Toward More Equitable Communities: A Case of Black Parent Leadership as Social Justice Praxis

• In Event: Bolstering the Voices of Racially Marginalized Students and Families Through a Community-Based Approach to Leadership

Abstract

Objective
This paper examines the ways Black parents’ educational leadership may serve as a form of social justice praxis. Exploring the life history of one Black mother of working-class origins provides important lessons into the ways Black parents might enact various forms of power to advance more equitable outcomes for their communities.

Theoretical Perspective
This study is guided by Historical Womanist Theory, which examines the ways in which Black women’s contemporary lived experiences are historically constructed (Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2002; Rosseau, 2013; Wilson, 2014) by racism, racialized patriarchy, and other marginalizing intersections. Mirroring the broader societal narrative, low-income Black mothers, are often devalued and viewed through a deficit lens. This study builds on prior scholarship that has noted the importance of documenting alternative forms of educational leadership (Author, 2016), by exploring various dimensions of Womanist leadership (King & Ferguson, 2010; Wilson, 2014).

Methods
The paper traces the life history and contemporary efforts of Jeanette Taylor, a Black mother from Chicago’s South Side as she grapples with her various identities including, Black mother, parent leader, community organizer, and recently elected councilmember. The study utilizes a life history interview approach (Fielding, 2011), school board meeting minutes, journalistic accounts, and archival video/audio footage. A life history interview technique was chosen to provide deep insights into the ways that the informant’s experiences intersect with local events, and broader educational and racial justice efforts in Chicago. The interview with Ms. Taylor was conducted in 6 parts over several days, each interview mirroring different stages of her life from childhood to present. To guard against a solitary life narrative devolving into hagiography, this study triangulates Ms. Taylor’s interviews with the aforementioned publicly available data that parallels her own lived experiences.
Analysis was conducted for the corpus of data using an initial coding scheme based on tenets of Historical Womanist Theory and Womanist Leadership. Then, a secondary coding phase was initiated to identify themes from a content analysis of data sources outside of Ms. Taylor’s life history interviews. Using these additional forms of data helped further refine key themes that emerged (Bowen, 2009).

Results
Findings show aspects of Ms. Taylor’s early experiences provide evidence of how the everyday educational engagement of Black mothers can lead to sustained efforts towards more equitable and transformative schools and communities. Analysis of her life history interview data reveal various moments when Ms. Taylor made significant leadership decisions that enabled her to “move from justice as theory toward justice as praxis.” (Ladson-Billings, 2015). Further, Ms. Taylor’s recent victory as city councilmember provides evidence of the role of power in educational leadership. Her early participation as a Local School Council member served as a catalyst toward more encompassing forms of civic engagement tied to broader, city-wide ideals of racial justice.

Significance
This study is significant in that it illustrates how the key informant’s lived experiences contribute to our understandings of community-based educational leadership—particularly its constraints, and its potential for transformational change of local schools and communities.

Author

• Rhoda Freelon, University of Houston