Welcome to the June installment of the BARWE yearlong inquiry series, our last for the 2018-19 school year. Thank you for joining us this year, and we look forward to continuing and deepening this work in the future.
We are still planning what we will do for the 2019-20 school year, but would like to announce that we will be doing a Summer Podcast discussion group. We’ll be listening to 1-2 episodes of the "Seeing White" podcast from Scene on Radio each week. You can register here for our group, and we will send out details in the coming week about online and in-person discussions throughout the summer.
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.
Don't forget to give us feedback!
We are still planning what we will do for the 2019-20 school year, but would like to announce that we will be doing a Summer Podcast discussion group. We’ll be listening to 1-2 episodes of the "Seeing White" podcast from Scene on Radio each week. You can register here for our group, and we will send out details in the coming week about online and in-person discussions throughout the summer.
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.
Don't forget to give us feedback!
Section 1: June Inquiry
Overview:
We are grateful that you have participated in our inaugural BARWE inquiry series, whether it’s been all year or just a few months. This month, we’re looking back and looking forward.
Looking back: we’d like any of your members who participated frequently to take time to fill out this end-of-year feedback form, and we encourage you to use the questions in the feedback form as group discussion prompts this month. If you don’t have time to meet (we know June is busy!), we’d appreciate you sending the link out anyway to your group so we can collect as much feedback as possible.
Looking forward: One essential “next step” of anti-racist work is to bring more people into it. We especially know that it is critical to reach out and engage our white colleagues who might not recognize their own biases or could use a push to prioritize racial justice work in their practice. As such, our reading this month is a guide to building and using networks within our schools to get more people involved. This is a resource we used in our first Facilitator Training back in April. Finally, we will be participating in a summer podcast group (think book group, but with a podcast) and want to invite you to join us!
Primary Articles:
Recruiting New Participants: Anti-Racist Relationship Map
Guiding Questions:
Additional Readings:We are also including a summary of Helms’ White Identity Development Model as an additional reading. It delineates the stages white people often go through as they grapple with their whiteness, white supremacy, and racism, and is useful context that can help us figure out how to approach different colleagues who are at different stages in the process. We see the development model not as a strict progression in one direction, but a process people move within, often cycling through and bouncing between stages.
We are grateful that you have participated in our inaugural BARWE inquiry series, whether it’s been all year or just a few months. This month, we’re looking back and looking forward.
Looking back: we’d like any of your members who participated frequently to take time to fill out this end-of-year feedback form, and we encourage you to use the questions in the feedback form as group discussion prompts this month. If you don’t have time to meet (we know June is busy!), we’d appreciate you sending the link out anyway to your group so we can collect as much feedback as possible.
Looking forward: One essential “next step” of anti-racist work is to bring more people into it. We especially know that it is critical to reach out and engage our white colleagues who might not recognize their own biases or could use a push to prioritize racial justice work in their practice. As such, our reading this month is a guide to building and using networks within our schools to get more people involved. This is a resource we used in our first Facilitator Training back in April. Finally, we will be participating in a summer podcast group (think book group, but with a podcast) and want to invite you to join us!
Primary Articles:
Recruiting New Participants: Anti-Racist Relationship Map
Guiding Questions:
- Reflection Questions on Feedback form
- Who are you going to recruit to join BARWE next year?
- How would you approach a colleague to invite them to join BARWE next year?
Additional Readings:We are also including a summary of Helms’ White Identity Development Model as an additional reading. It delineates the stages white people often go through as they grapple with their whiteness, white supremacy, and racism, and is useful context that can help us figure out how to approach different colleagues who are at different stages in the process. We see the development model not as a strict progression in one direction, but a process people move within, often cycling through and bouncing between stages.
Section 2: Facilitation Information
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 your favorite “Pass the Hat” this month.
- Complete the Feedback Form.
- Join our Summer Podcast (Book) Group!
- Have a great summer and look for new emails starting in September!
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 humility around 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:
It makes the most sense to put aside our discussion protocol this month, and use it as a planning session based on the resource provided as the primary reading. If you would like to stick with the Discussion Protocol this month, it makes sense to use the Helms’ White Identity Development Model as your primary text.
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.
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 look back that the organizations we have donated to this year, choose your favorite, and make another donation. Alternately, you can choose a local organization that works for racial justice and is led by people of color. If you donate to another organization, please email us to let us know who you donated to, and we'd love to consider them as a future "Pass the Hat".
If you are looking to buy refreshments for your session, we recommend supporting businesses owned by people of color, especially Black-owned businesses, if at all possible. In Philly, we recommend Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse, Franny Lou’s Porch, and Uncle Bobbie’s Coffee & Books.
