It would be a lie to say that I predicted my professional path or even the extent to which my experiences would intersect and become this *gestures at career*. Working towards a Masters of Social Work, I studied the healthcare system just as President Barack Obama helped to make it a national talking point, during his first campaign. 

 

My first big stride into the world of work was at a large social service non-profit profit organization. This was key. I already had an interest in healthcare reform, and to that, I added knowledge and experience in the areas of program delivery, fundraising policy, and advocacy. Practicing these skills built an appetite to create change and the desire to acquire more tools to effect that change. 

 

Anti-oppression played a role in my pivot to education when a Dean recruited me because the institution wanted to be intentional about having instructors who looked and sounded like the students they served. I was present at the intersection of youth, expertise & social background at the precise moment when those characteristics were salient. 

 

So even with minimal experience in teaching, I was the right person for the job. I was skeptical but she assured me that anything I needed to know about teaching and adult learning, I could learn myself. And I did - but it was an opportunity extended to me because of who I was - I was trained to understand how systems work and now I was understanding what that meant as an educator, trainer, mental health practitioner, and leadership coach. 

 

Not every experience in the public and private sectors came with the same commitment at an institutional or even an individual level. There were times at different institutions where my role was to lead systems change and I discovered that the people in important positions resisted change because it would mean relinquishing power. That rejection of my ideas and intent led me to orient towards anti-oppression because it asks us to analyze power and to think of our active role in the self-to-systems model as we contribute to justice-oriented change.