On loving gospel music
Last Sunday, the kids snuggling on each side of me in the pew were disrupted when the Brighter Day Community Choir entered the Mayfield Memorial sanctuary singing MELODIES FROM HEAVEN … Continue reading
Thriving in this Wild World
I am in a season of thriving. I know because most days I wake up feeling solid and my most consistent source of overstimulation is my own children. I recently … Continue reading
My Toast to Ben Boswell
After I’d flown the nest and had been teaching in Congo for several years, Commonwealth Baptist Church’s bright new young pastor Ben Boswell invited me to do a presentation about … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 12: Shazam! It’s time now for the Benediction
It’s the end of this series but not the end of ‘the work.’ Many people within Myers Park Baptist Church are shocked by everything that’s happening, by the departure of … Continue reading
Day 11: Who is left to bear this cross?
Last Palm Sunday a group of deacons at Myers Park Baptist Church – Black, white, old, young, gay, straight – carried a BIG ASS cross from the sanctuary out into … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 10: Dysfunctional deacon leadership is what’s failing Myers Park Baptist Church.
I am certain that every individual deacon at Myers Park Baptist Church is overall, a good person. Everyone I’ve ever engaged with personally has been kind, respectful and authentically wants … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 9: Great individuals don’t always make a great leadership team.
Making total sense of things is one of my superpowers. As you can probably tell from this 12 part series, I’m thorough AF. It’s honestly just how my brain works … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 8: Transparent reporting on progress toward goals combined with accountability makes Healthy Orgs (and Healthy Exits)
Even if we are measuring success – are we sharing the most important, relevant data with the entire organization along the way? Is everyone clear on who is accountable for … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 7: Measuring Success and what’s at stake if you don’t (spoiler alert: accusations of all the -isms)
The problem with not defining and measuring success is – it makes it impossible to get everyone on the same page about how the organization is doing and perhaps even … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 6: Talent acquisition and retention
I didn’t realize that I was my own talent acquisition enemy until I attended Service Never Sleeps Allyship Training led by the phenomenal Whitney Parnell. Up until that point, I … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 5: Stay awake! The systems that fail to deliver racial equity.
I think this is the hardest topic to write about and not put folks to sleep. As I said before, “widespread organizational failures” isn’t sexy or explosive. If I’m being … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 4: Humility about racism has to come from white leaders at the top.
After George Floyd was murdered, white leaders in organizations around the world began squirming in their boardroom seats. They were facing the uncomfortable truth that the public was waking up … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 3: Embrace the fact that harm will happen
In any multiracial space, even really safe ones, it’s simply inevitable that at some point a racially harmful idea will be shared or someone will make a comment grounded in … Continue reading
Confronting Whiteness Day 2: When someone says you have a race problem
I was a teacher in New York City when the dean of students joined our grade team meeting to share his analysis of student discipline data including students sent out … Continue reading
Introducing 12 days of Confronting Whiteness
Welcome to Day 1. I am writing this 12 part series in order to make sense of what I’ve experienced as a leader in multiracial organizations and propose ways that … Continue reading
This Veterans Day
On November 11th, I offered a presentation to my Coming to the Table group about Black WWII veterans who were killed by white supremacist violence in North Carolina. Woof. I … Continue reading
Celebrating 15 years of writing: classroom cackling, Congo’s okapis and cooking in the Carolinas
On this day fifteen years ago, I published my first blog post. Everything is the Same Everywhere. I had just started my third year teaching in the Democratic Republic of … Continue reading
Coming to the Table
I’ve always loved my great-grandparent’s dining room table. As a kid I remember playing underneath it in my own house, using the chairs to build forts around it… and striving … Continue reading
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