The Integrated Schools Podcast
Kids & Family:Parenting
In 2021, 80% of teachers in our country's public schools were White, while just 6% were Black. That same year, 54% of public school students were students of color, and 15% were Black. We also know of the extensive research showing the positive impacts of Black teachers on all kids, but especially on Black kids. However, as we learned last episode from Dr. Leslie Fenwick, we lost over 100,000 Black teachers in the wake of desegregation attempt, and the Black teacher pipeline was crushed through explicit and implicit government action. In 2019, Sharif El-Mekki founded The Center for Black Educator Development to do something about it. With a commitment to the "deeply subversive act of teaching superbly", they are targeting interventions to increase the number of Black teachers so Black and other disenfranchised students can reap the full benefits of a quality public education.
Mr. El-Mekki joins us to discuss his work, and explain how it is rooted in a Black educational tradition that stretches back generations. His teaching and leading is informed by his own upbringing attending a Black freedom school in Philadelphia, his experience as a teacher and school leader, and the teacher activists who poured into him throughout his life.
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The Integrated Schools Podcast was created by Courtney Mykytyn and Andrew Lefkowits.
This episode was produced by Andrew Lefkowits and Val Brown. It was edited, and mixed by Andrew Lefkowits.
Music by Kevin Casey.
Between We and They: A School Integration Story (Part 2)
Between We and They: A School Integration Story (Part 1)
Not In My Suburbs: Milliken v. Bradley @ 45 (BONUS)
Busing: The Terms of the Debate (BONUS)
ICYMI: Seeing White (BONUS)
ICYMI: The Miseducation Podcast (BONUS)
Ep 23 - Grappling with Brown v. Board (BvB@65)
Ep 22 - I Hope They Hear It In Our Voices (BvB@65)
Ep 21 - Beyond Black and White with David Hinojosa (BvB@65)
Ep20 - Amanda Lewis on Desegregation Without Integration (BvB@65)
Ep 19 - Segrenomics, Black Teachers, and Noliwe Rooks (BvB@65)
Ep 18 - Rucker Johnson and the Grandchildren of Desegregation (BvB@65)
Ep 17 - Public Schools, Private Money
Ep 16 - Too Bad, Just Fine, and Whiteness Centered
Ep 15 - Gifted, Talented and Segregated
Ep 14 - Kirkland on Integration
Ep 13 - Hopes and Hazards of Dual Language
Ep 12 - Whiteness vs Rightness: A Conversation on Colonizing
Ep 11 - White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy
Ep 10 - Why My Choice Matters: Taking Back the Playground
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