I used to believe that I was the furthest thing from a white supremacist. My identity as an activist and liberal blinded me to the ways in which my acceptance of white culture as the norm perpetuated white supremacy(1). My realization as of late has been that we do not need to be card carrying KKK members to perpetuate white supremacy. Rather we must recognize that white supremacy is woven into the very fabric of our society. As a classroom teacher, it has been vital for me to dig into this realization deeply. In light of my new education, I realize that the choice to not engage in dismantling white supremacy is active complacency with white supremacy.
As educators, we carry the unique responsibility and privilege of occupying space in our students’ lives. How we choose to take up that space—whether positively or negatively—is often determined by our willingness to do self-work around privilege, race, and culture. Nationally speaking, 82% of public elementary and secondary teachers are white whereas only about 50% of students are white(2). The diversity of the student population is projected to increase by 2024, which will only further highlight this discrepancy. My hope is that all white educators engage in some serious learning/unlearning because we represent the majority of school teachers.
Since 2011, I have grappled with what it means to be a white educator while serving students of color. I’ve made many mistakes along the way. I’ve blindly accepted false narratives from white colleagues about Black students, stayed silent in the face of racist comments/actions, and assumed that I wasn’t “one of those white people.” As a science teacher, I focused heavily on eurocentric contributors to the profession, and when I initially switched to the humanities, I bought into the idea that Standard English is superior and that students should read the “classics.” I am also aware that I will continue to make mistakes, but my evolution as an educator has armed me with resources in dismantling white supremacy in my mind, life, and classroom.
I am acutely aware of the plethora of tasks teachers are responsible for. Given that we have so much on our plates, I’ve curated resources for educators to start to interrogate their own relationship with white supremacy based on their “lifting energy” (light, moderate, heavy). For the purposes of this list, “lifting energy” takes into account both the amount of time to engage with the resource as well as the emotional/mental energy requirements. While this is not an exhaustive list, the goal is to provide aspiring anti-racist educators with a solid place to start. Unlearning racism is an exhausting and emotional process. Imagine though how physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting it is for people of color to live with the impacts of racism and white supremacy on a daily basis. It is important to remember that our inaction around these issues in the classroom is inherently traumatizing to marginalized students and colleagues, so our effort carries great weight.
Lifting Energy Required: LIGHT
Follow educators active in this work (like @rachel.cargle, @chrisemdin, @theconsciouskid, and @teachandtransform). I only use Instagram, but following individuals like those listed has been immeasurably helpful for me. These pages are full of resources, current events, and questions/prompts to push your thinking. On them, I’ve found rich discussion and information that make me a better educator in my classroom immediately.
Listen to a podcast. Teaching While White “White Fragility Part 1” and “White Fragility Part 2” as well as Scene on Radio’s series “Seeing White” are great places to start if you’re new to exploring whiteness and its role in your life. Teaching While White provides a great introduction to Robin DiAngelo’s work (author of White Fragility) and her ability to concisely convey the struggles white people have around race is phenomenal. I walked away with a better understanding of my own emotional responses, automated thinking, and awareness of harm caused from just a 48 minute interview. Listening to a podcast while driving or doing mundane chores is a low lift, but the thought provoking and informative experience is well worth the minimal effort. While listening to the podcasts, I recommend that you approach your reactions with curiosity, a willingness to embrace discomfort, and bravery in dissecting those feelings. Finally, invite a colleague, friend, or family member to listen as well and then discuss what came up for you and how best to move forward with your learning.
Have lunch with a colleague or student whose experience is different than your own. A colleague said to me the other day that, “Public school classrooms are made for white girls.” I knew immediately what he meant. From characters like Hermione Granger to Lisa Simpson, there are countless examples of perfectionist white cisgender girls who succeed academically(3). I should know, I’m one of them. This is exactly why I should connect with folks for whom school is or has been a traumatizing or dehumanizing experience. Taking time one-on-one with students and colleagues to understand their experience builds empathy and informs how we approach our curriculum. Ensure that you approach this conversation in a way that does not trigger or further traumatize the individual. I also recommend buying them lunch or coffee—compensate them for their time, energy, and vulnerability!
Lifting Energy Required: MODERATE
Bring in guest speakers and community partners from diverse backgrounds in your discipline. When deemphasizing eurocentric curriculum, it’s important to make it tangible. Bringing in individuals from the community who aren’t already a part of the culture of power in their given field broadens students’ vision of themselves and others. Furthermore, it exposes students and adults in the school to various forms of cultural capital. This also creates possible connections for future professional mentorship for students.
Read relevant articles/blogs/websites. There are so many articles, but here are a few great reads to get you started.
“Detour-Spotting: For White Anti-Racists” by jona olssen. This article provides an informative list to apply to both yourself but also your school. What examples do you see of detour-spotting in your work environment? This article would also be useful to share with fellow colleagues.
“Dismantle White Supremacy Culture in your School” by Joe Truss. If you’re knew to exploring what white supremacy culture is then this is a good place to start. Truss’s website is a treasure trove for engaging in this work, so I recommend reading more than just the linked article.
Teaching Tolerance. I highly recommend subscribing to "The Moment" and updates from Teaching Tolerance. Not only do you get original content that’s focused on all facets of social justice but their emails include a “Check Out What We’re Reading Section” that includes current and relevant articles. I use Teaching Toleranceall the time for classroom curriculum and professional development.
Hold or attend a weekly (or monthly) lunch meeting focused on equity conversations. A great one that we’ve started at my school is from the group based out of Philadelphia: Building Anti-Racist White Educators (BARWE). My preparation for facilitating these meetings has been minimal because BARWE sends their curriculum on the first of the month with a suggested discussion protocol. While it is difficult to find common time among educators, even two people doing this work is better than zero.
Read books! As an educator, I personally love to read books that push my practice. We spend so much time with individuals who are not our peers and supporting their development that we often forget about our own identities as students and learners. Books that have been incredibly impactful for me in becoming a more culturally responsive educator are:
A Different Mirror by Ronald Takaki. I truly believe that all individuals are better able to understand the present by studying the past. Ronald Takaki’s seminal text on a multicultural history of the United States provides a necessary historical context for understanding racial injustice in the modern world.
Other People’s Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroomby Lisa Delpit. This book should be required reading for all educators. It’s likely that you’ve read Lisa Delpit’s work previously, including some of the essays from this book (“The Silenced Dialogue” or “Skills and Other Dilemmas of a Progressive Black Educator”). I continuously return to her words and broader questions about the culture of power as it relates to serving students of color.
The Fire this Timeby Jesmyn Ward. Firstly, this book is a gorgeous piece of writing. It’s a collection of essays and poems about race in modern America. Several of the essays shook me to the core, including one about a historian desperately trying to honor the death and resting place of enslaved people and another about a Black student whose first experience of racism occured when they were an adult after immigrating to United States from Jamaica. As a white individual, this book helped me to better understand the deeply emotional and human side of race in America.
Layla Saad created a comprehensive, 28-day workbook for white folks to explore their privilege, fragility, and role in dismantling white supremacy. Each day includes a brief essay about a particular topic followed by journal prompts to process and investigate our own connection to the topic. Personally, I found that Layla’s workbook pushed me to think deeply about topics where I had thought I didn’t have a connection. For example, I justified not engaging with racial justice community groups that meet after school with the thought, “Teaching is enough activist work on its own.” This falls under “White Exceptionalism” wherein I am assuming that I am different than other white people and feel like I’ve already done the necessary work in this area. Without Layla Saad’s workbook, I wouldn’t have had this realization.
Spend time in our student’s communities and connect with their lives. Go to their sports games and theater performances. Go to their Girl Scout award ceremony or graduation party. If our students lives and families are inherently separate and compartmentalized from our own life then we can never truly understand or serve them.
As a white individual, I will never be done with the task of dismantling white supremacy. The culture and structure of white supremacy is a ubiquitous thread throughout my life and the lives of everyone across the world. I still believe there is a place for me in education as long as I continue to do this work. I am reminded of Maya Angelou’s words to Oprah, “I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.” White educators have tremendous power to shift the culture of education. My hope is that if we all know better, we will do better.
1. For the purposes of this writing, I am operating under the following definition of white supremacy: “...white supremacy is conceived as a comprehensive condition whereby the interests and perceptions of white subjects are continually placed centre stage and assumed as ‘normal’” Gillborn, David. "Rethinking white supremacy: Who counts in ‘WhiteWorld’." Ethnicities 6, no. 3 (2006): 318-340. 2. US Department of Education. "The state of racial diversity in the educator workforce." (2016). 3. I’m ignoring other ways in which the educational system fails female-identifying students for the sake of focusing on race