To my non activist friends this sounds like a silly question. I am pretty sure, when they think of radical
activist they think of me. At first it was because I used Facebook to
proliferate my radical views but since returning to Washington, DC in 2011 I
have attended and organized numerous marches and conferences taking my social
media activism to the streets. However,
lately as I get deeper and deeper into the world of education activism I am
often left wondering if I am radical enough to be a part of this movement. Or
perhaps their definition of radical varies greatly from my definition of
radical and that is why I feel like I am not fully welcome in this movement. And by their version of radical I mean white
liberals, because frankly they dominate the education activist movement that I
am a part of. This is not surprising, given that white liberals often have the
privilege including time and money to fully engage in the activist
movement. When they use that privilege
for the common good, then we get one step closer to winning the war. However,
when they use that privilege to dictate to others how they must think, act, and
behave in this movement, then they become the oppressor no matter how good
their intentions may be.
In July 2016 the Save
Our Schools Coalition for Action organized the People’s March for Education and
Social Justice and Activist Conference in Washington DC. The Save Our Schools Coalition was originally
made up of the following 8 organizations: Save Our Schools (SOS), The Badass
Teachers Association (BATs), United Opt Out (UOO), Network for Public Education
(NPE), the National Council of Urban Education Association (NCUEA), the BAT NEA
Caucus, the Center for the Expansion of Learning and Thinking (CELT), and the
Florida Opt Out Network. Members from these organizations, spent 10 months
working to plan and organize the march, rally, and conference. We had hopes of substantially growing the
number of attendees from the 2011 SOS march and rally but realized that it
would cost serious money and none of the coalition organizations could afford
to pay for this event. So, as was done in 2011 we asked both of the national
teachers union, AFT and NEA to endorse and financially support this event. We also asked the Washington Teachers Union
(WTU) for support.
Money from AFT, NEA,
and WTU was used to offset the costs of the event. In case you are not aware,
hosting a march, rally, and conference cost money. In addition to paying for a sound system and
the use of space at Howard University, money was used to help members of
Journey for Justice and other grass roots organizations travel to DC and take
part in this event. No one was paid to
speak. Most people had to pay for their own registration although we did allow
the first 100 children to register for free.
Bob George who served as the director of the event, hopes to be paid a
modest fee if there is any money left over after we pay all of our expenses but
that might be wishful thinking. Anyway,
that is where we got the money from and that is what is was used for.
Sounds harmless right?
Well not according to some white liberals. Because according to them if you
take money from the unions then you have been bought, co-opted, and
neutralized. It doesn’t matter what the
money was for. It doesn’t matter how hard you worked to make sure the unions
did not take control of the event. No
you see they wrote the playbook and in that play book under no circumstances
can you have anything to do with the unions if you want to be a real education
activist. Now don’t get me wrong, I have
serious issues with both national teachers union. I have been a vocal critic of
their decision to align with corporate reformist agendas such as Teach Strong
and I believe they should be using all of their power to protect the teaching
profession by explicitly denouncing and fighting against fast-track teacher
preparation programs such as Teach for America and Relay Graduate School that
are wreaking havoc on the profession they are supposed to stand for. If I had the opportunity to sit down with
Randi Weingarten or Lily Eskelsen I would gladly share my views with them. But
seeing as how I am not in a union I don’t expect them to come knocking on my
door for advice any time soon.
As much as I object to
decisions made by the national unions, I prepare teachers every day who will
become union members. And with the task
of preparing them comes the responsibility to ensure that they support the
teaching profession and that begins by becoming an active member of your
union. No the unions are not perfect but
no organization is, and if you want to bring about change you need to get into
the mess, roll up your sleeves, and get to work. It may be easier to complain
about the unions from the sidelines and denounce anyone associated with them in
anyway, but that is not how change works.
However, I digress because this really is not about unions, although it
was definitely a catalyst for the personal attacks directed at me and others.
So the SOS Coalition
for Action took union money, and that caused certain white liberals, who did
not attend or help plan the event, to denounce the march and rally as a union
zombie fest. Forget the fact that
Reverend Barber founder of the Moral Monday’s movement was a keynote speaker at
the rally. Ignore the fact that Brother Jitu Brown, director of Journey for
Justice, and Bishop John Selders gave keynotes at the activist conference. None of that matters because union money
helped to pay for the event. In fact,
according to some white liberals, the unions used the fact that the event was
connected to black social justice leaders as a pretense to further their
corporate agenda. Never mind that
neither Randy nor Lily were at the event and the only union influence came from
the teachers who are members of their unions and did not object to their dues
being used to fund the event. None of
that matters. The mighty white liberals of the movement have spoken so truth be
damned. I mean come on of course white liberals who blog and teach in the ivory
tower know best. How dare we ask them not to judge an event that they know
nothing about? If they say that SOS, UOO, BATs, and NPE have been co-opted by
the unions then we should all just nod our heads and agree because white
liberals always know what is best for everyone else.
Well that is not going
to happen. Because I have seen this before and I am wise enough to know that
this is how movements die. When white
liberals attempt to define movements, especially movements that have strong
connections to the needs of black and brown communities, they strangle the
movement to death. Their inability to
step back and realize that they do not have all the answers and do not have the
right to dictate to others how to fight for their freedom leads to chaos. It has happened before and it will happen
again (think Occupy and white feminists). They fail to realize that while they
have the privilege to refuse to compromise others are not afforded that same
luxury. Others are fighting for their
lives, and the lives of their children, and the life of their profession. Many
of these white liberals do not live in communities ravaged by school closings,
no excuses charter schools, economic disinvestment, crime, and poverty. And if
they do they often have the means to protect their own children from these
harmful effects through private schools or even homeschooling. I mean if we are being honest, the ability to
even opt your child out of high stakes standardized testing is a privilege that
many black and brown families do not have.
This does not mean I
am against opting out. I remain a board member of United Opt Out and I will
continue to encourage parents, especially black and brown parents, to opt their
children out of high stakes testing. But that does not mean that I am not aware
of the privilege inherent in such a move.
But United Opt Out is about more than just opting out of testing. It is
about opting out of the entire corporate reform agenda. Many white parents joined opt out because
they hated Common Core and anything that came out of President Obama’s
administration. But when we challenged them on charters, school closures, and
racist disciplinary practices they wanted no part in that fight. They demanded
that the group focus solely on testing and we demanded that they leave the
group because we clearly were not the right fit.
One of the reasons I
pushed to have UOO be a part of the SOS Coalition for Action is because I
wanted our voice to be prominent. I know that unions can exert power and take
control. But I also knew that we could be that voice demanding that we do not
concede control to any one organization.
And we didn’t. We took their
money and we had a kick ass event.
Nonetheless not everyone at UOO were happy with the decision to be a
part of the coalition but they were out voted by a majority of the board
members. Since then 5 members of the
board have stepped down. Some left for personal reasons and others may have
left because they did not like UOO being associated with the SOS Coalition for
Action. Honestly, I do not know exactly why they left but I want to thank them
for all they did to create and UOO and make it the organization it is today. And
I wish them all the best in whatever they do next. Ceresta Smith, one of the founding UOO
members, Ruth Rodriguez, and I all decided to stay. And we have added Gus Morales and Zackary
Rodriguez to the board. We are all
currently planning a Civil Rights Summit in Houston in conjunction with the
Houston Federation of Teachers. Our plan is to bring together civil rights leaders
and education activists to dialogue and engage about the effects of
privatization on public education. Many
civil rights groups are opposed to the opt out movement, however given that the
NACCP has recently come out against for profit charters, we believe now is the
time to bring civil rights group to the table and have a conversation about how
we can fight for racially just schools that does not come wrapped in high
stakes standardized testing.
As much as white
liberals might want to denounce the civil rights groups for believing that
standardized testing can close the racial achievement gap by holding teachers
accountable, some of us non-white liberals know that is a recipe for
disaster. Sure we could join our white
brethren and draw a line in the sand and refuse to dialogue out of fear of
being seen as one who compromises. Or we
can roll up our sleeves and work with these organizations to determine (1) if
we all share the same goal of having a racially just high quality public
education system for all and (2) how can we work together given that the
corporate education model is doing more harm than good. I don’t know. Maybe we
are naïve to think this is even possible. I mean our
white liberal overseers obviously don’t.
They see that the Houston Federation of teachers is involved and once
again slam us for being co-opted by AFT.
I mean I guess Ceresta, Ruth, Gus, Zack and I are just not capable of
fighting the good fight now that many of our white founding board members have
stepped aside. We must have gone over to
the dark side, literally and figuratively.
So here I find myself, questioning if I am radical
enough to be a part of this movement.
People who I thought I knew and who I thought knew me, are quick to
accept the word of a white man as the gospel and question my integrity and
commitment to this fight. Is that what
it means to be a radical? To allow the voices of white liberals to dominate the
movement? Well if that is what you mean by radical, then maybe I asked the
wrong question. Perhaps instead of
asking if I am radical enough I need to ask whether I am willing to allow white
liberals to define who I am and how I engage as an education activist. And that
question is much easier to answer...HELL NO.
