How Relief Roster Fixes Substitute Chaos ft. Kyle Sumrow | My EdTech Life 346

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 0:10

Hello, everybody, and welcome to another great episode of My Ed Tech Life. Thank you so much for joining me on this wonderful day and wherever it is that you're joining us from around the world. Thank you as always for engaging with our content. Thank you so much for all the likes, the shares, the follows. Thank you so much to our amazing sponsors, EduAid, Book Creator, Yellow Dig, and our newest sponsor, Peelback Education. Thank you all for your support and bringing some great conversations into our education space so that we may continue to learn and grow together. And today I am excited to welcome a wonderful guest. His name is Kyle Sumro, and I had the opportunity to meet Kyle at the Tech My School conference. Uh, if you are if you've heard Tech My School, you've probably, you know, are familiar with Robbie Cobbs, who was recently a guest on the show too as well. But I would love to welcome Kyle to the show. Kyle, how are you doing this morning?

Kyle Sumrow: 1:05

I'm doing great. Thanks so much for having me on, Fonse. Appreciate it. Love your show.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:08

Yes, absolutely. Thank you so much for uh reaching out and saying, like, hey man, like I want to be on your show and I've got some great stuff to share. And I'm really excited about that because, as you know, this is what we do here on our show. We love to just find some amazing educators, professionals, builders within the education space that are creating solutions for some of those problems or little things, obstacles that we may run into on our day-to-day and operations as well. So, Kyle, thank you so much for uh joining me today. So, Kyle, before we get started and we dive into the meat of the matter as far as relief roster, because we'll be talking about that. Kyle, can you give my audience members who are not familiar with your work just yet a little brief introduction and what your context is within the education space?

Kyle Sumrow: 1:57

Yeah, sure. Um, so I started my teaching career um in Minneapolis uh as a school bus driver. I think we've all had that same start, right? I had this very random, uh circuitous route into ed tech, but um started substitute teaching for that school and realized how much I loved teaching. So I actually, my bachelor's degree is in music. I went to Berkeley College of Music in Boston, got a degree in audio engineering and then um technically music production in engineering. Um great program, was looking for work and found work as a school bus driver while I was looking for work in recording studios and actually decided to change years totally because I loved being in the classroom. So St. Mary's University of Minnesota, shout out to my peeps in Winona. Um I ended up getting a um teaching license, 512 life science. We were just laughing off air too. I've uh I went back to school well for like an additional what 65 undergraduate credits in life science and other sciences, um, and ended up teaching basically everything except for science during most of my teaching career. So I've I've taught mostly computer science and digital media filmmaking, of course on media bias was really interesting. Um, and and was a was a tech admin, right? So was um head of technology at several different schools, all over the world, actually. So been in five countries. Um first overseas post was in Cameroon in Yaounde. Uh after that, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia at the American International School, Jeddah, then to IS Bern in Bern, Switzerland, and then uh actually back to Minnesota for one year to finish my master's degree. That's a funny long story about how the provost contacted me and said, your credits are about to expire for that master's you started 12 years ago or something. You know, I was like, we should probably go home and finish that. So I finished my master's and then uh went to Vietnam after that. Came back to Houston, back to my hometown, uh, came to Episcopal High School, was the director of technology and innovation here in uh Houston for at Episcopal for five years, and now have gone full time with Tech My School. So uh, if you didn't hear the interview with Robbie, you should listen to it. But um Robbie's one of my closest friends and has is one of the most inspirational educators I've ever met. Um, has such a fascinating background. And uh he and I worked together in Saudi. Actually, that's how we know each other. Um, and we started doing some work together in Saudi that he really took on board and kind of ran with and turned it into this amazing um assessment tool that we use to assess schools. When we go into start a relationship with a school, we basically start off with um uh helping run them through a self-study that is a really great non-judgmental way for them to self-identify what they want to do, what their vision is for technology. And um, so I I actually I'm working with him full time now because when he came to Episcopal, we had him come in and do that assessment with my team. And I was completely floored uh by the results of what we found. And I think in my ego, I was thinking, now what's this guy works with these schools in Puerto Rico? What's he gonna be able to do for us? We're this big, you know, high-powered, high-achieving, uh, really fantastic private school here in in Houston. And we we learned a ton about ourselves. Um, we learned that we did have it really amplified the good that we were doing, but then it also pointed out a few things that um we had never thought about before. So I think that's the beauty of the whole process with Tech My School. Um, but yeah, so that's where I am now. I'm the director of outreach and development um for the organization. I I helped to raise money so that we can essentially take on as many schools as we possibly can in Puerto Rico. So um, yeah, it's it's been really great. And um the reason I'm really on here talking to you is about software, right? And software design has been uh just something during my career that I have been able to use to solve problems for schools. And problems come up, and when you're sort of like mired in it, when you're in the in the weeds uh working through these problems in schools in real time, um, it's really helpful to have a skill set to be able to generate pieces of software that are totally useful for the schools, right? That can um systematize and and automate some of the processes that schools struggle with.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 6:16

And that is fantastic. Um I mean, Kyle, like I got to meet you at Tech My School, and it was just fantastic. I think you had just come on board uh there too as well. So it's great that you are working with Robbie, and I do agree Robbie is definitely kind of like uh on a whole other level and even sometimes wavelength. Uh, but he is fantastic. Like you said, he definitely has a heart for education, and he's definitely doing some great things. And today I'm also thankful that you get to be on the show too, as well. And talking a little bit about like we mentioned prior to the show, this that this may like you mentioned, he's like, well, it's just some software, it may be like unsexy software, but you know, sometimes I totally unsexy. Yeah, totally unsexy software. But you know what? It's like sometimes what we think and what you may think that is unsexy could be something that is potentially something that is great. And and the way that I learned about this, obviously, is that you you reached out to me, but seeing and hearing a little bit about what this can do, I think that this is something that is great as far as, like you mentioned, uh creating systems or having systems within your schools to be able to do certain things. And today we're gonna be talking about relief roster. So I want to ask you before we really dive in into you know what really uh you know is is relief roster when you'll demo this for us and everything. But I want to ask you, you know, in your educator mindset and and again, very interesting background, you know, going into from Berkeley school bus driver, and then becoming an international teacher, and then you know, being a uh tech director and innovator or innovative in innovations or tech director and innovations, I think you mentioned that at Episcopal Director of Technology and Innovation was my uh that was my role at Episcopal. There you go. And then Episcopal and now at Tech My School. I mean, you have seen education from some amazing lenses and also getting different perspectives. So I want to ask you, you know, where where did this idea of relief roster come from?

Kyle Sumrow: 8:46

Yeah, um, I would say it came from a pain point that is, it's almost like that death by a thousand paper cuts sort of a scenario. It's something that every school deals with. And uh public schools have there's a couple of pieces of software that exist that are very, very expensive that that do some of what this product does. So my product is a little bit different now. So I'll I'll explain some of the things I didn't tell you before the show about what it does now. But um I I was really shooting for something that schools who are under-resourced would not be, you know, scared out of the market, basically, um, just because we had this great product. Wow, they're really excited that they can't afford it. I don't want that to ever be the case. I don't want anyone to say no because they can't afford my software. Um, if they say no, it's because they already have a solution or they just love pain or something. So um in in schools, back to your question. Uh, the schools that I had worked in, um, by and large, they they were they were resourced very differently from each other, right? Some huge budgets and some way less, but they all have the same problem. And to me, like that's a signal, that's a red flag, uh, that something needs to be created. If all of these schools have similar issues, then why is there not a solution for it? Um, and so I was in a position where I'm a total nerd. I love spreadsheets. I've always loved spreadsheets, and I'm good with spreadsheets. And and and that's something it's like when you know how to change somebody, you know, change the brakes on your car, you try not to share that with anyone because then you're gonna get calls about I'm changed my brakes. The spreadsheet thing maybe a little different, but um, I would I would say that a lot of the the ways that I solve these problems, if you're familiar with a Rube Goldberg machine where you create something incredibly complex to solve a simple problem, that's how my spreadsheet solutions started to feel at some point. Um, I mean, you could ask some of my old colleagues. So, like if somebody types the wrong thing in the wrong cell, it destroys this whole cascade of spreadsheets. And I thought, this is just untenable trying to make I I would create something that worked, but like nobody wants to look at a spreadsheet. So then my I first started developing by um creating web apps. So I was creating web apps using Google Scripts to be able to interface with Google Sheets. And uh I every listener, by the way, just fell asleep as soon as I started saying that. But um I I got to the point where what I realized was users don't want to look at spreadsheets because they don't love them the way that I love them. So I was able to create an interface that was super simple for people to put in information and it would populate the spreadsheet. They never had to look at the spreadsheet. They don't even know there's a spreadsheet, right? So out of sight, out of mind for them. They're like, oh, this guy created a solution for this thing and it seems to be working. Um, the fewer people that were actually like able to mess up the code in my spreadsheets, the better for me. But I also still felt like there needs to be an actual interface for this that works, that is, that's that's functional, that's beautiful. I taught design. It was one of the things I love. I love design, right? I hate it that we refer to STEM and not Steam, because the A, the arts piece, that design part is absolutely essential. I would challenge you to find, you know, um, one of the you know big tech company CEOs who is not very in tune with the fact that like UX UI has to be on point um in order for people to enjoy using your product. Your product can be great, but if it looks like a website from 1998, nobody's gonna use it. So um yeah, so I guess that was a long answer to a simple question. Um, but I like solving problems that people have, and I find that software is a really interesting way to be able to go about doing that.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 12:24

There you go. Now Relief Roster. So tell us about with Relief Roster, what was the what is the pain point? Because I know we talked a little bit right prior to the chat, and I have seen it plethora of different ways that many school districts handle, you know, uh substitutes. Is that that's what we're gonna be talking about? Yeah, but I thought that it was something that was very unique in the way that uh relief roster can help set up the process and make it very customizable, where it's not just kind of like the next sub that's on the queue, or when you call a sub, it's like, well, they didn't want to, they didn't want the job, so it just skips over. But now you can actually what what I love and what I can see this, if I'm in charge of this, you know, at my campus or district, I would find obviously my pool of substitutes and then be able to divide them up by skill sets, divide them up by knowledge based, and divide them up in a certain way where now I can be like, okay, for this situation or for this uh other situation, now you can really customize that and at the campus level too, be able to do that too. So now that I gave all of that away and you don't even need me anymore. Yeah, it's like all right, see, it shows that no. No, tell us a little bit about that and how and the mission or the vision of Relief Roster in helping districts.

Kyle Sumrow: 13:50

Well, I'm I'm glad that you brought up the customizability part uh of it because when I first started designing it, what I realized is that I I don't, I'm not the owner of uh I don't have knowledge of every context that's possible with a school. And I will tell you, like with the first 10 clients that are using it, every single one of them has added to it over the last six months, has said, hey, our schedule looks a little different. So I realized, okay, the the scheduling tool, in order to set up the schedule, every school's got a different thing, right? I had it set up so you have like a standard, say, seven or eight period day and then a block schedule and like alternate them. And I realized that every school has such a unique um context to the way that they need scheduling setup. So the scheduler was really the first piece where I was like, okay, this this thing, the system setup part is everything for the user experience. So when we go about doing the system setup, it is so complex now that it's me walking like a system admin through it and getting it set to their context. And then after that, they don't have to think about the complexity anymore. It's really simple for them. Um, so it has that in common with that sort of spreadsheet example, right? That um it was it was a little too complicated for most users. And I would say that this is also very, very complex. But once we've gotten it set up so that no one has to look at the that really, really long, you know, system setup section of the app, um, it's super clean and straightforward and really easy to use and it's wired up to communicate and and um it's customizable for yeah, almost every context. So one context, I had a school recently that came to me and said, listen, I really like the scheduling thing, but that only gets us for the through the first like trimester, because then we completely change our schedule for the you know second trimester, and then we completely change it for the third trimester. And so I had to create uh I had to make the ability to create something we call time blocks, where you have all the scheduling tools, but now you can actually use all those tools within one block of time and then create a new block of time to do something completely different and then build your whole year that's in a totally customizable way. Um, you can create as many different divisions as you want. So from a district standpoint, if a district was going to roll this out, they would be able to accommodate every random customizable schedule for you know all 10, 20, 40, 100 schools that they have. So for school districts, um it it is it gives you the ability as a system admin to be able to see everything across all of your schools. Um, but at the school level, you have different roles, right? And so your your system admin sees more than your educational administrator, is the role that we would give to like a campus principal. The principal can see everything happening at their school, but they can't see things going on at the other schools. So um, yeah, it's it's designed to ultimately just be customized. And funny enough, it was actually designed for independent schools. Um, because that was my background, was international and independent schools. So my context was very um like K-12 and multiple campuses within one K-12 system, but usually a maximum of let's say like three campuses. So when I started thinking about the US public school district and campus setup, um that was when I had to really start expanding the customized uh the ability to customize the platform.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 17:59

That's great. Wow, Kyle, like one thing that I do like though, like you mentioned is that analytic component too as well, where you know you can differentiate who has access to what. So one of the things that I can see that being an advantage, not only like, you know, director CTO, but I mean I'm I'm assuming like the HR would be able to have access to that and see, you know, obviously from the pool of subs, because I think that is one of the biggest things right now is just being able to find substitutes, but not only that, but like be able to note that you can, you know, what kind of schedule and which subs are being selected more often, and maybe just to be able to see that and see the analytics behind it and say, okay, well, why why is this particular sub being selected more for let's say this math class? Is it because they do have a math background and they're able to uh you know provide instruction or provide support for students or the different skill sets that they may each uh have because as you know, some subs are former educators, some subs are aspiring educators, you know, and then of course you have some subs that you know they they sub. They, you know, and but retirees are yeah, retirees and but they still have a certain skill set. And one of the things that I find that is interesting is to be able to have your wonderful pool of subs from the beginning of the year, be able to have them and then analyze, okay, which subs are doing more stuff for more for specific schools, and you know, so there's a whole wide range of things that that you can look at, but just the fact that you're able to streamline the process and manage those absences and scheduling the the substitutes and having that placement, I think that's something that's great. Now, I want to ask you because I'm not too too in-depth with that, but because you are and you were a school leader and you're seeing this, is there you know, through being able to streamline this process, is there a cost savings for the district that you see, or maybe that the schools that you work with that it really helps them out in that sense?

Kyle Sumrow: 20:00

Yeah, so uh it's um with with tech my school, so we've we've created step back just a little bit. So tech my school is um sort of like a fully licensed reseller of the product. So because I work for Tech My School, I'm uh I'm able to promote my own product and all the proceeds actually are going back to Puerto Rico. So anything that any of the proceeds that come from the platform are going back to serving the kids that we serve, which I love um because that's that's a way that you know I can give back too. Um you you mentioned HR in there. So if I could pop back to that really quickly, there's actually an HR role in the platform. There's a subpay, uh that's one of four modules. So there's four modules. The first one that we talked about is a substitute teaching. There's also an absence and PTO tracking uh module, and then there's a subpay module, which only HR has access to. And then there's a volunteer onboarding and event management piece, which is the newest part of it. Um, so we I I wanted to make this so that uh a lot of the schools that we work with have they're like a religiously affiliated schools, Catholic school or something like that, and they'll have a school and a church. And so I wanted to create a product where you could use that for all of the employees, right? For the absence of PTO tracking. Then the school part of it uses the substitute piece, and then the volunteer management part is generally like on the church side. But independent schools and and even even public schools do a lot with volunteering anyway, right? So the platform was designed to really be kind of a one-stop shop for that any any time where there's like an event or some sort of an opening, and you need to put a person into that event. I wanted the platform to be able to handle that. So um look, get get me back on track with your your your question though, because I took a little buggy ride.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 21:47

Yeah, no, no, no, but that that's great because it it kind of it's a nice segue into that volunteer piece as well. And in well, I'll get into that too, because I I think that that's something that is great because I know oftentimes that we might have some parent volunteers, and obviously through those parent volunteers, there's a vetting process, you make sure you do background checks and all of that, but just to be able to put them into a system and to be able to it's like you know, they sign up and things of that sort for HR to be able to keep track of that. I think that's something that is fantastic and that's great.

Kyle Sumrow: 22:21

If I can can I cut in just for one second, I would say that that so that the subbing and the volunteer piece, they both have something really unique and common, which is the onboarding process, right? Because I already had the substitute onboarding process done. All that coding was done. And so what I was able to do is sort of transfer some of that same logic over into the volunteer section. So when you have these events for parents, you have a custom URL for your school that you send to them and it sends them uh whatever uh customized version of the onboarding um form you want them to fill out. It lets them put in custom fields, anything you want, but like by default, it's like contact information, skills, availability, that kind of thing, what things they're interested in. And then like a place for a narrative where they can just type in notes. Hey, you know, I used to do say accounting. If you have anything that's, you know, you want me to do something with spreadsheets. I I'm good at that. Or hey, I used to work in X, Y, and Z industry. So, and then the volunteer section also, the volunteer management um page also lets the volunteer manager search by skills and by availability and by all the different things that they put into the form. Each one of those has a process. So if you are a volunteer and you fill out the volunteer form, it puts you into the uh pending registrations bucket. And the whoever is assigned the volunteer manager role and the sysadmins can actually see this too. But um, they would go in and they would look at, hey, we've got three of these and they'll look through all the information. And then they can start, they can create a custom onboarding um checklist, essentially. And you don't have to fulfill all of that before you approve and onboard, but it gives you the option to do that. So, like, have they had a background check and I can upload files, I can upload like evidence of their background check. Have they been to like uh an orientation meeting? Um, have they uploaded their driver's license? Um, have they done like all of these different pieces? And it has a progress bar for them. And so at a quick glance, you can look at the uh pending registrations and say, hey, this guy's almost done. I'm actually going to reach out to him and just if he can just give me a copy of his driver's license, he's ready to go. And then um you can you can do, I haven't added this yet, but there's a company that I can uh have the like the BSA background checks um done straight from the platform, and the school would just have to pay for how many ever they used every month. Um I forget it's a few dollars, I think, um, to run them and they run quite quickly. Um so that's another piece. Like you, you you're on I wanted it to basically just be the easy button for onboarding. Anybody comes on this campus, here are our requirements. We can customize what those requirements are. Um, have they gone through the training? Check, check, check, check. Now I can onboard them. And as soon as I approve their their pending registration, they go into the directory. So they've got a substitute directory. Uh that then now they're they're actionable. And there's a whole communication portal um in there as well. So if I have a volunteer opportunity and I want to pinpoint all the people who have a specific skill, like maybe you say food service, hey, we're doing a pancake breakfast. We want somebody who has experience with food service. I mean, not that any parent couldn't come in and flip pancakes, but whatever the thing is that you want, you look for that skill. Uh, and then you're able to communicate with the people. You're like, hey, I want to create this message for all the people that say they do food service or they do, you know, A V support, or they love doing dishes, whatever the things are, you can create all of those different um skills that you want them to be able to fill out because that form is totally customizable.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 25:44

Uh right now you're speaking my language just in everything that you've described. And the re the reason I say this is because oftentimes, you know, there there's already like kind of platforms that are in use. But what happens is sometimes those platforms, number one, they don't offer pretty much everything that you say. It's almost like bits and pieces, and then there's another platform that needs to, you know, uh takes some of that info in in a different way. And then, of course, like you mentioned, the onboarding process and all of that great stuff. But like this truly, you know, is a and it really does feel like that easy button where everything that I can think of that would be needed is already there. And that's one thing that I love that as somebody might be interested in coming into your district to, like you said, either sub or be a volunteer, the uh going in through that, like you mentioned, they fill out a URL, your customized form for your district, your school, what whoever's gonna send out that form, they upload their documents, they say, okay, now you here's the training dates for, you know, maybe it's gonna be Tuesday, Thursday for subtraining that we come. So you show you the TAC or things of that sort, you check that box off. It's already in the system. So then you're able to, like you mentioned, at a glance, see who is almost readily available and then follow up with your subs because I think sometimes what might happen is that people might be interested. But the way that the system kind of works, because there's multiple people that do multiple things, kind of one person bogs down the process, then that doesn't get through, and then there's a sub shortage, or maybe that sub says, well, you know what, maybe they're not interested after all, and then they end up going to a different district, and you lose out on somebody that might have had some wonderful skills that could have been able to be uh used within your district for classes. Onboarding is such a long process, yes, and it doesn't have to be, and sometimes there's that lack of communication where, well, we got them onboarded. Oh, but they don't have their account yet to be able to log into um the uh to the substitute system. And I'm thinking to myself, I was like, what can we do to streamline that process? And I think, well, from what you're you're telling me, I'm already like, oh man, I'm sold. I'll take five, let's do it. And I'm and I'm not even in charge of that, but you know, this is this is this is great because you're walking us through real life scenarios. So if you'd like, um, Kyle, at this time, you know, I would love to see, and I know that our audience members would love to see the platform. So if you're able to share and kind of walk us through whatever it is that you'd love.

Kyle Sumrow: 28:20

The whole thing, the whole thing is integrated um with Google and Microsoft SSO as well. So um most schools are using one or the other of those. Um and then uh the the calendaring stuff all works too. Like it's integrated if you just tick all the boxes for Google Calendar. Like your Google Calendar is it can be integrated. Every time you sign up for something, it'll go straight to your Google Calendar. Um, let's see here. Can you see that?

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 28:48

That there we go. Perfect.

Kyle Sumrow: 28:50

Yeah, so I I have two different views loaded here for you. So this is a teacher view. So you can see it's really simple. There's not much over here. Um, they have a few user settings they can um decide whether they want SMS messages, for instance. Um, the FCC requires me to have them be able to opt out of that. But um, so they want to request an absence, for instance. They have two different options here. They have uh a time off request, which would be I'm sick for a day, uh, I'm gonna be at a conference for two days, whatever the thing is. And then they just have an off-campus notification. This tool is designed, um, and this really requires a culture shift for a lot of schools because a school needs to decide that they're gonna use this full time. But what this will do for you is that um the administrator in the school can actually see who is on campus or off campus. If there's a fire drill, if there's a lockdown, if there's something, they can actually at one click just get to like who's off campus right now and are they sick or are they off for another reason? But essentially um they just put in their dates. So the whole calendar has been um customized. That's part of the onboarding process. Your cut your custom calendar, the system knows what days are off. If I if I actually try to choose this day, it's telling me it's a school holiday, it's Thanksgiving break this week. We can't do this week. So what I'm gonna do here is let's say um the second, it shows me on here that my absence is going to be one day. If I were to extend this over to the next week, it automatically tells you it's seven calendar days, but there's actually only five work days that you're gonna be missing. So the system is smart enough to know um sort of what your calendar has set up. It doesn't charge you for weekends. Um, and then it gives when I when I create this request, I can select a reason, let's say work related, and I'll say that I'm gonna be at a conference in San Antonio. Um I can choose whether I want a sub for this or not. Maybe I am not a teacher, maybe I'm actually a staff member and I don't teach, so I'm not gonna check this box. And then I submit the request, and that request is gonna actually go through. I'll show you now what it looks like for the supervisor. So this is a supervisor dashboard. Let me actually refresh this. Um, the supervisor dashboard, they can see that here it shows up. Now, test teacher has a conference in San Antonio, and I can approve or deny it. If I hit deny, it's gonna ask me why. So I can give them a reason. Um, do I wanna count it against their PTO or not? I'll just leave this impending for. Now, because you can actually see the PTO balances here. It shows you each of the users. Um, so let's see, the test teacher should be this one right here. So it shows you on here that what's allocated. So it lets me set how many PTO days I get for the year, how many I've used, how many are pending. And actually, that didn't update yet. That should be at one because that teacher has one up top. And then how many they've used, right? If you look at PTO from um this side, this is the teacher. So it loads their PTO balance. Right now, it shows that they actually have two that are pending. Um so that supervisor dashboard's not showing those yet. But um it shows them they have 11 days. What's it's really nice because a lot of times as as a staff member, you kind of don't remember how many days you have left for these, you know, uh days you can take off. Every school, every district has different rules for um how you can and can't take PTO. It also lets you have blackout dates. So this is a really this is a really good one for the um the private schools. Um independent schools a lot of times will have rules where say this week is the whole week is offered Thanksgiving. Last Friday, for instance, might be a blackout day for PTO. If you request a day after in there, it's a big warning that'll show up in the system saying your PTO does not work for this, you're at risk of not getting paid for this day. So it lets you create sort of these exception days as well. Um, but so you can look at the subbing piece here. So they have a department that they're in and the name, and they can't, the teacher can't change these things. Whereas from the administrator side, they can request a sub and they can actually say, I want to submit this for someone else, and they can find an English department and they can find a teacher, whoever is in that uh department, and create an absence for that person. Let's go back to the teacher. So this is back to the teacher view here. Um they would just select a date. When do you want to be absent? Let's see here. Um, I think December 9th sounds good. And you'll see it it found on there that that day is a Tuesday and that's a block day. If I choose another day, it can choose. Oh, it looks like it's a block A week. Oh, here you go. That Wednesday is a regular day. So it shows you it at updates, it shows you that that Wednesday, you've got all eight periods plus advisory plus lunch. And you may or may not need coverage for those things, but it gives you the option to say whether you do or not. So let's do this day, whatever this Wednesday. Reason for absence. I think I chose a different day than I I reported my absence for. Uh, one of the benefits of pressing the the I need a sub button when you're doing the absence, because then you can remember to do the same day. Um, let's see, conference in, I don't know, Chicago. And I can, if I'm if I have one room, a lot of teachers say, like, hey, I'm in A123 is my my room number. But maybe I'm a specialist, maybe it's an elementary school and I'm like on a cart. I'm in four different rooms. If I select different periods, each period that I select adds a new uh block down here. So and I'll select say period three, and now there's a period three block. I can put in notes for what I need the sub to know uh the in the room. So the notes would go here, notes for the sub, lesson plans, whatnot, and then uh the room. So uh maybe this one's a three, two, one, and then this one is actually a one, two, three, and then I've got um more notes for this other class. Um let's see what else I got here. Oh, I can upload files. So if I if I so choose, I can I can upload as many files as I want. Um, if I have lesson plans, if I have a PowerPoint presentation I want to upload, there's no limit on what you can upload here. And then you've got this share section here where let's say I'm an English teacher and I actually want to share this with my internal teachers. Maybe somebody can pick up one of my classes for me. If I click the English department, it's gonna send it to everyone who's in my English department. But I can also say I want to share with my preferred substitutes. And in this case, let's say maybe I work in a big school and I've got um these teachers. Um, let's see, find another English teacher on here. Benito Thatcher. There we go. Those three, maybe those are my homies that are like right on my floor in my pod. And those are the ones that I always want to share with. I can actually save this as a group for the future and call this like my um uh English pod homies. And then I can save the group. And so the next time I go through, if I get rid of these, then the next time I go through and I want to say, hey, I want to share with preferred substitutes, I now have my English pod homies, three members, and it loads them in automatically. So then it will communicate these absences or these periods that you need filled specifically to those people. This also lets you choose outside subs, and um, that is something that's up to the school, whether or not the teachers get to choose uh which outside subs or if the teachers can communicate with outside subs. That was a lot. Sorry, this is drinking from a fire hose for you here, but um with the outside sub part. So what what you just saw were internal subs, right? People who work in the building. This is much more of the independent school model. Um, independent schools typically, not all of them, but typically will try to fill internally first, and then outside subs are sort of a last resort. Public schools are usually the opposite. They usually will try and this is from my knowledge, and and go ahead and jump in uh if you if you think differently from this. But there are so many school districts and so many schools that you know, this is bound to be wrong for some places. But if it's the case that the outside sub is sort of the first choice, the system can be set up so that teachers have a little bit different access to who they're sharing, who the teachers can share with. Now, let me tell you, there are two ways for you to use this platform. It was designed to be used like this, where this teacher, this demo teacher, um, every teacher is in the system and they can request absences, they can uh request subs, they can interact with the system. There is a version of this where only the administrator is playing quarterback and no one really knows about this platform. The platform will automatically email and text all the people that they're trying to get a hold of. For instance, if I check these three teachers off, they're gonna get an email. Even if they don't use the system, they're still gonna get the email that says, Hey, I'd like you to know about this you know subbing opportunity that's coming up. Or if I went ahead and signed them up for one, I can actually put people into those classes. So I'll show you that, what that looks like. Um this is a dangerous button right here. Share with all faculty. It turns red because that's a hundred in this case, 124 faculty members. So you can also disable that. Um, but I'm gonna submit the request and then go back to um let's look at available signups. You'll notice also with the administrator, there's a lot of stuff over here for them to look at, right? The teacher interface is much more simple. The administrators get a lot more to look at here. So um let's look at available signups. It shows this calendar. And what day did I put that on? Um, those two were on this Wednesday, the 10th. If I click on it, it shows me that there are uh the sub roles here, period one and three. Those are the ones I just created. And then it's telling me that uh I can choose whether or not I want this automatically getting added to my Google Calendar. I will say Google and their permissions make it impossible for me to elect to add something to someone else's calendar, even if it's an org-wide calendar. So I can't add something to someone else's calendar, but in the email that they get, there is an add to your calendar button. So they can add it on their on their own, on their own side. But from the add system admin role, if you're just quarterbacking for everybody here, you can actually just slot people in. I could even do my outside subs in here, and maybe I want my um test outside sub to be the sub to get it. I can confirm that and it won't actually add to the Google Calendar, it'll ask them to add it to their own calendar. But um do you have any questions so far? Is this is this making sense?

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 39:06

Yes, it is making a lot of sense. So one of the things that I kind of want to go back to that I found was a highlight of this, is I remember when I was in the classroom when I first started many years ago, it was a very interesting system that you would have to call in by phone and then you put in a code and then you request a sub for certain days, and then obviously that gets cued. What I love about where we're at now, and especially right now with what I see uh here through Relief Roster, is I absolutely loved that now those favorite subs that I had that would come in that I knew were dependable, that either knew some of the skills or had some of that knowledge of what it is that I was teaching to be able to at least may, you know, be able to uh provide some oversight on what the students are doing and still be able to provide some help. I think that being able to group them and like you mentioned, like these are my my pod homies or my substitute homies or however you want to label them, and you can put those two, three, four subs in there that when you put in your job, you can go ahead and select them and then it would just go straight to them. I think that that is something that is fantastic because I know that every teacher out there has had at one moment that one particular sub that they really want, that they want to rely on, you know, for whatever it is that they're out. And I think that this is a great way to be able to do that and uh make it so make it so easy. The other thing that I love too is just the customize how how easily cust and customizable your absence can be made. And the fact that, hey, you know what, if I'm out for a conference, I don't I need coverage for period one, period three, and period five, and you don't need coverage for that lunch or something like that. So now your dashboard or your campus admin, I should say, will be able to say, Hey, you know what? I've got this sub that's coming to Mr. Mendoza's coming in to fill in for Mr. Sumrow, but Mr. Sumrone let him know that he's only needed for one, three, and five. So now as an admin for that school, now I can say, Hey, Mr. Mendoza, would you be able to, since you don't have you don't need anything during lunch, can you fill in for this role? Should something pop up, or can you uh be able to help us here? Should something pop up? And I think that that's something that is great because oftentimes it's always a scheduling thing. It's always like, well, it's it's the teacher facilitator that is in charge of getting substitutes, but then they have to manage who's coming in, they have to manage the teacher's schedule, and then say, Well, now I gotta know that this teacher's gonna be out only this period and this period. And now how am I gonna juggle these subs? And and now I got a sub for all day, but they don't they may not need to be here all day. So what can I do and how can I use them? And and on top of that, their duties that they have to complete, you know, as far as the teacher facilitators concerned. So having something like this in a central location where the admin can see the dashboard, now the the scheduling should be a lot easier, and you're I you're able to maximize the usage of your substitute rather than well, now they're just here. And I mean, can if we don't need them, can we what can we use them for depending on the skill sets that they have, or do we just send them home? And so now I I like that that now you're intentionally uh you have intention behind the use of that substitute.

Kyle Sumrow: 42:41

Well, the school actually has the option um in the in the setup here, like uh this is sorry, this is the system setup piece. It's way down here towards the bottom, but there is a um right here in the management roles, require outside subs to accept a full day. So if I have periods two, three, four, and five, what I don't want as an administrator is to have them like cherry pick a couple of random periods and leave me hanging for the other ones. So you you don't have to set it up this way, but you can set it up so that they cannot sign up for in like if it's one teacher, they can't sign up for a single, they have to sign up for all of them or none of them. Um, so that's that's also another piece of setup here uh for them. I I wanted to actually show you as we were going. I thought of this as you were talking because this is if this is the teacher view and this is the um request a sub page again. Okay, one thing I skipped over. You can create these additional information buckets in here. So here's a random one that a lot of schools might want. Do you have any A V needs? If you you can put as many of these in here as you want, as long as you are aware that they're going to show up for every teacher that requests a sub. But there might be questions like where do you keep your keys for your classroom? Um, is there an emergency contact? Is there, you know, what students have special needs that we should know about or anything? Um, and if you don't answer it, then it doesn't show up for the sub. Uh you can actually make these required though, too. So in the that's just another piece that um trying to make this as customizable as possible for schools. That that was my biggest issue with the the big box, like the out-of-the-box solutions for substitute teaching management up until this point have been completely inflexible. And they're great, they have a lot of features to them, but if you don't fit that context, that it doesn't really work for you, or you are trying to change your context and the way that you work to wrap around a piece of software. Software needs to be the opposite, it needs to wrap around your needs, right? And that's the thinking here. Um, and to be fair, this is still a fairly new platform. And the people who are on board with me right now, they freaking love this process because they are helping me basically build out features. And I look, I've been in I've been in seven different schools on five continents. I still there are like no-brainers, these duh things that a school will be like, what if it did this? I'm like, you're so right. How did I not see that? How did I not know that was a thing? Um, and and so I I only say that to say this, which is that the the schools that are on board right now, the early adopters, they are literally getting to um help me to build in new and awesome features. If you and I had had this meeting three months ago, you wouldn't see half these features. This is what I do when I can't sleep and I'm up late at night. I'm like, hey, you know, X, Y, and Z School head of school wrote to me and said, I'd really like to be able to have this thing. The la the last thing I put in there actually was for um a school head of school who loves the process the the product, but said, I'm I'm I'm getting killed here because my outside subs are able to just cherry pick and do the one class, right? And so I was like, Oh, that's awesome. I will make it so that you can select to not have them do that. So um, yeah, I I mean there there are there are two more buckets here that that you haven't seen. So this is really the sort of overview of the absence and the subbing. Um, I don't know if you want to see the volunteer piece or kind of what that looks like. Yes, or this HR part is actually the most simple. But one thing you might have noticed on this other screen here, I have the ability to give multiple roles to a single person. So I can actually look at this as a volunteer manager. It takes a second to switch over, but um, once this user, same email, same everything, right? It's it's the exact same user, but it has multiple roles. And now you'll see these are changed, these are very volunteer-based. So they he can this guy, that's me, can look at the volunteer dashboard, right? Here's the pending registrations that I talked about. Um this is the onboarding process. So I've got the configuration of the onboarding process. I can change it however I want. Um, but then I click for details, and here is here is my um here's my person that this came in from a form that I created. So uh, and then I can I can look at their checklist as well. If I click that, now I'm looking at the checklist. Hey, fingerprints were completed on this date. There could have been a file uploaded here. It would show up if there was a file upload orientation session, required training, identity verification, emergency contact, volunteer handbook received. Did they sign the thing that we need them to sign? Did they do the safeguarding? Whatever, whatever your context is in your school or your district, it can be customized here. Um, but then in the volunteer directory, you can see this is the communications bucket in here. It lets you do like custom, um, custom template emails here that you can create to send out to people. Um, I can look at the history of the messages I've sent out. Uh, you could do a last-minute, hey, this thing's been canceled. Wanted to make sure everybody knew about it. You can you can communicate. Or yeah, I mean, pretty, pretty unlimited with the number of things you can do here. But um, let's see, on the events, I can create an event in here in the system. I could say, like, hey, this is our uh fundraiser gala at this location, date, start time, end time, description. Um, this was actually set up for a church. So that you're seeing this is very like churchy language that's on here, but you can customize all of this. Um, let's say, you know, I I can say I need somebody with A V and does like greeting and hospitality. This is the person who's going to be the contact point. I can create it for multiple days. Um, so that like maybe every Thursday, there's a, you know, at the food bank, we have this one, like the food pantry restocking at the Houston Food Pantry. I created this one and I wanted it every Thursday. And so I created a whole bunch of them at once. And each one is tracking how many volunteers have signed up for that event. They can edit the events. Um, but then under the on the volunteer dashboard, sorry, scrolling here. Um, there's this URL right here. So this isn't going to show local. I'm just running this off my local server. Um, but this would say like your school.reliefroster.com slash volunteer dash register, and that would not be on there. But um, that would be customized. You would paste that in and it would give you the it would give you the um what do you call it? Sorry, the um onboarding form. So I've got the onboarding form set up here. You can go through and say, like, here's all the options that I want for skills, relevant experience. I can make them required fields, I can get rid of them. I can do custom fields in here, whatever I want. And then I've got settings. So I have it set up right now to require an access code. If they access it, they have to type something in. So I'm not getting like Russian bots spamming me with a you know 10,000 applications at once. So you have your um pending registrations and then they go into active volunteers. And here are all of your volunteers who go and look at that. Robbie Cobbs, there's our guy. See what he's good at. So look, he's in Luquillo, Puerto Rico, where it's actually true. So here's all the things he does. Apparently, he loves worship music, Sunday services. This is this is like for a church example. Yeah. Um, but then I can say, like, hey, I've got this event coming up, and I want to find out who does what I mentioned food service earlier. Let's do food service. Oh, what do you know? It's Kyle and Lindsay. That's my wife and I. And we have owned two restaurants, so we definitely show up in the food service section. Um, but yeah, so we you can search by skills, you can filter, um, and you can communicate right from here. So if I'm looking at this guy, I can actually I can look at their onboarding checklist, I can edit, or I can email or call from here um straight from the platform.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 50:19

Wow.

Kyle Sumrow: 50:20

So yeah, and then that's basically it. Uh, they they can see um hang on here, available events. So here would be like a calendar that they might look at. They would see this is if I was looking at this as a volunteer, this is what they would see. They click on that date. Hey, there's a thing, there's 10 spots remaining. Um, Houston food pantry. One thing that's cool about this too is that I can actually, sorry about that. Um, I can actually sign up. So I'm a system administrator for this district and I am looking at the volunteer thing and I can go in here and say, you know what? I think I'm actually gonna sign up for this, right? There's my phone number, confirm sign up, awesome. Guess where else that just went? That went to my Google Calendar because I have it set up so that anytime I sign up for something, by the way, my Google Calendar is a hot mess because there's so much relief roster test stuff in there. But yeah, so basically that's the volunteer piece as well. And we wanted to make sure that um schools were able to um have all of these components in one place. The cool thing about this is the role-based part. So I I can have somebody who is my volunteer manager, and maybe that's a teacher or an administrator that takes over that role. Maybe that's a parent that takes over that role. The system is set up so that you can have whoever you want. You can elect for whoever you want to be in charge of the subbing, the volunteering, the HR piece. So yeah, you know, not sexy, but very helpful.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 51:44

No, like this is like so useful. Like, I was just thinking and wrapping my brain around everything, just that volunteer piece alone. Just oftentimes, again, as teachers, it's like, here, let me send send the paper home or let me send a reminder message. Uh, parents were looking for volunteers, but the fact that you could already vet those volunteers, there's a form, there's things there that you require of them, and now you can go into that pool of volunteers. I mean, and one thing that I like is that yes, maybe it's an event for fifth graders, but you know, those are all still your community. So maybe if there was a parent that is like, let's say a fourth grade parent, but wants to see what their kid is gonna go into into fifth grade and things of that sort, they're involved and then they're involved in your learning community, they're involved in your school. And when there's that buy-in, I think that's something that is fantastic too, because they're part of that community. And I I love that setup because then you're looking for, hey, we're doing our our carnival event, you know, we need somebody that's gonna be here just to take tickets, and we're looking for volunteers to watch this.

Kyle Sumrow: 52:50

Put fawns in the dunk tank of things of that sort.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 52:53

And I think that's something that's great that you're encompassing not only just the substitute aspect of it, but also the volunteer aspect and just the the level of communication, I think is so streamlined because I tell you what, sometimes I'll get messages on my phone, and that same message that's on my phone comes into my email, and then it comes in like three times in my email, two times on my phone, and I'm like, what's going on here? You know? So with this, it's the people that are involved will get those messages and then they can volunteer, they can accept, you know. Then you've got the sub the sub-uh aspect of it. I love that this now is high level where you get the the dashboard where HR can see what's going on too as well. You've got that admin dashboard too as well, and then just whether it's your CTO, CIO, whoever's gonna be in charge of that really high level has analytics and is able to see what's going on here. Are there any trends? Do we need any more subs? You know, what kind of subs are being asked for most? Is there a specific subject? What can we look for? And then this way you can go and advertise and say, hey, we're looking for, you know, specific subs that have this particular skill set.

Kyle Sumrow: 54:07

There's a whole there's a whole analytics bucket in there that I didn't show you. So you can one thing that's cool too is like from a from a building level um or a district level, you can actually figure out why people are missing work because they have to give you a reason. So it's it's logging stats on, you know, a lot of times in schools we'll say things like, I feel like I feel like Jim's missing a lot, or he's off campus a lot or something. But a lot of times we don't have the data because we're not collecting it in the right ways. Um, and we're not making it easily accessible for the right people. So one of the one of the goals of this is for an administrator to be able to see who's gone and why, you know, and say like, it looks like you know, Jim has gone to five conferences this year and missed a lot of school. So, you know, maybe we should have a chat with Jim about what our expectations are around, you know, and and that's that's a silly example because obviously the administrator's gotta approve those. But um it it is nice to have the the information and and it it attracts also one of the things um that I didn't show you on the supervisor dashboard. Whenever if you if the school's using it to track off campus, like I've got a dentist appointment, I'm not missing class, I don't need a sub, I'm not absent for the day, but you want to know that that teacher's gone. If you are using that, um, it also is tracking how many hours people are gone and what their reasons are for being gone. So if you're like Jim, Jim's not reporting all reporting a lot of absences, but he seems to like be gone every time I come to his classroom, he's not there. If you can just pop in there and say, actually, it looks like Jim's got like this standing meeting that he's doing like twice a week where he's off campus for an hour or something. I'm not saying your administrators don't already know about that type of stuff, but to have the data that tells you, like when I talk to Jim, I can say, Hey, look, this is this is what I'm seeing. I'm I'm seeing real data here that shows exactly what you've been up to. Um and that's not a gotcha. It's really like as an administrator, you don't know what you don't know sometimes. And to be able to make data-driven decisions, you need data.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 56:09

I love it. I love it. Well, Kyle, thank you so much for today, and thank you so much for sharing Relief Roster with us. And I think honestly, like this is something that feels it's well, number one, the interfaces and user experience that I'm seeing is it just seems so clean, so easy, so customizable too as well, which I think is a huge plus with a lot of the platforms that are out there that are kind of trying maybe to do the same thing or different systems that are might be in place, but they kind of have to go through a certain progression and only certain people get to see stuff and all of that. But I think that this is great. Like it really does feel like we talked about in the beginning or during the warm-up, it was just like this does feel like that one-stop shop where everything that you need gets done. And like you just mentioned right now, those analytics, being able to, you know, know, like you said, understanding and knowing what you may not know. But uh for me, the big win for me is just number one, being able to, if I'm a teacher, I can select from my favorite subs and just have them into that group and say, okay, one out of these three is gonna hit, but I know that they're gonna be good. You know, they're I know that they're gonna be good, and I know that I can trust them, so it'll get it'll get sent. And so I love that as that teacher aspect. But the volunteer, I think that that's huge too, because to me, I think it's uh oftentimes is there are many parents that not necessarily that they don't know they they don't want to volunteer, but again, going back to I didn't know, I don't know what I didn't know, but now with something like this, sending it out to parents and parents filling it in and saying, wow, I want to be part of this and just be part of the the community. And then for me, it's that buy-in. Parents are there, you've got your stakeholders there, your their kids go there. Now it's like, hey, they're vested in you be and they'll go and volunteer.

Kyle Sumrow: 58:07

Fonz, did you know, did you know about our equity-based pricing for software? I know. So that's one of the things that's really interesting, and and Relief Roster is a participant in this. We have other um, like Flint is a great example. Buying Flint through us, we're able to give discounts because we're a nonprofit. Um, we're able to help companies to write down certain expenses and things like because they can donate to us. Um, one of the ways we do that is equity-based pricing on software. And um, what that looks like is essentially the more underserved your community and the less you charge for tuition for the um independent schools and international schools, the lower your tuition, the bigger the discounts we give you. Um, and that goes all the way to some of the schools are the most underserved, underprivileged, you know, really, really rough areas that they serve or, you know, and they just they do not have the funding for this kind of stuff. Um, we have made these products completely affordable, um, a lot of them. So this one, for example, I don't know the numbers in front of me. I should have, that was dumb that I didn't think to bring them with me. But um, if you're in a position where you charge such a low amount of tuition because your uh you know your clients can't afford it, your your students' families can't afford it anymore, we've got all the way down to where the product is almost free for schools like that, and we're actually subsidizing. Um, so from the wealthiest schools and districts to the ones that are hurting the most, uh, there's like a whole continuum of pricing. So we call that equity-based because we believe that technology has the ability to really shrink the gap between the haves and the have nots. And unfortunately, we've not honored the fact that software is not expensive to operate. It is a it's a really natural product to be able to discount by need. Um, if I made a car and I was selling a car, they're gonna all cost me the same, whether I sell them to a rich person or a poor person, right? So, but um the software is not that not the case, right? So, one of the things I love about being in this position where I own this piece of software. Um, one thing I love about it is that I'm able to help people who need it the most. The people who need more time on their hands who don't need to be worrying about where this, you know, how the subbing is happening. I can buy some of that time back for them and and ultimately serve kids in that way. So nice. Um other one other thing I would say is that you know how much time people spend on this process of figuring out who's gone, who's who needs subs, who's subbing where. The process oftentimes is being handled by an administrator who has far more important things to be doing with their time than this type of like data chasing. Um schools that are more well resourced usually have a person for this. But if you don't have a person to do that, and even if you do, I mean, really it we're just talking about efficiency here. This whole thing is all about um keeping track of all the different components of this process from onboarding to execution. Um yeah, just creating efficiencies and Systems is at this point with technology as a no-brainer. And I want to make sure the schools can afford it.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:01:21

Lovely. Awesome, Kyle. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you being on the show and sharing this wonderful, wonderful platform, relief roster. We'll definitely link it in the show notes. Now, I know, I know I didn't get to send you the the closing questions uh here, but I don't know if you saw Robbie's episode. I'll always end the show with three questions. So I might be putting you on the spot here. But let's do it. All right, here we go. So here we go. Question number one every superhero has a pain point or a weakness. So we know that for Superman, kryptonite was his weakness. So I want to ask you, Kyle, in your experience and from that you can think of the many years in education and even until now, what would you say would be your edu kryptonite?

Kyle Sumrow: 1:02:09

Hmm. That's an easy one. Toxic attitudes. Okay. I I have worked with all kinds of different people across this whole spectrum of education. When people are kind and understanding and seek to listen and understand before being heard and understood. And people are just kind. I mean, it's kind of comes down to kindness. So people who are not kind. That's my kryptonite. Those are the people that drive me nuts.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:02:40

All right, good answer. All right, question number two if you could have a billboard with anything on it, what would it be and why?

Kyle Sumrow: 1:02:51

Wow. A billboard with anything on it. I would probably just stick with that same messaging. Be kind.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:03:01

Yep. Good answer. Perfect. All right. Last question. Alright. If you could trade places with a single person for a day, who would that be and why?

Kyle Sumrow: 1:03:13

Do I still get to be married to my wife? Because that's a non-starter for me. If I had to not have her. Um gosh, one person for a day. Um I don't know. I don't know that I would trade with anybody, honestly. Like, I don't mean to yeah, I don't know. I don't think I would trade with anybody. I I can't I can't think of anyone who's got a life that's more interesting to me than the one that I lead.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:03:44

That that is a wonderful, honest, genuine answer. I will definitely take that. You are in five plus years, you are the only person that has ever said I would not switch or trade with anybody. And that's not a bad thing, Kyle. I love it. And I think that that's something that is fantastic, and it says a lot about you and the person that you are. And obviously, I even myself, just listening to you in the very beginning, I didn't know the bus driver part. I didn't know the Berkeley part. And then I didn't know the, you know, just how you landed into education, and then all of a sudden you're doing international schools. And I think that that is something fantastic and very unique that you have a lens that nobody else can have and that nobody else can take away from you because you've been there, you've you've lived it. And I think that that is a great and wonderful answer, Kyle. Appreciate you, man.

Kyle Sumrow: 1:04:39

Yeah, thanks. I thought of a better, a better um billboard. I think I would just say stay curious. I think curiosity drives everything I love about education comes back to curiosity, right? And I I think like if you look at the circuitous route that my career has taken, it's all marked by curiosity. It's like, what would it be like to drive a bus, you know? And I don't I've I've ticked that box now, but like I I've I feel the same way about so many different things, you know, like the night sky blows my mind, but so does the inner workings of a a complex machine like a school. I I love um yeah, I just love I love finding out new things. I like knowing what I don't know.

Dr. Alfonso Mendoza: 1:05:22

Excellent. Well, thank you, Kyle. I really appreciate you. Uh thank you so much for you know reaching out. And I'm just really thankful that we got to connect again. And hopefully, yeah, and hopefully we'll be connecting uh this coming year also as well. Looking forward to Tech My School conference. I think it's gonna be something that's gonna be fantastic. As always, you know, Robbie and the gang, and you know, again to see you there and just there's so much great things happening in Puerto Rico, thanks to Tech My School. So thank you for being on the show and for all our audience members. Please make sure that you connect with Kyle on the show. Uh, make sure you connect with Kyle. I we will definitely link his information in the show notes. Please make sure that you do check out Relief Roster as well. And again, you can connect with Kyle. Also, if you have any more questions or if you will decide to work with Kyle, he will definitely be somebody that is helpful to you. But again, thank you as always. And to all our sponsors, appreciate you, EduAid, Book Creator, Yellow Dig, and Peel Back Education again for sponsoring our show. And if you're interested in sponsoring our show, please make sure that you reach out to us because this new year's coming up and we've got some big things planned. So thank you as always for all of your support. And my friends, as always, don't forget, stay techie.