Pledge to Support #EducatorEquity

So much has been said in the past few weeks since the death of George Floyd that any additional words would be wasted. So, let me get to the point.

As we see protests in America and around the world, I feel the need to act.

To that end, I am personally committing to three items.

I am, as suggested by Cait Hutsell, going to begin doing this work in public. And, I am taking a stance similar to those offered by many professional organizations to which I belong including the National Council of Teachers of English, the Michigan Council of Teachers of English, the National Writing Project, the International Society for Technology in Education, and the International Literacy Association. I also just joined (for free) and made a donation to Teaching Tolerance through the Southern Poverty Law Center.

First, as a white educator who has enjoyed privileges brought from institutional racism, I will join this call to action from my colleagues Shawna Coppola and Kate Roberts to support #EducatorEquity. This echos a similar call from Shelbie Witte, and is imperative as we consider the voices of educators of color.

In all future PD contracts for events that include multiple speakers, such as literacy conferences or webinar series, I will ask the organizers to ensure that they have contracted with at least one other educator of color, and will recommend colleagues from this list, “#POCPD: People of Color in Education PD Directory,” curated by my Educator Collaborative colleague, Julia Torres.

Second, in addition to taking up this pledge, I will begin sessions — even virtual ones — with an indigenous land acknowledgement like this one from my employer, Central Michigan University, and read the introduction from this NCTE blog post, “Being an Anti-Racist Educator Is a Verb.” These two actions will take only moments, yet will continually reaffirm my commitment to social justice education and a stance of anti-racism.

Third, I have signed on to our CMU Faculty Association’s call to commit to anti-racism, led by my English Department colleagues Carlin Borsheim-Black and April Burke. Both of these educators were schedule to deliver talks at a Chippewa River Writing Project (CRWP) event this spring, which was cancelled due to COVID closures, and I will work to get them reconnected with our site’s work as soon as possible.

That’s all.

For now.

We all have work to do, and I need to get started. This morning is our first CRWP event now that I have taken this pledge, and I need to prepare my opening words before we begin writing into the day.


Photo by Joan Villalon on Unsplash

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Recap of #ILAChat from August 8, 2019

Earlier this month, I was invited to be a co-host of ILA’s chat, focused this month on the “dos and don’ts” in writing instruction. As a prelude to a Research Address at this fall’s annual ILA convention, the entire conversation was robust, and I am particularly appreciative of Dr. David Kirkland‘s erudite responses and questions.

As just one example, his response to the first question pointed out a stark truth:

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This resonates for so many reasons: personally, professionally, historically, institutionally. I appreciate his keen insights and the ways in which he continues to push my thinking about literacy and social justice. I very much look forward to hearing his message as part of the Research Address and, for the full archive of the chat, visit ILA’s post on Wakelet.


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Reading the Organizational Newsletter

As noted in the first post in this series, I’m trying to unpack some of my daily digital reading habits. In addition to the (semi) automated daily newsletter that comes from social media updates, there are also a regular stream (sometimes a flood) of newsletters that come from various groups.

I generally categorize and read these types of newsletters in two ways: “headline” style updates from aggregation sites like EdSurge News (agree to have them use/sell my data based on the privacy policy) and SmartBrief (agree to have them use/sell my data based on the privacy policy). Then, there are specific, often thematic issues from groups  the Connected Learning Alliance (donation), Common Sense Media (donation), NCTE’s Inbox (professional membership), ILA Daily Blog (professional membership), and Edutopia (donation). More recently, I have subscribed to Chalkbeat (donation), too.

With the daily headline-style of newsletter (EdSurge and SmartBrief, in particular), I generally skim and may pick one or two pieces to delve into more deeply. The good news for these types of newsletters is that, with my “normal” news consumption of NPR (donation) and the New York Times (subscription), many of the links go back to these sources and I have already read/heard them anyway. These aggregators do send me out to other sites, including their own, to see a bit more of the education-related news of the day. From these sources, I’ve also been pushed out to Slate’s education reporting a few times, and I am thinking about subscribing there, too.

One that I appreciate, generally focused on Michigan, but touches on national news, too, is Robert McClain’s Student&Educator newsletter. He used to request a subscription fee (which I paid for at least a year), but it appears as though it is now free (as I haven’t re-upped my subscription in quite some time). I am not even sure how I ever got signed up for this one (no easy way to do it on the site), and it is probably best to email McClain himself to get put on the Constant Contact list.

Then, there are the organizational newsletters. I do appreciate and read these in as much detail as I can, just to have a sense of what is going on in the organization (at a 30,000-foot view at least) and to better understand what other professionals with similar interests are reading and blogging about. Also, deadlines. Knowing when conference proposals are due is pretty essential. While some are little more than advertisements for upcoming conferences or online events, many of the organizational newsletters point me to interesting tidbits that I would have missed in my regular social media feed or, perhaps, echo what I’ve already seen in my feed.

None of this, of course, is perfect. Some days, like over the holidays here, I still have time to read and digest a good bit of news (general and work-related). Other days, my feet hit the floor in the morning, my head hits the pillow at night, and I barely remember what happened in between. Reading, on those days, is a bit tough. Yet, the newsletters — even just skimming the headlines — help me stay in touch. If nothing else, I can pop open a few tabs and save them for reading at a later time (which I will need to discuss in terms of using Zotero, but that is another post).

And, a final note. If it isn’t obvious already, I have tried to indicate above how I pay for these services. Good journalism, even in aggregate, isn’t free. I am either giving away my data (and some privacy rights), or paying for the service, or a bit of both.


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Photo by Chris Benson on Unsplash

ILA Literacy Leadership Brief: Democratizing Professional Growth With Teachers

brief-coverAs teachers and teacher educators prepare for a variety of workshops, conferences, webinars, institutes, and other events this summer, I am pleased to share a timely publication I’ve co-authored with Misty Sailors of the The University of Texas at San Antonio: “Democratizing Professional Growth With Teachers: From Development to Learning.”

One in a series of Literacy Leadership briefs published by International Literacy Association, this brief begins:

In efforts to create classrooms that represent microcosms of U.S. democracy, teacher education encourages culturally sustaining pedagogies, development of the radical imagination of youth, the creation of personal and engaging learning experiences, and the use of authentic assessment that recognizes individual and collective growth, all within communities of practice. However, teachers themselves are not often afforded the same opportunities for their own professional learning.

Often, teachers must submit to the very type of instruction (e.g., in workshops, conferences, webinars) that teacher educators ask them not to use with their students. Teachers are not engaged as active learners with their own questions and goals. Instead, they are treated as if they need to be developed, an idea that we need to problematize, challenge, and reconsider if we wish to create empowering and equitable experiences with teachers. This shift requires that we democratize professional learning.

Read more here, please share widely, and let me know how you take up conversations about the shift from development to learning.


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