Hello and welcome back to our podcast. Today we are diving into the topic of decolonizing your curriculum. My name is Danbee Shin. I'm a mentor for web designers and a global inclusion specialist. And I'm here with my co host Mariana Pena.
Hi Danbee. I'm so excited to dive into this topic today. For those of you who are new here, my name is Mariana Pena. I'm a learning designer, I work with experts, thought leaders, speakers, and course creators that want to transform their knowledge into a course, a program, or simply a curriculum that is going to be impactful. And it's going to help them grow their business. And my personal passion is talking about the impacts of colonization around the world, but specifically in education.
And it's funny, because I feel like this is such a big part of my life now. But I don't think I have really thought about the impact of colonization on education in those very clear terms. Until you and I worked together just a couple of years ago, this was a new idea for me. So I can imagine that it is also a new idea for so many other people out there.
It's actually by design, that we don't know about this. And I think that's a good starting point. If you're here with us today, and you're like, What are they talking about? That's okay, that's perfectly fine. It's not your fault. It is by design, that you have never heard of this term. Or that maybe you know that some countries at some point in history, traveled to other countries and discovered them, I'm using quote unquote, here, and then help them again, quotation, to become civilized people and improve. And it's not only in the US that we hear this story, I was born and raised in Mexico. This is also the story that we hear there. I'm sure that we you also grew up with this type of narratives. I'm from
South Korea, my family, both on my mom's side of the family and my dad's side, are from Korea. And on my mom's side of the family, my grandfather was a Protestant pastor. And it's a direct direct result of American missions in South Korea, who came to like you say, educate, help civilize the poor people in Asia. And while that gave my family, a lot of privilege, and a lot of luxuries, if you like, in that war, post war era in South Korea, that messed us up. To and on my dad's side, my dad's family, I want to say they grew up poor, but it was normal because everyone was poor. And if that's the case, you don't, I guess you don't think of yourself as being so poor. But one of his first memories as a child was an American soldier sharing like a chocolate bar or a piece of the burger. And for him that was like the ultimate taste of luxury and civilization. And these are the images that kind of made up the fabric of the stories that we tell in our families.
Yes, this is so insidious, because you don't notice it. For some countries, it happened a few 100 years ago, like Mexico, for example. But for some other many countries, it's not even 100 years ago, that they were still dealing with occupation. And right now we're going through it in front of our eyes. So colonization is really a concept that perhaps sounds like very intellectual. It is very, very academic type of concept. And I want to debunk that idea. Because understanding how the world works can only help us in every single level and sphere of our lives. So if you are thinking right now, that sounds interesting, but actually, I'm a business owner, or I'm a freelancer, but does that have to do with me? Everything, it has to do everything. I will give you some examples. Colonization is directly responsible for you thinking that people who live in the global south can earn less money and should be happy about that. Globalization is the reason why all of these agencies that have all of a sudden come out of came out of the blue of I will help you hire your VA so that you can have a two week two day week and you can offload and contract and everything else and they can do it for you. And you can pay as little as insert whatever amount of dollars
you want. Recently, I saw $10 an hour. Oh, I've seen less.
I've seen $4 And they are all congratulating each other because these people you're giving the In the opportunity to have a job, and they don't have a job. Now, if you're hearing this, and you are a freelancer, you're a contractor, you're a business owner, you're an entrepreneur, you've heard of this tool. You've seen it everywhere. And maybe you've even considered that at some point, I want to tell you that the reason why that happens is because of colonization is this idea that some countries deserve more, and others deserve less, and they should move forward. And they should be grateful for that. And they should be grateful for the opportunity that we are bringing to them, while conveniently forgetting that the reason that these countries are at that point economically and historically, is because of this imperialist occupations, exploitation and everything else. Right now, Dombey. And I we can share how that feels. Because we both come from countries and regions in the world where the impact that colonization had, it is still very much alive today. So don't dismiss this concept or this idea. Just because it sounds like super academic and maybe unrelated to your business. It's not or
like you said, I think often you say colonization, and people think it's something that happened a long time ago. Oh, yeah. I've also heard some of my good, very well educated friends say, yeah, like people have always been invading each other's treasuries, like from the beginning of the human race. Like that is not what we're talking about. No, no, we
cannot escape history, right. Something that I really love is, the idea of history is alive. Like we are making history right now, the moment that we think that history is in the past, and it's something that is done, studied, wrapped up, and we can forget about it, then we are doomed to repeat it over and over again, history is happening as we are living it, and we are making it happen. And as entrepreneurs, as business owners, you have such an influence in how this is going to play out right now you can make the choice of contracting somebody and choosing to pay them accordingly to your own standards. If you wouldn't take a job for $4 an hour. What makes you think that somebody else should, right? So that's just one example. If you're a course creator, for example, you are in the business of making money through your knowledge, there are many ways where you can take action and shift, narrative shift history or example, if on your sales page, you are using deadlines, the typical, you have 10 hours to jump on this incredible opportunity that is full scarcity, your course is on demand. You don't have to pressure people to do that if you're running a live cohort, and I understand that because there's a cap right? If you cannot enrolled 100 people, then that's a reality. But if it's an on demand that pressure, that scarcity, that is oppression. Another one that I really like we always talk about it and we payment plans is a baby of neocolonialism. I think of neocolonialism as a very greedy parent that just wants to have everything for themselves. And a little baby of the greedy parent is abusive payment plans, because there's this idea in the online world that people should pay in full upfront. And that completely disregards culture. Because culturally, a lot of regions in the world prefer payment plans, like in Mexico, regardless of whether I have the money or not give me a payment plan, like my life needs a payment plan. Nobody feels the need to say I'm just going to pay $1,000 upfront because I have no give me a payment plan. And that has to do with our own history. Like we have to be very cautious about our expenses. So when you are forcing people to pay upfront, you are disregarding culture, you are disregarding history for these regions of the world. And if on top of that the payment plan that you're offering as an option increases the amount of the investment, and I've seen 50 plus percent increase that is a system of oppression. And the reason why that is a system of oppression is because it is designed to keep the world's people poor and the wealthy. And that's how the world in this capitalistic world can function. Oh,
that was a lot and we've only touched on a couple of really common things that we see all the time and beyond. line business space, we're not like digging through really examples in the margins. So we've talked about how colonialism affects everything that we do in the online business space. They're everywhere in terms of the content that we put out, obviously, as content creators and educators and of course creators, but also how we sell them with the payment plans that we offer. And what did we talk about just before that, paying people a fair, a fair wage a fair fee for the work they do? The idea that is so deeply ingrained that some people because of where they're from, where they are the color of their skin, their background, they somehow deserve more or less. I think if you've said it in passing, some people might not even raise an eyebrow, because it's so deeply ingrained, like just expect it. And I grew up mostly in Sri Lanka, I saw it on a day to day basis, right? You just expect there are different expectations for different people. I wanted to clarify a little bit about the payment plans, because I think this might ruffle some feathers. And people are going to have lots of different qualifications. And you mentioned that we've talked about a lot because it's something that I have struggled with personally. So the point here is that when you are offering payment plans, the underlying assumption is that for some people, this is the preferred way to pay, and they should have that option. And also, not everyone has that kind of cash flow. So you're making your program more accessible to more people. And when you add on an additional amount on top of that you're penalizing people for choosing to spread out their payments. I know that having been or being on the side of the course creator these days, that's where my focus is, there is like a desire to incentivize paying in full because I've been burned by people who choose the payment plan. And this is obviously not the majority of people, but there are enough people who take advantage of the payment plans and choose not to complete them, which means if my business loses out, so are we saying that we want zero, like difference between the total of the payment plans and the painful? Or do you see a space where business owners might make some decisions on how much additional amount they choose to take? If they offer the payment plan?
This is a great question. And because my passion is decolonizing, your mindset, there is no right answer that everybody is going through a very different specific scenario. For example, are we are we talking about courses that are on demand? That means pre recorded, ready to go as the purchase completes? Or are we talking about a live cohort that they are joining? Are we talking about services that you're delivering them for you or this is a service done with you. So you have to take into account the business model that you're following, in order to price it accordingly. And let's just say that you know, exactly your business model, and that the price that you are putting out there is in alignment with your values and is in alignment with your desired market. What I am inviting people to do is to question themselves, why is it that when you create the payment plan, if you are creating one? Because not everybody given? It's not a given? But why is it that when you are creating a payment plan, you immediately increase in your head 30% more for the payments? Where is that percentage coming from? I work with course creators, and I always ask, how are you going to price this? Are you going to offer payment plans, it is a requirement when working with me to be very honest about their position when it comes to diversity, equity and inclusion because it is at the core of my work. So when we have this conversation, and I get to ask them, why is it that the payment plan increases? 30% the total cost more often than not, they don't really know. That's what I was gonna guess. They don't really know. The immediate answer is my business coach told me I've seen other people do it that way. I've seen isn't that like standard practice? Isn't that expected very few times they have had a very realistic answer such as my clients. They run very successful digital academies and they serve clients all over the world. And they are very aware of how people purchase differently around the world they have taken the time to calculate the risk and they have absorbed that into the global system. So that when they are selling the product, they say for example, we are up so hoping the tax so you can just go ahead and purchase and we are absorbing the tax, because we know that from your region, you have to pay this amount of tax, we are paying for that. Don't worry about that. Or they also say something like, if you are from this specific country, please contact us. Because we can offer you a different set that takes time to do Oh, yeah. And then to know your people, you need to know your people. But you know what, if you're in the education world, you need to be very careful with what you're doing and what you're saying. Because you are not only teaching people with your lessons, you're teaching people with how you're running your business to by running your business in an exploitative way, what you are unknowingly telling them is I don't really care about you. And as a client, as a student, we notice we may not have the words for it, but we notice and we can feel it. So bringing it back to what to do with the payment plan. I'm not pushing you to have a payment plan. What I am inviting you to do is to sit with the question of where does the 30% come from? Where did I learn it? Because that is that is a direct result of colonialism? Who are we learning from the voices that we choose to hear the people that we choose to believe in look at them and what they're saying, and the narratives that they are replicating? Because more often than not, it is just replicating structures that keep the oppressed people oppressed. There's something
you said a few minutes ago, you said because you believe in not imposing one right answer on someone you I think you said there's no right answer because you believe in decolonization? Can you comment on that a little more? Because I think that's super interesting. You're not here to tell someone what to do. Yes,
traditional education is set up as a factory, we are trained by the system to behave in certain way to comply with certain norms. And above all, do not question to comply and follow instructions to learn rules and apply those rules for the rest of our lives in order to be a good student. And that is the pipeline in order to be a good worker, later, a good employee now that is the traditional education system all around the world. I'm not just talking about like the US or West Europe, like all around the world, that is how it is set up because the imperialist countries took it upon themselves. To do that.
I was gonna say there's a reason it's like that, or the other parts of the
indigenous knowledge has nothing to do with those structures and those that hierarchies now, but those got displaced, erased, or forgotten because of occupation, colonization and imperialist narratives. Okay, so that is the preamble. Now, when we look at online education, we have the opportunity to re discover ancestral knowledge in the form of we can collectively come up with an answer to our problems, rather than there is a mighty old teacher, that is gonna tell us exactly how we feel. And exactly what we need to do. There is a place and time for that, of course, if we're asking advice, but more often than not, we are adults, running our businesses. And as entrepreneurs or business owners, we make very big investment to learn something. And sadly, when we are making these investments to enroll in these programs, we are basically enrolling in traditional classrooms where the mydeal has all the answers, and I have to adjust to what they are saying I have to follow their framework, I have to follow their playbook or a game plan or whatever you want to call them. And otherwise, they cannot guarantee my success. And that forces you to forget that you can think for yourself. You can develop skills, like critical thinking like assertiveness, you can evaluate your own scenarios. You can make choices, informed choices. And when we forget that we become dependent on that some someone else by becoming dependent on someone else, we are effectively removing our own self agency. And that means that when we operate our business, we feel and we think there's only one way of doing things because they told me they told me and I've seen how that only way works. So I need to follow that if you look around the world, ancestral knowledge, indigenous communities, native peoples around the world. They don't believe in that. They believe that knowledge can be constructed by a community for the community. You don't find these type of hierarchies where there's one above the rest, and they more often than not value heavily. The inner wisdom that you have and their practices invite you to connect with that wisdom. And if you have questions, the community is there for you, to guide you. But if not, then you can guide yourself. And I would love for the online world to open up a little bit to that idea. Because if we are in community online, why are we not doing that? Why are we so hooked on replicating traditional systems like in this industrial factory systems of learning? We're adults, we want to change the world. And yet we're replicating the old ways. I don't see how that match. I don't know if I answered your question. Absolutely.
Yeah. And there is I see the same thing where you start an online business, you want to be successful. So you look to role models. And it's great to learn from other people's experiences. But it doesn't help you as an entrepreneur, when you become as you say, dependent on someone always telling you the right way to do something the the whole giving you like instructions in your own business, I don't think anyone really wants to be in that position. And I think that's also what's so insidious about some of these programs where, you know, these personal brands that are actually like multimillion dollar companies hide behind, oh, like, we're just a little business behind this, like pretty person. They almost prey on people who are vulnerable, who are feeling that they're struggling in their businesses, and their entire livelihoods depend on the success of their business. So they're in more vulnerable positions where they're more susceptible to being told, like, Oh, you're doing it wrong, here's how you do it. And this is the only way to do it.
But like I said, there is a place for advice, and mentoring and counseling. And I believe in that what I'm trying to bring is the perspective or the idea that maybe you're not the one that knows everything. Because we can only see the world from our perspective, as much as we try to put ourselves in somebody else's shoes, it is impossible to do so because we all have very different lived experiences. And that's the beauty of a community. That's the beauty of a learning community. Even for myself, if I am guiding a lesson, I cannot assume that I know exactly how you feel more comfortable in learning something or in your interactions. I'll give you an example. When I moved to the Netherlands, I was already like a seasoned teacher. I had spent, I think around 1012 years teaching every day, the whole day to kids first and then adolescence. I love a lot of adolescents and their learning journeys. I get them all their brains, so when but they were all Mexicans, we had a shared cultural background, we didn't have a shared cultural economic status, because they were very rich. I wasn't. But we had a cultural background. When I moved to the Netherlands, I started working at language academies. It was the first time that I was the teacher of a very multicultural classroom, people from Russia, people from Albania, people from Poland, people from the Netherlands, people from everywhere in Europe, and not only West Europe, but also Eastern Europe and a few here and there came to into the country, like from Morocco, or Afghanistan and they wanted to learn Spanish, it became very clear to me very quickly that I was like out of my Wilson because here I was having a perfect knowledge of how to acquire US foreign language, and a perfect knowledge of teaching and learning and everything else and the complete zero knowledge of their cultural background and cultural background plays a huge emotional role in the learning process in the acquisition of new information, how you receive the information, how you digested, how do you decide to keep it or not? How do you assess the teacher that is instructing you and I had to start learning very quickly that certain countries had certain systems for learning students game with their own emotional baggage. They wouldn't dare to ask questions, some of them, some of them would always be very pushy towards me. And then at the end of the lesson, they will be like, great lesson teacher. I was like, what you were fighting me the entire time. What are you talking about cultural background, and that just reassured me I can have everything that I am the teacher here, I may have some information and some knowledge, but that doesn't mean that I know them. That doesn't mean that I have the right answer that everybody has to follow. So again, if you are in your own business, teaching someone else something whether that is via a course, or a mastermind or They are the audience in your keynote speaking gig, you are teaching them something, just take a moment to think, where do where does this knowledge come from? Am I saying something that is going to be perceived as oppressive? Am I taking into account their cultural background? Am I seeing them as human beings like me like we are up to par, I'm not on a pedestal, because I don't want to be on a pedestal. And most importantly, is what I'm saying going to help them feel that they are growing personal or business wise, doesn't matter. So yeah, I think that regardless of how you see yourself, if you're conducting business, there will be a point where you're teaching someone something. And if you keep in mind the idea that we are surrounded by colonialism, and oppression narratives, you can make the choice to not reinforce that in your interactions.
So I feel like one of the key takeaways here, if you are in a position where you're teaching, maybe it's a course maybe you have a mentorship or a coaching program, like is that I didn't even think of, maybe your speaker at a summit or on a podcast, where you are sharing information, a good question to ask yourself is like, Where does this knowledge come from? And I loved hearing you talk about how, yeah, the cultural backgrounds of the people you're speaking to, totally matters. Because if your goal really is to impart some knowledge, some wisdom and some new information to these people, like it's, this is a two two way process, like they need to receive it, and how are they receiving it? And how it's your responsibility to consider their cultural backgrounds? Because that will affect that whole experience? What if you're on the other side? So what if you're buying a course participating in someone's program? Watching? We watch a lot of stuff as entrepreneurs, right? Maybe you're watching a YouTube video, maybe you're participating in these summits? What can we do on the side of the table? This
one is it sounds easy, but it is not that simple. It starts with being very curious about the people that you're choosing to learn from. And I don't mean curious, as in stock away on their socials and learn everything about their family. No. Be curious about? Who are the voices that you are listening to? Who are the people that you're choosing to believe in and try to diversify that try to see critically, if what they are saying is exactly the same thing that the rest of the white lineup is also saying? And if what they are saying is aligned with your values, okay? That's okay. But if it's not, which, unsurprisingly, is almost always the case. If it's not, then I invite you to just do some good old Google. There are many, plenty accomplished scholars, industry experts, thought leaders, course creators, you name it, whatever the industry is, there are people out there who are aware of how the world operates under the colonialist lens, and they are doing their best work, to try to shift the narrative, they're doing their best work to try to give you an opportunity to be informed and make informed choices. And that's all we can ask. I'm not going to impose anything on you. I only ask you, to be very honest with yourself, to be very honest with yourself and to make choices that are all of our wareness.
I feel like something that I come back to every time we have conversations like this is, wow, there's a lot of work that needs to be done. That is invisible. I have to take the time to think about where this information where this knowledge where this decision comes from. That means I can't move fast and break the eggs. I can't just go take action. I have to slow down and be okay with moving a little slower.
Yes. And there's beauty in that. There's beauty in making conscious choices. I think one of the narratives of capitalism is that fast actions brings you fast rewards. But yeah, it also brings us look around genocide, global warming. I don't want to keep going because it's going to be a complete downer. But that's what it is. There's your brain needs time to make thoughtful choices. I don't believe that deep down people are completely sure that the houses that they are building at this space Good, are gonna withstand the test of time we're operating under the impression that if you want to play the game, you got to play it at a certain speed. That's a narrative that comes from colonization. Ask yourself, why are you thinking that? But yeah, there is work to be done. And I don't want to overwhelm people with this, you can just choose one thing to pay attention to, like the next summit that you're going to enroll for? Where are the speakers? What are they saying, the next time that you're putting up a sales page, think about your payment plan, the next time that you're going to be the keynote speaker somewhere? Just ask yourself, what are the backgrounds of the people that are going to attend this engagement, take one little thing, and then eventually is going to become a habit
is thinking about the backgrounds of the people who are attending, it's so simple, but it's so big, like we we think to ask, Oh, who's the audience? Are they for me? I want to know, are they web designers? Are they like other kinds of designers? Is that online business owners in general? Or are we talking about a completely different group of people, I've never come across an event where the organizer specifically said, we are expecting people from these kinds of backgrounds, unless it's to say, oh, from all over the world, which is really not saying much at all. It's such an interesting piece of information, and such an important piece of information for you to keep in mind.
And if you do have a hard time right now listening to them thinking, what do you what do you mean by cultural background, for example, it has to do with your identity. Right now I'm in a few communities that are geared towards first generation, second generation daughters of immigrants. Now, that is a very specific cultural background, is a very specific lived experience. And you might think, there's not enough market for these to be successful there is because around the world, there are many people who are going through these experience. And while I'm not the daughter of immigrant parent, I am an immigrant mother. So it is of interest to me to know, how does this work when they grow up? Because I am raising two biracial kids. So if you are thinking of what do you mean by cultural background, that is a cultural background, for example, third, culture kids, that's another cultural background. So it's not exclusively about ethnicity. But you can also think of it as identities, lived experiences, and you can start with your own like, how do you see your identities? And then think, okay, if I see myself like as this, how is this audience thinking about themselves? How are they? How do they consider themselves? What is their identity?
That's such a good point, there's so much to cultural background, other than like your nationality, and your race and your ethnicity. And also, I agree that the best place to look at to start from is yourself, what are the different dimensions of who you are and your identity? Oh, wow, this was so great. We talked about decolonizing, curriculum, curricula, clinical lysing education, and what we tend to see in the online business space that's so common in terms of yeah, in terms of practices that have been directly influenced by the history of colonization around the world. We talked about what we can do as people who are teaching and sharing information and people who are learning from other folks, if they want to dive deeper into the idea of decolonization. What can our listeners do? Are there ways for you to get more of your expertise in this area? Yes,
there are free resources out there, right. And I'm not going to point you to a specific one, because again, it has to be aligned with your identities and where you are in your journey. But if you are someone who is right now working on the next educational product, course, mastermind group program, anything that has to do with teaching and learning, I work with people one on one, of course, is one on one, because it's very individualized. And I don't think that's obvious to everyone. That is true. That is true. It's not obvious that it would give one word that you're completely right, there is a lot of courses about creating courses, and it's a group setting. I prefer to work with people one on one, I like to take the time to try to understand who they are, who their clients are, and how can we create the best learning environment for both of them. So if you are interested in continuing your journey on decolonizing, your business or your curriculum, I would be more than happy to work with you. You can contact me on my socials or the email that is listed here. And we can find a way that best
suits you and I have to say As someone who has done this one on one break work with Mariana like, I came away with an amazing course, of course, both Global Inclusion basics and global, globally inclusive websites are directly influenced by the work that I did with Marianna, I just learned so much about myself, it's so true that she takes the time to really get to know who you are. And like I mentioned earlier, there is this bias towards moving quickly and taking action and making decisions quickly. And I totally fall into that trap all the time. And this was such, I don't want to call it a luxury because this is very much needed. This is not extra. But I had never taken so much time to really examine my own beliefs and values and where they come from. And the courses of course, were like amazing outcomes from it. But my biggest the thing that I got out of this whole experience with just more self awareness and so cheesy, but that is invaluable. Like you can't put $1 amount on it.
Thank you. I appreciate that. And because we're speaking about like decolonizing your mindset and your curriculum and your business, I think ultimately that is the goal that every interaction, every investment, every purchase that we make, we come out of it, feeling growth, experiencing evolution in ourselves, and evolution is not always related to more money in your bank. Why
we measure success around your thank
you so much than before this conversation.
Oh, thank you. This is amazing. I can't wait for the next one.
