Building a Better Table: Families and Communities as Architects of Imagination in Teacher Education Reform

• In Event: Preparing Educators for Family and Community Engagement: A Spotlight on Co-Constructed Research Approaches

Abstract

Objective:
Programs of educator preparation possess a preponderance of power to cultivate the skills, knowledge, dispositions, and ethical stances of educators. Yet, teacher education has been and continues to be complicit in advancing beliefs and practices that often result in the continued oppression and marginalization of families and communities. In this presentation, we contend that countering this trend requires educator preparation programs’ systematic embrace of approaches which decenter traditional sources of expertise, and actively elevate the wisdom and knowledge of families and communities.

Theoretical Framework:
Our work is based in a model of community-engaged teacher preparation which has been working in radical reciprocity with members of a historically Black community over the last 12 years (e.g., Authors, 2022; 2018). Community-engaged teacher preparation is a radical approach to teacher preparation wherein families, communities and educators work together to envision and enact a more just, liberatory, and culturally and community responsive and sustaining educational experience for children. This approach elevates the wisdom, expertise, and dreams of historically and presently minoritized families and communities as critical to the education of children and, importantly, to the teachers charged with educating them. This paradigm shifts the center of power away from the traditional sources, advocating the stance that effective teaching only happens when contextualized within community histories, cultures, and lived experiences and, when done in solidarity with communities to dismantle oppression. Families and communities do not simply have a seat at the table but are central to efforts to build a better table which will provide a culturally responsive and community sustaining force in the education of children.

Methods, Data, & Findings:
Data for the presentation come from more than a decade of qualitative data collection (interviews, artifacts, observations), history, and related research. For example, participating teacher candidates connect to community values and beliefs, cast aside deficit orientation to view the community in terms of its strength and resilience, and begin to form an emergent critical consciousness and ethic of social justice. They also understand how to connect community and family learning to classroom curriculum and pedagogy and reinforce a personal commitment to culturally responsive practice and equity in education.

Implications:
This work calls for the redefinition of teacher preparation to ensure a socially just and equitable education for all learners. We invite participants to envision a system that honors and elevates the wisdom, expertise, funds of knowledge, and community cultural wealth of marginalized and minoritized populations of children and families.

References:
Authors (2022) Title Omitted for Masked Review.
Authors (2021) Title Omitted for Masked Review.
Authors (2018). Title Omitted for Masked Review

Authors

• Wilisha Scaife, Ball State University
  Presenting Author

• Kristin Cipollone, University at Buffalo - SUNY
  Non-Presenting Author

• Eva M. Zygmunt, Ball State University
  Non-Presenting Author