We share brief presentations from the fourth "Global Saturday Salons” that Ethical Schools is sponsoring with three international partners. Dr. Benjamin Freud is the Strategic Lead for Regenerative Education at the Green School Bali, Manon Tiange is a Grade 12 student mapping labor invisibility and systemic inequality in Bali, and Scarlett Gonella is a Grade 12 student investigating plastic pollution and advocating for clean water access in Indonesia. They talked about an educational culture rooted in contribution to community. Learners are trusted to ask difficult questions, collaborate across generations, and imagine reform at the highest levels.

This salon series is called Learning to Citizen: Tales of Youth Voices, Agency, and Care. Our goal is to honor learners and teachers who are already doing the work practicing care, enacting citizenship, and learning how to regenerate their worlds. Discover more and join us on May 30th to learn with members of The Brotherhood Sister Sol: edfortheworldwewant.net

Dr. Chantal Francois and Dr. Jen McLaughlin Cahill, co-authors of Identity-Affirming Literacies in Schools, discuss their time at the school they call Pearl Street Collaborative, a progressive secondary school on Manhattan’s Lower East Side that prioritizes teacher inquiry and collaboration. Schedules include time for teachers to meet frequently with grade and content colleagues. Drawing on the work of Freire and Lilia Bartolomé, Drs. Francois and McLaughlin Cahill used literature to support students' identities, including by integrating an LGBTQ+ focus into English classes.

Overview

00:00-00:52 Intros

00:52-03:36 Humanizing pedagogy

03:36-04:44 Relationships and humanizing pedagogy

04:44-07:35 Scheduling facilitating creation and maintenance of faculty relationships

07:35-10:04 Collaboration as modeling for students

10:04-10:21 Pearl Street Collaborative

10:21-13:24 Literacy as more than reading

13:24-18:53 Reading and teaching as political

18:53-23:17 Mission statement as a meaningful document

23:17-31:23 Structuring literacy instruction around independent reading and reading whole books

31:23-36:44 LGBTQ+ identify-affirming literacies

36:44-40:34 Impact on students of LGBTQ+ focus

40:34- Outro

References

• Book Identity-Affirming Literacies in Schools by Dr. Chantal Francois and Dr. Jen McLaughlin Cahill: buy it on Routledge or find it on Amazon
• Article by  Dr. Lilia Bartolomé "Beyond the methods fetish: Toward a humanizing pedagogy"

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode. 

Soundtrack by Podington Bear

We welcome back Dr. Anthony Johnston to speak about his new book, "Introduction to Secondary Teaching: Blending Wisdom, Research, and Social Justice.” Dr. Johnston explores teacher wisdom of practice, social justice pedagogy, evidence-based practices, and adolescent brain research. He identifies the foundation of all classroom teaching as teacher identity, teacher presence, teacher passion, and teacher stance.

We share brief presentations from the third of the “Saturday Salons” that Ethical Schools is sponsoring with three international partners. Kerry Kirk Pflugh is the executive director of the New Jersey School of Conservation. She also comes with extensive background experience at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. Tom Roderick is the author most recently of Teach for Climate Justice: A Vision for Transforming Education. He was also the Founding Executive Director of Morningside Center for Teaching Social Responsibility. Deb L. Morrison is a Learning Designer and Advisor at the University of Washington and a Lead Author on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Report 7. They talk about how educators can respond to the urgent environmental crises we face. Learn more and join at globalconversations.net

We welcome back Dr. Ujju Aggarwal, assistant professor at The New School, to speak about her book, Unsettling Choice: Race, Rights, and the Partitioning of Public Education. In Unsettling Choice, Dr. Aggarwal focuses on the intersection of public education and gentrification. The book is based on her work with mothers at a Head Start center in NYC. We discuss the race and class discrimination the parents faced and whether exclusion is inherent in school choice programs.

Overview

00:00-00:56 Intros

00:56-07:13 Working with Head Start mothers in Manhattan’s Community School District 3

07:13-09:15 Connection between school choice and austerity

09:15-19:17 Issues mothers faced in choosing schools for their children and their experiences

19:17-24:06 The “post-Brown realignment” following the Brown v Board of Education Supreme Court decisions

24:06-25:30 Parents as “consumers” rather than as “citizens”

25:30-28:01 Can school choice exist without exclusion

28:01-29:03 NYC Schools Chancellor Samuels and citywide integration

29:03-32:21 Radical municipalism

32:21- Outro

Transcript

Click here to listen to see the full transcript of this episode. 

References

• Book "Unsettling Choice: Race, Rights, and the Partitioning of Public Education" by Dr. Ujju Aggarwal
• Listen to our first interview "Ujju Aggarwal on school choice, whiteness as property, and the “right to exclude” published in 2019

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear

We share brief presentations from the second of the “Saturday Salons” that Ethical Schools is sponsoring with three international partners. Sherry Johnson, Tribal Education Director of the Sisseton-Wahpeton-Oyate (South Dakota), Deepak Ramola, Founder of Project FUEL (India), and Charlotte Hankin of Coconut Thinking and the Green School (Bali) talk about the importance of stories in reshaping how we think about our relationship to the natural world.

Learn more and register for the third salon on February 21 at globalconversations.net

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode. 

We speak with Derek Black, Constitutional law professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law, about the impact of Trump administration’s policies on students’ civil rights. Department of Education offices meant to ensure students are not subject to discrimination have been decimated. The Department of Justice has switched from protecting minority students' rights to focusing on so-called “discrimination" against whites and attacking transgender students. Professor Black also says the need for "circuit breakers" on executive power transcends this administration.

Overview

00:00-00:52 Intros

00:52:02:21 Threats to students’ protection from discrimination

02:21-03:53 Status of complaints to Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR)

03:53-05:30 Importance of access to OCR without an attorney

05:30-10:09 OCR procedures and remedies

10:09-13:55 Role Department of Justice is supposed to have in protecting students against discrimination; Trump Administration priorities

13:55-17:01 How the Administration’s approach is schizophrenic

17:01-23:10 Ethical quandaries facing district administrators

23:10-24:43 Supplementing not supplanting: What happens when the Department of Education is no longer monitoring

24:43-27:21 The uncertainty factor—who gets focused on

27:21-30:36 State Departments of Education: How they fit in

30:36-34:11 Theatrics at US Department of Education

34:11-38:00 Problems before the Trump Administration and what would be important afterwards

38:00-40:11 Some specifics of “circuit breakers” that could reduce executive power

40:11- Outro

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode.

References

Our first interview with Derek Black happened in 2021. Click here to listen to "The attack on public education: Will public schools survive?"

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear

We share brief presentations from the first of the “Saturday Salons” that Ethical Schools is sponsoring with three international partners. Juan Mora of the Center for Artistry and Scholarship and Ramji Raghavan of Agastya International Foundation talk about how educators and communities can cultivate awareness of and relationship to the natural world.

Learn more and register for the next salon at globalconversations.net

Overview

00:00-01:36 Introductions by Amy and Jon

01:36-02:45 Introduction of Juan Mora by David Penberg

02:45-12:36 Juan Mora:

Separation of people from nature;

What would you do if you were starting a school from zero?

Experience in Córdoba, Argentina of basing a school on nature;

Integrating the curriculum into nature-centered activities;

And kids never asked, “Why are we doing this (activity)?”

We’ve left nature out of our learning environments;

A shift in learning that will help us understand how to teach and what to teach and where to teach differently.

12:36-14:09 David Penberg:

Reciprocity, centrality of relationships, “nature deficit disorder”;

Introduction of Ramji Raghavan

14:09-23:59 Ramji Raghavan:

Transforming a barren wasteland of 170 acres into an ecological preserve;

Nature-centric learning;

Eco-walk;

Constructing a giant figure showing herbs benefiting different parts of the body;

Constructing a termite hill;

Bandhu—everything is connected;

Distributing learnings throughout India.

23:59-25:15 David Penberg:

How educators can create conditions for people to think the kinds of worlds that they would like to inhabit and live in, whether it’s a school, a community;

Creative learning and what that looks like, creative being;

Being intentional, observant and continuously in relationship to the things around you.

25:15- Outro

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this conversation. 

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear

We speak with Dr. Mia Hood, author of  Pop Culture Literacies: Teaching Interpretation, Response, and Composition in a Digital World, about analyzing popular music and films along with more traditional literature. Dr. Hood talks about helping students to think about their ethical perspectives while engaging with "entertainment," and the importance of  educators'  resisting the temptation to impose their own “expert” interpretations in favor of modeling the process. We also discuss how teachers can resist imposing their views while teaching for democracy and social justice.

Overview

00:00-00:48 Intros

00:48-02:48 Pop culture literacies

02:42-04:22 Schools’ ethical duty to help young people navigate the world as it is

04:22-06:23 Helping students to thin about their ethical perspectives

06:23-11:58 Students’ responses; Intersection of pop culture literacies and schools

11:58-15:01 Critical literacy and text analysis

15:01-19:09 Power operating within and through texts

19:09-21:56 Piercing the veil of “entertainment” to encourage critical analysis

21:56-26:25 Impact of AI

26:25-30:48 Kathy Hytten’s article, “Ethics in teaching for democracy and social justice”

30:48-33:55 Parental pushback?

33:55- Outro

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode. 

Resources

Book Pop Culture Literacy: Teaching Interpretation, Response, and Composition in a Digital World by Mia Hood

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear

Collaborate with teachers and learners worldwide!

LEARN MORE AND REGISTER AT GLOBALCONVERSATIONS.NET

Along with our partner organizations – Agastya International Foundation, Center for Artistry and Scholarship, and Thinking With You – Ethical Schools is bringing together educators, youth workers, and students from around the world to discuss ethical, democratic, and regenerative education strategies. Hear exciting presentations from visionary practitioners and participate in group discussions.

Come with your co-workers! Attend with a cohort from your school or out-of-school program to maximize the benefits for your organization and students.

Series 1: Ethics and the Natural World Saturdays, January 10 and 31; February 21 8:30-10:00 AM EST

Pay what you wish. Suggested donation: $25 per session, $50 for all three sessions Additional participants from your organization: $15 per session, $30 for all three sessions.

LEARN MORE AND REGISTER AT GLOBALCONVERSATIONS.NET

We speak with Dr. Susan Jean Mayer about her recent book, "Practicing Pragmatism Through Progressive Pedagogies: A Philosophical Lens for Grounding Classroom Teaching and Research." Dr. Mayer defines pragmatism in today's world and discusses the importance of critical exploration, democratic construction of knowledge, and openness to diversity of perspectives in the classroom. As teachers and learners, we can construct a shared set of values based on our experiential realities and come to understand these realities in coherent terms.

Overview

00:00-00:36 Intros

00:36-02:55 How to define pragmatism in today’s world

02:55-05:34 How to define final truth

05:34-06:53 How to define an ethical classroom

06:53-11:29 Ethical and democratic classrooms: the same or how they may differ

11:29-15:03 Knowledge, experience, and education

15:03-17:55 Critical exploration in the classroom

17:55-21:05 Classroom example of critical exploration

21:05-23:49 How a critical exploration teacher can intervene when students are wrong

23:49-27:25 When inviting different perspectives and belief systems doesn’t come naturally to students

27:25-28:56 Schools aren’t encouraging students to talk to one another; have succumbed to discourse of test scores

28:56-33:20 How teachers can become more comfortable with perspectives they may disagree with

33:20-37:11 How pragmatic teachers can deal with a school system structured to eliminate or minimize cultural diversity

37:11-40:47 Balancing ties to local communities with supporting students who want to break from the consensus of the community

40:47-47:19 How teachers can help create a system of education based on pragmatism

47:19- Outro 

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcript of this episode. 

References

• Book Practicing Pragmatism through Progressive PedagogiesA Philosophical Lens for Grounding Classroom Teaching and Research by Susan Jean Mayer
• Susan Jean Mayer's website

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear