How to Change Careers and Become a Teacher

(upbeat music) (slide swooshing) - Here's what's coming up next on You Oughta Know.

(slide swooshing) The Golden Girls leave sunny Florida, only to find themselves embroiled in a murder mystery.

(slide swooshing) We examine the art of furniture repair, at Philadelphia's Cane and Rush.

(slide swooshing) Plus, a program that's equipping the next wave of school teachers.

(upbeat music) - Hi, I'm Shirley Min, and this is, You Oughta Know.

You know, second acts, pretty common nowadays.

Well, if you're thinking about changing careers and have always wanted to be a teacher but don't know where to start we found a graduate program that walks you through the steps to become a licensed, certified teacher.

- [Teacher] How many squares or circles do I need?

Zenia?

- [Zenia] Two.

- [Teacher] Two.

- [Zenia] Oh.

Shaded in.

- [Teacher] Two shaded in.

But how many total circles do I need to represent my mixed number?

DJ?

- [DJ] Three.

- [Teacher] Three.

Now we're getting it.

Light bulbs are going off.

That's an improper fraction.

I always wanted to be a teacher, but by the time I was getting my Master's, they were like, oh, well do you have a teaching certificate?

And I was like, oh, I didn't know I needed that.

So it kind of got pushed to the wayside.

- [Shirley Min] Until 2021 when Bianca Nagy happens to see a flyer about Relay, a program for those interested in teaching particularly those looking to start a second career.

And for the longtime fitness instructor and personal trainer, this seemed like fate stepping in.

- It was a huge change, obviously, learning all of the ins and outs of classroom management, of how to plan, of how to read curriculum standards, core standards but they broke it down so that you could really understand it and really get a good handle on it.

- [Shirley Min] Relay is a two year master's program that puts an emphasis on hands-on in classroom experience.

- [Bianca Nagy] That first couple of months I just kind of observed and I got to know the class, and then after that we started to incorporate myself more into the classroom.

- [Dana Davisson] The only degree that we confer, so we're specialized in that way, is a Master of Arts and Teaching as opposed to a Master's of Education because the art of teaching you achieve through practice.

- [Shirley Min] Relay has 11 campuses nationwide.

Dana Davisson is the director of Relay's Delaware campus.

- [Dana Davisson] The residency specifically is a more gradual on ramp to teaching because the first year of the residency is spent with a highly effective mentor teacher that we call a resident advisor.

And that resident is learning alongside of and teaching alongside of that teacher the entire year.

And then the second year, they would qualify for a lead teaching position for their own classroom.

- [Shirley Min] Dana says the support guidance and constructive feedback Relay provides sets it apart from other educator prep programs and reduces the risk of teacher burnout.

- Our faculty at Relay are teachers.

We've been teachers in classrooms and now we are teachers of teachers, so we get it.

There's so many challenges that new teachers face as simple as like, how do I call the school nurse when a student is sick?

What's the best way to get ahold of family members to talk about students?

These are things that if you're a lead teacher on day one you're learning it as you go and it does cause more burnout because you're exhausted from doing it.

And so the retention rate in the residency at Delaware is 83%, whereas someone who's not going through the residency, they're jumping right into their own classroom on day one, their retention rate tends to be lower, about 60%.

So we're already seeing that the residency is paying off - [Shirley Min] Music to school district's ears especially when there's a shortage of teachers nationwide.

Tuition for the two year residency is between 27 and $33,000, depending on the certifications you pursue.

But Dana says, Relay residents are eligible for significant scholarships from AmeriCorps and through the state of Delaware.

- In 2017, our launch year, we had three residents.

Only three.

(laughs) And now our average enrollment in a year is between 15 and 20 residents.

Next year we are actually projecting about 30.

- [Shirley Min] For Bianca, it's a dream come true.

- When I see them get it, when I see that they have those light bulb moments and I know that it's from something that I delivered for them, of course it makes me feel like, yes, I get it.

Now I'm finally getting to be a teacher that I always wanted to be.

- In addition to Relay's Delaware Hub locally there's a Philadelphia Camden Campus, one in Newark, New Jersey, and Washington, DC.

While these next stories come from WHYY's Youth Media Lab, these young reporters show us how their generation is preparing to make their voice count and how weapons are being transformed into Tools of Hope.

- I'm Shane Clayborne.

I'm one of the founders of Raw Tools Philly and we're right at the corner of Kensington and Allegheny.

Our shop's right on Kensington Avenue.

From the beginning, my friends have called this organization I'm a part of Raw Tools, which is "war" flipped backwards that's how we get our name but turning guns into garden tools and other life giving things art and crosses and jewelry.

But the whole point of it is to is to transform things that have been designed to kill into things that give life.

(rotary saw cutting) - [Katie Brotherton] I am mostly the blacksmith there, so turn the guns into garden tools and other projects.

We make hearts and we're getting into melting different metals into shapes.

I mean, the goal right, is to take as many guns off the streets that we can then we can definitely plant more gardens and grow more vegetables in this world.

- [Shane Clayborne] We've made these heart necklaces out of the slice of a gun barrel, and sometimes I, I think as we're kind of crushing the metal into a heart, we think of all the hearts that have been, you know, crushed by gun violence in our neighborhood and the country.

We try to make sure that none of the gun goes unused.

(upbeat music) - You know, we gotta show the world there is another way than what we are doing.

You know, it's not only changing these weapons of war into something that could be life giving like a garden tool but also, we're gonna work on changing people's hearts, also.

So using the spirit of imagination of what we're doing, what we learned from the Old Scriptures, to hopefully to show people there is another way.

- I grew up around guns.

I had a pistol, I had a concealed carry permit.

Had been talking about some of those things with Shane sharing with him that I felt like there was something I should do.

I didn't want to bring that gun to the neighborhood.

And so kind of in talking with him he shared with me about what Raw tools was doing and invited me to kind of cut my gun up and see it transformed into something else.

- [Shane Clayborne] You know, sometimes we expect for change to come from the top down but the vision that the prophets kind of invite us to see is that change comes from the bottom up.

It's the people that are tired of violence and they take things into their own hands and they begin to transform their weapons into plows and pruny hooks and tools that are meant to cultivate life.

(slide swooshing) - [Student] Everyone knows more.

I'm too young to make change.

I don't know enough.

Everyone knows more.

I, I I'm too young to make change - Educate others, educate others educate others, educate others.

- Your voice is change, your voice is change your voice is change.

- [Angelique Hinton] Use Political Power is to me really understanding the impact their voice can have.

My name is Angelique Hinton and I am the Executive Director of PA Youth Vote.

Voting can be very complicated and overwhelming so especially for young people, there's a lot of barriers.

So PA Youth Vote works with young people year round to engage them.

- [Rebecca Allen] Basically, our role is just to represent students and to talk about the issues that we care about and to be there to advocate for students.

- We then also work with students year round to build voter registration teams in school but then we pay students stipends to work along with the teachers, right?

Understand which students are eligible make sure they're registered and make sure they have resources when they ask those questions about, well, where do I vote?

Or how do I find out who's running?

The voting process for someone who doesn't really know anything about it is completely overwhelming.

- One of the biggest barriers is just a lack of knowledge that you can be involved.

You don't see a lot of policies and curriculums that center around civic engagement and and getting involved with your community.

- [Angelique Hinton] So for a lot of young people feel like it's not anything that they need to engage in because no one's engaging them.

- [Student] In the beginning of the summer we started to work with Just Act.

- [Lisa Jo Epstein] Which is an applied theater nonprofit that works with non-actors using arts based to catalyze dialogue and action planning for real change.

- [Student] We did a play called How's Your Voice Going to Matter If You Don't Vote.

- [Lisa Jo Epstein] Which they performed on the steps of the Philadelphia School district.

- [Student] Creating theater based off of the issues that we face really allows us an outlet to talk about issues that we care about, while also being creative and inviting other people into our space.

- [Male Student] Having the ability to really let ourselves be heard with that makes it more equitable in a sense because there is, you know, more of a chance that things that will benefit younger people will be carried on into whatever legislation or court decisions might be enacted.

What's the point of not letting your voice be heard?

How, how will you expect things to go your way if you're apathetic to things and just let them be the way they are and stay that way?

- [Student] Voting can be intimidating, but once it's put in a digestible form, it's so empowering because one vote makes a huge difference.

- Now we're gonna see how natural materials cane and rush bring new life to old wicker furniture.

- Wicker is a generic term for all the material, the cane, the rush.

My sister Regina had done a chair and I picked up the book after she was finished.

I had taught myself from the book with help from people in the business.

I found that chair in an old barn and he had a whole barn full of chairs.

That's the first one I wove and that was 40 something years ago.

The material comes from China, Indonesia, it came to this country around 1745 when China Trade opened up.

The rush, which is these chairs they came from England about the same period.

And it's a vine, rattan palm, and it grows up the trees and it's about an inch thick and they peel the outer bark.

This is the outer bark that they've changed.

They gather it into hanks.

It's about a thousand feet.

I soak it for about 20 minutes and then it, and it you keep it wet, just make it more pliable and it tightens up as it dries so you wanna keep your tension.

That's why the pegs are here.

There's the flat reed on that chair.

Hand cane.

This is the machine cane.

It's, you put it in like a like a screen and that's the material.

It's all pre-woven.

This is the natural rush and that's what they would use.

Both natural materials, one's your grass and one's a vine.

I'm doing the seven step hand cane and I'm on the third step now.

The first step is your vertical from front to back.

Your second step is side to side.

And your third step is a repeat of the first step.

The chair itself determines how you weave it and the distance between the holes and the size of the hole determines what size can you use and how you weave it.

And there are about four different weaves.

There's the spider weave, the regular seven step, and then there's also a daisy.

The spider and the daisy are more decorative.

I'm a caner.

A lot of people will just drop their chairs in front because they don't know what to do with them and they think I can use them.

A lot of them are heirloom pieces.

They're family pieces, so they think it's worth it.

- You don't have to cross the pond to find one of a kind hats and fascinators.

Eggcup designs in Dover, Delaware is a much closer option.

- I'm Connie.

- I'm Fred.

- (together) And we're Eggcup Designs.

(upbeat music) - I'm a milliner.

I make ladies hats by hand.

A tradition that has not changed in a long time.

Still do it the old fashioned way.

You take your piece of straw and you shape it over a wooden block.

Use some water on it and an iron to smooth it all out and sewing machines, feathers, flowers.

Bam, you got a hat.

♪ Boom, boom, bang, bang ♪ ♪ Bang, bang, bang ♪ - [Conney Borda] I've been doing it 25 years.

I started out in advertising.

I would mock up product.

Three-dimensional product when the computer got real big, I got shown the door.

♪ Boom, boom, bang bang ♪ - [Conney Borda] I just always liked to build things and I could do it.

It was either gonna be cobbling or hats and I thought, there was a class for hats.

So, I picked the hats.

(upbeat jazz music) - We sell them across the country from New York to California.

Stores carry our hats.

We don't sell anything ourselves.

25 years we've been at it and it's grown quite, quite nicely for us.

- [Connie] Both men and women's hats are coming back.

A lot of people now are pretty much buying their clothes from the same stores.

They're wearing the same t-shirt, blue jeans, same sneakers.

What they can do is go see a hat store and get something custom made and limited runs.

Both men and women are doing that.

- [Fred Borda] I'm very proud of them.

We make an extraordinarily well made hat.

They're really masterpieces.

I mean, if you look at them and you see the color they're terrific and everyone loves them.

We have a technique on feathers in which half of the feather looks one color and the other half of the feather looks another color.

No one else does that.

Connie created that and started doing that.

- [Conney Borda] I pretty much have an idea, do a few gestures on a piece of paper and start working with my materials.

- [Fred Borda] Hats have become more popular in the last 25 years.

Certainly what goes on in England has has had an effect here.

Women want the hat to look like the princess, or something or some style of hat, like a princess.

A couple of our stores had customers who were going to England to have tea with The Queen and we made hats for them.

And we also had in the Kentucky Derby Winner Circle a lady had bought a hat at a store in New York and there it was.

It's something we built together.

We worked together, which was important to me.

I wanted to be with my wife, you know and it's nice to see our hats in stores and see people acknowledge her effort and her workmanship.

That's, that's a wonderful feeling.

- [Conney Borda] Women will spend a lot of money on a pair of shoes.

They'll spend a lot of money on a handbag.

This is on top of your head so you might as well spend some good money for something on top of your head.

People who wear hats are individual people.

They don't want to be like the rest of the crowd.

- [Fred Borda] These are one of a kind and they stand out.

It's hard to miss somebody in a hat.

- [Conney Borda] I just like something that will make a person's day.

It's fun to do, but in the end the person has to like it and they have to be comfortable and happy and walk into the wedding or the party or whatever and everybody goes, I love your hat.

Then you know, you just made someone's day and really people look cool in a hat.

- Imagine enjoying a night at the theater and all of a sudden there's a murder.

And the suspects are none other than the beloved Golden Girls.

- [Traci Connaughton] The world's obsession with murder, I, I wish I could understand it.

There's just something about, I think, trying to figure it out trying to solve it and the, the mystique around everything.

The history of Murder Mystery.

We started, our wall starts at Edgar Allan Poe because that is considered to be the first detective who'd done it.

It started there and then caught on.

20 years ago, I and a group of other actors some of which are still working with me, were doing shows, murder mystery dinner theater shows, and you know, with different companies all over the place.

By the time 2019 rolled around we were doing almost 500 shows a year.

Now that we're here, we can choose whatever we want, which is really exciting.

But I'll just think of the theme that I think is going to be interesting to the audience that is going to look good costume-wise.

Then once we pick the theme I start writing.

There's an outline.

I have to know who did it, who died, why, how and then from there, the suspects and all the red herrings and then I just start letting the characters talk.

- [Male] Nothing to do with what mom?

- The feud between our families.

(mysterious music) - [Traci Connaughton] Once the show begins, it happens right within the room so the actors aren't up on stage they are sitting right in with them.

Once everyone's in and seated the actors come out and they mingle.

They talk in character, they warm the crowd up a little bit kind of almost like an opening act of a comedian.

And they get to know people's names and how they can pull stuff from them as they perform.

So our actors are all local actors.

We have 40 to 50 on staff right now who work consistently all year long.

- Oh actually I'd like to jump in.

- [Traci Connaughton] We also do training on how to ad lib with the audience, how to adlib with each other because we do take pride in kind of being comfortable and loose with the script so that we can find the funny in things that may not have even come out of the rehearsal process.

- Ladies and gentlemen, on your tables you will find ballots.

Now is your chance to tell us who you think killed Chris.

- Our two main productions that are coming out this summer at Red Room Theater, we will have Murder at the Moulin, which is a Moulin Rouge French inspired murder mystery.

Then, in Atlantic City at Resorts Casino Hotel we will be opening a brand new, all new Golden Girls murder mystery called a Golden Girls Murder Mystery: The Girls Do Atlantic City.

Premise is the girls are visiting Atlantic City for an Elvis convention but the wrong one shows up and things go awry.

- [Male] Thank you all for coming.

(clapping) (slide swooshing) - [Female] Someone is luring a strike force into the Persian Gulf.

(explosion) - [Male] President is sending you to stop a war before it starts.

Not butter a crumpet.

- [Patrick Stoner] The Diplomat is a series about a reluctant American ambassador to the UK, Kerry Russell, who ends up going to a war zone but also, she has to deal with a turbulent marriage to her high profile husband played by Rufus Sewell.

I asked them if they knew from the beginning where it was all going to go.

- I've had a couple of experiences where because the writers kept on changing and the regime kept on changing, you didn't know if the the new people had the same brief, the same intent indeed the same understanding - Yes, of course - With Deborah Kahn, no anxiety involved in a new script arriving.

It became exciting, because you knew quite quickly that it was gonna be the same voices the same quality, the same feel.

- I can imagine though you do as as the star have some power to say, "You know I just don't think this is would be right for what she does".

Couldn't you?

You can do that, can't you?

- [Keri Russell] I guess, but you know, there was no need in this.

I mean, it was a delight to, to see where this was going.

This, even in the pilot, it had so much in it.

It has Deborah's intellect.

It has humor.

And I didn't know exactly what level they were going.

- [Rufus Sewell] All the DNA was there.

- [Keri Russell] Yeah.

And so once we had a few episodes under our belt, you you could feel which way they were leaning a bit and you know how far you could push the humor and it, it it got fun and I think we figured it out.

- Yeah.

- One of the things I particularly like to watch in acting is when people are playing against what's going on on the surface.

You have to be very careful about how much you show because you don't want to, you don't want it to be obvious.

How do, how do you make that balance?

- [Rufus Sewell] I don't, I don't really worry about what we show.

You?

- [Keri Russell] That's the editor's job.

- [Rufus Sewell] Yeah, exactly.

(laughs) I'm just trying to like, no but if you just like kind of think it.

- [Keri Russell] Yes.

- [Rufus Sewell] You know, I think we're quite similar like that.

- [Patrick Stoner] I guess I first heard that from Gene Hackman many years ago.

- Yeah.

Me and Gene very similar in our work.

- [Patrick Stoner] Yeah, you and Gene I think he was saying and he told, he said you mentioned that to him.

No, what he said was "What I've learned as I've done this more is the less you do the more you relax into it" - It's true.

- The more you relax.

- [Patrick Stoner] The more it comes out.

- Yeah Well and sometimes impossible.

- Sometimes you fail.

- You know?

But that's the goal.

- Yeah.

But that's the thing is like, yeah you're trying to be less neurotic.

For me it's always bouncing off the floor of getting it wrong.

What keeps me, you know what I mean?

That, that's how you get up there is like.

I think most of the time, you know we are just working the same way, aren't we?

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- Thank you both for coming.

- Thank you very much.

- [Patrick Stoner] I appreciate it.

I'm Patrick Stoner.

- All right.

That is our show and you wanna know, we appreciate you tuning in.

Goodnight, everyone.

(upbeat music) - Thank you for being our friend.

- That was pretty bad.

- Yeah, it was.

(laughing) - Try again.

(upbeat music)