Teaching, Leading, and Social Justice

The Co-Benefits of Urban Green Spaces [Video]

Christine Zivic and Aaron Lemle, UCLA Science Project, UCLA Center for Healthy Climate Solutions (C-Solutions), and UCLA Film School

Join the UCLA Science project as they explore the benefits of urban green spaces in this video featuring the educators and students at Esperanza Elementary School, along with climate researchers and activists.

How student school board members are driving climate action

Anya Kamanetz, Hechinger Report

“Idaho really is the state where we can solve climate change,” Shiva Rajbhandari tells me over bagels and lox at Russ & Daughters Cafe in New York City. “It’s got sun and it’s got wind and these beautiful natural spaces. And it’s a very resilient ecosystem.” Rajbhandari, who beat an incumbent to win a seat on Boise’s school board last year, sounds like any other boosterish local elected official — except he’s an 18-year-old high school senior in the same district he governs. And he’s part of a growing number of student school board members across the country, many of whom are putting climate action at the top of their agendas. Currently, Rajbhandari is one of approximately 500 student school board members in 42 states serving almost 20 million students.

Earth Day: California schools remain vulnerable to closures caused by climate change

Andrew Zhou, Cal Matters

I stood outside my school in Cupertino helplessly holding onto an umbrella that was being pulled away from me by the gusting winds. “Mom, can you pick me up now?” I said into the phone in my other hand. Class was dismissed early because of a power outage, interrupting one of my tests. Later that night, I tossed and turned in bed wondering where I could go the next day to get my work done since there was no power at home, either.  Power outages were the latest in a string of climate-related disruptions from wildfire smoke, heat, drought and floods over the past year. It was really taking a toll on me both physically and mentally. The California Legislature, schools and communities need to make student health and education a top priority in the battle against climate change. It’s time to build climate-resilient schools to reduce the harm to K-12 students caused by extreme weather, as called for by the statewide Climate Ready Schools Coalition, or CRSC.

LAUSD, teachers union reach tentative labor deal with big pay bump

Clara Harter, Daily Breeze

The Los Angeles Unified School District and the union representing its teachers announced on Tuesday, April 18, they have reached a tentative labor agreement that includes a 21% salary increase, a reduction of two students in K-12 academic classes, and more mental health services.

“With this tentative agreement, LAUSD now has an opportunity to become one of the most successful school districts in the country,” United Teachers Los Angeles President Cecily Myart-Cruz said in a statement. “We held the line during bargaining on a number of initiatives because educators are the experts on what has the ability to transform LAUSD into a more equitable environment that not only improves students’ learning, but also the quality of life for L.A. families.” The district issued a statement saying that the pay raises in this deal address “years of pay inequity and inflation” that impacted teachers, while the smaller class sizes and increased mental health services will greatly benefit students.

Language, Culture, and Power

Japanese American author calls out Scholastic for asking her to cut ‘racism’ from kid’s book

Michelle De Pacina, Next Shark

Maggie Tokuda-Hall, an Oakland author of Japanese descent, has called out Scholastic’s “deeply offensive” suggested revisions to her 2022 children’s book while offering to license it for their Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander narratives collection. Tokuda-Hall was given an offer from Scholastic’s Educational Division to license her book “Love in the Library,” which is a love story set in a World War II Japanese American incarceration camp. The story is inspired by the story of her grandparents — Tama and George — who found love and joy amid war.  In the author’s note, Tokuda-Hall wrote, “[My grandparents’] improbable joy does not excuse virulent racism, nor does it minimize the pain, the trauma, and the deaths that resulted from it. But it is to situate it into the deeply American tradition of racism.”

As schools face calls to drop Native American mascots, some could lose state money

Scott Neuman, NPR

It was at a high school baseball game in 2019 that Becky Gaither’s quiet resentment was transformed into action. The mother of three, who grew up in the Seattle area and traces her ancestry to the Cowichan tribe of the Pacific Northwest, was there to see her son on the field for South Point High in Belmont, N.C., “Home of the Red Raiders.” As the game got heated, so did the taunts from fans for the rival school, Stuart W. Cramer.

Trying to erase Black history won’t work

Imani Sumbi, American Prospect

While Gov. Ron DeSantis and the College Board fought over an Advanced Placement African American studies course and so-called “divisive concepts” like “critical race theory,” school districts across the country were already working on integrating Black Studies concepts across curriculums without walling off classes to select students or inflaming political controversies.

A new AP class was never going to be the best avenue to introduce Black history to high school students. Significant racial and ethnic disparities still persist in Advanced Placement classes—and the College Board’s standardized testing inherently advantages wealthier students, who attend higher-ranked schools with more AP offerings and are able to pay for expensive test prep resources.

Whole Children and Strong Communities

“I live in a gray area”: Being a trans high school student without support

Spencer Katz, The Nation

After I cut my hair short for the first time, a friend at school saw me. “You look like a boy,” he said. It felt validating—especially coming from a boy—and it started to click that maybe I wasn’t the girl I thought I was. A few nights later, I sat cross-legged on the bed in my dark room, illuminated by the screen of my laptop. A quick Google search had provided the further validation I was seeking: “Why do I feel like a boy if I’m a girl?” I’m “transgender.” That’s the word my laptop told me. The definition—a person whose gender identity does not correspond with the sex assigned to them at birth—described why I felt so out-of-place in my own body. I had always felt this way, but the slight feeling of unease escalated to full-fledged dread as I went through puberty and entered middle school. I was a 12-year old who had built my entire personality on what was expected of girls—dresses, makeup, and boys—when I had no idea who I was.

Police in public schools harm students, leading to far-reaching socioeconomic inequalities alongside less safe schools

Tyler Whittenberg and Jessica Alcantara, Washington Center for Equitable Growth

Assigning local police forces to U.S. public schools harms students economically, academically, and socially—especially Black students and other students of color. A large and growing body of data-driven research demonstrates that the misperceived benefits of what is essentially school security theater masks the far-reaching, long-term harmful consequences of empowering police in educational settings. Such school policing is both ineffective at making schools safer, and is a primary driver of the school-to-prison pipeline—a web of policies and practices that directly and indirectly push students out of school and onto a pathway to the youth and adult criminal legal systems. School policing compounds the systemic underinvestment in other areas of public school education in disadvantaged communities. Recent research details how placing police in schools increases exclusionary discipline. School policing also leads to more student arrests for minor behaviors while reducing instructional time, lowering student attendance and impacting on-time graduation rates.

Amid ADHD med shortage, parents fear sending unmedicated kids to school

Jackie Spinner, Washington Post

Annie Artiga Garner feels a pit in her stomach every time a teacher approaches at school pickup for her twin 9-year-old boys, both in fourth grade and both diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Like a lot of kids with ADHD (62 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) the twins take medication to help control the symptoms of the neurodevelopmental disorder. The medications target some of the symptoms of ADHD, including lack of attention, hyperactivity, impulsive behavior and executive dysfunction.

Access, Assessment, Advancement

Biden issues executive order to make child and home care cheaper [Video]

Katherine Doyle, NBC News

President Joe Biden signed an executive order Tuesday to advance affordable caregiving and support workers as the White House sharpens its pitch to voters ahead of an expected re-election announcement. “The actions we are taking today are about dignity, security, working families, caregivers all across the country,” Biden said at a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden. “And they’re good for the economy, as well.” He called the issue “fundamental to who we are as nation.” The order includes more than 50 directives to Cabinet-level agencies to take steps toward fixing the nation’s child care and long-term care system, White House officials said in a call with reporters previewing the actions.

Asian Americans spent decades seeking fair education. Then the right stole the narrative

Jeff Chang, The Guardian

For decades, the rightwing gadfly Ed Blum, his group Students for Fair Admissions, and his shadowy rightwing funders have been trying to end affirmative action. They have finally secured an opportunity with the Trump-stacked supreme court to accomplish their mission with a decision expected in June. In the cases before the court on Harvard’s admissions, Asian Americans have been presented as victims of affirmative action and unfair admissions processes. But Asian Americans spent decades fighting for both fair admissions and affirmative action.

Having diverse doctors saves lives, but students of color face barriers to med school

Maria Godoy, NPR

Research suggests that diversifying the ranks of physicians is critical for saving lives. A new study highlights barriers that keep determined students of color from actually making it to med school.

Inequality, Poverty, Segregation

LAUSD, teachers union reach tentative labor deal with big pay bump

Clara Harter, Daily Breeze

The Los Angeles Unified School District and the union representing its teachers announced on Tuesday, April 18, they have reached a tentative labor agreement that includes a 21% salary increase, a reduction of two students in K-12 academic classes, and more mental health services.

“With this tentative agreement, LAUSD now has an opportunity to become one of the most successful school districts in the country,” United Teachers Los Angeles President Cecily Myart-Cruz said in a statement. “We held the line during bargaining on a number of initiatives because educators are the experts on what has the ability to transform LAUSD into a more equitable environment that not only improves students’ learning, but also the quality of life for L.A. families.” The district issued a statement saying that the pay raises in this deal address “years of pay inequity and inflation” that impacted teachers, while the smaller class sizes and increased mental health services will greatly benefit students.

Collapsing roofs, broken toilets, flooded classrooms: Inside the worst-funded schools in the nation

Becca Savransky, Idaho Statesman and ProPublica

Jan Bayer sank into the couch in the family room of her Bonners Ferry, Idaho, home and stared at her phone, nervously awaiting a call. Her twin teenage daughters were nearby, equally anxious. It was election night in March 2022, and Bayer, the superintendent of the Boundary County School District in a remote part of Idaho on the Canadian border, had spent months educating voters about a bond that would raise property taxes to replace one of her district’s oldest and most dangerous buildings: Valley View Elementary School. Built just after World War II, the school was falling apart. The walls were cracked. The pipes were disintegrating. The ceilings were water-stained.

America’s 4th leading cause of death: Poverty

Cara Murez, US News and World Report

Poverty is the fourth-greatest cause of death in the United States, according to new research. Researchers at the University of California, Riverside estimate that poverty was associated with 183,000 deaths in 2019 among people 15 years and older. And that’s a conservative estimate, they say, because the year was just prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. “Poverty kills as much as dementia, accidents, stroke, Alzheimer’s and diabetes,” said David Brady, the study’s lead author and a UCR professor of public policy. “Poverty silently killed 10 times as many people as all the homicides in 2019. And yet, homicide firearms and suicide get vastly more attention,” he added in a university news release.

Democracy and the Public Interest

Principals’ responses to student gun violence protests: Deter, manage, or educate for democracy?

Alexander Kwako, John Rogers, Jennifer Earl, and Joseph Kahne, Teachers College Record

School-based student protests have received little scholarly attention, yet they have the potential to impact the school community, students’ civic development, and larger social movements. Principals are key actors in responding to school-based student protests. As school leaders, principals’ actions affect the outcome of student protests and shape many students’ first experiences as activists. This study examines U.S. public high school principals’ responses to school-based student protests in 2018, a year of heightened protest activity in response to gun violence in schools. The purpose of our study is to understand how a national sample of principals responded to student protests and to quantify general trends in their responses.

Using a mixed methods approach, we surveyed 491 principals during the summer of 2018; follow-up interviews were conducted with 38 principals. Analyses are grounded in the Deter-Manage-Educate framework, a new conceptual framework that we develop in this paper, organized around the three broad goals principals pursue when responding to student protests. Using this framework, we determined how and how many principals deterred, managed, and educated.

Students walk out of school in support of Ralph Yarl [Video]

Associated Press

Students from Staley High School in Kansas City, Mo., marched for their classmate who was shot twice after going to the wrong address to pick up his brothers.

Arizona students walk out over anti-LGBTQ bills, demand action from lawmakers and schools

Gloria Rebecca Gomez, AZ Mirror

For the second year in a row, Arizona Republicans have sought to restrict the behavior of LGBTQ students, and for the second year in a row, students across the state walked out of class to protest that hostility. On Friday, students at eight Arizona schools gathered to express their support for LGBTQ youth on the national Day of Silence, held to acknowledge the erasure of LGBTQ people. At Chandler High School, dozens marched to nearby Dr. A.J Chandler Park, where they discussed their fears and called on schools to implement better safety measures and more inclusive policies. Tamaiah Briggs denounced Republicans lawmakers and others who make students feel unwelcome in school. “Every student has the right to feel safe in the space where they go to learn,” the 15-year-old said. “Arizona legislators, teachers and administrators: you have a duty to make your students feel safe.”

Other News of Note

50 years after he was assassinated, why Marcus Foster is more relevant than ever

Carolyn Jones, EdSource

Marcus Foster, the revered superintendent of Oakland Unified in the early 1970s, has been a role model for generations of educators inspired by his courage, vision and passion for helping even the most marginalized students succeed. But there was one thing he was especially good at. “He could connect people who have money with people who don’t,” said Denise Saddler, an Oakland Unified principal whose family was close friends with the Fosters.