We were lucky to catch up with Miriam Burlakovsky Correia recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Miriam, thanks for sharing your insights with our community today. Part of your success, no doubt, is due to your work ethic and so we’d love if you could open up about where you got your work ethic from?
I think I developed my work ethic watching my family, who emigrated from the former Soviet Union, make a life for themselves in the U.S. My parents and grandparents were incredibly hardworking. My paternal grandmother worked 2-3 jobs at a time: working as a seamstress during the day and spending the evenings and nights with elderly patients.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I work with the most behaviorally challenging students in schools. I am regularly kicked, punched, scratched, bitten, hit, and have had objects thrown at me every day for weeks at a time. And I keep showing up. DAY. AFTER. DAY. Imagine your brother, sister, son or daughter, best friend goes to work, gets head butted on their second day and then keeps going to that same job. You would think they were nuts, right? I’ve had special education teachers break noses and receive multiple concussions. I regularly chase kids across campus, using physical restraints as a last resort, but often blocking physical aggression directed toward me. I conduct risk assessments, call the mobile crisis unit for threat to self/others, make CWS reports, and hold space for students’ stories… and it all takes a toll (vicarious trauma).
On top of it all – parents are suing districts, so we are also stuck in 4 hours IEPs every other week with attorneys and trying to defend ourselves and our colleagues while the attorneys and educational advocates undermine our credibility and accuse us of not caring. And that’s not even considered the worst – I have friends who sat in depositions all summer!
These factors, on top of limited resources, high staff turn over, huge caseloads, and COVID-induced social, emotional, behavioral, academic, and attention deficits, it’s no wonder teachers are leaving the profession in droves.
As a school psychologist, I witnessed first-hand the toll that chronic stress and burnout takes on educators, especially special education teachers. I have teachers in my office on a weekly basis: venting, crying, hanging on by a thread, wanting to quit or going out on stress leave. I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing.
Motivated to make a difference, I dove into the research on the adverse effects of toxic stress, as well as what we can do about it. Employee burnout, motivation, satisfaction, and work/life balance are hot topics in the news. Building on the latest leadership books, stress management literature, resilience-informed practices, and Self-Determination Theory, I focused in on teachers’ and other educators’ unique challenges and needs, including factors in teacher turnover and retention, the role of personality differences, and the biological, psychological, social, and spiritual factors influencing resilience in education. That is how The Association for the Wellbeing of Educators (A.W.E.) was born!
We are now a non-profit, supporting educators with live and pre-recorded professional development, coaching, mentorship, retreats, and community support for their physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and professional needs. We’re thrilled to announce the release of the Mindful Miri App in December 2023, where all these resources will be in one place!
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
My greatest strengths lie in my empathy, love of learning, and action-oriented nature. As an emotional empath, I sense other people’s feelings, easily taking on their perspective and curating content to create a meaningful experience. I also love learning and measure my daily success by whether or not I’ve learned something each day. I often geek out and go down several rabbit holes before I come up for air and realize hours have gone by. In addition, my love of learning facilitates my action-oriented nature: I initiate tasks, make decisions quickly, and tend to “try things out” when they are low cost, rather than deliberately endlessly. While others may talk about starting a podcast for three years, I just start. After all, what do I have to lose?
I LIVE to use my empathy, love of learning, and action-oriented nature to awaken insights in others. Everything I have done has been to benefit others and I curate the information to each audience: from facilitating workshops on the Holocaust, Civil Rights Movement, fitness training, teaching yoga/ meditation/ mindfulness, to tutoring students for the SAT and AP exams, teaching children with autism new skills, training parents to improve their child’s behavior, assessing for disabilities (including autism, intellectual disabilities, learning disabilities, ADHD, mood disorders, and other neurodiverse conditions and disorders), developing academic and behavioral interventions, providing counseling services, designing professional development to educators, coaching and training teachers in equitable, inclusive, and resilience-informed evidence-based practices, starting a nonprofit, starting a podcast, writing a book about body positivity, and so much more.
For those early on in their journey, I will quote Jen Gottlieb: “Don’t compare your chapter 1 to someone’s chapter 20.” Come with a beginner’s mind: curious, receptive, and open to new learning and experiences. Always approach others with the mindset of supporting and connecting them with resources. When in doubt in your business or creative journey, take small steps to build your confidence and pivot as needed. Every situation brings knowledge and experience to move you toward living your life’s purpose.
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
I hate the idea of “sales.” I want to leave people better in one way or another: by guiding them, solving a problem, or connecting them to a resource. But I struggle with the idea of people paying me for my work. That’s why I felt better going the non-profit route with A.W.E. The problem is, if I don’t get paid, I won’t be able to keep doing what I’m doing and make an impact, so I need to focus on tasks that will fund the non-profit, not just on things I enjoy or that make me feel productive.
Each day, I have three non-negotiable tasks I need to accomplish to move the needle on funding. I might reach out to 2 new sponsors, record a meditation, and schedule a batch of content with a call to action to enroll.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.awesomeeducators.org/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/awesomeeducators/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/awesomeeducators/
- Other: Recess Reset Meditation: https://insighttimer.com/mindful_miri/guided-meditations/reset-for-burnt-out-teachers
https://mindfulmiri.buzzsprout.com/2007387/13560013
Image Credits
Bonni Pacheco
