Teaching for Social Justice

By Lorena Germán

Social justice is not a book that you teach. It is not a unit you explore with students. It is not a week-long, school-wide celebration during which you acknowledge diversity. These are all too often superficial attempts at having in-depth conversations that require nuance, time, and pause. While well-intentioned, this type of teaching may lead educators to think they’ve done the work because they spent an hour or day teaching one idea in a one-dimensional way. However, social justice is not a topic or a content area, but an ongoing action and fight for a better quality of life for all. Therefore, it requires actionable and tangible steps.

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Education in a Time of Upheaval: What Can We Learn?

By Peter Smagorinsky

Two stories have dominated the news since late May. One began quietly in January and took off with urgency in early March: the Covid-19 pandemic. The second occurred suddenly on May 25 and nearly blew the virus off the news: The killing of George Floyd, the culmination of a series of spring murders of Black people that included Breonna Taylor in Louisville and Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick, Georgia.

In the background, other stories were reported, if obscured by the immediacy of these larger events. Among them were the questions of how schools would open in August, and how ordinary citizens could help address the systemic problem of racism in the US beyond issuing noble statements of support and participating in protests.

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