acceptance, and so AfriCancer was born out of that.
Speaker 1:The name AfriCancer. You put it very poetically and very. Can you talk about the name and how that came together for you?
Speaker 2:Yes, um, and so you know, again, I was talking about how a lot of my work centered around African-American student achievement and I was just sitting there just kind of writing on the sofa and I wrote out African.
Speaker 2:And then my husband and I we came together and we were like African and at the end you could make it cancer. And so with the last C-A-N of African, we turned that into cancer. And then I looked and my whole time before that day I was really kind of negating the whole idea of having cancer and I saw I can, I can in the middle. So it was AFR, a real large I, real large C-A-N and then C-E-R and it turned into AfriCancer and that's how it came about. And so I really, when I'm talking to people about it, I will point that out and I will really try to make sure they're focused in on the I can, that there are some things that you can do and also, as a survivor, there are some things that I want to share with you that I've been, you know, that have helped me, like the PowerPoint, like seeing people who look like me, who overcame or didn't, but still has some things to offer to help me along my journey, so that's how that all came about To help me along my journey.
Speaker 1:So that's how that all came about and you've had some collaborators in that work. Can you mention some of the collaborators that have helped that part of the project?
Speaker 2:Yes. Well, first and foremost is the UW Carbon Cancer Center and people like yourself. You just have been champions and you have been, as, as the kids would say, ride or die, just been there the whole time, helped me along the way, helping, support the vision of getting the education piece out, getting the awareness out, helping people know where they can go for screenings, and so I want to shout you out, I want to shout out, sophia Redditoff, you guys have just been champions in the work and I cannot thank you enough. Also, dr Erlise Ward, thank you enough. Also, dr Elise Ward has been very helpful, helping us again reach those goals that we set forth for the Afro Cancer Project. We work with PanCan, pancreatic Cancer Network. They have come in and done sessions specifically focused on African Americans and just cancer in general. We have had the Prostate Health Education Network, FEN, focusing on African American males and prostate cancer. We just have had a number of organizations that have been gone over and above and beyond to help us achieve those goals.
Speaker 1:And you have helped transform youth engagement in healthy living. Can you share some of those experiences or feedback that you've gotten from youth around this focus?
Speaker 2:Well, I also missed an organization. Exact Sciences has also been very supportive and with that when I think about youth, and with that when I think about youth, I have to say that my focus and the thing that I have thought about the most and have wanted to get out to the youth is that I reached out to a high school student who came in and talked about what his experience has been as an intern of color a person of color who is doing research in the cancer arena, and what types of opportunities are available for youth to be able to partake in those experiences. And my biggest push with the youth has been you can take leadership roles around this work. And I even went to one of the sessions that we offered at the Black History Education Conference and I asked the youth to consider becoming a part of internships like the one the speaker was involved in, as well as ask them consider going into a field that might help create a cure for what I have. And I saw some light bulbs go off and some eyes light up when I put out that plea, when I said you might be the person that finds the cure for pancreatic cancer, what I have, cure for pancreatic cancer, what I have. And this young man is here telling you about how he's working with doctors, how he is doing research in various cancer related areas that one day, you never know, he might come up on a cure and be the one that does that.
Speaker 2:And my grandson is 10 and he was with me last summer and we were at Culver's. We were eating our dinner and he said, grandma, what kind of cancer do you have? And I said I have pancreatic cancer. And my husband was like, well, you might be a doctor. And then he was like no, I think I want to be an engineer, but when I'm an engineer, I'm going to focus on finding a cure for G glamize cancer.
Speaker 2:And so I just really have been pushing the youth to understand that, first of all, they may be the people who find these cures, and trying to push them in the direction of the STEM fields where we know we've been talking for so many years about. We want more of our children to look in that direction, and I also have been pushing them to say, if you do end up with some type of illness or disease that you don't want to have, maybe you could do the same thing that I did, and find some people who look like you, who have had or have the same thing that you do, and they might provide you with some inspiration on how to move forward.
Speaker 1:So, in a nutshell, that's the, that's the two directions that I've been kind of pushing you that I've been kind of pushing youth, so that is very powerful to know that you're inspiring and motivating youth to consider these types of career paths and career fields, and I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart and just can you give us some like themes that may have outlined your professional career and then we can lead into some parting thoughts.
Speaker 2:Sure, sure I am. When I look back over my career, even from day one, back over my career even from day one. The first thing I thought about when I entered my classroom in Madison, wisconsin, for the first year, first day, I thought about what my educational career looked like in Milwaukee and the number one thing I wanted from my heart was for children to be able to see themselves in the learning experience, no matter who they were. And so that was self-identity, or identity development has been crucial for me. Identity development has led me through everything that I have done. Can you see who you can be? Can you realize your possible self? Are people showcasing, demonstrating, speaking life into you? That grows that identity development. So that's a critical one.
Speaker 2:Culturally responsive practices. We got culturally responsive practices from Dr Gloria Lassen-Billings and I switched it around to cultural practices that are relevant. Cultural practices that are relevant has been the block that I have firmly planted my feet. Firmly planted my feet throughout everything that I have done, and even with the creation of the Black History Education Conference. It was created out of what I felt was not a sense of urgency around African-American student achievement and around they were at the time talking about American Indian and our Latinx students around culturally responsive practices, because in even raising my own three men now, that was what led me.
Speaker 2:I never wavered off of that and I know that the students, many of the students that I've taught, and my own sons, they know who they are. They know who they are. So that is also another thing know who you are, because you also have to know who you are as a practitioner and what you bring to the learning environment. And how does that need to be enhanced, enriched, adjusted. So knowing who you are is also a theme that I've carried with me as well.
Speaker 1:And, as some parting messages, what would you like to leave for our audience and future guests?
Speaker 2:Well as of recently, I've developed a mantra. I do prayer call every Monday, wednesday and Friday, and everybody knows that when I say what my prayers are, I say that I'm living large, with God in charge. I also would like people to know that a big mantra is visualize the future and be inspired, and that has carried me a long way on this education cancer journey. If you visualize the future and you're inspired, it moves you in a direction of looking for the positive. It moves you in a direction of knowing that joy will come in the morning, and I'm hoping that everyone who is listening today just leaves with a message of inspiration. Just leaves with a message of inspiration, a message of I too have tools and resources that can be shared with the world. A message of things can get better and things can get brighter and that collectively, we can make it happen.
Speaker 1:You heard it here first, folks from Ms Andrell Davis. Thank you so much once again for joining us and being able to impart upon us your wonderful experiences.
Speaker 2:Thank you for this space, thank you for this time, thank you for our connection, thank you for the work that you do and that you lead and again, like I just said, I just hope I have many more years of holding hands with you in this work.
