Centering Black Educators in School-University Partnerships

• In Event: Advancing Critical Pedagogy and Praxis Across Educational Settings

Abstract

Objective
This presentation centers the perspectives of Black educators engaged in a district-university partnership within an urban city in the U.S. Midwest. Through an exemplification of the educators’ expression of how their lived experiences directly influenced their mistrust of their university partners, this work seeks to illuminate the importance of honoring and centering the perspectives of systematically marginalized educators in partnerships.

Methodology
This research is theoretically grounded in critical race theory’s understanding that experiential knowledge is central. Thus, critical race theory challenges deficit based research and methods that “silence and distort the experiences of people of color” (Solórzano & Yosso, 2002, p. 26). Instead, critical race theory intentionally centers the narratives and lived experiences of people of color by honoring their intersectionality as classed, gendered, and racialized beings (Solórzano & Solórzano, 1995; Solórzano & Yosso, 2002; Valencia & Solórzano, 1997).

Data Analysis
All data was analyzed using inductive to deductive invivo coding. During the first stage of analysis, the transcripts were inductively coded for the emergence of key themes (Saldaña, 2012). After this initial round of coding, all transcripts were coded deductively with the codes that emerged in the first round. Through this second round of deductive coding, subcodes began to emerge within the existing codes, so an analysis of the coding clusters occurred to identify salient themes within each coding cluster. After the subcodes were identified, all codes were examined and emerging themes within the codes was identified.

Findings
Throughout the educators’ narratives, they expressed the belief that the university held deficit-based, and even racist, understandings of their schools and Black people more broadly. This understanding was informed by the educators’ lived experiences within and beyond the partnership. As such, some of the educators expressed feelings of shock and surprise when the university began to engage in the partnership, especially given the focus on culturally-based pedagogy. Just as the educators’ bring their own perspectives and lived experiences into the partnership, it must be acknowledged that institutional behavior deeply influences partnership dynamics particularly when the institutional behavior privileges whiteness and anti-Blackness. The educators involved in the study were acutely aware of the historic and contemporary harm inflicted by the university, and were not convinced that the university entered into the partnership with pure and honest intentions.

Scholarly Significance
Through an exemplification of the educators’ expression of how their lived experiences directly influenced their connectedness to the work of the partnership and their overall mistrust of their university partners, this work sought to illuminate the importance of honoring and centering the perspectives of systematically marginalized educators in partnerships. This understanding is a direct response to the 2024 AERA call for submissions, which asks scholars to “investigate and stud[y] topics that have been unabating, harmful and disruptive to people’s quest to be self-actualized” (p. 1). As such, if we are to envision justice and “construct educational possibilities” (AERA, 2023), it is imperative for us to question how we are creating equitable and inclusive partnerships that center the experiential knowledge of Black educators.

Author

• Kelly R. Allen, Augusta University