A Pragmatic Approach Towards Educational Justice: Examining the Purpose of Education Through the Historical Gaze of Black Youth

• In Event: 75.061 - Roundtable Session 34
  In Roundtable Session: 75.061-1 - Critical Issues in the Education of Minorities in the United States

Abstract

The wedding of Dr King Jr.’s philosophy to the responsibility of educational researchers imply that there is a moral component to education. Understanding how morality and justice relates to education is essential because the moral push for educational justice existed even when the laws were unjust. The purpose of this paper is to examine how educational justice was defined through the historical gaze of black youth before and after the Brown ruling. Too often the legality of desegregation is elevated as a pivotal moment in history but if we examine the struggle for a more just public education from the framework of the arc of the moral universe we see that the arc has yet to bend towards justice.

Author

• Vincent DeWayne Willis, University of Alabama