"Them old ideas are buried here": Embracing antiracist school counseling and liberatory practices

• In Event: Advancing Antiracist and Social Justice Practice in School Counseling

Abstract

Following George Floyd’s tragic murder in 2020, school counselors called for antiracist counseling. This incident, and the ensuing debate, underscore the common experiences of BIPOC individuals, raising questions that led to conversations about the unrecorded struggles of BIPOC students, families, and staff in K–12 settings (Hill et al., 2020).
Although these conversations have been meaningful, they have been met with white rage and barriers that continue to derail progress. As a result, school counselors are forced to rely on old ideas (i.e., policies and practices) that perpetuate harm or merely attend to band aids that result in larger problems. To date, antiracist school counseling research primarily identifies problems, with limited exploration of liberatory practices for student development and self-empowerment.
The presentation has three purposes: (1) to introduce participants to an antiracist school framework (Mayes & Byrd, 2022); (2) to explore liberatory practices school counselors may employ to support the critical consciousness development of BIPOC youth within the scope of that framework, and (3) discuss the narratives of two individuals (Black woman-mother-sister-daughter-scholars) who lead/support school-based efforts aimed at increasing youth critical consciousness. The study from which this presentation is drawn employed Critical Race Feminism and Black feminist qualitative inquiry. Presenters used autoethnographic methods to analyze memos, notes, and artifacts from two years of facilitating affinity groups with BIPOC youth. Presenters will highlight the significance of this project in reimagining their role in empowering BIPOC youth against educational oppression, affirming their identities, and discuss how counselor educators can engage in research practices to support antiracist school counseling in K-12 settings.

Authors

• Janice A. Byrd, Pennsylvania State University

• Renae D. Mayes, University of Arizona

• Paul C. Harris, Virginia Commonwealth University