We are Donnell Cannon and Jenny O’Meara, two passionate educators. Welcome to Season 2 of The Hummingbird Stories! This season, we’re asking the question: What does an extraordinary education look like for every student?

We’re hosting conversations with the most innovative, equity-minded leaders in education from all across the country — and that includes young people.

In this episode, we confront the paralysis that can set in when it feels like there’s so much to do. Our guests remind us, though, to just start! This episode features interviews with Miguel Gonzales, directors of schools at Embark Education, Aylon Samouha, director at Transcend Education, and Kimberly Smith, executive director at the League of Innovative Schools.

We don’t just want to hear from guests on our show. We want to hear from you, too. In every episode on this season of The Hummingbird Stories, we’ll pose a question and ask you to weigh in through our Telbee. This week’s question asks you to think about the emphasis Aylon and Kimberly placed on the importance of listening to community. What’s one first step you can do a better job of listening to your community tomorrow? Visit sayhi.chat/hummingbird to chime in.

We know a lot of “Hummingbirds” who are no longer waiting for change in a system on fire, but rather choosing to do something. We hope they’ll inspire you to take real action, no matter how small, toward redesigning schools.

An extraordinary education for all young people is possible. But it’s going to take all of us to make it happen.