In Abolitionist Teaching and the Future of our Schools, Dena Simmons, Bettina Love, and Gholdy Muhammad speak about the fact that they don't want schools to just gradually reform. They want schools to tear down the current model and start over! The current model in education has black students saying, "I learned that I wasn't enough" (Dena Simmons). Our current model is seeped in systemic racism and does not teach students about how to be fully human and non-racist. When you see black people working in school systems, you can bet that their story is a story of trauma.
When I first graduated college and my first got a job as a Christian school teacher in 2002, I worked with a black woman named Linda who had been fired from a nearby public school system. She told me regularly that the reason that she had to work for this Christian school (and we were severely underpaid at 17K a year) was because she had been fired from the public school because she was black. I quickly dismissed her claim and said I was certain that there must have been another reason... who would fire someone because they were black?
I keep thinking of those conversations now that I am listening to women like these three. Linda was right. I now believe she did get fired because she was black. When I think about it today, I think about how difficult it would be for a teacher to be fired in my district. They would have to commit a crime that is worthy of jail time to be fired. It is EXTREMELY difficult to be fired when you work for a public school! And yet... here was Linda. 40 something years old, her children in high school, and she had most likely just sliced her pay by 3/4 right before her boys went off to college. Just like these women mentioned, Linda's story was a story of trauma. Just like in the video "How Can We Win?" where the black activist woman shouts about how much oppression the black population has suffered in the past 400 years, Linda was trying to help me see that she was also being oppressed. However, I did not believe it. That was 19 years ago and I am just beginning to see it now.
Lately, because of the BLM movement, I have been noticing more about how commercials position themselves within multi-racial communities. I have noticed in some cases where important new hires for companies or government jobs have been black. Many times, the bulk of the company or government department is mostly white, with a few key hires being black. Therefore, it struck me when Dena Simmons said she's tired of people saying to her, "Hey, can we use you?" (Dena Simmons). Companies and departments want to look diversified and anti-racist, and therefore, they use the few black faces they have to make it look like the population of employees they have hired is a beautiful mix of all different races. However, this is most often not the case at all and just a PR stunt. How completely sad that this is one way we are trying to "fix" racism. And, like I Am Not Your Negro stated, white people refuse to to realize that these things are going on.
Last year, during the beginning of the BLM protests during Covid, I was introduced to this video.
https://de-de.facebook.com/KREXTV/videos/557824134935068/
It was posted in June 2020 and depicted a black man demanding for the police to end this racism and oppression that was going on in the city of Grand Junction, CO. I was struck last year when I watched this video that the policeman asks the black man, "What do you want me to do?" referring to the next steps in healing for the black community. The black man responds saying, "I don't know! That's for YOU to figure out!" Initially I thought to myself, "See? That man doesn't even know what he wants! He's just looking for some way to cause discord!" However, after listening to Dena Simmons, I realize that there is so much hurt, so much oppression, so many days where the black community has been pushed down and made to feel less that human, that by the time some white person asks them, "Ok. What do you want me to do?" the black person can only answer, "This reckoning? That's on YOU!" (Dena Simmons). I get it now. Why do they have to endure whites oppressing them, killing them, stealing from them, and then also be burdened with the job of coming up with all the solutions as to how to fix the entire system?! It's completely unfair for us to ask that question, and now my heart breaks for that black man as he rages at the police officer in that video I watched last year.
Lastly, it really hurt to see hear the part that Bettina Love said at the end, asking white teachers if they would send their own children to the schools they teach in. What she said struck a chord with me because as we were discussing a few weeks ago, "White Flight" is real. White people will not buy homes or send their children to schools where the population is 20- 30% black or more. And yet, we will work in those cities, take their money, and buy our white children better educations or things with the money that the impoverished, red-lined city provided us with. And Bettna Love says, "This is OUR money!" It's like we are stealing. Ouch. That one really hit home.
Meghann, after listening to the women speak I felt a more thorough understanding of their perspective specifically related to education. Recently I was talking to someone in another district who said that they did not have any translators even though all of the secretaries speak Spanish. They were being taken advantage of, being asked to translate and not being compensated for it. That reminded me of the discussion about being the token or model black person. I was thinking about what Dena said about teaching her students and allowing them to skip the test against the administrations will and how much courage that must have taken.
ReplyDeleteMeghann,
ReplyDeleteI have also been very shocked by the reality that black people are fired from jobs, just for being black. After watching this video, and some of our class discussions, my eyes have been opened to how blind I have really been. As an educator, it is so important to do our best to understand all that our students are going through and have gone through. I think this video helped to paint a realistic picture about the oppression of black people and how white people do not want to believe it is happening. It makes me realize that there needs to be a lot of change in order to help all our students feel safe and represented in their schools, and in their communities.
Meghann, wow! What a powerful blog post! What you wrote at the end: "White people will not buy homes or send their children to schools where the population is 20- 30% black or more. And yet, we will work in those cities, take their money, and buy our white children better educations or things with the money that the impoverished, red-lined city provided us with. And Bettna Love says, "This is OUR money!" It's like we are stealing. Ouch...." Well, ouch is right. That really stuck with me and it is hard not to feel horrible as a white woman teaching in an only black and latinx school. Thank you also for the video link you posted- I had not seen it before. When you write, "when you see black people working in school systems, you can bet that their story is a story of trauma," I see this now as well.
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