The teachers within the classes all speak about knowing where you came from, reflecting on your actions, and reconciling. LOVE, . They were teaching students from multiple races and backgrounds. There were white students with Hispanic students and African American students all learning about society and life.
"How can I change the world for the better?"
The students were being taught to monitor their own thinking
"Expect more, challenge more"- It looked like they were participating in more authentic learning/ life learning. This reminded me of the discussion that we had last week about the teachers planning the protests and all of the work that is expected.. Me thinking about teachers pushing the topics onto the students versus the students rallying and simply being guided by the teachers. These teachers were guiding students but NEVER once that I saw did they tell them how to feel or what to believe in. They just asked that they reflect on their choices and lead with love...
According to TUSD, students taking ethnic studies show significant improvement on AZ standardized tests..... with a graduation rate of over 93%
They discussed all systems of oppression: During the documentary there was a project about societal problems. The students had to find a cause AND offer solutions.
The unity festival reminded me of diversity week when I was in high school. We would have talent shows and a food festival where students brought in food from their culture and shared it with their peers. It gave students a chance to see some of the things that made our peers different from one another and learn to appreciate and embrace the differences.. OUR DIFFERENCES ARE WHAT MAKES US SO SPECIAL.
"The American culture has an outline for all of us, that is oppression".
Some of the complaints about the class was that it taught resentment towards a race or group of people. It taught victimization and that Benjamin Franklin was not on the wall in the classroom. When someone stated that Benjamin Franklin was a racist, he was SOOOOOO offended, like they were saying it about him.
Benjamin Franklin did come to a point where he was against slavery.... BUT... he also owned slaves. Why can't we explore and teach our entire history. Why can't someone who did good ALSO have made some serious mistakes. It should just be a fact. History is something to learn from we should not be offended when the truth is spoken. Just becasue someone did something good doesn't mean they didn't do something wrong. People can and do have both good and bad tendencies in them and while we can appreciate them for the work they did we should also acknowledge what they didn't do, or did wrong...
When the students were protesting with the brown berets and there was a meeting with the picture. She stated that them standing with brown shirts, bandannas and sunglasses was "VERY SERIOUS". It was teaching hate fro the country that they were living in. Yet many of the white people on the other side of the protest were SPUING hate from their mouth along with threats. "Hispanic parents don't want their children to act this way".
"When social change begins it cannot be reversed, you cannot un-educate a person who has learned to read, you cannot humiliate a person who feels pride, and you cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore".
-Cesar Chavez
I loved your thoughts about how people are complex. I agree that there should be room for talking about the bad things that people do and that it doesnt negate the good things they did. Some people prefer to see the world in black and white, or choose to present the world that way, instead of embracing the contradictions inherent in being a human, as you say. Someone once told me that this either/or thinking is part of the narrative of oppression, and that embracing both/and is counter to that. I think I was skeptical at the time, but it does keep coming up, as you point out in your blog, so something I plan to keep thinking about.
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