Queering Community Schools: A Queer Intersectional Abolitionist Perspective on Community Schools in Philadelphia

• In Event: The Role of Community Schools' Culture and Climate on Students, Teachers, Families, and Community

Abstract

Purpose
In this paper, we ask what a queer intersectional abolitionist framework for educational analysis of community schools can look like; and, what can this framework tell us about Philadelphia’s implementation of community schools. We provide a brief overview of the socio-political context of Philadelphia education, unpack our queer intersectional abolitionist framework, and apply our framework to examine the ongoing formation of community schools in the city.
Community schools emerged as a reform strategy in Philadelphia and other U.S. school districts confronting racial and socio-economic injustices (Frankl, 2016). After decades of economic and population decline, Philadelphia has undergone an uneven remaking driven by investment in certain industries and real estate alongside the disinvestment and dispossession of low income, Black and Brown communities. All the while the city’s schools have navigated severe underfunding, and a range of racist, neoliberal austerity measures, like the state takeover of the district, high stakes testing, mass school closures, and the expansive growth of charter schools (Dixson, Royal, & Henry, 2014). In this context a “from the ground up” vision of community schools was pushed forward by a coalition of community and labor activists as an alternative to the racial neoliberal bent of education reform.
Framework, Methods, and Evidence
We are mobilizing a queer intersectional abolitionist framework to make clear that marginalized people have multiple identities that oppressive systems use to prevent liberation from control and containment by public institutions. This paper is part of a series of case studies (Crosby and Bryson, 2010) of various parental/community collaboration models, like: University Assisted Community Schools, and the Mayor’s Community Schools program. This paper is an extended case method (Burawoy, 1998) examination of the Mayor’s community school program. We analyze media coverage, data from semi-structured interviews with policy actors, and research from a related project to provide a historical view of the formation of community schools in Philadelphia. Then we examine data from semi-structured interviews of individuals affiliated with a local community school site. We evaluate findings that center those most marginalized in a policy context to construct a more accurate picture of socio-political struggle.
Results and Scholarly Significance
Mobilizing a queer intersectional abolitionist framework in this study reveals two important findings. First, despite the progressive origins of the current push for community schools in Philadelphia, the force of intersecting forms of structural oppression, continue to make it difficult for a transformative, “from the ground-up” vision of community schools to gain sufficient traction. Second, while local community schools have been finding ways to enact a transformative vision, it is highly dependent on individual leadership vision and strategies. A transformative praxis that seeks to disrupt structural inequities as they exist in schools and communities is neither systemic or sustainable, and thus limits the possibility of meaningful change. Our goal is to contribute to the literature surrounding community schools and provide a framework that leads to abolitionist thought and action that moves toward people-driven collaboration and transformation, and away from unsustainable, unidirectional service approaches to educational and social justice.

Authors

• Edwin Mayorga, Swarthmore College

• Maya Henry, Swarthmore College