A recent listen to an old James Brown and Fred Wesley album called to mind the importance of self-empowerment. In their 1974 song “Damn Right I Am Somebody,” Mr. Brown asks those present in the studio, “Are you somebody?” Each response is a variation of “Yes, I am somebody.” It struck me that the music conveys the same message we need to share with our students: authenticity, creativity, and soul—a dose of which can reawaken education from a long slumber of reliance on policy compliance over deep understanding. If we as educators aim to deliver the individual to a higher plane of thought and capacity and provide a classroom climate that accomplishes this with integrity, we must leave space for each student to raise their voice with confidence to say, “I am somebody! These are my ideas!”
