Issue 57: Memory

Noun. the faculty by which the mind stores and remembers information.

Photo Description: Artist Jonathan Harris is standing with a pink hoodie under a jean jacket in front of his painting titled, "Critical Race Theory." The painting shows a white man wearing a red shirt with a paint roller in his right hand covering images of Harriet Tuban, Malcolm X, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in white paint. The painting went viral in 2022.

Check-In:

“The great force of history comes from the fact that we carry it within us.” -James Baldwin

Before the Civil War, it was illegal in many Southern states for enslaved people to learn to read or write, with laws such as the 1831 North Carolina statute making it a crime to teach literacy to enslaved individuals. Slaveholders feared that literacy would empower enslaved people to resist oppression, communicate secretly, and challenge their enslavement. The restriction on knowledge was a tool of control, ensuring that generations remained subjugated.

• Today, across the United States, book banning has become a frequent topic in school board meetings, with challenges to books that address race, gender, history, and LGBTQ+ identities. In 2022 alone, the American Library Association reported a record number of book challenges, the highest in decades.

Before Colonel Pratt used the phrase, “Kill the Indian, Save the Man” to push for Native American children be removed from their homes and sent to boarding schools to teach assimilation and erasure of their culture and history.

• Today a 2019 report by the National Congress of American Indians found that 87% of state history standards did not mention Native American history post-1900, and 27 states did not include Native Americans in their K-12 curriculum.

Before post-Reconstruction era (1865-1877) Southern states passed a series of discriminatory laws known as Jim Crow laws, which enforced racial segregation and disenfranchised Black people. These laws affected every aspect of life, including schools, transportation, public facilities, and voting rights. For education, there were significant reductions in funding for Black schools and universities.

• Today, post-George Floyd, a series of federal executive orders and state laws have passed to reverse any equity and racial justice efforts that were advanced to support the advancement of Black people in every aspect of life.

Before in Texas during the 1910s-1950s, teachers and administrators often enforced "English-only" rules with corporal punishment, detention, or public humiliation. Students caught speaking Spanish—even during recess or lunch—could have their mouths washed out with soap, be assigned extra chores, or be physically punished with paddling.

• Today, on 3/1/25 an executive order was signed on designating English as the official language of the United States allowing government agencies and organizations that receive federal funding to choose whether to continue to offer documents and services in language other than English. It also rescinds a mandate from forme President Bill Clinton that required the government and organizations that received federal funding to provide language assistance to non-English speakers.

“It takes strength to remember, it takes another kind of strength to forget, it takes a hero to do both”. -James Baldwin

We are currently in a cycle of repetition and within every instance of cycles of history, we also saw how individuals and communities broke those cycles.

• 1831 North Carolina statute make it illegal for enslaved learning how to read-Ida B. Wells, Frederick Douglass and many, many others found a way to learn how to read and write and used those skills to become powerful abolitionists and speakers

• Laws against preserving the history and culture of Native Americans- Sarah Winnemucca opened the Peabody Indian School in Nevada. The goal was to help children by proud of their traditions and history

• Laws against bilingualism - The Aoy school was a bilingual school opened in 1887 in El Paso, Texas by Mexican parents

• Jim Crows laws against advancement of Black people – Black-owned and run schools, newspapers, cities, etc. expanded across the country to continue to advancement of Black people

• Executive Orders and state laws passed to further minoritize people across all aspects of society in the USA- ????

As education leaders, we need to be able to place today’s current moment in a historical context and be ready when there is another repeat of history. Find the pattern and speak on it. Find the hope and amplify it. The question is how are you preparing the children for it?

#mondaymotivation: “History is not the past. It is the present. We carry our history with us. We are our history.” -James Baldwin

Interview with a Leader of the Global Majority:

Dr. Aaron T. Jennings, MSW is the Equity, Diversity, and Excellence Officer for Chelsea Public Schools. He has been in the role for over four years. The comments below are Aaron’s and do not reflect the opinions of his district. The comments below are Aarons’s and do not reflect the opinions of his school system. His first interview excerpt can be found in Issue 17: Sustainability.

Mary: Tell me how your history has shaped your approach to equity work.

Aaron: I was raised in Southeast D.C., and Black history was every day in my formative years and education. I went to D.C. public schools and my early education was steeped in Black excellence and the realities of systemic inequities.

I did my undergrad at the University of Virginia, where I carved out for myself an unofficial social justice studies track. I studied religious studies and politics—took classes on gender politics, racial politics. As a Black student leader on campus, I was often in the middle of racial progress movements at the undergrad level.

After UVA, much of my professional career was in St. Louis. I worked at Washington University in St. Louis at the School of Social Work. My work put me in predominantly Black schools that were under-resourced, with students facing more material and systemic challenges than their suburban counterparts. I wasn’t calling it “equity work” back then, because it wasn’t a trendy term yet. At best, I used the term “social justice.” But in reality, I was doing the work—bringing my social work students into Black schools to expand their capacity, building partnerships with nonprofit organizations, philanthropists, and community leaders to bring in resources that my students at Roosevelt High School didn’t have access to.

I also learned the importance of knowing the players in a city, understanding the history, and leveraging relationships to make real change. I had deep intimacy with the St. Louis context. I knew the school districts, the communities, and the people shaping them. That was a key marker of my success there.

Mary: That’s a long-term strategy grounded in historical understanding. What have you learned about yourself through this process?

Aaron: Like my work in St. Louis, I am an 'innopreneur' as opposed to an entrepreneur. I like to innovate within existing structures and systems. That’s a Monica C. Higgins’ term. I believe in the power of relationships and context. My job is to bring into the atmosphere what people say in quiet—to be that fierce equity lawyer. To remind people that something isn’t right here.

Please let me know if you would like to be interviewed and/or if you would recommend someone to be profiled in this section. I need new interviews!

What I’m Reading, Watching, and Listening To:

• READING: .Original Sins: The (Mis)education of Black and Native Children and the Construction of American Racism by Eve L Ewing. The book combines all the excerpts on schools that I have in many other history-focused books into one comprehensive yet readable book. You can find a full list of my book recommendations here. Please note that I am an affiliate with Bookshop.org and receive a small compensation for your purchase when you use the book links provided.

• ALSO READING: This Chalkbeat article emphasizes that lack of educator diversity persists in Asian American communities in NYC. “Nearly 1 in 5 students in New York City identified as Asian American during the last school year, while roughly 8% of the city’s teachers did. The gap is even wider for school administrators: Just 5% of principals in New York City are Asian American. Those numbers are up modestly from a decade ago, when 6% of city teachers and 3% of principals identified as Asian American, according to the Education Department.”

• LISTENING/WATCHING: A conversation between authors Roxane Gay and Saeed Jones at Harvard Medical School. The more than hour conversation talks about writing, politics, and culture.

How to Continue to Support Leading-Within:

• Go to Amazon and rate or review the book there! Reviews are a great way for others to see that this book is worth the time to read.

• Post about the book on social media using the hashtag #leadingwithin. Even better if it includes a picture of you WITH the book!

• Host a book club with your affinity/ERG group. Two study guides are also available on the ASCD website - one for leaders of color and one for white co-conspirators that are perfect for starting a group conversation. For book clubs with participants who have purchased and committed to reading the book, please reach out to me so I can support your journey!

• Connect with me to speak to your organization or group about topics covered in the book, like ‘practicing love and rage’, ‘building a coalition’, and ‘taking a stand’.

If this is your first time reading, please go back and read my Introductions post.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think. If you like it, please share it with your network!