If this is your first year doing this series, we recommend starting with an orientation meeting using the August 2018 material before starting our current series with September.
Overview:
As we move into our third month of our series, we are taking time to reflect more deeply and revisit the intentions and commitments we have set so far. In September, we looked at how white supremacy culture shows up in our practice and in our schools and offered a tool to build ongoing awareness. In October, we talked about the importance of Black Joy, and asked you to set some goals around ways to elevate Black Joy in your classroom and school. These topics are foundational to all the anti-racist work we will continue with this year. We know that systems of white supremacy are deeply rooted and ingrained throughout our society. It will take time and practice to unlearn and uproot these systems. We therefore must be persistent in our approach. This month is an opportunity to revisit how the inquiry of the previous two months may have changed your awareness or actions, and how you can continue to push yourself and each other.
Therefore, instead of a new primary reading this month we will be offering a few different ways to delve into these topics and actively apply our learning. We hope this month’s suggestions will provide structures that will help you sustain and deepen your inquiry as you build a community that fosters follow through and accountability.
Choose the option that best meets the needs of your group at this time, and please use the form posted below to share what you are doing so we can all connect and learn from each other. We will share anonymous quotes on social media and use your responses to plan for future months. We also encourage you to join the Slack and share how you are using this month to transform your inquiry into action.
Choose Your Own Adventure:
Tell us what you did!
Facilitation Reference Guide:
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 #EduColor. From their website: “EDUCOLOR was founded by people of color, with people of color, for people of color. We are an inclusive collective coming from many parts of the education sector, including educational technology, education policy, and higher education. We use democratic processes to reach objectives and goals. Our team is way strong. We currently have 26 members from across the country and internationally. We have expertise in the areas of pedagogy, research, educational technology, and education policy.”
Overview:
As we move into our third month of our series, we are taking time to reflect more deeply and revisit the intentions and commitments we have set so far. In September, we looked at how white supremacy culture shows up in our practice and in our schools and offered a tool to build ongoing awareness. In October, we talked about the importance of Black Joy, and asked you to set some goals around ways to elevate Black Joy in your classroom and school. These topics are foundational to all the anti-racist work we will continue with this year. We know that systems of white supremacy are deeply rooted and ingrained throughout our society. It will take time and practice to unlearn and uproot these systems. We therefore must be persistent in our approach. This month is an opportunity to revisit how the inquiry of the previous two months may have changed your awareness or actions, and how you can continue to push yourself and each other.
Therefore, instead of a new primary reading this month we will be offering a few different ways to delve into these topics and actively apply our learning. We hope this month’s suggestions will provide structures that will help you sustain and deepen your inquiry as you build a community that fosters follow through and accountability.
Choose the option that best meets the needs of your group at this time, and please use the form posted below to share what you are doing so we can all connect and learn from each other. We will share anonymous quotes on social media and use your responses to plan for future months. We also encourage you to join the Slack and share how you are using this month to transform your inquiry into action.
Choose Your Own Adventure:
- Follow-through Buddy
- With this structure, your BARWE members would pair up during the meeting in order to support each other to follow through on goals they set for themselves and their practice in a previous month’s meeting. You might consider inviting your BARWE members to meet in between your monthly meeting or send reminders to each other. Consider keeping these partnerships in future months. Consistent relationships can provide a stronger foundation for change-making.
- One possible structure for a follow-through buddy meeting might be: “Rose, Thorn, and Bud.” A rose would be a success story or progress made towards a goal set in the previous month’s meeting regarding Black Joy. A thorn might be a missed opportunity to work towards the goal or a challenge or barrier you have found as you try to meet your goal. A bud might be an upcoming opportunity you hope to seize towards realizing your goal.
- A Deeper Look at Your Institution
- If your group finds itself wrapped up in the reading with little time to connect it to your institution, then you might use this month to take a deeper look.
- This approach would enable your group to more fully unpack how white supremacy shows up or how you might further center Black Joy at your institution. This may lead you to look at curriculum, discipline policies, school culture and events, or the way play is encouraged/discouraged.
- Depending on who is in your group, you might consider doing an informal audit of how Black Joy is represented in the book selections for the English classes, how Black culture, art, and joy shows up in the history curriculum, or how discipline practices and school events harm, neglect, or make space for Black Joy.
- You might also investigate more deeply the areas in which your school could more fully cultivate and celebrate the genius of your students. This framework is taken from Ghouldy Muhammad’s book Cultivating Genius (2020):
- Celebrate the achievements of Black and Brown people, especially student activism.
- Identify ways that your students can engage in social justice action by identifying needs of the community
- Connect Black Joy to Black narratives and works from the neighborhood or school community
- Connect learning to "pursuits" that students will engage as a lifelong practice instead of checking a box
- Consider how your school approaches courageous conversations around racism and white supremacy. You might ask these questions:
- How many courageous conversations are you having with your peers (in your BARWE group and beyond)?
- Are there other affinity spaces at your school to engage courageous conversations?
- How many courageous conversations are you having in multiracial groups?
- Troubleshoot an Issue
- One possible structure for troubleshooting an issue would be the commonly used Problem of Practice protocol, or consultancy protocol. This protocol, outlined clearly in this 1-pager, would allow the group to focus the meeting on problem solving a dilemma faced by a member. You might share this protocol ahead of time and ask for a volunteer who is facing a dilemma related to white supremacy culture or Black Joy as these have been the topics of the past two months. If you are a large group and you have multiple volunteers, you might break into two groups of 5-8 and run simultaneous protocols.
- If you use this protocol, be sure to allow different members to present dilemmas each month you use it.
Tell us what you did!
- Complete this new Google Form to share how you are using your time this month.
- We also encourage you to join the Slack and share how you are using this month to transform your inquiry into action.
Facilitation Reference Guide:
- This month’s work is based on the topics from September & October - Take time to engage in those discussions before you do this month’s.
- Set a day and time for your group to meet - Make sure to send reminders. If you’re meeting in person, snacks are always a good idea!
- Choose the format of reflection for this month and email participants how to prepare.
- Prepare yourself to facilitate by reading through our Norms. Feel free to use a Discussion Protocol if it is helpful.
- Pass the Hat and collect donations for #EduColor this month.
- Complete this new Google Form to share how you are using your time this month.
- Prepare yourself for December by setting a date and time, inviting colleagues, and looking out for our next Discussion Guide on December 1st.
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 #EduColor. From their website: “EDUCOLOR was founded by people of color, with people of color, for people of color. We are an inclusive collective coming from many parts of the education sector, including educational technology, education policy, and higher education. We use democratic processes to reach objectives and goals. Our team is way strong. We currently have 26 members from across the country and internationally. We have expertise in the areas of pedagogy, research, educational technology, and education policy.”
