(2023). Preparing Social Workers for Anti-Oppressive Practice: Evaluating the Role of Critical Social Work Education. Journal of Social Work Education, v59 n2 p407-422. Although critical social work (CSW) is an important framework for addressing racism and oppression within social work, few studies have examined CSW education. This study assessed CSW educational opportunities, student attitudes, and the effect of CSW exposure on student learning via a survey administered to undergraduate and graduate social work students (N=191). Findings suggest that students have a strong interest in CSW, but that classroom and field placement opportunities are inconsistent. Linear regression model results demonstrate that student knowledge of and interest in CSW are significant predictors of higher scores on the Diversity and Oppression Scale (Windsor et al., 2015). Based on the study findings, recommendations regarding curriculum development and field placement policies for social work educators are discussed…. [Direct]
(2023). When White Parents Aren't so Nice: The Politics of Anti-CRT and Anti-Equity Policy in Post-Pandemic America. Peabody Journal of Education, v98 n5 p548-561. In the run-up to the U.S. 2022 midterm elections, Republicans brought their fight to regain control of Congress to school districts across the country. Deploying a national disinformation campaign regarding how issues of race and racism are taught in K-12 public schools, astroturf conservative advocacy organizations mobilized activists to descend on school board meetings and upend school board elections nationwide demanding an end to indoctrination of children with critical race theory (CRT). These efforts created a chilling effect among superintendents and school board members committed to advancing equity, anti-racism, and social justice. In this descriptive, conceptual paper, we portray and analyze the national campaign against CRT and equity in schools, how it played out at the local school district level, and its implications for superintendents and school board members leading for equity. Tenets of critical policy analysis are used to frame and organize our analysis of the… [Direct]
(2023). Student Assignment and Enrollment Policies That Advance School Integration: A National Perspective to Support Planning in the District of Columbia. Century Foundation The Washington, D.C. metro area schools are the fifty-third most segregated in terms of students' economic status and twenty-third most segregated in terms of Black-White separation. This segregation in the District of Columbia's schools undergirds systemic racism, creates social strife, and leaves children unprepared for an increasingly interconnected and multicultural world. The process currently being undertaken by the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Education to analyze student assignment policies and create a facilities master plan for District of Columbia schools poses the opportunity to create new pathways for more students to learn in integrated classrooms alongside peers from different backgrounds. As background information to inform and inspire that planning, this report draws together examples from around the country that illustrate different strategies and considerations for creating student assignment and enrollment policies that promote integration. [This report was… [PDF]
(2024). Recovering Anticolonialism as an Intellectual and Political Project in Education. Educational Theory, v74 n5 p759-779. In this essay, Michalinos Zembylas revisits the tension between decolonization and other social justice projects in education scholarship, focusing in particular on the arguments for and against the notion of decolonization as land return. While different colonized communities are justifiably projecting their own political priorities in struggles against specific colonial forms of domination, Zembylas argues that education as scholarship and practice would be well served to recover the "anticolonial" as a "shared" intellectual and political project for understanding the different practices and experiences of resistance to colonialism and imperialism around the world. Anticolonial thought and praxis offer education scholars, activists, and practitioners an intellectual and political framework of connectivity and anticolonial solidarity that neither erases differences between decolonization and other political projects, nor fails to foreground community building… [Direct]
(2021). Disrupting Anti-Blackness with Young Learners in STEM: Strategies for Elementary Science and Mathematics Teacher Education. Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, v21 n2 p239-256 Jun. If we envision a future for Black young learners where their full humanity is honoured and educators facilitate rigorous science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) learning experiences that are justice-focused, "we must disrupt systemic racism now." In this article we discuss how anti-Blackness is pervasive in science and mathematics education, especially for young learners. We also address why teacher educators must disrupt anti-Black racism in our work with elementary teacher candidates and in our research. We argue that to do this work and disrupt anti-Blackness, elementary teacher educators and teacher candidates need "political clarity" (Beauboeuf-LaFontant, 1999). Political clarity is the understanding of how structural and school inequalities work to (re)produce differential learning experiences for minoritized learners. We offer suggestions for how teacher educators can further develop their teacher candidates' political clarity. Drawing upon… [Direct]
(2022). Antiracism Education Activism: A Theoretical Framework for Understanding and Promoting Racial Equity. AERA Open, v8 n1 Jan-Dec. Although antiracism activism has contributed to substantive progress under certain circumstances and in certain contexts, little research attempts to theorize how antiracism activism is manifest across contexts. In this article, we explore individual and collective antiracist actions within and outside schools. We introduce a theoretical framework that identifies four domains of activism–policy, community, leadership, and teaching and learning–in which activists operate to make a positive difference in promoting racial equity and antiracism in education. The framework offers a systemic way of thinking about antiracist activism in education and the importance of recognizing that several aspects of antiracist activism usually conceived as distinct are interrelated within and across domains. Indeed, antiracist education activism must be understood holistically and systemically if we seek to dismantle the racism that is woven into every piece of the education system…. [PDF]
(2022). Seizing the Moment: A Critical Place-Based Partnership for Antiracist Elementary Social Studies Teacher Education. Theory and Research in Social Education, v50 n3 p402-430. We designed and implemented a hybrid elementary social studies education elective focused on antiracist teacher education, place-based teacher education, and archaeology with partners at an historic site, James Madison's Montpelier. Our action research study indicates that, in the midst of injustices highlighted in 2020, participants engaged in meaningful race reflection in ways that demonstrated shifts toward becoming more antiracist individuals and teachers. Purposeful course work and interactions with course texts and participants, as well as the power of the place itself, supported students' race reflections toward increased racial awareness and understandings of how to facilitate their future elementary students' racial literacy. Implications include that critical place-based experiences have the potential to serve as powerful learning experiences to prepare preservice social studies teachers to teach children about race and racism…. [Direct]
(2024). Insider Knowledge, Outsider Practice: The Disruptive Liberatory Potential of Skateboarding in US Higher Education. Current Issues in Education, v25 n2. This conceptual paper articulates how the unique social, experiential, and navigational perspectives of college skateboarders contribute to their potential as changemakers in higher education. Drawing from the theory of campus ecology and multidisciplinary body of skateboarding scholarly literature, this paper applies the unique navigational and analytical lenses of skate culture to render visible oppressive institutional conditions that are currently absent from educational scholarship. In order to accomplish this application, I conduct an extensive search for literature, and begin the writing by contextualizing the macro- and micro-systemic elements of the U.S. tertiary system and emplacing skateboarding within them. Then, I use skate scholarship to argue that skateboarding provides new critical perspectives on the philosophies of public space, policing, and social deterrence that manifest in university spaces. Additionally, this work explores campus skaters' resistance to systemic… [Direct]
(2023). American Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century: Social, Political, and Economic Challenges. Fifth Edition. Johns Hopkins University Press Whether it is advances in information technology, organized social movements, or racial inequality and social class stratification, higher education serves as a lens for examining significant issues within American society. First published in 1998, "American Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century" offers a comprehensive introduction to the complex realities of American higher education, including its history, financing, governance, and relationship with the states and federal government. This thoroughly revised edition brings the classic volume completely up to date. Each chapter has been rewritten to address major recent issues in higher education, including the COVID-19 pandemic, the movement for racial justice, and turmoil in the for-profit sector. Three entirely new chapters cover broad-access colleges, race and racism, and organized social movements. Reflecting on the implications of ethnic and socioeconomic diversity within higher education, the book also… [Direct]
(2020). Viewpoint: 'When Black Lives Matter All Lives Will Matter' — A Teacher and Three Students Discuss the BLM Movement. London Review of Education, v18 n3 p519-523. The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement is generating a new appetite for understanding the ubiquity of systemic racism. In this short piece, a professor and three newly graduated students from different racialized groups reflect on the reproduction of social inequalities in key institutions and on what decolonization means for the nation, not just for education…. [PDF]
(2018). Diversity, Inclusion and (Anti) Racism in Health and Physical Education: What Can a Critical Whiteness Perspective Offer? Fritz Duras Lecture, Melbourne University, 22 November 2017. Curriculum Studies in Health and Physical Education, v9 n3 p207-219. This Fritz Duras lecture argues for the importance of physical educators' critical engagement with issues of race and ethnic diversity. Despite its colonial history and close relationship to sport–where racialised discourses about the body contribute to shaping commonsense ideas about race–we have yet to engage in any sustained way with issues of race in Health and Physical Education (HPE). Concerns over rises in racism, coupled with persistent gaps between a largely white profession and ethnically diverse school populations in developed countries, point to the need to support teachers' critical engagement with race. In the paper I examine the potential–and challenges–of adopting a critical whiteness perspective for this task. Antiracist perspectives focusing on the effects of racism position white teachers 'outside' of race, and contribute to a deficit view of minority ethnic students in HPE as 'problems' for not being 'active or healthy enough' in relation to an accepted white… [Direct]
(2020). Why the Critical Race Theory Concept of 'White Supremacy' Should Not Be Dismissed by Neo-Marxists: Lessons from Contemporary Black Radicalism. Power and Education, v12 n1 p78-94 Mar. Since entering the field of education studies, critical race theory has had an uneasy relationship with Marxism. One particular point of disagreement between Marxists and critical race theory scholars centres on the critical race theory concept of 'White supremacy'. Some Marxist scholars suggest that, because of its reliance on 'White supremacy', critical race theory is unable to explain the prevalence of racism in Western, capitalist societies. These Marxists also argue that 'White supremacy' as understood within CRT is actively damaging to radical, emancipatory movements because the concept misrepresents the position of the White working class as the beneficiaries of racism, and in doing so, it alienates White workers from their Black counterparts. Some neo-Marxist thinkers have sought to replace the concept of 'White supremacy' with 'racialisation', a concept which is grounded in capitalist modes of production and has a historical, political and economic basis. Drawing on… [Direct]
(2023). "I Had to Call Them out on a Very Tight Rope:" Exercising Voice with K-12 Education Colleagues to Confront Racial Injustice. Educational Studies, v49 n6 p955-972. This paper examines how educators in the U.S. public education system speak to their colleagues about racially oppressive beliefs and practices. Limited research exists that examines the experiences of educators who exercise voice to challenge and engage co-workers and supervisors around issues of racism in their schools. Using data from semi-structured interviews with 25 educators and a flexible coding approach, the authors found that participants described using cautious, covert, and indirect approaches with their White colleagues to increase the likelihood that their messages would be received and to decrease the personal and professional consequences they might face for openly challenging their colleagues' racist beliefs or actions. This cautious approach serves to reinforce the dominance of Whiteness and White fragility in the context of anti-oppressive practice. Examples of an alternative to a cautious approach are presented and recommendations are made for future research and… [Direct]
(2021). National Movements for Racial Justice and Academic Library Leadership: Results from the Ithaka S+R US Library Survey 2020. Research Report. ITHAKA S+R Academic librarians, like so many others in the higher education and library sectors, have discussed equity, diversity, and inclusion for many years. A number of prominent initiatives have worked to address these issues across the profession and within individual institutions. Yet, libraries have struggled to make progress on these stated values, especially in meeting their goals of employee diversification. The organizing led by Black Lives Matter activists in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd sparked an increase in demands for racial justice across the higher education sector. Many leaders called for an end to police violence and pledged to address their institutions' history of racism. Academic libraries in turn have grappled with renewed attention to increasing the diversity of their employees, addressing retention issues, and fostering equity and inclusion for both internal and external constituents. Some have also focused their efforts on library practices such as… [Direct]
(2021). "Racist-Blind, Not Color-Blind" by Design: Confronting Systemic Racism in Our Educational Past, Present, and Future. History of Education Quarterly, v61 n2 p127-149 May. This History of Education Society Presidential Address comes at the society's sixtieth anniversary and provides a new conceptual framework that foregrounds recognizing a "racist-blind," and not a color-blind, ideology in the intentional and unequal design our educational past and present. It highlights systemic racism brought on by the dual pandemic moments of COVID-19 and global racial unrest, with a call to action for educational historians to lead in promoting systemic, institutional changes…. [Direct]