Teachers Can Legally Hit Your Children in 19 States. Let’s Talk About It.

This past year has tested more than our mettle as educators; it’s tested our investment in the causes we claim as ours. I mean, it’s…

Here’s Why Dumping the Discipline Question on the Common App Really Matters

This is a year unlike any other. I am sure you have heard this over and over again as, over the past seven months, our…

Breonna Taylor Didn’t Get Justice, But It’s Not Too Late to Save Our Kids From a Country Set Out to Kill Them

Before we even get started, I just wanna say that the Grand Jury ruling Breonna Taylor’s killing justified is bullshit.  Now that I’ve gotten that…

This School Really Called the Police on a Black Child for Playing With a Toy Gun on Camera

Recently, I saw a mother post on Facebook about how her son’s school called the cops on her child. In the post, the mother details…

One Incident Can Tragically Alter a Black Boy’s Life

Do you know how it feels to almost drown? I will never forget that feeling. I was 7 years old and knew that I could…

Statues Are Only One Kind of Monument to White Supremacy

Every year, I ask my students to identify phenomena in our world that are both imagined and real. In other words, what are some things…

If You Want Justice, Teach Kids How to Read

In 1990, I was a brand-new teacher in an unusual environment: a Chicago alternative high school where teens and young adults could earn their diplomas…

Getting Pepper-Sprayed by School Police Shouldn’t Be a Part of My Job

I have only felt the terrible sting and discomfort of pepper spray one time, and that was when I was teaching and coaching teachers in…

A Student Who Is Ineffectively Taught by an Anti-Racist Teacher Is Not Receiving Justice

Last Sunday educators, students, and families marched in Philadelphia demanding a long overdue anti-racist action in the city’s schools, insisting that anti-racism “be the overarching…

Award-Winning Teachers Demand 4 Anti-Racist Policies to Ensure Schools Are a Place of Liberation

As educators, and also as community members, parents, and learners, the undersigned 2018 Teachers of the Year, rise in solidarity with Black Lives Matter against…