This blog on Texas education contains posts on higher education, as well as preK-12 policy accountability, testing, bilingual education, immigration, school finance, race, class, and gender issues at both the state and national level. It also represents my digital footprint, of life and career, as a community-engaged scholar in Texas.
Listen to a recent presentation by Bill McKibben on climate change in a talk that he gave here in Austin on September 20, 2019 on the People United radio program hosted by Allan Campbell. Another pertinent piece by Bill McKibben that I posted to my blog is Global Warming's Terrifying New Chemistry. The obstacles he says are not technological; rather, they are political. His talk is scary and hopeful at the same time. Among other things, we need to fight the Tar Sands Pipeline in Canada. He also mentions a widely-read piece that he published this past summer in the Rolling Stone magazinetitled, "Global Warming's Terrifying New Math." If you're not already aware of Bill McKibben's writings and are interested in the science behind climate change, I encourage you to read his credible analyses across his various writings and to listen to his recent presentation in Austin. I'm so glad to hear that he paid us a visit here in Austin. -Angela Valenzuela
August was the hottest month on record. I don't know about you, but the August heat here in Texas felt different to me. Not just hotter, but different. The word, "ominous," comes to mind. For the first time in my life, "it," meaning "the heat," truly felt not just like "weather," but rather like "an event." Arwa Mahdaw captures this well in her piece in The Guardian titled, "The world is literally on fire – so why is it business as usual for politicians?" where with the concept of “eco-anxiety," she further notes its harmful effects on our mental health. Her concluding paragraph offers important directionality going forward nonetheless:
After all, only 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions. You know all this already; we all do. But our politicians still are not taking meaningful action. Capitalism is carrying on with business as usual. The world is literally on fire – and it feels as though we are fiddling with paper straws while it burns.
In the piece that follows, Bill McCann is spot on. We must absolutely listen to our children and grandchildren. I'm a total fan of Greta Thunberg, the young, Swedish activist. Don't even listen to the naysayers. The world IS on fire. Now let's do something about it. -Angela Valenzuela #GreenNewDeal @EnviroAction
By Bill McCann / Contributing columnist |San Antonio Express-News
Thursday Sep 26, 2019 at 5:00 AMThe placards held high by the marching teenagers during the global climate strike on Friday said it all. One sign lamented: "You'll Die of Old Age, We'll Die of Climate Change." Another reminded us: "There is No Planet B." A third warned: "You Are Destroying our Future."
Young people and supportive adults marched peacefully by the millions worldwide on Friday to demand that their governments immediately address the climate crisis engulfing our planet. It was the third global climate strike organized by young activists this year. A 16-year-old Swedish activist, Greta Thunberg, inspired the strikes. She raised global awareness by protesting last year outside the Swedish Parliament to demand more aggressive action to protect the Earth from overheating.
Watching videos of throngs of young marchers demanding a better future took me back to the first Earth Day in April 1970 when millions of students participated in environmental events nationwide. They were inspired in part by a giant oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara, Calif.; a pall of pollutants hanging over many U.S. cities; and Rachel Carson's book "Silent Spring."
I covered one 1970 Earth Day event in Cleveland, Ohio, as a reporter. Marchers walked to the Cuyahoga River, which was so bathed in oily waste that it had caught fire a year earlier. Nearby steel mill operations spewed hydrogen sulfide gases that choked the air – and all who breathed it – with the horrid smell of rotten eggs.
Earth Day became a national annual event. It helped raise the awareness of citizens and politicians who responded by enacting clean-air, clean-water, and other environmental laws. With citizen pressure, the laws worked. The nation's air began clearing of visible pollutants and unhealthy sulfur gases. Water quality improved. Fish returned.
Meanwhile, scientists determined that "greenhouse" gases like carbon dioxide, once considered harmless, weren't harmless. These gases, produced by burning coal and other fossil fuels, trap the sun's heat in the atmosphere and warm the Earth, the scientists warned.
The warnings got louder as researchers accumulated evidence of a warming planet. Even some energy company researchers recognized the problem. But the industry stayed silent. Delay was good for the bottom line. Instead, companies funded "experts" to convince the public that global warming was not real. Or if it was real, it was "natural" and not their fault. Or it would be too costly to fix. The paid deniers tried to drown out the scientific voices of reason. They often succeeded.
Now the planet is in trouble. Most of us realize it. Young people certainly do. Scientists predicted that average global temperatures would rise. They have. July 2019 was the Earth's hottest month ever recorded. Millions of people in the U.S., Europe, and Asia wilted under historic heat waves. Scientists predicted storms would become more extreme, more costly and more deadly. They have. Scientists told us land ice and sea ice would melt and sea levels would rise, threatening to swamp island nations and coastal cities. They have. Scientists said more prolonged droughts would force people to flee to other countries to survive. They have. Scientists say the climate crisis could get much worse without immediate action to cut greenhouse emissions worldwide. I believe them.
Unforgivably, President Donald Trump, supported by Republican deniers, is taking us backwards. His administration is rolling back environmental rules, resulting in more carbon emissions from coal and gas-burning power plants; more methane emissions from oil and gas operations; and reduced motor vehicle fuel economy.
In 1970, the government listened to its citizens who demanded a healthier environment. It can happen again if those serious about protecting the Earth for future generations join with their children and grandchildren to speak emphatically with their voices and votes. There is No Planet B.
The Seal of Biliteracy has social justice roots. Promoted by Californians Together, a non-profit coalition supporting educational equity, the Seal was initially intended to demonstrate the value of bilingualism by attaching a prestigious credential to the diplomas of students who demonstrate proficiency in two or more languages by the time they graduate from high school. There was a special, though certainly not exclusive, focus on demonstrating the linguistic assets (rather than the deficits) that emerging bilinguals bring to the table.
Yet as the Seal has spread to other states, a recent studysuggests the program may have strayed from its equity-based origins in that it privileges native English speakers. The study found that students of color and students from low-income families are less likely to participate than students who are white and/or from higher income families.
In the Q&A below, NEPC Fellow Beatriz Ariasdiscusses the Seal in the context of broader trends affecting emerging bilinguals in the United States. Ariasis former Vice President and Chief Development Officer for the Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL), a nonprofit organization based in Washington, DC. Currently she is a Senior Research Scientist for CAL. Arias is an emeritus Professor at Arizona State University with expertise in policy issues for Latinx students, including bilingual education and school desegregation.
Q: What are “Seals of Biliteracy?” How did they come about? Recent research has found that schools with higher percentages of students of color and students from low-income families are less likely to participate in Seals of Biliteracy programs. Why do you think this might be occurring?
A:The Seal of Biliteracy is an award placed on the student’s high school diploma in recognition of achieving bilingual proficiency. The Seal of Biliteracy program began in 2011 in California as a collaboration between the California Association of Bilingual Education (CABE) and Californians Together. The goal was to give recognition to students’ linguistic accomplishments and add a tangible benefit to being bilingual. The Seal becomes part of a student’s high school transcript and is a highly visible recognition of success. By 2017, 30 states and the District of Columbia had adopted the Seal. That number has continued to grow since then.
Some states have been very successful in promoting the Seal. In 2018, 11 percent of California’s graduating class attained the Seal of Biliteracy. However, there is concern about unequal access to the language curriculum and to the assessment required to qualify for the Seal. Each state determines the criteria for the Seal, and in most cases, requires successful enrollment in advanced language classes. Schools in wealthier neighborhoods tend to have a more comprehensive world language curriculum in comparison to schools in poorer neighborhoods. For instance, they may have the opportunity to take more advanced language courses that are not necessarily offered in lower income communities with fewer resources. This gives them an advantage when it comes to obtaining the Seal. Also, the exams approved for the Seal are those developed for more commonly taught languages such as Spanish, French and German. Less commonly taught languages such as Hmong, Malayalam, and Navajo do not have comparable exams. Consequently, native speakers of these languages may not be able to take the exams required to earn the Seal.
Additionally, Emerging Bilinguals (EBs) sometimes have higher hurdles to earn the Seal because the criteria for earning the Seal mandate that ELs also pass English-proficiency tests—holding them to a higher standard in their second language (English) than native English speakers. These two factors can impede the access of EBs and low-income students to the Seal.
Q: You referred to “Emerging Bilinguals.” In recent years, many people in this field have shifted from speaking of “English language learners” (ELLs) to speaking of “Emergent Bilinguals” (EBs—which is the term we use throughout this newsletter). What is the thinking behind this change, and does it reflect actual policy and practice in the classroom?
A:The field is leading a shift in the terminology used to define English Language Learner and how that learner is perceived, moving from a deficit-based term to an asset-based term. “English Language Learner” limits and focuses the identification of students in terms of their English proficiency. In the past, the terms for Emergent Bilinguals have emphasized their limitations and deficits: “Limited English Proficient” and “Non-English-speaking” were terms that were used officially. But this terminology presents a stigmatizing picture of EBs, defined by their limitations in English: non and limited.
A fresh focus on a new term, Emergent Bilingual, puts an emphasis on the students’ assets, their bilingualism and their potential for growth. This terminology helps teachers recognize students’ dynamic bilingualism and develop pedagogical practices that are consistent with an understanding of children’s home language practices. Teachers are developing innovative ways to include community language in their classrooms. By focusing on EBs, teachers can develop more rigorous instruction and challenging material. For parents and communities looking at the child through the lens of assets, the term EB brings attention to home language use and parents’ role in language learning.
Excellent opinion-editorial by Stephanie Hawley, AISD's new Chief Equity Officer. Racism is indeed in the very DNA of our country. Scroll below to view Hawley's proposed antidotes to what she terms," the cancer of educational racism."
Chief Equity Officer at Austin IndependentSchool District
“There is separation of colored people from white people in the United States. That separation is not a disease of colored people. It is a disease of white people. I do not intend to be quiet about it.” --Albert Einstein, The Travel Diaries of Albert Einstein
As a Black woman, mother, teacher, administrator, racial equity advocate and inclusion strategist, I have been asked more times than I can remember by well-meaning White teachers, leaders, and politicians, "How can you help close the racial achievement gaps?" The question in and of itself assumes that "I," as a woman of Color, may have the cure for the cause of the racial equity gaps in education-- that devastating centuries-old global disease of racism.
Racism is in the very DNA of our country birthed in the bloody legalized genocide of Indigenous people, nourished and gorged for centuries on the "human capital" of enslaved Indigenous people and enslaved Africans and currently sustained by the exploited labor of people of Asian and Mexican descent.
When I ask questioners, "What do you think is the real problem causing the racial achievement gaps," individuals inevitably point to a myriad of stereotypical factors (that often also apply to millions of White students): Black, Brown and Indigenous children's lack of motivation and preparation, poor parenting and most often labels are affixed including economically disadvantaged, in poverty, traumatized, etc. While these descriptors of the conditions with which children of Color (and White students) may live might be accurate, rarely is there a mention of the strengths, resourcefulness, resilience and creativity Black and Brown students bring to the public school learning experience. Most often, well-meaning educators with deficit mindsets about the children, recommend additional supplementary grant-funded programs or extended time with the same failing curricula and the same teachers who are under prepared to support students of Color. Few, if any of the questioners, profoundly and consistently interrogate a public school system perfectly designed to predictably fail students of Color (statistically speaking).
The American public school system is where racism insidiously metastasizes without detection, intervention, and treatment because we've been "schooled" and socialized NOT to examine the system. Antiracist educators are stepping up to transform White cultural conformity in schooling to racially and culturally inclusive learning experiences for all students.
Individually and collectively, we educators may be in denial that we are the system and we are the disease that tacitly and blindly normalizes, centralizes and prioritizes the thinking, needs, values, history, culture and fears of White children and White families. We have been "schooled" to do so.
Even in the face of alarming data for decades, educators continue to assume the achievement data gaps are telling us howbroken the students of Color are, but in fact, the achievement data tell us how well the system is working for White students and how poorly it is designed to serve Black and Brown students. Educating Diverse (including White) students is not about choosingone group or the other, but using researched-based strategies that promote the learning and flourishing of all students.
Educators who are growing in racial and cultural consciousness sometimes shield White colleagues from words like, "antiracist," 'White fragility," "White privilege," "White supremacy" and other terms that might upset their sensibilities and shut down their amygdala for fear they may tune out/run away and never come to the table for courageous conversations and accountable actions to address individual and systemic racism in classrooms and schools. While empathy is critical, coddling and protecting fragile colleagues to the detriment of students have created and sustained an environment that is toxic and unacceptable.
As awakening individuals and those desperately trying to remain racially and culturally conscious in school systems, we may continue to silently wait at the speed of comfort for White educators and administrators who have been schooled and socialized to avoid conversations about race and racism.
While we are patiently waiting for White leaders and educators to "elect" to confront racism and engage in the necessary and uncomfortable ongoing conversations and training needed to be held accountable for taking direct action for change, disproportionate numbers of Black children languish in detention, suspension, and Special Education. The children are predictably placed on the conveyor belt from frequent suspensions to juvenile detention and on to for-profit prisons. This is a hard truth from which we too often protect White privileged and fragile educators whose daily decisions as early as pre-k are one of the determining factors in the fate of Black and Brown children.
Systemic Diagnosis & Systemic Cures
Racism is a disease that takes on many forms and avoids the light of analysis while it benefits, privileges and profits all systems: health care, city governments (gentrification), insurance, housing, collegiate sports, banking, tech, law enforcement, entertainment, the multi-billion testing industry, for-profit prison industries and yes, public schools.
No child in America should be segregated by low expectations, imprisoned by illiteracy, abandoned to frustration and darkness of self-doubt. . . .Now some say it is unfair to hold disadvantaged children to rigorous standards. I say it is discrimination to require anything less -- the soft bigotry of low expectations. . . .
Denial about racism (a common symptom of the disease) is so deeply entrenched in the individual and collective American psyche, many educators and administrators truly believe ourselves to be innocent and unaffected by racism because we are not directly involved in overt and intentional acts of hate.By focusing on our intentions instead of looking at the serious and daily impact and damage of individual and systemic decisions and policies that routinely exclude and criminalize children of Color, we educators, leaders and politicians believe our hands are clean. Racism is insidious and can be difficult to detect if educators are enmeshed in the traditional time constraints of schooling, focused on bureaucratic routines, and initiating the latest "quick fix"interventions.
Certainly, more questions could be asked to detect the cancer of institutional racism, but those below are an introduction to compassionately interrogating the system and are worthy of discussion with elected officials, families, colleagues, principals, board members and the community:
1.Are the system's annual measurable achievement goals lower for Black and Brown students than those established for White students?
2. Are Black, Brown and Indigenous children disproportionately placed in suspension, detention, mental health facilities, alternative learning environments and Special Education?
3. Are Black, Brown and Indigenous children consistently "missing" from gifted and talented programs?
4. Are the system's most experienced teachers placed and/or allowed to select teaching assignments in predominantly White schools, historically supported by strong leadership, rigorous programming and modern facilities?
5. Are students of Colors historically and disproportionately zoned and assigned to old buildings that are in disarray, unattractive, poorly maintained and plagued by high teacher absenteeism and new, failing or developing leadership?
6. Are administrators, staff and teachers allowed to "opt out" of ongoing cultural proficiency, culturally responsive teaching, racial equity and inclusion training because they are "good" teachers, don't appear to be racist or simply express discomfort with the topics?
7. Are cultural proficiency and antiracist training experiences such low priorities in the system that when training opportunities emerge throughout the year, funding is difficult or impossible to secure?
8. Are antiracist teachers and administrators ostracized, silenced or isolated for speaking up about race, racist policies and differential treatment and outcomes for students of Color and students belonging to other historically marginalized groups?
A "yes" to even one of the questions is a sign racism is alive and has infested the district, school, program, department, and the classrooms.
Fortunately, we have had the cure for racism in education for many decades. Unfortunately, individually and collectively, we simply lack the political will to do what we know we must to bring about racial equity. We often blame the children, funding and politics (code for fear of making White people in power uncomfortable) for our individual and collective failure to do what we know works for Black, Brown and White children.
Over many decades, thousands of Black and Brown families and children have told us what is needed through interviews and research studies. What is needed to close the gaps is no mystery. It requires belief in our collective ability to transform the system with daily courageous action.
First steps with antidotes to the cancer of educational racism include several do-able actions:
Ensure all leaders, board members, administrators ad community partners are engaged in ongoing training and development sessions to build relationships and community to establish and monitor the achievement of realistic equity goals.
Ensure all Black and Brown students are taught and supported by excellent (experienced, culturally conscious and antiracist) teachers, staff and administrators with high expectations.
Ensure curricula and teaching materials are culturally responsive, rigorous, relational, inclusive and affirming with positive images of students and achievers of Color and support varied approaches to critical thinking and interactive instruction.
Ensure buildings are modern, clean, and well-lighted; make certain external and internal facilities are welcoming and reflect respect for the culture(s) of the community.
Hold all leaders i.e. boards of trustee members, superintendents, and principals accountable for allocating the appropriate funding and developing policies and strategies to recruit, hire, develop, retain and reward excellent (experienced, culturally conscious and antiracist) teachers and staff.
The actions above are a mere primer for beginning the work to interrupt racism to close the racial achievement gaps. All actions require the "grit" constantly demanded of students of Color and students who have been impoverished by multiple racist systems since birth. Taking action to interrupt racism requires consistent courage and commitment to "unlearn" years of unconscious and conscious socialization and conformity to domineering White cultural norms in the P-16 system.
Public education is by design and default deeply and unconsciously racist as evidenced in the enrollment and academic outcomes data and the continued acceptance of the dominance of White cultural norms, segregated and low performing schools and poor building conditions for students of Color. I've been told many times over the years that teachers' unions, individual White educators, White parents, the nation, the city, the county, school districts, and school cultures are just not ready to accept responsibility for engaging in and benefiting from racism, let alone curing racism-- even when presented with evidence and tools to interrupt the privileges and damages.
Civilly and relentlessly examining interactions, policies, practices and communication that exacerbate and feed racist outcomes is only the beginning. Collectively, we can and will heal racism in public schools with a systemic commitment to lifelong "unlearning" of our socialization and public schooling that has had no time for self-diagnosis or the meaningful inclusion of the history and strengths of all cultures and races. The healing of educational racism will begin when politicians and educators actually engage in culturally proficient leadership, assure culturally responsive teaching for all students, and when immersing Black, Brown and White students students in inclusive and affirming learning experiences is the only way schooling is done in America.
The question from White politicians, educators and administrators will no longer be "How canyou (Black educator, administrator and equity strategist)close the racial achievement gaps," but the core question will be,"What am I doing with my power as a White person to individually and collectively identify and eradicate the malignant disease of racism that creates racial equity gaps in education?"
While heralded as an antiracist by many African Americans, Einstein himself, struggled with deeply racist views of people of Asian descent as reported in his own diaries. However, like Einstein, educators cannot "be quiet about racism" and like Einstein, we all have unexamined racist beliefs and values that have yet to be addressed and transformed. The time is now for us to begin to heal ourselves individually and collectively so that we can cure a racist educational system that disproportionately wounds Black, Brown and Indigenous children daily.
How are you engaging in self-reflection, community-building and direct action to eradicate racism in public education? Let's chat! Contact me at convergenceconsulting3@gmail.com
Check out this analysis by Dr. Mario Barrera on the power and limits of what today is know as the "Southern Strategy." We can only hope and work toward a major defeat in the 2020 election of Donald Trump, and in the process, stretch the limits of this strategy to its breaking point. Enough with this institutionalized form of electoral racism. -Angela #2020Election
Contemporary Republican politicians like to invoke the legacy of Ronald Reagan to bolster their policies. However, the type of White nationalism being espoused by Donald Trump and his supporters more accurately traces back to two less appealing Republican personalities: Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon, and to the backlash created by the Civil Rights Movement of the nineteen sixties.
It was the Civil Rights Movement that weakened the Democratic Party’s hold on the South, a hold that dated back to the post-Civil War period of Reconstruction. The Goldwater 1964 Presidential campaign took advantage of the opportunity by appealing to Southern White prejudice, and thus pioneered the “Southern Strategy” that was further developed by Nixon and has continued in effect to the present day. Goldwater’s opposition to the Civil Rights Act and his defense of “states’ rights” won him five Deep South states that had not gone Republican since Reconstruction. Donald Trump’s electoral “base” is of course not limited to the South, but it’s nevertheless true that Southern and border states constitute the bedrock of the GOP today.
Trump’s innovation has been to transform what had been a coded set of racial and ethnic messages into a far more overt and wide-ranging array of appeals to racial and ethnic bigotry. These appeals have resonated with a White electorate which is increasingly anxious about the demographic changes taking place in the United States today, especially the increased visibility of non-White groups and of women. It seems more and more clear that Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan hearkens back to an idealized vision of pre-civil rights America where minorities “knew their place” and no one questioned the privileged position of White men.
Trump’s approach resulted in an electoral college victory in 2016 despite a decisive loss of the popular vote. However, this strategy led to a GOP loss in the 2018 mid-term election, which Trump insisted on making into a referendum on himself. In the process, the Republican Party has been transformed into a party with a constituency consisting largely of White males in rural areas.
It could be argued that Trump’s 2016 victory was mostly a fluke based on an unusually uncharismatic Democratic candidate (Hillary Clinton) and a highly inept Democratic campaign. An Obama or a Biden might well have defeated Trump and perhaps won a Senate majority as well. In effect, the Republican Party seems to have painted itself into a corner by embracing Trump’s White nationalist approach and his attempt to remake the party into a personality cult centered on himself. Unless the GOP can bring itself to reject Trumpism and return to its more traditional center/right identity, it’s difficult to see how it can avoid dwindling into a permanent minority party along the lines of the California GOP, which currently controls no state-wide office and only a small minority of legislative seats. A major defeat in the 2020 election may leave the national party with an excruciating hangover and a regret that it ever heard the name Trump.
Dr. Mario Barrera is Professor Emeritus of Chicano/Latino Studies at UC Berkeley. Among other publications, he’s the author of Race and Class in the Southwest (University of Notre Dame Press), which won an award from the American Political Science Association. He was one of the founders of the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS). He was a producer of the documentary film “Chicano Park.”
whose work with students earned him the Pennsylvania Professor of the Year Award, is back on the road with his high-octane, poignant, and hilarious one-man show The Trouble with My Name. Audiences across the country have fallen in love with Dr. Ávila's blend of storytelling, comedy, and poetry about the American Latino experience.
Don't miss this phenomenal performance when it comes to your area this fall! Provocative, insightful, and unforgettable, The Trouble with My Name provides audiences with an excellent platform for a continued conversation about race, identity, representation, diversity, and inclusion.
Because of the high demand for private and public shows, there are no more available fall dates for 2019, but we are now booking for 2020. Contact us to secure a date for your institution!
