The Scoop with Tanya Flanagan

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This is a Kun V studios original program. The content of this program does not reflect the views or opinions of 91.5 jazz and more the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, or the Board of Regents of the Nevada System of Higher Education.

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Good morning, and thank you for joining me for the scoop with Tanya Flanagan, I'm so happy you decided to wake up and start your day with me here on the scoop, where we talk about life, joy, funny moments, trending topics and so much more. We promise to keep you in the know and find out what you know. So let's get started. Good morning Las Vegas, and welcome to the show. I'm so grateful to have you here once again this Sunday morning. It's nice to be with you and to have yet another conversation. We are in the month of November. We are so close to election day. I know so many of you are like, let's hurry up and get there and see what happens. Or others of us are like, Oh my god, we're running out of time. What else can we do? But either way, we are here today to have a conversation with three very dynamic ladies in this space, and just to make sure we are talking about the topic of education and how that is shaping up on the political horizon this year. So I am delighted to welcome to the show three very beautiful people. Tanya home, Sutton, thank you for being here.

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Thank you for having me. Camila by waters, back in the house. Thank

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you. It's always a pleasure to be with one of my favorite radio personalities. Thank

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you. And another first time guest on the show, Eileen Edie, thank you for being here.

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Thank you for having me. It's really exciting to be here.

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Well, thank you for being here. As we get into the show, I'm going to have each one of them give you this bill a little bit on who they are, how long they've been here, or what they're doing. So without further ado, I'm going to start with you, Tanya. Thank

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you. I appreciate you. My name is Dr Tanya Holmes. I'm a national board certified teacher. That is the highest certification that a teacher can earn in the country. I am also an educational consultant. I support teachers in leadership and advocacy, specifically through the pursuit and achievement of national board certification. I've lived here in Nevada for 28 years. I've been an educator with CCSD, as well as teaching classes at UNLV and Nevada State University. Had some additional opportunities for leadership in the state as well. I have been working to diversify and bring forward excellence in the faces of teachers of excellence. For Teacher of the Year, mentoring and coaching and supporting teachers of color, specifically the 2020. Was the first teacher of color as a national board certified teacher here in Nevada, Gail Hudson, also the 2021 teacher of the year, Julian ARCHA Bay, who went on to become our National Teacher of the Year, and our 2022 Teacher of the Year, who does not identify as a teacher of color, but was a guest in a tribal community up north, which was important to me in terms of amplification and transparency, and also recently, our 2024 Nevada Teacher of the Year, Laura Jean Penrod, so do a lot with advocacy and leadership in that regard. Just appreciate the opportunities.

Unknown Speaker 3:15
Thank you for being here. The list of things that you laid out for us is quite impressive. So kudos to you on that very, very impressive list of things that you've accomplished and people you've helped to shine the spotlight on and take to another level, having the pleasure of getting to know you, realizing that you lived here for 28 years, I've lived here for 29 and just how you cannot cross a person's path until you just do so I guess there's always the season of engagement. So it's nice to have you here to talk this morning about what we're going to get into around education and who you are. So thank you for that introduction.

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Thank you. I appreciate you so much.

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Next up, I'd like to introduce Camilla by waters and have her go into some detail about who she is and her background, and just share with us the sparkle that is you.

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Thank you. I love sparkles. It is gracious. My name is Camila bywaters, and I am a licensed special education teacher. I have a master's in education. Specifically, my work is in special education. I have a master's in divinity from Howard University and Howard University School of Divinity, and I'm currently completing my PhD in special education while running a campaign. So that's been great and fun. I started my teaching career in the Clark County School District. I worked one year in DC public schools. Then I went away, and now I'm back. I'm a long time resident of Las Vegas. I attended schools in the district that I'm currently running for, and I just look forward to supporting our community and working together to improve education. Well,

Unknown Speaker 4:53
I look forward to hearing more on your thoughts and just having us talk a little bit about education and the various aspects of how. It's affecting families, the trajectory for our children, what the future plan and the path forward is around that, and how you plan to impact it. So before we jump into the details of the conversation, I'd like to welcome Eileen. Eileen, please share a bit about who you are, your background. I'm also enjoying getting to know you more as our paths cross and we engage with new people. Yeah,

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thank you for having me. My name is Eileen. I was a career teacher for 15 years. That was my first career. I'm an independent consultant. Now I actually when I'm not running, I help other women when they're racist, so I really enjoy that. But I started teaching in 1997 and I taught all over the country. I was duly licensed in four states, and I taught in five different states. We've been here in Nevada for 11 years. And you know, what has impressed me, not what is impressed upon me the most, what is the most that I've seen is that we are still facing all this inequity. You know, I started teaching in 1997 and we still have the same issues now that we had back then. We're still struggling with listening to the teachers. And so I'm hoping, with the resources we have, you know, as the most diverse county in the entire nation, that we can move our schools forward and start focusing on, you know, not only student achievement, but also addressing a lot of their mental health issues as well.

Unknown Speaker 6:25
Well. Thank you for being here. Each one of you has raised really interesting points, and we're going to get into those points before we do. It's been hinted a couple of times that before I got into a campaign, or I used to help other people run their races. And so we're talking a little bit because each of you is in a space where you're doing a race. Tanya, you are looking at Board of Regents. Yes, yes, that's

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correct for remind me which area just so, District Four, Board of Regents. District Four,

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you are looking at Board of Regents. District Four. Camila, District

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Board of school trustees. District E, which is the Summerland area and northwest part of the valley.

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And Eileen, you are running to serve alongside Camila in

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District B, which actually our districts bump up against each other. We kind of dance, is what I like to say on the south end. So I'm above Summerlin, pretty much anything north of Ann road between Mount Charleston and Moapa and mesquite is my district, so it's the entire north part of the valley.

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Okay, okay, so now we have some geographical perspective. Tonya, you really did. I know Regent districts are a little different, but let's have, let's make sure we talk about your boundaries too.

Unknown Speaker 7:38
I am East Las Vegas. And so we're looking at Craig on the other side of Nellis Air Force Base, and then coming over to lamb. And my apologies, as I'm also trying to visualize over Vegas Valley site.

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Okay, I know what you mean. It's a lot of ground to cover, and you try to find the points that people can picture in their heads. But so we're really talking about how it looks across the entire valley, with maybe the exception of a couple areas not overlapping or being included in this conversation today, where you guys are concerned, as people are listening and thinking education, whether you have kids in the system or you don't have kids in the system at whatever level a person may be, what do you think? And Aileen, you made a point about inequities. And I came here in 1995 and as a reporter, okay, so I would cover, go to some of the meetings concerning the school district. Are the community groups concerned with education. And a few years ago, end of late, I have gone to some more of those meetings where community organizations are concerned with the state of education, and the conversations sound like they've just been frozen in time. And the very thing that was frustrating, teacher, equity, inclusion, supplies, classroom sizes, all these things are the same. Now the difference in our conversation so people aren't CCSD versus region is very different. So before we jump in, let's qualify that. Tanya, can you draw the line in the sand on what you deal with, and then Camila and Edie you can Eileen, you can bounce off of each other on what you are looking at?

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Yes, I appreciate the question. Board of Regents governs overseas, the colleges, universities and research institutes in the state of Nevada, there are eight, and so we're specifically looking at all issues within higher education and acknowledging right we can't talk about higher education without talking about our K 12 system and the opportunities that we should persist in with regards to collaboration. And partnership, certainly those that have been endeavored, but those that need to also continue to be addressed in that area, when people ask, I try to make sure that I articulate the distinction between the two, because often there is a misunderstanding or a belief that it is the one in the same. So yes, higher education, all colleges, universities and research institutes in the state of Nevada, and if I may, I'd like to also just acknowledge that as we talk about the challenges that persist for us, particularly around education that are our universities, specifically UNLV, UNR are top tier research institutes, and so they are amongst the top educational institutions in the country. Certainly some challenges in how we are preparing teachers and how teachers are coming from all over the country to serve in CCSD, but acknowledging that we have

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quality, said that because it is good for people to hear where we stand, how we are viewed by others around the country, because the conversation, let's just be honest, around education in our great state and City, isn't always a positive sounding conversation, because we hear the challenges and the weight of the woes that weigh down the various boards that oversee these different spaces. And so we hear about the problems we don't always hear about the things that are worth celebrating. So glad that you shared where we are in terms of how we're viewed around the country as it pertains to being a research level institution at UNLV and UNR. So thank you for sharing that Camila and Eileen, just to bounce off a little bit of the role of people who sit on the CCSD Clark County School District Board of Trustees, when each take a piece or you know where your passions are in purpose and intentions lie. Okay, so

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the main, one of the main responsibilities of the board of school trustees is the supervisor, superintendent, and that's a very important role that has been lost. The community has felt that the board has not really, as a whole, held this individual to accountability. So I know that's definitely a really big focus for me. The board also sets the vision for the Clark County School District and sets the vision for the board. So that's some of the few responsibilities of the board. I think so. Anything else you want from an

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administrative So then from a classroom perspective. Eileen, how do you how would you say CCSD role plays out in terms of the actual teacher, the actual classroom, the students, the families. So

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because of the nature of CCSD and the huge size of it, where, you know, trustees and other places I've lived are more hands on with staff and and in the schools more, but we don't have that here. That's not something that's happening very often. And so I do, what I would like to bring is that classroom perspective, you know, I did teach for 15 years, and then I ran my own daycare center, so I have a, you know, a nice view of of, you know, cradle to to, you know, to post, post secondary education, and so seeing what those things look like all across the country, you know, and what, how that works down in the classroom. And honestly, you know, like you said, that it hasn't changed, you know, the things that we need are the same thing. The teachers don't have enough supplies, they don't have enough support, they don't get paid enough, you know. And so I'm hoping that with the diversity that we have here, and not even diversity of people, but the diversity of resources, that we can change the, you know, change the narrative on that, and start being a community that they're like, oh, you know what Las Vegas was, you know, the most diverse city first. How did they do it? How did they work education? How did they find a way to make it work for those kids who come from so many different backgrounds and the challenges that that brings? So

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I'm gonna try to tie the questions together, because you're really two different spaces, higher education, K through 12. I Hmm, because that, because one of my curiosities is, what's your vision, if you have it on, how they overlap or work well together, like but before I jump into that, that I'm curious as to what's the moment that triggered each of you to want to be impactful in education this way? Because you're already working in education, you're hands on, you're shaping lives, you're developing teachers or working with students. What was the trigger that said, I think I want to. To get into a political race and serve in a different way. I'm serving. I want to serve differently. I want to serve and be super accountable.

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So I see you looking at me,

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because right now there's even, like, the question on the ballot about, you know, so, yeah, not digging that, but it's a really interesting time to choose the space you're choosing.

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It is, it is I will acknowledge that I have been in the space for a number of years. I previously served on Nevada State Board of Education as a governor appointed member, and did that in 2014 until 2019 where I transitioned to become a member of the Nevada State Public Charter School Authority Board of which I am now the chair. And I also have been serving on boards across the country. I am a board director with National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, former trustee with the national teachers Hall of Fame, as well as serving as a board director with West Ed board out of San Francisco, specifically looking at research and policy, but also supporting teachers. Stepping into this space was a consideration and a commitment to leverage my leadership and the learning that I've had from those boards and be able to have collective impact. I acknowledge that there are challenges that are persisting with the Board of Regents, and that those have been in the news, and want to bring what I have learned from my own leadership into that space. It typically has been that someone has said, Hey, would you consider that is how I became a member of the State Board of Education. Similarly with the charter school, and likewise in this regard as well, there was a request for me to consider utilizing my knowledge, my skills and my leadership, to step forward into the campaign, I will say that once upon a time, I had said, never elected office, never elected office. It's funny and then never, never, never, say never, say never, say never,

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never, say never. Okay, thank you. The trigger for you, Camila, to go from the hands on support to babies and special ed, which is a very, very important space in education, when you are teaching a child that has a developmental delay yet they have this ability to get to some level of greatness, whatever that is for them, within their sphere, and to say, I'm going to remove myself from this space of day to day gratitude because I have a different calling or a bigger purpose, or I say something. So what was your trigger point for you? I finally

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realized maybe about a week ago, what it means to stand in the gap. And if you come from a family of ministers, I hear ministers preaching all the time by standing in the gap, and I have received so much hate mail, stalkers, harassment for me running for office, and what that tells me is that someone has to do this work that can take those punches, take those hits, because we're continuously to see these hits that are coming towards our most vulnerable people, and that's our students. I'm doing this because I know that I was built for this. I was trained for this, prepared for this space, and as an advocate with the Las Vegas alliance of black school educators. Big shout out to Tracy Lewis, who has been grounded in this. Work with me. We get the individual cases and stories, and we're helping hundreds of people, which shows me that we have a systemic educational issue. So for me now, for me to make a bigger impact in the system, I need to be on the other side of the dais as a school board trustee so that we can begin to make policy change that is going to ensure that the countless stories that we continue to hear about inequity, continue to hear about unfairness and retaliation, can be fixed from a policy level so that no longer children and their families, teachers, support, staff and administrators have to deal with the drama and education that they're dealing with. So I'm doing this work to stand in the gap for the people so they don't have to take the hits.

Unknown Speaker 19:45
Thank you for that very personal, I think, view of why, and thank you for sharing what's happening to you. Conversations are all around us about, can we just coexist? Can we. Agree to disagree, or can we respectfully occupy the same space at the same time and do what we're doing? And it's like that respect is getting lost, is being taken for granted, and it's obvious in the actions that people are demonstrating because people shouldn't attack you in that because you don't agree, just don't get to attack someone however. You're attacking them and threatening their sense of safety. So thank you for sharing. I'm sorry you're going through that, and thank you for sharing

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that. I appreciate that. Thank you can express that, acknowledging that when I put a statement out asking about safety during campaigning during the election season that I thought sharing would kind of help to address that and yet acknowledge that our safety continues to be compromised and jeopardized. And as recently as last week, I had someone return to my home for the third time, which just makes things feel very, very overwhelming. So I just appreciate being in community with you, being in space with you, and having you use your voice to speak up.

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Thank you.

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I like that. We're building bonds outside studio, in the studio today. Eileen, your trigger moment that said, I'm a teacher. I have my own business because that means you have, like, done one career, started another career, and I'm helping other people. But then when the tide turned and you decided to be one of the people who stepped forward, what was it for you that said

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it was actually a couple things? Thanks for the question. Sorry. I get so excited and I talk if I

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missed it, it was

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a couple things, actually. So I left the classroom in 2012 and the reason I left the classroom is because, at the time, I was teaching in the state of Arkansas, and Arkansas had passed a law that 40% of your evaluation as a teacher was based on how your students did on the test. And I taught special ed like Camille, I taught special ed for 15 years, and I was a behavior specialist, but I also I worked with kids who had a lot of challenges. That was my I had specialized training and students with reading disabilities. So I, you know, I came home and I said to my husband, what do you do for the rest of your life? 40% of what you do is determined by how your kids do on one day during one particular school year. What do you do? How does it? How do you look at that and say, I'm going to continue to feel defeated because I'm, you know? I don't think any of us are here because we're not high achievers, you know. And I don't ever want to come in with the deck stack like that. And so what I see with that is the teachers weren't able to speak up and say anything about it. You know, Arkansas is a right to work state. They don't have strong unions. My first three years teaching, I was in South Bend, Indiana. It's a very strong union town, you know, the auto industry and and several other unions. And so our teachers union was phenomenal. In fact, they they went on strike shortly before I started working there. And so it was really powerful to see that voice they could search. And then I moved to Baltimore, which was also Maryland, was also right to work state. Baltimore, you know, was a large school district, a lot of challenges, severe, you know, corruption in the government in the city, you know, I think we've all, you know, gone to see that, seen that, and what? The teachers didn't have a voice. They just felt like it didn't matter if they spoke up, nothing was ever going to change. And so, you know, I, you know, I'm white, right? And so my ability to say, let's stand up and let's talk about this is a lot different than other people's. And so I was looking at them, and I said, But you have, you can be a union, you can do this, you know, and, and they, you know, it would the circumstances weren't, weren't there that in that place. But then I moved, you know, I worked in Virginia, and then I worked in Mississippi, and then Arkansas. And it was always the same thing, the teachers are, you know, holding up the educational system on their backs, and then their, you know, their funding and their their evaluations and their ability to be successful is tied to, you know, this, this standardized testing. And so that's that kind of started it, you know, and we moved here, and I knew the schools were were had more challenges than where we came from, you know, but I didn't realize how badly they were funded right until I started asking questions, well, why this? And why don't we have that in my and they were like, well, you know, our pupil spending is only like, $8,000 Yes. And I was like, we have casinos and mining here. What's going on? Why? Why is Mississippi funding their schools better than we are, you know? And so that part is, is that's where I'm on the road, right? I feel I'm I'm gonna yell and scream and run my red headed mouth as much as I can to get better funding for our schools, because that's where it all comes down to, right, right? That is exactly when we talk about everything that's

Unknown Speaker 25:29
your trick. Okay, I have, I hope I get one last question that popped in my head while you were talking, and I hope I'm able to get it in. And I also don't ever like to run out of time on the show. What happens sometimes when conversations are really good, you run out. So one of the things I want to make sure we do cover is social handles. In case anyone wants to get to know you, I hate to rush through that. So Eileen, please share your social handles, and if anyone wants to get to know you, where might they be able to read about you engage with you? Sure.

Unknown Speaker 26:05
So thank you. My website is my last name, Edie, spelled out, and then the word for Nevada, and all that is spelled out.com, Edie for nevada.com. Probably the best place, I think, is Twitter. I usually post every day, because it's the only social media have on my phone. Oh, that, I guess Instagram too. But the social media for Twitter is a lot easier to remember. It's at and it's my last name, Edie, the number four kids at ed for kids.

Unknown Speaker 26:37
In case anyone isn't aware, I like to make sure people really know Camila, yes,

Unknown Speaker 26:42
if you would, if you would like to look me up, my social media handles are all the same. It's Camila bywaters, and my website is Camila, the number four nevadans.com

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and Tanya, similarly,

Unknown Speaker 26:55
Tanya home, Sutton, H, O, L, M, E, S, hyphen, s, u t, t o n, on Instagram, on Facebook, on X, formally Twitter and my website is t o n, i A, H, O, L, M, E, S, S, U t, t o n.org, tanyahom.org,

Unknown Speaker 27:16
you read my mind, because I was going to say, I said, Tanya, how do you spell that? Because we don't all spell it the same. We consider nav show about how we smell it. So thank you. We may try to run them to you again one more time. We're getting into the last couple minutes of the show, and in getting to know each of you. Because Eileen, I didn't realize you traveled so much, part of me just wants to ask how you moved around so much, or like, what prompted that? But Tanya also has a background coming through, moving around so much. Now, Camille, if I'm not mistaken, you're a native, right? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 27:46
I am. I just left for college and came back. So the magic is our native magical.

Unknown Speaker 27:51
Now there are several. The more, the longer you hear, the more you realize how much and what I love, and I've said it before about Las Vegas, is a strong sense of community we're getting into the few. So this is like a 10 seconds or less, but how your travels will help what you've observed help you do what you're going to do, and is there a commitment to trying to find ways for the foundational pipeline to play into the collegiate, university space? And I think I'm going to toss it to one person, because we have one minute and 14 seconds, toss it to Tanya, and then Eileen, you piggyback, and then I'm gonna close this out. So

Unknown Speaker 28:30
I appreciate you so much acknowledging my father was in Target intelligence in the Air Force, and so I moved quite a bit, and everything that I have learned in my experiences in education and in leadership, speak to being able to step forward and appreciate people from diverse perspectives, opportunities, experiences, and just want to utilize that to to make a difference. Thank

Unknown Speaker 28:52
you. Eileen, anything you want to add

Unknown Speaker 28:54
sure we moved because my husband's job, right? He's in the trades, and he, he, he's worked on different jobs, and so we would move for his jobs. And because I taught special ed, I could work anywhere. So So that's, that's what we did. I'm hoping to bring that perspective of working in so many different school districts, and so seeing like everything from, you know, six people to

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three, 300,000 so that's great. So as we check out, thank you for joining don't forget to vote. Tuesday's your last day. Thank you for joining us. Have a great week. I want to thank you for tuning in to the scoop with me. Tonya Flanagan and I want to invite you to get social with me. I'm on Facebook and Twitter. My name is my handle, T, a n, y, A F, l, a n, a G, A N. You can also find me on Instagram at Tanya almond eyes Flanagan, and if you have a thought, an opinion or a suggestion, don't hesitate to shoot me an email to tanya.flanagan@unlv.edu Thanks again for joining in. Stay safe and have a great week. You.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai