Adult educators are often seen as proponents of social justice but what does it really mean to be an advocate for racial justice in and outside the classroom? Draconian policies implemented by the Trump administration have placed additional hardships on Americans. The increasing attacks on education have clear ramifications for adults in formal…

Recent discussions about critical race theory (CRT) have exposed, once again, the heated disagreements that prevail in the United States regarding the nature of its racial past and present. This debate is highly significant in itself, but the dispute is also noteworthy for revealing how quickly a contentious issue can become a lightning rod for…

For decades, marginalized communities have been naming the harms of policing--and the systemic racism that undergirds it--for health and well-being. Only recently have policing practices and racism within policing gained more widespread attention in public health. Building on social justice and emancipatory traditions in health education, we argue…

This essential resource helps educators tackle common and challenging dilemmas that arise in today's classroom--such as diversity, privilege, and intersectionality. This book examines common issues educators face when teaching social justice and diversity-related courses and offers best practices for addressing them. Contributors discuss the many…

Teaching and learning in times of crisis like the Coronavirus pandemic is less about crisis management and more about humanizing the crisis. Restorying COVID begins with understanding our students and ourselves as whole people, and their multidimensional needs--academic, socio-emotional, and socio-cultural, including racialization, social class,…

In 2022, many are coming to understand that racism is a proverbial pollutant in the water people in the U.S drink. Moreover, it is a toxin all members of a race-based society consume, and all must address. In this paper, I share my reflexive journey facing and dismantling racism in my own teaching praxis--examining ways I have upheld structures of…

This article is a revised version of the "Studies in Art Education" invited lecture that was to have taken place at the annual convention of the National Art Education Association in March 2020. Taking into account the challenges of the global pandemic and the possibilities presented by uprisings for racial, climate, and social justice…

The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on educational policies and practices are unprecedented. Our pre-COVID-19 lives in education were defined by boundaries that shaped taken-for-granted meanings about what counts as education, whose responsibility it was to educate, and what it meant to lead, teach, and learn. In this essay, we imagined education…

We understand the terrors of this historical moment: rising white nationalism and white supremacist violence, xenophobia, homophobia, sharpening economic inequality, homelessness and underemployment, neoliberal assaults on workers and the environment, Islamophobia, attacks on immigrants, kids in cages. While schools are guilty of perpetuating some…

With the onset of the pandemic, Philbrook Museum of Art's education department grappled with loss of staff, suspension of long-standing programs, and an unclear sense of identity and purpose. As the larger institution sought to continue a transformation towards more equitable and culturally resonant practices, we undertook a process of…

With the purpose of exploring how engaging with Hip-Hop might contribute toward decentering Whiteness in US music education, this research aims to understand the perceptions of three White music educators in the United States teaching Hip-Hop in their classrooms comprising majority students of color. The study explores participants' past…

Although many postsecondary institutions have recently begun grappling with racist histories, there is little research connecting an institution's history of exclusion to its current racial climate, particularly among faculty and staff. Using the campus racial climate framework (Hurtado, Milem, Clayton-Pedersen, & Allen, 1998, 1999), this…

If a person were to observe my classroom when I taught high school physics, he or she would find the traditional labs with the lectures, notes, and problems to solve that enhanced understanding. As I became more skilled in my profession, I promoted inquiry and critical thinking skills. However, the necessity was never obvious to me, nor was I ever…

What does it mean to teach and learn in this age of hyper-incarceration and the ongoing criminalization of multiply marginalized students and their families? And how can restorative justice be leveraged to initiate and sustain the important community-building and justice work needed in schools in the United States? In this article, the author…

Educational leaders must embrace activism as central to their efforts to combat racism and other unjust policies in schools. Social justice activism is an intentional action with the goal of bringing about positive social change. It requires leaders to accept their responsibility to actively resist exclusion, prejudice and injustice in our…