Episode 220: Bridges, Belonging, and Buy-In with Joe LaTorre

Darrin Peppard (00:01)

Hey my friends, welcome back into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. This is episode 220 and my guest on the show today is Joe LaTore. But before we dive into our conversation with Joe, I want to take a moment to talk about something really energizing from a recent keynote that I gave. I had the chance to speak to a group of school leaders and not only was the audience incredibly engaged, but even the sound team came up afterward and said,

Man, I usually just sit back and monitor the levels and that kind of thing, but I was hooked the whole time. Man, that was powerful. If you can hook the sound team who has heard it all, you know you've absolutely crushed it. Now, that's the kind of impact that I strive to bring to every single event, to be authentic, to be actionable, and to be uplifting. So if you're planning a leadership retreat,

back to school kickoff or professional learning day and want to start your year with clarity and with energy, let's connect. I'd love to bring that same energy to your district, to your event. Now let's get on to today's episode. Joel Latorre is a middle school English teacher, team coordinator, and the founder of the Bridges program, a student leadership and cultural exchange initiative that has truly transformed how students engage with school, how they engage with each other.

and how they engage with their community. Joe's work is very intentional around culture, trust, and student empowerment. And it aligns perfectly with what we talk about so often here on the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. So let's not waste any time. Let's dive right into this conversation with Joe Latorre.

Darrin Peppard (00:01.083)

All right, everybody, welcome back into the show. Today, my guest, Joe Latorre, is an educator in New York. Always love when I have the opportunity to sit down and have a conversation with a practicing educator and one who honestly, I think, speaks a lot of the same language that I do with being intentional with.

focusing on culture with really engaging our students and finding ways to give them authentic learning experiences. We're going to talk about all of those things today on the show. Before we get to that, though, let me welcome our guest in. So Joe, thanks for joining me here on Leaning into Leadership.

Joe LaTorre (00:45.144)

Darren, thank you so much for having me. It's really an honor. I'm the biggest fan of your podcast. I am listening to over 100 episodes now. And I don't know where I will come in the order, but I'm excited to listen to 100 more. So thank you for having me, and I'm really excited to talk.

Darrin Peppard (01:02.585)

Yeah, absolutely, man. I appreciate that. really do. Let's do this. Let's maybe zoom out just a little bit and orient the viewing and listening audience a little bit on who Joe Latorre is. Give them a little bit of your story. Tell them a little bit about who you are and kind of what really is your passion in education.

Joe LaTorre (01:23.938)

Well.

I am a reformed finance bro from Long Island, New York and I did that for a few years out of school before realizing where my heart really lies and it is an education and it's specifically an English education. So I'm really fortunate. I've been teaching almost 15 years now at Oceanside Middle School and that's on the south shore of Nassau County in Long Island. I have a bunch of roles in my building because I really do love being here.

addition to teaching, I'm a team coordinator. So our middle school is a seventh and eighth grade middle school and we practice teaming and looping. And I think a lot of people know what teaming is. It's a team of teachers of different subject areas. Looping, I don't know if it's as commonly known, is when you get the students for more than one year. So you get to really build relationships and culture in a different way. Along the way, I became a union representative. I'm in year nine or 10 of that. I'm starting to lose track.

founded a program called Bridges, which is sort of my passion project that developed into something bigger than I could have ever imagined. And we're about to hit year 10 there, and I'm going to talk to you more about that later. And I'm really fortunate. I've won two New York State English Teaching Awards, the first for the program Bridges in 2019 and the last this past year, 2024, for excellence in English education.

So here we are and I would have to say the thing that I'm most passionate talking about, know, besides poems and literature and all the great things that make an English classroom really rewarding for kids is culture building and creating buy-in so that kids really embrace those experiences in our classrooms, especially in middle school where they might not always see the connection between a poem and their life. They're not quite at that age where they have the life experience to kind of

Joe LaTorre (03:23.824)

make that text to life connection yet, but we always find ways.

Darrin Peppard (03:28.506)

Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And let's, let's, let's maybe stay on that. Let's, let's stay on the middle school piece. Uh, I don't know if you're aware of this, uh, my first five years in education, I was a middle school teacher. I taught middle school science. Um, absolutely loved it, uh, before moving on to the high school to, to, teach and to be a head coach and that kind of stuff. Um, truly enjoyed middle school. And of course, culture in the classroom is something that's very important to me. Um, I know you're aware, um,

my most recent book that I co-authored with Katie Kinder is Culture First Classrooms. And in many cases, Katie, of course, was a middle school teacher. We tend to think a lot about the middle school classrooms and in many ways, because I think middle school is the one that gets overlooked the most. We think a lot about, here's what happens in elementary. And then we think about high school and the, you know, preparing for college and career and all of those types of things. But I want to go back to

to something that you said there specifically, and let's stay with middle school. It's very applicable at all grade levels, but let's talk about that actual building of culture in your classroom. And I think this is gonna lead us eventually to talking about bridges, but share a little bit of what you do, maybe your approach to that culture building, especially when you're looping, which I think is so interesting. My daughter had the opportunity to loop in third and fourth grade.

Second and third grade, she looped. So wonderful, built great relationships with her teacher, but also with all of her classmates, which I thought was really great. Maybe talk about it from the, you know, when you're getting a new group versus that, you know, start of year two with setting the standard and building that culture in your classroom.

Joe LaTorre (05:15.178)

So I love looping and it's funny, I think to your point about middle school being overlooked, I think sometimes people almost block out their middle school experience. When you tell people you teach middle school, they have like a visceral reaction, like,

Darrin Peppard (05:29.99)

yeah, you can see it, yeah.

Joe LaTorre (05:31.624)

Yeah, in like an adult's face. And I get it because it's the first time you care about how you look and it's probably the worst you're ever going to look. And it's the first time you care about how you speak to people and you want to talk to people and make connections and you kind of are lost on how to do that, whether it's with the adults who teach you or the kids who are usually pretty new. You're moving from that elementary pond to like a much bigger, you know, lake, so to speak. And so what we like to do is

is show them on day one that we trust them.

And that's the thing with the teachers I work with on my team is we try to take an unorthodox approach to it. I think that you are used to sort of being dripped trust through school, right? Because you're growing and it's only natural for all the amazing elementary teachers, have to kind of, know, trial and error give them a little bit more trust. But one of the things we do is we show them right away that we're going to start with trust.

and go from there. And I think that's the foundation all of it because when they see that you trust them, they trust you. And I think in terms of building culture, we start with a few different things. Obviously, you know, we try not to do the standard icebreakers, but we try to find different ways to come about it in an unorthodox way. One thing I'll do sometimes is they'll come into the room in the first week and I'll have a roll of toilet paper and I'll say, take as much or as little as you like. And they're just looking at me like I'm

crazy for asking them to take toilet paper. And they go, all right, guys, you have how many squares? That's what you got to tell everybody. Now let's do that. And for a lot of them, it's not going around in a circle and saying your favorite ice cream flavor. It's being put on the spot and seeing that it's going to be OK.

Joe LaTorre (07:19.948)

You know that idea of you're speaking in front of a room of people who haven't just met you, and it's fine. We're all in the same boat together. We're all going to go through this together. And once you start building that trust right from day one, you could talk about how trust works as a team. And I think whether you're a team of adults, so the teacher is working with the kids, or the kids working with each other, you show them how you're accountable to one another.

and you build that accountability through silly things like, you know, the team dress up days that, you know, every middle school and even elementary schools have, but you also build those things through showing them, listen, like, we are all on task together and we're creating something bigger. And then over time, you get to build community. So you start with this trust and you start with this accountability and you find ways to build community. And sometimes that's...

something very, very proactive. So you you've done restorative circles. I'm sure we've heard those terms, that terminology before. Sometimes it's a proactive meant for the moment day where we spend the entire day working on it. Sometimes it's, you know what guys?

let's put everything aside first and put you ahead of the curriculum. And I think for them, that's unorthodox, and I think for a lot of teachers, it's sometimes a hard sell at first, but once you try it, you get it. Because I think we're all rushing to stay on pace, especially if you teach English and reading and math, you know, you're held accountable to state tests and state standards. And you view it as...

Darrin Peppard (08:53.209)

Right.

Joe LaTorre (08:56.906)

Every day I'm not teaching toward those standards is a day I'm losing toward making the progress. I think in reality, when you center that culture, you get something better. They're going to follow you anywhere. And that's kind of been our secret is.

before we touch curriculum, we really try to build relationships. actually, because you brought up your book, I have to say, because I've just finished it it's wonderful, and I think it should be the standard of when we're pedagogical instruction is that it's based on this idea of relationships. That's what it is. We're a relationship business. You know I mean? We're creating.

lifelong relationships, honestly, because I'm old now and now I work with some of former students. But we're creating relationships for the long haul and I think you have to start there. know, I'm really happy to see that, you know, people like you are writing books like this because I think it's making some of those dinosaur expressions like don't smile before Thanksgiving, go by the wayside and people are starting to open up to this idea. So thank you.

Darrin Peppard (09:48.271)

Yeah.

Darrin Peppard (10:10.51)

Yeah, well, no, I appreciate that. Thank you for that. There's unsolicited plug, but thank you. I think one of the important things there, you know, with what you're saying, I mean, we are 100 % in a relationship business. And if we're not investing in our relationships, that's when actually I think things are going in the opposite direction. So I would echo what you're saying.

you know, setting a day aside or setting time aside to focus on relationships is not time that you're losing to cover curriculum. Because if all you're doing is covering curriculum, students aren't necessarily learning it anyway. And, you know, once, once they know who you are, when they know that you trust them and that they can trust you, that the odds of, you know, the curriculum that you are bringing to them,

sticking and actually becoming something they take some ownership of. I think the odds of that go up astronomically, especially in middle school. This is the thing that I think is maybe most special about middle school. The students at the middle school level are, you talked about it, know, they're, you know, worried about how they look, you know, they're trying to speak to people, all of those kinds of things, but they're also still teacher pleasers.

And when you really lean in and build relationships with kids, was to me, that was the most important piece when I was a middle school teacher is just focus on the relationship. Man, I had kids who, who worked so hard in my classroom and other teachers who would say, I don't know how you're getting work out of that kid. does nothing for me. Well, you know, if you're building the relationship with them and

building some trust, get to know, you know, you get to know their story and you understand how you can best best support that that particular child. So I want to take that just a step further, because I think once you get to that place where you've established those trusting relationships, and you're you're developing this, this atmosphere of you will be trusted.

Darrin Peppard (12:21.72)

That to me is where that student leadership piece starts to come out. And I know that's so much of what that Bridges program was all about was really enabling students to lead. And that's something I'm really passionate about. And I'm really excited to hear you talk about this Bridges project that you've been working on now for almost a decade.

Joe LaTorre (12:43.086)

Yeah, and and I'm actually you're catching me on a fantastic day because my collaborators on the project and I were about to Embark where we're just finalizing a date to plan and dream up next year So bridges is the passion project and I have to thank you know, all of my collaborators on the project So hi guys, hope you're listening but um, I'll break it down for everyone. So I live on Long Island and Long Island is diverse. It's a sub

of Manhattan, but it's also largely segregated in a sort of de facto way where people often live in communities where everyone looks like them. And those communities can be next to each other or close by, and yet you don't interact with people who are not like you. And I was very fortunate to start my teaching career with two great mentor teachers, Nina Sabbath and Justin Williams at Uniondale High School, which is a district that's demographically different than Oceanside, and I loved it there.

I really, really learned so much there from the students, from the teachers I worked with. And then I came over to Oceanside and I started working here and it's a different group of people. And I started to realize these are two communities that are 15 minutes away that never interact. And we dreamed up this program that way. So it starts in the seventh grade. Students apply to be the program. We ask them to talk about an issue that they think that the government, so nationally, state level, needs to address, so a societal issue.

and then an issue which they think they're empowered or could address in their community. So they write these assignments for us, we go through them, it's sort of like your audition for the program, and we create cohorts of 30 kids from each school that then meet throughout the year, and it starts in seventh grade and moves all the way up to our senior year. So these kids now form friendships and bonds with people they never would have met starting in the seventh grade.

Along the way, we create that sort of decentralized leadership that we both love, where the kids are sort of taking the onus on themselves to create something special. So in the seventh grade, it's just about, why don't you make some new friends from a new community that you don't know, and the kids really take to each other, and we give them cultural experiences. In the eighth grade, we start to move more into discussing some of the issues that...

Joe LaTorre (15:07.392)

For better or for worse, teachers are often afraid to bring into their classrooms now. And these are issues related to race, politics, religion. The hot button issues, we show the students how to share space when they disagree. We show them how to find and verify the accuracy of those sources so that media literacy skill set that's going to matter.

And then a crazy thing happens. Those kids get older and they go into the ninth and the tenth grade. And we start, you know, exposing them to guest speakers and new cultures. Last month we took them to a Sikh temple and they learned about the Sikh faith. And that's a religion that students in neither school really would know much about. And so now two demographically different districts are learning about a third group they never would have met in a million years before this program.

And we start to give them leadership skills. So communication tools that they can use to be the class president, the captain of the football team, at their part-time jobs to resolve conflict. I don't know if you've heard of Amanda Ripley and the looping technique. We teach them that.

And it culminates in them being seniors in their school communities and seniors in our program, where we have what's called a year of giving, where the kids partner up or work in even larger groups and create these service learning projects where they do give back to their communities. And it's just been so rewarding. Our first group are in college now. We have two kids who are college roommates that wouldn't have met without the program. And it's just, it's something, man, I...

can't say enough good things about the teachers or the kids because they're all going somewhere. Some are in the military, some are in college. All of them are giving back. One of our students just did, it was Mental Health Awareness Day. I believe that's nationwide. I don't know if it's New York State thing, but we just had Mental Health Awareness Week in New York and we just had a Mental Health Awareness Day and she put on in the local community center eight cards for Mental Health Day. you know, when you start to see the way kids take...

Joe LaTorre (17:11.924)

know, sort of the seeds of the culture we're trying to create and then already give back to their communities as teenagers. It's just incredible.

Darrin Peppard (17:22.136)

I think it's an amazing program and what I love about it, there's a whole lot of things there that I really love about that. But one that you've been able to build that sustainability to where, you know, you have kids who, you know, are in college who started in that program when they were in the seventh grade. And I think that's really cool that two of them are college roommates that met through that program. I think that's a really, really neat thing. Another thing that I really like about that is that service learning element.

that it isn't just about learning the curriculum in the classroom, it's also about what we're doing outside of the walls of our classroom. We're not only maybe taking down some of these barriers that exist between our communities, but that we're actually doing things that impact our collective community. Is there a project or two that you can think of that are just really awesome examples of what the kids have done over the years?

Joe LaTorre (18:20.838)

So we're working on different things. Some kids, they're into the concept of like doing voter registration. So that's something we would be focusing on. A lot of them, believe it or not, and this is, think, a sign of the times, a lot of kids do have this vested interest in mental health. We just did, we call it a reinvented career day for the program in October where we kind of changed the model and made it more about having kids sit in small groups and rotate through small groups rather than, you know,

booths where they go, okay, what do you do for a living? We had the kids work in smaller groups and kind of dialogue with different professionals about what they do without us watching. So again, there's that trust piece. You really ask the questions that you want to ask when there aren't adults watching over you to make sure you don't embarrass them. And we kind of just let them run with it. But the thing that's sticking out is the way they've worked on. I know I just touched on one of those projects.

their focus has been on mental health, both in their community.

and in the community at large and how do you translate that? Something that I think is cool is through some of the conferences and experiences we've given them. They've thought about things that are starting to become, I think, more common in the US, but the concept of having student board leaders to work within their community, which we now have an Oceanside N Union now. They've gotten into the concept of messaging and how creating podcasts, bringing awareness to different topics, that

in itself is a form of creating change at an age where I think you don't really feel empowered, you? Maybe if you're lucky you're able to drive and are fortunate enough to have a car as you move into the later stages. But I think kids starting from middle school into that end of high school, it's a time where you really want to be an adult. And you really want adult responsibility. And you really want adult trust.

Joe LaTorre (20:21.868)

What you learn through these programs is also adult accountability. wow, I said I'm going to do this. Now I have to follow through. well, I'm doing a service learning project with other students. They're depending on me to do this. I can't just not show up for them. And I think that's my favorite thing about the program because I don't know if every single student is going to go through bridges or come through our team as middle school students and necessarily, you know.

go on to that career they said they were doing in the seventh grade, but they are going to learn to be accountable to others. They are going to learn to give back, even though what's coming back to them forgiving isn't necessarily apparent in the moment. They're going to learn to just value community.

And that's probably the coolest thing about this. that's incredible. Yeah, and that's the thing now, especially, and I'm sure you've probably dealt with this a lot, are people bringing up the program Adolescents and how it addresses mental health, the Netflix series? A lot of kids have mental health as their focus.

Darrin Peppard (21:09.228)

Yeah, no, I think that's awesome. Yeah.

Joe LaTorre (21:29.366)

in terms of service learning, in terms of I'm doing a Google Genius Hour project with my students right now, a few of them are addressing it through their projects. So that's fascinating to me that they're already forward thinking and also service oriented.

Darrin Peppard (21:44.057)

Yeah, well, and I think a lot of a lot of what it does as well, and I'm sure you see this and this leads into into my next question, is that it creates a lot of buy in into into the school into the classroom into the community, not just from the student, but from those in the greater community that are seeing the impact that that these students are having.

on the community, impact that you and the rest of your team are having on these young people, which I think is just amazing. Let's talk a little bit about buy-in. And you and I were talking about something before we hit the record button about a project that you had taken on with Lockheed Martin there in your greater area, but then also just creating buy-in in general.

in the classroom. think this is something that all teachers would say, man, I will take anything that will help me get students to take even more interest and more ownership in their learning. Share some thoughts and some ideas around the stuff that you do that are helping to build that.

Joe LaTorre (22:55.788)

So I think you're constantly looking at three things. We've talked about trust already, right? And how by giving that trust, you're going to get something back from kids. But then it also becomes, how do you create resilient kids who are going to take the risks they need to achieve, whether it's through service learning projects or...

being comfortable speaking about the hot button topics of bridges in front of students who they do not know that well remember at that stage we're just getting to know students in another building or and I'm sorry in another community even forget about another building how do you take the intellectual risks of an English classroom because our subject

It's not black and white. It's not here is the hard answer. A lot of the answers in an English classroom, you're really kind of opening up and making yourself vulnerable. So I think you have to be vulnerable to them. You have to share your victories and you have to share your own flaws and show them that sharing that does not make you a weak person, that it actually makes you a stronger person.

And then they start to buy in and take those risks and build that resilience that I think every parent wants a kid to have. But it's also about creating targeted opportunities for a community. So we do a cultural food festival that is like the highlight of my year when we do this, where you're sharing a little bit about who you are at home. And I'm fortunate, I've traveled quite a bit. There isn't a time we've done this where I haven't tried something new.

And so now, back to me, an adult who's traveled, think about how you're exposing kids to new worlds who maybe haven't left the town that they grew up in. So those community events, we show up for them, I think, probably is the best thing. So when we talk about small, actionable items that a teacher can do, go to their sporting events. Go to the play. Because yes, at some point, you do have to teach curriculum. And I'm

Joe LaTorre (24:52.108)

very much an advocate for balancing the curriculum with culture-based days where you're creating that buy-in. But also there's little things you can do like showing up to their football game. Showing after this, actually I'm headed to the baseball and softball games. doing those things, we don't realize how much it matters. I think for a lot of us, we just assume the kids don't care, you're just another face in the crowd. But going to the school play, going to the board meeting when they receive an award, nominating.

them for all the different awards and opportunities that exist. Certainly as you move through middle and high school, there are state and local awards. I'm really fortunate. I just had a student win a local writing award. you know, getting her honored at the board meeting is like tremendous for her as a seventh grader. Doing those things are a different way to show up for them. And again, like I'm incredibly lucky to have worked with great mentor teachers who told me that from day one. You know.

Whether they see you as a mirror or as a window to another world because you're not from this community, showing up to the baseball game, showing up to the school play, it's very hard not to buy into the person who you know is taking that extra time with you to create that. And that's kind of the thing that I tell all of our newer teachers. We just had spring concerts.

You know, sometimes parents don't show up to those concerts and you're the only one there for them. And when they see you sitting there, they are thrilled, Like, I cannot overemphasize that. And now we've become a little troupe of teachers that make sure that we're there. Because I think there are a lot of spaces where teachers don't think to attend, but the school and the community are setting it up right there for you to, you know, build that buy-in you need.

to then come into school the next day and give Darren a shout out for killing it at the tuba last night because I don't know how often Darren's hearing that. Or with the Lockheed Martin program that you mentioned, they're creating opportunities for kids to their tribe. A lot of kids now are into robotics and CAD and coding and all of these cool, let's call them frontier technologies, but they might feel like they're the only one.

Joe LaTorre (27:12.266)

And when you help put them onto programs like that, whether they exist in your school or through a regional company doing outreach, you're helping them find their tribe. You're helping them build that belonging. And then they give it back to you when they come into your classroom the next day.

Also, I would say one thing, apologies. Think outside your subject. I'm an English teacher and I think natively that means caring about, let's say, the school play or the creative writing magazine. But you know what? We also like lacrosse.

Darrin Peppard (27:31.242)

Love it. Now go for it.

Joe LaTorre (27:48.526)

And we also can go to the art show and maybe take a picture of students, right, hey man, I saw this yesterday, you did a sick job, I didn't even know you could do that. I think showing that you care about them as a person, not just as someone writing an essay in your class, really, really does matter. So it's that sort of outside the box thinking that builds that belonging.

Darrin Peppard (28:11.418)

I mean, the reality is the more that you do this, the more that you share with your students that you're paying attention to them as more than just a grade in your grade book, the more that you're investing in them as a human being, the ultimate thing, and we started this conversation with this, is you're building a relationship with them. And you mentioned that you have coworkers that are former students.

you know, even, you know, an old guy like myself, you know, who's, who's been, you know, been around education for 30 years. Just in the last couple of weeks, I've had two different conversations with former students of mine, you know, for a variety of different reasons. And, you know, you'll, you'll always continue to, have those relationships if you're willing to invest in those relationships with the kids. I mean, that's, that's really truly what it's all about. Man, so much good stuff, Joe. And

like always, our time has just flown by. we're at that point where I'm gonna ask you the same question I ask everybody here on the show. So it's the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. So Joe, how are you leaning into leadership right now?

Joe LaTorre (29:25.762)

Let me just say how excited I am to answer this question because I love your podcast once again. So I'm leaning into leadership by bridging the gap between intention and intentionality. And for anyone who's like, these are Bud's words, what is he talking about? Let me break that down in a far more simplistic way. I think that every single person that works in a school building,

has the intention to create kids who feel like they belong and are going to be successful adults. Every single person from the principal to the security staff to our paras, which to me are the power professionals or the unsung heroes of schools, especially these days.

Darrin Peppard (30:10.317)

Amen.

Joe LaTorre (30:12.62)

to the educators who are running their classrooms. We have these incredible attentions and maybe we start the year as we said with a grounded piece of culture building. But culture is gained in drops. Drops that you have to place in the bucket over and over, day after day after day, right?

And that requires intentionality. It requires, in the same way, we plan units of study. In the same way that we do backwards learning models to make sure that kids are going to be able to understand a concept or even be able to learn a skill. You have to take that same approach with building buy-in and creating belonging and

creating a incredible classroom culture. And when I speak to the concept of intentionality, that's what it is. Looking at the next month, two months, three months school year and saying to yourself, I'm going to make sure that when things get crazy, when I get overwhelmed, when I'm facing finals as many of us are right now as we record this in late May, I'm going to take a moment and show them that.

that they matter as much as the final, that I care about them as a person. And when you're intentional, not just having good intentions, and you're saying, know what, the baseball games, after this meeting with Darren, I'm gonna make sure that I'm there.

I think you're going to get so much more out of every kid. And my goal is to communicate that to the world at large through my speaking, through training, through following up with the adults I work with the way you followed up with two of your former students and now I get to follow up with students. And yeah, think that that's probably how I'm going to be leading into leadership over the next year. I'm excited to do it.

Darrin Peppard (32:06.958)

I think that's an excellent answer, man. I love that so much. So Joe, people are going to want to follow you, they're going to want to get in touch with you. What's the best way for them to connect with Joe Latorre?

Joe LaTorre (32:16.238)

So I am at josephlattore.net. That's josephlattore.net. But I know that, you know, in our profession there are a variety of social media. It seems like Instagram is the one that a lot of people are on right now for our space. And I'm the joelattore. So T-H-E-J-O-E-L-A-T-O-R-R-E.

Instagram, I'm also on all the other spaces and I'm always willing to talk shop with anyone, new teachers, administrators, people thinking about getting into the profession because I love what I do and I want you to love it the way I love it.

Darrin Peppard (33:00.6)

Outstanding stuff. man. I really appreciate this is a great conversation. Thanks so much Joe Latorre for joining me here on Leaning Into Leadership

Joe LaTorre (33:09.262)

Thank very much, Darren.

All right, friends, ⁓ excellent conversation there. Really appreciate Joe reaching out and coming on the show. Just so much fun having a conversation with him and definitely learning all of the amazing things that he's working on.

And now it's time for a pep talk. Folks, I want to start today's pep talk with a quote that I come back to quite often. You can't lead what you can't see, and you can't grow what you don't nurture. Look, leadership isn't accidental. The best leaders I know are not the busiest. They're the ones that are the most intentional. Being a school leader means juggling hundreds of things every single day, but if we're not intentional with our time, with our actions, and our words, we're just managing chaos. We're not leading people.

Let's start by talking about time. How many times have you said, I meant to get into classrooms today, but then your day got hijacked. Hey, I've been there. A long to-do list doesn't equal meaningful leadership. If we want to impact culture and instruction, we have to schedule time for it, just like we schedule time for meetings. What gets calendared, get done. Being intentional with time means choosing to focus on what matters most, not what screams the loudest.

Now let's think about actions. Every hallway walk, every decision, every email, every single one of those sends a message. Our actions have to be aligned with our values. If we say relationships matter, but we never stop to talk with a teacher or a student, what are we really saying? Intentional leadership means acting with purpose, modeling the culture and behaviors we want to see in our teams and in our classroom. And then finally, our words.

Words carry incredible weight, especially from someone in a leadership role. A quick thank you and I see you can change someone's day. But careless words can damage trust so fast. Speak to inspire, speak to connect. Be the voice that lifts others and reminds them of why behind the what. Look, intentional leadership isn't about being perfect. It's about being purposeful.

be purposeful with our time, our actions, and our words. Because when we lead with intention, we're not just managing, we are truly transforming those around us. And that's what I've got for you folks. Thank you so much for joining me this week on the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. Get out there, have a road to awesome week.