[00:00:00] Ellington Brown: Welcome to SpeakUP! International with Rita Burke and Elton Brown! 

[00:00:21] Rita Burke: As on SpeakUP! International, we traverse the globe finding people who are community builders. Today is no exception, but we're at home in Canada. As a matter of fact, we are going to be speaking with Mr. Lee Jones Imhotep, who is an adult educator, Who creates professional programs.

His work is informed by anti oppressive lens. Lee Jones is credited for creating a system wide professional learning program based on an anti oppressive approach. He's inspired and motivated teams across hundreds of schools. whereby securing the NBA Raptors Read to Achieve Community Award. Lee has also been lead writer for the Ontario Language Curriculum.

There's so much more to tell you about Mr. Lee Jones - Imhotep, however, as we say on SpeakUP! International, we prefer if our interviewees tell their own stories. So welcome to SpeakUP! International, Mr. Lee Jones-Imhotep! 

[00:01:43] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Thank you very much. I really appreciate the warm welcome. 

[00:01:49] Ellington Brown: Very happy to have you with us today, Lee. I want to talk a little bit about your professional development.

So can you share your report to designing and delivering system wide professional learning programs with an anti oppressive level?

[00:02:11] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Thank you for the question. So I've been an educator for 30 years now, and I'm looking toward the next phase of my career. And over those years I've developed many different programs as a literacy coordinator, as a learning coach and as a, what we call a student work study teacher.

And in those roles, I had to design professional development for teachers. I had to design programs for students. And I also over the last few years, especially since COVID, I've been able to design programs online for educators, and I teach something called Additional Qualification Courses where teachers go to upgrade their qualifications.

And so I've been doing that for the past four or five years. I'm taking a little bit of a sabbatical right now. To regroup but in those programs we design programs that are engaging that are interesting, that use the student's voice. And I'm so glad that this podcast is called SpeakUP! Because in those, we really take the student voice and base a lot of our planning around that, around things that are engaging, things that are interesting, and things that drive.

They drive student achievement. They drive teacher capacity, and they also lead to success. And I'm happy to share some of those programs with you during this hour. 

[00:03:44] Rita Burke: So you said Mr Lee Jones said you have been an educator for 30 plus years. You could have been an engineer, you could have been a cook, you could have been a dancer, you could have done anything.

Why did you choose education? 

[00:04:00] Lee Jones - Imhotep: That's a wonderful question! So my mother was an adult English as a second language teacher. So she was a teacher. What I did is over the summers when I had several part time jobs, one of them was a teaching assistant. In summer school, I was probably 16 or 17 years old and I would go in and help the teachers in summer school.

And as I did it, I just thought, this is, it's interesting. It's fun. It's inspiring. It's motivational. And I didn't really feel like it was work. It felt really meaningful. And important. And so as I did that, and I progressed in my education, I thought, you know what, why not pursue this as a field of for a career.

And so that's exactly what I did 30 plus years ago now, three decades.

[00:04:51] Ellington Brown: You have won the MBA Rafters award? So how did your team earn that award? And what key lessons did you learn from that experience? 

[00:05:07] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Oh, what a wonderful question! This brings me back quite a few years, but it's a really probably the highlight of my career.

So I became a literacy coordinator at one school, and at that school, when I first arrived, the students, unfortunately, We're throwing books out the window of the library to see who could throw it the furthest. So that's the scenario I came into. And my job was to improve student achievement in literacy.

So I had to go from that to the complete opposite. How do you do that? Other than teaching the skills and strategies for reading and succeeding. My main job was to make reading fun, interesting, and to make it something that captured their attention. So how did we do it? We designed one of our contests called the Bookmark contest.

And the way I got that Bookmark contest was by thinking about the public library would have a Bookmark contest where you'd fill out a Bookmark and submit it. And if you want, they would take it and print it off and and publish it and give it to different people at the library. So we entered we didn't win.

And then I thought, you know what, why should we enter an outside contest? Why don't we start our own, then we know someone's going to win. And, in the school, someone will win, but also in each classroom could have their own winner as well. So we started this Bookmark contest. We really went top to bottom.

We had students fill out a form where they talk about why reading is important, and I would come in with a pitch and say reading is important because it'll improve your reading, your writing, your spelling, your grammar, your punctuation. It'll improve the way you think. It'll help you in every subject, in every grade.

All the way through school and in life. So reading is the most important thing you will ever do. And after telling them that, they would fill out the form, they'd talk about their favorite book, and then they'd design their bookmark here. Now I would tell them, you might not be the best artist, but come up with a creative idea on what You could do to promote reading at our school, and they did that and they succeeded.

We put all the bookmarks up on the bulletin boards across the whole school. We went on the announcements and we came on and read off some of the entries. We really hyped it up. We got students to come in and become Reading Rangers. And those Reading Rangers helped us to promote and also to be judges for the Bookmark contest and decide on who the winners were.

We opened up the democratic process and got them to vote. Each class would vote on the best bookmarks and why they thought they were the best. And what we did is we took the bookmarks we brought them to a place called Kinko's, which I don't know if it exists anymore, but we got them to blow them up into posters.

We got them to laminate them and we cut them out and give them out at assemblies. We'd have prizes. We'd have prizes and they'd always ask me, what is the prize? What's the prize? And I'd have to say, it's a surprise. And so I couldn't tell them what it was, but we really whipped them up into a frenzy. And my favorite was, you may not have the best bookmark.

You might not place first, second, or third, but we're going to have a random winner. And a random winner is someone who is in it to win it. They didn't have the best bookmark, but they entered. And then what we would do is take all the entries that weren't for second or third, mix them up and pick the random winner.

And sometimes the random winner had the best, biggest prize of all. Now, in the meantime, we had a couple of students that, resisted a little bit and said, I'm not going to enter, and I did warn them ahead of time, I did say, you have to be in it to win it. And if you don't enter, you can't win.

After one of the assemblies where the prizes were wheeled in, we had security for the prizes to make sure no one touched them. We had medals. We blew them up into posters. We gave them out as laminated as prizes. We gave pizza lunch to the top class. After that, I saw one girl was crying after the assembly, and I remembered it was the same girl who said, I'm not going to enter.

And so unfortunately, I had to speak to her. It's quite heartbreaking because she was quite sad that she didn't win. But I had to explain to her, did you enter the contest? And she said, no, I never entered. And I said how can you win if you don't enter? And so the following year, we really emphasized.

You may not have the best bookmark, but give it a shot. Try! Give it your best shot. And because of that, in our tagline was, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners, grade 8 winners, the honor, the glory. Do it now. Read to succeed. And make sure that you enter. So the Raptors found out about our Bookmark contest. And what they did is they approached us and they asked us about the Bookmark contest and some other things that we were doing, get caught reading.

And we were doing the ring of reading where we give out different awards for different things related to reading and succeeding. And the Raptors approached us and said, we'd like to interview you on Raptors TV. We'd like to dedicate a Raptors reading corner to your school. With thousands of books, three NBA players will come and read with your students will host an assembly and we will give you, and this is my favorite, we will give you a Raptors book bin, which is a book bin where old books go in and they get donated to Frontier College to teach adults how to read. 

[00:11:07] Rita Burke: You alluded to the fact that your mom. Was involved with education. It sounds to me if somehow education is tattooed in your DNA. And I like that story. It's magical. It's fascinating. You brought out the best in those students. Congratulations! 

[00:11:29] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Thank you. 

[00:11:30] Rita Burke: Now, at the top of this program. You were mentioning something that you did at OISE when you were doing some research. Do you want to tell us as quickly as you can about that little research that you did, please? 

Yes, I will. And then I can also link it to some further research that we did with a much more positive light to it and really shines on student achievement and success.

The fact that I found when I was doing my research was in 1865 Blacks in the United States owned 0. 5, half of 1 percent of the wealth in the United States in 1865. In 1990, a full 135 years later. They owned 1%. So from 0. 5 percent to 1 percent in 135 years, what's changed? Nothing. And so that fact really was the genesis of my research paper.

At OISE it looked at factors affecting success. And sadly wealth is one of those things, but there are things that can be done to overcome that. And education is probably the most powerful tool. In the toolbox to overcome that systemic inequity and and I'm going to give you an example shortly of how we used.

Change to really highlight student achievement and student success. And I can share it with you now if you prefer. So what we did is we were part of a research project where the Ministry of Education and our school board were partners in documenting student work, student thinking, student learning.

And what we did is we focused on math. We focused on some Afrocentric principles around students background the Nguzu Saba, and a lot of Afrocentric principles and math. And what we did is we developed professional learning for teachers we, and we did lots of surveys and documented a lot of student work, student thinking, student learning.

Here's what we found. I was in a kindergarten class, downtown Toronto, and a little girl was working with some little tiles, and she ended up solving a little math problem. And I said, oh, how'd you do that? And she said, oh, I subitized. And I said, really? I said, do you know what that means? And she goes, oh, yeah.

Subitizing means knowing a number without having to count it. Like six on the dice. You don't have to count one, two, three, four, five, six. You will know it's six just by looking at it. She's in kindergarten and she said, I learned it last year. That's my favorite story because I go and sometimes work with high school teachers and high school teachers Might not even know what subitizing is.

Their students might not know what subitizing is, but this kindergarten student knew what it was, could define it and used it to solve a simple math problem. And so we took that particular process and then turned it into a curriculum. Based on visual learning, and we developed lessons that we gave out to all the schools that we worked with based on the student surveys, student work, student thinking, student voice, student learning, and we use that to design visual learning lessons, because subitizing is a visual learning skill and then use that to all the way up to grade eight, where grade eights were actually using Pythagorean theorem and a visual properties of Pythagorean theorem and the triangles and the squares that they create to solve the math problem.

And they told us, we need this to learn and their teacher said. I need this too, to learn. So the visual aspect was what we ended up creating, taking a need, seeing a a problem that was existing with the math and then using that to improve student achievement, to improve student teacher capacity, and really to engage students all across the different grades to to find success.

[00:15:36] Ellington Brown: Wow, that is absolutely amazing! All of the stories that I'm sure are intertwined in this one general story that you've given us. I'm sure we could possibly spend hours just reveling in your joy. Which professional accomplishment are you most proud of, and why? 

[00:16:01] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Wow, that is a great question! I have to say, because of the way the students were involved, because of the change from throwing books out a window to winning the Raptors League to Achieve book corner and the book bin and the books.

I would have to say the Raptors Bookmark contest and the Raptors Read To Achieve is probably my favorite accomplishment. I've had many, but I, along those lines, and I'm glad you asked that. I do have this, which really, of everything I've ever done, this one speaks to me the most. And what it is, I'll read it for you because it'll be a little hard for you to see.

It's a picture that a girl wrote many years ago. And she said, When I'm a hundred years old, I will be sitting in my couch and reading my books. I will read them to little kids like Mr. Jones. I will have white hair and I will live by myself. And I would say really of all my achievements, this one probably takes the cake.

[00:17:09] Rita Burke: What a wonderful, magical, exciting story. Mr. Jones, I get the feeling, I get the sense that you are so immersed in education and you enjoy it as well. It's not a job. It's a passion. It's your gift to be an educator. Talk about that. 

[00:17:41] Lee Jones - Imhotep: I appreciate that very much. I, there are challenges. Every day is not easy.

But I find myself at this point in my life thinking about, I have three boys at home, and like we, we like to say, boy, oh boy. So that keeps us very busy, and I feel like that's an important role that goes on forever. So I've shifted a little bit, and I've looked at maybe, Adult education, teaching teachers.

I've tried to develop some things around that and thinking about the next phase after, teaching the classroom. I'm looking for other opportunities and, even such a format like, like your podcast I, I joke because the only podcast I ever did, I did with my son on his birthday, because my son was valedictorian and athlete of the year.

It doesn't happen by accident. And so I thought, why not interview him on this podcast? And my idea was to interview him every single year on his birthday, turn it into a podcast. But I'm basically at this point, although it is definitely a passion of mine, I'm trying to look for the next iteration of that.

And something like what you're doing here, I think is extremely exciting. And then the other part of it is with my sons, we developed some journals that we created. We created them in the middle of the pandemic. And we thought instead of consuming and buying and purchasing, why not turn ourselves into producers?

And produce something. And we created these success journals. They're in many different colors. I use them to set goals and I'm proud to say that one of the goals that I said I wrote it down and enacted it and in under a year achieved exactly what I had written. I've done that again for this year and I'm on track to, to do that as well.

And we also created some workbooks for printing letters as well, my sons are listed as co authors on Amazon. And then we also did one for cursive writing. Cursive writing is a part of the language curriculum. Recently, and so we developed these as well. And so we thought, I believe we're created to create.

I believe we're created to create. And so I feel as if, teaching is creating. But I feel like that's when we're happiest when we're creating. The other piece of it. And thank you for asking about passion. I feel like people who are maybe a little bit more close minded may talk about things.

People who are maybe a little bit above that may talk about people, but I think people at the highest level, they talk about ideas. And so that idea, the concept of read to succeed or write to achieve or being in it to win it, I think leads to creation. And I think that is where I feel most passionate is, delivering lessons and workshops in person with teachers and and with students as well.

That's where I'm happiest. Thank you for asking that question. 

[00:20:50] Ellington Brown: I don't have a clue anymore when it comes to cursive handwriting. I think that skill was lost with the advent of computers, because this is what we do. We don't sit there and write letters or, write, your problems.

We don't do any of that anymore. So I really gravitate toward that book that you have that teaches students how to perform cursive handwriting. I want to know a little bit about your AAQ courses, workshops and curriculum and visions and you're addressing contemporary challenges. Talk to us a little bit about that, please.

[00:21:45] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Sure. Actually, just along the lines, what you mentioned is something we found across the board is students and even teachers, handwriting has gotten worse and the printing has gotten worse because we're so used to using the computer. So if you note, it says ages 7 to 77. And the reason is because I felt like I needed to relearn it myself.

And a lot of teachers feel the same way. We learned it in school when we were Going through school, but we've lost the art of it, and it's actually very therapeutic to not lift your pen or pencil off the paper, and to do cursive that way. So the, they included it in the new language curriculum, and we're very happy that they did, so we came out with the book just in time.

So along the lines with additional qualification courses, so these are courses that teachers take to upgrade their skill, and I have to tell you how passionate teachers are about learning. about growing and lifelong. learning. No one forces them to take these courses. I've had teachers that have been expecting a baby and worried about handing in their assignments for this class to make sure that they fulfill all the requirements even when they know they're going to be induced a few days later.

And their main concern is making sure that they've done what they need to do. It's just incredible. It's just incredible. I'm honoured to do that. As I mentioned, I'm taking a little bit of a sabbatical right now, but I've been able to do courses in reading, in math. In an assessment evaluation, and and I'm always incredibly impressed with, teachers across Ontario, sometimes across the world, taking these courses to upgrade their skill and and to improve, improve their capacity and in turn, improve student achievement in terms of in person courses, this goes back a little ways, but probably my favorite is something called Summer Academy .

Which I do for ETFO, Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario, and they're three day workshops. And those are my favorite. They're in person. I'm able to really Unleash my passion for Read to Succeed, Write to Achieve, Being In It To Win It, giving them practical tips and tricks that they can use in their classroom.

The next day, this is a quick one that we do. It's a math one where we basically cut two circles. We cut the Pac Man mouth on both of them. We combine them like this. We do this with students all the time. And then we basically ask them what math, What do you see? What math do you see? And you would not believe the amount of math that is in this small, double circle math wheel.

You would not believe. We can turn this into a lesson that's probably an hour and a half long, and we can generate probably 50, 50, 5 0 different types of math that we see inside of here. It doesn't plug in, doesn't need to be recharged, there's no screen, there's no keyboard, it's paper and pencil, and you would not believe what we could do with this.

So those are just a few of the different ideas that we do. In the summer workshop, we use some of these in the Math Acuse and we try to spread that across to as many classrooms as we can. So I'm really honored to be able to do that. 

[00:25:23] Rita Burke: There's no question. Humankind, education, every sector of society benefits from technology, but you cannot beat the organic something like that to learn math. You cannot beat it. So there's still room for that. I want to hear from you, Mr Lee Jones. What is something that you have grown to appreciate as you grow older? Talk to us about that, please. 

[00:25:54] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Oh, that's a wonderful question! I would say it probably relates to time. And I was walking in the woods and the leaves were falling.

And as the leaves were falling, I reached my hand up and I caught one of the leaves in my hand. And a little later on, I reached up my other hand and caught another leaf in my hand. And I just thought how beautiful this moment where it's marking the passing of time, it's showing us the time passes no matter what, but in that moment, there's an abundance, there's wealth, there's appreciation, there's a growth mindset in that one moment.

And so I really feel as if, time's our most valuable resource. We have to find ways to maximize it. And really capture the time before it gets away from us. All three of my sons have a tree planted in the backyard in and around the time they were born. Because I've heard that the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.

And the next best time is today. And that's because time passes so quickly. You have to take advantage of every day. And so I'm really pleased and honored to be able to have a tree for each of my sons in the backyard. And I'm pleased and honored to have, being a part of everything I've been a part of.

And so I think time and appreciating time as a valuable resource, I think is probably the biggest lesson I think I've learned related to that, I can talk about the best advice I've ever had 

[00:27:34] Ellington Brown: Yes please, that is, that's tied right into one of Rita's questions. So that would be perfect. 

[00:27:41] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Wonderful. I've received lots of great advice. I've heard different things. One of them is when all is said and done, more is said and less is done.

I've heard that one. I think that's a good one. There's another one. There once was an owl who lived in an oak. The more he heard, the less he spoke. The less he spoke, the more he heard. Why can't we be more like that wise old bird? I think that's a good one. The one that I tried to incorporate onto our journals is early to bed, early to rise makes a person healthy, wealthy, and wise.

And I think that really resonated. with setting goals, health, wealth, wisdom. So that really, I think, ties in nicely. But I have to say the two best pieces of advice I've ever had. One was from my father, which I lost my father when I was about 10, 10 or 11 years old. And but I remember everything about him, but I especially remember when he told me Lee, you could be anything you want in life.

You can be anything you want to be. And I remember telling him, I want to be a baseball player and the soccer player and this and that. And he said, Lee, you could be anything you want to be. And I believed him. I believed him and that gave me the sort of the confidence to approach any challenge in a way that I knew I could succeed if I worked hard enough and focused on different strategies.

And then my grandfather gave me some great advice as well. He said, everything that happens was supposed to happen and everything that's happened was supposed to happen. And that idea combined with you can be anything you want combined with the everything happens for a reason and everything that's happened was supposed to happen for a reason.

I think those two are probably the strongest bits of advice really gives you comfort in knowing that, there's fate, there's karma and there's also, your effort as well. But some of it gives you comfort in terms of things that happened to you, especially challenges. 

[00:29:43] Rita Burke: That's one of the questions that I sometimes ask our guests.

I'm not going to ask you that question today, however. Who or what is responsible for the person you are today? Because I think you've answered that kind of indirectly. But my next question to you is, what is something simple that makes you smile? Because regardless of who you are, regardless of how balanced you are, regardless of how educated you are, regardless of how much you read, you can't beat that smile for bringing joy into your life.

Talk about that for us, please. 

[00:30:18] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Oh, wow! What a great question! I have to say I have three boys. And seeing them smile or laugh or be happy that. That will make me instantly happy. I also am amazed at how creative and insightful they are. That really, when they get an idea and say, dad, I've got an idea.

I just light up immediately, one of my sons, my oldest, it was Halloween and he had the candy, the bowl of candy, and he was getting ready to go trick or treating and he went to go grab the bowl that we had. To give away the candy and he went to go take it out onto the street and I said, Whoa, where are you going?

And he said oh i'm going trick or treating and I said, you can leave that here You're gonna go and get candy. He said oh no dad I thought we're gonna bring this candy and give it to other people and I thought wow, what an amazing idea That's actually how it should work. It should be people going, giving candy to each other, as opposed to going and taking it.

What an amazing idea. It just, that idea alone just it just lit me up. And it just put a huge smile on my face. And the other one is, some funny little things that, my, my two younger ones I say, Dad, I don't want a cookie. I need a cookie. Very hard to say no when they need it so badly. Those things put a smile on my face and and make me happy for a long time. 

[00:31:43] Ellington Brown: I know cookies make me happy for a long time. I've never met a cookie I didn't love. I'm gonna have to align myself with your son. I can, I always need a cookie. I want to know a little bit about your strategies that you use to lead and motivated teams and achieving transformative results in education? 

[00:32:09] Lee Jones - Imhotep: What a great 

[00:32:09] Rita Burke: Sounds to me like it's cookies, but I'll wait for you to answer 

[00:32:14] Lee Jones - Imhotep: It can also it doesn't hurt. It doesn't hurt. Let's put it that way. Food is a very powerful motivator. Definitely. Oh, great question. So I can tell you the story about 1 school we were in.

I was a learning coach and I was working with teams. Number one is building collaboration and teams very important. We had everyone on board the grade three teachers, both of them. We had the librarian, the vice principal, the principal. We had the students and the students were really the key to this.

We that particular school was stuck. They were 48%. Achievement. They were stuck there for probably three years, and they really became stigmatized because they weren't moving. They were at the bottom of the group of schools in that family of schools. And so we set about coming up with a 12 week plan.

We mapped it out. We practiced, we broke them up into smaller groups, we did guided reading with them, we rolled up our sleeves, I took a group, the principal took a group we even had the superintendent involved as well and so we worked extremely hard with something called glow and grow, it's a little bit of a feedback, where students, they self assess themselves and think about something good that they've done, And then something that they need to improve on.

So it's called Glow And Grow. So glow something you did well grow something you need to improve on. And we really use that quite often teaching them what they needed to do. And then showing them how to assess themselves and see if they had done it or not. Then we also had peers also assess them using Glow And Grow.

And then we use the feedback to help improve their work. So we did that over 12 weeks consistently, we took some projections on how we thought we would do. We thought we'd get 83 percent and it turns out we scored 84% From 48 percent to 84 percent in one year, and that was because of the students, because the teachers, because of the entire school really coalescing around a very intense goal, which was to move the students forward.

And we used a lot of different strategies in, within that, but the consistency, the teamwork and we also use something engaging, which was a unit on plants and soils, where they planted their own seeds, they got them to grow, they planted two, one for home, one for school. And those students even today will come to me and say, Mr. Jones, that plant, we still have it. 

My grandma's made it really tall now. And they're so excited about it because it brought the learning to life using science, using reading and teamwork. So they went from the bottom of the schools right to the top. And so that's just a huge story that I love sharing because it's heartwarming and it also empowered an entire school.

[00:35:07] Rita Burke: So on SpeakUP! International, we aim to inspire, to educate, and to inform. And that's exactly what we're doing today with Mr. Lee Jones, who's telling his story. Mr. Jones, I would like you To imagine that you're doing a presentation to a group of graduating teachers. I would like you to share with us and our audience three important points or gems that you would leave with these educators as you speak with them, please.

[00:35:43] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Wow that's a great question! I would break it down in a similar way that I would with students, to be honest with you. Students that we would teach and also for teachers as well is I would say number one is read to succeed. Reading is the most important thing you will ever do. It'll help you with your reading your writing your spelling your grammar your punctuation Every single subject in school every grade in school all the way through school and in life we read more and more even text messages, things on the internet.

We're reading constantly And I wouldn't focus so much on exactly what the student is reading, but just the fact that they are reading, they're thinking. They're growing. They're getting better. They're getting stronger. They're getting smarter. So number one, I would say read to succeed. And I see that throughout the students that succeed the most are the ones that read the most, number two, I would say right to achieve.

Writing is such a powerful tool. They've done studies where people will tell say a goal or tell you a goal, but if they write down that goal, the odds of achieving it are so much higher. Writing is such an expressive skill, and it really, even in kindergarten or grade one, when a student puts a pen to paper or pencil to paper, they're showing that I matter.

I can make a mark on this world. And number two would be write to achieve. When you write. Automatically get better. And then the last one I would say, and the strongest and this goes for anyone who wants to be a teacher, anyone who is a teacher, anyone who's looking for the next step in their career or their journey is you have to be In It To Win It.

Not every day is going to go perfect. You're going to make mistakes. Hopefully you learn from those mistakes. But you have to look at the abundance in the world and really be optimistic about that. And so you have to be in it to win it. You have to give it a shot. And what I have learned is in that journey over those 30 years, the end goal is not really that important.

It's more the journey along the way and making the most out of it every single day. Sometimes you find yourself at the end of the journey, and then you have to set a new goal. And so I would just say, read to succeed. Number one, number two, right to achieve. And number three, be in it to win it.

[00:38:18] Ellington Brown: Thank you so much for your gems as Rita would call them. I want to. Just quickly mention the fact of writing down goals. I remember reading some, I can't remember where, but someone said that you should say your goal out loud because when you internalize it, That's when self doubt and all of that negative stuff grabs hold of it.

But once you say it out loud, you more or less release it out to the universe. Now the negative thoughts and things that hold you back are trapped and allows you to reach. Your goals, or at least put you in a position to achieve them. I want to thank you so much for your Involvement with our students and you are such a passionate individual.

You are definitely a teacher, educator, instructor. I would be interested in knowing once you finish regrouping what you decide to do. You said you've reached the end of one journey and now you're preparing for another. So we talked a little about your personal development collaboration with other individuals your impact with a Q courses, leadership and education.

We could talk to you for at least another hour and I don't think that our audience would find themselves to be board. By the way, you and Rita have something in common. Both of you are teachers. 

[00:40:10] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Wonderful! 

[00:40:11] Ellington Brown: Believe it or not. And also Rita is a writer. She writes books. Children's books and she heard the name of her book is I Like Being Me! 

[00:40:27] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Oh, I love that! 

[00:40:28] Ellington Brown: And I think it's on Amazon as well Rita. Do you want to chime in? This is your book 

[00:40:37] Rita Burke: Thanks for giving me a plug. Yes, the first book is called I Like Being Me, and we describe it as an extended affirmation. People, whoever is reading it, keep saying how much they like being themselves, whether they're tall, they're short, they're big, they're small, they're brown.

They must buy into the philosophy of liking self. And in order, when one begins It's too like self, then they grow and learn and become. So that's her first book. But her last book is a novel set in Toronto for young readers, let's say middle school readers on Kwanzaa. 

[00:41:16] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Oh, perfect. 

[00:41:17] Rita Burke: First Toronto, first Canadian Kwanzaa book. 

[00:41:22] Lee Jones - Imhotep: I love it! 

[00:41:24] Rita Burke: So we can talk some more, this is your interview, this is your time, and I certainly don't want to steal your time, but yes, that's what I do as well. As a matter of fact, we have a lot in common because I went to OISE, but we'll talk off screen about that. 

[00:41:39] Lee Jones - Imhotep: Sounds wonderful! You've inspired me because, as I mentioned before, we've made the journals. We've made the handwriting and we have the printing but you know The next thing I think would be a children's book and that's and I love the way you put a positive affirmation That's one thing we did with our youtube channel.

We had I am wealthy. I am wise I am healthy because that Affirmation after you've repeated it enough it sinks in and it starts to become true so that's a huge inspiration. Thank you for doing that 

[00:42:13] Ellington Brown: So thank you so much for spending time with us this afternoon. And we definitely want to know when you begin your new journey.

We would love to know what that is. We would love to know what is the goal, which I'm sure you probably have written in one of your book. And so that would be great to also know what that is. And then actually, Inspire other individuals to do the same and the importance of actually writing it down so that every day you have an opportunity to look at it, which kind of keep you on track to get that goal.

So thank you so much. And you have a great afternoon. 

[00:43:00] Lee Jones - Imhotep: You too. I really appreciate the opportunity. I hope you have a wonderful day and thank you to all your listeners as well. Thank you!

[00:43:16] Ellington Brown: Thank you for listening to SpeakUP! International. If you wish to contact Mr. Lee Jones – Imhotep, please be prepared to submit your name, your email address, and the reason why you wish to contact Mr. Lee Jones – Imhotep at info@speakuppodcast.ca. 

Mr. Lee Jones – Imhotep has other social media accounts you can use to contact him that will be listed in the description section on Spotify and other social media platforms. 

Are you interested in the opportunity to be interviewed and have your cause promoted by SpeakUP! International? We invite you to connect to us by sending a message that includes your name, company or organization name, the valuable service you offer to your community and your email address to info@speakuppodcasts.ca. 

Worried about your competence as an interviewee? Don't fret! SpeakUP! International can provide you with the necessary training, so you shine doing an interview. To receive training information and a 10% discount about the SpeakUP! International's Podcasts Trainee Program, email us at info@speakuppodcast.ca. 

You can also reach us using Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. 

To connect to our podcasts, use Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform, and search for SpeakUP! International. You can also find our podcast using our web address, www.speakuppodcasts.ca. Our logo has a woman with her finger pointing up mouth open. speaking UP! 

By joining Patreon, we can offer you an exclusive opportunity to become an integral part of the continued success of our podcast. Your financial support will enable us to cover the costs associated with producing high quality content, such as equipment upgrades, hosting fees and professional editing services. 

As a member of our Patreon group, you will gain access to a range of exciting benefits. We are working on providing you with early access to new episodes, the opportunity to suggest topics or guests for a future episodes. Your contribution will not only be able to help substain the continuity of the podcast, but also allow us to enhance the overall listening experience for all of our dedicated followers. Help us help you! https://www.patreon.com/speakupinternational. 

At SpeakUP! International, we aim to inspire, to inform and to educate!