Anti-Racist Educational Leadership and Policy

Addressing Racism in Public Education

Sarah Diem, Anjalé D. Welton

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780429945328
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Anti-Racist Educational Leadership and Policy helps educational leaders better comprehend the racial implications and challenges of the current educational policy landscape. Each chapter unpacks a policy issue such as school choice, school closures, standardized testing, discipline, and school funding, and analyzes it through the racialized and market-driven lenses of the current leadership context. Full of real examples, this book equips aspiring school leaders with the skills to question how a policy addresses or fails to address racism, action-oriented strategies to develop anti-racist solutions, and the tools to encourage their school community to promote racial equity. This important book demystifies a complex policy context and prepares current and future teacher leaders, principals, and superintendents to lead their schools towards more equitable practice.

2021 Winner of the AESA Critics' Choice Book Award.

Chapter 1

Anti-Racism and Color-Evasiveness in a Neoliberal Context

An Introduction

In May 2019, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a nonpartisan civil rights organization that has been operating for almost 50 years and is dedicated to fighting hate, seeking justice, and teaching tolerance, released a special report entitled Hate at School, which documents the rise of racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and other forms of bigotry occurring in schools across the United States. Specifically, the report notes that while the SPLC identified 821 hate-related incidents in schools that were reported in the media in all of 2018, the nearly 2,800 educators who participated in the SPLC’s survey stated that over 3,000 of these types of incidents occurred in just the fall of 2018. Further, most of the incidents were driven by racism and were not addressed by school leaders (Costello & Dillard, 2019).

These figures should be alarming to all of us. However, given what is currently happening in the larger U.S. sociopolitical context, sadly, we should not be surprised when we hear about the latest incident in which white male students are proudly giving the Nazi salute or when a Latinx student is told that she does not belong in the country and should “go home.” Indeed, schools are not impervious to what is occurring every day in the larger society. Yet, they can be critical sites where such issues are addressed, making it increasingly important that we work to better equip those leading our schools with the tools necessary to confront such acts of hate and racism as well as the racial disparities that continue to pervade our public schools.

Racial inequities in educational opportunities largely continue to exist because district and school communities often try to address these inequities through technical fixes that are color-evasive and largely ignore the role that institutional and structural racism play in creating these gaps in opportunity (Castagno, 2014; Milner, 2012; Welton, Diem, & Holme, 2015). Unfortunately, these catchall solutions to racial differences in student achievement end up blaming students from low-income families and students of color for school failure, rather than the system charged with serving them (Ladson-Billings, 2006; Leonardo, 2007; Milner, 2012). Moreover, even when educational leaders do attempt to ideologically promote racial equity and diversity, they face faculty, staff, and community members who push back and even resist these efforts to shift norms and values. As a result, if educational leaders capitulate to any resistance to supporting racial equity, district and school level deficit attitudes and mindsets about students of color and their families will most likely go relatively unaddressed and the racial status quo may remain unchanged (Castagno, 2014; Lewis & Diamond, 2015; Welton et al., 2015).

Ultimately, what has been found in the research on districts and schools that engage in strategic improvement processes to achieve racial equity is that their good intentions often never really lead to full systemic and ongoing action to redress the inequities that exist (Castagno, 2014; Lewis & Diamond, 2015; Welton et al., 2015). Consequently, we need anti-racist educational leaders who are trained and prepared to face the political complexity and uncertainty that will undoubtedly occur when they advance racial equity in their district and school communities. It is only when educational leaders establish a common language for why discussing issues of race is indeed important, and model how to do so, that the rest of the district and/or school community will feel they have the space, buy-in, and sense of urgency to do the same. Thus, to actively be anti-racist in both their values and practices, educational leaders need to understand the system of racism, its influence on society, and purposefully act to confront issues pertaining to race and racism in their districts and school communities (Brooks, 2012; Diem & Carpenter, 2013; Gooden & Dantley, 2012; Gooden & O’Doherty, 2015; Young & Laible, 2000).

Educational leaders are responsible for articulating to their staff why racial equity is important and also lead their staff in the district/school improvement planning processes that are critical to achieving racial equity. This is particularly important as research shows that a school’s academic performance and achievement is largely determined by the quality and effectiveness of the school administration’s leadership, especially their leadership in supporting teachers’ instruction and fostering a positive school-wide culture (Kellough & Hill, 2015; Wallace Foundation, 2013). Ultimately, expanding research on anti-racist leadership will give educational leaders the practical tools needed to guide their district/school communities through change processes that are important to racial equity work.

Anti-Racism and Anti-Racist Leadership

Anti-racism is defined as the system of thoughts and practices that aim to confront and eradicate racism as well as ideologies and practices that promote equality for racial and ethnic groups (Blakeney, 2005; Bonnett, 2000). Everyday anti-racism considers how individuals work towards combatting racism in their daily lives, practice, and/or lived contexts (Aquino, 2016; Pollock, 2008). In the field of education, research on anti-racism examines the pedagogical tools, or anti-racist pedagogy, useful to teaching about anti-racism or how to actively be anti-racist in practice (Kishimoto, 2018; Pollock, 2008). However, most of the research on anti-racism in education is in teacher education, focusing on how either pre-service teachers become racially aware or how teachers use anti-racist pedagogy in their classroom teaching (de Freitas & McAuley, 2008; Milner, 2010; Mosley, 2010; Ohito, 2016; Raby, 2004; Ulluci, 2011; Welton, Harris, La Londe, & Moyer, 2015). Furthermore, the limited research on anti-racist leadership that does exist tends to focus on three main areas: problem identification, recognizing that leaders need better preparation, and professional development on how to be anti-racist leaders; however, the research falls short in offering specific strategies for how to engage in these efforts.

While we are certainly not dismissing the importance of the research that does exist on anti-racist teacher education and leadership, much of which includes examining color-evasive mentalities, pushing back against the existence of a meritocracy, the perpetuation of deficit thinking, the lack of culturally responsive curricula and reflexive thinking about race in the classroom, as well as tackling the (often non-existent) discussion on whiteness and its role in education and the larger society (Brooks, Arnold, & Brooks, 2013; Carpenter & Diem, 2013; Gooden & Dantley, 2012; Gooden & O’Doherty, 2015; Milner, 2010; Milner & Howard, 2013; Pollock, 2010; Sleeter, 2014), we think more research needs to focus on how leaders “ensure their everyday actions are drawn from an antiracist orientation” and what practices they need to engage in that purposively address “social, political, and educational oppression” (Diem, Carpenter, & Lewis-Durham, 2019, p. 711).

We are living in a sociopolitical climate where we constantly hear the rhetoric around paying attention to and being respective of “both sides” of an issue. While we agree that there are often differing opinions around hot button issues, when it comes to racism, there are not “good people on both sides” of the discussion. Racism and white supremacy, as Burkholder (2018) notes, are “inherently wrong and tremendously dangerous to American democracy” (n.p.). Further, while school leaders operate in a context that is increasingly political, being an anti-racist school leader is fundamentally a political act. Indeed, school leaders are called to advocate for the needs of their school communities and address equity and cultural responsiveness in their leadership practices, as outlined in the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders (NPBEA, 2015). Thus, with this book we aim to demonstrate that central to such practices is addressing racism and ensuring that schools, and those who operate within them, are aware of how racism manifests itself in policies that ultimately dictate practice.

Whiteness and White Fragility

Part of the work associated with anti-racist leadership is recognizing the factors that work every day to undermine anti-racism, factors such as whiteness, white fragility, and anti-Blackness. DiAngelo (2011) defines whiteness as

the specific dimensions of racism that serve to elevate White people over people of color…Whiteness is dynamic, relational, and operating at all times and on myriad levels. These processes and practices include basic rights, values, beliefs, perspectives and experiences purported to be commonly shared by all but which are actually only consistently afforded to White people.

(p. 56)

Whiteness has value and therefore a possessive investment in it, which compels white Americans, in particular, to “invest” in an identity that rewards them with power, opportunity, and resources (Lipsitz, 1998). Whiteness has real ramifications for (in)opportunity in society, in large part through policies that have been (re)created to privilege white individuals. Whiteness also perpetuates anti-Blackness and a discourse that blames Black people and people of color for existent inequities rather than acknowledge the advantages from just being a white person in society (Lipsitz, 1998).

When white people are challenged by their racial privilege, they often become defensive, angry, fearful, and personalize racism. DiAngelo (2011) calls these acts and associated behaviors such as silence or argumentation “white fragility.” Specifically, DiAngelo defines white fragility as “a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable” to white individuals causing them to become defensive, which then reifies “white racial equilibrium” (p. 57). White fragility is perpetuated by a number of factors, including white people living racially segregated lives; viewing themselves and their experiences as “universal” and representative of all “human experiences”; valuing individuals and individualism rather than seeing how white people are part of a racialized group just like other racial groups; desiring racial comfort, racial arrogance, racial belonging, being “free” from thinking about race; and the consistent messaging of “white superiority” (DiAngelo, 2011, pp. 58–63). The very existence of white fragility demonstrates the possessive investment of whiteness and why the failure to disinvest in it prevents us from genuinely addressing racism.

Anti-Blackness

The schooling experience of Black students in the U.S. continues to be one of dehumanization. Indeed, there are countless examples of anti-Blackness and violence against Black bodies in schools, from the lack of opportunity and access to quality education, to body shaming and banning hairstyles such as locs or afros; violent disciplinary actions; reinforcing stereotypes; and making outright racial slurs as if they were part of the acceptable school vernacular. Dumas (2016) argues “that any incisive analyses of racial(ized) discourse and policy process in education must grapple with cultural disregard for and disgust with blackness” and examines “how a theorization of antiblackness allows one to more precisely identify and respond to racism in education discourse and in the formation and implementation of education policy” (p. 12). We agree with Dumas and believe that being an anti-racist school leader includes being cognizant of how the education system is centered around anti-Blackness (Dancy, Edwards, & Davis, 2018), an understanding of which in turn can lead to designing and implementing more implicit anti-racist school policies and practices.

Dumas and ross (2016) note that “antiblackness is not simply racism against Black people” but instead “refers to a broader antagonistic relationship between blackness and (the possibility of) humanity” (p. 429). Dancy et al. (2018) add, “White humanity is dependent on its ability to harm Black life. To avoid violence against Black people would place White humanity in question because, in an anti-Black polity, White humanity is predicated on Black inhumanity” (p. 188). Acknowledging anti-Blackness is therefore different than simply stating that racism and white privilege exist and are problematic; anti-Blackness is comprehending the Black condition and how the dehumanization of Black people has resulted in historical and contemporary acts of violence toward Black bodies (Dumas, 2016).

Anti-Black deficit practices and policies in education are certainly not new and are in fact pervasive in marginalizing Black students, particularly when it comes to academic outcomes. However, school leaders are in powerful positions to contest anti-Blackness and provide meaningful opportunities with their school communities to discuss the ramifications of anti-Blackness. It is only when these critical discussions occur that we can begin to envision an education system that values Black students.

Color-Evasiveness

School leaders often find the revolving door of school policies and reforms they are tasked with implementing as the one arena that seems to be outside of their locus of control (Rallis, Rossman, Reagan, Cobb, & Kuntz, 2008). This is particularly the case when educational policies come from the top down as educational leaders typically have little input on how such policies may affect their school and district communities. Educational leaders also have limited time to consider the potential racial implications of policies, thus pushing them to [color-]evasively implement policy (Diem, Welton, Frankenberg, & Holme, 2016; Holme, Diem, & Welton, 2014; Welton et al., 2015). This level of racial unawareness amongst school and/or district leadership is indeed problematic because when leaders indiscriminately implement policies that overlook and in many ways discount how institutional racism is at the roo...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1 Anti-Racism and Color-Evasiveness in a Neoliberal Context: An Introduction
• Chapter 2 How School Leaders Respond to Demographic Change
• Chapter 3 School Choice and Who Has a Right to Choose
• Chapter 4 The Racial Politics of School Closure and Community Response
• Chapter 5 Standardized Testing and the Racial Implications of Data Use
• Chapter 6 School Funding and the Need for Resource Redistribution
• Chapter 7 Racism and School Discipline: From Schools to Prison, or Schools As a Prison
• Chapter 8 A Protocol for Anti-Racist Policy Decision-Making in Educational Leadership
• Index