Latest / Exceptional Educators Podcast by FrenalyticsEDU / Building & Storytelling for the Future: Hayley Spira-Bauer on Equity, EdTech, and Fullmind’s Learning Can’t Wait Podcast

Transcript

Building & Storytelling for the Future: Hayley Spira-Bauer on Equity, EdTech, and Fullmind’s Learning Can’t Wait Podcast · Exceptional Educators Podcast by FrenalyticsEDU

• 0:00
  Nisha Srinivasa: Welcome to the exceptional educators podcast by Frantalytics edu, where innovation meets inclusion in education. I'm your cohost, Nisha Srinivasa.
• 0:09
  Matt Giovanniello: And I'm Matt Jovanella, the CEO and cofounder of Frantalytics. At Frenalytics, we put special education and English language learners front and center. Our award winning Frenalytics EDU platform helps streamline progress monitoring, improve communication and compliance, and offers truly personalized learning to your students of all abilities.
• 0:26
  Nisha Srinivasa: Each episode of our podcast features candid conversations with district and school leaders, classroom changemakers, ed tech founders, and industry executives, all dedicated to transforming learning for each student, especially our learners with unique abilities. With the focus on extraordinary educators and the exceptional students they serve, we explore the latest in special education, accessible technology, and inclusive leadership. In this episode, Exceptional Educators is exceptionally thrilled to welcome Hayley Spira Bauer, a leader in the EdTech space. Hayley effortlessly blends her passion for education access and advocacy through her work with Full Mind Learning. So we are so thrilled to have Hayley with us today.
• 1:08
  Welcome. Thank you so much for being here.
• 1:10
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Thank you so much for
• 1:11
  Nisha Srinivasa: having me, Nisha and Matt. We're so excited to launch into our conversation today. And speaking of launch, we have an opening question for you just to get us started. I'm sure you know as a former educator, something that pops up in the world of education is thinking about why, like thinking about why we're here, why we're centered in this work. And so that's what we want to start off by asking you today is what is your why?
• 1:33
  What has brought you to the world of education and what continues to keep you here?
• 1:36
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Well, thank you again for having me. I'm so honored to be with you both today. The why question is such an important one, especially in education, which is a job that is daunting, relentless, challenging, and also exceptionally rewarding. For me, my why is that I was very privileged and fortunate to have a high quality education as a child, and that is not true for every student. Our country has really amazing schools and schools that struggle, and a student's ability to be in an amazing school depends on their geography when they're born very often.
• 2:09
  And so my why that persists today is around the idea that every child deserves an exceptional education. And I continue to seek opportunities to ensure that every single student, regardless of what zip code they're born into, has a chance to have an exceptional teacher.
• 2:26
  Matt Giovanniello: Haley, that was a perfect way to summarize a why in one short paragraph of a decades long tenure, not only in education, but now supporting educators outside of the classroom. I would love to hear more about the various roles you've taken on over your past few decades in the education and the ed tech space. You're the chief academic officer and chief operating officer of FullMind, but you're also an advisor, a mentor, a parent, an advocate, and more. Tell us about how that collective time and education has impacted your work in this sphere. And if there's maybe one or two little tidbits from your time at FullMind that has kind of become the genesis of everything you're doing, we'd love to hear more about it.
• 3:02
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: You know, after leaving the brick and mortar setting about almost nine years ago now, I was uncertain if I would feel comfortable not having a school or a classroom in front of me every day when I woke up. I felt like so much of my identity was wrapped up in being a teacher and an administrator and just generally being around kids. So much so that even today, which, you know, it's almost nine years later, one of my major asks when I visit partners or potential partners is, Can I please do a read aloud? Because I miss it so much. But now in the space that is, as I call it, school adjacent, I am able to do something which I think is really powerful.
• 3:41
  I'm able to learn what works and what doesn't work and under what conditions when we talk about solutions for students and solutions for teachers and solutions for schools. I became obsessed pretty recently with the research to practice gap, this idea that we know what research research tells us what interventions are most effective for kids. The problem is that when we don't intervene effectively and we don't implement these research based interventions effectively, they don't work for every kid. So, going back to what I answered in the first question, you know, we care really deeply about having great education for every student. And schools mean well.
• 4:17
  Teachers mean well. But on the other side of this now, as I said at FullMind, I have the ability to see that well intentioned leaders and well intentioned ed tech solutions and well intentioned teachers, they don't always translate to students growing and learning. So I feel incredibly fortunate that I get to do the work that I do today because I learn from so many schools and so many vendors and so many partners to schools about what works and how. And I'm able to bring a lot of that back into my work at FullMind and my work as an advisor and a mentor in order to ensure that everybody gets on the same page around how we make what we are trying to do work for students. And if it's not working, one, we should be measuring it.
• 4:57
  But if it's not working and what we're measuring is showing us it's not working for kids, we have to stop and tweak our solutions and our work so that students actually benefit from every resource we're pouring into them.
• 5:09
  Nisha Srinivasa: I just want to say thank you so much for sharing. It really resonated with what you just said about schools and teachers really being well intentioned. I think that's really refreshing to hear that there's an awareness and understanding that folks within the system of education are doing the best they can with the resources that they have. And I'm really curious, what have you taken from your experience in doing school observations, being present actually in the classroom? What have you taken from those experiences that have transferred to the work that you do at FullMind?
• 5:39
  Like, what are some examples of the work that you've seen and how that transferred over?
• 5:42
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: I continue to believe very deeply that classrooms should be loud and learning should be hands on. And that might sound funny coming from a leader at an ed tech organization where our teachers are ed virtual. But even in that setting, I think it is very true that our educators, our students should be highly engaged and engagement can look so many different ways. And the learning environment should be rich with voice and joy and excitement. I never want to be the student in a classroom who is listening to somebody drone on and share information at them.
• 6:16
  First of all, my ADHD doesn't allow it. My personality doesn't allow for it. And, you know, most kids are like that. The first thing my boys said to me when they came home from kindergarten, I have two boys, and they're not the same age, but they both said this to me unbeknownst to one another was, mom, I had to sit at a desk for so long in kindergarten. And it was just like a smack in the face to me and everything I know about being an educator and everything I've learned.
• 6:41
  And again, like well intentioned teachers, this is not a condemnation of the teachers that my boys had, but more a remark on the evolution of our system and education over time. And so what I've seen in the best schools, in the best learning environments, in videos, in person, whatever it may be, are educators that are really seeing their kids for who they are. They're engaging in a back and forth, a dialogue about learning, and they're building curiosity within their classrooms. You don't have to answer a question with that's right or that's wrong. So often, the best reply from a teacher is, What makes you say that?
• 7:15
  Tell me more about your thinking. And soon you hear in kids in a powerful learning environment, you hear kids echoing those same things. And your modeling as an instructional leader becomes the voice of your children and your students. And so what I've taken from the many observations I get to do in part as my in my role and also the thousands and thousands and thousands of hours I've watched of great teaching on my platform is that joyful learning is loud and it is engaged and it is curious.
• 7:43
  Matt Giovanniello: I think through the thousands of hours of watching those observations through Full Mind's platform, you would probably agree with the old adage too, Haley, that talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not. And I think that bringing a virtual classroom into the fold and making it ubiquitous of classrooms and of schools nationwide and, frankly, around the world is leveling the playing field, so to speak, of the ZIP code adage that you brought up, where if you're not in a wealthy, affluent, well-to-do neighborhood with parents who can advocate perhaps more than others can, then as a result, your education's not as good. That's not the case anymore. It shouldn't be the case anymore, especially in this world of COVID induced virtual learning that really skyrocketed that. And so to the families, the schools, the administrators, where you think that they might be a little bit stuck in old ways that virtual learning can't work.
• 8:27
  What do you say to that? Where in a virtual learning environment, there's actually more there there's there's more critical thinking happening. There's more interaction happening. There's more there's more learning happening. How do we get over that hurdle of getting past those old tactics and saying that this can happen virtually?
• 8:44
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: So first, we have to remember that emergency remote learning is not the same and should not look the same as thoughtful, planned hybrid learning opportunities. What we all experienced, the trauma of COVID, especially in those early years, was a crisis response. So I want to acknowledge that I saw it firsthand. It was not quality instruction. And again, no one should blame our educators and our systems for that.
• 9:11
  They were doing the best they could under the conditions we were all experiencing. However, now we have this opportunity to think about what parts of our experiences from COVID and even from before, because, I mean, Full Mind itself has been around for nearly ten years. But what we learn from those experiences and what we can bring forward that really benefit kids. And one of those pieces that I know a lot of folks are embracing and are more interested in engaging with is that hybrid learning, that virtual learning. And why are they doing that?
• 9:43
  They're doing that because we now know that the world is so much bigger than where our cars or trains or buses can drive and take us. And the best teachers for our students may not be located within that radius. So in terms of what I see in my work, we want to make sure that schools become partners and they recognize that they can go beyond their four walls to get the very best for their kids. You know, I think about so many folks that I've encountered along the way and the ways that they've implemented the work that we do at FullMind. And I've seen just incredible examples of ingenuity and creativity.
• 10:21
  And I believe very deeply that necessity is the parent of invention. And you see in like rural America, for example, schools that have never had the choice of resources at their fingertips. They're lucky if for every application they put up, they even get one qualified candidate, meaning like their certifications match what the state requires. They don't have the ability sometimes to even vet for quality. And for so many of those folks that lead schools in rural America, the ability to bring a teacher in virtually, even temporarily, is the difference between their students excelling and no certified teacher in front of their kids at all.
• 10:58
  So I do believe that technology has the power to unlock so much for so many and really is the ability to provide equitable learning opportunities for kids everywhere.
• 11:09
  Nisha Srinivasa: I completely agree with you. And I think technology has such a transformational power to bridge learning gaps and opportunity access for students. It really is making me think I'm an educator myself in California working in an urban school district. And the students that come to mind as you were sharing were students, for example, who live very far away from the school, whose parents, for multiple financial reasons, might not be able to have the resources to provide them access with coming to school every day. And so for those students, for example, for attendance reasons, I could also see the ways that this could be powerful and transformational for students to continue to access learning.
• 11:44
  Is there an ideal divide between access to print resources versus access to technology rich resources? What do you think about that? And do you think that there is sort of an opportunity to strike that perfect balance?
• 11:59
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: I don't think there's a right answer for everyone. I believe that the whole reason why technology allows us to be personalized in our experiences in schools and different settings affords us the opportunity to fit a community need. No two communities are the same. And as a result, the answers and resources that they apply to solve various problems should look different. The context and culture of our schools is as important as the solution we can purchase, whether it be a textbook, a website, an app, you know, all of those things have to be considered within the context of the environment in which they're going to be applied.
• 12:38
  And that's part of implementation science, right? Like even the adoption of the best tools when not introduced properly in a community can impact the success of those tools. And so what I'd say is even more important than figuring out the right ratio, I would say is empowering leaders to really learn their environments and approach the tools that they have access to or that they know about with an attention to who lives in their community, how are they going to apply it, who will it benefit, and are they reaching all the learners in their community or just the select few?
• 13:13
  Matt Giovanniello: Speaking of reaching just a select few learners and not making sure that they're moving beyond the average to consider students with diverse learning needs. I feel like virtual learning is a fantastic medium to reach students who have a whole variety of disabilities. As a disability advocate yourself, I'm sure you can attest and speak to how this has been really impacting students who have IEPs, five zero four plans, even newcomers of the country by delivering all sorts of accommodations, modifications, and services to meet the more they are. How do you see not only the services that FullMind provides on behalf of schools and districts to meet those student accommodations, but broader ed tech. How do you see the role of ed tech and tools like FullMind meeting students where they are and really trying to hold true to the needs that they have and and deliver on those IEPs and those five zero four's?
• 13:59
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: So first of all, the tapestry that is our world and the learners in our classrooms is beautiful. Every single student is different, whether or not they are diagnosed with a disability or they're an English language learner or they are, you know, cut from a different cloth, so to speak. It behooves us as educators to first celebrate that difference and to think about, Wow, what an incredible opportunity I have, albeit a tiring one, to recognize who my students are as individuals. Again, it can be tiring, right, when you have sometimes 35 learners in your classroom with very unique needs. And we are so lucky to live in a world at this very time with access to so much.
• 14:45
  There are both incredible free resources that can help you learn about the diverse needs of your learners and also tools that can help you meet their needs. And so what I think is exceptionally exciting about the world we live in today in 2025 is that we have at our disposal so many resources and so many tools to allow teachers to be maximally effective. You know, FullMind is providing an incredibly valuable service. One teacher is a resource, an incredible resource. But we can have access to more teachers to support that classroom teacher to meet learners' needs, whether it be for resource room, credit recovery, students who are homebound, supporting multilingual learners, students with disability.
• 15:25
  You know, I see that every day. I've seen implementations which help students exceed expectations at a statistically significant level. And I'm so proud of that work. But more generally, in our world today, there's so much research that tells us what works and what doesn't and how it works. And so what I think is most exciting about the technology that exists and the power of ed tech to partner with schools is that we need to celebrate, venerate, and respect our teachers.
• 15:53
  And by bringing technology into the classroom that helps their jobs be easier and supports them in this important and difficult work, we can do exactly that.
• 16:02
  Nisha Srinivasa: I definitely see that on a day to day basis, the ways that technology has such transformational power. Framing is so critical in this conversation. Framing around the use of technology, framing around how it's supporting students, framing around the students themselves. So what advice would you give for educators, folks who are leaders within school districts who are sort of considering, like, evolving the ways that they're approaching the use of technology in their classrooms to support students?
• 16:29
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: I believe that beyond the labels that students have associated with them, we have really interesting people in front of us. And so one thing I would do absolutely is get to know your kids. If your students like Roblox, study up on Roblox. I mean, I have zero interest in Roblox, but if I was still teaching today, I would care a lot about Roblox. For my students, it was sneakers at the time.
• 16:52
  And I learned all about sneaker trading. I learned all about the coolest sneakers. I learned who Giannis was in basketball. Right? I have the right sport.
• 17:00
  I hope I have the right sport. Just because that was important to my kids, my students cared a lot. You know, my reading passages had to do with topics they were interested in. My differentiation met those students' interests. And so I would say, first and foremost, I would really consider the population you're serving, the students in your classroom, and their individual likes and dislikes.
• 17:21
  And then beyond that, I would say we should all be as teachers forever learners. What we know today is very different than what I even knew when I was an educator and I was in the classroom my very first year in 02/2006. And so I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge that my time in schools is a little bit past. And what research we have today that tells us what works best for kids is different than what research told us then and humbly is very different than what we knew about when I was a kid. So I would say that first and foremost is, you know, stay up to date and make sure that you are accessing resources like coming from CASEL.
• 17:59
  Again, another thing that I'm not exactly sure how to pronounce. Look at the best frameworks for social emotional learning. Take a look at understood.org, looking at organizations that support diverse learners. You know, we know so much more today than we did even five years ago, and we will continue to learn more about how brains operate. And so if we can consider ourselves forever learners and educators, then we are doing a service to our students.
• 18:24
  Matt Giovanniello: I think you hit the nail on the head exactly with the framing for accommodating diverse learners and all of the resources that are available. As who would be considered a diverse learner yourself, I'm sure you not only keep it pressed for your own purposes, but also for your children and on behalf of Full Line, including with the Learning Can't Wait podcast that you run. You're talking with the most cutting edge guests, executives, students themselves, staff, researchers, and educators across the entire world of ed tech. And so as coast of the Learning Can't Wait podcast, I am dying to know how you use that very astute and privileged role to help amplify other voices, and then through that, shape education and ed tech leadership. Do any particular episodes or guests come to mind, and how do you think about your responsibility with that role?
• 19:07
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: How lucky am I, first and foremost, to be able to do this as part of my And as you said, interview some of the most brilliant minds in education. I mean, I feel so grateful every single day that I get to do this because, one, I get to learn, and I am a forever learner. And two, I get to amplify important work and important stories. And that platform, I do not take for granted at all. One, a couple episodes that really stick out to me.
• 19:36
  Early on, I had the really good fortune of interviewing a friend who I met through Teach For America. Her name is Claire Blumenson, and she is the founder of the School Justice Project. And she and I did an episode together entitled The Education of Incarcerated Youth with Disabilities. And she talked about how the School Justice Project, which is a nonprofit of lawyers, sued the Department of Education in Washington, D. C.
• 19:57
  After COVID for not providing mandated services for incarcerated youth according to their IEPs during COVID. And I was enamored learning about this work, how they won the case, how they were able to find justice for the students who were incarcerated, and ultimately able to get those students the services that they need and deserve, regardless of where they were living at the time or regardless of what transgressions had occurred in their lifetime. And that to me felt really, really important. And that was early on and really set the tone for me about the types of stories I wanted to tell. Another episode that really, really struck at my heartstrings was interviewing Ellen Charat, who at the time was the board chair for the Teachers Salary Project.
• 20:43
  Teachers deserve to be paid more. And there has been a lot of movement in Washington, D. C, to put forth bills and get co sponsors signing to get teachers that income that they deserve. And that episode was from season three and was entitled Pay Teachers More. And that was just really powerful because I learned a lot about what kind of legislation was in the works and who was supporting it and what challenges they were facing.
• 21:09
  And that story felt really, really important for me to tell. And then just just one more that I wanna talk about was in season four. I mean, there's so many. I could literally talk about this for days. But in season four, there was an episode called Celebrating Growth in Ourselves and Our Students, And it was with Ben Markowitz and Jerrell Bryant, and they're from Collegiate Academies in New Orleans.
• 21:30
  But Ben was the founder of the school, and Jerrell is now the CEO and principal of the school. And this is a school that was founded under the assumption that all students should achieve the highest possible bar of outcomes, regardless of what designations or disabilities they had on their IEP or five zero four. So they took in a disproportionate number of students that were designated as students with disabilities, and their team worked incredibly hard and continues to work incredibly hard to this day to ensure that every single child receives the scaffolding and support needed to have them reach and exceed that high bar. And that was just another powerful example of people doing the work that students deserve. Education is promised in our country, but not every student receives an exceptional education.
• 22:16
  And so I was really just honored to be able to introduce those folks and interview those folks on the Learning Wait podcast. And and how much more time you have if you could, like, you know, keep going if you'd like.
• 22:25
  Matt Giovanniello: I consider myself an avid listener of the learning can't wait podcast, and I'm embarrassed to say I've not heard any of these three episodes. So I don't think I'm as avid of as a listener as I purport to be.
• 22:35
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: So No. And those
• 22:36
  Matt Giovanniello: are to you, though, a of them.
• 22:38
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Are older episodes. Right? Like, I I had the good fortune last season of interviewing, you know, Mike Gates, Chad Alderman, and Amanda Bickerstaff, and then Sia Raj Parohit in a row. Like, four people that are just and oh, and Alex Cotran, like five people that are just huge in this AI and education movement. And like, I am not an AI expert.
• 22:58
  I am learning alongside a lot of other people. But having the opportunity to amplify what they were sharing in their work was it was great. It was mind blowing and mind bending and such an opportunity for our listeners and for me.
• 23:12
  Matt Giovanniello: Are these before or after you interviewing The US Former Secretary Of Education, Artie Duncan? Because you forgot that mic dropped too.
• 23:19
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: It was after that. Yeah. No. That was that was the highlight for sure. I have never been as nervous as when I flew to Chicago to interview Arne.
• 23:28
  But let me tell you, that man is gracious. He is brilliant. He is attune. That interview and and my subsequent conversations with him were very transformative.
• 23:37
  Matt Giovanniello: I I would be remiss to forget mentioning that I have met Arnie Duncan in person as well. Thanks to you and thanks to Sia. And he's about two feet taller than me. And I consider myself not a short person, but he is he is just he just towers over you, and he is as nice and gracious as you say he is, Haley, in person as he is in interview fashion. So that was a highlight as well, and I didn't even get to interview him.
• 23:57
  But Alright. We wrap up, Haley, we have just a couple more questions for you.
• 24:00
  Nisha Srinivasa: Of course.
• 24:01
  Matt Giovanniello: I hinted at this before, and I know this is a particular passion point of yours, especially in the year ahead of removing kind of the taboo around the nature of having a disability, whether it's a visible one or an invisible one like I do as well. And I would love to hear your background on how you've embraced it, how you channeled it into positive change, and how it has maybe morphed your perspective on not only educating students with disabilities, but looking at the disability community overall and how you've kind of contributed your 2¢ to make society better as a result of it.
• 24:32
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: So first of all, I feel like such an impostor. I get told all the time, wow, I didn't know you were struggling with X. I would never have known. It's a hard thing for me to hear, in part because since the age of 10, I have had a chronic illness diagnosis. Since the age of 16, it's been lupus.
• 24:48
  And literally, when you Google the word chronic illness and disability, lupus is in even the AI summaries that you see today on Google, for example. And you just can't see that I have it. And you can't see all the things that go into making sure that I can function in my day to day world. Take care of my kids, my dog, be a good spouse, work this job, and feel healthy and have a social life and have friends and all those other pieces. So, first of all, I feel such like such an impostor because I get told that all the time.
• 25:20
  And I truly identify with the disability community. My lived experience is very different than I think a lot of people assume. I had terminal kidney disease while I was in college, and maybe five people knew at the time, despite the fact that I was going home every month for chemo infusions and, like, was very ill at college. And then I now recently just got this diagnosis of ADHD just a couple years ago. And even that, you know, ADHD, I talk about this a lot on the podcast and on other folks' podcasts.
• 25:51
  ADHD, the criteria was built off of white men and white boys. It's not built off of people of color. It's not built off of women. And so I don't have a typically presenting case of ADHD unless you, like, are really familiar with how much I talk, which is one of my most common symptoms, that I'm, you know, extremely verbose. And so, you know, all that to say that it has made me as an educator extremely patient and empathetic and understanding.
• 26:22
  And not everybody is going to be able to say like, Oh, I have a disability, so I'm a patient and, you know, empathetic educator. But I hope that they hear a story like this and they're able to say, you know, Just looking at someone doesn't tell their story. So much of what we think about when we think about classrooms and we think about especially disruptive kids, because that's what can be so challenging for a teacher, is rooted in just fixing the problem. And you can't always fix a problem. Sometimes it's hardwired and it's right inside of the student.
• 26:53
  And so I think a lot of what I think back about my own experience in learning and my own experience, that I received throughout time is somebody really knew me and somebody really saw me and they made it possible for me to be successful. You know, very recently, my older son told me this anecdote that he got a reward in his classroom and he had earned a number of points and he redeemed the reward. And he was so proud and so excited. I said, Oh, which one did you choose? Because I had seen on parent teacher night or I had seen this list and it was like pajama day, like your lunch with the teacher, all these things.
• 27:26
  And he's like, Oh, mom, I did the gallery walk. And I'm like, What's a gallery walk, bud? He's like, oh, I get to walk at the down the hallways and, like, look at all the hallway art for the other teachers. And in my head, I'm like, like sirens, like alarm, like he just needs to get up and move. And, like, my husband and I know this about him.
• 27:41
  But this was a new teacher. And the fact that that was one of the rewards she had really spoke to me. And this teacher he has this year subsequently has proven time and time again that she understands the diversity of the learners in her classroom. And I'm so grateful he's in there because that isn't innate for every educator. And so, you know, when I tell my story and I think of my own story, I think about, you know, going back to seeing your kids for who they are and what they need.
• 28:08
  And even kids with the same exact diagnosis are not going to need the same things. And that is an important part of the story that I like to make sure I tell.
• 28:17
  Nisha Srinivasa: My goodness. So much of what you just shared, one, just like resonates so deeply with me as someone that suffers from a chronic disability. And so I just want to thank you for your authenticity and your vulnerability. And it's so clear the way that your personal connection to your work really transcends and is infused into every single element of what you do. What do you think is the future of full mind learning?
• 28:39
  Where do you see continued opportunities to further inspire the work that you already have done and the work that you will continue to do?
• 28:47
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: You know, FullMind is making a huge difference in hundreds of districts across The United States. And there's somewhere upward of 16,000 districts in America. And I have a dream that FullMind will be in every single one of those districts. But how they apply FullMind differs based on whatever pain points are surfacing as most significant. Right now, we hear a ton of schools struggling with teacher vacancies.
• 29:11
  That's a solution that we are able and eager to support schools in solving. But other schools may struggle with being able to provide a course load that meets the special interests of their students. They simply don't have, you know, a high volume of students who wanna take AP chemistry, but the students who do wanna take it deserve to take it. And FullMind can do that too. I I look forward to the day when every single school in America has on their, you know, ClassLink or Clever integration or that button to just click Fullbind and again, meet learners' needs in their own diverse ways because the flexible solutions should support that.
• 29:50
  Matt Giovanniello: I can't wait to see a future in which that's available, Haley. I just think back to my own days in public school where I was fortunate enough to have an IB program, but it was quite prescriptive and we didn't have access to really any AP classes, which is not something that you hear every day. But my exposure to things like computer science, like business, were just classes that I did not have an opportunity to take. And I was very grateful to have gone to a well funded public school. I think back to other types of programs where they don't have IB, they don't have AP, they don't even have advanced honors classes.
• 30:20
  And there's just such a wide opportunity gap that virtual learning and virtual teaching can really fill, and it'll just help the quality caliber continue to rise and help students achieve even more than what we think we're capable what we think they're capable of. So on that note, I'd love to wrap up by asking you a question, Haley, that we ask all of our guests. And our question to you is, what does being an exceptional educator mean to you?
• 30:42
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Being an exceptional educator to me means bringing your authentic self to the classroom every day and seeing the authentic selves of your students in your classroom represented in how they interact, how they engage, and how you build content and engage students in their learning every single day.
• 31:01
  Nisha Srinivasa: That is absolutely incredible and, again, speaks volumes to the work that you are doing in paving the path for diverse learners all across the country.
• 31:11
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Thank
• 31:11
  Nisha Srinivasa: you. Thank you so much for being here today. We really appreciate having you on the podcast and getting to learn from you. It was such a treat.
• 31:19
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Thank you, Nisha and Matt. It was an absolute honor to come on.
• 31:22
  Matt Giovanniello: We'll need you back. I have so many more questions I need to ask you that we did not get a chance to cover. If history tells us anything, that having you for part two will be even better than today's discussion. Until then, thank you for tuning in today's episode. Haley, thank you for all of your thoughts and for your insights and for your time today.
• 31:38
  We look forward to catching you on the next episode.
• 31:39
  Hayley Spira-Bauer: Hi, my name is Haley Spirbauer and I'm the Chief Operating Officer and Chief Academic Officer at FullMind, and I revere exceptional educators.