Decolonizing Professional Development: A Rehumanizing Approach

• In Event: 31.040 - Critical Ethnic Studies Praxis in an Age of Expansion

Abstract

After the passage of AZ HB 2281 (ARS 15-112) the highly renowned Mexican American Studies (MAS) program was eliminated from the Tucson Unified School District, and Arizona was aptly labeled the “State of Hate” where racial profiling, book banning and the deliberate erasing of Chicanx history was, and still is, a daily occurrence. In an act of resistance to the neoliberal racism inflicted on the MAS program and permeating Arizona, the Xicanx Institute for Teaching & Organizing (XITO) emerged as a strategy to continue on the legacy of the banned MAS program. XITO, an urban education collective offering professional development and teacher education to facilitate the critical and necessary processes of decolonization and re-humanization in educational contexts and beyond, is responding to the need for Ethnic Studies training for K-16 educators. As Ethnic Studies programs continue to develop across the country at an exponential rate, XITO is at the forefront of offering research-based teacher training, including community organizing skills for educators to develop skills to defend the decolonial practices they are engaging in while teaching.

This article will argue that Ethnic Studies teacher education must counter the deficit model of traditional teacher education using a decolonial, re-humanizing framework that has been proven to increase students’ graduation rates, matriculation to higher education and most importantly, students’ sense of belonging in academic spaces through culturally sustaining practices (Cabrera et. al., 2014). In addition, I will argue that XITO has developed a model to train teachers who work primarily with and for Xicanx youth within these frameworks and offers revolutionary and paradigm shifting educational possibilities. The theoretical framework for this article will be grounded in decolonial pedagogy (Arce, 2016; Pérez, 1999; Villanueva, 2013), counter-storytelling (Yosso, 2013; Delgado-Bernal, 2002) and culturally sustaining practices (Paris & Alim, 2014). An overview of how XITO developed, how we approach our work and plans for future work will be included along with narrative samples from XITO institute participants highlighting how our training has been implemented in their classrooms and how it has impacted their teaching.

Author

• Anita Fernández, Prescott College/XITO