Rachael Mahmood has been on the road for the past year asking educators across Illinois about what belonging means to them and what school districts can do to support educators.

Mahmood, a veteran elementary school teacher at Indian Prairie School District 204, was named Illinois Teacher of the Year in 2024. One of the perks of the title is being able to take a year off to pursue professional development. Mahmood decided to spend the year traveling around the state facilitating conversations about belonging, known as World Cafes, with educators and school communities.

As a student of color growing up in a predominantly white suburb outside of Chicago, Mahmood always felt like an outsider and has been on a search to figure out how to ensure students and educators feel like they belong.

“Right now, a lot of people are talking about how do we attract teachers to the field, how do we attract students to become teachers, and how do we retain teachers,” said Mahmood regarding the idea behind her project. “And so I kind of married that need right now in the community with this idea of belonging.”

Throughout the year, Mahmood organized about 50 meetings across Illinois, which attracted crowds ranging from 30 to 600 people. Nearly 2,500 participants came out in total, she said, and almost 2,000 of them work in schools. The meetings were open to educators, students, and families. Mahmood traveled all over the state, visiting school communities in rural, suburban, and urban areas.

Mahmood would ask participants to sit in small groups, and she would provide them with discussion topics, such as how they define belonging, what their schools strengths and challenges are when it comes to making people feel like they belong, and what action steps they want to see their school take to increase a sense of belonging. Right after, she would survey the groups.

Mahmood took the data she received from participants and ran it through an artificial intelligence program that helped her understand what participants wanted. She found that many of the teachers’ answers differed based on their racial or ethnic background and their years of service.

Read the full article about what belonging means to educators by Samantha Smylie at Chalkbeat.