total time: 23.47 minutes
total words: 1244
[Danielle Balocca]: The following interview is with Melanie Perkins McLaughlin. Information for this introduction was taken from Melanie's campaign website and will be linked in the show notes for further reading. Melanie is the proud parent of three children, one current MPS student and two graduates and current college students. Melanie grew up in Lawrence, Massachusetts, spending time in the foster care system from ages 13 to 18. going on to graduate cum laude from Fitchburg State College with a dual bachelor's degree in communication media and human services and a minor in business administration. Professionally, Melanie is a documentary filmmaker who believes in the power of stories to connect people. She has received awards and recognition for her work in advocating for children. Melanie was the co-chair of the Medford Special Education Parent Advisory Council. and has received awards from the Association of Special Educators and the Alan C. Crocker Award from the Massachusetts Down Syndrome Congress for her child advocacy work. During her first term on the school committee, Melanie helped to establish and sustain the Universal Safety Committee, which meets monthly with the goal of improving safety in the schools. She has also focused on the strategic plan, family and community engagement, professional development, and equity, diversity, and inclusion. Hi, Melanie. Thanks so much for joining me today. Yeah. I've been starting out all my interviews kind of asking folks about what their favorite place to eat is in Medford and what they like to order there.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Sure. Well, our family gets a lot of takeout. So I would say, you know, on Friday nights, we always have pizza night. So we get pizza and Amici's and Mario and his staff have been so inclusive and welcoming of all of my children and especially Gracie. They gave her a shirt over Christmas that said, Peace, Love, Amici's, which I just love. And then also we walk down to the Magnificent Muffin when it's nice weather and unfortunately I'm far too fond of their pistachio muffins.
[Danielle Balocca]: Great, thank you. So I know we're getting down to the wire before the election and so I'm struck by sort of how busy people are and all the events they've been attending. And I've just sort of been asking people to sort of summarize kind of how, what led you here, kind of what was your path to getting involved in local government?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Sure. So I have three children, all of whom have gone through the Medford Public Schools, one of whom is still in Medford Public Schools. And our third child was born with a congenital heart defect and an intellectual and developmental disability. And we learned right from the start that we were going to have to advocate for her just from the moment she was born, even before she was born, based on bias that people had about who she was before she even existed. And I had had two children who were typical in the school. the schools and you know one was an advanced placement student in the high schools and another was the captain of the soccer team and I had just seen them at five different schools within our district and the experience that they had and their experiences were both individual as well like our children are all individuals and so we have individual experience but with Gracie it was different it was I I saw inequity in our K-12 system, in our pre-K-12 system. And as a mom who's privileged and middle class, I hadn't experienced that as much as an adult. I did as a child. As a child, I was a ward of the state and a foster child, and I didn't have anybody to advocate for me, really. And I was a product of Lawrence Public Schools, which has been in receivership for over 10 years now. So I think that gives some people an indication of what the school system's were like in some of these urban cities, but for me it reminded me of the inequity that I saw as a child and I learned that a lot of children know knew that a lot of children don't have something called social capital and I am very much about social justice and about ensuring that every child has the opportunity to access a high quality public education and has every opportunity in life. And I thought, how can I apply all that I've been given in my life to advocating for other children, not just my own daughter? And I decided after eight years of being the co-chair of the Special Ed Parent Advisory Council and working with the district to help them communicate with families and with families to help them communicate with the district, that it was time for me to kick it up a notch and run for school committee so that we could partner at a number of different levels systemically to change outcomes. Because systems change is hard. It's hard work and it's long work. It's not something that happens overnight.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, I hear that. And I know you've had a challenge over the last two years with COVID and all the work you've all done to make everyone ready to go back to school. And in that, I've heard of other work that you all have been doing and change that's begun. And I wonder sort of in a next term, what your priorities would be for continued change.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah, I mean, I think that none of us expected, obviously, that we were going to have a global pandemic during our first term. But I'm also really pleased with the things that we were able to accomplish, given that we had a global pandemic. I mean, I think being able to restructure an entire school system under these conditions was quite incredible. There were a lot of nights where I know I lost sleep, and I'm sure my colleagues lost sleep over the safety of our children. you know, we could do to protect them and our staff. So that was always first and foremost. And we also were able to move forward issues around equity and inclusion and diversity. So we created an inclusive school calendar. I did presentations on professional development around human rights and civil rights. especially pertaining to disability awareness. We were able to get lunches for our children and food, universal food services over the time, volunteered in food markets and micro pantries. So there was a lot that we were able to get done, surprisingly, during a global pandemic. which makes me even more excited to think about what we can accomplish in the next term, hopefully with the global pandemic waning. But I think that we need to be prepared for these sorts of situations. So one of the things I'm actively involved in is the Universal Safety Committee. So we really look at how we keep our schools safe for all children. We're really looking at one of my jobs and one of my roles in school committee is to always bring that underserved population to the table to really be able to say, well, how are we serving these outliers, right? Having personally experienced food insecurity and having lived in a homeless shelter myself and having had all those experiences and bringing those to the table, personal experience and lived experience is important and as important as professional experience. And I think I bring both of those elements to the table with a master's degree in education policy from Harvard and my experience growing up as a ward of the state and as a foster kid living in a housing development, public housing. So my goal is really to change hearts and minds, which is long, like I said, slow work. And so how do you, how do we do that? I think we continue to work it at every angle. So, you know, symbolically, you know, policy wise, leadership wise, and so always bringing it up, always having it, you know, giving voice to it, but also having some really strong strategies around what I want to move forward. I really want to focus on the social, emotional, and behavioral mental health needs of our children. I have a subcommittee on the school committee that I am the chair of for those purposes. We're currently identifying with the community what our goals are for the year. I'm very goal-oriented and data-oriented. I want to have a goal, and at the end of the year, I want to be able to assess how we work towards that goal. Did we achieve it? Do we have more work to do? I think that's really important. We all are in agreement that we have got to do something about the high school and the crumbling infrastructure there and what's happening with that building and with that school as a whole. But at the same time, I think it's really important for us to celebrate and appreciate the diversity that our students bring to our community. We have something like over 300 different languages at our high school and our vocational school. And I don't want to forget our Carter's Tough School, our alternative high school. So our students and our families bring so much to the table and I want to be able to recognize and celebrate the diversity that is this community because our students are getting a world education. Every single day they go into the classroom and they're with their peers in the classroom, and that's invaluable. So I think that's really important to celebrate diversity, really focus on meaningful inclusion. What does that look like? What's best practices in meaningful inclusion? What does inclusion even mean to people? because I think everybody has a different definition, so defining that, really looking at accessibility, both through the ADA, which is a law, the Americans with Disabilities Act, but beyond that. What is accessibility from a hearts and minds perspective? And then equity, and not in any particular order, obviously. But equity, I think we really need to think about what equity is. And equity is not that everybody gets the same. Equity is that we all get what we need. And so looking at and assessing our district as a whole and Who needs what, and how do we give people and students what they need? So these are big buckets that are really hard to work on. But I also think people need to remember that school committee is a team, just like a sports team or a corporate team or anything like that. And you want to build your team with certain strengths, right? Not everybody can be a catcher. Not everybody can be a pitcher or any of those other. I'm kind of sports illiterate, so I don't want to go too far down that road. But you know, you get the idea that we all have to bring our strengths and the strength that I bring to the table is social emotional awareness for our kids and lived experience.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, and I hear kind of the, my next question was about equity, I guess I'm wondering, I hear your sort of lens, maybe being primarily around likeability and disability. And so I wonder, like, when you talk about things that we need to do in terms of equity, what you think that means, or what that would look like it sort of in the next term, how you would how you think about Medford becoming more equitable?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Right. So equity is not obviously just about disability. And I don't want to give people the impression, you know, that because I have that direct experience, um, in my own family, that that's what I think it's all about. Of course, that's not what it's all about. Equity is about, like I said, everybody gets what they need and, um, not everybody gets the same, but I look at it with a lens of, you know, from, um, racism, sexism, ageism, ableism, All the isms, right? And how do we actually address this? And what do they actually mean? And so for me, I think one of the most important things we need to do both in our schools and in our community is have representatives of color, so teachers of color, you know, BIPOC community to be really involved, both of color and running for office. I think it's a really big ask for me in my position to assume that other people will want to run, especially given the political climate that we have today. But I am an ally, and I want to continue my allyship with the BIPOC community to ask them what's important to them, what do they need, and how do I continue to have that conversation. So going into the community, first and foremost, and hearing from community members and listening to community members. in those settings, really promoting and ensuring diversity in our workforce. So when we're hiring people to really be holding, you know, maybe people don't understand the role of school committee, but the role of school committee is to create policy. to approve a budget and to evaluate the superintendent. And so really being able to look at our policy around diversity and inclusion and what that looks like and hiring and really to be able to hold the superintendent accountable in her evaluation. What is your data around really diversifying our workforce and what that looks like, but also from a city perspective. And again, this is no one person's job. This is all of our jobs, but what we have to pay attention to is who's not at the table, right? And so that's one of the things that I'm really trying to work on. And I also am always learning and I have a growth mindset, which means I'm always learning. And I have to be willing to learn and I also have to be willing to be humble to step up and step back and to admit when I make mistakes. And so I'm trying to be in that humble learning phase of how do we really diversify our city and celebrate our diversity in our city and appreciate all that that brings to the table. I guess that's a long answer to the question, but I would say with a lot of help from community members.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, thank you for that answer. I think you've mentioned sort of some of the things that have been in the works in your first term. I'm wondering if there's anything that you're currently doing that you haven't mentioned that you want to amplify or talk about how the community could become involved.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah, well, I mean, I think there's some things that happen systemically that people just aren't aware of, right? Like these really basic, frankly, injustices that I think people don't know about or are aware of. And it was brought to my attention this summer that school districts charge students and families for credit recovery. So in other words, for remediation over the summer when students are at risk of failing. And I was shocked by that. And I guess, especially as, like I said, a child of the Lawrence Public Schools who, frankly, experienced neglect by my own mom, who would never have been able to either pay for summer remediation programming for me or been able to really advocate for me, I was stunned by the fact that we are charging our students, most of whom are students who are most underrepresented and most vulnerable, we are charging them for credit recovery at the risk of them not passing. into the next grade, which, you know, we talk a lot about a school-to-prison pipeline, or I don't know if the community's heard of or thought of a school-to-prison pipeline, but, you know, if you can't pay for summer services because you didn't, you know, necessarily weren't able to learn over the school year for any number of reasons, could be a million different reasons, could be because you have a learning difference, it could be because you were suffering at home, it could be because you were ill, it could be a million different reasons, who knows, but You know, if you are required to then pay for courses over the summer in a public school setting so that you can then progress to the next year, yet you're not able to pay, what do we think is going to happen to those students? Most of them are probably going to drop out. They're not going to stay and be embarrassed by being retained for the most part and have additional struggles over what they've already experienced. And then, you know, what happens when you drop out? What is your likelihood of getting a good job? All of those things. So, you know, and then maybe there's, you know, there's, you know, easier, faster money in crime. And so it creates this whole school-to-prison pipeline. And I just was stunned by that. And then I was even stunned more to find that this was a common practice among a number of districts. And so, from my perspective, Fully intend to eliminate that and I know that as one member we can't do anything alone so I really hope my colleagues will work with me around the inequity of that and what that really is and as I started to dig into the data with our administration I knew what the data was going to say, but I needed proof of that to show me, well, who are these students? Are they our black and brown and minority students and disabled students and students who are economically disadvantaged? Or are they our students who have supports at home? And not that it's not a false equivalence. I didn't mean to have a false equivalence. But are they our sort of students who are not those things? And lo and behold, the data showed that, in fact, it was our students who were more vulnerable and our students who were more underrepresented that were actually being charged $250 a course for credit remediation over the summer.
[Danielle Balocca]: That's something I did not know. And one of the, I think the terms I've been hearing a lot in is like modernizing. And that's something that like Jenny Graham mentioned and sort of the approach to the last term was like modernizing these policies. And I think you're bringing up a great point of how some of these policies that who knows how long ago they were created and became common practice. Like what were they reinforcing about equity or race or socioeconomic status?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: 100% and I think that and the other piece of that is that you know member Graham and member Rousseau and I are all on the policy Subcommittee and you know the pilot the way subcommittees work is that you evaluate policy and then you bring it to the bigger committee And we vote on it as a bigger committee, but the reality is is that look at also the makeup of our committee We are all white middle class or upper middle class Community members, you know, so what's really important, you know, I think in those subcommittees as well as to how are we reaching out to again those voices that you know those individuals who are not typically at the table and how and so that's another thing I really want to work on is what are best practices in engaging a more underrepresented families and I don't have those answers yet but I'm going to be working on that to really work within our community to find what those are and I'm also taking a course on family and community engagement and teaching professional development on family and community engagement to some staff members at the Federation for Children with Special Needs. And I requested and got a partnership with DESE last year for a family and community engagement audit of our school district. And so we'll be presenting on that soon. And, you know, we need to be partners in the work with family and community members. And Again, especially our underrepresented community members because we don't know what their real life situations are and I think all the time about That little girl who was me, you know in Lawrence Public Schools who? People couldn't see that I was so hungry that I couldn't concentrate on my schoolwork because I had a terrible headache You don't see that those are invisible things. And so how are we? working preventatively to be able to address these things. And how are we diversifying our school committee as well? So when getting back to the diversity question, how can we diversify our school committee and get more people to run who are from some of those underrepresented communities? And I'll continue to work on that as well.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, that's great. Thank you for those thoughtful answers.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah, let me take a sip of coffee, excuse me.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, please. And so I think it's been apparent in how you've talked about, you know, these answers so far, but I'm curious kind of if there's something that you would share that you sort of appreciate most about Medford and the community here.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Well, what I appreciate most about Medford is, I think, the engagement of the community and the compassion of people who truly care about making our community a better place. I think this is such a uniquely diverse community. And we're an urban community that has a suburban feel to it in some ways. So it's this sort of like interesting mix. But I love Medford probably for a lot of the reasons that I love Lawrence is that I feel like we're a scrappy community of fighters who work hard to make sure that we're improving our lives and the lives of others.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you. Yeah. Um, so the next set of questions are supposed to be a little like on the fun side, actually one that you suggested for me, which I really appreciate. Um, so if you could share something about you that might surprise us.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah. Something about me that might surprise people. Um, I guess maybe people would be surprised to know that I'm afraid of heights and bridges. Um, I had, you know, I grew up again, like I said, in Lawrence and there's an open air bridge in Lawrence. We call it the duck bridge. I don't, I don't know what the, the real name was of it, but it's a, I just drove over it not long ago and it has not changed in the 40 plus years since I've lived in Lawrence. And it is literally a disaster waiting to happen. It is like this open air bridge across the Merrimack River where there's these huge child size slots that open to the river, rushing river below you that you can fall in. And they have these two by fours that with big gaps in between them that you use to cross the bridge and then when cars drive over it like sings and hums because there's like metal so there's also this really loud noise with vibration and you know the only way you could get from one side of the city to the other was by crossing that bridge or by going way across the other side of town and using the cement bridge which is really sort of inconvenient. I would often go way across town and use the cement bridge to cross between South and North Lawrence but If I was stuck and I had to cross over the duck bridge, I would have a lot of difficulty and I still have nightmares about that bridge. So I am afraid of bridges and I used to be afraid of even driving over bridges, but I've gotten a little bit better with that. I suppose it didn't help that I have three older brothers who, as we would cross the bridge, they would jump up and down on it while I was crossing to just, since I was the only girl and the youngest, they had to find some entertainment around that. I'm traumatized by bridges for life.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, I mean that sounds like a terrifying bridge. Thank you for sharing that.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah.
[Danielle Balocca]: What about any like important advice that you've received that you'd want to pass on?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah, you know, I think that we evolve. If we're living a meaningful life, we evolve over time and we learn. And you know, so I'm not the person that I was when I was 18 and I would not want to be held accountable. for the things that I did when I was 18 or even the things that I said when I was 30. And I've evolved, right? And that's the whole point of life, I think, is that we evolve and we learn and we continue to grow. And I think that a really important piece of advice for life is be willing to learn, be willing to grow. Be gentle with yourself in that learning. Be open-minded. And most of all, and this has really been the key to my life, and I tell my children this all the time, be grateful. If you can find gratitude, That's the secret of life like it really is because the glass is always going to be half full or half empty It's really just a matter of what we decide to perceive it as and so I really work every day on practices of gratitude I mean I can hear that in your story to like it sounds like Gratitude and resilience can be connected right?
[Danielle Balocca]: There's opportunities where you could have you know, just Turned the other way totally and when you say like
[Melanie McLaughlin]: I think you said something earlier about families who have children with disabilities and don't end up in the advocacy role or whatever and it's like I think they are in the advocacy role because you have to be, you're forced into it, but sometimes you're not doing it from a systems level or you're doing it, or sometimes you even have to shut down and not do it because it's just so painful and so difficult. And some days it's really hard to fight and to be a fighter for life, right? So like somebody asked me the other day, what would be the one word you would use to describe yourself? And I was like, advocate, like the one word I would use to describe myself as advocate, I left my mother when I was 13 years old and went to a court hearing to advocate for myself to be able to be taken away from her as a young child. I advocated in my classroom in elementary school to not be put in the C group of the reading level because the teacher had a bias against me based on what I was wearing, not based on what I could do in my reading skill. I was always advocating, I have always been advocating, and it's exhausting. It can get really tiring. fighting can be hard and it can be a lot and so combined with the with the gratitude and the resilience is also trauma and you know and Advocacy, but I think and this is more complicated than we need to get into I think for the podcast but I think it's like a combination of all of those things and so that if you take time for self-care and reflection and are able to find gratitude if I take time for self-care and reflection and and I'm able to find gratitude in my life, then I'm more capable of being able to advocate for others and not just myself.
[Danielle Balocca]: I'm so glad you said that. Because I think being around all these campaigns and seeing how busy everybody is, that's the question on my mind is like, how are you all taking care of yourself?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Totally. And then I think the social media piece of it is really harmful. And so you can really get into that zone of like, oh, my God, and just sort of start to judge your Insides on everybody else's outsides and it's like, you know, that's not healthy and but that's what evolution gives me as an older candidate like I've been able to work through some of that stuff and not have to be able to Judge myself on what perhaps other people are writing about me or others on social media It's like just you know focus on what my goal is here at hand and this is not an easy job It certainly doesn't pay well But it's in a really important job and it's one that I'm doing For Gracie and for children like Gracie and for children like me when I was a kid and for children who you know are marginalized on the daily who you know are black and brown and underrepresented and hungry and all of those things and so the the truth is whether you know, I I'm re-elected for school committee again or not, I'll continue to serve in this capacity as an advocate no matter what I do because it's just my life's work.
[Danielle Balocca]: That's great to hear. Thanks. Those are all my questions. Is there anything that I didn't ask that you want to be included?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: No, I just, I guess I want to say thank you for doing this. I think it's really important for community members to understand that we all have our talents and, you know, bring something to the table. So, you know, last year I did, and I want to start again, this ed talk show on Medford Community Media, but, you know, write articles for the local newspaper, do a blog, have a podcast, do any of these things to sort of highlight, you know, what the beauty is in our community and how we can continue to improve it. So I want to really thank you for that. I'm really eager to hear where everybody else's favorite spots to eat are and you know to think about how we build community and how we can get together and break bread with each other and laugh and not have to be so heavy and intense all the time about everything really about because we're all I think for the most part Everybody wants a better future for our children. So we have to figure out how to make that happen together.
[Danielle Balocca]: Yeah, I hope so.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Yeah, me too.
[Danielle Balocca]: Well, thank you so much.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Thank you. Have a fun Tuesday. Yeah, thanks. Appreciate it.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you for listening to this interview. A link to the campaign website is listed in the show notes. For any feedback or questions about the podcast, please email medfordpod at gmail dot com. You can also subscribe and rate the podcast on Spotify, and follow the podcast on Instagram at medfordbytespodcast. That's M-E-D F-O-R-D B-Y-T-E-S P-O-D C-A-S-T for updates about upcoming episodes and other announcements. Thank you to all who have supported this podcast, but especially to my wife, Brittany.
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total time: 23.47 minutes total words: 1244 |
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