BEGINNINGS, BUY-IN, AND BELIEF IN PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH WITHIN A SCHOOL COMMUNITYUrbana High School Social Justice Class

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA-CHAMPAIGN RESEARCHERS

UCEA Indianapolis 2013

ELEMENTS OF SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT

Student Voice?What about the voices of those most impacted by the school improvement decisions of educational stakeholders?

School Leadership: Administrators must take responsibility to foster, support, and embed student voice into school improvement initiatives.

STUDENT VOICE, YOUTH PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH & SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT

MEANINGFUL COLLABORATIONUIUC & UHS

• “Schooling” those in the “ivory tower”

• Challenging the “ivory tower” notion by learning from experts within the field.

• Who are the experts?• Teachers• Students• Administrators• Community members

• Understanding our socio-political context & nurturing stronger community relationships

• Fostering a more democratic school improvement effort:

• Equity centered• Inquiry based & participatory• Student voice in school improvement• Critical reflection & feedback

MS. MOYER

• Teaches English at UHS

• Dually certified in English and Social Studies • Chair of the Social Justice Committee

• Serves on the School Improvement Administrative Advisory

• Taught Social Justice elective course for the first time this year

• Committed to Culturally Responsive Pedagogy and disrupting traditionally asymmetrical power dynamics in the classroom

COURSE OVERVIEW

• In the first half of the semester, I led lessons that helped students engage with issues of identity and power

• In the second half of the semester, students engaged in Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR)

FIRST HALF OF THE SEMESTER

• Learned key vocabulary and frameworks related to identity and power

• Reflected on our own identities

• Studied historical & current events

• Engaged in debates

• Discussed the issues in our community and decided to take action

NOTABLE VOCABULARY

Social construction: a perception or idea that is 'constructed’ (or made up) through cultural or social practice; a product of human interaction

Intersectionality: the overlapping of identities

Who’s marginalized? Who’s privileged?

NOTABLE READINGS

• Select chapters from The Latinization of US Schools by Jason Irizarry

• “Colorblindness: the New Racism” (Teaching Tolerance)

• “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack” by Peggy McIntosh

• Excerpts by Gloria Ladson-Billings

• Excerpts from Courageous Conversations about Race by Glenn E. Singleton and Curtis Linton

NOTABLE ASSIGNMENTS

• Gender autobiography

• Race autobiography

• Counternarratives

• Co-authored an article for Leadership for Social Justice SIG The Social Justice Leader with Dr. Welton and Mr. Wiemelt

“STANDARDIZING” SOCIAL JUSTICE: COMMON CORE ALIGNMENT

Alignment to English and Social Studies standards

ReadingExample: RH.11-12.1. Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources, connecting insights gained from specific details to an understanding of the text as a whole

WritingExample: WHST.11-12.4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and auidence

Speaking and listeningExample: SL.1..-12.1. Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions with diverse partners on texts, issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively

ResearchExample: WHT.11-12.9: Draw evidence from informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research

“EVALUATING” SOCIAL JUSTICE: DANIELSON DISTINGUISHED RATING

CLASSROOM ENVIRONMENT

• Students indicate through their questions & comments a desire to understand the content

• Students assist their classmates in understanding the content

• Students take initiative in improving the quality of their work

• Students correct one another in their use of language

INSTRUCTION

• Teacher invites student to explain content to their classmates

• Students suggest other strategies they might use in approaching a challenge or analysis

• Teacher uses rich language, offering brief vocabulary lessons where appropriate, both for general vocabulary & for the discipline

• Students use academic language correctly

SECOND HALF OF SEMESTER

• Youth Participatory Action Research

(YPAR)

• Youth gathering together to solve real

problems through research

• Students and teachers work

collaboratively to incite change within

communities

www.mikvachallenge.org

HOW WE CHOSE OUR TOPICSVoting

Root causes and rationale

• Institutionalized racism: the cumulative effects of

policies and systems which have the effect of

disadvantaging certain racial groups; describes a system

of inequality that can occur in institutions

• This does not include individual acts of blatant racism

Color blindness: claiming that race doesn’t matter

(“I don’t see race”)

White privilege: unearned advantages white people

benefit from because of their light skin (ex: white people can

go shopping pretty well assured that they will not be

followed or harassed)

ROOT CAUSES: BRAINSTORMING

OUR TOPICS

Teacher-student relationships

Lack of faculty racial diversity

Underrepresentation of students of color

in honors courses

Disproportionate dress code enforcement

on females of color

Overrepresentation of students of color in

DRA

RESEARCH PROCESS

Developed guiding research questions

Consulted a variety of sources to find

answers

Established claims based off of findings

LETTERS TO THE ADMINISTRATION

We summarized our findings and offered

recommendations for the future to 2013-14

UHS administration in letters

copies available during the poster

sessions

STUDENT PRESENTATION

May 10th and 17th, UHS library

In attendance: teachers, counselors, deans, administrators, U of I students and faculty, community members, central office staff, students

MAY 10TH PRESENTATIONS

TEACHER-STUDENT RELATIONSHIPS

CLAIMS AND FINDINGS

We claim that culturally responsive teaching affects

students’ learning in positive ways because

students’ identities are affirmed; relationships

between students and teachers matter

We learned that teachers can better relate

to students by developing relationships and

embracing their students’ cultural identities

DISPROPORTIONATE DRESS CODE ENFORCEMENT ON FEMALES OF COLOR

CLAIMS AND FINDINGS

We claim that females of color get more dress code

infractions than any other group at UHS

We learned that the vast majority of

students believe that the dress code is

enforced more severely on black girls

LACK OF FACULTY OF COLOR

CLAIMS AND FINDINGS

We claim that diversity is a strength; we

believe the diversity of the faculty should

reflect the diversity of the student body

We learned that the faculty at UHS is 92%

white

OVERREPRESENTATION OF STUDENTS OF COLOR IN DRA

CLAIMS AND FINDINGS

We claim that the higher level of referrals black

students receive may be “pushing” kids out of

school

We learned that 74% of students that

receive DRA are black

UNDERREPRESENTATION OF STUDENTS OF COLOR IN HONORS COURSES

CLAIMS AND FINDINGS

We claim that there is a lack of racial, ethnic, and

linguistic diversity in Advance Placement courses

We learned that the rate of white students

enrolled in AP courses is over three times the

rate of black students enrolled in AP courses.

NEWSPAPER FEATURE

STUDENTS & TEACHER AS ACTIVISTOur next steps will be to…

…work with administrators to implement as many of our recommendations as possible…work with the Social Justice Committee to advocate for and facilitate these changes…propose a second social justice class to the Curriculum Development team…Social Justice class & UIUC researchers collaborate in order to continue this work

RESEARCH COLLABORATION PROCESS

Leadership

• Support from school administration• District level leadership

Coalition Building

• Community organized support that• Motivates teachers & students• Challenges resistance & whiteness• Brokers resources & capital

• Encouraging educators to include student voice in the classroom

The research

• Developing theories based on classroom pedagogy & community building

• Co-authoring papers with high school faculty• Students & teacher on the “speakers circuit” facilitating PD for

educators