Deficit language concerning historically marginalized students pervades much of education today. Black, Brown, and Indigenous children experience marginalization and dehumanizing practices in classrooms instead of participating in a safe space to learn and grow. For this paper we employ a crucial component from Critical Race Theory to address…

This research study examines the learning experiences of 11th- and 12th-grade Black girls participating in a precollegiate program committed to increasing the number of Teachers of Color entering the profession by viewing a teaching career as an act of social justice committed to educational equity. The pipeline functions as an education reform…

Recent societal and political shifts have underscored the need for higher education programs to examine and reflect on the ways in which they address equity and social justice. As teacher-educators, we feel this call with particular urgency. In this paper, we describe our past and current efforts to engage in self-reflective inquiry and enact ways…

This paper investigates the ways that teachers in one alternative school blur the boundaries of the political, personal, and philosophical in their efforts to re-engage marginalised and disenfranchised young people. The labours of the school staff at Harmony High offer an intriguing narrative of working both within and against the grain of policy…

This paper considers the emancipatory potential of incorporating youth participatory action research (YPAR) and restorative practices (RP) implementation into a transformative mixed methods study design as a means to create equitable and caring school systems for marginalized youth. The utilization of "transformative mixed methods"…

Nathaniel Stone, the principal of Lakeshore Community High School, was summoned to a meeting in the city. The gathering included more than a dozen influential leaders. The conversation that unfolded was, literally, unreal. Mr. Smith, a government official of sorts, called for the destruction of a social movement that was having a positive effect…

The research presented in this study focuses on Educational Cultural Negotiators (ECNs). The participants were teachers, administrators, and graduate students in an after-school program in the Midwest and a community-based school/university partnership in the Western U.S. We posit that the roles of the ECNs function as advocacy leaders to invoke…

This Chicana Critical Feminist Testimonio reveals a Mexican/Mexican-American Ethic of Care and Testimonios of struggle and survival informing curriculum and pedagogy of one Mexican/Mexican-American female educator of predominantly Mexican/Mexican-American students. This work is part of a larger ethnographic study conducted through multiple…

In public high schools across the country young people deal with issues of discrimination and bullying that are often the result of intolerance and misunderstandings across social identities. Progressive educators who advocate for critical multicultural and critical pedagogical approaches have proposed that young people need to have educational…

Critical pedagogy, combined with partnerships with adults at school, enabled the Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) advisor to create the foundation for reflective, activist-oriented learning at one Midwestern high school. Underreported in current literature, the use of critical pedagogy in school clubs and/or organizations has broad implications for…

Literature in leadership studies is devoid of knowledge about the unique ways that Latina/Chicana educators engage as leaders, activists, and agents for change. Women's studies, ethnic studies, and Chicana feminist studies alert us to the complex role that social context and the intersectionality of gender, ethnicity/race, and class play in the…

This postcard compares youth resistance across classroom contexts. It draws from a two-year ethnography of the East Oakland Step to College (Step) program, which prepared underserved African-American and Latina/o youth to enroll in four-year universities, while nurturing students' sensibilities to fight for social justice. Students were highly…

This article explores the ways that students in a humanities class talked about, researched, and disrupted homophobia at Jones School, a public combined middle school and high school in a small New England town. It includes strategies that move beyond discussions of right and wrong to a place of critical inquiry and support for the human rights of…

The authors contend that studying emotional perspectives can facilitate understanding of the complexities of socially just teaching. They explore the intersection between emotions and socially just teaching via a case study of a White novice teacher at one urban school as she struggles to formulate socially just teaching practices. Drawing from…

Democratic political systems and the democratic way of life is aspired by most people around the world. Democracy is considered to be morally superior to other forms of political systems as it aspires to secure civil liberties, human rights, social justice and equality before the law for everyone regardless of their gender, culture, religion and…