Reimagining Professional Development on White Racial Identity: Antiracist Study and Practice With White Practicing Teachers

• In Event: 26.079 - Roundtable Session 7
  In Roundtable Session: 26.079-10 - Learning From Differences in Professional Development

Abstract

This paper examines an innovative, two-year professional development course on structural racism, white racial identity, and antiracist pedagogies. As two white university teacher educators, we worked with eight white teachers from local, diverse elementary and secondary schools. Centered in the collaborative relationships developed through small-group, intentional study as well as embedded research, this course engaged teachers in antiracist pedagogy motivated by anti-oppressive education (Kumashiro, 2009). Teachers designed and implemented antiracist action research ranging from curricular changes to revised grading practices to new home-school connections. Despite feeling under-prepared and often overwhelmed, these teachers came to see themselves as antiracist agents and to work with students, teachers, and administrators to enact more racially just practices and to improve all students' learning outcomes.

Authors

• Shannon McManimon, Science Museum of Minnesota

• Zachary A. Casey, Rhodes College