As we have mentioned before in class, the education system in
the U.S has undergone massive changes, not just in the wake of desegregation,
but complete changes in attitude about what a school or a teacher was supposed
to accomplish. Many scholars and students will openly acknowledge that the
education system that dominates in the U.S – a system based around standardized
testing and academic acceptance rates- is deeply flawed in the inaccuracy of
the measurements, but also the racial biases and divides they enforce and
encourage.
But what can we do? Can we avoid playing into this flawed
system?
These questions made me incredibly interested when I heard
the Codeswitch team (which focuses on race and identity in the U.S.) at NPR
would be following the first year of operation of a new, revolutionary high
school in Washington, D.C. The high school - Ron Brown College Prep – is an
all-boys, all-people-of-color school that is based on the leadership of
Principal Ben Williams and the school psychologist Charles Curtis, a faculty of
exceptional black teachers, as well as a team of staff and other students that
are dedicated to emotionally supporting and personally engaging with all the
students (called the CARE team). The entire organization, policies, and
curriculum of Ron Brown are based on the goal of fostering self-love and
self-respect in young men of color. They don’t even refer to their students as
students, they call them “kings,” and the entire student body and CARE team
begin each day complimenting each other and sharing their accomplishments from
the day before. The CARE team is also responsible for resolving disputes or
behavior that would normally result in disciplinary action in a typical public high
school. In fact, going into the year, they had a no-expulsion, no-suspension
policy. However, they weren’t able to maintain that policy until the end of
2017. This education model interests me because I feel like it is necessary and
everything about it sounds like the perfect formula for bringing back self-empowerment
education. The small student body, and the intense faculty investment in
working with students at whatever skill level they enter the grade. Many of the
students starting at Ron Brown had been passed through the D.C school system
without truly learning the state-mandated curriculum. This story is not a
simple turn-around of these once-neglected students into self-empowered kings who
gracefully and completely rebounded from years of systemic racism over the
course of one year. The problem is, the focus is on the students, not the
academic standards of the state. Which means that this entire class of boys,
nearly all of whom entered the school testing below their grade level, were not
meeting the state goals established through standardized testing. Those scores
are not meaningful to the school, but they are meaningful to the state. The
problem is, school funding and achievement is often determined by these tests.
So, can we base education on self-empowerment, in a system that does not value
the self-empowerment of people of color? Is this the starting point we build
from to change long-engrained racial biases? Or is this too late to build these
school and community support systems? Does creating an all-black school promote
racial separation?
Mallory, I'm thinking about your question, "Does creating an all-black school promote racial separation?" as I respond to this. I think the Ron Brown model is powerful in the way that it empowers these "kings" through educational practices. I do think that this model can be implemented without promoting racial separation as a starting point to addressing greater freedoms and liberations. I think in this context, rather than singling out men of color, schools in marginalized communities should adopt these practices--especially pertaining to disciplinary actions. Instead of punishing students by suspending or expelling them, restorative justice methods should really be implemented in the public school system. So, I think reframing the Ron Brown model and establishing it within the educational system could be really powerful, especially for students who are in marginalized communities that are facing the injustices of poverty and homelessness. By encouraging students through self-love and self-respect and self-empowerment, students are more likely to be well-equipped on mental health standards to theorize and make more sense of their places in society. Of course, this is not THE solution, but I think it is a huge first step.
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