Description
The PK-12 education system in the United States suffers from anti-democratic and authoritarian ideologies, policies, and power structures, leading to limited educational access and oppressive disciplinary practices for marginalized communities. PK-12 Professionals’ Narratives of Working as Advocates Impacting Today’s Schools offer a powerful solution to these challenges. This book comprises a collection of counter-narratives that empower educators, counselors, and stakeholders to challenge and disrupt the anti-democratic and authoritarian forces prevalent in schools.
By sharing personal experiences, strategies, and recommendations, the book inspires academic scholars to reflect, (re)learn, and take action to support students, communities, and personal growth. It serves as a critical teaching tool, encouraging professionals to reimagine their practices and collaborate with others in creating inclusive, equitable, and transformative educational environments. PK-12 Professionals’ Narratives of Working as Advocates Impacting Today’s Schools present a path toward dismantling oppressive structures, ultimately advocating for an education system that prioritizes the needs and voices of all learners.
Author's/Editor's Biography
Patrick De Walt (Ed.)
Patrick S. De Walt is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Liberal Studies at California State University, Fresno. He has experience teaching at the elementary level: first and third grades. His research interests include: Africana Identity, Racial Identity, Theory, Curriculum Development, Teacher Education and applications of technology in education. He is an editorial board member of the Journal of Multicultural Affairs. He also serves on the Advisory Board of CalStateTEACH.
Dara Nix-Stevenson (Ed.)
Dara Nix-Stevenson
(she/her/they/them) is a social justice educator currently working as a Curriculum Specialist with Sincecombahee Educational Consulting. A former middle and high school science educator with twenty plus years of classroom experience, she views classrooms as transformative collaboratories where both the teacher and student can share in the learning process as co-creators of knowledge. She strives to incorporate learning as expressed by bell hooks, “But learning is a place where paradise can be created. The classroom with all of its limitations, remains a location of possibility.” She hopes that when her students leave the classroom they are able to develop a critical consciousness that allows them to read the world, feel humanized, and become agents of social change. Dr. Nix received her Ph.D. in Educational Studies from UNC-Greensboro with a concentration in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies. Primarily interested in racial, gender, and environmental justice, her research focuses on environmental displacement, identity, resilience, and planetary citizenship. She blogs as Sincecombahee.