January 9, 2019
We have several opportunities ranging from a Disrupting Inequities Webinar starting tomorrow to a chance to join the planning team for Fall Meeting!
Boston Fall Meeting – Call for Volunteers
We are very excited to announce the call for volunteers for our next annual conference: SRI Fall Meeting in Boston, November 7-9, 2019! As a special bonus, this is our 10th year anniversary celebration too!
We are seeking volunteers from the SRI community who have the passion and time to help us craft an engaging, inspiring and transformative experience for educators. The committees represent the core elements of the SRI Fall Meeting.
If interested, please email Deirdre Williams to let her know which planning committee you’d like to join. Interested in more than one? Outstanding! We could really use your help and talent!
Please email Deirdre (deirdre@schoolreforminitiative.org) with your interest and/or questions, by February 15, 2019.
News from the Network
Equity: Buzzword or Bold Commitment to School Transformation
By Deirdre Williams, EdD and Kelly Brown, EdD
As school leaders focus on equity to ensure every child succeeds, it is imperative they understand and value the current demographic reality of the students in the communities in which they serve. The National Center for Education Statistics (2009) indicates that “students of color, described as Latina/o, African American or Asian, are now the majority of students in K-12 public schools in the United States” (Taylor, Kumi- Yeboah, & Ringlaben, 2016, p. 42).
Our schools are increasingly seeing a trend of students with backgrounds identified as ethnically, linguistically, culturally, and otherwise socially diverse while over 80 percent of the leadership and teacher force who serves them is predominately White and monolingual (Taylor et al., 2016; Khan, Lindstrom, & Murray, 2014; U.S. Department of Education, 2016).
These cultural and linguistic differences between our educator and student populations can influence the overall student academic achievement in our schools, arguably due to the lack of cultural knowledge, sensitivity, and competence to meet the needs of all students (Khan et al., 2014). If our goal is to achieve equity and obtain comparably high academic achievement among all the students we serve, we must begin to awaken our mindsets to the influence culture has on our bias, assumptions, beliefs, and ultimately our practices in schools.
Dr. Deirdre Williams, new SRI Executive Director, and Kelly Brown, SRI Affiliate, have offered webinars and Fall Meeting learning experiences on equity and SRI in the past.
Call for Writers
We are looking for stories that will bring SRI practices and principles to life. Submissions might challenge and provoke new thinking, introduce a new practice or initiate an exchange of ideas and experiences around shared dilemmas. They may also share and celebrate success or perhaps highlight challenges and shortfalls that we can learn from. The work of SRI is complex and we don’t always completely meet our hoped-for outcomes. It is the striving toward success that creates hope and durability of our efforts, and offers opportunity for fruitful learning.
Free Minds, Free People 2019 – Call for Proposals
Free Minds, Free People is a national conference presented by the Education for Liberation Network that brings together teachers, young people, researchers, parents, and community-based activists/educators from across the country to build a movement to develop and promote education as a tool for liberation. The conference is a space in which these groups can learn from and teach each other by sharing knowledge, experience, and strategies.
They are inviting proposals to present work addressing a range of education justice issues by January 30, 2019. There are several different types of activities for which you can submit proposals: Workshop, Discussion, Paper or Research Exploration, Free Young Minds, Assembly.
Read more on submitting a proposal
36 Teenagers Show Us Their Generation
As we reflect on 2018, we thought it might just be fun to share some images the New York Times student photo contest.
Upcoming Events
Virtual Learning Opportunities
Disrupting Inequities Webinar Series
January 10 and 17, 2019 – 1pm CST
Cost: $25 for affiliates, $35 for non-affiliates (each session)
January 10, 1pm CST – Implicit Bias and Microaggressions
In the first session, attendees will be introduced to links between school climate, microaggressions, and student learning, and engage with SF-CESS’ Theory of Transformation to reduce the conditions that lead to microaggressions and a harmful school culture.
January 17, 1pm CST – Discourse 2 Probing Questions
In the second session, attendees will be introduced to the concepts of Discourse 1 and Discourse 2 and use these to invite more radical discourse through the use of probing questions. The series is offered as individual sessions, so you can register for one or both.
Facilitating Virtual Learning Communities
January 17, 24, 31, February 7, 2019 – 8pm EST
Cost: $75 for the series for SRI affiliates; $115 for non-affiliates
Julie Moore and Natalie Berger will help participants in these sessions engage in a variety of SRI protocols and practices to explore how SRI critical friendship can foster and sustain transformational learning communities in a virtual space. Ample time will be reserved to debrief the virtual experience, examine implications for our work, and develop next steps in using virtual transformational learning communities to engage more teachers and students in SRI’s Mission and Guiding Principles.
Leveraging Descriptive Feedback for Classroom Observations January 29, 2019 – 8pm EST
Cost: $25 for SRI affiliates; $35 for non-affiliates
Educators might not know what constitutes high-quality written feedback when some of them have never received it themselves. Join Thomas Van Soelen in this webinar and close the gaps in your practice as we explore, study, and write feedback of our own. Leave with an appetite to further develop skills needed to create an environment where teachers say, “Are you coming to my room today?” and they really mean it.
Culturally-Relevant Recruitment, Retention, and Responsibility Webinar
February 6; February 20; March 6, 2019 – 12:15PM Eastern
Cost: $95 for the series for SRI affiliates; $125 for non-affiliates
Join SRI and Dr. Liza Talusan (LT Coaching and Consulting, LLC) for a 3-part series on culturally relevant attitudes, behaviors, and actions that support recruitment, retention, and responsibility towards employees from institutionally underrepresented backgrounds.
- Part 1 will focus on why diversity, equity, and inclusion matters in the hiring process. We will go over the big questions that you and your institution should be asking itself about why you would engage in a culturally relevant process.
- Part 2 will focus on creating a more inclusive process that pays attention to the foundation of why we do this work together.
- Finally, Part 3 will explore the big questions around whether the culture, climate and behaviors of your institution are prepared to support and authentically engage with communities from institutionally underrepresented backgrounds.
Equity First Retreats
Join SRI this winter for two days of reflection and renewal in three fabulous locations across the country:
- Philadelphia – March 7-8 at the Friends Center, 1501 Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102
- Los Angeles – March 21-22 at California State University Dominguez Hills, 1000 E. Victoria St., Carson CA 90747
- Chicago – April 25 & 26 at University of Illinois at Chicago, Student Center East 750 S Halsted St, Chicago, IL 60607
Together we’ll reflect upon where we are in our equity journey, refresh our practice of collaboration and reflective discourse, and renew our fierce commitment to improving teaching and learning for every student. As always, we’ll learn from artifacts and issues that we’ll share from our professional practice, using protocols from School Reform Initiative. The SRI retreats, “Equity First,” will offer a host of opportunities to:
- gather, share, and reflect with others on what we’re learning as we continue to develop a practice centered on equity;
- build our capacity to access, engage, and sustain complex and challenging conversations about equity, identity, and implicit bias that lead to action;
- strengthen our resolve to work as agents of change, with formal or informal authority;
- refresh our perspective on the work we do in schools and districts, non-profit organizations, early childhood and post-secondary institutions — across and among cities, states, regions and on the international scene;
- use SRI tools and processes to remain true to and sustain our fierce commitment to making schools better places for every child.
NOTE: SRI welcomes any participant who wishes to attend, regardless of experience; however, “Equity First” is not designed to be an introduction to SRI’s work or a training session.
More Information and Registration
Do you have news to share? Interesting things happening in your area? Please let us know so we can share with our community! Email Chris Jones, chris@schoolreforminitiative.org.
Thank you,
Kari Thierer and Chris Jones
On behalf of School Reform Initiative
