This summer, the uprisings for racial justice and the marches for Black lives have been heartening. And believe me, we need something to root for during our pandemic timeline. This wake-up call to reckon with systemic racism and to dismantle it—and there have been many before—is ringing loud and clear. Now we need that same momentum to carry into the classrooms—all virtual please!—with the same gusto. Because schools are part of the system, too.
A Q&A with David Stovall: I’m born and raised in Chicago, and have witnessed the charter phenomenon emerge from a community-based approach to a corporate conglomerate model that is grounded in theories of deficit surrounding Black and Latino youth. From discipline policies to curriculum, it sickens me to see schools that think Black and Latino youth are to be “fixed” by aspiring to what is perceived as White, middle-class values.
By David StovallThe 2016 report issued by the Southern Poverty Law Center (The Trump Effect) reveals a disturbing, but commonly known fact in US public schools: the United States has NEVER intended to educate the majority of its populace. Because it hasn’t, we find ourselves in a constant struggle to make sense of a world that masks the realities of economic decline, imperialism, and white supremacy. The inability to provide an education that provides the masses with the capacity to ask critical questions of themselves and government feeds into a sordid process that engages a mythical relationship. With a problematic account of history that is imbued in the larger racist colonial project of stereotype, violence, and innuendo, our society rewards diversions from historical accuracy through the glorification of the contributions of rich white males.