Welcome to the February installment of the BARWE yearlong inquiry series. Last month, we heard from our first international participant, all the way from London!
Thanks to everyone who joined for our Twitter chat this month! You can check out the discussion at #barwe215. We hope to organize another one in the coming months - stay tuned! In addition to participating in the inquiry series this month, we hope that you’ll join by having your school or organization participate in the Black Lives Matter at School Week of Action, February 2-10. Use this starter kit to jump start your planning. Use this Curriculum Guide to develop lessons for your classroom. Have your students contribute work to the Creative Challenge.
If this is your first month, please start with Section 2: Facilitation Information.
If you have already participated in a previous month's discussion, we are glad you are continuing the work! Start with Section 1.
Information regarding norms, discussion protocol, and pass the hat can now be found in Section 3: Inquiry Tips & Information.
Overview: Studies show that students learn best when they are in the presence of educators that can act as “windows and mirrors” (people, content and stories that reflect their own experience as well as the experiences of others). In our nation’s schools, there is currently a growing number of students of color, while the percentage of educators of color is declining. For example, in 2001-02, 34 percent of Philadelphia teachers were Black, today only 23 percent are (data found here).This month’s primary article (and additional readings) focus on why it is critical to have a more diverse pool of educators, some barriers that stand in the way of diversifying school staffs, and ways to increase hiring and retention of educators of color. Primary Article: To Get To College, It Helps Black Students To Have a Black Teacher Early On AND An Over-Looked Cause of the Teacher-Diversity Problem
Guiding Questions:
Why are teachers of color so important for our schools?
What teachers in your own education were “mirrors” or “windows” for your cultural and racial experiences?
How does the racial makeup of the student body at your school compare to that of the teachers?
What processes at your school encourage hiring teachers of color? What barriers to racial equity exist for staff at your school?
How can current educators at your school encourage and support a more racially diverse teaching staff?
If this is your first month participating in the inquiry series, welcome! There are a lot of materials in this email, but here are some quick tips that can help guide you through them:
If your group is just starting this month - we recommend that you start with the August materials, and then pick up with the current month. Find all past month resources on our website.
Set a day and time for your group to meet - during lunch, before school, after school. If you start with a group of 2, that’s great! If 20 folks at your school are interested now, even better! The goal is to grow our work.
Send this month’s Primary Article to your group. You could even send this to a broader group of your colleagues - maybe it will pique someone’s interest! Also look through the additional readings to see if there is another reading that might be better suited to your group and its interests.
Prepare yourself to facilitate by reading through our Overview, Norms, and Discussion Protocol. If you have a large group, maybe ask a colleague to help facilitate.
Pass the Hat at the end of your discussion and collect donations for The Fellowship this month.
Prepare yourself for March by setting a date and time, inviting colleagues, and looking out for our next Discussion Guide on March 1st. If you'd like to access the materials early, they are normally on our website by the 25th of the previous month.
Section 3: Inquiry Tips & Information
Norms: As you facilitate this work with your peers, it is important to keep some norms in mind. You can open your sessions by reviewing these (and more, if you’d like to add) with your group.
This BAR-WE Inquiry series was designed with the understanding that it is not the sole responsibility of people of color to educate white people about race. White people must take responsibility for our own growth to be anti-racist educators and community members. It also matters how we approach this work, so please keep the following norms in mind while engaging in these discussions:
Please approach this inquiry series as a learner. We all have room to grow with our understanding of race in our schools and communities. No one is an expert who has come to explain race to others; we are striving to be in dialogue with one another to learn and grow collectively.
The inquiry series does not take the place of anti-racism or diversity trainings that school districts can and should offer. When done well, such trainings are valuable. Nevertheless, we believe that any one-off training is inadequate, and this inquiry series is designed to encourage the ongoing reflection on race in our teaching and in our schools.
As white people engaged in this work, it is important to maintain humilityaround the topic of race when in dialogue with our colleagues of color. The goal will never be to explain to a colleague how they should feel about race; rather, we want to learn how to be productive allies in the work towards racial justice in education and society.
Keep the focus on RACE. It is easier to shift the conversation to colorblind versions of the topics; nevertheless, we must persevere through any discomfort to identify how race is central to our work and advocacy for justice in our schools.
Finally, as you keep in mind the ongoing nature of this work, please expect and accept non-closure. It is OK to “hang in uncertainty” and not rush to quick solutions. We believe sustainable, meaningful growth will result from the commitment to reflection.
Suggested Discussion Protocol: In our experience, we have found conversations about racism and white supremacy to be most fruitful when primarily done in small groups (4 or fewer people). This makes folks more willing to share, and also gives each person more time to talk and process. We have also found it productive to use a protocol for these conversations - and have someone serve as a timekeeper during each segment.
10 mins - If you have the time, give everyone a chance to write and reflect on the article and questions at the start of the session. You can also ask people to do this in advance and bring their reflections with them. We don’t recommend starting without giving everyone time to reflect individually first.
For the rest of the protocol, it is recommended that you split into groups of 2-4 people, so that everyone can have a chance to share and discuss. If you have limited time, use smaller groups.
3 mins - Person 1 shares their reactions and reflections on the article and questions
5 mins - others ask questions of Person 1 and Person 1 answers
Key point: Other group members should limit their reactions to each Person’s reflection with ONLY questions, not statements. This can be hard at first, but we’ve found it to be a fruitful structure for conversation.
Rotate through the group members following the Share-and-Question structure
End with open discussion - however much time you have.
If you have a larger group, this would be the time to bring the small group discussions back together.
Feedback Form We want to know who is using these resources, what they find useful, and any recommendations for improvements in the future. We hope that one person in your group can take a few minutes to fill out our feedback form to let us know how it went.
“We want to name race in all meetings, site wide, departments, grade level, etc; whenever we are talking about students (or our colleagues), we need to bring race into the conversation.”
Thank you all for you feedback so far, please keep it coming!
Pass The Hat In addition to being accountable to our colleagues and students of color, we believe it is important to be financially accountable to people of color who are doing this work on a daily basis. Each month, we will recommend an organization led by people of color, in education and beyond, doing the work of pushing for justice.
At the end of each monthly discussion, pass a hat (or a box) and collect donations for the designated organization. You can then have one group member go online and donate in the name of your school. If you want, you can add “Building Anti-Racist White Educators” after your school name.
This month, we encourage you to donate to The Fellowship: Black Male Educators for Social Justice. Less than 2% of teachers nationwide are Black men. In Philadelphia, this number is only marginally better: about 4% of all teachers are Black men in a district with a student body that is 50.49% Black and 27% Black male. The Fellowship is dedicated to advancing recruitment, development and retention of Black male educators in schools throughout Greater Philadelphia.