Equity in Education
The artifact below is a paper I wrote for Dr. Crawford-Garrett as a response to a presentation about a curriculum lab created by Dr. Sosa-Provencio at the University of New Mexico and an analysis of the issue her lab addresses in teacher education. My reflection appears below the artifact.
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Reflection
My third artifact is the revised version of a paper I wrote about using testimonio to subvert White supremacy in New Mexico. I find myself returning to time and time again to the issue of equity in education. I am fascinated with the idea of other ways of knowing, especially where it contradicts and intersects with mainstream (read: White Supremacist) educational values.
This topic is kind of like a box labeled, Don’t Open ‘til Doomsday: “...you might not like what you find, inside.” White people having to confront their Whiteness amid the hegemonic fog of White Supremacy — I can see how that might go sideways for some people. I usually enjoy confronting, or trying to confront, my Whiteness, but I also try to frequently and deliberately leave my comfort zone. It forces me to grow as a human being. That’s me purposefully applying Vygotsky’s idea of a Zone of Proximal Development to my own life.
When I put myself in a position as an outsider or a minority, it helps me understand my Whiteness and how my thoughts and beliefs are informed by White culture and how my behaviors might perpetuate White, Anglo-Saxon hegemony. It helps me think about education through the lens of a culturally-responsive educator. For example, as one of two White people at a Zuni educational conference in July, I was keenly aware of my outsider status. I was able to learn about Zuni culture and their values regarding education. It helped me think about how I might approach a variety of subjects, including White cultural traditions that are so ubiquitous as to seem invisible in many cases. A perfect example of this happens every December in schools all over the country. We put up Christmas decorations. They don’t even have to be directly related to anything Christian. Even the lights can become problematic. The Zuni fast during Christmas time, and when they fast, they even fast from electricity. Try explaining the nuances of that duality to a kindergartener who attends a public school but lives in Zuni Pueblo and wants to know why they can’t put lights up. That for-real happened to one of my pre-service teacher students here at UNM. It isn’t just White people either. Anyone raised in America could be susceptible of perpetuating White Supremacy because it has become the dominant, mainstream culture. When people say American culture, they are talking about the same White Supremacy that I am talking about right now!
In NM it is critical that teachers start employing culturally responsive teaching. We’re living in the wake of the Yazzie/Martinez v. State of New Mexico and the findings that teachers in NM are generally under-serving minority students.
This caused me to reflect on my own practice, especially when it came to how I taught and differentiated for diverse students. I am proud to say that I actively differentiated, modified, and adapted assignments, assessments, and projects to meet the diverse cultures and ability levels of my students. My capacity for differentiating and for recognizing the unique cultures and backgrounds of my students was something I grew instinctively and joyfully. I don’t know that this is the case for all teachers. I know that I’ve been in more classrooms where this is not the case than classrooms where it was commonplace. Although, if you asked teachers about it, I’d bet they would almost all say that they are being culturally responsive. The problem is that too many teachers just don’t get it. This is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night. The thought that our predominantly White teacher workforce might be completely blind to the needs of the students they see every single day plays in my mind like a horror movie.
The more I learn, the more I know that I don’t know enough. I know that there are thousands of other educators like me. White people who know that they need to examine their Whiteness and who are looking for ways to be a part of the solution — to be allies with Educators of Color working in collaboration to creolize the culture of education and make mestizaje of the mess in which we find ourselves. I am currently registered to take the Testimonio class with Dr. Sosa-Provencio in the Spring of 2020. As of this posting, the class is in jeopardy of not making the enrollment cut-off. I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed that more students sign up. Even if I have to take a different class, I am confident that I will continue to find ways to explore the crossroads of White-dominant educational paradigms and other ways of knowing.
In the meantime, if anyone reading this wants more information about being a culturally-responsive teacher, I recommend Zaretta Hammond’s Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain. I am personally planning to delve deeper into critical pedagogy by reading Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paolo Freire, Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands, and Teaching to Transgress by bell hooks.
This topic is kind of like a box labeled, Don’t Open ‘til Doomsday: “...you might not like what you find, inside.” White people having to confront their Whiteness amid the hegemonic fog of White Supremacy — I can see how that might go sideways for some people. I usually enjoy confronting, or trying to confront, my Whiteness, but I also try to frequently and deliberately leave my comfort zone. It forces me to grow as a human being. That’s me purposefully applying Vygotsky’s idea of a Zone of Proximal Development to my own life.
When I put myself in a position as an outsider or a minority, it helps me understand my Whiteness and how my thoughts and beliefs are informed by White culture and how my behaviors might perpetuate White, Anglo-Saxon hegemony. It helps me think about education through the lens of a culturally-responsive educator. For example, as one of two White people at a Zuni educational conference in July, I was keenly aware of my outsider status. I was able to learn about Zuni culture and their values regarding education. It helped me think about how I might approach a variety of subjects, including White cultural traditions that are so ubiquitous as to seem invisible in many cases. A perfect example of this happens every December in schools all over the country. We put up Christmas decorations. They don’t even have to be directly related to anything Christian. Even the lights can become problematic. The Zuni fast during Christmas time, and when they fast, they even fast from electricity. Try explaining the nuances of that duality to a kindergartener who attends a public school but lives in Zuni Pueblo and wants to know why they can’t put lights up. That for-real happened to one of my pre-service teacher students here at UNM. It isn’t just White people either. Anyone raised in America could be susceptible of perpetuating White Supremacy because it has become the dominant, mainstream culture. When people say American culture, they are talking about the same White Supremacy that I am talking about right now!
In NM it is critical that teachers start employing culturally responsive teaching. We’re living in the wake of the Yazzie/Martinez v. State of New Mexico and the findings that teachers in NM are generally under-serving minority students.
This caused me to reflect on my own practice, especially when it came to how I taught and differentiated for diverse students. I am proud to say that I actively differentiated, modified, and adapted assignments, assessments, and projects to meet the diverse cultures and ability levels of my students. My capacity for differentiating and for recognizing the unique cultures and backgrounds of my students was something I grew instinctively and joyfully. I don’t know that this is the case for all teachers. I know that I’ve been in more classrooms where this is not the case than classrooms where it was commonplace. Although, if you asked teachers about it, I’d bet they would almost all say that they are being culturally responsive. The problem is that too many teachers just don’t get it. This is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night. The thought that our predominantly White teacher workforce might be completely blind to the needs of the students they see every single day plays in my mind like a horror movie.
The more I learn, the more I know that I don’t know enough. I know that there are thousands of other educators like me. White people who know that they need to examine their Whiteness and who are looking for ways to be a part of the solution — to be allies with Educators of Color working in collaboration to creolize the culture of education and make mestizaje of the mess in which we find ourselves. I am currently registered to take the Testimonio class with Dr. Sosa-Provencio in the Spring of 2020. As of this posting, the class is in jeopardy of not making the enrollment cut-off. I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed that more students sign up. Even if I have to take a different class, I am confident that I will continue to find ways to explore the crossroads of White-dominant educational paradigms and other ways of knowing.
In the meantime, if anyone reading this wants more information about being a culturally-responsive teacher, I recommend Zaretta Hammond’s Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain. I am personally planning to delve deeper into critical pedagogy by reading Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paolo Freire, Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands, and Teaching to Transgress by bell hooks.