In Classrooms: Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 3)
I come into the Ethnic Studies class just as Sasha Guzman, wearing a denim jacket over a T-shirt and jeans, is walking around the room checking on small groups of students at each table. The 19 ninth graders wearing ID lanyards are tapping away on their Chromebook keyboards or reading screens. Guzman has taught for 16 years in Los Angeles Unified School District, the last five at SJHA.
The period which lasts one hour and fifty minutes had begun a few minutes earlier before I arrived and students know what they are to do since it is written on the side whiteboard:
AGENDA HOMEWORK
* Choose narrative *Academic paragraph due 2/28 by midnight
*Write academic paragraph
The spacious room has the obligatory clock and flag and a printer sitting on a table in the back. Playing softly in the background are Spanish songs. Posters are on the four walls and door of the room. Above the door is one that says: “A Proud Member of the Facing History and Ourselves Schools Network.” On the door is another that says “Protect DACA.” Propped against a wall nearby is a print of a woman with the inscription “Viva La Mujer.”
On another wall are two posters that hang in every SJHA classroom:
Three to five students sit at tables facing one another. The teacher’s desk is in a corner at the front of the room. When students have questions, they address her as Ms. Guzman.
The teacher has loaded software content on their tablets about the current assignment. Students have to choose a story from political activist, America Ferrera’s Americans Like Me. Judith, a student sitting nearby, shows me which CONTINUE READING:In Classrooms: Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 3) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice
