‘More Great Seats 4 Kids’ Podcast: Growing Teachers from Within – The DREAM Teaching Fellowship
In this episode of the State University of New York (SUNY) Charter Schools Institute’s More Great Seats 4 Kids podcast, the Institute’s Mike Lesczinski is joined by Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer at DREAM, and Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment at DREAM, for a conversation on building sustainable teacher pipelines from within school communities. They discuss the origins and growth of the DREAM Teaching Fellowship, why DREAM prioritizes alumni and community members as future educators, and how the fellowship supports both teacher development and long-term student success. The episode explores recruitment, retention, mentorship, and professional growth, while highlighting how investing in homegrown talent strengthens school culture and advances DREAM’s commitment to generational impact.
Episode Guests
About DREAM
Founded in 1991 in East Harlem, DREAM began as a baseball program for neighborhood youth. Today, it is a network of seven schools in East Harlem and the South Bronx serving young people from birth through early adulthood — through 0-4 early childhood programs, extended-day and extended/year school model for students in grades K-12, and six years of alumni support after high school graduation. DREAM serves more than 3,000 students and alumni across East Harlem and the South Bronx. With strong academic results, free afterschool and summer programs, deep family partnerships, and healthy school meals cooked on-site, DREAM supports the whole child — so young people are prepared for school, college, and career.
Episode Transcript
Mike Lesczinski, Director of Strategy, SUNY Charter Schools Institute:
Welcome to the State University of New York Charter Schools Institute’s More Great Seats For Kids podcast. I’m your host, Mike Lesczinski, Director of Strategy and Communications at the Institute.
Originally founded in 1991 as Harlem RBI, DREAM has grown to serve thousands of youth across East Harlem and the South Bronx through a network of Pre-K through 12, extended-day, extended-year DREAM Charter Schools and youth development programs.
Now, DREAM is recruiting its own graduates (Legends) and part-time staff to be the next generation of teachers at its schools.
Today, DREAM Chief People Officer Kalila Hoggard and Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment Ana Rader are here to share more about the exciting program.
Before we begin, please take a moment to review the podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast feeds. Your feedback is essential to ensuring more listeners can find our program and learn about the exciting work taking place in SUNY authorized charter schools.
Now let’s get on with the show.
Mike Lesczinski:
Kalila, Anna, thank you so much for joining us here today.
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
Thanks for having us.
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
Yes, thank you.
Mike Lesczinski:
I know I’m capturing both of you during the middle of a school day, and I know you both must be incredibly busy, so I really appreciate you taking your time to be with us. I asked you both to come on today to talk about DREAM’s Teaching Fellowship, teaching recruitment, retention, and issues that are bubbling up in most every school. At the same time, we also know schools are seeing more of a focus on supporting students post-graduation. With this program, you managed to create something that does both of these together, so I’m very excited to hear about the fellowship.
But first, let’s start with a little bit of a softball question. I want to give you both a chance to tell us about DREAM and what makes it special, to set the stage for listeners.
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
I’ve had the pleasure of being at DREAM for over 11 years. One of the things that I think makes DREAM so special is the way that we’re really able to balance incredibly high expectations, big goals that we’re trying to accomplish, with a really incredible amount of care. We don’t see high expectations, care, and love in opposition. We really see the balance of those two things as where the magic happens. And I think that’s true in everything that we do at DREAM.
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
And what also makes DREAM so special is just how invested we are in a child’s life, from early childhood all the way into early adulthood. Cradle-to-career success means starting with early childhood, elementary, middle, and high school. Many students have their first job with us in high school and are supported for six years after graduation with postsecondary guidance and resources. I think that’s really special and unique.
Mike Lesczinski:
I love that. Kalila, how did your journey with DREAM begin? What has kept you here?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
As I mentioned, I’ve been at DREAM for over a decade. I joined in 2014, coming from a background of experience in classroom teaching, but also working for a nonprofit that was part of a community school model. When I got to DREAM, I was really impressed by the way that DREAM brings together whole child investment, family and community, with really rigorous academics. I’ve been lucky to be able to grow alongside the organization as we’ve grown in scale, but also in the way that we deepen the work that we do. The thing that really keeps me here, first and foremost, are the people. A lot of people I’ve been able to be teammates with for over a decade are still here. We really have this orientation toward innovation and continuous improvement, and it’s not just for the sake of innovation. It truly is oriented toward tackling the big, most important issues in education and really thinking about how we better create systems of equity and fight against the systems of inequity that our communities face every day.
Mike Lesczinski:
Ana Rader, what did your path to DREAM look like, and how does that shape the way you think about developing future educators?
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
I joined DREAM seven years ago as a part-time member of our talent team after many years working with students and families directly in schools. I came on full time about six years ago to launch this teaching fellowship and to be able to grow in and build it from the ground up. In that time, it’s been very powerful to see our culture of development in real time. People who were teachers when I first started are now deans and teacher leaders. Deans are now principals. To grow alongside my colleagues makes me feel further invested in growing teachers in our organization.
Mike Lesczinski:
As DREAM grows and serves more students, what becomes most important about how you build your teaching staff?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
I think how we do the work is as important as what we do. One of the things that we realized, even before the teacher shortage that came to a head during COVID, was that while technical skills are really important, we also saw our most effective teachers as the ones who had been here a long time and had really deep connections to our students and to the community. We thought about how to take members of the community who are already here and think about an opportunity for them to grow within the teaching profession and have a career within teaching, to really ensure that they’re excited not only about teaching itself, but about DREAM and what it means to be part of it.
Mike Lesczinski:
Why prioritize alumni and part-time staff for the fellowship?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
First and foremost, we think about our long-term goals of ensuring that we’re an organization that one day is run by alumni. This is one really important pathway for ensuring that alumni are able to become the engine that moves DREAM forward in the future. We also think it’s really impactful for young people to see leaders in their classrooms and in their organization who were in those seats not too long ago and what that does for a sense of possibility. People who are just like them, who were in their seats not too long ago. What that really does for a sense of possibility for a third grader or for a high schooler.
Jenya, one of our former fellows, who has been one of our most successful elementary school teachers, comes to the work with an orientation toward building deep partnerships with families. Many of the families she works with see themselves in her, and we think that’s a critical part of our work.
Mike Lesczinski:
Walk us through what a year in the life of a DREAM Teaching Fellow looks like.
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
It’s a busy year. Our fellows are typically hired in the spring and meet their mentor at some point over the summer and then join DREAM’s New Staff Institute alongside other DREAM teachers and new-to-DREAM staff. So they really hit the ground running with learning the foundations of our curriculum and our model and the way we do things. And then once students join us, they follow a gradual release of responsibility in the classroom. In the fall, they might first be observing or providing one-on-one redirection to students, but pretty quickly they start leading transitions, desk to rugs. If they are an elementary teacher, they are leading morning meeting and taking on more responsibility in the classroom. Bit by bit, they start launching lessons, ELA and then math. By late winter and spring they’re operating similarly to a lead teacher, under the guidance and observation of their mentor teacher. That mentor is instrumental to their growth, providing real-time coaching and feedback but making sure that it’s bite sized and actionable to a pre-service teacher. Our mentors are great because they can really explain what they’re doing and why and they’re willing to have someone who’s really new to the procession in their classroom and integrate them fully.
Students are not seeing the fellow as different from their lead teachers.
Fellows are also part of a cohort experience. They know each other and come together roughly every six weeks to support one another emotionally and answer questions about their journeys.
They might coach a sports team. One of our fellows is our cheerleading coach.
Mike Lesczinski:
How do you become a mentor as part of this program?
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
It’s a great opportunity for our highly effective teachers to grow in their practice, especially in coaching and developing other adults. We have a selection process where our principals identify which high-leverage teachers are in a great position to coach the next generation. Kalila, I don’t know if you have anything you want to add?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
Yeah. This is a very literal teacher fellowship and the fellows who are coming and growing and becoming lead teachers. But also, the fellowship gives an opportunity for our strongest teachers to think about their practice and grow into leadership as well. So at many levels and layers we are thinking about how we’re growing from within.
Mike Lesczinski:
Fellows are working full time, participating in professional development, and in some cases pursuing degrees. How do you support them in balancing all of that?
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
One piece is our selection process for the fellowship. We are looking for people who have demonstrated an ability to manage multiple priorities at the same time. Many fellows might have worked full time while pursuing degrees or managed multiple jobs in the past. I’m also hiring fellows who have great self-care practices or who have hobbies and interests that can prevent burnout and sustain them in this really difficult work. But once they join, the cohort experience has a supportive pace every six weeks, that allows them to focus on pursuing their degree or their certification. I am also fortunate to be able to support them in navigating systems related to registration, their school bill. I may not have all the answers, but I can be a teammate and help them navigate any barriers.
Mike Lesczinski:
So, the professional development series. There’s a heavy focus on communication, resilience, time management, and professional identity. Why was it important to design the program that way?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
We’re a data-driven organization, oriented to continuous improvement. And one of the things we learned early on that is that fellows needed additional support around these topics. Many teacher preparation and certification programs don’t focus on what it means to be an early-career professional. Many of our young fellows are entering their first full-time professional role. We wanted to provide the support to set them up for success. What does professional communication look like? How do you deal with conflict in the workplace in a productive way? How do you manage all these different competing priorities and make sure you are leveraging your time well? We see this as important to the long term success of our fellows, especially as they move into full time lead teaching positions.
Mike Lesczinski:
What have you seen in fellows that makes you confident this model works?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
Really, it’s the deep connection that fellows have to their students and their commitment to making a positive impact in the community. Earlier this year, I met with a group of 11th grade DREAM students who wanted to learn what it’s like to be a teacher. So, I invited some of our former teaching fellow who are now DREAM teachers to speak with them. And one was our current high school teachers who is an alumni of DREAM. When he left, several students on their own just jumped in to share how impactful this teacher had been when he taught them in ninth grade and how they just felt seen and understood. They talked about how he helped them not just learn history, but mature and grow as a person. So, to me, that’s what it’s all about.
And we’ve seen a focus within the sector on how to recruit and retain teachers. And while we’ve seen positive improvement in growth in overall teacher retention, the retention of our fellowship graduates actually outpaces that. And we’ve had 100 percent of those who successfully completed the followship and receive a full time offer with us, stay on with us. We really believe that’s because they start with the deep knowledge and commitment to the organization and our community. They are signing up for this an experience to think about their career at DREAM, not just a job. So that; s been hugely impactful and why we believe this model works.
Mike Lesczinski:
How do educators who grew up in DREAM or have deep community roots influence school culture?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
The best champions of the organization are the people who have gone through it and the positive experiences they had. You don’t have to reteach the culture. They have it deep within it, they embody it.
We see the impact and positivity even among our existing staff time and time again of what it feels like to have somebody who once taught in the classroom as part of the fellowship now sitting in the room with them as a peer. I think it’s also fulfilling to our teachers and those who’ve been here a long time to see their long term growth. So our culture keeps reinforcing and growing from all angles.
We have people who get it and who have DREAM in their souls.
Mike Lesczinski:
Where do you hope the Teaching Fellowship is five years from now?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
We hope this continues to unlock access to teaching careers, especially for alumni and people on longer pathways to degrees. This is a way to provide greater access to teaching careers and create a self-sustaining teaching workforce that grows from within. We hope that we can fill all of our teaching roles from our fellowship and not have to look outside the community. That would have an incredible long term impact.
Mike Lesczinski:
If a DREAM alumnus or part-time staff member is listening and wondering if they’re ready, what would you say?
Ana Rader, Director of Seasonal and Fellowship Recruitment, DREAM:
I love this question. I would say if you’re energized by the thought of spending time with students and adults who are committed to students in a rigorous environment, and you want to grow, and you want a challenge, then you should apply. What’s great is if you are still pursuing your bachelor’s degree or want to reengage with your bachelor’s degree, the fellowship can also support you. If you want to become a teacher who makes a difference, the DREAM Teaching Fellowship is for you.
Mike Lesczinski:
Last question. When you picture a DREAM classroom led by a former DREAM student, what does that represent for the future of your DREAM community?
Kalila Hoggard, Chief People Officer, DREAM:
We get to see that in reality and see the impact every day, and it’s truly one of our greatest organizational accomplishments, having our alumni as the next generation leaders. We’re an organization that’s committed to generational change and impact. We see the strength and positivity of the fellowship and hope this becomes a model of impact.