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Conversations with Chanda isn’t just a podcast — it’s a movement. Hosted by powerhouse CEO, philanthropist, and unapologetic truth-teller Chanda Smith Baker, this award-winning show cuts through the noise to confront the issues that shape our world: race, power, leadership, justice, and philanthropy. With a fearless voice and a deeply personal lens, Chanda brings listeners into raw, unfiltered conversations with national changemakers like, Robin DiAngelo, PhD, Luvvie Ajayi Jones, Caroline Wanga, and Ibram X. Kendi, as well as the bold Twin Cities leaders shaking up business, community, and culture. Whether it's pushing past politeness or unpacking the quiet power behind real change, Conversations with Chanda is where leadership gets real — and personal. This is not just a listen. It’s a call to lead. Subscribe and download now — your next breakthrough starts here.
Chanda Smith Baker: Hello Community. You are listening to conversations with Chanda, where leadership gets real and personal. This is where we cut through the noise to confront the issue, shaping our world and our community from power and justice to the heart of community change, hosted by me, Chanda Smith Baker, president, and CEO of the Saint paul Minnesota Foundation.
Patricia Virella: I'm in Connecticut, uh, born and raised in Manhattan, born in Spanish, Harlem, and then moved around and then, um. I was a principal teacher school, uh, literacy coach, AP in New York City, and then I came up to Connecticut to get my doctorate at Yukon. And I love it. It's a very white space, but I love it here.
I love my property.
Chanda Smith Baker: I understand. So how did you, how did you get into education? What was the path there?
Patricia Virella: Um, so I worked in advertising in my twenties and I found it to be so morally bankrupt. Um, and I remember hearing a conversation about Beyonce very when she was very young. I worked on the L'Oreal account and instead of saying things like, you know, she was graceful or this, they said she had so much hair on her face that we had to airbrush off, and I thought that was such a racialized.
Connotation of black skin. Um, and so I said I need to do something different. Mm-hmm. And so at 26 I was pregnant with my son and I was, you know, had done some philanthropic things that I brought to the ad agency, like working with kids in need, um, tutoring in Spanish Harlem tutoring, um, newly released women from, um.
Prison. Mm-hmm. Like how to cook meals in their, in their homes and stuff like that. Um. I had set, like started to do these things and I was like, actually, education seems like it could be interesting. And so I went and the other thing was, and this is very real, but I needed a job that I was interesting to me that would stretch me intellectually, but also would guarantee a paycheck for, for me with.
Son, because at the time I wasn't married to my ex-husband, and so I was like, yeah, I have to take care of my kid. And teaching was one of those pathways. So I went to Sarah Lawrence. I actually went on a full scholarship, a Regina Arnold scholarship, and Regina Arnold did a lot of work with women. She was a black woman.
A lot of work with women and, and maybe men, but um, in prisons.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: New York. And, you know, I, I realized in that program at Sarah Lawrence was very progressive. We read, you know. Fre, we read hooks, uh, del it it was really dope. That program was so cr ahead of its time and, and continues to be. And I, I was like, yeah, this is the work I wanna do.
And so, um, I stayed and it's the best decision. And it's interesting because I hated school.
Chanda Smith Baker: So let's talk about that. What was your own educational journey like your relationship with education? Because I didn't quite hate it, but there were things about it I didn't like. Um, that have set on me a lot. And so I spent a little bit of time in education and became really, really aware of trauma that people had related to trauma or how they experience education became the frame in which they see other people experiencing education.
And so how did you experience it? And
Patricia Virella: I hated it. Um, I, I lived in a very, um. For lack of a better word and not being too exposing. Tricky family situation. Mm-hmm. Um, and so I don't necessarily know that I had an advocate on my side to understand what school was like, what it was for. Um. And so, you know, the way that I was always talked about in school was I was bad.
I wasn't paying attention. Um, there were a lot of those kinds of things until I got to fifth grade. Um, I really didn't have that many friends, which I think, so like now as it's funny, when I was a teacher and I went to Sarah Lawrence, they had this like descriptive review process of a child, which is Pat Carey's work.
One of the elements was, who does this child spend time with? And I was like, mm-hmm. Right. I was like, okay. So for me, it wasn't until fifth grade when I was allowed to read whatever book I wanted, uh, without someone taking it outta my hand. I went to a all girls Catholic high school, which was not for me.
Um. It was, you know, they, I, it was in Brooklyn and I had at that time transitioned from my mother's house to my father's house. So there was a lot of stuff going on for me as a teenage girl and, you know, in a predominantly white space. And, um, just a lot of conversations. When I was growing up of like, you know, Patty's never gonna be anything.
She's never gonna do anything. She's never, um, and so much so that, I remember when I applied to college, my brother went to Ohio State and I wanted to go to Ohio State. I told my guidance counselor, Ms. Demmick, and I said, I wanna apply to Ohio State. It's the only school I'm applying to. She said, you should think about community college.
I don't think you're gonna get into there. It was the only school, uh, early decision got in, was the first kid in, in college, a big 10 college in my whole high school. Um, and so for me, school has always been the lack of belief in me. And the lack of belief in my autonomy. Mm-hmm. Um, and agency as a learner.
And so, you know, a lot of like, this is what you should do, this is what it should look like. This is the kind of person you should be. And so my, you know, for me it was funny because I actually became principal of an all girls school, uh, in the lower East side of Manhattan. I remember to your point, like some of my teachers talking in ways that my teachers talked about me, and I was like, yeah, you know, I had people say that about me and now I'm your boss.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: It, it just was such, it was that belief. That's why Sarah Lawrence was so transformative because I had read, uh, Gloria Ladson Dreamkeepers and I was like, to the belief in black children. Such a powerful act of love and care that I knew that I didn't have that my whole career except great. So when I became a leader, that, that was my thing is like, if you can say you believe all kids learn, but if I don't see it, then we have to have a real discussion about what, what harm you may be, you know, um, inducing on children.
Chanda Smith Baker: We have, we have, um, parents listening.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: And, um, I have four sons.
Patricia Virella: Oh, wow.
Chanda Smith Baker: Um, I have a daughter as well and um, I've had to parent many different ways. Right. Just because of the variety of how they learn. I've also had them in different types of schools. So I've said I've parented in almost every type of school situation, like private charter, right?
Public, um, traditional district schools. One of the things that I know from my own experience and for families that call me are, especially with boys, they'll say, well. You know, my son's in first grade and, and they're already struggling with him, and they said he wasn't sitting still, and so now, you know, he's on punishment or whatever.
Mm-hmm. What, what advice do you have for family that are navigating a system that may or may not see the full genius of their child or may not understand what their needs are? What would you offer in terms of how they can best advocate?
Patricia Virella: So it's funny, I'm going through this right now with my own daughter, similarly as you.
So my husband and I have four kids between us. Um Okay. And, and again, very disparate in learning styles and what we've wanted. Um, and what's interesting, so my biological children have gone to the same schools primarily since they were young. Um. What I'm learning now in this high school is there's a sense of misogyny.
I mean, misogynoir is very clear, but the misogyny is outstanding. Um, and what I've learned is my son who was very quiet, very, you know, nerdy, uh, bookish, he. He was an angel in that school. People loved him. We love Hudson. My daughter, who is, you know, struggling, you know, gets a lot of the, you know, teacher saying to her, I'm not dealing with your, your nasty attitude all year.
Or saying, um, one teacher said to her recently that he wasn't gonna give her a good report on her 5 0 4, um, because she wasn't acting right in class. And so as an educator, infuriating doesn't begin, uh, to, to capture what I felt. So my advice is similar to what I've been doing. Mm-hmm. Um, I know the law and I know what I'm supposed to get at a very basic level, even in this administration, right?
Mm-hmm. That's first of all. Second of all, um, I hired a child advocate. Mm-hmm. I, I feel that, um. You know, I only hired her because of time-wise. I didn't wanna wait until, you know, there are other ones that do pro bono work. Um, and I wanted her particularly, but my thing is, is I would tell parents is that I do feel that sometimes at the school level, parents end up being like, well, you know, she's always gonna complain.
And so I think at some point it's important to bring an outside person to advocate for your child.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: And. To do that, um, and understand that the culture of schools is still a business. And if you have to be litigious, then you have to get what you ki your kid wants. But that's the advice I would say is to hold true and also to hold a safe space for your child.
I know my girl could be difficult, right? I know she can. It is not your job to insult my child. Right. Um, you know, there's this misnomer that happens in schools. It's like, you know, I'm trying to prepare them for the future. The future is diverse.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: You, you really have no idea what a child will be when they're younger.
You can have, you know, thoughts, you can think, you know, um, but to say that you're, you're trying to tamp down, you know, something before they've even realized it. Knowing that the brain doesn't fully develop until 20 something.
To me is, is that line. So I, that's the line is like, what is it that is happening that is, is not, you know, having the integrity for my child is not believing in the, you know, her brilliance or her possibility for good. Um, once I feel that we're in a negative space with the teachers, it's, it's time to have a meeting.
Chanda Smith Baker: I have had many great teachers, even on this podcast I've mentioned, um, Ms. Toy who, uh, was my second grade teacher, she's now a so of mine. Um, I see her every time I see her. My heart just warms up and, um, I can think about her and feel like I had a very pleasant experience. The reality is, as I think about the three teachers that I interacted with, that basically gave me hell.
And so any advice for administrators that have those teachers in their building? 'cause they do hear about them.
Patricia Virella: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I would say I was maniacal with my teachers and I always looked from the chi, and this is, I just gave a speech in Puerto Rico about this. Right. Um, as a school leader, you have to walk the building as one of your students.
Right. You have to be able to walk the school building if you have a kindergartner and there's things in the hallways for them to, you know, whether it's like directional, right? For the traffic in the hallway, like walking one way on this side, or walking one way on that side, or it's, you know, sight words or something.
They have to be at a eye level for the kid, right? Because you can't hold children accountable for things that they like, you know? Um. They can't, they can't see yet, right? They don't have the visual acuity above yet, right? Mm-hmm. This is a statiSaint This is a scientific fact. So things like that. Walking through the school, if you were a kid, would you wanna go to the bathroom in that school?
If you were a kid, would you want to eat that food? Instead of saying, which I think is a very carceral statement, right? Well, the food is what it is. It's school food. What if you had to eat it, not in a dire sense, but you just were coming to school and have lunch, would you wanna eat that food? Does it look clean?
Does it look appetizing? Does it look healthy? Um,
Chanda Smith Baker: does it look familiar? 'cause we have kids coming from a lot of places.
Patricia Virella: Yeah. Accessible, right? Like, do I, do I know the parts of the food, right? Mm-hmm. I can see that there's a bean in there, or a piece of corn or whatever. Um. But I think that a lot of times we reside on the teacher's side and I think that that's, that is helpful.
But I think, are we residing on the child's side? Right? So a teacher's classroom that's really messy. If, and it's not even if it was my child, if it was little you. Mm-hmm. Would you wanna go play in those blocks? Would you wanna read those books? Right. And I think that is something. That I, I constantly did, and I, I was holding teachers accountable.
Um, because, you know, my superintendent at the time, she had made a comment and she said, you know, we can say that in a year this teacher will get better, but in a year, the, the kid will have moved on.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah, right.
Patricia Virella: That time moves for that child. So if they're not learning what they need to, if they're not in a space that supports them, reaffirms them, um, then why are they there?
Chanda Smith Baker: Right. So we talked about the parents and the teachers, but what does it look like for, um, institutions to truly be designed for the students that they say they're serving?
Patricia Virella: Yeah, I think it starts with adult reflection firSaint Mm-hmm. So this is something that I've done. Um, I did this with Patterson, New Jersey for three years, is, you know, we've talked about how do, how, how is our district, if at all, anti-raciSaint
And this is, this is. The professional development we did for three years, right? Every couple weeks, um, to every three weeks, we would meet as a entire leadership team across the whole district. This is the third or second largest district in New Jersey, by the way. Right? So there's a ton of us, but it was a lot of conversations about, you know, why do you hold kids who are.
Impoverished or families who are impoverished to a level that you don't even hold yourself. Right. Um, you know, one of the things one of my colleagues at Montclair had said that really landed on me, um, when I was in this one high school, this, uh, teacher was like, some of these parents shouldn't even have kids.
Right. And he was like, you know, I don't have kids, but I wouldn't. And I said, so, so sometimes that could be true, right? Where there's instances of abuse, whatever. However, and this is what my colleague had said, and one day that landed on me, he said, sometimes the best thing families can do is to bring them here into your classroom.
And, and that is a huge sacrifice. Right. A huge belief in the child, right? Mm-hmm. Particularly with immigrant children, that they're gonna take them out of everything they know.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: To be in your
Chanda Smith Baker: classroom. Yeah.
Patricia Virella: Right?
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: And so, you know, I think that that to me is, is where you, where you start, is to think about that, the belief that rides inside of you.
And how is that espoused through your leadership? Right. Um, or through your, your teaching. So, you know, we had some teachers who they were like, I'm an immigrant myself, and they're not doing, you know, they're not reaching high levels. And I'm like, they're teenagers. Right? Right. And so again, there's not this kind of grace.
That's given, and that comes from adults. And so I think adults have a lot of reflective work that they need to do in order to understand where their positionality shows up inside, you know, their um, their pedagogy and in their classroom.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. So I'm gonna take a bit of a pivot, but I think it's related, at least it is in my head.
Hopefully it translates, um, as people are listening. But when you started, um, you grew up in Spanish, Harlem, you went to an all girls school and you said it was white space, and then you talked about being in Connecticut and you said it's white space.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Right? So there is a way that you have to navigate in that space, right?
You're holding multiple things.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Chanda Smith Baker: Can you talk about what that experience has been, particularly as you are advocating for kids of diverse backgrounds? It's exhausting. Is that what you said? Exhausting. I know
Patricia Virella: it's exhausting. Um, and you know, it, I think for me, my reflection has been in like, why am I in white spaces, right?
Like, have I been co-opted into this knowledge of like, I need to be in a safe space, so here I am. Right? And I think that's. That's been some of the challenging work that I've been doing with, with myself is like, yes, my property is mine, but if I'm in a, you know, if, if we're in this political climate right now and I don't feel safe, am I in a safe community?
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: And I think for me, that is something, you know, someone had written, a scholar, had written, you know, sometimes putting your, you know, black and brown children into white schools is an act of harm. And it's something that I think about, right? Is what is, is that happening now with my daughter? Is that, did that happen with my son?
Like my son is at an HBCU, right? And he's thriving and he's, you know, um, there's a texture to, to his experience that he wouldn't have got at a PWI. Yeah. And so, you know. I, I think about that and that's, that's the work that I'm doing now is mm-hmm. You know, are you really safe in a safe white neighborhood?
Right. I don't, I don't think I was asking myself those questions, but I also think that's a symptom of like, me reading a lot more critical work over the last 10 years.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: And like I've been reading, um, Audrey Lord's Cancer Journals, this book
Chanda Smith Baker: mm-hmm. Is
Patricia Virella: my favorite. Okay. Like she talks about being the whole self and like, you know, the whole self shows up in that historical context.
So you're never really free in a manner in which you think you are until you understand that that part of you, right. Um, and so yeah, I say that all to say it's exhausting, right? It's exhausting, um, to, to be in, in those spaces.
Chanda Smith Baker: It is. So if we translate it back to the kids, right. And I think about, again, we're reflecting on our own experiences, and I made choices, particularly with my younger two kids.
Um, they went to a neighborhood school. Um, lots of opinions about that that I, I heard over the course of their time. Mm-hmm. But the one thing I felt was that they were safe and they were loved and they were being affirmed. Um, and that mattered a lot to me. That they were, they essentially went from not wanting to go to school to like, are you gonna come home from school?
Patricia Virella: Yeah.
Chanda Smith Baker: Like, they're getting up, they're going, they're working out in the morning at six, at six o'clock, they're doing something in the evening. I'm like, I want, I miss you guys. I want you to come home. Um, them waking up on time versus I can't get them out of bed to go to class. Um, the energy shifted tremendously on their experience of school, which mattered a lot to me.
So I'm thinking through like outside folks that have a lot of judgment, right? People are sending their kids to underperforming schools and they should be going to this school. And what you're introducing here is, first of all, it's personal. Um, and it depends on what you see as a measure of success, right?
Is it academic? Is it psychological safety? Like what, what, what measures of success should we be open to as folks that are working on behalf of young people and their families?
Patricia Virella: I mean, I think for me, I agree with you. I think one of the things that I've had to like get crystal clear with the high school in particular with my daughter, is let us not talk about if she goes to college or what.
I'm a professor at a university. She has a path, a pipeline, right?
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. Yeah.
Patricia Virella: So let's, let's actually remove that and let's talk about, you know, what it is that we would want. For that child. And to your point, my daughter wants to be a vet right now. I'm trying to convince her not to hate school. 'cause I know that being a vet, she works with animals, she rides horses, she does all these things.
That's a ton of school. And so if she is disengaged, you know now, right. So I think for me it again comes down to what is it that you want, the tradition and the values of your family to hold. Right For me is that I want my children to be happy. At the end of the day, and it's not trite, we know from the research that happy people do better work, happy people do better in marriages, they have better, more sustainable relationships and not the glib notion of happiness.
So part of my research focuses on hope and hope in leadership. The cognitive process of hope that gets enacted through leaders as they deal with crisis. So it's a similar function, right? If you're happy, you're, you're goal oriented. If you're happy, you're more willing to listen, right? Or even content, right?
Not even this like elevated happiness. So I think about what are the values I want for my children? I want my kids to be good people, right? I want them to be able to be empathetic, compassionate. I want them to be able to listen to someone. Maybe they don't agree with them and they walk away. They're confident enough to say, that's not for me, or they're confident enough to retort back and that they pursue a life of happiness.
I mean, it's so short. I mean, I, I just turned 46. I feel like I was 16. Like, you know, like my mom always would say, I have a mind of a puppy in the, the body of an older woman. Right. And I feel that now. And so when I think retrospectively and I look at my son, right, who is in school chose, uh, Morgan State on his own.
Um, and, and in my family we got pushback. 'cause as Latinos, they were like, why would you go to A-H-B-C-U? And I was like, 'cause we're black.
Chanda Smith Baker: Right.
Patricia Virella: And even if you're not, like HBCUs are open for everyone, right? It's a community he's looking for, and I see how he's thriving in this community. He's the head of the chess club.
He's, you know, doing all these things. That to me is success because he's continuing in the line of things that make him happy and bring him joy.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: All while learning all the important things.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah, let's talk about your research because, um, here I sit in Minnesota.
Patricia Virella: Yes.
Chanda Smith Baker: Lots happening here.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: And I am always talking about hope.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: And I remember working for an organization and hope I, I fought to get hope on one of the, as one of the values. I remember it being a huge discussion because people saw it as a passive thing.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Chanda Smith Baker: And I see it as a choice, an active choice.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Chanda Smith Baker: I think that's part of our work is to hold hope in the midst of things that aren't well, like you have to believe that something ahead can be evolved or better or more just, or more inclusive in order for us to reach.
Differently than what we're reaching today. Right. So talk to me about what you're learning, uh, with the, with the context of many of our listeners, not only are they going through stuff, but specifically in Minnesota, we're coming out of yet another season, hopefully we're coming out of another season.
We're in a season, another season of, of pain here.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm. It was so funny when I was not ha ha funny, but I was mm-hmm. When I was getting ready, I was thinking, I was like, oh, I'm gonna be on the podcast today. I said, and look at that. We are in the middle of a war. The last time that we were, the first time we were supposed to do it.
Yeah. Renee Good. Got shot.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: Then we were gonna do something a du another day. But there was the uh, Alex Perretti shooting. And it just has been the site of crisis in America. Like I don't think people realize how Minnesota per specifically the Twin Cities are used as a site of what can happen in your city.
And I think that people need to pay. Much clearer attention, um, because you all have had years of crisis from the murderings of George Floyd and Dante Wright all the way to today. Yeah. And even recently,
Chanda Smith Baker: Orlando was live. Right.
Patricia Virella: And then also from JD Vance saying he's holding Medicare.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: You know, thi this, this is a multi-pronged approach to, um, attack a very progressive, but also statistically, uh, positive improving lifestyles of all Americans.
And, you know, I think, so I thought about that today. And what I do believe is that you do have to have hope. I think people are just not willing to di dig deeper into things, which is unfortunate because hope, it's funny, when I was putting out my articles on Hope, there was so many people, reviewers who would be like, uh.
You know, oh, this seems like a hallmark thing, or like, whatever. So, and it's not so the way that I found that hope works. So it comes outta positive psychology and hope as a po a cognitive process. There is a gradient, is what I've found, right? And this is in true of humans in general. You could find this in the positive psychology, but in education, in my research and leaders particular, there's a continuum.
There's the high hope leaders, and then it goes all the way to the people who have no hope, right? So they're, they're in despair, right? So the way that hope operates is that you believe if you're a hopeful person, you see a problem and you say either, Ooh, I know how to fix that, or, you know, what? I'm gonna call Chanda.
I think she knows how to fix it. And then Chanda says, I have an idea and I say, let's work together. Right? And find, and this is, that's the agency part part. And then you go and then find the pathway.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: That's the pathway thinkings part. Right? So this is the cognitive process that operates in, in hope.
And so what happens is, is that hopeful people will usually say. They are optimistic, but they're not like, um, naively hopeful, which is like, everything is awesome. Mm-hmm. Instead, they're like, we, we will make, we have to make a change. So Hope is a very powerful, what I found is a very powerful mediator for school leaders experiencing crisis.
Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Um,
Patricia Virella: and so, you know, they, they, if hope is something that leaders lean on, and I have a book coming out next year, it's gonna be titled The Hopeful Leader. Um, these are things that you see leaders working together. Leaders who are, are marshaling for ideas, you know, trying to engage in something. If it doesn't work, they start over, right?
A hopeless leader throws everything at the wall.
Chanda Smith Baker: Hmm.
Patricia Virella: And so if you, you can apply this in the sense of like your daily life. Like do you know someone who like, is like, there's a problem, they're just throwing stuff at the wall and I'm, you're like, there's no strategy. There is no cohesion. It's because they're, they are, have lower levels of hope.
So in knowing that, you know, I think hope is, is essential in the time we're in, we are in a multi war. Context, right? Poverty is extremely high and there's a lot of racial violence, right? Yeah. A lot transgender violence. Um, and so I, I don't, you know, it's like Bell Hook says, you know, education is a vocation rooted in hopefulness.
And so I don't find that you can be, you can. Live this world. In this world and not be hopeful without sacrificing a part of yourself. Like you have to believe something will be better. And that's hard to do. It's really hard to do, but it is possible.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. I mean, I think people see hope as something sort of aspirational, inspirational, and I think you're talking about it as a strategy.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: And so how do you operationalize hope?
Patricia Virella: So one of the things that I think people can do is they can look at the problems that are in front of them and think about ways to solve them if they have to solve 'em, right? Who can I call on? What do I know? What do I need? And then I think from that point, again, it's the pathways thinking, how does this get done?
How can we make this happen? And then see what the outcome is. That whole thing right there is hope. Right? Mm-hmm. That whole strategy, that whole cognitive process is hope. And then at the end you reflect, did this go well? Do I need to tweak anything? Do I need to change anything? And then you continue through that process.
It's a, it's an iterative process. So that's what I would say is how you operationalize it. So again, if you're in a school. And you have a curriculum, right? A lot of people get told what curriculum. So you look at the curriculum, you look at what you like, what is important, what are the standards that it meets?
What are the things that you think can be changed? Who can you work with if you need to work with someone, grade team leader, or what else? And then your outcome is the result of that thinking and you just continuously apply it. And I saw it in the data. I mean, there were school le, there was one leader in New Jersey, she's the first chapter case study in my book, and she talks about how she had a lot of gang deaths in her schools, an elementary school, and she was finding that her third graders were being recruited in Newark for gangs.
And so she created this whole program. It's iterative. But she also went into the community. She went to some of the funerals. She talked more directly to the parents. Instead of saying things like, um, you know, watch out for your kids. She would tell the parents she had a code word and she said, you're gonna be sad, which means your child's gonna die, right?
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: And she said, unfortunately that came true, right? Um, for some kids who would get in the midst of this gang violence, but she really found like, she was like, I'm not gonna lose hope. I can't, she said, she said, I can never lose hope. And so she consistently thought, what is the program that needs to be in place for parents to educate them?
What do I need to do for kids so they're here later and more engaged with this school? And then what are the people, or what do I need to do to make this happen? How is this gonna make this happen? And then once that program was set up, reflecting on how, what was going on? That comes from, right. They call it in the psychological literature affective zeSaint
This belief in the possibility and the positivity of the world around you. So for her, it was never good enough to say, well, I tried.
Chanda Smith Baker: Right?
Patricia Virella: For her it was like, this is a problem. We need to solve it, and if my goal is to have kids in this area get to and through elementary school, let's go work on this.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. So you gave us an example of a leader that chose. Actively chose to lead through that lens of hope.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Um, and possibility, can institutions or leaders diminish hope?
Patricia Virella: Oh, a hundred percent. So I had one, um, I have examples of like the complete leader in despair, which I was like, mm-hmm. You should be a principal.
But what I found in this one paper I'm writing now is that there is so much moral injury to school leaders
Chanda Smith Baker: mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: In their job. They come out with a lot of guilt and shame, and they move that to a new school setting. So they don't leave the profession, they leave the district. Yeah. Um, at least my sample.
And so what you then end up having is leaders who, their hope was diminished by the district and they just move on and they don't, you know, some of the leaders I interviewed, they were cr, all of, most of them cried. Everyone that cried said, I haven't talked about this in years. So I'm not saying that the tears were, uh, but it was a strong emotional reaction and a lot of it, so in an instance where a school leader, um, one of her students tried to commit suicide in the school building, tried to hang herself in the school hallway, she said her superintendent never came to to talk to her about it.
Chanda Smith Baker: Hmm.
Patricia Virella: And so she said, I understand he was busy, but he could have come by. And she was like, so I left the school. And so you see that rupture and it's never really, you know, there's a scab over it. Um, during that interview she was saying, you know, like, oh my God, I've never even cried about this. Like, you know, but what I think is, is that deteriorates.
What leaders feel that they can do and how they're doing it. Because leading a school is a community effort, and so when you don't have that community to kind of bolster you as a leader, there's just so much you can hold. And so I do think that schools have to get better. I think preparation programs should get better at this because the reality is, so part of my other research is on crisis.
We're in a state of poly crisis, right? So this is overlapping crisis that are exacerbating one another. So we see this today with the war. We're gonna have, um, higher gas prices. People are dying. Mm-hmm. Right? So then schools are gonna start talking about it. It's just gonna continue to exacerbate as we go down right on top of everything else that's going on.
And so what I think is, is that it is an impossibility to think that leaders can lead without hope right now. So why not help them cultivate hope so they feel more agency and they understand that, you know, they can still make a difference. And I, I think leading schools right now is an ex is an exceptionally hard job.
And so I think the district has to be part in that, right. And supporting. That cultivation of hope and not being like, well, you know, the world's burning, and who cares because, you know, children don't necessarily see it that way.
Chanda Smith Baker: They don't. So leaders in despair, right? They're the compounding issues that you talked about, like I'm feeling it here.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Like how people come up. Right. I'm six months in as the, um, president and CEO at the Saint Paul Minnesota Foundation. So I'm in the honeymoon period. I tend to be very hopeful in general, but people come up and they're like, isn't it awful? Like, isn't it awful? Right. And. Not the way I wanna enter a conversation.
I certainly understand that it's, it's there, but there are a lot of leaders that are just in a space where it feels so heavy.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Like if we, if there's any leader, any person Right. Leading any work that is in a place of despair, what would you offer them in terms of advice right. To, to move through it?
Like we all go through it at some point, but you, you know, what would you offer in terms of. Well, not just them individually, but the impact of that.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: On the relationships that they're responsible for, including their peers, kids, family. Like what would you offer?
Patricia Virella: Therapy?
Chanda Smith Baker: Therapy.
Patricia Virella: I think, um, this has also been a big push in the way I'm thinking about leadership right now is that there it is Okay.
To say it's too much to hold. And I think people need, um, a space where they can share it. Right? Because one of the other things I'm, I've been working on is fear leaders having a lot of fear. Um, and that's all the way from leaders who are afraid to say DEI to leaders who have a transgender teacher right to ICE coming in their building.
So I think there has to be some aspect of support that you have a private space to talk about what's going on. I think the other thing, and this is, it's so interesting that you had brought this up because one of the things that did not come up in the 60 plus principles I've interviewed over the last five years is self-care.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: I think that as leaders, and I've been arguing this in the literature, that like we've done a bad job of saying like, the principalship is lonely. I think we've created that, right?
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. Yep.
Patricia Virella: You hear that, right? It's time to unwind that and to find colleagues that, you know, like I used to have, my friend Liz, she would drive in from New Jersey.
I would drive down from Westchester every morning and we would just talk about work. Right. Like, oh, I gotta do this. Oh, I gotta do that. And then like we would workshop those things.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: I think it's important to find that kind of partner, whether that be like a coach that you hire and they work with you or it's a colleague.
Mm-hmm. Um, I think that's great. And I think self-care, I think you figuring out, so one of the things I've been doing, 'cause again, this world is so heavy and I think people are just not acknowledging like. The heaviness takes a toll on you. Yeah. Takes toll on your body and your mind. And your spirit. Right.
Um, and so one of the things I was, I was looking on, this is like the one good thing about social media. So I was, um, on, so on Instagram and I saw this black woman and she did this, um, post about a personal curriculum and it was, it's something black women have been recently doing. I encourage everyone to check it out.
So essentially. You can pick four topics, two topics, how many you want, right? I would say no more than four, but I'm not you, you can do what you want. And what you do is you then create like a curriculum about things you wanna learn about. And I found AI is extremely helpful in this. Um, so like I have a work personal curriculum where I'm working on learning a methodology, but I'm also learning about how to scrapbook and junk book, right?
Mm-hmm. Those kinds of things help you to turn off the tv, put your phone away. It's the equivalent of touching grass is like, what are the things? So this black woman has, um, she was talking about how she was studying coffee. She loves coffee. Mm-hmm. So she just wanted to know more about it. I think being intentional about those things for school leaders, because the one thing I learned as a school leader, the job is never done.
So you can go home and you can work till your eyeballs fall out, you're still gonna have more work. Right. The better. The work is usually comes from when you rest and you restore, and so, you know, I, I think that's what a lot of leaders need now, is that you don't lean into more work. You have to lean into some respite, some, some joy and, and really take some time for you.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah, you're reminding me. My very first, uh, podcast was with Van Jones, which is sort of wild when I look back at it. But after the recording he said a couple of things to me that has really stuck with me.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: And um, at that time I was thinking a lot about pace. Right. The weight of responsibility and like the demand on time and energy, right?
Like you're, you're, you're being pulled in many directions all of the time. Mm-hmm. And he was so visible and had gone through so many public things and people have opinions about him out loud, um, regularly. Right. And, um, I remember him saying to me that, oh man, I hope I remember, but basically you gotta, um, basically.
Um, curate an experience that supports your spirit.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Chanda Smith Baker: And there was another side to it. Maybe I'll remember, I have to go back and look at my notes, but essentially saying that. Whatever role you're in, it's important that you find other people, not the people that want your advice 'cause they're coming.
They wanna follow your footsteps and not people that are giving you advice because they've been there already. You need folks that are sort of in the same experience with you in real time, that you can pick up the phone and that part of your responsibility is curating it. So it translates sometimes and people say.
You, you know, you need your own personal board of directors or you know, you find women. I was looking for circles of women and certainly that is good, but his advice was very clearly find someone who's in a very similar role as you and curate it. And so part of even what you're saying with this curriculum and with hope, right, that these are, these are actions and I think oftentimes we expect things to come to us.
Right hope. Like if you're feeling despair, you gotta, you gotta actively take steps, therapy, whatever it is to curate what it is that you are acting against or, or recognizing what's holding you back.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Chanda Smith Baker: And curating a set of experiences and relationships that allow you to show up in your best self.
Patricia Virella: Yep.
Because the thing too is, and I think this is put on, you know, black women in particular, is it's incumbent on us to solve problems. And it's not, you know, I had a, a colleague of mine, a younger assistant professor, and she was, you know, on the, she's on the tenure track. She's like, you know, I, I need to focus on grading.
I said, you need to focus on writing, right? And she's like, but I, I want, I was a principal and I wanna make sure the students get what they need out of this principal prep program. And I said, I felt the same way. I felt singularly responsible for some reason. No one deputized me, but I felt singularly responsible for, for providing the best leadership class.
And what I said to her is, it's a program. That is not just on you, it's on every single professor in that program. So take some of that pressure off.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. Right.
Patricia Virella: And, and you're absolutely right. No one is going to give you permission to take a break. Right. That is not rewarded in our society. I always laugh when I go visit my cousin, he lives in Switzerland and he has like four weeks of vacation in the summer.
He is like, I'm right under the CFO. No one bothers him. Right. And, and like my husband. Runs this like multimillion dollar project. I mean, uh, project and he gets called all the time, right? It's a different type of standards and knowing where we are in our context, we have to curate joy. You have to, you have to find people that you feel are, are going to do the work with you.
Or, you know, provide you an an option. Fred Joseph, uh, said this very early on when Trump was elected. He said, it is okay to keep an eye on what's going on and not gaze at it, right? But gaze on, gaze in, on the joy and the life that you're experiencing, right? Something along those lines, because if you're just gazing at it, you do become full of despair, right?
If I watch, if I watch my timeline. In the news every day, I would miss the little things. And, and those things are extremely important to the human narrative. And I think that that's what gets people caught up is that they think, you know, particularly in schools, it's just like, I gotta do this, I gotta do this.
You have to take care of yourself.
Chanda Smith Baker: I think there's people that sit outside of the direct immediate experience, right? Like, I'm going back to Minnesota. So maybe a white person who's not an immigrant. Mm-hmm. Or when George Floyd was murdered, a white person who wasn't a black male. Right. And so then they're holding guilt.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm.
Chanda Smith Baker: Right? They're holding guilt and they wanna have the conversation to make sure that they're showing allyship. Which is a whole different burden that they're holding or sometimes transferring. Any advice for folks that are working particularly in your space that maybe don't have the same background?
Again, you're talking about white space, but you've been in white space with white leaders that understand how to show up as who they are in a way that honors a relationship and those that are in this space that are uncomfortable and not certain. And then those in the space that really just don't give a damn.
Right? Like they just, they're just in their own little world and they think everyone else's world looks exactly the same. So what, what advice would you give to those folks? Right. I'm using white as an example, but we've all been in space that where we have been the person that needs to be an ally.
Patricia Virella: I mean, I would say hold your peace.
Um, my job, I felt for a while my job was to educate people for, one of the things that always strikes me is I'm Puerto Rican. Both my parents were born on the island, and I always get the, are you a hundred percent Puerto Rican? And for a while I thought, well, now it's time for a history lesson. And. Now I just say, yep.
And I keep it moving. Right? Um, sometimes I engage in a little bit more. Like I had one woman tell me before my, um, speech, uh, in Puerto Rico that she was excited to see, hear what I had to say. 'cause these were her people. And I said to her, these are my people. My mother lives on the other side of the island right now.
My aunts and uncles live over there in Bon San Juan, right? I own a place in East, like, come on. And. For me in that moment, I thought to myself, no, it's important that you know that I'm from this island, but I'm not gonna get into a dialogue with you. Um, I think for some people, when you're ready, you know, like my neighbor, she's a white woman.
And when, you know, the, the genocide started happening in Palestine. She had made a comment, she didn't wanna really say much 'cause her partner was Jewish and I said to her, that's so insane. Because they're literal children and mothers and, and men dying that didn't ask for this. Right. And so sometimes it's those comments.
I don't, I, I just, for me, I feel like it's not my job to put you on. Mm-hmm. You know? Mm-hmm. I think that's something that's come with age, to be quite honest, you know? No, for
Chanda Smith Baker: sure.
Patricia Virella: Mm-hmm. I, I was, I was talking at the University of Buffalo, and as young a student said, you know, she feels like the administration is not doing enough and blah, da da da, da.
How do you deal with that? I said, well, first you look at what you can change and what's worth your energy. Sometimes the space is not worth your energy. Sometimes.
Chanda Smith Baker: That's right.
Patricia Virella: Is not going to change. Mm-hmm. Right. That is what America is. Mm-hmm. Sometimes the space is not gonna change. You have to make the decision to decide what is your level of engagement,
Chanda Smith Baker: man.
So, so, uh, bad Bunny made a decision.
Patricia Virella: Yes. Yes.
Chanda Smith Baker: How did you feel about watching that? Like the feedback was so interesting. Um, this was one of those moments where, um, similar to Kendrick Lamar, like, I got more of the nuances in real time. I'm watching Bad Bunny and I'm like, oh man, this is deeper than I even understand.
And like, this is so good and I don't even understand how good it is. So like I have to read, I have to research, I under, I need to understand the symbolism, but I knew it immediately. I knew not to judge it immediately because of. I knew it was more, I knew it was a statement. I just didn't know how much.
Patricia Virella: I mean, so I loved it.
I, I've loved Bad Bunny since he had Chumba, which is his first single, um, I, I love Bad Bunny and I love Bad Bunny. Um, you know, 'cause he's a, he was a, a kid in a grocery store bagging groceries. Okay. And I think, um, what he's been able to do and what he's been able to share is very important. Um. I love the Super Bowl performance because similar as you said to Kendrick Lamar, there was a lot of nuance.
So one thing I remember when I saw the, the electric poles and I looked at my husband and I said, holy sugar honey iced tea. He just put up the electric poles. When I tell you Puerto Rico has the worst electric infrastructure across the island for no reason, um, you know, it's insane. And to have that. It was such an acknowledgement that literally Puerto Rico lives in the dark daily and people don't know that, right?
Mm-hmm. Even in San Daily, I thought there were things like having, uh, the girls painting their nails, right? It's a very Puerto Rican thing. LASAs, right? My grandmother had these very bright red nails to the day. Even in her coffin, she had bright red nails,
Chanda Smith Baker: right?
Patricia Virella: Like mm-hmm. There was so much of our culture that was there.
Um, but I think some people expected too much. Right? I think, you know, I saw one person posting that he is not Jesus. I don't think that's what's happening. I think that right now people are looking for hope and I think having someone who is an American citizen who speaks Spanish singing. About our culture have saying all the names, like saying Guyana, my kids are half Guyanese.
That's important for them to hear.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: Hearing these things, I think inspire hope, and I think they inspire creativity and potential and I think that similar to what James Baldwin talks about with art, art helps to, you know, noodle on what is happening in the now. He said it like that. That's a very loose.
For me, that was me seeing myself finally, you know, when Jayla was, Jayla was on the Super Bowl and she had, um, I remember she had this dress and she was like, wow. And it was a flag. And I remember that flag and being like, holy, that's amazing. But people don't know that the flag bad bunny had was actually the flag we had before the flag.
Now, and the reason we have the flag now is because the US wanted us to change our blue. To the blue of the American flag.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: So to have the older flag to symbolize, we've been here before, right? We've been here for a while. I think it was wonderful. I think though people expect too much.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah.
Patricia Virella: You know, I, I don't know what you think you're going to get for a super, I mean, it's still a capitalistic thing.
It's a Super Bowl halftime show. Yeah. This is not at the Schaumburg. Right. So, you know, there's an element of this that is naturally capitalistic in nature, but I think that in coupling it with, you know, again, seeing the light poles and seeing, you know, the nails and seeing the original flag, I was like, this is, and, and you know, the he bottles with the sugar cane.
Those things are important. I think also it's important for everyone to see. That this colonized space is also a racialized space.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah. And
Patricia Virella: so it's important to see the diversity of, of, of colors that, of skin that he showed. Um, I. So, yeah, that was my thoughts on it. I mean, I loved it. You know, it's, it was something that to me, I was like, holy cow.
Um, he also bridges this idea of New York, right? With the, um,
Chanda Smith Baker: the bodega.
Patricia Virella: Yes. I forget her name, but
Chanda Smith Baker: I forgot her name too. The social club, the Puerto
Patricia Virella: Rican Social Club. Yeah. But these are things that, like my mom and dad talked about when I was a kid, right. Going to, uh, the Puerto Rican Poets Cafe and like mm-hmm.
These are landmarks and I think. For me, it's about showing and expanding culture and understanding the connections and the internal migrations that happen. Um,
Chanda Smith Baker: yeah,
Patricia Virella: but I loved it. And of course, you know, I was dancing my husband.
Chanda Smith Baker: Yeah, of course
Patricia Virella: he has a 65 inch tv. I thought bad bunny was in the living room.
Chanda Smith Baker: I love it. I have one more question, um, before we wrap, which is, I'm gonna just tie this bad bunny conversation because earlier we were talking about education. You're like, and I can pick the books, having books that I choose, or you said something along those lines and it, the tie for me is around representation.
Right. Like I was very much that same kid like my dad would get on me 'cause I'm, you know, I would skip a class and go to the library. He's like, this is insane. And I'm like, yeah, but I like to read and they're reading something I don't wanna read, but I'm curious on this. Right? So to be able to pick the books, to be able to see yourself.
And so when I think about higher education, you're in a university system, like where is higher ed? Like are the teachers of tomorrow being trained like around this issue of representation and the technologies and the things that we need? Because even in this conversation we've identified. From a systems point of view, right, to individually how that is important to see our leadership reflected.
Are we doing enough to prepare people to allow for our young people to see themselves represented?
Patricia Virella: Uh, I don't think so. I mean, I think, I think there, I will say this education is, is incredibly contextual and the preparation is dependent upon where you are. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And what the department and the university values.
So I can say at Montclair, there is a lot of great critical work that's happening with identity and understanding the students you have in front of you. I can say that's true of UCLA's program where my friend Tanika Orange runs a fabulous program. Right. Um. Then there may be other programs that don't do that.
Right. I think there is a lot of work that's happening. Um, but there can always be more. And I think it really, again, it's something I've been talking about with colleagues of mine, so I think a lot of syllabi that I've seen is like, I, I say that it's like dripped in white guilt.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: That's not gonna teach me how to be more empathetic.
I don't wanna put on an something on my syllabi because I'm like, you need to understand that you know black people and no. What I want you to understand is how are you showing up in this and doing a lot of self reflective work,
Chanda Smith Baker: or I want it on the curriculum because they contributed and you should know it.
Patricia Virella: Exactly. Yeah. And like, and, and then also like, what are the things that, you know, it's very funny because there's this, uh, really great paper that I love, and it's all about the brain malleability and plasticity, and it talks about having safe, culturally relevant spaces for kids is a like. A hallmark of like high, excellent learning, right?
And when kids feel that they are in those spaces, their brains are able to grow and they, you know, they're less worried about like, am I safe? Am I da da da? And more like, what's happening? So I think there could be more, unfortunately, I think we're in a space now where people are doing less of that. And I think the misnomer is, is, is that people think if we do less of it.
That it's still gonna come in, in some way. And I think it has to always be explicit.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: You know, I think I'm a, I'm, I am a Puerto Rican woman, and I think what the way that I was raised and some of the cultural things that I have, you know, are important to acknowledge in a classroom and in my being right.
And how those show up, those that's work that I should be doing, um, in schools. So I would always argue that teachers can be more fully prepared for that as well as leaders. I think, I think it's leaders make the win. I always say this, leaders put the wind in the sail.
Chanda Smith Baker: Mm-hmm.
Patricia Virella: And so if you have a leader who does not believe in equity, right.
And does not understand that their budget is an equity action, 'cause you're literally deciding what grade gets this, what grade gets that? Then you fundamentally have a lack of understanding of, of resource allocation. So are you ever going to be an effective leader? I think that kind of clear tie needs to be more explicit.
Yeah. For teachers and for leaders.
Chanda Smith Baker: Thank you for listening to Conversations with Chanda, hosted by me, Chanda Smith Baker, president, and CEO of the Saint Paul and Minnesota Foundation. To hear more conversations with change makers, visit conversationswithchanda.com, conversations with C-H-A-N-D-A.com or find us on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast.