June 16, 2025
By Jenna Fournel, Chief Curiosity Officer
Listen to this week’s Hooray For Monday podcast to hear Jenna and Meag’s conversation with Deepa Iyer, lawyer, author, and activist. They speak about the different roles we can all play in furthering the causes we believe in.
Teamwork makes the dream work. Inspired Teaching Fellows take part in an improvisational activity that requires silent collaboration among participants.
Thursday marks the 4th year of Juneteenth as a federal holiday. According to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, “on June 19, 1865, Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas with the news that the more than 250,000 enslaved Black people in the state were free. This day came to be known as Juneteenth—a time to celebrate, gather as a family, reflect on the past, and look to the future.”
As we all know, that date didn’t mark the end of racism or the beginning of social justice for all or the launch of an equal education for every child in our country. But the significance in making this a federal holiday according to Angela Tate, the former curator of women’s history for the National Museum of African American History and Culture, is that it is “part of a continuum of moments where African Americans have advocated for their full participation in American citizenship and commanded the maintenance of the memory of our history and culture in the face of resistance and racism.” You can learn more here.
This celebration and its history make us think of all the individuals—some famous, most not—who work together to create change. Even in the face of insurmountable odds, when people come together to fight for what is right, over time more often than not, they win. Victory is not achieved by individuals, but by communities working together with each person in that community playing their own vital role.
Deepa published “We Are the Builders,” to support teaching young children about their role in community and making change.
This is something Deepa Iyer, a lawyer, author, advocate, and activist, whom I met this year, is striving to teach not just teachers and students, but everyone who wants to make a difference. Deepa created a framework to help guide social change that emphasizes discovering our strengths and the roles we can play in building movements within community. We met Deepa at a Social Justice Curriculum Fair in the fall, and my colleague Meag Campos and I were thrilled to have an opportunity to learn more about her work.
I encourage you to listen to our conversation with Deepa on the Hooray For Monday podcast. Her insights are fortifying in this time of ongoing uncertainty and offer us all actionable steps to take in strengthening our communities and the causes we believe in.
Here are some of the overarching themes from her framework:
Everyone has a role to play
Figuring out how best to use our skills to solve big problems doesn’t need to be overwhelming. Deepa has identified ten roles–including Builder, Storyteller, and Weaver–that encompass many personal traits, values, and interests. Identifying which role best suits you can help you determine where and how you contribute to a cause.
We can’t all be Martin Luther King, Jr.
Deepa points out that movements are not made and progress is not earned by a single charismatic individual. While the names of leaders like Dr. King make the history books, it is the effort of the collective that makes history.
Be open to change to create change
Movements are built in community, and community is an evolving ecosystem. Cultivating an improvisational mindset–being able to adapt your strengths for new situations–is integral to supporting long-term change.
Throughout this year, I had the pleasure of visiting dozens of classrooms across the District as part of our Teaching With Improvisation Fellowship. In each, I was delighted again and again to witness the ways in which our Fellows were equipping their students to be active participants in their community. Whether it was helping them collectively navigate loss or empowering them to find their own solutions to a problem, supporting young people in the development of critical life skills was a consistent thread.
Their classrooms reflected many of the roles outlined in Deepa’s framework and this helped them nurture learning communities full of respect, curiosity, and compassion. There is tremendous work to be done. But as the school year comes to a close, and Juneteenth celebrations take place across the country, there is good reason to celebrate every small step forward.
For additional insights, resources, and information on Inspired Teaching teacher and youth programming, subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter!
Hooray For Monday is an award-winning weekly publication of Center for Inspired Teaching, a social change nonprofit organization that champions the power of curiosity and is dedicated to transforming the school experience from compliance-based to engagement-based. Inspired Teaching provides transformative, improvisation-based professional learning for teachers that is 100% engaging – intellectually, emotionally, and physically.
