"Release the Kraken!" An Auto-Ethnography of a Black Woman Charter School Leader

• In Event: 75.037 - The Mediating Role of Teaching and Leadership in Shaping Pro-Black Educational Contexts

Abstract

This autoethnographic research study will focus on a Black feminist perspective on the disciplining of children in charter schools. Drawing on my experiences as a dean of discipline in an urban charter school, I examine how Black women charter school leader make sense of and navigate gendered and racialized expectations and experiences in their role. In particular, I examine how Black women’s intersectional identity informs their leadership and serves to disrupt and reproduce systems of oppression within charter schools. Using the lens of controlling images (Collins, 2002), I explore how two prominent stereotypes, the mammy and strong black woman (Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2009), influence and inform the actions of Black women charter school leaders when it comes to implementing school discipline policies.

Author

• Ruqayyah Perkins-Williams, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign