Thoughts on the Intersection of White Fragility, Institutional Power, and the Culture of Education

Recently, on a podcast, I heard replayed the audio of the Sandra Bland’s traffic stop. In case anyone has forgotten, Bland was stopped in 2015 by police officer Brian Encinia for failing to signal a lane change in an otherwise empty street. She was found dead in her jail cell three days later.

I wanted to turn it off, but I didn’t. I listened. Because in Encinia’s voice I recognized something beyond the obvious racism and spitting hate: I heard the thrashing rage of power confronted with noncompliance. As a high school teacher, that sound stopped me cold.

When I was in fourth or fifth grade, my teacher shook a student until his head bounced against the wall. The student had been smirking. It’s possible that the words “wipe that smirk off your face” had preceded the assault. I remember none of the circumstances of the event — not the boy’s crime, nor his name, nor the teacher’s name. But to this day, nearly 50 years later, I remember the emotional pitch in the teacher’s voice — the sense that he had moved beyond reason. He had “snapped.”

It’s worth remembering that, just as the history of policing in the U.S. lies (partly) in the capture and return of people who escaped slavery, a key part of the original mission of our public schools was to create a docile work force. Teachers’ role as enforcers was, and remains, built into the system. When the principal walks into our classroom, our eyes do an adrenaline-triggered scan to make sure things are “under control.” We often feel that classroom “management” is our primary task. This is dangerous to our students because of what it does to us.

The fact that power creates fragility — a fear so intense it can lead to brutality — is evident in the ongoing history of deadly violence against Black people of all ages, whether perpetrated by white mobs or by armed police officers. What, then, is the risk run by our students — by all our students (my fifth-grade classmate was white) — but especially our students of color, who stand at the intersection of teachers’ anxiety over noncompliance and (I speak as a white teacher) our implicit bias?

I’m not saying that teachers shouldn’t enforce expectations. Call them rules, if you like. If I see a student thumbing a phone under the desk, I ask them to put it away. If it’s the third or fourth (or fifth or sixth) time, I take their phone or send them to the dean, making no secret of my frustration and annoyance. But I need to do a mental and emotional check every single time: I need to be sure that I’m responding to their behavior for a meaningful reason (it interferes with their work, is disrespectful to their classmates, etc.), not simply reacting because I’m being personally disobeyed. The distinction between these two motivations matters because the second — the panic of power challenged — is what leads to the whole abusive spectrum, from humiliating remarks to head banging.

So, how do we perform such fine-tuned in-the-moment self monitoring? As teachers we’re used to split-second multi-layered decision making. We know how to read a room, a moment, an interaction, and how to assess the results of our actions over time until we’re guided by something that feels like instinct, but is actually experience. Learning to examine what’s going on inside us at a deeper-than-conscious level is another layer of challenge, but it can be done, and unearthing our own implicit bias is, simply put, our job. It takes education, practice, falling short, coming face-to-face with our insecurities, acknowledging our failures, persisting with humility. Rinse, repeat.

That’s the band-aid, and band-aids can make a difference.

But it remains to be said that monitoring our own behavior is not an adequate solution to a structural problem. When I check my reactions, I’m resisting institutional and cultural pressures that function systemically to make school a site of racist oppression. The flair of panic in a teacher’s gut when their power is contested by a student is less a product of the teacher’s personality than of their job description. We perform roles within systems.

And yet, for better or worse, I stay in school. I do my best to make my classroom a space of humanity, respect, and collective inquiry. On a good day, I believe my students feel called upon to participate in community building rather than forced into a compliance/rebellion paradigm. To enumerate my own and others’ strategies for this would take another few blog posts, but they boil down to trust and risk. Most recently, I’ve looked to Matthew R. Kay’s chapter on “safe spaces” in Not Light, But Fire: How to Lead Meaningful Race Conversations in the Classroom. (Kay offers both analysis and concrete strategies.) More distantly, it was Paolo Freire and bell hooks who first helped me see teaching and learning as relational and potentially radical.

And still I’m left with the question: Is it possible to work within the system to change the very nature of education — its guiding purpose and its real-world enactment — away from a culture of compliance and control to one of community, growth, and empowerment?

I feel duty bound to pursue the answer. I think our students’ lives depend on it.

Lise Brody currently teaches English Language Arts at Innovation Academy Charter School. She has taught high school for 18 years.

A Letter to White Teachers of My Black Children

Dear White Teachers of My Black Children:

I am a Black mom.

I know it’s sometimes hard to decide whether to say Black or African-American. I used to identify as African-American because I loved hearing the reference to my ancestral homeland in my description of myself. But then to say African-American reduces the majestic continent of Africa down to the status of a country. Africa is not a country, and so I now identify as a Black woman.  I identify here specifically as a Black mom because I have two children who are now in high school. Raising them to be inquisitive, informed adults with a strong sense of identity and agency is an essential part of my life.

I am also an educator, so I understand the deep importance of guiding and shaping all of our children. I’m also intimately aware of all the cultural complexity surrounding our work. I know, too, that we have a long way to go before we’re even close to treating all of our students equitably. This is why I’m writing to you today. I have much to say about what I wish you had been able to do for my children when they were in your elementary and middle school classrooms, and what I hope you will do for all children of color entering your classrooms.

Because I’m an educator, I know well what you — or at least the vast majority of you — learned in your pre-K-12 education and in your teacher-prep program. I also know what you didn’t learn. As you grew up, you were most likely taught in school and at home that Abraham Lincoln was the great emancipator, that it was acceptable, right even, to refer to the people of the global majority as minorities, and that communities with higher percentages of Black families are in need of saving.

As a teacher, you most likely did not receive ongoing professional development about race and education in America. You’re likely to have a vague understanding about issues of diversity and equity and inclusion with insufficient understanding of culturally responsive teaching and learning. On the other hand, you most likely received extensive training on implementation of state and national education standards, new curricular initiatives, and how to improve standardized test scores. In recent years, you might have received professional development about social emotional learning, but you’ll have done so without exploring the critical sociopolitical considerations that are essential to strengthening your ability to teach well across race, class, and gender.

In high school, college, and your teacher-prep program, you no doubt were taught something about race in America, but it’s highly unlikely that you learned the truth about Black experience. It’s likely, for instance, that you’ve been taught little to nothing about the pre-enslavement contributions of Black people to the world, the horrors and impact of centuries of enslavement, post “Emancipation” Jim Crow laws and practices, and the many ongoing racially based systemic injustices such as mass incarceration, housing discrimination, wealth disparities, and lack of equal access to quality education, health care, and more.

I didn’t learn about these things in school either, but thankfully, my parents made sure I learned about these important aspects of American life and history that are absent from the textbooks and teacher’s guides.

Because it’s unlikely that you learned about all of these things in school or in your home, it’s even more unlikely that you teach about these matters now. I know that those of you who taught my children when they were younger didn’t necessarily teach them about these issues. But here’s the thing: they truly wanted to hear it from you, too. We have talked extensively about these matters at home, but my children’s school experiences would have been far more valuable if you would have introduced them to the lives and works of Ellen and William Craft, Katherine Johnson, Lewis Hayden, Ida B. Wells and Denmark Vesey. They wanted to hear you tell them the truth about The Black Panther Party, the reasons behind the FBI’s surveillance of Martin Luther King, Jr., the painful facts about Columbus’s experiences in the Americas, and the meaning of Juneteenth. And they didn’t want to just hear a few tidbits about these essential and complex aspects of American life in February just because it was Black History Month.

What my children needed from you in school — what all students of color need from you in school — is a much deeper understanding of racial history and ongoing racial matters. If you are to teach them well — teach them as I know you want to teach them — you need deeper cultural knowledge and skills. If, for instance, you teach a social studies unit on immigration and you have your students present about the countries of their ancestors, Black children need you to think more deeply about how this assignment feels for them. One of the many things Black Americans lost as a result of the nation’s involvement in enslavement is the knowledge of which African countries our ancestors came from. Although we now have some helpful information from Ancestry DNA, I, for instance, can’t say for sure whether my African ancestors were Nigerian, Senegalese, Ghanaian, Congolese, Beninese, Togolese, Cameroonian, Malian, or from the Ivory Coast. And because we didn’t have access to this information when my children were in elementary school, they ended up focusing only on their European heritage because our White ancestors are a lot easier to trace.

This can also be a tough and painful assignment for other students of color as well — especially for First Nations people whose ancestral stories are overlooked by misrepresented in the textbook versions of American history.

My guess is that you didn’t think about all this in planning the unit. Going forward, I hope you will.

Because you were entrusted to partner with me in the education of my children, I wanted you to be curious about them with the same intensity with which you’d have them stand to pledge allegiance to the flag. I wanted you to wonder how they felt when they saw Mount Rushmore or the face of Andrew Jackson on the twenty-dollar bill they handed you with their field trip permission slip. I wanted you to wonder how they felt in your class after hearing about yet another unarmed Black life erased from this world by police brutality — all because the melanin we see as so beautiful looks like danger to others. Do you know how it felt for my children when you didn’t say anything about racial injustices at the time of their occurrences? Do you know how it feels for your Black students today?

If your school is anything like the schools where I taught, you’ll be expected to interact with your students’ families at open houses, conferences, and literacy or math nights. On those nights, families are expected to come to school, and are often judged harshly if they don’t. I want you to think about this, think about why you are judging them harshly and what assumptions you are making. During parent teacher conferences, you will most likely not have a lot of time, so you’ll probably default to talking at families about their children instead of engaging in dialogues with families as partners. I know it’s hard. I’ve been there, too. But I’m asking you now, when it’s time for conferences, when families show up to engage in conversation with you about the most precious people in their lives, please don’t see your contract as a limitation. Use these moments as opportunities to connect, learn, and share.

As you well know, the dominant culture in the United States tries to suppress conversations on race. There are numerous reasons for this, most of them related to the maintenance of the power status quo. I’m asking you to help break this damaging practice — especially among adults in your school. There are certain conversations that take place in teachers’ lounges about students and their families that I find both infuriating and heartbreaking. Too often, teachers are silent in the face of racist, prejudicial, biased, or stereotypical comments. I know it’s uncomfortable to confront a colleague. I want you to consider, however, how uncomfortable it makes my family and all other families of color to know that there are people who we’ve entrusted with the care and teaching of our children who think of them as less than — less important, less worthy of our love and attention. When that moment arises next time — and it will arise — I want you to think of how uncomfortable the students are in that teacher’s classroom, and I want you to speak up on their behalf. If a colleague says something derogatory about a child and/or that child’s family, you must speak up. As Desmond Tutu said, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” 

My children are in high school now and have had the privilege of participating in advanced placement and honors courses in school. They have scored at proficient and advanced levels on standardized tests. They are amazing young people, and they have worked hard. But none of these accomplishments make them exceptional or in any way better than their schoolmates who have not had these same opportunities. It also doesn’t make my husband and me exceptional or any better than the families of their schoolmates. Please consider the access and opportunities that are available to all students in your schools. Our job, if we are doing it right, is to celebrate every child where they are and move them forward with skill, love, courage, and grace. In a nation that claims to believe in educating all children to become engaged citizens, this practice of failing so many students of color, or tracking them based on implicit bias, or pushing them out of schools, or driving them into the criminal justice system, or ignoring them in hopes they’ll simply drop out — this adult behavior in schools perpetuates inequitable systems.

Finally, I know it’s tempting to think that because you teach in a school with a high percentage of Black students, racism isn’t an issue for you. Please know that proximity doesn’t equal awareness. That would be like a male teacher saying, “I can’t be sexist because I have female students.” Know, too, that racial colorblindness isn’t really a thing. While it’s right to treat children equitably, it’s also important to understand how race shapes lives in a racist system.

We all breathe in the smog of oppression, and the only way to expel it is to read, listen, reflect, ask questions and become better as a result of what we learn. I’m here asking you as educators to help lead the way. By improving equity in schools, by becoming truly inclusive learning communities with an effective anti-racist curriculum, we improve both individual lives and equity and justice in society. I’m here for you and I’m rooting for you. As Lilla Watson said, “… your liberation is bound up with mine.”

With love, respect, and hope,

Afrika Afeni Mills

A Black Educator Mom

Afrika Afeni Mills is the Senior Manager of Inclusive and Responsive Educational Practices and Instructional Coach for BetterLesson, an education organization designed to support teachers in developing the next generation of compassionate, resourceful, and iterative learners. She facilitates conference sessions frequently around the country.

Color-Conscious Family Engagement

I’m white... really white. I’m blonde and have blue eyes. I grew up in a rural, white Connecticut town where all of the black and brown METCO students traveled over an hour on a bus from Hartford. I went to a private college in a struggling city where campus gates firmly divided the elite white students from the “townies.” Like so many white people, I had little reason to question race; I was thriving on white privilege.

When I became a teacher, I joined the ranks of millions of other white women who had little reason to notice race within the classroom.

I was so wrong.

For the past few years, I’ve done the work to understand the harmful effect that color-blind approaches have on students. I’ve dissected and scrutinized my whiteness, acknowledging many cringe-worthy moments. I’ve examined the ways in which my whiteness shows up in the classroom and have shifted my practice to be more color-conscious and culturally responsive. Shifting my approach to students felt challenging, yet do-able. Critiquing my approach to family engagement, re-evaluating it from a color-conscious perspective, felt overwhelming.

These are three lenses through which I evaluate each family engagement initiative and strategy.

1) Awareness of whiteness

I often wonder, “What does it feel like to walk into your child’s school and not feel a sense of belonging?” In the process of re-examining the parent-teacher conference experience, I started sending simple surveys before the conference in which I asked, “What do you want to be sure to discuss?” and “What are your hopes and dreams for your child this year?” During our conference, I resist the temptation to direct the conversation and instead focus on listening, shifting to “dialogue” rather than “presentation” mode. We discuss the concerns of the family early on to provide sufficient time.

In the case of one family of color that I had a difficult time connecting with, I named my whiteness, saying “I am yet another white lady teaching your brown son. I promise to challenge him.” The statement served to diffuse some of the tension and demonstrated that I saw her; I was aware of the effect of my whiteness on her family.

Like Robin DiAngelo discusses in her work on white fragility, I rarely questioned how I’ve benefited from the oppression of others. Accepting and owning my whiteness is a process of retraining myself to look toward, instead of away from, systems of oppression and then taking action. A colleague of mine once suggested that I practice asking myself, “Where is my whiteness in this?” each time I have a new curricular idea, interact with students, families, or colleagues, or agree to a new initiative. I have developed the habit of asking myself, “Whose voice is not included? Whose identity is not validated?”

2) Cultural responsiveness

A subtle but powerful shift has involved consciously approaching each family with compassion. Since becoming a mother, I now appreciate that there is no single formula for parenting. Regardless of our race, ethnicity, family structure or parenting style, we all want success and happiness for our child. When a family seems upset or distant, I reframe my thinking and check my biases. I do work to see if I’m missing something, sometimes asking others in my community to help bring my blind spots into view.

One of the ways that I’ve increased perspectives is by opening up my classroom to families. Early in the school year, I sent an email to all families in which I invited them to visit the classroom; the structure of the visit intentionally left open-ended. The purpose of the visit was to create a shared experience among the student, the family, and me. This type of engagement says to the families, “You have something valuable to share with the classroom community and school. This space belongs to you, too.” So far this year, over half of the families have visited the classroom.

Another avenue for building my competency has been through participation in a Professional Learning Community (PLC) focused on a critical reading of Zaretta Hammond’s Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. Our readings and discussions helped me recognize that if I want to create an affirming and inclusive environment, I need to know a lot about each of my students. I view the families as gateways to that information. When I interact with families, I ask questions that help me learn more about them, and I actively listen. I put time and effort into connecting by making positive phone calls home, selecting books that mirror their child’s identity and offering to communicate via text, email, or phone. I convey my genuine love for their child at every chance possible and communicate through actions and words that I will fight to do better.

3) Asset-based view of families

As a white teacher, I’ve been conditioned to hold unconscious biases about my students of color. Only in recent years have I started to see the impact that institutionalized racism, skin-color privilege, and language discrimination have on my students and families. If I, as a white educator, look at families of color as deficit-based, I reinforce stereotypes.

In the past, I’ll admit, I assumed that when black and brown families didn’t return phone calls, it was because they didn’t care. I’ve thought that when parents didn’t show up at a conference, it was because they were disinterested. These deficit-based biases are pervasive and harmful. These same families do care. In the past, I’ve neglected to see all of the possible barriers that might push a family of color away, making them feel as if they don’t belong.

Too often, teachers view parents and families as obstacles to teaching. We sometimes complain about parent (over) involvement in the classroom or the burden of answering parent emails. I’ve experienced this, too. But, while attending Harvard’s Family Engagement Institute last summer, I learned from Karen Mapp the importance of viewing families as integral contributors to student achievement and happiness. I now see families not as obstacles or factors that derail my work, but as essential sources of knowledge and experience who hold the capacity to influence their children’s success positively.

As a teacher, what fuels me is knowing that each day presents an opportunity to be better and do better. I’ve managed to make small changes that prioritize families. The more I embrace the complexity of race, equity, and inclusion, the more readily I see how important this is — and how much work I still need to do.

Katie Carr is a Grade 1 teacher at The Park School in Brookline, Massachusetts. She enjoys writing and learning about issues related to family engagement, teacher development, and literacy. Connect with her on Twitter.

On Empathy and Action

How might we be inadvertently reinforcing racial inequality in our community?

Why is “niceness” sometimes problematic when issues regarding race emerge in our community?

How does your self-awareness inform you in your approach to how and why you teach?

My eyes scanned these and other questions posted on the whiteboards around the room during a recent professional development activity. I immediately gravitated toward the last one, knowing I had an answer for it. Reviewing the responses other teachers had written on the whiteboard around this question, I saw that a number of white teachers acknowledged a lack of awareness of how their racial identities in particular might influence their teaching practices. Responses from teachers of color, on the other hand, reflected an acute awareness of their own identities in a classroom space.

As a civics teacher navigating hot-button political issues in the classroom, and as a member of the LGBT community, I often take into consideration not just what I teach but how I teach it to avoid the perception of political bias. With that in mind, I began writing, perhaps a bit too eagerly, about these teaching challenges. After a minute or two of quiet self-congratulation (“I get it. I’m a member of a marginalized community, too.”), a less positive feeling started to creep in to my mind. How would I answer this question if I were looking at it through the lens of my racial identity? And why wasn’t I doing that? Words in response to those questions escaped me. 

I started thinking back to other times in which our faculty community explored issues of identity during professional development. One activity, a year earlier, involved us checking off boxes related to our status in various privileged and marginalized groups. I felt a certain level of satisfaction that day knowing I could check some boxes in the marginalized column. As some of my colleagues around me had humbling “a-ha” moments about their various positions of privilege, I thought to myself, “for once — being marginalized is a positive!” I could think with specificity and nuance about the many ways in which my marginalized identities have shaped my experiences navigating the world around me. Yet, again, I did not spend much time thinking critically about how my privileged identities have also shaped my experiences. My colleagues were doing the hard work of deep self-reflection and awareness — and I was not. 

The ability to empathize is a critical skill when we are aiming to dismantle racial inequalities. In my case, however, I realized I was allowing my empathy to shield me from a certain level of self-reflection. In Teaching While White’s podcast interview with Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility, DiAngelo identifies a similar dynamic, noting that white women often use patriarchy and sexism as a way out of supporting women of color as opposed to using it as a way in. 

I do not intend to downplay the realities of injustice that members of the LGBT community experience on a daily basis. What I need to do, though, is make sure I can speak with just as much fluency about how my privilege shapes who I am in my classroom and the larger world. That journey, I realize, is only just beginning.

As I have stepped into this process, I have already learned a few key lessons:

Lean in for the long haul.

At the start of this process, I kept looking for easy answers and teaching strategies I could put into place right away. For example, I would ask those who have been doing this work for some time how I might structure individual check-ins with students of color before starting a unit in which race played a central role (such as a unit on enslavement and Reconstruction). The answer was always, “Well... it depends on the context.”

A bit frustrated, I turned to other resources. I began reading Ali Michael’s Raising Race Questions: Whiteness and Inquiry in Education only to encounter in the early pages that “[a]lthough some race questions have answers, the ones that are most worth pursuing lead to a process rather than an answer” (Michael 21). I almost gave up on the text soon after reading those lines. I didn’t, however, and the further I progressed through the book, the more I started to understand why there are no easy answers. Educator Andrew Watson, in his work about the ways in which neuroscience can inform teaching practices, often states that teachers need to have a “think this way” mindset when interacting with his resources; if teachers are looking for “do this thing” advice from him, he will not be providing it. The work of racial identity development for educators is similar in that way; there is no quick fix.

Make this work a priority.

In order to take a “think this way” approach to racial literacy, I have to keep the work at the forefront of my mind daily. For me, this includes stating my aspirations in my yearly teaching goals and end-of-year reflection. It has also meant finding people who will help me hold myself accountable. I have informally partnered with other teachers doing similar work. We can serve as each other’s sounding boards and exchange honest feedback as we reflect on and learn from difficult moments in the classroom. As Jen Cort has recommended in a past TWW blog entry, “It’s Not About Being Liked,” I also plan to ask a peer to observe me in the classroom.

As for reading materials, I try to have one book lead to the next, moving from Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility to Eddie Moore, Jr. and Ali Michael’s The Guide for White Women Who Teach Black Boys to Ali Michael’s Raising Race Questions and, most recently, Matthew Kay’s Not Light but Fire. Additionally, I printed out the Teaching While White blog (which, helpfully, prints out as one continuous document), took notes, tried out some of the advice, came up with new questions to pursue, and identified contributing writers I might want to reach out to so that I can learn more from them.

I’m working to build my network of resources both within my school and beyond it. I also try to ensure that my professional development choices involve continuous opportunities to develop my racial literacy as opposed to a “one-off” approach.

Embrace humility.

This is not new advice in the scholarship of racial identity development for white people. For me, it played out like this: Over the past few years, a colleague and I have been working to transform our interdisciplinary civics course into one in which students can more effectively use their knowledge of history to make sense of the present. The course has always focused on civil and human rights, but following the shooting death of Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, I realized that students were not using the subject matter of the course to make sense of the current events that were unfolding. Bewildered at first, I began to realize that it made sense; through the structure of the curriculum, I was implicitly sending the message that the fight for civil rights was a series of events that happened a long time ago and had a successful conclusion.

My colleague and I set about restructuring the content of the course and updating a number of teaching strategies as well. The course is now titled “Systems of Justice and Injustice” and delves far more deeply into the history and current realities of systemic racism and other issues. The course content is awesome, and I’m really proud of it (clearly I have not reached the humility part yet). My colleague and I spent the last couple of years feeling as though we were making progress with the course redesign but that we had a ways to go.

This fall, the pieces finally started to synthesize. I was ready to pat myself on the back and say, “I feel like the course is finally where it needs to be.” But just as I was preparing for my victory lap, I started in on Raising Race Questions and allowed Ali Michael’s words to sink in yet again: “You can have a multicultural curriculum and still not have an antiracist classroom.... Understanding that we have a racial identity... is the most critical step in building antiracist, whole classrooms” (Michael 2-4).

I began to realize that, no matter what content I am teaching or what themes we explore, if I do not take into account the impact of my identity as a white woman in the classroom as I facilitate that content, I can inflict stress on students and create an unsafe feeling in the classroom — the exact opposite of what I am striving for.

I have a lot more work to do. 

I look forward to this next phase of growth in my role as an educator. I have a lot to learn. Ultimately, I need to remind myself that while empathy might be a good starting point, taking action is the only way to start making a meaningful difference.

Melissa Dolan teaches humanities and serves as middle school curriculum leader at The Rivers School in Weston, Massachusetts. She can be reached at m.dolan@rivers.org.

Why We Need Racial Literacy Now More Than Ever

Given the current national landscape, it has become painfully obvious that those of us in schools need to double our efforts to teach racial literacy (Stevenson, 2014). Recently, I was working with 4/5th graders who are part of a racial affinity group program we coordinate in Portland, OR (for more about these groups, see So What Do White 4th Graders Have to Say About Race?). This past week, we were doing “race questions” where the children get to ask any question they have about race and racial identity. As I collected their notecards and began reading through their questions, I came across this one: “Why do white people dress up as Black people?” I could feel nervousness move through my body as I considered where to begin. To buy some thinking time, I asked for a bit more information: “What an interesting question! Can you tell me a little more?” Well, the floodgates opened:

“Elizabeth, I heard about this governor who put black paint on his face so he would look Black. I think he was making fun of Black people.”

“Yeah, and he dressed up as Michael Jackson. But that was for a party. Is that OK?

“That’s not OK. That’s racist.”

“But how can he be a leader if he’s racist?”

“Would it ever be OK to dress up as a Black person if you were doing it to honor someone, like Dr. King?

“But is it racist if he didn’t know better? Did he know?”

Oh my. We were off and running.

I started by asking the students the difference between appreciating and respecting a culture and the idea of just taking someone else’s culture as your own—without knowing too much about that culture or minimizing the importance of certain cultural traditions and values. I wrote the word “appropriation” and “appreciation” on the board and we made two columns, thinking about where certain actions would fall. For example, we talked about how some white kids will greet Black kids differently than white kids, pretending to sound like a hip hop star with Black kids because it makes them feel cool. But it seems like the white kids are acting, maybe even pretending to be Black, which the group thought was not actually demonstrating appreciation for hip hop music. I then gave them a quick description of when blackface started and how. They were rapt and wanted to know more. I showed a few clips from the film Ethnic Notions, an amazing documentary film by Marlon Riggs that traces the history of anti-Black racism via popular culture and media stereotypes from the Civil War through both World Wars. I also showed them part of a news story from PBS that connected current events to this long history of demeaning Black people.

I’m always impressed by how young people can navigate racial terrain in a way that adults seem unable to do. They can clearly see the forest for the trees and ask why anyone would think that blackface was OK given the history we had just learned. One of my favorite comments was, “But, Elizabeth, I don’t get it. If this started like almost 200 years ago, why would someone STILL think it was OK to do this after they had been told it was bad?” And then one student concluded, “I think blackface makes white people look bad.”

My thoughts exactly. But then I said, “Well, maybe they didn’t learn about all this when they were kids.”

Gasps around the circle.

So, the good news is we can teach our way out of this. But that means teachers have to be ready, willing, and able to wade in to talking about a concept with such history as well as current implications. And if this was not a part of our own education, we can sometimes feel paralyzed. How do we know if we are ready? And how do we make sure we are not doing more harm than good?

Equity as Excellence started four years ago in response to these kinds of questions and more. How do we swim against the tide of a culture that has historically been so incompetent at talking about issues related to race and identity? How do we make sure children of color do not have to educate us about race and how it impacts their school experience? How do we ensure that we do not have another generation of white students who, at best, feel bad about being white, and who, at worst, promote racial stereotypes and prejudice? Focusing our effort on professional skill development and curriculum implementation, participants can map out a plan of action based on their own sphere of influence in their school. So, a fourth-grade teacher can think about their own implicit bias and how it may play out in the classroom, and then write up a lesson on stereotype threat. A school leader can reflect on how their own racial and/or gender identity may impact the way they give feedback to their colleagues and develop an action plan for how to address this. A trustee can examine what equity literacy looks like from a governance perspective and consider how this might be shared with the board.

Finally, this kind of skill development gets us past the notion that “diversity work” is about our character or morality when it’s actually about our competence. Everyone can learn how to make our schools more equitable; it’s a question of will as opposed to ability. Granted, explaining the history and effects of blackface can feel overwhelming. The other questions I got were relatively easy to answer: Why do we have different colored skin? Where did the term “white” come from? Why are most storybook characters white? What I realized is that these children are curious, and ready to engage. They just need the space and time to think and talk about these issues. It is imperative then that teachers and school leaders require their own space and time for this as well, and that is why I hope you will consider joining us at Equity as Excellence this July.

Elizabeth Denevi is the co-founder of Teaching While White and the Associate Director for Mid West Educational Collaborative, a nonprofit agency that works with schools nationally to increase equity, promote diversity pedagogy, and implement strategic processes for growth and development. 

Editor’s Note: This blog piece appeared first on the California Teacher Development Collaborative website.

Resource:

Stevenson, H.C. (2014). Promoting Racial Literacy in Schools: Differences that Make a Difference. New York: Teachers College Press.

Teaching African-American Literature While White

I’ve been teaching English in selective private high schools for almost 25 years at this point. During my first 13 years, teaching often mixed-race classes at Georgetown Day School in Washington, D.C., I started thinking about what my whiteness meant, as a teacher and as a general citizen. Most of us white people don’t “know” we’re white, just as fish don’t know they’re wet. But a fish out of the water soon gets the idea of what “wet” is.  

I went to college in Washington DC, which at the time — the early 1970s — was about 75 percent African American. My political and musical adventures got me off campus a lot, which meant I was a skinny, very white kid with long red hair in a mostly black town. The result of these forays off campus was that, at times, I was forced to really feel my white skin, although I didn’t know what to make of it at back then. In the casually racist logic of the day, I was supposedly of this dominant race, but it sure didn’t feel like it. Everybody African American, from the nurse DJ whose show came after mine on the campus radio station, to John Wilson, later a DC councilman but then a radio show host whose program I engineered, to the bass player in my band and his two buddies who were our roadies (they preferred the term “valets”), seemed to know more about everything — or at least, everything that mattered — than I did. After college, I was living in Old Downtown DC at 11th and E Streets, NW, and a whole day could by without my seeing a white face. What was remarkable about those days was that when I’d get home from work and go to wash up, I’d see this white face in the mirror and be startled at the pale stranger before me. I seemed to have forgotten that I was white. I wondered if the same would have happened had the races been reversed.

My wife and I moved to California ten years ago (a career move for her, with me as the trailing spouse), and I, at 55, found myself the new guy at a tony all-girls private school in Los Angeles. We taught a lot of African-American literature back at GDS, so I offered to teach a senior elective on this topic, to which my new school gave the OK. So I found myself teaching a class on African-American literature to a class of nine African-American girls, all savvy, going-places seniors. And then there was very white, new-guy me.  

I had learned something interesting back at GDS about teaching African-American literature while white. I had been teaching a section of Senior English also taught by a female African-American colleague. We were both teaching Toni Morrison’s Beloved at the same time, and as I had taught it a few times before, I gave her my notes and lesson plans and quizzes, etc. Since we had adjacent desks, we had plenty of chance to talk and debrief about how a day’s classes went. At one point, she was getting frustrated with some of the white boys in her section. She felt they were resisting or undermining her ideas and interpretations of the novel. I had taught two of them the previous year, and we had good rapport, so with her permission I had a word with them. What they told me was that they felt attacked in the classroom, that the anti-white rhetoric in the novel, and particularly the anti-white-male rhetoric, made them feel singled out and defensive… that when the teacher teased out the class’s moral observations of the white male characters, she was inviting the damnation of every white male in the room. Luckily, I had something in my repertoire of responses to address this moment. It was left over from an earlier encounter I’d had with another student, a white male, a few years earlier. Let’s look at that first, and then we’ll get back to Beloved. 

We had been reading and discussing Herman Melville’s novel Benito Cereno, about (spoiler alert) a cryptic slave rebellion on a Spanish ship, a rebellion unnoticed by a naïve American ship captain who stops aboard to chat with the Spanish captain. Eventually the rebellion re-erupts under the American captain’s nose, a fight ensues, and the African “rebels” are suppressed by American reinforcements. The novel is useful in that it is told from the point of view of the American captain, and thus when the rebellion re-erupts, we find ourselves taking his side, which was Melville’s little trick with the story… to catch us out. In our own implicit racism, those of us who are white could forget that we abhor slavery, losing track of our moral bearings in the comfort of our whiteness. However, before the class could dig into the interpretive riches of the story, a white male student (we’ll call him Jason), pronounced, “What a mess. It would have been better for everyone if we had sent them all back to Africa.

The class, which was racially mixed, came to a stuttering halt. Heart pounding, I managed to think fast and asked Jason, “When did your ancestors come to the U.S.?” Turns out they were Russian Jews who arrived around 1900. 

“So, Jason, who is this ‘we’ you refer to? Your people showed up on this continent centuries after most African Americans, and certainly weren’t in a position to send anyone anywhere in 1799.”  

Jason was actually a pretty timid and kind boy. He admitted that he guessed he was identifying with white Americans because he was white, too.  

“Even though the white Americans with whom you are identifying are ethnically and religiously unrelated to you and hold beliefs that you find pretty horrible?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

Well, that was what Melville sets up with that story, so it should be no surprise. But it led to a rich class discussion about identification and an exercise at listing and prioritizing those things with which we “identify.” Most of the kids at that very liberal school found themselves not far off from Jason’s identification hierarchy: race first, then religion, ethnicity, politics, morality, and gender. Then we came to the notion that we can check the depth of our identification(s) by what makes us feel defensive, makes our face heat up and urges us to say ‘Hey! Wait a minute!” when someone makes an offensive comment. With that in mind, for Jason, the ordered list became: religion, politics, race, morality, and ethnicity. For the African-American kids in the classroom it was race, religion, morality, and politics (their “missing” African ethnicities buried by history in their racial identity, at least before DNA testing).  

A year later, the question of identity arose again with Beloved. I asked the disgruntled white boys in my colleague’s class why they felt the novel and discussions were about them. Did they identify with the slave owners and other white sadists that show up in the novel just because they are white?

“Well, no,” they said.  

“Well, it sure sounds like you did. Yet, I’m sure you condemn what those characters believed and did. It’s easy to put your race, or some other tribal affiliation, ahead of your morality. Maybe take a lesson from this?”

“Uhhh, yeah.” 

“Does the class and your teacher know that you find the behavior of the whites in the novel hideous, and that you, and anyone you would call a friend, should seek to stop any such behavior?”

“Uhhh, probably not.”  

“Well, maybe youneed to make that more clear, first to yourselves, and then to the others in the room, because if you feel “attacked” because you do identify with those white characters, that’s telling you something, isn’t it?”  

During that first semester I was first teaching African-American literature to African-American girls here in California, we came to the realization that a white teacher can “own” the past sins of white America while denouncing those sinners, but it takes work. As we — the nine girls and I — came to see it, these novels are not about us, per se. We may identify with a character demographically, but our sovereign moral compasses should point us back toward true north. Schoolteacher in Beloved was a middle-aged, white male schoolteacher with an inquiring mind, just like me. But I’m not Schoolteacher, just as my young, African-American, female students were not Morrison’s Sethe. The characters’ choices are not our choices. We may identify demographically, which might help us understand where a character is coming from. But morally? We need to calculate who we are. If we feel ourselves identifying with someone “like us” who we know to be morally corrupt, that’s a self-teaching moment. Some moral introspection may be necessary.  

Literature is about trouble. No one over the age of eight wants to read the story of the day everything went fine. And in African-American literature, much of the trouble comes either directly or indirectly from white power. Teaching African-American literature while white invites the peril of identifying, even unconsciously, with the bad guys, so a white teacher needs to be sure of their moral compass, even while rejecting the “otherness” of the racist, recognizing the “usness” of their whiteness — and to be honest with one’s self about it. I’ve been lucky enough to have spent a lot of hours in workshops and training and classrooms where my anti-racism reflex has, of necessity, been tested, and I believe, strengthened.

I’m not done yet — maybe never will be — but I’m getting there.  

Christopher Thompson teaches English at Marlborough School, an independent, all-girls school in Los Angeles, California. He can be reached at chris.thompson@marlborough.org.

Rethinking How We Choose Books in School

Several middle school and high school English departments have approached Teaching While White for help in diversifying the racial makeup of the authors of the books they teach. All of the teachers can articulate why they should have a more diverse group of books: ”We want to provide windows and mirrors for all of our students.” “We want to build empathy.” “We want to prepare our students for a diverse world.” All of this is true, and yet, when it comes to taking old classics out of curriculum in favor of including a diversity of voices, I have seen, time and time again, the resistance to authors of color. They cite these books as either inappropriate in terms of content or literarily uninteresting.

Here is the problem. As long as white teachers set out to evaluate what is good literature and worthy of study without examining how their own experience has shaped their appreciation for literature, then all of the book lists of diverse authors in the world will not result in changing the white literary canon.

I have watched English teachers fiercely defend the notion that there is, objectively, such a thing as complex sentence structure, solidly constructed narrative, and beauty of language — and either a book has it or it does not. No matter how I might try to persuade or examine how that aesthetic has been taught and created, mostly by white men, there seems to be an inability to conceive of great literature as being anything other than an impartial standard. Teachers will often point to books written by authors of color to prove that this objective standard crosses race and culture. In particular, they note the success of books like The House on Mango Street and Beloved as their proof that literary greatness is not a racial formulated construct. The problem with this logic is that it doesn’t take into account the ways in which our exposure to and experiences of linguistic variety impact our affinity for language. For many white educators, this is a clear blindspot.  

In Brene Brown’s research, she concludes that it requires knowing, even a little bit, about a subject in order to feel curiosity about it. It wasn’t until I had learned about romanticism that I was able to full appreciate Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Once I understood some things about the Harlem Renaissance, I developed a deeper connection to the words and work of Zora Neale Hurston. So why couldn’t it be true that with some curiosity about the Black Lives Matter movement, readers would gain a fuller appreciation for Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give? It is not simply a matter of discerning what constitutes beautiful language within a white literary world. Context matters and can also allow readers to look into something unfamiliar and see beauty where it is often overlooked.

Similarly, content is too often scrutinized with the same biased approach. As we discuss in our podcast episode, Challenging the Canon, somehow we are OK with the use of the N-word or a description of sexual assault if it is in a “classic.” Perhaps if white teachers had firsthand experiences of the trauma that the N-word still causes people or color, we would be less able to justify teaching some of the books that use that word in the name of illuminating attitudes of a particular era. However, the mention of sexual development or the use of the F-bomb in a book by a writer of color too often renders a book unteachable. In a recent interview with Trevor Noah, Angie Thomas said, “There are 89 instances of the F-word in The Hate U Give... but last year alone, over 800 people lost their lives to police brutality and that number is far scarier. So when your telling me it’s the language. No, that’s not what it is. You don’t want to talk about the topic.” Which forms of violence are deemed appropriate and who decides?

Without questioning what and why we have an affinity for certain literature, we will continue to replicate a world where only the white voice is heralded as true literature and students will continue will be inculcated into the philosophy of a limited, hierarchy of linguistic and literary mastery. Instead of focusing on a narrow and questionable standard of literary merit, we should be asking ourselves essential questions about what we are trying to achieve in our classes. How can we offer context to all the books we teach so that the books’ content resonates more deeply? How can we teach students to recognize and value verbal agility in any form that leads readers to see the world in a new way? And (to reference R.O. Kwon’s quote yet again) how can we encourage students to see the shared humanity in people, even when they are different, by giving students an opportunity to try to imagine their lives? 

Here are a couple of tools. In working with schools on this issue, I culled questions (there are many thoughtful articles, books, and rubrics) to create bias reflection questions and a rubric for evaluating current curriculum and choosing new texts.

Questions to consider:

1.  What are the unspoken rules and hidden curriculum in your department/classroom?

2. What are the  unconscious beliefs/norms, group values, world beliefs, and core values of your department/classroom?

3. How would you describe the ideal student for your curriculum? What assumptions do you have about their background, culture, and language?

4. What messages do you believe students receive about race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, age, ability, religion, and socioeconomic status through experiences in English class?

5. Are there any assumptions/biases built into your criteria for your assessments? Does it create an advantage for certain students?

Text Evaluation Rubric:

1. Does the text offer a compelling narrative and characters?

2. Are we addressing any of the “Big 8” social identifiers with this text?

   Age  Ethnicity

   Race                                     Ability

   Gender                                 Sexual Orientation

   Religion                                Socioeconomic Status

3. What topics and issues do we hope to teach in connection to this book?

   a. What perspectives are missing?

   b. Are there other books/authors that could address these same objectives?

4. Does this book reinforce stereotypes or offer a counter-narrative to stereotypes?

   a. If the book does have some stereotypes, what counter-narratives and or additional

   readings could be offered? 

5. Is the author from the depicted social group?

6. Does this text increase students’ understanding of systemic oppression (sexism, racism, homophobia, etc.) prejudice, stereotyping, discrimination, etc. 

7. Does this text have any depictions or language that has the potential to re-traumatize students (sexual assault, N-word, etc.)?

8. Does this text offer linguistic variety?

9. Does this text offer students opportunities to apply multicultural knowledge for analyzing and solving social problems?

10. Does this text offer opportunities to examine cultural biases and assumptions?

11. What do we need to know more about and research to teach this text responsibly?

Jenna Chandler-Ward is the co-founder of Teaching While White and co-director the Multicultural Teaching Institute. She consults with schools nationally on developing more inclusive communities and curricula.

The Goal Is Fluency

While working toward equity in schools, educators are often asked to see equity as a metaphoric lens — one that will give us a new and valuable cultural perspective and point of view. It is not uncommon, for example, to be asked to review our curriculum with an “equity lens” or use an “equity lens” to examine our bookshelves for literature that more appropriately reflects the lived experiences of our students. For me, a white woman with 34 years of conditioning into whiteness, this metaphor has been useful. For one, it helps me to understand how I have been conditioned to whiteness — and clarifies the work I need to do to serve my students better. But I also see that the use of an equity lens is only a starting point. Rather than simply applying a lens over my conditioned way of viewing the world, I believe I must aspire to an entirely new way of being — that is, to develop the kind of perspective and skills that comes through fluency.

While living and teaching in Ukraine a few years back, my language teacher, Volodya, shared the story of two villages. In one village, everything appeared yellow. In the second, everything appeared blue. Although villagers from the village of yellow always hoped to see blue, despite their best efforts, and even after multiple years in the village of blue, they were only capable of seeing hues of green. 

This story has made me think more deeply about the “equity lens” metaphor. I am struck by the realization that adding a new lens to my pre-existing way of thinking has the overall effect of simply tinting my way of seeing the world. While this new “tint” might move me closer to equitable ways of being, it’s not enough for the level of change our society, and my classroom, requires. It enables an intellectual understanding of the issues related to equity and justice in society and schools, but it can keep us at an emotional distance. It is for this reason that, instead of just “adding a lens,” I think more about shifting my worldview and perspective entirely. I’m trying to develop a much deeper cultural fluency.

The work of achieving any kind of fluency requires dedicated study and immersion into something new. The obvious example is learning a new language. Before we achieve fluency, we study the grammar and vocabulary. We learn how to write and read simple sentences. Many even learn how to speak with a proper accent and intonation. But fluency requires us to take all this knowledge to the next level. This is why the most successful way to really learn a  language is through immersion — to live and study and work among people who speak the language and who embody the culture connected to the language.

A telling mark of language fluency is its impact on one’s subconscious — that is, when we dream in the new language. Fluency means that the language is now part of us.

As I aspire toward equitable systems, I know that I must go deeper. So it is the rigorous work of aspiring toward fluency that my sixth-grade students and I engage with daily. Supported by the Courageous Conversations About Race protocol (see framework below), we regularly dive into exploration of social identity, including consideration for how our identities shape the way we view the world and the way the world views us.

Yes, we read, analyze, and discuss texts by authors with different social identities. But we also explore the relationship between ourselves as readers and the text we’re analyzing. We do not simply add a literary lens. Rather, we aim to go deeper, to achieve greater understanding of the work and of how our own cultural perspectives shape the way we see and respond to the work. It is through this deeper understanding of ourselves that we can begin to engage authentically with others — and by engaging with others we can better understand and address events in our world today.

In the last few months, hate has been crowding the headlines with disturbing frequency. We have witnessed as parents have been separated from their children at the border, high school students have openly taunted indigenous elders, and Kiah Morris, a representative in the Vermont house, was forced to resign as a result of ongoing racial harassment and threats to herself and her family. In these moments, in our class, we tug at our burgeoning fluency by reading, examining images, and elevating the voices of those most impacted by the events. Rather than taking a “both sides” approach to these events — and thus placing humanity up for debate —  the students center justice through critical analysis. Ultimately, students in my classroom understand that there are not “two sides” when bigotry is involved.

In our conversations, we learn the names of the social justice activists who came before us, and honor those who lead the efforts today. In particular, we use the voices of Angie Thomas, Jewell Parker-Rhodes, Jason Reynolds, Aisha Saeed, David Barclay Moore, and so many other remarkable authors to frame our discussions — turning to literature when we struggle to make sense of national news. As a white educator, I lean on the work of authors of color to bring much needed perspective to my classroom.

With my students, my goal is to see AND make sense of the world around us. Through examining excellent literature, through the conversations and the explorations of the experiences of others, through attentive listening and consideration of the forces that shape our views — we deepen our understanding of the cultural beauty and complexity of the world as well as our understanding of the work that needs to be done in the name of equity and justice. We deepen our language and skills and competencies so that we can learn from each other and  work well across differences.

By striving for fluency, we aim to understand ourselves better — how we see the world and how the world sees us — and thus achieve a higher, more just, understanding of the world so that we can become a force for positive change.

Christie Nold teaches sixth grade at a Vermont public school on Abenaki land. Together with her students, she loves learning about the intersection of identities and experience. Christie also co-facilitates courses for educators. You can catch her on Twitter at @ChristieNold.

Helpful Reading

Here’s a sampling of the excellent books my students engage with:

The Hate U Give, by Angie Thomas

Ghost Boys, by Jewell Parker-Rhodes

Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds

Amal Unbound, by Aisha Saeed

The Stars Beneath Our Feet, by David BarclayMoore

 The Four Agreements of Courageous Conversations

 1.     Stay engaged: Staying engaged means “remaining morally, emotionally, intellectually, and socially involved in the dialogue” (p.59)

2.     Experience discomfort: This norm acknowledges that discomfort is inevitable, especially, in dialogue about race, and that participants make a commitment to bring issues into the open. It is not talking about these issues that create divisiveness. The divisiveness already exists in the society and in our schools. It is through dialogue, even when uncomfortable, the healing and change begin. 

3.     Speak your truth: This means being open about thoughts and feelings and not just saying what you think others want to hear.

4.     Expect and accept nonclosure: This agreement asks participants to “hang out in uncertainty” and not rush to quick solutions, especially in relation to racial understanding, which requires ongoing dialogue (pp.58-65).

Adapted from Glenn E. Singleton & Curtis Linton, Courageous Conversations about Race: A Field Guide for Achieving Equity in Schools. 2006. pp.58-65. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

“Dear Student, You’re White”

I was socialized as a white girl in a state that is 94 percent white.

I had a wonderful childhood: sufficient resources, supportive parents, dedicated teachers, and positive, affirming experiences at the public and private schools I attended. I felt seen and safe in the classroom, free to be myself and to pursue my interests — an experience that only now, as a teacher, do I realize is a privilege available to many more white students than students of color.

Throughout my childhood, the whiteness of my surroundings remained invisible to me. I never noticed, named, addressed, or challenged it. Nor did anyone else, as best I can tell. White was simply “normal,” and I accepted this norm as easily and unquestioningly as I conformed to the silent expectations around me. I did not know then that my lack of awareness came at a price, not only to others, but also to me.

In my seventh grade geography class in the late 1990s, we studied the continent of Africa and apartheid in South Africa. I remember my white teacher, an energetic man in his early thirties, drawing a mess of arrows on the board to illustrate European colonization. Now a thirty-something middle school teacher myself, I recently uncovered a worksheet I had completed after watching the 1992 film Sarafina!, starring Whoopi Goldberg.

One of the short-answer questions immediately caught my eye: “In 5 sentences please explain how you would have acted in South Africa, would you have been a rebel, an activist, a person in the middle or not got involved at all? please use at least five sentences.[sic]”

In neat printing was my answer:

“I would not get involved. I know I should be an activist, but I can’t stand violence of any kind. I’d rather live a life of injustice and safety than justice and constant fear and danger. It’s not right, but it’s how I feel. This country was not founded by people like me.”

Below my response, my teacher had scrawled simply the word “Good.”

Rereading this assignment as an adult, I was overwhelmed with guilt and shame and felt the urge to travel back in time to shake some sense into my seventh-grade self. What could have led her to write this infuriating answer? How could she have been so callous, so cowardly, so selfish? At the heart of my anger and disappointment was fear: Is this the person who, despite my best efforts, I will always be? Am I so fearful for myself, despite my position of privilege, that I am resigned to turning my back on others who are oppressed?

How did I become the twelve-year-old who wrote this answer? Thinking back, I can identify three aspects of my personality, shaped by society’s expectations of my race and my gender, that help me to better understand the person that I was.

The first is that I was compliant. I learned early on how to follow directions, how to sit quietly, how to smile and please adults. My mild and agreeable nature was valued by those around me, and also meant that I was easily dominated by others. My earliest memories of friendship involved being bossed around by my peers, obediently playing the horse that others rode in the recess yard. I remember desperately having to go to the bathroom in first grade, and being told by my best friend that if I went inside, she wouldn’t sit next to me anymore or invite me to her birthday party. Faced with this unthinkable threat, I put my bodily needs aside and remained outside. I followed the path of least resistance, regardless of the cost.

 I was tenderhearted. Fascinated by all living things, I had a habit of finding and collecting small critters so as to observe and care for them. When I was eight years old, I discovered a mother spider with an egg sac and carefully transported both to a tiny house I had built out of plywood and mesh screen. When I came to check on them the next morning, I was horrified to discover that the egg sac was open, the cage was swarming with ants, and the spider was dead. I buried her with the remains of the egg sac in the garden, and made a tiny gravestone on which I wrote “Mother Spider” and the year with a black Sharpie. I could not bear to see a living creature harmed.

I was conflict-averse. In my family, I played the role of the peacekeeper. I was slow to anger and quick to apologize, an unusual temperament in my family. My parents praised my calm and forgiving character and I came to see it as a virtue. A bookish New England girl, I obsessively read and re-read Little Women between the ages of ten and twelve, fascinated by the lives and personalities of the March family. While nearly everyone I knew identified with the strong-willed and independent protagonist Jo, I saw myself clearly in her younger sister Beth, the kind sister, the weak sister, the one who plays the piano, the one who dies. I knew even then that I was not strong, but that I was kind, and that was almost as good.

When I remember the child that I was, following the path of least resistance, sheltered from the realities of injustice around me, I understand her differently. I see that she was raised to be a nice, polite, well-intentioned bystander, bred to be complicit in others’ oppression through inaction. This perspective allows me to quell my anger with my seventh-grade self and, instead of shaming her, to hear her heartbreak. She desired to be kind and do good. But she did not see herself as capable. She did not know how. 

I wonder about my teacher’s response to my answer. His seemingly simply affirmation remains inscrutable to me even now. “Good”? What was good? That I had followed directions, writing exactly five sentences (as stipulated twice in the directions)? That I had spelled all of the words correctly? That I had answered honestly? That I had made a conscious choice to put my own comfort above safety and justice for others? That I had used my aversion to violence as an excuse to comply with a violent system?

Here’s the thing about my seventh-grade self: I knew how to spell. I knew how to follow directions. I knew how to write in complete sentences. What I didn’t know was how to be a person in the world: a person becoming aware of oppression but who was not oppressed, a person who benefitted from the privilege of choosing whether or not to act, a person who wanted, but was unable, to put her own fear aside to advocate for others. Where was the teacher who would teach me that?

Where was the teacher to make visible to me the crux of my dilemma: how to be a white person in a racist world? 

Here’s what I imagine my teacher could have written to me beyond “good,” what I hope I am able to convey to my own white middle school students.

Dear Student,

You’re white. So am I. We didn’t choose the color of our skin, and there’s nothing wrong with it. What is wrong, though, are the systems that have been set up in our world that value certain skin colors and physical traits over others. And the scary thing is that this isn’t just about apartheid in South Africa. Racism exists here and now, in our country and in our state and in our school, and the fact that it’s so hard to see tells us just how deep it runs. 

The thing about being white is that we are never the victims of this system. Even though it is unjust and utterly ridiculous to assign value to something as meaningless as race, our society does just this. For us white people, racism is something that we get to think about if we want to, and not think about the rest of the time. The color of our skin doesn’t make our intentions or skills suspect in the eyes of authorities, or make us the targets of violence, or make us less likely to get a job or a loan or a home. This unearned privilege feels as natural to us as breathing because we are so used to it, but that doesn’t make it any less unfair or its effects any less devastating.

Whether we want it or not, we are part of a racist system. The truly awful part is that we white people actually benefit from the oppression of people of color, with advantages that accumulate while others are disadvantaged. Once you start to notice and pay attention to the inequality around you, it can feel really scary and sad. You might feel powerless and guilty — I know I have felt that way. That discomfort, though, is actually a good thing, because once we begin to understand the injustice around us, we can take a stand against it. We can be part of a change.

Remember that even though we might feel helpless, the privilege we benefit from makes us anything but helpless. Because of racism, white people often have access to powerful resources, spaces, and people. We can speak up about injustice without being accused of “playing the race card” or being an “angry black person.” We can help to make marginalized voices heard in spaces in which they are not represented. We can advocate for change in our political system. We can urge others to donate their money to fight racism and benefit people of color. For me, it’s not just about what I can do, but what I have to do. As a human, it makes me feel terrible to know that my security comes at others’ expense. I hear that pain in your answer and I invite you to use your empathy to empower your action. For, as Desmond Tutu once wrote, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Know, too, that fighting injustice can look like lots of different things. Not everyone will start a protest or lead a political revolution. It can start small: by educating yourself, by learning about current events and about history, and by listening to people share experiences that are different than yours. By speaking up when you disagree. By telling the truth, even when it’s hard. Because in order to change this unfair system, we need to challenge it. I hear you say, in your answer, that you couldn’t stand a life of violence and fear. I want you to know that not all resistance is violent but that oppression always is. Your honesty and self-knowledge are a sign of strength, and I think that you are braver than you know. I know that you can be a force for change.

Let’s keep talking. 

In solidarity,

Your Teacher

Julia Donnelly Spiegelman has spent the past ten years teaching foreign languages and social justice. She holds an M.A. from Middlebury College, where she was awarded the Kathryn Davis Fellowship for Peace. She is currently a doctoral student at the University of Massachusetts Boston and a faculty member of the Multicultural Teaching Institute (MTI).

How Not to Address a Student’s Feelings of Unintentional Discrimination

Editor’s Note: We received the following letter from Shannon Wanna, a Native American and digital marketing expert, regarding her and her daughter’s experience in their Kansas public school. We were tempted to offer educators advice at the end of this piece. But the letter, edited here, speaks clearly for itself: Check your racial bias; don’t be defensive.

Before the start of the school year, I contacted the principal at my daughter’s school to make him aware of the “Teacher Tribe” T-shirts I found circulating on social media. I let him know that I found these shirts to be highly offensive and that I would be particularly offended if any educator wore them at the school. I said I know it would upset my third-grade daughter as well. As Native Americans and members of the Muscogee Creek, Seminole, Omaha, and Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate tribes, we deeply value our culture and traditions. Given the history of Native Americans having to restrict their cultural practices and traditions through assimilation and boarding schools, I said it is inappropriate for teachers to wear shirts with the word “Tribe” or that include images of a tipi and arrow.

The principal responded, addressing my concerns, and spoke to a few of the staff members about this. This was last I heard of it.

One Friday early in the school year, my daughter came home and told me she saw one of the teachers wearing a similar “Teacher Tribe” shirt and that it hurt her feelings. We practice open communication in our household, so I asked her what she wanted to do about these feelings. She said she wanted to talk to the teacher. I have always felt comfortable speaking with any of the staff at the school, as they have always been very open and approachable to my family. So I thought not only should they be aware of how offensive these shirts are to Native Americans, as well as other students and parents, but that they’d be receptive to hearing from my daughter. I also thought this was a powerful way for my daughter to use the leadership skills that she had learned through the Leader In Me program at her school. I am so proud of my daughter for wanting to stand up for what she believes in!

So we went back up to the school around 4:30 pm that day to have a conversation with the teacher who wore the shirt, but she had already left. My daughter still wanted to talk to someone at the school, so when we ran into her second-grade teacher from the previous year, my daughter spoke about her feelings and I provided further explanation on the matter. The teacher had no idea how offensive the shirt was and commended my daughter for being brave enough to speak up, educate and bring awareness to those around her about her culture. This made my daughter feel so much better and at ease. She planned to talk to the teacher who had actually wore the shirt on Monday. I told her we would go in early or stay after school to meet with her.

Then at 7:45 pm that Sunday, I received a phone call from the teacher in question. She said the principal gave her the OK to speak to me about this (I found out later from the principal that he did not tell her to call us). I was expecting a respectful conversation, but she came at me — and my daughter — in a very aggressive and defensive manner. We had respected and trusted the teacher so my daughter and I both felt comfortable talking to her about a sensitive topic. I felt this could be a teachable moment for my daughter and a great way to express her feelings, use her leadership skills, and speak up for what she believes in. I am so very proud of her bravery! Instead of having an open dialogue between a teacher and student and parent, we were subjected to a horrific phone call. The teacher did not enter the conversation to listen or to understand our point of view. She was very defensive. We in no way wanted to make her feel uncomfortable. My daughter simply wanted to have a conversation about the shirt and share her feelings. That was it!

After the teacher stopped interrupting, my daughter was able to express her feelings. She was visibly shook up by the teacher’s abrasive tone and interruptions, but she was able to speak her mind. The teacher stated that she was feeling attacked and her character was attacked and told my daughter that she was hurting her heart to think that she would want to hurt us. She turned the whole thing around to where she was the victim. She said we were making her out to be a racist, hurtful person.

We never said the teacher was racist to anyone. In fact, when we spoke to the other second-grade teacher on Friday, we said we know she didn’t wear the shirt to hurt our feelings. That is why we wanted to have a conversation with her — so she could better understand what the shirt means to us and our culture. The teacher turned this very teachable moment into an attack on my daughter and me. After I explained our feelings about the shirt (noting the painful history of assimilation and boarding schools, etc.) she told us she was still planning to wear the shirt. She said she didn’t find it offensive, and to her “tribe” means community. She was not listening to our point of view at all! I asked her, so you are willing to make a student and family feel offended and uncomfortable at the school. Her response was simply that we will have to agree to disagree. My daughter heard all of this and her eyes immediately welled up with tears! She cried herself to sleep that night. We both did. 

I feel the teacher spoke to my daughter in a way that no adult, especially a teacher, should speak to a child. She said she was going to speak to the whole faculty about this situation to get their take on the shirt. I feel she was threatening us and this was in retaliation for bringing up a valid concern of ours. My daughter used to think of school as a safe environment with trusted adults. And now she certainly sees teachers in a different light. I am heartbroken for my child who stood up for what she believes in, only to be completely shut down by a close-minded individual who is actively teaching children.

The whole incident also makes me feel as if my concerns are not valid.

It has been three months now and the teacher still has not apologized for her actions and has even tried to talk to my daughter at school. I have spoken with the principal and assistant superintendent several times as well as the staff counsel for the school district. I told them all what we wanted was for my daughter to feel comfortable and safe while she is at school. To help this process, we would like the teacher to not wear the shirt to school. Because of the behavior of the teacher during the phone call, I said we would also like an apology for her actions and words. Everyone from the school district (at first) said they could not deliver these to us. They each said we were just going to have to try and move on and that my daughter would probably see the shirt again so she is just going to have to deal with it.

The staff counsel for the school district stated this isn’t an objective offense but a subjective offense — a matter of competing opinions — so they can’t do anything. To Native Americans this is objective. The problem is that most non-natives, at least in this school district, see it as subjective. And given that 99% of the school district is non-native, our voice and feelings do not matter.

Since the incident, we have seen some progress from the school administration. The principal and assistant superintendent have both spoke to the teacher and advised her to not wear the shirt. They confirmed to us she will not wear the shirt to school again. The principal has addressed the school staff on the incident as well as cultural awareness. He is currently working on bringing diversity training to the school for staff development.

Some members of our school community are definitely treating us differently since the incident. People are less friendly. They don’t make eye contact. They turn around when they see us. Some have also unfriended and blocked me from social media.

We live in Kansas and my daughter attends one of the “best” and largest school districts in the state. There is no equity council, diversity committee, or student support for minority students within our school district.