🎧 The Confidence Code: Transforming Student Potential Beyond Limitations

What happens when a school believes every student can succeed, regardless of their background? In this powerful episode of [Podcast Name], Sam Wakefield, Executive Director of AFSA Charter School, reveals the transformative strategy that’s rewriting the narrative of student potential.

About Our Guest:

Sam Wakefield is not just an administrator, but a visionary educational leader who has dedicated his career to creating learning environments where students discover their inherent strengths and capabilities.

Episode Highlights:

In this revealing conversation, listeners will discover:

• How strategic confidence-building changes academic trajectories
• Innovative approaches to bridging generational educational gaps
• Practical strategies for nurturing student self-belief
• Techniques for creating inclusive learning environments
• Real-world examples of student transformation

Key Insights:

“Confidence is the key to unlocking student potential.” – Sam Wakefield

Listeners will gain actionable insights into:

– Recognizing and dismantling barriers to student success

– Creating school cultures that empower rather than limit

– Understanding the critical role of educator mindset in student achievement

Who Should Listen:

• School administrators
• Teachers
• Educational policymakers
• Parents interested in student development

Don’t miss this inspiring episode that proves every student has untapped potential waiting to be unleashed!

🔔 Subscribe now and join the movement of educational transformation.

 

FULL PODCAST Transcript

 

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (00:01.026)

Hello everyone and welcome to the brighter together podcast. My name is Janet Courtney and my special guest today is Sam Wakefield. Sam is the executive director at AFSA charter school in Vadnais Heights, Minnesota, which I just learned is outside of St. Paul. So Sam, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for having me. I’m excited to have some time with you.

Awesome. So tell me a little bit, Sam, about AFSA, why this charter school, and how you got into this role as executive director.

Well, I’m going to be honest, I never thought I would be a director. I always looked at that job as not my thing. I started as a FIAT and health teacher and a coach. I’m like, this is the dream. This is cake. Like, how could you ever leave this job? Like it’s the best. I got to wear shorts to work and play and hang out with the kids. over your career, you want to improve and get better. And over my history, I just, like student behavior and that’s kind of triggered my admin world. And I just slowly became.

Right?

Sam (01:03.96)

like a dean of students and assistant principal and then this job kind of fell in my hat with some turnover here and

I applied here three years ago and I explained all my tours and students a little bit of our school. I knew nothing about our charter school, right? You said AFSA charter, which is the Academy for Sciences and Agriculture, and no one knows what agriculture was. and I was, I, was, I was four jobs I applied to. It was number four out of four, because I just didn’t know. It was just a job on a job posting, right? But once I came here, then I understood what it meant. And it went from four to one. I didn’t even take the other three because I saw what was

yeah.

Sam (01:39.706)

happening here and I wanted to join that and I just slowly bought into here and I the community accepted me so now I’m sitting here as the executive director now and seven four fifteen years ago in the gym I never thought I would be doing this but we never that’s education that’s the point of school and you’re always wanting to get better and learn yeah

Yeah.

And that’s life life life life takes you down all kinds of roads you never thought. I always told my husband I said man our kids they stretch us in ways I never thought I do. I never thought I’d be the mom the wrestling mom in the stands screaming for my kid to flip him over flip him over you know whatever it is I don’t know I don’t even know what I’m saying half the time but they do they said life just takes you and and it is it is a ride that is

Yeah.

Yep.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (02:29.922)

You don’t get to you don’t get the only there’s only one way to get off right and that’s not a way most people and we all do it But let’s not do it anytime soon, right? So so tell me about AFSA. I was just so you know, I’m I’m a little bit of an agricultural kid myself I was born and raised in Grand Island, Nebraska So my grandparents lived on 120 acre dry land farm For my father was raised on so I know a little bit about it, but I would love to hear and I’m sure our

Yeah. No.

Sam (02:43.531)

Okay.

Sam (02:46.99)

All right.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (02:58.998)

You have way more knowledge than I do. just grew up in that environment.

I came in with nothing. like I was on ground floor. was like, I give my tours. I’m like, I was you. Like, I’m still learning. Um, I think the biggest component, what I explain is I know agriculture, everyone thinks farming, everyone thinks we’re a farm school. You have to be a farmer and that’s not what it is. Like I was about 80 % of at least Minnesota agricultural jobs are actually outside of the farm. So we have a lot of big Minnesota corporations like General Mills and Cargill that it’s agriculture. It’s where’s.

Yeah.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (03:10.446)

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (03:16.418)

Mm-hmm.

Sam (03:32.748)

everything comes from our food, our clothes, everything. So we have classes like food science, like we still have welding, we have wood shop, we actually have a greenhouse on our high school campus where students learn how to plant, take care of the plants, water them, we, they’re in charge, they’re hands-on, and then we sell all of our product back to the public on Mother’s Day weekend. So it’s all these things that…

Mm-hmm.

Sam (03:56.14)

teaching our students that there’s way more in agriculture than just the whole farming thing, even though farming is a big part of it. Yes,

That’s just where it starts. Farming is where it starts. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, so it’s trying to teach kids different ways. know college is great, but we try giving students a different lens. Like our school is a normal school. You can get your diploma. You can come here and know nothing about it, want nothing to do with it, just want my high school diploma and that’s fine. But it’s just like our extra lens, I say, that it allows students another opportunity for leadership, to expand their knowledge, to use their hands, to get out and experience what it means to be in the agricultural and science. Science is big part of it.

So it’s just an extra component of our school, but that’s a little bit what it is.

Right.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (04:41.752)

Yeah, and science and agriculture go together, right? They just really do. You cannot, I mean, there’s so much science that goes into how you grow your crops, rotate your crops and all of that from that perspective. But then what happens to it after it is harvested and where does it go? And what do you do with the soybean? And how do you keep corn from rotting in the bin and all of that stuff too? yeah, fascinating.

Yep.

Sam (05:06.466)

Yep.

Cotton, you know, that was something when we moved, we lived in Michigan. I told you when we started, we lived in Michigan for 19 years and we moved down to Corpus Christi, Texas four years ago. I didn’t realize there were cotton fields on the way down. And I was like, my gosh, honey, look at that cotton. That’s cotton. And it was of course blooming because it was, it was harvest time when we were moving down. And I was like, I didn’t grow up around cotton. I don’t know that much about cotton. I mean, I know that if you pick it, you can, from the movies, you can get cuts on your hands. That’s about it.

Yeah.

Sam (05:37.74)

Yeah.

But that’s, mean, I’m wearing a shirt. It’s, it’s, know, it can be synthetic or it can be cop and or it be a blend or whatever. And that’s all part of it too. So, yeah, very cool.

Yep, so yeah, it’s just an extra little lens.

Yeah, yeah. So, so how, how do you, as an executive director then, advertise and get kids to come to your school? Where, what is, what is the draw? I mean, obviously the agriculture and the science piece of it, but where does that, how do you guys, as a, as a corporate entity, because you’re still a school and you’re still trying to get kids to come, how do you get them to get them interested in coming to your school?

Well, that’s a really actually good question because you should take the agricultural and science out because that’s not why students are coming here. To be a, I give tours, I said before, and like I talk to families, we’re always, you know, doing the Google ads and having events, but when I speak to them, I’m like 95 % of the kids that come here don’t.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (06:25.687)

Okay.

Sam (06:36.334)

know what it means or why they’re coming. They’re not coming for our name. It’s through what has been told to them from other families, other students. And the big thing is we have kind of two sayings. One was a place to fit in and a place to stand out. So we’re a small community. Every teacher knows everyone. We have about between 370 and 450 students, depending on the year and stuff like that. it’s the impact we have on students. That’s the number one goal.

Agricultural and science great getting math and all that but it’s it’s we individualize to make sure that each student is successful and we pave a path for them based on what they need we have a very unique student body I have students that love the egg world and Go headfirst into that we have students that want to be athletes or doctors or lawyers We have kids that want to go to college some that want to go welding in the trades And we have some kids that don’t know or come to us that need a fresh start. So like it’s

you

Sam (07:36.367)

It’s allowing us to adapt to every student. That’s what brings students here. A lot of them were said come here. They’ve did a huge impact on my student. have some, it’s it’s a small class size. It’s allows students to be themselves. yeah, that’s the place to fit in and stand out was our all like our our motto that we always live by.

Awesome.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (07:58.508)

Yeah. So where does, what age does, you start, what grade do you start in? And do you go all the way through high school?

We’re the whole bang. have pre-K. We added last year all the way to 12th grade. So we kind of grew backwards. I wasn’t here through the growth. We’ve been here for 24 years. The previous director was here for 23. So I’m the next. So I’m learning from the smartest one of them all because she has all the knowledge. But we’re a ninth, 10th grade. We kind of slowly grew backwards and into what we are now.

Awesome.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (08:16.526)

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (08:31.662)

Yeah, it’s interesting schools charter schools. I’ve seen that as I’ve done. I think you’re like number 184 of these podcasts that I’ve done. I’ve talked to little schools, big schools, public schools, charter schools, private schools. I’ve talked to them all. Um, but one of the things about charter schools that I have seen is they either start somewhere kindergarten and up, or they start high school and then they, if they’re all, they go backwards with the kids.

Yep.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (08:58.726)

Or as the kids get advanced, get, know, okay, well now our kids are going to be third graders and fourth graders and 10th graders and et cetera, et cetera. And that’s how they grow. So yeah, it’s interesting.

Yep.

Sam (09:07.531)

Yeah, I think the original intent was just to be a high school. That was its original like philosophy. It actually came from the U of because these corporations like Cargill weren’t getting the right employees. And then they would go to the U and say, we’re not getting the right workers. And then the U would say, well, we’re not getting the right students. So it kind of trickled down and that’s kind of how this formed. And then it obviously, just like my career, the school changes and adapts and here we are today.

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (09:21.686)

Mmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (09:34.028)

Yeah, yeah, but the history is there and so the name sticks, right? Absolutely, absolutely. That’s fantastic. So tell me about your passions. What things drive you with what you do? Where does Sam fit into all of that?

Yep. Yeah.

Sam (09:53.143)

Where do I fit in? The touche answer of always saying all my family members are educators, right? Because that’s where we all say it. And it’s true. I just really like what I do. I’m busy. The charter school world, I love being in it because you have hands on. I like having my hands on everything and being involved.

Yeah.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (10:01.805)

Mm-hmm.

Sam (10:13.869)

It’s blessing and a curse, but I really truly do like making differences in student lives. That’s what it comes down to. And I learned that through my education and I learned that through my experience in teaching. Like I just truly want.

I want to be there for them to make them to make the next step so they don’t look back and say, I wish I would have done this. I wish I would have done it differently. I regret doing this. So I really want students to leave high school, not just the academic part of it, but to grow as a person and make an impact when they leave the school. And I think that’s why.

I do what I do. I love working with students. It’s hard for me to stay in my office. That’s the toughest. This job, I have to. Otherwise, I have late nights of emailing. Like, we had a cool event yesterday, but I come back to my computer. like, gosh, what do I got to do now? But I like being out there. And I just make a difference. And they make a difference in my life, too. That’s why I’m probably where I’m at now is because some student along the way directed me towards where I’m going to go.

Mm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (11:06.914)

Yeah. Yeah.

Sam (11:18.229)

It’s fulfilling. It really is.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s something that that I think that I hear a lot from teachers and and and administrators is it’s it’s a it’s a hard job. But and it’s not a job that you’re never going to be a multimillionaire doing this job. But the what you’re paying forward and what you’re given back is the and what you do. You don’t even get to see all of it. I mean, you know, we get to see some of the rewards of it. But

There’s so many things that kids are gonna remember that you did that you, so typical day, right? And that’s cool. That’s really cool thing.

I just found a letter. I was going through some of my stuff in my house and I found it was like my second year teaching a letter from a senior like thanking me because she hated gym class but for some reason we came in you made it better as like that those are the things why I like doing it because it was fine I found it was 15 years later so I kept it.

Yeah.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (12:16.396)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, because it matters and, she’s better because she, you, know, you were in her life, right? It’s very, very cool. That’s very cool. So, what would you say is your biggest challenge?

I the student, think we need to, there’s two parts of this. Students are changing. I don’t think we noticed as much growing up because there wasn’t, we always blame social media, but our world is changing and so are students. And I think sometimes us as educators are not changing as well. So we get in this divide where I’ve done my way and it’s worked for so long. I’ve taught for 10 years and it worked. Well, we’re seeing a shift and I think,

If we keep doing the same thing over and over again and it’s not working, it’s insanity, right? So that’s I think that’s the biggest struggle I see. Every student is capable. They all I know there are students that have difficult situations come from a different background, but they’re they’re they’re able to do things. Word is not finding the way to reach them. I think that’s my biggest struggle is I think the divide between adult and student both stuck on their own ways and allowing us to come in the middle and meet in the middle.

Right?

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (13:25.08)

Mm-hmm.

Sam (13:29.365)

you can blame both sides. I think that’s the biggest struggle I have right now in challenges is finding that middle ground and allowing us to work together. I feel like the world right now we live in, it’s a divide. We’re too polarizing. Let’s come together. that’s not every day, but I think that’s the biggest over-accompassing problem that I see in education right now.

Yeah, and it’s not, it’s not a new problem. It’s just, I just think as technology and AI, especially has become so mainstream in our world. And you look at my generation, because I’m a Gen Xer, I’m 58 years old, I’m older than you, I could probably be your mother, but you know, it’s like we have, we were the generation that grew up drinking out of the,

Water hose and you know get out of the house and be gone until six o’clock and then we’ll call you and then you can come and eat and you Don’t darn well better be there on time, you know, and our parents didn’t worry about us But I mean we didn’t grow up with helicopter parents, you know but and there’s been this shift and and and it’s not necessarily a bad ship But we didn’t have computers. We didn’t AI what the heck, you know 30 years ago. I graduated in 1985. So that’s even that’s 40 what 40. Oh, I’m old

41 years ago now So, you know, it’s like what we had I mean not even cell phones not even you know any of that stuff and And yet, you know, we were fine. We graduated we survived. We survived without seat belts believe it or not car seats, what’s a car seat, right? But you know, it’s like when you go back and you really look at it and you see some of those memes on social media It’s really kind of funny the things that that like we just

It wasn’t anything you ever thought. Lawn darts, lawn darts were fun. Man, they were fun. We were throwing them at each other. Good grief. Yeah. And merry-go-rounds. I love merry-go-rounds. That was my absolute favorite. And when they took them off of the playground, I was heartbroken. It’s like, no, you gotta keep the merry-go-round. Anyway, I digress completely, but you know, that’s not the world that we live in today that isn’t. And it shouldn’t be, you know, we should grow and change. But how do you, and I think that

Sam (15:21.581)

It still can be.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (15:45.902)

My generation gets older and retires and and this is a sad thing to say But I truly think that that shift when that shift happens that you’re gonna see more acceptance and and because every generation goes I Wanted I know the right way to do it right and I’m I’m the one that’s in charge Well when my generation isn’t in charge and and a younger generation comes in I do honestly think and and I’m and please don’t

Please don’t write me and tell me I’m being narrow minded because I’m not trying to be. I’m trying to make a point of there are older people like myself who get it, who are like, we want to embrace the change, but help us, show us how, help us. Half the time I can’t even use my phone because I don’t know what it’s doing.

Or get on my computer. I have smart people. I run a tech company and my family loves to tease me that I’m the least tech person out of everybody in the company and yet I’m the CEO. Well, what do you do when you don’t know you put really smart people around you, right?

Yeah, and it’s the open-mindedness. It’s okay to be wrong. It’s okay to adjust and to learn something new. when I went through my schooling, when I learned I wanted to be administrator, I went through and got your masters and your specialties. And their big thing was your mission statement, right? And I always thought that was goofy. But there’s something around it in knowing your mission. And I always thought leaders, the best leaders create leaders around them. Because once you get soloed and you think you can do it all yourselves, and I’ve failed miserably, fell in my face because I thought,

Mm-hmm.

Sam (17:19.503)

I got this. I don’t want to burden anyone. I will do it and then I fail and I learn trust the people around you and It’s okay to be vulnerable and you don’t know everything so just work together If you could all do that, you’d have no issues, but that’s not school.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Wow, yeah, right? If people would just communicate with each other and listen, yeah, and try something new.

I told my dean, my dean of students, like why won’t they just listen to me or can’t the parents agree with me? I’m like if all the parents agreed with you and the students listen to you, you would be out of a job. So let’s not, let’s not go down that road.

And true. Yeah, yeah. And that’s something I think when you are in a smaller school like you are, how do you work with parents? What is your philosophy when it comes to working with parents?

It’s always got to communicate with them. It gets a little more difficult because they know like you know everyone right and they know all the teachers and there’s personalities and we have to I think the biggest thing is understanding and listening like you said and your your line of work. Listening is key. I will. I want to listen to my parents. I want to listen to my community and hear what they have to say and then work together to a common goal. So I think that’s.

Sam (18:33.803)

It’s hard to do. Even if it’s you know you’re in the right or you know you did this correctly, you still have to take time to listen because it’s their child, right? It’s their they’re taking care of that person and they make the decisions. We are just here to help guide them. They’re driving. We’re the lines in the road and they’re the car so.

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (18:43.896)

Yeah.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (18:53.068)

Right?

Don’t yell at the driver. it’s just finding common ground and it’s okay to have a disagreement. Like I’ll have parents in my office. It’s okay to be mad. It’s okay. Let’s just work together and just be honest. There’s gonna be ups and downs and that’s just being communicate often, right?

Yeah, I love that.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (19:13.324)

Yeah. Yeah. One of the things we did, we did a whole series before I started the podcast, we did a whole series on conflict resolution and, and how, how to deal with conflict resolution. And one of the things that is that I have always taken away from that. And, and even before we did that was there isn’t always like we all, everybody thinks they’re right. Everybody thinks that they are right. I think I’m right. mean, I,

Yep.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (19:39.84)

I but I’ll tell you with maturity comes the wisdom of saying, oops, I’m wrong. I made a mistake. It’s okay to say I made a mistake, right? And and and get that or to say to look at exactly what you said is like, let’s come to a common ground and go, okay, that’s not necessarily how I would have done it. But that might work. And it might work better than my plan. But having that finding that middle place, you know, and I talk about we talk about I try to stay very,

Out of the political arena because it’s just it’s we’re so divided in this country anyways, but but there’s on both sides. I’ve said this a million times on the show. I swear I have. Either side wants their kids to get a good education. Either side, both sides love their children. Both sides want what’s best for their children. That’s why we’re all fighting so hard to get what’s best. Now what I think is best and what you think is best is different.

Yeah, you too.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (20:34.242)

But that doesn’t mean that it’s wrong. It’s just we have to figure out what that middle ground is so that we can go forward instead of just sitting here and back and forth, right?

I’ve said the same thing to them like we are all in educators. We all are here for a purpose. It’s not an easy line of work. There is other jobs that you could go to with less stress. We’re not here to terrorize your student. We’re here together. So I really like how you stated that it’s 99 % of the educators are here to make an impact. So let’s work together.

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (21:06.397)

Mm-hmm Yeah, yeah, and and you know, that’s the whole point of brighter together, you know It’s like I just want to talk to the people that every single day you’re out there. You’re fighting for it You’re fighting for your kids You’re fighting for the students that God has put in front of you to serve and that’s it. That’s exactly what we do here We we fight to serve those kids because the devil doesn’t want us to be successful, you know, it doesn’t there’s no I’m a Christian I’m not gonna you know, I never I never shy away from my faith, but

Yep.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (21:34.446)

Nobody, you know the the universe if you want to say that I don’t care what you want to call it But it’s not it’s not something that is just given to you. It’s not something that’s given to the kids They have to do the work that parents have to help Cooperate with the school as well and the school has to cooperate with the kids and the kids have to cooperate with the parents in the school It’s all all three pieces of that have to come together in order for those kids to be successful And when you do it well

You get exactly what you’ve got, which is a beautiful opportunity for kids to learn and learn. And I love the fact that you said at the beginning, learn based on where they are. I’m, seeing that more and more. So if you could expand on that just a little bit, like the opportunities that kids have to learn based on where they are and what their interests are and making it kid centered. I think that that is such an amazing thing. That’s what IEPs are right. But we’ve taken the IEP and

and applied it more, I think that’s that’s a, a simpleized, simpleized analogy, but, but it’s kind of true.

Yep, that’s a good one.

Yeah, it’s like the 504 experiences and.

Sam (22:45.773)

Parents will come in and say, have a 504 and that’s great. I’m going to promise you though, you’ll give us that 504 and you’ll forget it exists because it’s just kind of a natural thing we do at our school. We want to meet the needs of the student. But like what I mean by like meeting where students are, we have such a unique student body that when they come in, my goal is to find out what works for you, what doesn’t work, what’s your challenges, what’s your roadblocks? what are you here for? That’s the big thing. Like what’s your goal? Let’s get you there. All of our goals are different. Some just need to get out of their senior year.

Mm-hmm.

They might have 65 % in every single class, but that is that’s winning, right? That winning looks different for everyone. So I have kids that want to go on CDE competitions and small engine stuff and go above the above and beyond and be an FFA member and they want to take care of take advantage of every single opportunity that’s given to them.

Mm-hmm, yeah.

Sam (23:35.085)

But I also have students that come here, it’s like I am one year behind. I need some hands on help to get me to where I need to go. So it’s like between that and the high achieving, we’re able to meet with them and get them to where they need to go. Then that’s not because of me or the school, that’s because of the staff. Because if you don’t have, it’s a lot of work. It’s tiresome. can’t have the, I’m going to come at work at 730 and leave at 330 every day. No work goes home, not grading at home. If we had, that won’t get those students

Mm-hmm.

Sam (24:05.109)

there and I’m and that’s okay if you are an educator like that but I have such committed staff here that they just want to help and what they can do and every day is different I could give you a million examples but that’s kind of our philosophy around here so

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (24:19.212)

Yeah. Yeah, and that’s fantastic. And when communities know that that’s what you want for their kids, it just attracts them. then word of mouth, right? Word of mouth, that’s the best one.

Yep. It’s not like a 100 % success rate, right? And I tell, I’m like, you will make mistakes along the way. Just because we want to help you, it’s okay to embrace the mistakes and move on and use them and go on to your next challenge.

Yeah. Wow. 100%. 100%. So one last question. So Sam, if you could miraculously fix one thing, just one thing, can’t be money, can’t be money, in your role as whatever your, wherever your role is, know, all of the things that you think about that are your role, if you could just fix one thing that you would never have to deal with again, what would that one thing be?

To make sure everyone feels confident. Both sides, I think that’s the way we lose whether our ways aren’t working or our teaching style’s not working or students are not doing so well in class. I think it all comes down to self-confidence.

Hmm

Sam (25:33.965)

they think they’re not good enough, they’re not teaching good enough, or they’re scared to try something new, I think it all comes on to our internal self. So if I’m not confident in myself, I probably won’t lead very well. If a student’s not confident to go to school, well, I can tell you they might be the ones that are hiding in the bathrooms, right? So I think it would be life-changing, world-changing if we could just bring the confidence up and understand to be confident in yourself.

It won’t bring perfection, but it will allow us to at least take two steps forward and one step back instead of the opposite. that’s my off the top.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. It’s a great one. It’s a great one. It’s a great one. I’ll tell you, I tell people it’s like, how do you how do you start your own company? I’ve asked that question. How do you start your own company? How do you how do you get to where you are, Janet? And it’s like, I just kept doing it every day. You just do it every day. You have to believe that this is I felt like this was what I was being called to do. And I have been called to do it.

Yep.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (26:35.978)

And I just every single day was it easy? Wasn’t what did I feel like every day that I’ve it’s funny when you put CEO behind your name, when you put CEO, whether you’re qualified, win quotes qualified to be a CEO or not. I feel like I’m a CEO now. I really do. I feel like I have eight years I’ve gotten to the place where it’s like, yeah, I get I get the financials. I get that. I always get them right. But I don’t get anything always right. Nobody does. But you just keep I

No.

fake it till you make it. You just keep doing it. You just keep believing that what you’re doing has power and that you, and there are people that are not gonna believe in you and there are people that are gonna go, wow, wow, she’s, know. And when you have that confidence, I love it. There’s a, I’m gonna really age myself right now. Jean-Luc Picard was on a planet somewhere in Star Trek and he was, whatever this planet was, he was with his medical officer and I can’t remember her name, but.

And and it was like everything you could tell other people’s feelings based on what they were and someone’s gonna go Oh, I know exactly what rest episode that was or whatever I just it’s one of those things that stuck with me and all of a sudden she knew how he was feeling and and she’s he’s like she’s like which way do we go and he’s the leader and he’s on a planet he doesn’t know anything he’s like this way and she stops and he said she says you don’t really know I can tell you don’t really know and he’s like

No, I don’t know, but that way looks good. So we’re going that way. It’s just a decision. You know, you just make a decision and you go with it. And remember how I said, if you make a mistake, you admit your mistakes and you go, I screwed up. You have to, when you’re a leader like that, you have to go, yeah, it was my decision. You have to own it. You have to own your mistakes, right? Yeah. You can’t do it. You hide them, you hide your mistake and it’s going to be, it’s all it’s going to do is grow and blow.

Sam (28:16.183)

Yes.

Sam (28:23.799)

Never hide them. Never hide your mistakes.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (28:31.5)

You know, it’s going to blow up blow up in your face. So you might as well just go. Yep. That was me. I screwed that up. That was me. I take it and I’ll tell you what other thing too. and I feel like I’m on a soapbox here. But the other thing that you always do with your staff and I’m sure you do this is you give them the opportunity to say, yep, I made a mistake, but you don’t berate them for it. You go, you love them through it and you go, okay, we made a mistake. You made a mistake. We will fix it and we’ll move on.

was fun.

Sam (29:00.493)

I I 100 % agree.

Yeah, yeah. Well, Sam, I feel like I’m preaching to the choir and I don’t mean to.

You are. No, it’s all resonates with me. That whole like my biggest probably it would tell me it’s weird in my leadership. My wife and I bought a small business. Now we sold it about six years ago, a little sandwich shop in our downtown Hudson. And we didn’t know it was failing really.

Mm-hmm.

So we had like four years of getting a failing business back up financially and it was the biggest, like I’m just going to go with it and learn as I go. And that was really what helped my confidence of just cause you kept failing. But if you keep doing it, then finally six years, we saw a little bit of profit, but then I was moving on with my job. So we had to sell it, but like that, those things I could have easily quit and just said, I’m done. I’m not over my head. This is way too many hours, but if that’s what it is, it just do it again.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (29:39.042)

Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (29:46.572)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

riverside lighthouse therapy raw video cfr brighter together   0579 (29:54.572)

Yeah, just keep doing it. Yeah, just keep doing it. Yeah. And that’s why you’re an executive director. It’s obvious that that is exactly why you are where you are because the kids are going to win because of you. So, so Sam, it’s been a blessing to have you on the show. Thank you so much for being on brighter together. Where do people go if they want to learn a little bit more about Aftsa and about you?

Wake up and repeat.

Sam (30:16.205)

So we have our website, afsahighschool.com. You can find a lot of our information there. But if you look up AFSA Charter School, Instagram, Facebook, we’re all on the social media side of things. if you ever want to learn more, you can always contact me.

Awesome and AFSA as a FSA for those of you I mean I know you’ve said the whole thing but I wanted to you know if those of you that are listening and not on the Video or whatever. I just want to make sure people have that so

Yep.

Sam (30:42.123)

It’s, it’s, yep, you’re correct. A F S A, but you can probably do it about 15 different ways. Cause we obviously as our school adapted, our names change, our websites change the URLs. It all, if you Google it, you will get there at some point.

You’ll find, we’ll find you. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Google’s amazing. Yeah, for sure. And it’s become a verb, noun that’s become a verb. We Google everything. It’s a thing. Yeah. You can take any noun and make it a verb. It’s kind of fun. So awesome. Well, stay warm. I know that the weather is supposed to be, it’s January 22nd right now and it’s supposed to be cold. So stay warm and thank you once again for being on Brighter Together, because we’re brighter together.

Thank you so much for having me.

Absolutely.

All right.