Critical Hope as a Form of Community Resistance in a State’s Takeover of Public Education

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Thursday 3:35 pm Four Seasons Ballroom 1
  In Roundtable Session: Exploring Abolition, Resistance, and Critical Political Consciousness With Young People (Table 4)

Abstract

This study highlights community members’ responses and reactions to a hostile takeover of Houston Independent School District (HISD); one of the largest and most diverse metropolitan districts in the United States. Using critical hope as a guiding framework for analysis, this qualitative study explores community pushback, voices, and counternarratives present at school board meetings during the transitionary period of the state-sanctioned leadership takeover. Preliminary findings reveal a highly knowledgeable and active constituency holding the district accountable to politicized decision-making. In this paper, we foreground the experiences of the HISD community by which they discuss marginalization, power, and oppression.

Authors

• Leslie Uchenna Ekpe, East Texas A&M University

• Eleanor Su-Keene, Texas A&M University