We Want to Do More than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching

There is increasing evidence that students have better academic performance when they are taught by teachers of the same race. However, in the United States where most public school students are not white, they are taught, most often, by teachers who identify as white — a dynamic that can contribute to racial disparities in educational achievement.

It's this dynamic that Dr. Bettina Love explores in her new book We Want to Do More than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom. In it, she argues for dismantling tweaks to curriculum and testing that perpetuate inequality in school in favor of what she calls "abolitionist teaching" which draws on the history of the 19th century abolitionist movement, focusing on integrating lessons on racial violence, oppression, resistance, and social change in the classroom.

Join us for a conversation on how parents and communities can build communal, civically engaged public schools rooted in social justice where all students thrive, not merely survive.