I was teased a lot in school as a child, mostly for getting high marks. I worked hard and was an eager learner. As a white, heterosexual, Christian student without a disability, I enjoyed participating in an education system where my knowledge, learning style, identity, culture, and experiences were valued and affirmed. I was called a geek,...
Equity Matters: In Learning, for Life.
Equity Alliance Blog
As I enter the Native American Literature classroom that I am conducting research in, I see many faces, hear many stories, and engage in many conversations. On this particular day, I overhear a conversation Eileen has with another classmate. She says to her friend: “If you cut us in half and put us together, you’d have two complete people.”...
Recently I was walking with a colleague of mine on campus as a group of students passed us by. “Laura, is that you?” One of the students, a tall, handsome African American man, was looking at me. I studied this unfamiliar man and behind the mature face, trousers, and tie, I recognized the young undergraduate I had taught nearly a decade...
In April thousands of schools did outreach for Denim Day, a global observance that honors sexual assault survivors.
I believe the key to activating the lives of students with disabilities is not about changing who they are; rather, it is in changing how we listen to them. So let’s begin with a short listening exercise. If you are at our near a kitchen, perform the following steps before reading the blog. If not, feel free to skip ahead.
An...
Dear School District,
Sending my daughter off to school for the first time will be a bittersweet experience. I should be good at this by now, right? I’ve seen her off to kindergarten, middle school, high school – heck, I’ve even had the opportunity to walk her to her first class when she started her studies at the university. Each time...
Sometimes as soon as I step foot in a school, I can tell of its commitment, or lack of commitment, to affirming the diversity of their students. Some things are obvious, of course: posters, bulletin boards, the nature of the books in the library, the diversity of the staff, and the language or languages displayed in the school – not only...
My daughter Camila is back at school after a two week break. Last night while I was making dinner, I noticed her engrossed in homework, and she even seemed to be smiling. In order to understand why this struck me as suspicious you need to understand our history with homework. For the past year, I have become very hands-off...
I stumbled upon an amazing opportunity a few months ago. One that I’m sure many teachers wish would present itself at some point after their career in the classroom is over. I was sitting in the waiting room of my doctor’s office when a young woman approached me slowly and said, “Excuse me, but is your name Ms. M?” I was startled at first,...
In my work in schools, I have the opportunity to talk with students about their school experiences.
Working as a secondary teacher in South Central Los Angeles brought some of the best times in my life. I gained a perspective from students that dispelled my assumptions about their thoughts and feelings. I remember when I first set foot on the middle school campus, fresh out of college and excited to begin my work in the classroom, I...
To include or not to include? That is the question every parent has to struggle with as his or her child progresses through the school; issues related to placement options for students with disabilities are challenging.
I arrived at work in a harried state and frame of mind. I have so much work to do today and a ton of IEP meetings, these words ran through my head as I unlocked the classroom door and instinctively turned on the lights and walked to my desk and retrieved my phone messages. I put my book bag on the floor next to my desk, and checked my...
As a school psychologist during the late 1990s and early 2000s, I spent lots of time carrying out various parts of the process of determining students’ eligibility for special education. I also spent considerable, but not nearly enough, time reflecting on the ways that IDEA eligibility assessments of students of color did or did not contribute...
If you ask my daughter, Camila, about her teacher, she will tell you, “He is the best teacher in the world.” I had heard other kids praise Mr. Bandera as well. Last January I spent two weeks launching a poetry inquiry in their class. The kids were taking turns sharing out something they held in their heart. One boy enthusiastically threw...
Recently, I’ve taken on new endeavors that have opened my eyes to things I haven’t noticed before…namely the power and privilege that is associated with being a white person and the marginalization I sometimes experience as a lesbian. I grew up as a relatively privileged person and I still am in many ways. I come from a middle class home, with...
Most of the time when school administrators and professional developers get together to discuss the practice of teaching, the talk turns to technique. They’ll debate for hours on end regarding the best way to teach students to read and make meaning of text. They’ll talk about fluency, decoding skills and a lot of specific strategies and/or...
You have probably recently witnessed class sizes in schools surpassing reasonable thresholds, teachers losing their jobs, and university tuition increasing. For example, California Watch reports that not only have California’s class sizes risen by an average of 5 students at the primary level and 3 at higher grade levels (making 31 students the...
- ‹ previous
- 7 of 10
- next ›