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- [00:00]
A
When you think about the student, who may be the future doctor, maybe the future lawyer, may be the future principal, maybe the future inventor, that creates the next cure for a disease that we've been wrestling with for decades, and they are halted. They're running up against barriers because there's not enough support while they are a child. How, how, how dare we not be disturbed or moved to the point where we say enough is enough and we need to create more resources for them.
- [00:41]
B
Hello, and welcome to the Politics Girl Podcast. I'm your host, Lee McGowan. Let's get into it. Well, it's back to school. And while school shootings seem to be a given in America, actual education is not. Here we are in September 2025 with the Department of Education that is being systematically dismantled, while the policy impacts of the Trump administration on education is only set to make things worse. From food insecurity for children who are used to getting fed at school, to school closures, to policy decisions that tell us what we can and cannot teach. Now we have states taking right wing Christian talking points as part of the public school curriculum and even using videos from organizations like Prageru to teach our children. To teach our children things like slavery wasn't so bad. It was better than death after all. Why would we teach our children that? Those were the only two options, death or slavery. Aren't we supposed to be a land of freedom? What are we even doing here? This is a complete departure of how we teach our children and what they will be learning. So to talk about education in modern day America, I have invited Dr. Terrence Lester to join us. Dr. Lester is the author of the upcoming book From Dropout to Doctorate, Breaking the Chains of educational injustice. Dr. Lester writes about how education inequality isn't theoretical. It's real. That behind every data point you hear about dropout rates or underfunded schools or academic failures, there is a story of real people with potential who more often than not, got left behind. Dr. Lester tells his own personal story of going from a high school dropout who faced homelessness and gang violence to becoming a scholar and a humanitarian who has earned a PhD and now works to uplift other people through education. So without further ado, please welcome my guest, author, public speaker, and founder and executive director of Love Beyond Walls, the nonprofit focused on raising awareness on poverty, homelessness, and community mobilization. Dr. Terrence Lester, welcome. Terrence Lee.
- [02:40]
A
I'm really excited to be here. You told me something. You said that this is your 200th episode.
- [02:47]
B
Isn't that exciting?
- [02:48]
A
Congratulations. Yeah. It's amazing.
- [02:51]
B
Thank you for saying that. Yeah. We've been working really hard, so I really appreciate it. I love my aud and I love how far we've been able to go with this show and really give people a sense of what's going on in the world without overwhelming them with acronyms and scariness. You know, like, we really try and have a conversation with people. So, yeah, 200 is a big deal. So thanks for saying that.
- [03:10]
A
Yeah, no problem.
- [03:11]
B
I really appreciate you joining me because here we are going into the new school year, right? We know that the Department of Education is facing these significant cuts From K through 12 in higher education, and particularly in special education programs. And you wrote a book, From Dropout to Dogs Doctorate. And you talk about your personal experience of navigating poverty and trauma in a system that is structurally designed to work against you and how important education was to pull you out of that. So I would love it if you could just tell us a little bit about your experience in life. But then what made you want to share those experiences and write this book?
- [03:49]
A
Yeah, that's a loaded question.
- [03:52]
B
I know. And just lay it on me. It's a conversation.
- [03:55]
A
Yeah. I was talking to my mother here recently, and she told me about all of the struggles that she had to endure. Single parent, working multiple jobs. This was before online education. And how sometimes she would have to take me to her work outside of her normal job, just to sit in the lobby or even to school as she would drive an hour away to ensure that she kept going to school to continue her education, to give her better access to income, to actually care for my sister and me. And the way that she talks about it, she let me know that we were impoverished for a large portion of the time. You know, there were things in my environment, local to my community that made it really challenging to even dream outside of that environment. I mean, I can still remember the rundown school buildings, the divestment in the neighborhood, the potholes in the street, how crime went up. You know, we grew up in a food desert, and all of these social barriers made it even hard for someone like me who was going into educational setting to even connect with the lesson. You know, I mean, you think about students who show up in school and they didn't eat the night before, and the only time that they ate was. Was the prior day I was in that population, and it made it really challenging for me. I experienced homelessness when I was a teenager. I ran away from home. I dropped out of high school. I literally had no real examples or even men in my life at that point that could sit me down and talk to me about education and the educational journey and how education itself could give me opportunities to overcome a lot of the systemic challenges that I was faced with.
- [05:52]
B
I mean, honestly, like your, your personal story is quite phenomenal. I was reading about you, you know, leading up to this conversation, and you grew up in Atlanta, if I'm correct, and like you said, with a single mother and a sister. And like many single mothers in this country, she was working multiple jobs, right? She was trying to keep food on the table, she was trying to keep a roof over your head. But that makes you end up on an all too familiar path, right? Which is like, then you have access to gangs and, you know, you have homelessness, and you end up dropping out of school because you don't realize that school can be your way out. And no one is putting a lot of investment into the schools, maybe in your community as well. So it's like you don't see that path. And eventually I look at you and you went back to school. You graduated, you enrolled in a Nearby College at 28 years old. You'd earned four degrees, and then you went on to get a PhD in public policy and social change. I mean, you really, truly turned your life around and you did it through education. So I can't even imagine how you did that. And if you want to share that story, please do. I'm sure people can go buy the book and read it as well. But also, like, it must feel personal to you, these cuts that they're putting into the Department of Education.
- [07:05]
A
I get really emotional even thinking about the story. I remember the day that I pushed myself away from the desk in the school building. I was in an alternative school. It was the last step before, you know, I finally said, I'm not going to school anymore. It's called an open campus. I walk outside of the building, I literally push myself away from the desk. My friends follow. You could do this in open campus because it was self paced. And I'm walking out of the front door, three other of my friends are following me. And not even 100 yards away from the school, this guy experiencing homelessness called over to our group. I was the only one to respond. I walk over to this guy, trash hanging from his beard. He was stumbling, seemed like he had been using alcohol to cope with his circumstances. And he looks at me, he says, young man, is that your school back there? And I say, yeah. And he says, whatever you do, don't Stop getting your education. And he looks himself up and down. He says, or one day you'll end up like me. He had no clue that I grew up single parent household, that I've been sleeping in parks, experiencing homelessness as a teen, pushing away from the social conflict that I was having in my home life. No clue that I was carrying emotional trauma stemming from my social environment environment, but also the educational injustice that I was experiencing from teachers labeling me because they did not understand or have the trauma informed knowledge to really connect with me as a student. He had no idea. And he looks at me, Lee, and he says, you're one day going to be a leader. That was the moment, the disruption, the very thing that I needed at that moment in my life because I couldn't hear from all of the noise that really pushed me to go back to school. I talked to my mom. She got me back in school. As a fifth year senior, I opted not to do a GED path only because GEDs was used historically to stigmatize the black community and to make you seem like you're lesser than. My mom worked it out with the school where I could go back to the high school I dropped out of as a fifth year senior. Then I met Ms. West. Ms. West was an educator who taught tenth grade geometry. Her first year, young black woman and I enrolled in her class. I walk in a class and my face is despondent. I had all of this just social angst from coming from impoverishment and dealing with family conflict and the trauma and all of those things. It was hard for me to connect with the lesson, but I was determined. She calls me out one day after class and she says, young man, I don't know, but there's something special about you. You're brilliant and I want you to use my classroom as a sanctuary. Anytime you feel any type of pressure outside of this school that's too overwhelming, I just want you to come in here and sit and sit down. She was practicing a trauma informed approach to education and a trauma informed pedagogy long before we start using those terms. And I did that. And she became a champion of mine. And a large part of why I graduated was because of teachers and educators like Ms. West and my mom's example of going back to school, getting two grad degrees, going on to complete her doctorate in clinical counseling and really investing in me. So it was community. It was all of these strangers who became family who intervened in moments of my life where the outside circumstances seem overwhelming to the point where I could not manage. And that is the message that I'm getting through in this book. You have Department of Education cuts, right? Programs to Title 1. Schools are being cut. What does that mean? That means that the staff will be cut. Reading specialists, after school programs, extra counselors or social workers. The very people that it takes to stand in solidarity with students like I once was to say, hey, there's more to your future than the things that you have to navigate, even when you're dealing with impoverishment.
- [11:27]
B
Yeah. And the thing is, it's the people like Your mother, the Ms. Wests of the world. It's the people who see beyond what the circumstances are to what the children can become. And ultimately we should be investing so deeply in education instead of cutting it. Because if you are even a long term thinker, who would you have been without those opportunities? What would you have contributed to society versus what you can contribute to society now? It's actually a long term plan. If you want to build, you know, more tax base and more people in society doing well, you would want to have an educated base to begin with because you're only going to have a stronger society and if you're a capitalist, a stronger tax base moving forward. Like, I look at a life like yours and I think, you know, obviously you and I grew up in completely different ways. And yet I had a Ms. West in my life too. I was never in danger of dropping out of school. I was given every opportunity, every privilege. But I was bullied relentlessly, like chased. Like today you would be getting those kids arrested. But back in the 80s, it was like they just got bullied. Like that was the way it was. And there was a teacher who saw through it, Ms. Wilson. And she, you know, we came in with me and these three girls that were absolutely tormenting me. And the three of them were like, this is what happened. Total lie. But it was one against three. And Ms. W was like, you're lying. She knew and she stood up for me. And I will literally never forget it. You never forget those teachers, and those are the ones we need to be paying and supporting because they're the ones that look out for children who will then go on to do great things in their life. I look at the current budget proposal for the Department of Education and it's taking $12 billion, eliminating so many K through 12, and higher education programs completely K through 12. Schools this year are going to immediately see fewer staff, like you're saying, fewer enrichment programs, less supplies, less resources. Public colleges and universities are going to have smaller Budgets. They're cutting Pell Grants, which is the main form of financial aid for low income students. The administration is reducing research money for universities that count on it to not only bring in students, but also to solve world problems, solve diseases, you know, solve the problems that we're all going to be dealing with. And they are cutting all the support services for underrepresented represented students, which I'm sure you understand so distinctly what happens to students like that when those resources aren't there for them anymore on a.
- [13:57]
A
Personal level, well, even a practical level. So I serve on a school governance committee for a Title 1 school. I started an organization called Love Beyond Walls. One of our programs is.
- [14:09]
B
And tell people just so they, in case they don't know. What is a Title 1 school?
- [14:15]
A
Yeah, Title 1 school means that there's a higher concentration of impoverished students who either either live, their families, live below or near the poverty line, and they need extra support in the actual school to service this population. And so the school governance board that I sit on has the highest concentration of unhoused students in this one school in the entire public school system. And so our organization is building these resource centers within the context of schools. So like say if you have all of these students who are under resourced, that has tremendous needs and they come from families that way, and you only have one social worker, you spend a lot of your time looking outside of the school for resources. Sometimes those are disadvantaged or cut because of the national funding crisis. And then here it is, you have a student who shows up in school, they're being bullied because their families don't have any washing machines and dryers. They slept in a car the night before. They stayed in a motel with five or six people in one room and only one bed or two beds. And they come to school and they're unable to connect with the lesson. Right. And then you have overcrowded classrooms. You talk about paraprofessionals and teacher supports. Right now we were talking even yesterday when we were having our board meeting about the national funding is actually going to lessen the budget where the support teachers can't be in the actual classrooms helping the teachers actually provide the support where students can increase their grade level performance, their academic performance. And now you have to shift these roles and pull teachers or instructors that are helping teachers and place them in other parts of the building. And how does this impact the student? It impacts the student when they are unable to get the lesson and you need that extra support. It impacts the students when you overwhelm the school with great need and no resources, where the actual staff and the faculty is overwhelmed and they can't meet all the other resources you actually tell. You're indirectly telling students that they don't matter, that their dreams are locked inside of an environment that is created for their impoverishment, for essentially their demise. And when we think about the importance of education, it gives access to careers like steam science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics. And if they don't have a trajectory that will get them into higher education so they can have some of the more polished careers where they can provide for themselves and their families and even contribute back to the community, then we have to ask ourselves, what are we even doing? We need more support, not less support. Students need to be able to dream, not have their dreams diminished because you're cutting funding. And the actual support systems that help them take the stance they need to reach their potential.
- [17:20]
B
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- [20:57]
A
Students need to be able to dream, not have their dreams diminished because you're cutting funding and the actual support systems that help them take the stance they need to reach their potential.
- [21:09]
B
Yeah, and I think it doesn't matter where you come from, what you look like. This is across the board in America. Our public schools are underfunded. Period. The end when we Were trying to get our son into school when he was going into kindergarten. We went over to our local public school and it was so underfunded that they were like, we actually need each parent to donate $20 a month to so we have enough paper to print the tests on. And we were like, wow, what? Like, how is that a real thing? And then they're paying for each child in the seat per day. That's how the state like sets it up, right?
- [21:45]
A
Yes.
- [21:45]
B
Louisiana. USD, which is where we are, was, I think at the time, the 12th worst school district in the nation. They were doing. And this is not so, like, what I'm saying is you don't even have to be like, well, I care about children that didn't have an opportunity. You can tear, but just bring it right back to yourself. Care about your own children, your own grandchildren. Public school education in America needs to be funded. That's where the money needs to be going. So we build an entire society of children who not only have to work in the next phase of this world with AI and with computers, who are ready for this world, but also who are out of the box thinkers. This whole concept, we don't even know what the problems of the future are going to be, but we know they're going to be there. And we need these children to be absolutely prepared for it. I mean, I was listening to you say that education is no longer a talking point, it's a battleground. Right? And so I'm saying, like, I think this battleground is not just in places where there's Title 1 schools, but right across the country in general, that every parent in America should be outraged about these cuts to the cost of public education because these money and services that go to K through 12 schools, that go to colleges, especially colleges in urban and rural communities, are at major risk here. And like, what happens if we're not even educating our children, not even properly educating our children, where we have one guidance counselor for 600 kids, but just not educating them at all. And as these policies with this government get worse, higher education itself has only become more fragile, especially for black students, for those from communities where poverty is concentrated and the opportunities are limited. I mean, it must feel quite overwhelming when you're in this world and you want to make a difference, to watch what's happening from on high. Because even with the their new budget, this government is not only cutting education funding, they're cutting snap, they're cutting Meals on Wheels, they're cutting programs for the poor, health care for the very poorest. Americans. And that's only gonna compound how people like your mother get their children to school, how people like your mother pay to get food on the table. And we need to think about that.
- [23:46]
A
Yeah. As a matter of fact, it should be so disturbing that a child is showing up in a classroom and can't connect with a lesson because they're hungry. Yes, it should be disturbing that an educator has an overwhelming amount of. Of children and not enough resources to actually educate the next future. You brought up AI Lee, and I'm very much afraid of the future of students who are living in environments both urban and rural, that have greater exposure to poverty. And here's why. AI is going to replace jobs, right? Some of the jobs that people acquire, whether it's driving a bus or being someone who is standing behind a cashier register, we see right now technology taking over and the workforce being reduced to the point where jobs are going to impact the ability to just care for yourself, to be able to work and make a sustainable living where you can provide for yourself and your family and contribute back to community. And I believe that this is going to increase homelessness across the country, you know, because one of the leading causes of homelessness is actually job loss and having less income than you need to actually provide for yourself and having an enormous, you know, budget where you can't even, you know, access, I would call it accessible housing, not just affordable housing, because people right now can't even afford affordable housing because of the. The rising costs. And so I'm really nervous, you know, when you think about the student who may be the future doctor, maybe the future lawyer, may be the future principal, maybe the future inventor that creates the next cure for a disease that we've been wrestling with for decades. And they are halted. They're running up against barriers because there's not enough support while they are a child. How, how. How dare we not be disturbed or moved to the point where we say enough is enough and we need to create more resources for them. I normally tell people when I show up on podcasts like this, or I'm able to speak before crowds or write books. I travel a long way to get here. And I'm not talking about by car or by plane. I'm talking about the barriers, the resilience, the homelessness, the days I didn't have anything to eat, watching my mom struggle to overcome impoverishment. You know, showing up in classroom, not being able to connect with the lesson because I have all of this emotional weight on me and not feeling like I was good enough until one day somebody said, I'm going to step in and invest in this student and this child in a way where they're able to see this potential. But it shouldn't stop with a story like mine. It should be across the board. We should be outraged and showing up in our school systems to look for the future leaders, the future doctors, and saying, what can I do to ensure that that student's future is bright?
- [26:57]
B
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's why people say, like, racism affects everyone. Sexism affects everyone. Poverty affects everyone. Because it's like, how many diseases didn't we cure? How many, you know, inventions didn't we get because we didn't find or allow those people that would have become those people to succeed? I think about, you know, the story from those beautiful women in the. They made the movie about it at NASA, who were the ones that solved the math equation on their own. And they were black women put in a separate room in a separate, you know, know, whole wing. And they were the ones that got those astronauts home. Right? Without those hidden figures, which is what that movie's called, what would have happened? Right? Like, we have. We have lost so many cures and inventions to not allowing those children to become the adults they should have become. You know, it hurts everyone. Like, the reason we don't have universal health care in this nation is because we were racist, right? Like, we were like, well, I don't want the black people to get health care, so I'll just not take it myself. Like, it was just horrendous. We hurt ourselves with our racism, right? Like, it's just terrible how much it goes back to it. And you're talking about homelessness and how this is going to make more homeless people. And of course it will. Right? Of course it will. And I think about this recent crackdown of the homeless in D.C. right, and the homeless encampments where the Trump administration is now promising to roll this action out to other major cities. And I think, like, are you kidding me? I'm watching these people. Cheers for the most disenfranchised in our society losing what's left of their possessions. This is all they have left. And they're just flattening homeless encampments with, like, you know, bulldozers. Yeah, with bulldozers. And throwing it all in. In dumpsters. And I'm like, that doesn't solve homelessness. That doesn't solve homelessness. It just hurts the homeless people.
- [28:48]
A
Don't even think about it, Right? Everything you own and possess is in a Tent. Right. Your birth certificate, driver's license, maybe your vital records or documents. And when it's trashed, you know how hard it is to recover ID when you don't have ID or an address to actually prove that you are who you say you are? I mean, even in the work that we do, we've had to work with attorneys to solicit birth records and write documents and actually do research and how to validate someone's existence. When you don't have access to an id, you can't get a job, you open a bank account, you can't get access to housing, you can't get some of the essentials that you actually need to be stabilized. And then we need to push back against the idea that to be poor and unhoused is to be criminal. Right. They're trying to interlock the two. Right. We are talking about the humanity of people. I like to say that homelessness is one of the only justice issues in our. In our world where you can be labeled for what you don't have and then punished for trying to survive it. And we need to reframe the narrative of how we think about our neighborhood neighbors without an address. If we're really pushing this ethic of love, as Dr. Martin Luther King says, this world House, we have to start seeing the world as an our address. We have to start thinking about the interconnectedness and the interrelatedness of all of us that what I do for you, I'm also doing for myself for the betterment of humanity. Right. Our unhoused neighbors are just as human, just as dignified, just as worthy as anybody else. And research actually shows, coming out of John Hopson Children's Hospital, that people who commit the most crimes aren't people without an address. They're actually people who are housed. And so we just need to reframe that narrative. And we need to push back against the cuts with Housing first policies, because that's even connected to students and youth. One of the largest groups of people who are unhoused are actually children and youth, not adults. And we have to reframe this narrative. And children and students never ask to be unhoused. Right. This is just a circumstance they have to walk through.
- [30:59]
B
And if you actually want to solve homelessness, you have to deal with the root cause of why people are homeless, which is everything from the high cost of living to the low minimum wage to the extraordinary cost of health care. If you have children and then you have health care, like you're going to go insane. Social Services are being cut. The lack of affordable housing, as you said, the lack of access to housing. And then of course, education. Right. That brings us back to education. It's the opportunity that education offers people to be upwardly mobile and like, like we're not solving any of the root causes and then we're punishing the people that are suffering because we made it impossible for them to function in this society. You've probably heard about our next sponsor, irestore on TV. It's an @ home hair regrowth system, clinically proven to help regrow hair using 300 lasers and 200 LEDs that send light therapy directly into your scalp from the comfort of your own home. So if you have thinning hair and you would rather have healthier, fuller hair, Irestore Elite is for you. I got one for my husband. Sean is in his late 40s and he's in great shape, but he is conscious that his hairline is creeping back and he does not like it. So now he's just popping the eye restore on while we're watching a movie or while he's working and allowing science to do its thing. And this is science. The Irestore is the most advanced hair regrowth technologies technology because it's equipped with trademark Vixo lasers that feature wider beams of red light so they cover more scalp and surface area which increases follicle stimulation for better and more consistent results. In a four month double blind clinical study performed by a board certified dermatologist and laser surgeon, nearly every participant saw an increase in hair growth with Irestore laser and LED technology. And they stand by what they can do, which is why irestore offers a 12 month money back guarantee so you can try it completely risk free. If your hair doesn't make a glorious return, they will give you a full refund. No awkward questions, just fuller, healthier hair or your money back. So get yourself the gift of hair confidence for a limited time only. Our listeners are getting a huge discount on their Irestore elite when you use the code politicsgirl@irestore.com head over to the letter irestore.com and use the code politicsgirl for our show's exclusive discount on the Irestore Elite. And if they ask, please support the show and tell them that we sent you. I'm telling you I understand that hair loss is incredibly frustrating, but now there is something you can do with Irestore. So I traveled a lot this summer and one of the things that's hard when you change beds or locations or time zones is sleeping. Which is one of the reasons that I am such a devoted fan of Calm. Calm is the number one app for sleep and meditation that gives you the power to calm your mind and change your life. And it really does change your life because I've become completely Pavlovian when it comes to their sleep stories. Over time, I have picked the ones that I like the best. It is the train stories, the Taurus Express, the Glacier Express, and as soon as I hear the narrator's voice voice, it is an almost immediate reaction for me to go right to sleep. I am also a big fan of Calm for naps. The app has a number of terrific meditations that allow you to take the perfect amount of time for a nap, which is about 28 minutes and it wakes you up with birdsong. So if you're feeling overwhelmed in the middle of the day, you can take a quick less than half hour nap and be back and ready to go. It works so well. I don't even have to set an alarm. Those birds are just chirp, chirp, chirp and I am back, back, Back to school can feel like a good time to reset. So why not make calm one of the resets you add to your life to make it better for the rest of the year? As I said, I use the sleep stories the most, but they also have sleep meditations, calming music, white noise, green noise, brown noise, guided meditations, expert led talks on different topics, and grounding exercises to help you relax when you're feeling overwhelmed. There is a reason calm has over 2 million 5 star reviews and it's because they help you stress less, sleep more and live better. Calm now has an exclusive offer just for listeners of our show. You can get 40% off a Calm Premium subscription at calm.com politicsgirl that's C A L M.com politicsgirl and I'm going to tell you, as someone that's been paying for this app for well over seven years, that is an amazing value. So go to Calm Politicsgirl for 40% off unlimited access to Calm's entire library. Com.com politicsgirl and tell. Com that you heard about them from me. We're not solving any of the root causes and then we're punishing the people that are are suffering because we made it impossible for them to function in this society.
- [35:45]
A
Yeah, how do you create punitive measures for people who don't have access? Right. Dr. Gowen in her book Hobos, Hustlers and Backsliders, she has a chart these socially constructed ideas of how we see poverty, Right. These narratives, sin talk, sick talk, and system talk. The sin talk category has to do with how we think maybe they're poor because they don't have any morals or character issues. And then how we solve it is through punishment or the sick talk. Right. We talk about maybe they're addicted to substance or they have some type of mental health challenge. And she says, normally when we talk in these terms and we pathologize people, we don't actually provide the actual resources people need. And so sometimes people who have access to housing, have access to mental health support, have access to these things are actually stigmatizing and pushing people away that don't even have access to the resources that they enjoy themselves. But we never talk about the systemic issues which you raise. Right. The lack of access to accessible housing. When you get placed on a list, right. For housing, sometimes you have to wait two years because it's a small amount of housing available to a large population of people who. Who don't have access to housing, healthier access to healthcare. Right. I think about our organization, how we working with people who are living on the streets with disabilities, veterans who serve this country who are having hard times, even accessing the very supports and benefits that they need to get back on their feet. And so we have to ask ourselves, how are we really treating people? The way that we treat people shows a lot about what's in the heart and the soul of our policy and the ways in which we are showing up in society. That's what I think.
- [37:43]
B
Yeah. No, that's exactly it. We have to ask ourselves how we are treating people. I think that's so essential. I mean, look, you were a former high school dropout, then you were sort of in gang world, then you got yourself a great education. You became a doctor, a pastor, a community activist. I should tell people that it was 2013 when you and your wife Cecilia founded Love Beyond Walls as a way, I'm assuming, to give back and help other people who face the same sort of circumstances you had faced. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that organization? Because you just mentioned it now and why you believe that people need it and why felt the need to start it.
- [38:20]
A
Yeah, I'll never forget. I was walking down the street. I was headed to a conference, which to be able to read and think and go to conferences is a. As a privilege. And I was in a group, and we were walking past a person who was unhoused, and the whole group started saying all of these derogatory Names, let's walk across the street. I mean, I was shocked. I could not believe that I was around people who would spewing this type of hatred, right? And they didn't even know that I had experienced it myself. And at that point, I was like, we need to reframe and change the narrative of homelessness. And so out of that passion, both lived experience and education, I decided with my wife, we started asking the question, how can we support our neighbors without an address? I actually started Love Beyond Walls. I launched the very first campaign. My family dropped me off underneath the bridge, and I lived on the streets long before it was a formal organization to live amongst those who were unhoused. I was put out of shelters. I slept in the cold. I had the unhoused community and my friends rallying together to get me a tent, a blanket, all of those things. I went through all of those experiences because I wanted to be daring enough to walk in the shoes of those who suffer with this every single day, even though I had my own experiences so I can better articulate it from there. We started reuniting people with their family members to get them off the streets, getting people access to identification cars. We created programs where we have grooming and support services. I mean, think about showing up to a job interview and you haven't had access to a shower or you don't have the proper clothes on. Becoming a conduit and a resource. We start retrofitting RV units to temporarily house the unhoused community where we can walk with them out of homelessness. And then volunteers started coming from everywhere offering services and support. I had one volunteer who would show up and just donate one hour a week because she had a knack for research. And she helped a guy named Ronald actually reunite with his family that he had been out of touch with for 30 years. 30 years. We launched the first museum in the United States called the Dignity Museum that represents the subject of homelessness out of a shipping container, educating people about the stories of those who have the courage to wake up every single day and suffer through what it means to be poor and unhoused in this country. And we build empathy. We show people what it means to be proximate to their neighbors. We've built showers and Love Sinks In, a campaign that went viral during COVID We were the organization placing hand washing stations in the street. We love to just show up and crowd love. Love this community with support. Because one of the greatest things you go through when you are living in isolation and you're unhoused and people are turning their head, locking their doors, or not even acknowledging your very existence is isolation. And we say, how can we love beyond the walls? Right? All of the walls that seek to divide us in a way where we remind people who are so worthy, who are beloved, that they matter.
- [41:39]
B
Yeah, they matter. You know, anyone who's born without privilege struggles in our society. And the world is clearly very unjust. And it only seems to get more so every day. Poverty affects every single part of your life. And instead of helping, our government seems to be abandoning these people. And I think that is why people like you and people like me talk so much about community these days. Like what you and your wife have created, this power of community to make a difference, to hold people up in our society. I mean, I was looking at your old, you know, other books that you've written, and one of them is called I see you How Love opens our Eyes to Invisible People. And I thought the concept of invisible people is exactly right. And then, of course, you wrote when we the power of Seeking justice Together. And I feel like it's all about community and seeing each other as one another rather than as difference between. And when I think about you and I think, like, well, what would you like to see in the world? Like, what if people like you were in charge of government? Would you be doing so? We could seek justice together so we can stand up for the invisible people. So we can all be seen in this society, because only working together can we make it better. We can see what happens when we allow a handful of people to have all the power and it doesn't serve any of us.
- [42:58]
A
Yeah. I was asked recently if I had five minutes to address the entire world, what would I say? Which is a very huge question. I would talk about compassion. I would talk about compassion in a way that would lift and elevate the stories of the student who shows up without the meal, the person who is unhoused, who is put out of a restaurant for asking to use the restroom. I would talk about compassion in a way that has the tangible, actionable items embedded in it that suggests that when we show people love and compassion, we're actually providing and meeting their. Their basic needs. I mean, Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You can't. You can't even think if you don't have anywhere to live, you don't have anything to eat, you don't have the types of relationships that you. You would need. So I would talk about compassion. I definitely would use a stakeholder approach to decision making. Have you ever noticed that when people in power are actually making decisions, they're not actually proximate to the very people who are being harmed by public policy? What about the EMTs that services those who are unhoused? What about the educators who spends 40, 60 hours a week in the classroom with students who are struggling? What about the after school program workers who are being proximate to families that are in need? What about the business owners who are equitable in how they pay living wages? Right? We need to bring everybody to the table because sometimes when we leave out voices and making decisions, we also leave out the communities that are being targeted by public policy. And so compassion, we need compassion in the way that we see each other. We need compassion in the way that we design policy. Because sometimes public policy lacks empathy, right? We need compassion in the way that we talk about people. We need compassion in the way that we equitably meet every person's need so everybody has an accessible chance to flourishing, right? Housing should be a human right. Public sanitation and hygiene should be a human right. Access to food and livable wages should be a human right. And so when we strip people of the opportunity to actually flourish, we're not showing compassion. And we need more compassion in the world. And that's just how I would show.
- [45:26]
B
Yeah, that's a pretty good five minute speech you would give the world there. I kind of love it. But I also think like, it serves everyone. Be selfish. That serves everyone. It serves everyone to have everyone housed and fed and have water and have, you know, access to a job. It serves everyone. Our communities are safer. People are better. I think it's why we got so confused during the wonderful. I think it was wonderful when the BLM protest came up because it had a real point. But I think one of the things that got skewed during that time was this concept of defund the police. Because people were like, oh, you don't want law enforcement? I was like, no. What they're trying to say, and it was unfortunately marketed badly, was that we need to fund the other things that can help. If someone's having a mental health issue, don't send cops with guns. Send people that know how to deal with that mental health issue. Fund those people. If someone is having trouble and they're living in their car with their children, don't send the cops, you know, send a social worker that can help them get on their feet, a caseworker. Like, it's not about not funding law enforcement when law enforcement is needed. It's about Sending the right people that can actually solve the problem. I once watched in the streets of New York a man having just a terrible. He was clearly having a terrible drug trip. He was literally like his skin. You could tell he was just losing it. And they had sent nine or 10 firemen and they were all standing around because they didn't know what to do. And the whole scene was very scary because the man was clearly struggling. But the firemen were not prepared to do this thing. And it's about funding the right people to help us move forward and making sure people aren't missing their basic needs. Only serves the community as a whole. Hank Green, who's an author and he had a quote saying like, I don't have any children, but I love to pay into taxes that go to education because I don't want to live in a society, society with stupid people, right? Like it actually serves everyone to educate our public to keep them off the streets, to keep them fed, to keep them housed. Like when we were talking about universal basic income a long time ago, it was like, people don't not want to work, they don't want to sit around all day. They actually want a life of purpose. But we've made a society that's so damn expensive, people can't. Can't do the most basic things. We used to say with housing. I live in a two bedroom house. We should have moved out of this house. House years ago. But we couldn't afford the next jump, right? The next step up. So we stayed still. So that meant that the next family coming along couldn't take our house, right? And then the family that was living in a one bedroom apartment, they don't move out. So then the people that should be going in there and then the studio apartment, they don't move out. And then that's how you end up homeless. Because the person that should just have a studio apartment can't afford it anymore because no one's moving along because everything has become too expensive. So it serves our community truly to take care of everyone. This idea that I just need to take care of myself has actually not served us in any way. I just, I. Your story to me is so personal and so honestly universal in many ways. Because I'm sure you'd be the first to say that you're not the only person who lived like this. I'm currently reading the most amazing book. It's called My Friends and it's a book called a fictional book by Frederick Backman. And it's about four kids who really have major troubles at home. And they, you know, one child's being beaten, one child doesn't get enough to eat, and they form a friendship. And it's sort of a reflection back from the one last friend about his life as a child and all the opportunities they didn't get. And the one person who saw one of them as someone that was worthy, the Miss west of the group in your life, who was a janitor, who saw this one kid as the artist he was. And it's an amazing story about what happens when we have these invisible people who fall through the cracks and we don't see them, and how essential it is that we take care of those people. Not just to serve those people, but to serve society as a whole.
- [49:22]
A
To serve society as a whole. Isn't that the message? Yeah, that is the message.
- [49:29]
B
Yeah. It really is.
- [49:31]
A
Wow.
- [49:32]
B
Honestly, I want to thank you so much for joining us today, Terrence. Please tell people, first of all, the best way to buy your book, but also to help you and Cecilia with your amazing organization as well. Please tell us how we can support you, follow you, and help you with your work.
- [49:46]
A
Leah, I really appreciate you. It is very humbling to hear that you're impacted by my story, but my wife and I, Cecilia, we're working through Lobby on walls to ensure that there are resource centers in Title 1 schools. We've already launched two. We just started a little earlier this year, and we already have seven schools lined up.
- [50:07]
B
Up.
- [50:08]
A
That's how much need. Right. If you want to support us as we are supporting students who may be unhoused, you can go to lovebeyondwalls.org click Zion's Closet, that's what we call it. And help us build this. This type of support so this. The educational futures of students can be supported. So we can support educators and principals and social workers doing very important work every single day. I have a book coming out. We talked a little bit about it. It's called From Dropout to Doctorate. How Breaking the Chains of Educational Injustice can actually Change the World. Right. And if you want to support that book, wherever you buy books, please pick it up. You know, it's part my story, but it's also part a call to what you can actually do to make a difference in the lives of students who may be struggling.
- [50:58]
B
Yeah. And that will only end up serving all of us in the end.
- [51:02]
A
Yes.
- [51:03]
B
Yes. Thank you so much for coming today, Terrence, and thank you for having the courage to move through your life without giving up. I think that we really have to honor the people that did that. Because you go on to help so many other people. And I'm. I'm so grateful that you're here. I'm so grateful for the work that you're doing. And I'm so grateful to your mother for working as hard as she did to make sure you got to where you needed to be.
- [51:26]
A
Yeah, I never gave up.
- [51:28]
B
That's the key. Thank you so much, Terrence.
- [51:32]
A
Thank you.
- [51:34]
B
So that was Dr. Terence Lester reminding us that when we leave certain voices out of the discussion, we leave out the very people who could have the solution because they truly understood the problem. That compassion is everything that we need to understand. That funding education, supporting those who are struggling or dealing with homelessness is not just about doing the right thing for those in crisis, but about doing the right thing for society as a whole. That citizens who are safe and fed and housed only make a stronger, safer world for all of us. That students who are seen and educated only make a richer, more capable, successful society. That we must reframe the narratives of who deserves to thrive in this country so that it includes everyone. It is the isolation and lack of opportunity that lead to crime and disease. And we don't want that for anyone. I want to thank Terrance for joining us today and you for caring enough about this country to be here. Now go buy his book. From Dropout to Doctorate, or check out lovebeyondwalls.org and help him help others through Zion's Closet. We can no longer count on our government to look out for us, so it is going to come down to us looking out for each other. I, for one, am on board to do that until next week. Pt. Before you go, if you like what we do here on the Politics Girl podcast, if you feel the efforts we're making here are worthwhile, then please consider being a patron of our work. If you're already a premium member of this podcast, thank you so much for your support. And if you're not a member, you can join us by signing up in the bio of this episode. But also@practicsgirl.com you will receive this podcast ad free, delivered directly to your inbox along with my kitchen rants. Mainstream news lets you down every day. They are not giving you the truth. They're not having these kinds of conversations. They're only giving you some version of billionaire backed propaganda at this point. So if you want real knowledge and education and facts that are essential, then support those of us out here still bringing them to you, please click the link in the bio of this episode or on our website to sign up. And as always, please like and share this podcast so we can grow our audience, because the more people who have access to this kind of information, the better. As always, thank you so much for your time and support. The Politics Girl podcast is written and performed by me, Lee McGowan and produced and edited by Happy Warrior Entertainment. All rights reserved.