School-Based Racial Battle Fatigue and Trauma in the Lives of Black Students in TK–12th-Grade Schools

• In Event: Interdisciplinary Culturally Responsive Pedagogy: Centering African American Archives, Educators, Students, and Technology

Abstract

Institutional racism, specifically Anti-Blackness, incubates in U. S. schools and produces Racial Battle Fatigue and, depending on the severity of experience, race-based traumatic stress and trauma in the lives of TK - 12th grade Black students. Interestingly, the impact RBF and RBST has on African American youth’s mental health, well-being and overall academic success is often overlooked. Therefore, the author proposes we recognize the phenomenon she describes as racial classroom school fatigue, a form of RBF that links the racially traumatic experiences of Black students to the current and historical racial bias of educators.prompting an urgency to diversify the teacher workforce and call for teacher education programs to require coursework in African Diaspora Studies before teaching Black youth in schools.

Author

• Katrina Hasan-Hamilton, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign