[percussive music]
- Murv Seymour: Tamika Johnson,
thank you for joining us on In Focus.
- Tamika Johnson: Thanks for having me.
- We're here at Vibe Lounge,
and now, this is a kind of a special place
because, you know, you're an educator
and I understand this is a family-run business
that is run by one of your former students.
- Yes, her parents.
A few of my former students' parents own the facility.
- Murv: Awesome. - Yeah.
- So, you're an educator and you're also a new author.
And we're here to talk about your brand-new book,
Teaching Through Trauma.
- Tamika: I'm a serial author.
- Murv: Serial author? - Tamika: Yes.
I have about nine books out, so.
- Murv: Wow. - Tamika: Yeah.
- Murv: So, you can't stop? - No.
- Murv: Always gotta write some stuff out.
- Why stop? [laughs]
- I wish you could pass some of that serial-ness along to me,
'cause I can't get through writing my first one.
Maybe you can help me out. - Most definitely.
Most definitely.
I have a publishing company.
- I love to start just a little bit
by maybe, give me some insight in terms of, you know,
why did you decide to get into teaching?
Why teaching for you?
- So, teaching for me has always been a calling,
and it runs in my family.
And so, I have family full of educators
all over the United States.
I started teaching at 23 years old.
And I'm 48 now, and I continue to teach.
I taught kindergarten and first grade
for the first 13 years.
Then I went to be a dean of student for a while.
And then, I went to middle school teaching ELA,
alternative high schools teaching ELA,
and now I'm back in middle school teaching ELA.
- What is it about teaching that excites you?
- I think for me, it's just being able
to pour into others' lives to see them become,
like, the best version of themselves.
I have a calling of being, like, an intercessor for people.
So, and an advocate for people.
So, teaching allows me to do that.
- And when did you know?
- I knew that I wanted to be a teacher
when I was in the first grade.
So, my first grade teacher used to give me
all of her scrap papers, and I would go home and I--
We lived with my grandmother at the time,
so my mom and my brothers,
we lived with my grandmother at the time.
And so, I had cousins that lived there too.
So, I would have them all sit in the desk
and pass out papers and I was the teacher.
And I was always considered to be
the bossy one of the family.
- No way, not you. - Tamika: Oh, yes.
[laughs] - Murv: Tamika, seriously?
You bossy? - [laughs] Very.
- Telling people what to do? - Yes, yes.
- Don't do that, do this? - Yes.
Make sure my mic, you know, is on right, yeah.
All of that. [laughs]
But yeah, so that just--
teaching just came naturally for me.
- Yeah, and then what do you see
as some of the challenges in the classroom these days?
Without getting into talking about your book.
- So, without getting into the books.
- Murv: We're gonna get to that. - Some challenges
in the classroom nowadays is behavior issues
concerning students,
and teachers not having the autonomy necessary
to run their classes effectively
as the experts of education that they are.
Being told what to do and what not to do in the classroom,
it kind of-- it kind of hinders a teacher's ability
to be totally effective in the classroom, so.
- Yeah, and so you've written this book,
Teaching Through Trauma, a great read, by the way.
I spent one evening looking through it,
and I love it 'cause it's a really small,
kind of packed with a lot of great information
in terms of dealing with trauma
and the different kinds of trauma and things like that
that teachers go through.
Why write the book?
- So, for me, I've always been in a space lately where I--
I have to decide if I want to transition out of the classroom
or remain in the classroom, remain in education,
or go off to do another field, simply because of the stressors
that's coming with-- that comes with teaching.
For many years, you learn to adapt.
You're told that that's part of the job,
you know, behavior issues,
dealing with conflict with parents
and administrators, and different things.
You are told that that just comes with the job.
But after COVID-19,
and we seen how the pandemic kind of, like,
opened everybody's eyes to the reality of how short life is.
Teachers began to realize that it's time
for us to take care of us, our mental health.
We can't continue to take care of everyone else
and pour into everyone else
while we are left empty, you know?
And then think about the living wage.
That's another big issue.
It's like, "Okay, if I'm teaching
"and telling students to go to college
to get a livable wage and teachers are suffering."
You know, so it's like, it's just time
for this conversation to be had, and for teachers--
And I wrote this book so teachers can understand
that they are heard and they are seen.
And the issues must be addressed at this point.
- And when we talk about, you know, trauma,
you know, for me, trauma was not a word
that I heard a lot of growing up.
- Right. - And I say new, meaning
in the last 15 or so years,
it's kind of popped up and we hear about it.
What kind of things can you speak to in terms of--
that fall under the category of trauma,
you know, that teachers are experiencing.
- So, when you think about teacher trauma,
you think about, there is a terminology
that is-- that you can actually research this called
secondary traumatic stress.
And that's where teachers are--
That's what teachers deal with
when they have to support students who are traumatized.
Students that deal with food insecurities,
violence in the home, of physical abuse, mental abuse,
those type of things that they bring into the classroom.
And then the teachers have to deal with those behaviors.
And so, indirectly we are being affected.
And then you think about conversations with parents,
abuse from-- verbal abuse from parents.
We usually just call it parent conflict and have a meeting.
But now, it's time to call it what it is.
It's traumatizing when you have a parent
yelling at you, screaming at you.
You think about in a home, if a child is being abused,
it's usually a parent yelling at 'em,
hitting 'em and things like that.
Well, it's a lot of abuse that goes on in the classroom.
Yes, teachers are adults,
but we deal with all forms of abuse,
and it never was identified as abuse.
But now, it's time to call it what it is.
It's simply abuse in the school system,
in the classroom, systemically, as well as with students.
- Is there a way to turn it off in terms of,
you know, is it as simple as turning it off
and not letting it impact you as an instructor?
Is that even possible?
- For many years, we've been told to ignore it,
but it shows up in our homes.
It shows up in our health, in our physical health.
It shows up in our mental health.
So, for many years, teachers have been told
to suppress the trauma that we endure.
But now, we can't suppress it any longer
because it's spilling out into our everyday life.
So, no, you can't turn it on and off.
We may hide it, we wear a mask.
And as you see on the cover,
I have the lady's hair all over the place,
which represent the trauma and the abuse
and the confusion and all of those things will come--
that comes with being an educator.
But then I have the red lipstick
that is symbolic to wearing a mask,
you know, hiding what I'm really feeling as a teacher.
You know, it was a time when I came,
when I was on my way to work,
I was happy to go into the classroom.
And now, you have a lot of educators,
when they're on their way to work,
they are dreading walking into the classroom
because it's different.
Teachers aren't doing a lot of teaching.
We're doing a lot of parenting.
- Yeah, I got the impression also reading that
kind of whatever those students
are going through in their personal lives,
it seems like many teachers are going through the same thing.
- Yes, yes, yes.
- Is that the sense you get in terms of--
like whatever problems they have,
are they bringing those to school?
And then, somehow as an instructor,
you kind of get involved,
even though you may not want to get involved because you're--
just out of compassion? - Sometimes you have to.
Sometimes you have to get involved.
If it's causing disruption in the classroom
or you see a child who is not functioning well,
you have to get involved.
You have to figure out what's going on in the classroom.
We're mandated reporters, too, so a lot of it becomes legal.
So, you have to become, you know, get involved.
- Yeah, what are some of the things that you've seen?
- Food insecurity, children-- I had incidents
where children come to school with marks on their bodies
that we have to report, children coming to school saying
their parent yelled or cussed at 'em.
And so, they brought it in the classroom,
and I had to redirect the energy.
Like, "I don't know what happened at home,
"but we have to redirect the energy
when you come into the classroom."
Because we don't think about not only
is that child being affected,
but what about the other students in the classroom
that have to hear the yelling and the cussing
and the screaming of that child that's having a bad day.
That also indirectly affects that child
and creates trauma in the other students.
'Cause you have students that say,
"Man, you know, Dr. Johnson,
"can y'all just remove him or her?
You know, I can't even focus."
And so, it not only affects the teacher and the child
that is-- that you're dealing with,
it affects the whole classroom climate, you know?
And so, a lot of the classroom climate
is just disturbed at this point,
and it's just too much for a teacher to handle.
When I first started teaching,
every teacher had an assistant, right?
And that would somehow alleviate some of the stress
that teachers dealt with, right?
But now, it's just like really one on what,
30 kids or more, 25 or more,
you know, and it's just a lot.
Think about society, the changes in society.
So, we're dealing with the economic changes in society,
all type of things changing in society,
but teacher salaries,
but policies pertaining to teachers
is just becoming too much.
- Yeah, what's been out there for--
to support teachers, you know, with the trauma?
What's been out there in the past
in terms of support systems for them?
- Probably none.
None.
Some schools are now trying to offer
mental health counseling.
They may say, "You have free sessions
as long as you work here," and things like that.
But, think about a teacher's workload.
When do you have time to go see a counselor?
[laughs] You know?
So, it's a lot that comes with teaching these days.
You know, it always was a lot that came with teaching.
But for me, being an expert of education,
I was able to teach with fidelity.
I was able to teach, manage the classroom.
And if you got teachers like me,
that's saying, "Okay, enough is enough,"
it's time that we do something
to change the trajectory of what we're seeing
in the school systems and in the classroom, so.
- And like you, I come from a family of educators.
My mom spent probably 40-plus years in the classroom.
And, you know, I heard her always complain
about grading papers and all these little things,
but I never really saw her obviously talk about
some of the personal things
that she might have been dealing with in the classroom.
How much of that personal stuff
that they deal with in the classroom makes it home
with people, with other teachers as they,
you know, leave the classroom and go home?
- It makes it-- It makes it home a lot.
'Cause sometimes, I hear my husband
or my children be like,
"Oh, we don't wanna hear about it today."
'Cause, you know, I had a incident recently
where this young lady just exploded
because she was somewhere she wasn't supposed to be.
And I kind of like, "I'm gonna give you a demerit."
And she just screamed.
And I mean, when I tell you--
because it was a student that I rarely had issues with,
I never had issues with.
She was my class helper.
And when she did that, it kind of hurt my feelings.
And so, I took it all the way home.
I was all day, I was talking about it,
what she said to me, how she said it.
And then my whole family was like,
"We don't wanna hear about it," you know?
But it really does affect us mentally, emotionally.
And then, you think about some teachers become timid
when it comes to redirecting behaviors,
because you don't wanna deal with that backlash.
You don't wanna deal with students yelling and screaming
because you're redirecting them, right?
But then you have parents that says,
"Why you didn't tell me?"
Because, yeah, if I redirect your child
and they scream and yell and cuss in the classroom,
and then I call you and they give you a story,
then we have to defend ourselves against you
because you said, "I believe my child,"
and then you wanna set up a meeting with admin.
And admin is worried about finances in the school.
Like if this child leaves,
then that means money leave, you know?
And so, teachers just choosing to suffer in silence,
which is not fair and it's not part of the job.
And so, instead of teachers facing and calling it out
and calling what it's-- saying what it is,
teachers are leaving the profession.
I spoke with someone who works at a university,
and they said that the people are not even enrolling
like they used to in the School of Education.
People no longer wanna be teachers.
- Murv: Mm-hmm. - And so, it's like, if we--
If the field of education dies,
what does that-- how would that affect our world,
our United States?
We already have a lack of education.
Students don't value education and we see the effects of it.
But what if teachers-- we don't have teachers anymore?
- Now, and I know you're not--
you're not a therapist, per se,
but as someone who's spent, you know,
24-plus years in that classroom, it has to be healthy
for teachers to talk to somebody about some of the stresses.
And what are some of the ways that you tell teachers,
you know, to help themselves
in terms of relieving some of that stress?
- So, I am a mental health coach as well as a life coach.
And so, I took all the strategies
and things I learned as a teacher
and put it into my life-coaching business.
So, I'm a firm advocate of mental health management.
And so, I do talk to the teachers
and I tell 'em, "Don't take the workload home."
I had teachers that would come to me crying about,
"I gotta grade all these papers, report cards are due."
And I was like, "Uh-uh, don't take that home."
I'm gonna tell you what my auntie told me.
She said, "Leave it in the classroom.
Don't take it home with you."
Because it used to be-- - Easier said than done, right?
- Easier said than done when you have deadlines,
right, that have to be met
and you don't have enough prep time
to do it while you at work,
so you're forced to take it home.
Which is not fair,
but you're forced to take it home
because you have all of these deadlines.
Report cards due,
conference on the same day report cards due,
emails being sent to you during class time
where you're supposed to respond to emails while you're teaching
and parents calling, all of these extra things,
and it's like, we're not superhuman.
We are, you know, people.
- Do you feel like we're expecting
too much from teachers? - Too much, and given--
and we're given little, too little.
Not much.
At all.
So, you think about it.
We're teaching other people children.
We're left with a large student loan debt.
Then we have to think about when we plan our families,
our children going to school.
So, there's no really-- real benefit
of being a teacher or educator.
You think if you teach at a university,
the kids go to school for free, even, you know,
people that work for the police department
or the sheriff's department,
their children and family get benefits,
but there's no real benefits,
retirement benefits that will make you say,
"Hey, I wanna be a teacher."
Not even the salary is livable wages.
- Why do you think teachers make so little?
- Paid so little? - Murv: Yeah.
- I think it deals with why teachers--
Teaching became a field many, many years ago.
You think about why schools began to be necessary.
So, remember, teaching were for white women
who wanted to get out the house
while their husbands were being the provider.
And so, the teaching
was a white woman's field back in the day, right?
Young white women who really didn't need the moneys per se
because they had husbands who were the providers,
but it gave them something to do, right?
And we still have that mentality,
because not only are teachers white married women,
you have single white women who are teachers now.
You have single Black women, you have single many minorities.
You have male teachers now
where teaching is their sole source of income.
So, back in the day, you had people that were married
where it wasn't their source of income.
And nowadays, you think about it
and nobody thought to change that type of, um...
- But don't you think, like, the best teachers are the ones
that are just most passionate about teaching
as opposed to the people that go into teaching
because they couldn't go into something else or anything else?
- Most definitely.
And that's another thing that we--
It was a fluctuation of teachers
coming in from other fields who did not go to the--
go through the School of Education.
A lot of people thought they can teach.
And teaching is not just about completing your license,
you know, getting your license.
Teaching, you have to be compassionate
to be able to teach.
It has to-- Teaching, for me, is a calling.
I say, "Everybody can't teach."
I don't care how many degrees you have.
Everybody cannot go into the classroom and be effective.
- What do you think it takes to be a good teacher?
A great teacher? - I think what, again--
What it takes to be a great teacher
is someone who's called to teach.
Somebody who is passionate about the people
that they are teaching, you know?
People, someone who care
about the community in which they live.
Somebody who's invested where they're teaching.
- And does that make it any easier
to deal with all the trauma and stress?
- It did, but now it doesn't.
Like I said, when I was younger teaching, I was highly invested.
And all the extra things that I did was worth it.
But the difference, too, is
I felt like I had more support then.
And so, now that so many things
have been stripped away from teachers.
When I first started teaching, I had more autonomy.
I was respected as the teacher,
so my opinion mattered of, my opinion about the changes
that was needed in my classroom.
I had the autonomy to say so,
and nowadays, teachers' autonomy has been stripped from them.
You know, we have to follow the mandates
of politicians now, right?
To keep the funding in the school building,
we have to do A, B, C, D.
So, the autonomy in the classroom
is stripped away from teachers, right?
So, we're basically being told what to do by people
who are not experts of education.
- You mentioned in your book that you don't like politicians
putting their hands into the classroom.
- Yeah, stay out the classroom.
- Murv: Why is that?
- Because most of the time,
they're giving directives about issues
that they know nothing about.
They're giving mandates about the classroom
when it comes to teachers and students,
and they know nothing about the realities
of what goes on in a classroom.
And so, then you have educators
who are in the classroom every day
having to follow these mandates of people
who don't even realize that
what they're asking us to do is not effective.
It's ineffective,
and it causes more harm than hurt, right?
Harm than help, right?
And so, you have a lot of people
that wanna tell teachers what to do,
and they have no clue about teacher reality,
what goes on in a classroom.
You have people who think they know
what's best for children
yet have never taught a children.
You know, you may have children,
but it's different when you have 30 children in a classroom
and you're responsible for their academic growth
and their social growth and their mental growth.
All of this we are responsible for, right?
But we don't have all the necessary tools to support them.
And so, you think about it, we wanna give our all.
But then, I'm gonna be honest.
You leave home--
You leave the school building feeling defeated.
You leave the schoolhouse
feeling like you're lacking financially.
You're trying to figure it out for your own family,
yet you have to face all the ills
that comes with being a teacher nowadays, and it's...
- There was an interesting session-- section in your book.
You talked about several different students, actually,
and it kind of deals with teacher intuition.
You know, you tell your students
at the end of the day, "Be safe, take care."
You know, we say these things kind of in passing,
not thinking of it literal sometimes,
- Tamika: Yes. - But, you know, you work in a,
you know, certain areas and in more,
you know, schools that kids
have a lot more challenges than other schools.
Those things become really serious.
So you've experienced some,
you know, some tragic... - Yes.
- ...you know, loss of life in the classroom.
Give me some insight on the impact of that,
I guess, and how that impacts you.
- So, for me, I had one student who, she tells--
Most of my students tell their parents,
"Dr. Johnson is our mama at home-- at school.
She's not only our teacher, she's our mama."
Because, again, I live in Milwaukee,
so I live in the community
in which I live, in which I work.
So, those students are a part of my daily life.
I teach a lot of students who I may know their families,
right, or know they live in situations.
So, I try to impart in my students life issues,
especially our Black and Brown children.
I know what they will face when they leave the classroom,
so I really try to pour into them life skills
and integrity and all of these things.
Education.
But at the same time, I like to know who you are as a person.
So, I respect them as a person
and you develop relationships with children.
Sometimes, the teacher is that child's safe place.
Even the males, the girls, you are their safe place,
so they come to you
when they having issues with their parents.
If they having issues with somebody in the school,
they come to you and they tell you everything.
So, you build these relationships.
Relationships that parents may not even know that,
you know, when parents say, "Well, my son--"
- 'Cause those kids are gonna share something with you
they might not share with them, right?
- With their parent, yes.
And we're with them eight hours a day almost.
- Murv: Yeah. - For, like, 180-some days.
So, there's no way you can't build a bond
unless you just heartless with the students.
And so, when you think about my student,
for instance, I talk about Tariq.
So, I left-- I left the Christian schools
because I wanted a taste of public schools, right?
And I started teaching at this school
and it was different, very different.
But as a Christian teacher, I always prayed with my students
and talked about God.
And even though they'd say, "You can't talk about God here."
And I'm like, "Listen, this is just who I am."
And so, I built relationships with my students.
And then the students would come into the classroom
talking about their friend who died,
and then I would give 'em a outlet to discuss it, you know,
because they don't know how to take that energy.
You know, and-- - I mean,
there's a lot of grown-ups
that don't know how to take that energy.
- Yes, and so that particular, the one that,
the particular student that I talk about,
I start off with,
which was very traumatizing to me was the Tariq Akbar.
And he made news headlines in 2015.
He was the 14-year-old that was murdered
at the lakefront in Milwaukee on the 4th of July.
And I-- And Tariq was one
that the students called my favorite student.
And I'm gonna tell you why they called him my favorite student.
Because Tariq had a personality
that if you didn't have a relationship with him,
he would probably be in detention room all the time
because he was vocal.
He said what he had to say, but he was sweet.
And I-- And for some reason,
I'm always the teacher
that the other teachers say, "She favors the bad kid."
She-- But it's not that.
It's that I see the potential in them
despite of some of their flaws, right?
And I try to pour into them
and give them some type of love and care and attention
that the rest of the world may never give them
because of their disposition, whatever, right?
And so, he was one student that I would pour into,
but he was one student that I would always say,
"You better pray at night.
You know God?"
You know, and I would talk to him.
And I really felt like I was getting to him,
but he was graduating from eighth grade.
And I said, "Now Tariq, you're going to high school.
It's gonna be a little different, you know?"
And so, I gave him and the boys
this long conversation about not going to every fight
that they invited to, you know?
I said, "Y'all ain't gotta go to every fight y'all invited to.
Y'all know that, right?"
- And when you say that, that means, like,
kids in high school,
someone's gonna fight after school.
And then other students end up showing up.
Is that what you mean? - Or, so what I meant by that is
if somebody is starting a fight with you,
you don't have to accept the invitation always.
You can turn the cheek, you can turn the other cheek.
And then they would say, "Oh, that's soft, that's soft."
But turning the other cheek can save your life at times.
And so, Tariq was my student
that the other students would cause drama
and he would take up for whomever.
And I would always say "Tariq, don't.
"Stay out of it.
"You don't have nothing to do with it.
Stay out of it," you know?
And so, I really envisioned him
being something great when he got older, right?
I said, "God is gonna use that energy
and you're gonna be something great when you get older."
I would always impart words of wisdom
and affirmations into the students, right?
And so, this one particular student,
the summer I gave them this long speech,
you know, "Don't go to every party you invited to."
And, of course, they say,
"Oh, you so mushy," and "You so emotional."
And I'm like, "Seriously, you know,
"and I don't wanna see y'all on shirts--
I don't wanna see y'all names on a R.I.P. shirt."
And I will explain to them that for that moment,
you know, it's R.I.P. such and such.
And it's, and it's all, everybody's together.
I said, "But then your parents are gonna be left with
"the effects of your death once all of your friends leave,
when the funeral is over and everybody's done."
'Cause I experienced that.
My brother was murdered when I was 15, in 1993.
So, I understood how everybody was around.
And you got the R.I.P. shirts and all of this fanfare, right?
But then you're left with the effect afterwards.
Your parents gonna be left.
So, I really wanted them to understand that.
And so, that summer,
I started getting, like, two weeks before he was murdered,
I started getting text messages from former students.
And I'd text them back, like, "How do you get my number?"
And then I text one of 'em back and they was like,
"Oh, I see you got rid of that Android."
I had gotten an iPhone or whatever.
And I said to myself-- - Hey, I'm on an Android.
[Tamika laughs] - Don't start.
- No, that's what they were saying to me.
And so, I would laugh like, you know,
"I'm glad you-- How your summer going?"
Whatever, and I remember saying this.
Like, I don't know if it was a few days or a week
before I got the text message from one of my students
that Tariq was murdered.
I said, "Tariq gonna end up calling me."
'Cause the other kids got my number.
I was like, "Tariq 'bout to end up calling me."
And 1 o'clock in the morning, my phone went off,
and it was from my student Tyra, and she--
And it just said, "Tariq is dead."
- Murv: Mm. - And I looked.
And I jumped up and I said-- I said, "What are you--
What do you mean?"
She said--
I said, "What do you mean Tariq is dead?"
She said, "They saying he got shot
at the lakefront and he dead."
And I was like, "Hold up, let me go on Facebook," you know?
And so, once it was confirmed, you know,
that was my first instance
where I really dealt with the death of--
I dealt with the death of students
at my former school.
But they were-- it was, like, health issues, right?
And but this particular student is like one
that I really grew close to.
And I had conversations with them every day.
And to see I had just told them like a month prior,
like, "Be careful," and things like that.
So, dealing with that was very traumatic for me.
Learning to process it.
Even now, I still think about those students
and things like that.
- Well, the scary part to me is like...
you still have to go teach. - After, when you're done.
And that's what I mentioned in the book.
Going back to that same space, in that same classroom,
and having to deal with my students
who don't know how to process his death.
But we're in the same classroom.
This is the last place that they saw their classmate alive,
and I'm supposed to teach them,
but they wanna have a conversation
about his death and how it affected them.
And me being who I am, we have those conversations.
- Let's just say, what have you learned
before and after, you know,
before you had some knowledge on how to deal with trauma
as a teacher and what you know now?
- So, I'ma be just-- I'ma be real.
I've always been a believer in Christ.
So, I've always had a relationship with God.
And so, that's always been my source of therapy.
And so, when I got to studying--
My PhD is in Christian counseling,
so I did study a lot of mental--
and my focus was mental health education.
And so, a lot of those things that I was taught educationally,
it was stuff that I already learned through the Holy Spirit
and the Bible that talked about,
you know, processing my thoughts,
think on these things, talk.
I'm a talker, you know that.
I talk. - No, what?
- I talk a lot. - Wait a minute, you?
- But that's good, that's a good thing.
For those people who talk a lot,
they get all of whatever's in them out,
and that's healthy.
- And what do you say to the folks that
don't have that spiritual connection?
They may not have a higher power that they believe in.
What should they be doing?
- Seek a therapist or a coach
or somebody that they trust that they can talk to.
I tell my students this,
"If you don't feel like talking to anybody,"
I say, "pull out a notebook and journal.
And go back and read your journal."
Journal, declutter.
It's putting your thoughts on paper.
So, I'm a firm believer.
I've always been one that journals
since I was a little girl, and I still do it as an adult.
And that's very therapeutic to me,
because you have some students that can't talk to anybody
and don't wanna talk to anybody.
You have grown ups, adults.
And so, I told them, I said, "Journal, journal."
- Do your students ever become a source,
to help get through the trauma in terms of what they provide?
- Mm-hmm, yes.
A source for me?
- Murv: Yeah. - Most definitely.
I talk all the time to my students.
- But I'm, in terms of anything they say to you.
- Tamika: Most definitely. - Like what kind of things?
- So, because I talk to them a lot about things--
And believe it or not,
children are very insightful when it comes to things.
And they're like, "Well, Dr. Johnson,
maybe you should just let that go or leave it alone."
Like, you'd be really surprised
when you have conversations with your students
that some of the things that they tell you to do,
you need to do. - Murv: Right.
- "Oh, you stressing about the wrong thing.
We can do that tomorrow." [laughs]
That's so funny, but it's true.
You know, sometimes-- And I'm very--
I'm-- I started off as a teacher
who was strict on,
I wanna get this done on deadlines and time.
And that's very stressful, right?
And so, I'm a little lax now.
- Yeah. - Then I'm getting older too.
So, it's like, I'm a little bit more lax.
And I understand that that helps with my stress.
- So, this is lax Tamika that I'm seeing today?
- Oh, yeah, yeah.
'Cause I was a very rigorous, very rigorous...
I mean, we on the go all day, you know.
You know, and so now it's more, I'm just chill at this point.
- I have to share this story.
I, you know, I spent a little time
in the classroom as a sub at one point.
And then I also, early in my career,
probably 30 years ago,
I volunteered at a high school for basketball,
and I had a horrible situation where
I had to cover a shooting.
And when I showed up to cover the story,
it turns out it was our star basketball player.
- Tamika: Wow. - And, you know,
he's fighting for his life.
The police tape's up, all that.
The cops knew me from the news, and they let me cross the tape.
And I sat there and held that kid's hand
while he was fighting for his life.
And I was probably--
I was definitely in my 20s there.
And I don't think the word trauma was a word
that I was familiar with at that time.
And I just remember going through that.
I covered that story for a good week.
And kid's name's Doug Williams.
Not the basket--
not the football player from Grambling.
But he was a basketball player at Fair Park High
in Shreveport, Louisiana.
But I remember sitting in a dark room
for probably a couple of weeks
trying to sort through the trauma of that.
And I don't know, like,
you know, I certainly got through it.
It certainly helped me.
But like, you know, if I was armed
with what we know now, you know?
Is that, you know, the right way to deal with that?
Is that normal?
Is that different for everybody?
How do you look at that? - Yeah, people--
People process trauma totally different,
differently, right?
And however long it takes you to process
what you need to process, you should.
And I tell people, you know,
"Some people know how to cope with it.
Some people don't."
So, it's very important that you get with a professional
who can tell you how to cope with it.
And you think about as a teacher,
you mentioned the yellow tape
and I mentioned my student Tyrese,
where there was an incident at the school
and I heard gunshots at my--
Think about it, you know?
I'm teaching and I'm headed--
After this big incident happened and I'm ready to go home
because everything appeared as if it calmed down,
even though one of our teachers
did get a gun brandished at them.
And I'm just like, "Oh, my goodness," you know?
Sometimes you become-- It becomes normalized.
So, what I realized in my life when I was teaching,
teaching at these inner city schools,
I was becoming desensitized to the violence
that I was seeing every day.
Because when I left the school where Tariq went,
I started teaching at Milwaukee public alternative schools,
high schools.
And so, the violence that I would see in the schools
or outside the schools
and my student's on the news for stealing cars,
my student's on the news for shooting somebody,
like, it was just, I was becoming desensitized to--
It was like nothing for me.
And not realizing that I was suppressing a lot of it.
And I'ma tell you how it came out,
because once Tariq--
Tyrese, the incident that happened with him
and I go to the window and I hear, like,
five gunshots, and I just jump and slammed the window.
And I'm like, "Oh, my goodness," right?
And so, I asked the guard, I'm like--
Our security guard, like, walked me--
You know, all the things I talked about
what happened in between.
But I'm like, "Walk me to the bus stop
so I can see if it's one of our students."
At first, I was telling him to walk me to my car to go home,
but then when I heard the gunshots, I'm like,
"Walk me to the bus stop."
Because I started seeing a lot of people running
towards the bus stops where--
the bus stop where our students usually catch the bus.
And I'm like-- And the office staff,
she was like, "Mrs. Johnson, our kids are gone.
They've been gone over a hour ago."
I said, "But you know how they linger around."
So, I'm like, "Darrell, help!
Just walk me down there."
He like, "I'll walk you down."
He was reluctant, so.
And as I walked down there, I see a huge crowd.
And I see them at the bus stop, the very bus stop
where our students usually go to catch the bus.
And you-- And I see them performing CPR.
And I'm short, as you know.
And I'm like, "Can you see Darrell, who--"
- Five foot is not short.
Just so you know. [Tamika laughs]
- So, I'm asking him.
He's tall like you.
I'm like, "Can you see the person?"
He goes, "I think I know the shoes."
And I'm like, "Whose shoes?"
And he's trying to figure out whose shoes,
and I'm trying to get past the yellow tape.
And the police officer,
Milwaukee police officer came to me.
He was like, "Ma'am, you can't go past the yellow tape."
And I'm like, "I'm a teacher up the street.
And I just wanna see if that's my student."
And that's when I had a young lady come to me
and she goes, "That is one of y'all students."
And I'm like, "Which one?"
I said, "Can you describe him?"
She's like, "The guy that wears the kufi."
And I'm like, "Tyrese?"
And then the guy was like, "Yes."
And then it was just...
That was just like...
- But you know, as you tell that story,
you tell it with a great bit of joy.
And I'm wondering how much work went into being able
to do that and to be that way?
- Because Tyrese is alive, right?
I went to the hospital.
Prayed for him all the time at the hospital.
Put my oil on him.
And I remember when
they were telling us the prognosis.
And I would go home, though.
I'm telling you, I was in tears at home.
It was just like, "I can't deal with this anymore.
"I'm done teaching.
I don't wanna teach in the alternative school."
And it wasn't that-- It wasn't the crime.
I just was so connected to my students
that I didn't wanna see them being murdered and hurt.
And it was just mentally, you know, bothering me.
And so, when Tyrese got out the hospital,
you know, I would visit him, he would call me.
Sometimes he'd asked me to pay his phone bill, like,
"Dr. Johnson, can you, Mrs. Johnson?"
You know, and I would talk to him.
And just knowing that he survived...
- Mm.
- Tamika: ...that gives me peace.
I called his mother, like, I think a week or so ago.
And, like, "Did he ever get his high school diploma?"
'Cause I was supposed to help him with that.
But it was so much going on, you know,
in the world of education for me.
But he got his high school diploma.
He's still living, you know.
He have his challenges because of the gunshot.
And, you know, he had to have half of his skull removed
and all those different things, so.
And then again, even after that incident,
I had to go to work the next day.
I chose to go to work the next day.
Because I knew--
Of course, my mother and everybody's like, "Quit!"
[laughs]
"Stop teaching at those type of schools."
But I would tell people, like, "Those children are normal."
You know, I thought walking into alternative schools
that I was gonna have Freddy Krueger or Jason, you know?
But they really have a story.
And if you hear their stories,
you realize that those students are dealing with trauma
that was out of their control.
And if you build relationships with them,
you could help change some of the trajectory of the behaviors
that they were, you know, going through and doing.
And so, I had to go back the next day.
Was it somber, yeah.
It was very, very somber. - Murv: Yeah.
- Have I cried in front of my students?
Plenty of times. - Murv: Yeah.
- Telling them stories like this.
- Murv: Yeah. - Tamika: You know?
- And I'm gonna wrap this up here shortly,
but I wanna-- I wanted to get to this part
because I really enjoyed.
There's a section in the book where you talk about
how you set your classroom up to create a better vibe.
- Mm-hmm, like the vibe. - Speaking of vibe.
See, we did that at the same time.
[Tamika laughs] See, see?
But you talked about how you set the classroom up,
not just from the aesthetics of it,
but even just the scent of the room itself.
Speak to me on the importance of those little things.
- So, as-- And I've always done this.
So, when I taught kindergarten,
it was very important for me to keep a organized classroom
and have it smell good,
and I really didn't understand the effect of my smell good.
It's just how I was at home.
So, when I brought it into the classroom,
I didn't realize the effect that it had on those around me,
because I will have teachers during they prep time
when my kindergartners were napping,
they would come in and say,
"Miss Johnson, can I just sit in your classroom?"
Because it smelled good,
it's peaceful, and I'm gonna play music.
- What fragrance were you using?
I just wanna know.
What fragrance did you have in that room?
- So, what I have now is like a cashmere, Cashmere Woods.
That's what I have now, and I got that--
- Yes, of course, the Cashmere Wood.
Yes, I love cashmere. - So, I have that from--
I got that from another staff last year,
but I used to use, like, different kind,
like Hawaiian, different type of smells, whatever.
And it was just a calm peace.
It was calm, peaceful.
And the teacher, when she told me that,
she's like, "I like to come in your room.
It's clean, it's peaceful."
Now, mind you, I'm like,
"Why you won't clean up your room?" [laughs]
- Murv: Right? - But, so I knew.
So, my students, once I started teaching at,
like, the at-risk high schools, the public schools,
I understood that a peaceful atmosphere was needed.
So, when they walk into that classroom,
if they don't find peace at home,
if they don't find peace in the car
on the way to school or on the bus,
when they walked into my classroom,
I want it to smell good,
I want it to be clean, I want it to be organized.
I want them to be able to know what to expect
when they come into my classroom.
And it's still like that,
because a lot of times, students go home to stuff
that they don't know what to expect.
Chaos, right?
And if they couldn't find order or peace
any place else in the world, I want it to be my classroom.
- Yeah, and do you find that
the trauma that teachers experience
sometimes is part of the reason why many
aren't staying in the field, or there are challenges
of getting more teachers in the field?
- Yeah, they just-- A lot of 'em just leaving now.
You know, The younger child--
The younger teachers--
You know, the older children, we felt--
The older teachers, we felt like we were called.
And this is our duty and we are supposed to take it.
This was-- This is what make us a great teacher.
But now, more like you said, trauma and abuse
and those terminologies weren't talked about as often.
But then if we look about--
we look at what's happening in the classroom
and the things behavior-wise, verbal abuse from parents,
systemic racism that Black educators deal with,
it's abuse.
It's traumatic.
And if you do research,
it says now that it's not talked about,
but teachers experience post-traumatic stress disorder.
- Mm.
- From violence in the classroom, from verbal--
students being verbally combative,
yelling and screaming at you.
You know what I'm saying?
And you're supposed to remain professional
in the face of somebody talking about you,
talking about the way you look
or whatever they're talking about.
You know what I'm saying? - Yeah.
- Tamika: And so--
- You know, when I was a sub, I called it PTSD
for post-traumatic student disorder,
'cause them kids used to rough me up
real good. [Tamika laughs]
- And so, now it is coming to a place
where it's like, teachers are letting the students
just take over the classroom.
But I'm like, if we wanna save the field of education,
if we want healthy schools, healthy students,
we must first have healthy teachers.
And we must know that teachers are not--
Good teachers are not disposable.
You may get rid of that good teacher,
but the next teacher that come in
may not be as effective or effective at all.
- Yeah. - Tamika: You have the new--
Like I was mentioning, the new generation of teachers,
they are taking their mental health seriously.
They are taking their finance
and everything about their life seriously.
And they're leaving the field within the first few years.
And that's just the reality of it.
So, if you have teachers like me phasing out, retiring, whatever,
and these new generation come in and say,
"Oh, I'm not dealing with that."
- Murv: Yeah. - But you gotta say,
a lot of it, they shouldn't have to deal with, you know?
Abuse is not part of the job.
- Murv: Yeah. - From no one.
Not the principal, not the-- not your colleagues,
not the students, not the parents.
Abuse is not part of the job description.
And you shouldn't take abuse from anybody.
- Murv: Yeah.
Tamika Johnson, thank you so much for joining us.
- Thanks for having me. - Where do we pick up the book?
- Tamika: You can purchase the book on Amazon.com.
- Murv: Perfect.
Thanks for joining us. - Thank you.