A director asked me a question recently that I plan to answer on Thursday. “How do we keep our staff when we can’t give them a raise?” She was asking because she’s watching good people walk out the door, folks committed to children and families. You know the ones. The teacher who could calm any […]

Over 100 of You Showed Up… I have been trying to find a word for what I am feeling, and I am not sure one exists. I’m tearful even as I write this. Today we premiered the film about Becoming a Connected Champion. Over 100 people came. Some of you I have known for years, […]

EEEK! Our film is done, and at minute 6 you’ll see why I burst into tears. It’s a little surreal to see my life’s work come to fruition in a short film. But you get to see it first because whether you’re a parent or a professional – you’re the ones out there every single […]

I know your inbox has been getting a lot of love from us lately (fall launch season will do that), so this one’s short and sweet. Just an update on what’s been happening behind the scenes, a couple of fun teasers, and an answer to a question I keep getting asked. What we’ve been up […]

In one of our recent Champions Collaborative meetings, the community of practice open to everyone certified in Cards for Connection for two years following their certification, we had the privilege of meeting a young man named Sam. Sam is the CEO of Autism Rocks and Rolls, and he came to us with a lived experience worth slowing down […]

They turned the camera on, asked me how I was doing, and the first thing out of my mouth was this:  Today is the day the world finds out about this. I hadn’t planned to say it. It’s just what I was feeling. We’ve spent this summer with a film crew. They came to Central […]

As I’ve been working with Muse Storytelling, a new marketing partner of mine, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why I do this work and where it actually began. If you’ve been to one of my trainings, you know the origin story has a couple of parts. Part of it comes from the work […]

At the end of my training day in West Texas, after spending the day with almost two hundred early childhood professionals from Head Start, the director walked to the front of the room. I assumed she was about to transition the group to their next activity, wrap up the day. Instead, she started telling a […]

I was in West Texas last week, training almost two hundred professionals. Tonight, after a long day of teaching, I went down to the hotel bar for a glass of champagne and some quiet time to collect my notes — thoughts on the curriculum, ideas for what comes next. For most of the night, I […]

I want to tell you about the last two weeks, and how important connection has meant to me. It feels almost insignificant to write this after two weeks of glowing messages about camp. But I realized that after all of the pouring outward, I needed to absorb a dose of connection for myself.  Since our […]