The Election Is Over. How Do We Help Our Students (And Ourselves) Heal? - Philly's 7th Ward

The Election Is Over. How Do We Help Our Students (And Ourselves) Heal? - Philly's 7th Ward

THE ELECTION IS OVER. HOW DO WE HELP OUR STUDENTS (AND OURSELVES) HEAL?

“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” -Audre Lorde

After one of the most tumultuous and fraught elections of our lifetime, Joe Biden was chosen to be our next President, and Kamala Harris the next Vice President. A time for celebration in many corners, to be sure, but let’s not forget that over 70 million Americans voted the other way.

And we cannot forget that, just two weeks ago, Walter Wallace, Jr. was senselessly murdered at the hands of the Philadelphia Police Department and, before that, Breonna Taylor’s killers went unpunished and lack of accountability across the board signaled to everyone that business will go on as usual. 2020 has been punctuated with tragedy after tragedy, trauma after trauma—the ongoing convulsions of a national reckoning with racial inequity. 

The election was clearly a divisive, stressful time for our country, and especially for our students. And this stress came on top of a nation already in shock and mourning from COVID-19 that is still forcing us to face the deadly racial and social inequities worsened by four long years of a discordant CONTINUE READING: The Election Is Over. How Do We Help Our Students (And Ourselves) Heal? - Philly's 7th Ward

Learning Relationships In The New Normal | The Jose Vilson

Learning Relationships In The New Normal | The Jose Vilson

LEARNING RELATIONSHIPS IN THE NEW NORMAL

This post is sponsored by WE Teachers, made possible by Walgreens. All opinions are my own.

The last conversation I had with students before the official end of the school year was between me and a few of my seventh graders. We talked about summer plans over Cardi B and Juice Wrld. We shared a snack together. The boys jockeyed for position as “best” virtual game player. The girls talked about the ways they’d miss school and their least favorite teacher. I didn’t participate in that one. As I ended the phone call, I winced at having to hang up. What does it mean to have an unofficial, face-to-face, end-of-school back in March then have an official, virtual end-of-school hangout in June?

One thing’s for sure: that episode wouldn’t have been possible without the relationships I had already established from September to March.

In different circles, I proposed that schools shouldn’t start classes with some of the usual routines we’ve seen and heard. Schools should take a good inventory of the people and things we’ve lost, the ways our relationship to school changed, and what’s drastically changed since our last set of interactions. As the majority of school districts opt to start school virtually, schools have to shift their relationships from the technocratic headquarters for academic learning of the recent past to the child-centered hubs for well-rounded growth for the present and future.

A trauma-informed school has been important to children’s nurturing prior to this moment. A CONTINUE READING: Learning Relationships In The New Normal | The Jose Vilson