Black and Brown Students of Achievement First Amistad High School Protest: “We are More Than a Demerit System and College Acceptance Rate” ?>

Black and Brown Students of Achievement First Amistad High School Protest: “We are More Than a Demerit System and College Acceptance Rate”

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This piece originally ran at Huffington Post. Yesterday, I visited a beautiful inspirational, fairly new high school in New Haven Connecticut called Amistad, an Achievement First charter school. The school design has distinguished adult figures etched throughout the exterior and interior of the school: Cesar Chavez, Mexican American labor leader and civil rights activist, who, with Dolores Huerta, co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, Barack Obama, the first African American President of the United States, Maya Angelou, an African American…

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Dear Department of Justice: The Constitution Does Not End at the Schoolhouse Doors and Plessy v. Ferguson Was Overturned – Right? ?>

Dear Department of Justice: The Constitution Does Not End at the Schoolhouse Doors and Plessy v. Ferguson Was Overturned – Right?

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Dear Department of Justice (DOJ), with all due respect, this Black mom wonders are we reading and learning from the same History books? Let us recap. Sixty-two years ago, the United States Supreme Court issued a landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, declaring states that establish separate education laws for black and white students to be unconstitutional. This decision overturnedthe Plessy v. Ferguson decision of 1896, which allowed state-sanctioned segregation through “separate but equal” laws, as…

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Courts Are Failing Children on the Promise of Brown v. Board of Education ?>

Courts Are Failing Children on the Promise of Brown v. Board of Education

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“The people in this country whose job is to even the scales of justice cannot continue to turn a blind eye to the injustice being done mostly to children of color and marginalized communities every day in America’s schools. The Constitution does not end at the schoolhouse door.”  I address my concerns as a Black mom in my post republished from Huffpost BlackVoices.  You can find me on Twitter @RealTalkGwenS. ***** As a mother of color, I have long looked to American courts to right wrongs…

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BEFORE MY GRANDSON UTTERS HIS FIRST WORDS ?>

BEFORE MY GRANDSON UTTERS HIS FIRST WORDS

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                      My grandson Amyis was almost a week old when I wrote this blog on April 23, 2014. The sad reality is this one fact. These words I wrote two years ago still hold true for being a black boy, in many traditional public schools, in America  today. His whole world from birth to high school graduation will be dependent upon his parents, grandparents, educators, peers and the community supporting his positive development thus ensuring he has equitable access to opportunities and life…

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Arresting parents won’t improve education, but equity will ?>

Arresting parents won’t improve education, but equity will

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The education system in America says all children matter, which should mean black, brown and poor children as well.  But when parents and students of color and low income speak out for their education and start to ask questions about their educational rights, school district policy, accountability regarding finances and personnel and safety, then all of a sudden all children do not matter. Suddenly the rights of the adults in the school district becomes what matter the most in education….

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Empowered parents, don’t believe the hype about testing ?>

Empowered parents, don’t believe the hype about testing

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If you are a parent with children in primary or secondary schools then you may be familiar with the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the second largest teacher’s union in the United States. If you are a Black or low income parent in particular, then I would encourage you to pay special attention to the political games AFT plays to keep accountability out of the classroom. The AFT is on an aggressive track to totally mislead us about the important…

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Teachers Unions Should Listen to Parents, Not Marketing Firms ?>

Teachers Unions Should Listen to Parents, Not Marketing Firms

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Solutions for parents to public education’s many inequities require real talk in real time. But you won’t find real talk in the new National Education Association (NEA) messaging. A recently leaked document indicates the NEA, the nation’s largest organization representing teachers, wishes to minimize the struggle for those most in need of access to a quality education by putting a kinder, gentler spin on critical issues that affect academic and life success. I am part of that struggle, like so…

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