Dear Freedom School Literacy Team 2020, Across the nation, we started the summer of 2020, lighting up the streets with rage. We rage for George Floyd’s senseless strangulation. We rage for Ahmaud Arbery, who was hunted...
Tag - Black teachers
If you take the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, add the massive Black-white wealth gap, and then mix in America’s ungodly lack of social safety nets; Black families are about to be served a hellacious helping of...
Late this winter, just before the world turned upside down, we sat down with two people we admire. Sharif El-Mekki, 26-year veteran educator, founded the Center for Black Educator Development. Mario Shaw, newer to the game but...
Teaching is one of my greatest gifts. Seeing my mother’s life’s work as a teacher in Dekalb County created my blueprint for what the life of a “game-changer” looks like, and the many influential teachers I experienced...
Pennsylvania’s teacher roster is the least diverse in the nation; less than 5 percent of Pennsylvania’s teachers are people of color, according to the state Department of Education. Yet evidence regularly points to the...
Have you ever sat in a staff meeting where the tension was so thick you can cut it with a knife, where you were not sure if a comment would spark an all-out race riot amongst teachers? Well, three years ago I sat in...
I reread it slower this time, an email sent to 40+ staff members with the subject line, Congrats and Great Work, from my principal. The email was a glowing account of one of my colleagues’ recent...
When it comes to Black male teachers, the question shouldn’t be, “Do we need to hire more?” We know Black teachers, both men and women, are vital; they are particularly critical to the education of Black and...
One of the main pillars of the Center for Black Educator Development is professional learning, coaching, and mentoring teachers, with an emphasis on early career Black teachers. Teachers are the most important in school factor...
Gloria Ladson-Billings remembers that there was a difference between the black and white teachers she had growing up in Philadelphia. African-American teachers could give the students “the talk,” she recalls, referring to...