Reimagining School-Community Partnerships for Self-Determination and Community Control: Community Organizing and Critical Participatory Action Research

• In Event: Taking Collective Action and Responsibility to Address Inequity: The Case of Partnerships for Community Schools

Abstract

The authors were members of a citywide coalition that organized to bring community schools to Philadelphia and launched a critical participatory action research (CPAR) project in 2017 to examine the efficacy of our organizing. For coalitions and groups organizing in response to educational crises – as they are in Philadelphia – there is an ongoing struggle for the most basic level of equity and justice vs. a transformative vision of schooling. In this paper, we interrogate the possibilities and limitations of “partnerships” for advancing radical education justice movements. We argue for a radical approach to partnerships that has a dual focus on individuals’ lived experience and dismantling systems of oppression through transformative praxis.

Organizing and CPAR are underpinned by the premise that the people closest to the issue – neighborhood schools – are experts and best situated to make schooling decisions and develop strategies for sustainable educational equity (Annenberg, 2012; Fals Borda, 1979; Oakes & Rogers, 2006). We espouse an organizing and community-driven approach to partnerships where youth, families and communities drive transformative praxis in schools and neighborhoods. Community control of schools as self-determination is explicitly about oppressed groups “ability, autonomy and authority to make decisions” about all aspects of schooling (McSwinte, 1974, p.12).

This study utilized the following qualitative methods: storytelling, artifacts, field notes, surveys, interviews, and focus groups. We are conducting an inductive and deductive thematic analysis of the data (Braun & Clarke, 2006) guided by the conceptual framework and research questions to identify possibilities and limitations of school-community partnerships in Philadelphia.

Two key themes have emerged in the initial analysis. The first theme reimagines the what, why, and who of partnerships. In Philadelphia, community schools begin with a needs assessment by newly hired site coordinators who are typically not from the community. Needs assessments identify existing deficits, issues, and gaps to be addressed by external partners. In Philadelphia, outside professionals are legitimized and prioritized over existing informal assets (e.g., families and community members). Data illustrated the ways in which students and families are viewed as consumers, passive recipients of services instead of active collaborators, leaders, and decision-makers.

The second theme centers on sustainability and self-determination. There is an overabundance of private entities offering nonacademic and support services in Philadelphia. Research participants noted an overarching culture of blame and deficit-perspectives about students, families and schools. As professionals, rather than members of the community, partners are accountable to their employer, not the school-community they serve. Many participants critiqued the lack of sustainable partnerships due to a reliance on nonprofit, contract, or grant-funded services that are limited in time and scope and driven by neoliberal models for maximizing outcomes. These type of partnerships shift power to funding priorities, rather than a community-driven vision of self-determination.

Our research illustrates both the possibilities and limitations of community-school partnerships for advancing education justice within a contentious sociopolitical context. Participant data and our organizing experiences evidence the desire and benefits of reimagining partnerships through an organizing and community control framework.

Authors

• Kristen P. Goessling, The Pennsylvania State University - Brandywine

• Pep Maria, Our City Our Schools

• Nic Lopez Rodriguez, Philly Participatory Research Collective

• Caitlin Fritz