Teaching, Leading, and Social Justice

She’s devoted her life to teaching your kids — in a country that now wants to deport her

Nadra Nittle, The 19th

Scattered among the shrubs on the southern border lie belongings migrants left behind — toothbrushes, water bottles, baseball caps. Some of the owners forged north, crossing the boundary undetected. Others were apprehended or succumbed to dehydration, drowning or one of the unimaginable dangers in the harsh desert that straddles Mexico and the United States. 

Angélica Reyes survived. At nine months old, she made the journey that could have claimed her life just as it started.  Since 1994, approximately 10,000 migrants have died in the borderlands. That year, the North American Free Trade Agreement took effect. Designed to open trade between the United States, Canada and Mexico, the now-defunct policy has faced criticism for depressing Mexican wages. Their income flatlining, Reyes said, her parents left the city of Guadalajara, in the western part of Mexico, and headed with her to Los Angeles. They did not have authorization to live in the United States.

Tanya Clay House on Freedom to Learn, Danaka Katovich on Attacks on Activists [Audio]

Tanya Clay House and Danaka Katovich, Counterspin

This week on CounterSpin: You can say someone ‘supports the rights’ of people of color to vote, or to have our experience and history recognized—as though that were a passive descriptor; she ‘supports the rights’ of people of color to be seen and heard. The website of the Kairos Democracy Project has a quote from John Lewis, reminding us: “Democracy is not a state. It is an act.” Tanya Clay House is board chair at Kairos and a longtime advocate for the multiracial democracy that the Trump White House seeks to denounce and derail—in part by erasing the history of Black people in this country. As part of that, she’s part of an ongoing project called Freedom to Learn and its present campaign, called #HandsOffOurHistory. We hear from Tanya Clay House about that work this week.

Four Ways Trump’s Budget Proposal Slashes Public School Funding

Tim Walker, NEA Today

On May 2, the Trump administration unveiled its blueprint for the fiscal year 2025-06 federal budget. Since it does not list specific funding requests for every federal program, the 46-page document is a “skinny” budget. Congress ultimately decides how federal government dollars are spent (the fiscal year begins October 1) but the proposal is a clear signal of the White House’s priorities: a massive 23 percent cut to U.S. domestic spending, and, in the process, continue hollowing out the nation’s public education system. This should come as no surprise to anyone following the administration’s actions over the past 100 days. Through a flurry of executive orders—including ordering the dismantling of the U.S. Department of Education—the administration has made gutting education funding, and diverting taxpayer dollars to private schools, a major priority of Trump’s second term. No federal education program—almost none—has been spared.

Language, Culture, and Power

Trump Is Taking a Wrecking Ball to Indigenous Education

Connor Arakaki, The Nation

On Valentine’s Day, Kaiya Brown was in class at her local tribal college, Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute in Albuquerque, New Mexico, when she learned that 20 of her school’s faculty and staff members had been laid off. They were given two hours to clear out their offices. By the time they left campus, their work had been wiped from federal servers. “When we came back after the long weekend,” Brown said, “there wasn’t a single class where someone wasn’t crying.” Brown, a 19-year-old freshman from the Navajo Nation, picked SIPI because she wanted to be surrounded by other Native students and educators who understood her. “These aren’t just people. These are our family members,” she said. But in the aftermath of the layoffs, many basic support systems of her college disappeared: tutoring programs ended, financial aid disbursements were delayed, and students were unsure if their classes would resume.

We Can’t Improve Children’s Language Learning by Slashing Dedicated Federal Resources

Conor P. Williams, Leigh Mingle, and Daniel Velasco, Century Foundation

Earlier this spring, the Trump administration cut the staff in the Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA) from fifteen down to one employee. Just last week, the White House announced even more dramatic cuts in a budget proposal that would eliminate the office’s $890 million in funding. This risks abandoning decades of research and evidence, and will cut millions of children and families across America off from access to congressionally mandated services.

While sudden, severe staff reductions have become this administration’s calling card, it is surprising that this office received some of the deepest cuts in the Department of Education. OELA supports one of the administration’s stated goals, as asserted in its March 1 executive order declaring English the official language of the United States: the efficient and effective transition of English learners to English proficiency to “create a more cohesive and efficient society.”

Punish to Rule: Colonial Penality and the Urban Badlands 

Loic Wacquant, New Left Review

Colonial punishment is of special theoretical and historical interest when it comes to conceptualizing the penal state for three reasons. First, under imperial rule, state violence is suffusive, explosive and multifaceted, woven into the fabric of the colonial economy, society and polity.footnote1 Legal and extralegal force are closely enmeshed, as are military and civilian agencies tasked with delivering them. Second, the colonial Leviathan is the quintessence of the racial state: it fashions and defends naturalized social difference and hierarchy. So its erection and operation reveal the organic connection between punishment and race as two interlocking forms of material suasion and public dishonour.

Whole Children and Strong Communities

Trump Administration Erases School Shooting Victims at ATF Headquarters

Julianne McShane, Mother Jones

Jaime Guttenberg’s family should have been celebrating her college graduation this weekend.

Her family has known that would not be happening ever since Feb. 14, 2018, when 14-year-old Jaime was one of the 17 people killed in the horrific mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. But what was always going to be a difficult weekend for the Guttenbergs became even harder when they discovered the Trump administration was reportedly eliminating a memorial to victims of gun violence.

California promised to boost mental health in schools. Why one key program is behind schedule 

Ana B. Ibarra, CalMatters

California made a huge one-time investment in youth mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic as rates of depression, anxiety and eating disorders surged among children and teens. One piece of the state’s plan included a way to keep money flowing for schools that  wanted to expand mental health services for students. It involved allowing K-12 schools and colleges to charge Medi-Cal and private health insurance for behavioral health care provided on campus, a change that would allow them to provide more services and hire additional mental health staff. But that effort — among the first of its kind in the country — is off to a slow start, delaying dollars and resources for schools to help students with mental health challenges.

The opportunities and effects of climate action on adolescents

Megan Rouse, Youth Today

In recent years, the issue of climate change has mobilized young people across the globe to participate in climate justice protests, campaigns, and marches, and even to lead some of the world’s largest climate action organizations, including World’s Youth for Climate Justice and Fridays For Future. Research shows that young people are particularly concerned about and conscious of climate change and uniquely inspired to find solutions, make a difference, and participate in climate action. Adolescence is a period of significant brain and social development, when we are particularly sensitive to the world around us. This sensitivity can create challenges to young people’s mental health and well-being when they experience or are exposed to information and images about climate change. But these changes can also increase youth’s motivation to participate in climate action, which can mitigate these negative effects while providing an opportunity for them to fill key developmental needs and become leaders in their communities.

‘I missed talking math with people’: why John Urschel left the NFL for MIT

Rich Tenorio, The Guardian

John Urschel lifts the blinds in his second-floor office in the mathematics department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Outside is Cambridge in all of its springtime splendor on a mid-April afternoon. Everything about his office says “college professor” – the computer on one side of the desk, the stack of papers on the other, the books on the shelves behind him. He grins through his beard and his eyes sparkle behind his glasses when he describes his research in linear algebra. When he gestures enthusiastically, you can imagine those huge hands protecting his quarterback from opposing pass rushers – which he once did as a guard for the Baltimore Ravens.

Access, Assessment, Advancement

The Child Care Crash

Bryce Covert, The Progressive

At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, Christina Robles had to close her home child care program just outside Salt Lake City, Utah, and let go of half of her staff. With parents continuing to keep children at home, she reopened a month later with just eight enrolled instead of her usual capacity of sixteen, which meant she lost half her income, too. It stayed that way for more than a year. Her saving grace was government help. She got a state grant in 2020 that “plugged the hole” in her income, she says. Then in early 2021, Democrats in Congress passed the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), which included $39 billion in funding for child care, the largest amount of federal funding the sector has ever received. More than 90 percent of the 220,000 child care programs that received stabilization grants through the program said it helped them to stay open; an estimated 75,000 child care programs would have closed were it not for the money.

Trump Administration Terminates Education Grant That Has Helped Fund PBS Kids Content

Ted Johnson, Deadline

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting said today that the Trump administration has terminated grants that have long been used to fund education initiatives and PBS Kids programming. The CPB said that it was informed by the Department of Education on Friday that the 2020-25 Ready to Learn grant was being canceled, forcing it to inform PBS and 44 public media stations to pause the long-running program. “Nearly every parent has raised their kids on public broadcasting’s children’s content,” Patricia Harrison, president and CEO of the corporation. “For the past 30 years, Ready To Learn-funded PBS Kids content has produced measurable, real-world impacts on children’s learning. Ready To Learn has received strong bipartisan support from Congress and every Administration for the last 30 years because of the programs’ proven educational value in advancing early learning skills for all children.

‘Unconscionable’: Trump Ready to Garnish Wages for Indebted Student Loan Borrowers

Julia Conley, Common Dreams

With the Trump administration restarting collection efforts on defaulted student loans after a five-year reprieve on Monday, Mike Pierce of the Student Borrower Protection Center said the move “will further fan the flames of economic chaos for working families across this country”—particularly as the White House threatens to garnish the wages of people who struggle to make higher monthly payments. The SBPC joined nearly 200 other organizations in sending a letter to the acting undersecretary of education, James Bergeron, condemning the administration’s efforts to gut income-driven repayment options and eliminate the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, which has delivered student debt relief to 1 million public service workers since it was implemented in 2007.

Inequality, Poverty, Segregation

The five-alarm fire that public education is facing

Hilary Wething, Economic Policy Institute

All children deserve to attend welcoming and well-funded schools where they can learn and grow, regardless of race, disability, or income. But funding for public schools, where nearly 90% of all U.S. students learn, is at a near crisis point. The Trump administration’s goals, which are taken right out of Project 2025, seem to be to defund public education to the point that it doesn’t work, then offer private school vouchers as a solution to a manufactured problem. In this post, we highlight five ways public education is on fire in the United States and the damage this will do to students’ abilities to learn and thrive. Instead of cutting funds, lawmakers should invest in public schools, one of the best tools we still have to build a prosperous, equitable country.

The Persistence of Confederate, Enslaver, and Segregationist Namesakes in U.S. Public Schools: A Critical Quantitative Toponymic Analysis

Meredith P. Richards, Annie Gensterblum, and Cheyenne Phillips, AERA Open

In this quantitative toponymic study, we examine U.S. public schools named after Confederates, enslavers, and segregationists (CESs). We find that 4.7% of all public schools (n = 4,172) had CES namesakes, although this number declined slightly after the BLM/George Floyd protests in the summer of 2020. Most of these are named after enslavers, while 467 are named after Confederates and 210 after segregationists. While nearly one-quarter are named after presidents, the remaining three-quarters of namesakes have no such claim on American history. More than half of schools with CES namesakes reproduce their embedding geographies, highlighting how schools amplify the toponyms of other geographies and public spaces. Of particular concern, Black students are particularly concentrated in schools with Confederate namesakes. We discuss the potential harm of these “symbols” and conclude with policy implications.

To Rebuild Post-Fire, Los Angeles Should Look to Singapore

Natasha Hakimi Zapata, Jacobin

After Los Angeles suffered some of the most devastating wildfires in the city’s fire-prone history earlier this year, there has been a flurry of activity aimed at a rapid recovery. Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass declared that LA would “aggressively” rebuild, and signed city ordinances to stop landlords from price-gouging displaced renters and ban evictions of survivors for a year. Through his nonprofit Steadfast LA, failed billionaire mayoral candidate Rick Caruso offered prefab homes to survivors who can’t afford to rebuild. Building permits are also being speedily approved. After Governor Gavin Newsom nearly immediately slashed environmental regulations, some reconstruction has already begun without testing the soil for toxic substances.

Democracy and the Public Interest

Is This the End of the Separation of Church and State?

Ruth Marcus, The New Yorker

The beginning of the end of the separation of church and state started with recycled tires—specifically, recycled tires used for playground padding at a Missouri church’s preschool. The end could arrive this summer, in the form of a Supreme Court ruling requiring Oklahoma to fund the nation’s first religious charter school, a Catholic institution that is “faithful to the teachings of Jesus Christ.” The Constitution provides that the government “shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The Court has said the two religion clauses are intended to facilitate religious practice “without sponsorship” (the establishment clause) and “without interference” (the free-exercise component). But there are occasions, particularly when it comes to matters of government funding, when those clauses are in tension with each other.

Book ban prompts Waukesha author’s request to remove her name from Waukesha North Wall of Stars

Alec Johnson, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Author and Waukesha North High School alumna Kathie Giorgio has asked to have her name removed from the school’s Wall of Stars after the district banned her books from school libraries in the district. The Waukesha School District said it will comply with Giorgio’s request, according to an emailed statement to a reporter. The Wall of Stars honors the accomplishments of Waukesha North High School’s alumni. To be nominated, a person must have graduated at least five years ago, demonstrated citizenship during and after high school and have made a significant contribution to the community and society, according to the district’s website.

Hundreds of students protest sexual assault at Westlake High School

Makena Huey, Thousand Oaks Acorn

“Protect victims, not reputations.” “We want justice, not silence.” “How many more?”  The phrases were written on the posters that Westlake High School students carried during a May 2 walkout to raise awareness about sexual assault. A group of students organized the on-campus event after community members expressed concern last month about what they feel is a culture of condonation at the school. One by one, female students spoke into a megaphone, sharing their experiences with everything from sexist jokes to rape by their male classmates. Hundreds of students gathered in the quad and the balconies above to show support.  “I’m sorry I’m shaking right now, but I’m so scared that my sexual assaulter is here right now in the audience,” one girl said between sobs before addressing the boy. “I hope you’re here to hear this, but I didn’t want to do it and I told you that multiple times.”

Other News of Note

The ‘Sinners’ Movie Syllabus

Jemar Tisby & Keisha N. Blain, Black Perspectives

The ‘Sinners’ Movie Syllabus is a curated educational resource inspired by the 2025 film ‘Sinners,’ directed by Ryan Coogler. This syllabus delves into the multifaceted historical, cultural, and social contexts depicted in the film, providing audiences with a deeper understanding of its layered narratives. Set in Mississippi in 1932, ‘Sinners’ explores themes such as racial violence, spiritual traditions, Black speculative fiction, and the complexities of African American life during the Jim Crow era. Drawing inspiration from the #CharlestonSyllabus—a crowdsourced educational resource that emerged in response to the 2015 Charleston church shooting—the ‘Sinners’ Movie Syllabus seeks to foster a deeper understanding of the historical and cultural contexts of the film. By examining these elements through scholarly and popular resources, the syllabus will enrich the viewing experience and foster critical discussions.

Help Us Report on How the Department of Education Is Handling Civil Rights Cases 

Asia Fields, Ashley Clarke, Jodi S. Cohen and Jennifer Smith Richards, ProPublica

Have you recently filed a civil rights complaint or do you have a pending case? We need your help to get a full picture of how the dismantling of the Office for Civil Rights is affecting students, parents, school employees and their communities.