Just like the Boyz II Men hit classic, we are coming to the end of our road. It's part one of a farewell and it begins with an introduction to the new A.J. Fletcher Fellow. Everyone, meet Laura.
Just like the Boyz II Men hit classic, we are coming to the end of our road. It's part one of a farewell and it begins with an introduction to the new A.J. Fletcher Fellow. Everyone, meet Laura.
In this episode we cover:
As mentioned in the episode, click the link below to hear Laura share more about her senior thesis: Moderating History: North Carolina's Public Schools and Home-based History Education in the Black Community. 1915 to the present.
About Laura: Laura Collins is the 2021-2023 A.J. Fletcher Foundation Fellow. She is a graduate of Davidson College with a degree in History.
Note: The North Carolina Justice Center is a grantee of the A.J. Fletcher Foundation
[00:00:00] Kenneth Brown Jr: I'm Kenneth Brown, Jr and today is part one of a farewell and it begins with an introduction. Meet Laura.
Music: “Tarte Tatin” by Blue Dot Sessions
Kenneth Brown Jr: She's a North Carolina native
Laura Collins: Born in chapel hill, moved around a bit, but Winston-Salem is home.
Kenneth Brown Jr: who just graduated.
Laura Collins: I went to Davidson College. I majored in history. Had a really amazing time there. I just graduated.
Kenneth Brown Jr: And is interested in history, education, educational history.
Laura Collins: History, education, educational history, policy, kind of all of these overlapping spheres.
Kenneth Brown Jr: She loves dogs and is currently on a little break before her fellowship. Hanging out with friends and enjoying some good reads. One is a typical summer beach read.
Laura Collins: Kind of the more fun beach reads [00:01:00] things like that. So my sister, I just read “The UnHoneymooners”
Kenneth Brown Jr: The other, more substantive and thought-provoking
Laura Collins: Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown and it's kind of about how can we center pleasure in a fight for justice and liberation. So it's really cool. It's a mix of interviews, writing, essays. There's an Audre Lorde piece that's kind of the centerpiece of that book.
Kenneth Brown Jr: However, in context for this episode, she's our new fellow. So, before I hit the road, sit a spell and say hello. This is Pivots, a podcast about navigating transitions, negotiating change, and reimagining our world.
[00:02:00] Kenneth Brown Jr: When this episode will be released, it will be a little over a month since you have graduated, and considering that the pandemic cast a very big cloud over the majority of the end part of your college career, what have you been reflecting on or thinking about?
Laura Collins: As you're saying it's about a month out so I've had, you know, being able to speak with people after graduating and them asking me about, you know, probably the first or second question I get asked when I tell someone that I just graduated is, “oh, how was that for your senior year?” and I think one thing when I kind of reflect on that question, that's really interesting is that…it almost was. So I had a professor say this to me, and I think this was a really a great way to put the way I have, the feelings that I have about senior [00:03:00] year is "you can not romanticize the pandemic while also taking lessons away from it" and I think that is something that really, was, it speaks a lot to my senior year because I learned a lot of things about the things that I prioritize, the things that are really fun to me. So, kind of smaller, more intimate friendships or intimate connections with people is something that's really important to me. And something that I actually did get out of the pandemic because you had to limit your circle so closely and it also, you know, taught me a lot about, um, the importance of, You know, people mutual respect for each other and also how interconnected we are, I think we have this idea that our lives are so individualized and there's, I mean, so many factors contributing to that (inaudible). so many of these larger [00:04:00] things, but we do have such interconnected lives. And I think the pandemic really pointed that out. The ways that we each are not just individual people and we can't, we shouldn't just prioritize our individual things over the community and over what's best for the community and I think this was a really big example of that. So, yeah, I think kind of. Just reflecting on the role of ourselves, not just as people that operate, but as community members and we are someone who is a part of this community. Then also just like knowing I kind of like slower weekends where, you know, (I) went to the grocery store and then bake something and that was my big event, but that was kind of fun. So I think taking lessons well, not romanticizing this time and then also just understanding community and [00:05:00] understanding our place in that.
Kenneth Brown Jr: That's good and I think a lot of people have been understanding the role of the collective community. Especially here in the social sector, in the triangle, and in the nonprofit sector and just seeing how all different types of nonprofits are connected to each other. And sometimes has horrible, as it is sometimes it takes a tragic, massive emergency to get us to see all of our connections and that we're really like, even though we may do our individual thing, have our own little mission. Overall, we are all connected in this, in making our place, our community, what it is.
Laura Collins: And I think that is something that kind of drives or what, when I'm feeling really kind of stuck in one thing or stuck in, oh, this [00:06:00] assignment that I'm doing or this part of the research that I'm doing. I think stepping back and understand the role that, that assignment or that smaller thing plays in the larger picture? I think that's something that I thought about a lot when I worked with the Justice Center because they have these different projects that work, you know, within the project. So within the Education and Law project or within the Health project, or the Immigration Rights. Project all of these different projects, but they also work across because education doesn't just happen in a vacuum outside of health or outside of immigration or outside of workers' rights or all of these different projects. So I think that's also something that I thought about a lot with, just with the history major, there's something called entanglement theory, which is, kind of that, "Nothing happens outside of everything else." and I think that can get very meta when you think about it too much, but [00:07:00] it is very true. All of these things happen and are related somehow back to something else and they all happened together. And so I think, yeah, that's something I really love about history, but just understanding I don't think history repeats itself, but I think all of these patterns are related. And so I think understanding how those roots are related to each other and how continuing this path has continued to lead to this path and how we have to change that path in order to change, or we have to get to the root in order to change the path and kind of. Yea,
Entanglement theory is really interesting to me.....so I forget how I got here.
Kenneth and Laura Laughs
Kenneth Brown Jr: No, yeah I was talking, so one of our guests is Ernest Dollar, who's the director of the City of Raleigh Museum and one of his favorite quotes he was sharing was from Mark Twain where it says something along the lines of "history doesn't [00:08:00] repeat itself, but it often rhymes."
Laura Collins: Yes.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Yeah, How did you get into history? History major, co-editor in chief of the Davidson History Journal. Your thesis was around homeschooling and history education within North Carolina black communities. How did you get into history?
Laura Collins: So I always, I mean, I liked history in high school. I took... I had an amazing, well, in middle school, I did amazing eighth-grade history teacher and then in high school, I took AP US and these things, but I never thought that I was going to major in it, I just thought it was a subject that I liked. Then when I came to college, I was thinking about different stuff, I don't know, maybe econ or political science. I knew I had an interest in policy and so that all of those are kind of related and factor in. But I took a history class coming in my first year and I [00:09:00] think I just fell in love with the way that my professor and he ended up, Dr. John Wertheimer, He is a very close mentor, friend, advisor to me. He was my thesis advisor. He was my academic advisor. He's....my friend. I fell in love with the way that he talked about history and I remember one class, he said, "It's important to know some dates to understand context, but I know that you have Google and I know that you can find these things. And so for me, the biggest goal or the largest objective that I want to get out of this class for you is to learn how to think like a historian.So to understand, what does it mean? What does the period of time mean for all of these different things?" So what does it mean for gender? What does it mean to race? What does it mean for...? If we're in this period of time, what are all these factors and how are they being influenced? And so understanding the [00:10:00] historical context that is influencing all of these factors and so I thought that was so cool. I had never really thought about history in that way and thinking about it as not just a textbook to memorize or a subject to memorize, but thinking about it as a way of thinking, I think was really cool for me and it is something that you can take from this discipline and apply it everywhere because you know the skills you learn, like you, you have a letter, who is writing it? Why are they writing it to whom are they writing it? All of these factors, that's something that you can use just in the modern day. Looking at a bill that someone's passing. Okay. Who's, who's sponsoring it. Why? Who was pushing for it? All of these contextual factors matter and are important for understanding why that's happening. So, I think the skills or the ways of thinking, I just kind of fell in love with. Then I [00:11:00] remember my sophomore year, I was speaking to another professor and I was still, I was thinking about political science and thinking about history. He asked me, "okay, why political science? " I said "Oh, I want to, I think I want to go into policy or thinking about it." At that point, I had just worked with Senator Chaudhuri. So, I was thinking about state policy and stuff and then he said, "Well, why do you want to major in history?" And I was like, "Ah, well, I just like it. I just liked the class. Like, I love it." He was like, "Major in history." And yeah, so that's kind of how I ended up there and I've absolutely loved it. It's been one of the best parts of my experience at Davidson. Just I think, yeah. When you have something that kind of, you never get tired of. You have that feeling in your gut that kind of pushes you to keep wanting to read, or you're reading an article that's about whatever your interest is and it, you could get that feeling in your [00:12:00] gut. I think that's kind of a really beautiful thing and that's what I found with history and with that department.
Kenneth Brown Jr: I can sense your passion for it. I can sense your love through the screen and I'm here for it.
Laura Collins: Yeah, I mean lots of credit to the professors at Davidson too. I think they're really...and obviously, and everything has a history. I think that's also what's so cool. It ties into everything. Anything that you were interested in policy-wise or outside of that is influenced by, it has a history and the way it is now is influenced by so many factors and I think it's really cool to look at how that has evolved over time and explaining why that happened.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Yeah. Wow. Everything has a history, cool.
Music: "Speaker Joy" by Blue Dot Sessions
[00:13:00] Kenneth Brown Jr: This whole, this entire podcast project is just learning about how people have pivoted, things they've been learning, and all of the like, and so I was wondering how do you define a pivot?
Laura Collins: So I think you can define it in two ways. I think there's a pivot where you go down to the kind of the larger institutional. You acknowledge that step and then pivot based on that and then there's also kind of the more immediate that happens too. It's just, obviously my mind and that's the whole reason this podcast exists (inaudible). So kind of the pivots you make immediately and then I think back to what I was saying before, again, about there's not necessarily, taking lessons from the pandemic or taking [00:14:00] lessons from an event isn't necessarily to romanticize it. I think the pivots that we had to immediately make for COVID or for any other type of disaster or event I think it changes a society. I don't think we will ever go back to what it was like before COVID. I think, I mean, it was a horribly tragic event. So many people died. Those are all things that obviously can never, and should never be forgotten at the same time I think there are things that we can do better as a society that we have learned because of COVID, and that just came to the surface. So it's kind of a twofold, the media, and then the institutional.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Gotcha. Speaking of this, the root of things, you mentioned North Carolina as home, [00:15:00] and you seem really passionate about living in North Carolina and being a North Carolinian. And I'm curious as to why, why are you so passionate about this state?
Laura Collins: I think, I mean, obviously, as we said, North Carolina is home to, home to me. So I, obviously born in Chapel Hill, moved around a bit, but Winston-Salem is home and I think, honestly, I just was a little bit interested in North Carolina politics but didn't know anything about it when I interned with the legislature. Like I knew I loved this state and I knew that I was interested in politics, but that was about it. I was pretty, you know, uninformed about a lot of the larger...Just the history and everything and so I stepped into that role and I really and again, to go back to this feeling, that's difficult to name, but in your gut, when [00:16:00] you see these larger issues that are happening. Education was one that really sparked that kind of interest for me when I was there and I think also knowing that I was or that I grew up in the North Carolina public education system too. I think knowing that space too, gives you the ability to, I think you need to be kind of closer to that system in order to understand the ways that it could be better. And then also because...and then I also just met really cool people here, I think too that were doing really cool work. And so I credit that a lot to the people that I was able to meet and to the organizations that already exist and already are on the ground doing it. Like I did not invent any of it, these solutions, or the work that was going on. I just simply met really cool people that were doing really [00:17:00] cool things and I wanted to be a part of it. So I think it's kind of a combination of it being my home and a place that I love, but also knowing, and I say, I feel like I say this a lot, but I think knowing if you truly love something, you want it to be better because if you love it, you wouldn't care. So I think of it being a home and being a place that I love, I think you want to push it to be better and there are so many spaces where we can be better. And so I think a combination of meeting, like meeting a lot of cool people, seeing a lot of cool work that they're, that they're doing for the state and then also loving the state and wanting the state to be better. That is kind of what put me here.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Yeah. Nice. And speaking of meeting cool people, you know, arguably bias, core people that you about to work with, cool organization [00:18:00] doing...
Laura Collins: So cool.
Kenneth Brown Jr: A cool organization doing some really cool work, especially within the triangle. So why accept the fellowship? Why do this and why do it now?
Laura Collins: Yeah. Well, so many things, but I think I really was thrilled about the chance to come to the Triangle. I think the Triangle is such a cool part of North Carolina and of our state. Obviously, I lived there when I was little and just loved it. I think it's just a really cool area. I think also something that I really love about the way that the Fletcher Fellowship, or excuse me, the Fletcher Foundation's policy areas or policy priorities. I think it's really cool that it's so open-ended, so there's so many different areas even within, you know, [00:19:00] one of the groups. There's like museums, parks, all of these different types of things. So we're not just funding, the science museum is great, but it's not just the science museum, you know, I grew up going into the science museum, love the science museum but like, you know, that's just a small portion of what Fletcher looks at and what flusher cares about. And I think it kind of just goes back to all of the earlier stuff that we were talking about is if we're going to make the mission, you know, equity or making a more just society, we have to think about all of these other things and I think that was something that really stood out to me about the Fletcher Foundation, about the priorities that are there. I think something else that I really loved about the prospect of this fellowship was actually the small team. I've had the chance to work on smaller teams, um, through internships and [00:20:00] that was really an amazing experience because I had that hands-on experience. So even as a first-year that had just graduated, or not graduated, I had just finished my first year at Davidson, I was able to do research memos for Senator Chaudhuri and that was something that I loved because I wasn't just doing, I, you know, I, I did do some data organized and things like that. Someone's gotta do it.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Someone gotta do it.
Laura Collins: Exactly but I also got to do some of the really fun and Senator Chaudhuri trusted me with a lot, and that was a really, really cool learning experience for me. Obviously, I'm still talking about it all the time, and then same with the Justice Center, they have the smaller kind of project teams that really give you that, and because you're so close to these people and you work so tight-knit, you learn so much from those people as well. So I think that it really excited me by, [00:21:00] having the chance to work so closely with Damon and Natalie and to learn from them because they've been in it for a while and I just know there's a lot to learn. So yeah, I think that's what really excited me about the Fletcher, and also just after I met you all, I really felt confident that this was a place that I could both feel comfortable and push myself because I think that's kind of a two, I think you have to kind of have both of those things. You don't want to be in a position where you think you're just going to not do anything or not push yourself because that's never how you're going to grow. I really want to be in a space where asking questions isn't looked down upon. So, yeah I definitely left are a couple of interviews or talks together feeling that way. So yeah, that is where I am.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Cool. Yeah. Looking forward, they're looking forward to it. So kind of [00:22:00] going along that in, so you just finished school, taking a break, starting a fellowship in the fall, sitting at this inflection point. When you look down the road a few years from now, what do you hope to see for your community?
Laura Collins: I think and this can kind of go back to the pivot language and stuff like that. But I think...so we're, I think we're at kind of a cross- I hate when people say that, but I think after any sort of event or anything that happens and when we have that kind of immediacy pivot, and then we have kind of the root pivot, I think if case numbers, you know, are coming down or vaccination [00:23:00] rates are going up and things are able to, you know, open up more quote-unquote normally, right? I hope that for our society, that the lessons that we learned from the pivot, the immediacy pivot, aren't just forgotten and that we don't start chipping away at those root things and I think that's easier said than done because those things take a lot of time to change at an institutional level, particularly things that are as old as a hundred or no, like hundreds of years. I think it's easier to finish the immediacy pivot and then just keep going. And I think it's a lot harder to chip-chip. You know, there's this huge ball and we're like this tiny little thing chipping at it, but I [00:24:00] mean, you have to do it if you want the huge ball to be chipped away at all. I think speaking in very meta-theoretical terms, I hope we don't forget after doing the immediacy pivot, I hope we then shift down to the institutional pivot from learning, from what, what we learned from the immediacy pivot.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Gotcha. One of the last questions that I ask people is what words would you offer to a friend going through a pivot and having a tough time and if they came to you saying, "Hey, Laura, I'm really struggling. This is a lot." And they're looking for some advice and wisdom. What words would you offer them?
Laura Collins: Ooh, that's a tough question.
Laura Collins: I would, well, first of all, I [00:25:00] think just listening and feeling that the difficulty is okay. I think, again, kind of going back to this immediacy versus kind of larger root issue. I think it ties in there too is so much of the stuff we do is kind of just, we speaking kind of collectively as a society is, you know, put band-aids over things that we don't like, we don't want to feel, or we don't want to deal with. And I think this kind of goes back to the history of stuff I've talked about too because for instance, let's see, um, what thought, oh, the thought I just had was basically like in a lot of the rhetoric that comes up about historical memory and about monuments or about all of these kinds of larger public history is well, [00:26:00] "Why are you bringing this up now? Why do we need to talk about this? This happened so long ago. Can we just, you know, put a band-aid over and forget or move on? Like, this isn't a (inaudible) problem." And I think that completely dismisses the institutional element of every, of all of those things are not. Back to, of course, entanglement theory, none of the stuff that is happening today in the present is separated from the past. And so you can put this bandaid on it, but you're not getting rid of the root problem. You're just putting a bandaid over it and trying to forget that it happened. So I think it's good and important to feel things, but then also too then, okay. You can't just wallow in pity forever. You need to like...So, you know, if we, if we're gonna sit with what has happened or sit with that feeling of whatever pain or, [00:27:00] discomfort, but then using that to then chip away at that, or a little ball, you know, chip away with our tiny, tiny, tiny hammer at that large, large, large ball. And so I think, yeah, I don't know how much that made sense and I don't know wisdom I have to provide, but I think it's okay to sit in discomfort because it's good to not just put band-aids over things, but then also to channel that into productive... productivity and, um, Yeah. Looking for the right word and kind of chip away at that institutional or that root pivot or that, or the thing we need to pivot at the root.
Music: "A Burst of Light" by Blue Dot Sessions
[00:28:00] Kenneth Brown Jr: Well, thank you very much, Laura. I really do appreciate it.
Laura Collins: Thank you for having me. This is the first podcast I've ever been on. Maybe the only. I can tell people to listen to this one.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Yeah, no problem. There's loads of life left to live, which means loads of more podcast opportunities.
Laura Collins: We'll see. We'll see, right!
Kenneth Brown Jr: Yeah, thank you very much and we look forward to you joining the team in the fall.
Laura Collins: I'm excited. Thank you so much for having me.
Kenneth Brown Jr: Lauren Collins is a 2021- 2023 A.J. Fletcher Foundation Fellow. Her thesis is titled "Moderating History: North Carolina's Public Schools and Home-based History Education in the Black Community. 1915 to the present." You can listen to her summary by clicking on the link in the show notes.
She begins her [00:29:00] fellowship in August.
Meanwhile, stay tuned for part two of a farewell. As I share some things I have learned, observed, and a message of gratitude. But for now, this has been Pivots, a podcast about navigating transitions, negotiating change, and reimagining our world. Pivots is a project of A.J. Fletcher Foundation produced and hosted by me, Kenneth Brown, Jr. Our music is composed by blue dot sessions. You can hear this episode and more, or go into our show page at www dot pivots a-j-f dot simplecast dot com or wherever you listen to podcasts,
See you next time.