When my child was in second grade, her white teacher decided to use Black History Month to give a lesson on slave catchers.
After listening to vivid descriptions of the brutal and dehumanizing indignities suffered by people who look like her, my then-7-year-old called me in tears. Fearing capture, she begged to be picked up to avoid her fate. Her tiny, traumatized voice awakened in me the advocate I wish I didn’t have to be.
Walking the line of both parent and advocate has been as galvanizing as it has been distressing. Reports, such as the Toronto District School Board’s Human Rights Update, detail the pervasiveness of anti-Black racism in our schools, but can’t describe the burden placed on generations of Black families who have struggled with a system content to undermine, exclude, and gaslight their lived experience.
Even the momentary sense of urgency caused by 2020’s social unrest seems to have dissipated, while little has changed in the experiences of Black students and their families. There are no easy steps to fixing anti-Black racism in schools, but there are truths advocates can hold on to as they move the system in the right direction.
When we are heard, change follows
When I raised my concerns over the slave-catcher lesson, our school principal was dismissive. She emphasized that no other parent had raised concerns, while repeatedly assuring me this teacher was a “sweet person” who “meant well.”
Black children are all but invisible in curricula, until they are, only in ways that are traumatizing. The microaggressions, lower expectations, and disproportionate punishments that colour Black student’s experience are uniquely un-unique.
Yet concerns raised by Black parents are routinely dismissed, particularly when parents are not versed in education system vernacular or are unable to name the ill-a-tease feeling that is often our first indication of being gaslit.
Advocacy group Parents of Black Children’s 2022 report found 59.8 percent of families have raised concerns with their child’s school or board. It also shows through case studies that the perpetrator’s remorse is often centred, not the victim’s trauma.
Raising concerns is a tough call for parents; we often face reprisals in a system that fails to acknowledge and validate Black perspectives. But in cases where administrators, teachers, and other parent allies not only listen to but believe and amplify the voices of Black parents, we see changes made.
Know that “no” comes first
Those who advocate for change, or demand accountability face a system filled with folks desperate to uphold the status quo, whose first instinct is “that can’t work,” and who are not personally burdened with the outcomes of their failures to act.
I once asked for an anti-racism course to be included in my board’s curriculum. I naively thought bringing to life such a suggestion, post-George Floyd, would be easy. It had been implemented by other boards and was not a new idea: Stephen Lewis made this recommendation to Premier Bob Rae 30 years ago, after 70 meetings with Black parents and various professionals about the state of anti-Black racism in Ontario.
The first resistance came in the form of being told the board was doing “enough” by offering Black history courses. I was told students wouldn’t be interested in or have room for another such course. When I didn’t immediately retreat, I was bamboozled by arbitrary cut-off dates, nonsensical course codes, and torturous acronyms. The term “Culturally Relevant Pedagogy” was wielded like a protective shield, deflecting the shortcomings of the system. Each encounter felt like an effort to put this non-credentialed parent in her place.
Whew.
In education, “No” is reflexive.
My advice: Don’t give up at the first refusal. When the “No” gets more vehement and acronym-ladled, that signals you’re getting somewhere and should keep pushing for “Yes.”
Lean on and learn from community
Pushing for yes is not for lone rangers. Education advocates have been demanding accountability and working to implement measurable, well-researched solutions for generations.
The nature of this work is essential and also exhausting . Doing it alone next to impossible and unnecessary.
Practically speaking, I wouldn’t have known to keep pushing for that new anti-racism course if not for folks who let me know several schools with similar cut-off dates were able to add the course, while my board held fast to their myth of impossibility.
But more than just offering this kind of practical advice, a circle that shares your lived experiences or passion for creating a different future for Black students is affirming.
Finding community may take time but this process doesn’t have to be formal or burdensome. I’ve found my people everywhere from Facebook groups to writing circles and LinkedIn. Humbly reaching out to educator advocates I read about, I asked what may have been silly questions, but they embraced me in this work.
Whether your sphere of influence is a classroom, school, board, region or province, advocates hold fast to Audre Lorde’s mantra: “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.” Only collective wisdom and steadfast community—the antithesis of colonial white supremacy—can hope to dismantle the same within education.
Words of wisdom for parents tackling anti-Black racism in schools, Originally printed in This Magazine.
