Warriors Like Us – An Interview with Marcie Mills Sample

2020 has been a year full of challenges. However, for many GEAR UP professionals, one question has remained constant throughout the years. What do students need?

“Students need warriors like us to believe in them.” - Marcie Mills Sample, 2019 NCCEP/GEAR UP Professional of the Year Speech

Even as education systems change and our challenges take us on new journeys, the need for brave and experienced professionals will always be in high demand.  A warrior for student success is exactly how I and many others would describe Marcie Sample. She is the Associate Director with Washington State GEAR UP, a Study Lab Advisory Committee member, and the 2019 GEAR UP Professional of the Year. Her passion and commitment to the work make her an expert we can all learn more from. 

Grab a cup of coffee and dive in as Marcie shares expert advice and considerations for every GEAR UP professional.  

How long have you been involved with GEAR UP? 

I started with GEAR UP in 2007, so it’s been 13 years! How did that happen?

What are three things you wish you had known during your first year as a GEAR UP Professional?

• There are so many resources available! Find your network, ask for help, and never try to figure it out by yourself. 
• Family engagement is hard, but you have to keep trying and continue to build that toolbox. Even when only three people show up, what you did was valuable for those three people. Don’t be discouraged and keep at it. 
•  Know where to find the rules. Read the rules. Re-read the rules. 

What skills/competencies do you believe are essential to GEAR UP success? Why?

Knowing how to engage students and families is primary to everything else we do. Staff must be able to connect, build relationships, and understand the challenges our students, families, and school communities face so that they can work to address them through targeted services. You must believe that all families want the best for their child, but they might not know how to do that. Don’t ever assume that families don’t care. What looks like not caring can be so many other things (parents didn’t do well in school themselves, they are overwhelmed with life, they are working multiple jobs and can’t get to family events because of work commitments, on and on and on). Learn about generational poverty and its impacts on all of this, and how to design interventions that address those needs. Finally, the best we can do is provide information, that is our core job. Learn about your students’ aspirations, and then give them the information they need in order to achieve those dreams - and provide it early and often. Then, most of all, believe in them, every single day. 

This year has been challenging for many programs. One of the challenges that we experienced, was a shift in professional development. How have you navigated these challenges?

In addition to offering Study Lab courses to our GEAR UP staff, we shifted to webinar workshops. We were worried that they might not be engaging enough, or that folks have so much “Zoom fatigue” that they would not want to participate. We were pleasantly surprised that our August workshop (usually a two day in-person event) was one of our highest rated ever. We had our own practitioners provide mini-sessions about what has been successful since remote learning started in March.   We know that our best pro-dev is when they can network and learn from each other, and we were able to do this in a virtual environment. They also liked that they didn’t have to travel away from family and could sleep in their own beds!

We followed up by offering the first ever virtual GEAR UP West Conference. We revised the agenda to one day rather than two and a half and had far fewer sessions (eleven instead of the usual 45+). The conference registration filled in less than 48 hours and we had 375 people attend the live event. This tells us that there is a need for new ideas and opportunities to learn from each other. Our keynotes were relevant, focusing on hope and trauma-informed practices – two topics that are essential in today’s environment. All of the sessions were recorded and are available for viewing here: https://gearup.wa.gov/about/what-we-do/gear-west.

What do you believe are the strengths of online professional development? 

In the spring we had to cancel two pro-dev events – four days of training total. We were able to immediately pivot to offer Study Lab courses to our team to replace the lost time and content. Our GEAR UP folks had nothing but positive feedback for the courses and appreciated that they could complete them over an extended period of time. Our school-based staff have diverse education and experience backgrounds and varied years of experience. They were able to take courses that met their individual needs and interests, so they were engaged and reported that the content was relevant to their work.

As you look back over your years of experience and reflect, what advice would you give other GEAR UP directors?   

Take advantage of the generous willingness of your colleagues to help you. Ask them questions, steal their ideas, and don’t spend time reinventing the wheel. Duplication of effort is probably my biggest pet peeve. If you are looking for something, whether it is a form, an idea, or a video, someone else has probably already done it, so ask. Spend your time, energy, and resources on what really matters: the direct services we provide to students and families.

Thank you, Marcie, for your thoughts and your commitment to GEAR UP! Be sure to follow GEAR UP Washington State on twitter and on Facebook. 

Share your experiences with professional development this year in the comments below.