AESA Symposium Paper
Enclosed within are the reflections/narratives we will share at the annual American Educational Studies Association conference on November 5 regarding our work in the PrESS Network.
posted by adam at 3:22 PM
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PROGRESSIVES ENGAGED IN STRUGGLE SUPPORT (PrESS) NETWORK: SEEKING SOCIAL JUSTICE IN PUBLIC EDUCATION
This symposium focuses on the critical need for progressive educators to join together in the struggle to protect and promote public schools/education. Believing that they are one of the last (if not the last) bastion/possibility of democratic thinking/ideals, a fledgling coalition of professors, teachers, students and social workers have created a network of concerned citizens poised to connect with vulnerable constituents in our schools, support each other in our educative work in the community, and to propose more critical possibilities for schooling and education. We call this partnership the Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support (PrESS) Network. On our website (http://pressnetwork.blogspot.com) we claim the PrESS Network is
“a critically-engaged, hopeful, and supportive voice for change. It’s members are dedicated to affirming the basic rights of and creating solutions with children and families who are disenfranchised by an unjust socio-economic structure. This empowering partnership seeks to facilitate system-wide change through respect for social difference, humanistic teaching, service to others, transformative dialog, and an ever-evolving journey toward connectedness.”
The following presentations chronicle the formation of the PrESS Network, discuss the work that we do in and out of the classroom, what we think we have accomplished so far, and what is next for our partnership.
Presentation 1: Formation
This presentation focuses on the formation of the PrESS Network by a group of graduate students in the spring, 2004. These graduate students were part of a cohort in Bellarmine’s Master of Arts in Teaching Program. The second module in this program centers on issues of social difference, social justice, and service-learning. Realizing that this would, perhaps, be the last time these students would ever receive such in-depth information on social difference, progressive pedagogies, etc., they consulted with the professor, Adam Renner, regarding the possibilities of creating a group that could continue the conversations and information-sharing beyond the semester. This paper explores the early days of the PrESS Network: what we thought we were getting into, the struggle to get started, and the importance of coalition-building.
Presentation 2: Support through Stories
This presentation chronicles an integral part of our life in the PrESS Network: supporting the progressive work we do in the classroom and in the community. At each of our meetings, we begin by sharing stories of the issues/struggles we face in our work. Realizing that we are often one of the lone proponents/actors of progressive pedagogies in our classrooms, we frequently find few people with whom to critically discuss issues of social difference and social injustice. Our Network serves as a place to reconnect with others facing the same struggles and who view the issues through a similar critical lens. These stories, though, can also spark inspiration and innovation. Particularly for new teachers in the Network, they have an opportunity to learn from others who are implementing a more progressive approach, providing them with lesson ideas, assessment possibilities, and a whole range of teaching strategies. This paper focuses on some of these stories and the issues we’re facing in our schools and communities.
Presentation 3: Reading Circles and Professional Development
This presentation details another integral part of our life in the PrESS Network: our professional development. Similar to Freire’s (1987) concept of culture circles, we spend a part of each meeting “reading the word and the world.” As reflective practitioners, we find it necessary to continue to stretch ourselves for more nuanced and complex understandings of social difference and social justice. To date, we have shared in the reading of hooks’ (1994) Teaching to Transgress, Freire’s (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, and numerous articles from such publications as Rethinking Schools. In fact, a portion of our website is now dedicated to reading material and professional development.
In addition to the reading circles, a portion of our partnership had an opportunity to present at last years AESA conference regarding some of our research into issues of social difference. This served as an opportunity for graduate students (pre- and in-service teachers) in the PrESS Network to discuss some of their work with the wider academic community and to engage in dialog with other like-minded folks. This paper focuses on the importance of stretching ourselves and to continue toward Gramsci’s notion of the organic intellectual.
Presentation 4: Service and Action
Moving from the theoretical to the more practical, this presentation reveals our attempts at engaging with the wider community on transformative projects ultimately aimed at facilitating the system-wide change we call for our in mission statement. Outside of the individual service we provide as educators and social workers, we have attempted to come together on particular projects that focus our efforts on a particular issue. This summer, we have an opportunity to engage in our first such service partnership with a local boys and girls club. This partnership will involve an intensive reading program for the children at the club to help prepare them for return to school at the end of the summer. This paper examines the experience/partnership at the boys and girls club and outlines other work we hope to take up in the future.
Presentation 5: What is next?
This final presentation explores what might be next for our PrESS Network. Along with continuing with our reading circles, professional development and service activity, we also know that we must widen the circle within the network to encompass more community members, particularly parents. With this expansion other possibilities/needs might surface that will provide more definitive direction for our evolving partnership. Additionally, we have plans to investigate the possibility of getting several members of our Network hired in the same public school in order that a more concentrated effort might be made in a single building toward more progressive possibilities. Finally, we are also exploring the feasibility of creating our own anthology of progressive teaching strategies from the front lines of the classroom.
In any event, we look forward to sharing these possibilities with friends and critics at the AESA conference. We also hope to spark interest in the PrESS Network with conference attendees in order that we might also expand our partnership across the country. Given the assault on teachers and public education, this sort of coalition building is critical to the future of the teaching profession and public education as a democratic ideal. We look forward to the affirmation and critical feedback we know we can count on from the AESA community.
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OK... Here is a very rough (and ugly) first draft. Any comments would be greatly appreciated!
ASEA Conference Presentation
Presentation 4: Service and Action
The PrESS Network is a critically-engaged, hopeful, and supportive voice for change. It's members are dedicated to affirming the basic rights of and creating realistic solutions with children and families who are disenfranchised by an unjust socio-economic structure. This empowering partnership seeks to facilitate system-wide change through respect for social difference, humanistic teaching, service to others, transformative dialog, and an ever-evolving journey toward connectedness.
As educators and social workers we all hear it, feel it, suffer from it; the “countrafactual,” “hypotruthful,” the “misinformation.” George Orwell called it ‘doublespeak’ and ‘doublethink.’ Our lives are buzzing with euphemisms; vailed attempts at placating our understanding of the world around us. In Leaving Safe Harbors (2002), Dennis Carlson deftly describes this buzz in our ears using Plato’s description of the instability of democracy. “Politicians appeal to the desires and self-interest of the mob, telling them what they want to hear, using a form of sophistry – a speech designed to distort and mislead – that says one thing and means another, that appeals to emotions rather than reason” (p. 27). This “spin” keeps us from a true understanding of the well-being and social welfare of our brothers and sisters, our neighbors. Whether used to justify and unjust social policy, or redirect attention from what a government should have done for its people, we are left in a state of challenged reality. Yet, individually, in the service we provide as educators and social workers and as members of the PrESS Network we attempt to reach beyond the sophistry of governmental systems, and back into the real world, which is just outside our doors. What we find, hidden right in front of our eyes is the truth.
This past August, at the New Albany Boys and Girls Club in Indiana, the truth was in the eyes of 50 youngsters who joined us for five days of creativity, exploration and emphasis on the importance of reading. From groups of very young children who focused on theme based reading activities, to middle and senior high students who used their own creativity and photography to engage, ours was a journey towards the truth about each other, how we learn and the unique differences that helped bring us together.
Adam Renner
Our process brought peace, creativity, and democracy into the lives of 50 children. This experience is now a part of their living history--one that could be used to launch them in several different trajectories. Now, I'm not trying to oversell this thing here--we didn't save the world this week, but as Solnit points out, we don't have to--we just have to join the struggle.
Rachel Bryant
We sometimes don’t realize the impact we make on an individual child. Most children will have forgotten our experiences this week by next month, but some might never forget. My boys will not forget soon, if ever. They wish “real” teachers were as cool as all of you. I keep telling them that we are real teachers!
Cindy Smith
I found they worked best when I sat with them, allowed them to express themselves and have some control over their work. They asked…if they could make one collage page together and were allowed to do so. I watched the boys work together and they did produce good work. I think if a teacher had insisted that they each do their own page, more battles would erupt.
Angela Morgan
The one teenage girl was not as quick to speak up in the group as some of the boys were but when I took the time to sit by her and really LISTEN to her, she quickly opened up and talked about her hopes of becoming a photographer. This leads to my third point...
I was thinking about how the teens = our students = fellow community members really need to know that someone cares enough to listen. Listening is such a challenge for all of us…
There are times within our community when the greatest challenge is to do just that - be still and listen. We need to hear things we might otherwise miss. Most importantly, we must sometimes even put aside our own agendas and let our students/community members take the wheel rather than take what we bring to them.
Rebecca Solnit, in Hope in the Dark, cautions us to view the journey as our guiding light, not to “…mistake a light bulb for the moon…” (p. 84). Using the journey as our guide we are more likely to hear the truth from those that we serve, and in so doing, we join together with them. Paulo Freire taught us that true praxis is simultaneously reflective and active; describing the world around us while taking action to change it. Through the PrESS Network, we actively engage others in dialogue regarding our progressive principals, as we strive to serve our brothers and sisters and join together as one voice.
“Thus, to speak a true word is to transform the world” (Feire, 1970)
References
Carlson, D. (2002) Leaving Safe Harbors. Great Britain, London; Routledgefalmer.
Solnit, R. (2004). Hope in the Dark. New York, NY; Nation Books
Freire, P. (1970, 1993, 2003) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York; The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc.
In addition to project-based collaboration and our commonality as Bellarmine students/graduates/educatorsthe support, we share through connectedness cannot be overlooked. It is both an electronic and in person support system. By getting together for meetings, socials and sharing through emails and the blog we have a lifeline that has become important for all of us. When we think of trip posibilities to Jamaica and the student already here on scholarship "we" realize that lives are being touched locally and globally.
Right on! With your permission - I will use this in the last paragraph.
Thanks Bob.
FORMATION
Crisis in education: We have reached a crisis stage in education. We could argue, I guess, how long we’ve actually been experiencing this crisis, or whether “crisis” is just one of the characteristics with which you would describe education. Nonetheless, education sits precariously at the edge of an undemocratic, rigidly dogmatic, rabidly standardized abyss. With forces like:
• NCLB and high stakes standardized testing in P-12 schools;
• NCATE and Praxis (ETS) in higher education;
• a maniacal focus on the economic purposes of an education in a corporate-inspired, capitalistic-driven system;
• and a globalizing feeling of disconnectedness and despair in a Friedman-like (2005) flattening world ,
there is no telling how long before the free-fall will begin (if it has not already).
To combat these forces, a group of graduate students, teachers, professors, and a social worker have coalesced as an activist alliance to (1) build a community of dialogue, (2) support each other in the progressive work we do in our professional lives, (3) come to a more critical consciousness of the world around us, and (4) serve the local and global community.
How we got started: Our middle/secondary Master of Arts in Teaching program at Bellarmine University consists of five semesters, made up of modules that combine several courses together. In the first module, graduate students (who may be teachers of record, permanent subs, preferred subs, or still working non-education related jobs) take courses in the Social Foundations of Education, Curriculum Design, and Classroom Management. The second semester, in which Dr. Milton Brown and I teach, is made up of two courses: Parents, Schools, and Community and Social Difference and Social Justice. The third module is made up of Research,Technology, and Adolescent Development. The fourth module consists of Reading in the Content Areas and specific subject Methods courses. Following these four semesters of courses, students spend their fifth semester student teaching. Completers of the program receive their master’s degree in education and, supposing they pass the appropriate Praxis exams, become eligible for teaching certification in the state of Kentucky.
Interestingly, this program is the only program in our School of Education for which a course on social difference and social justice is required for graduation. While our undergraduate elementary program is a dual certification program (‘regular’ and ‘special’ education) and while our elementary MAT program robustly focuses on issues related to literacy, none of our other programs—undergraduate secondary education, Master of Arts in Education, or Principalship Program—or these make social difference and social justice a focus of the curriculum. Additionally, our second semester course also sits precariously within the middle/secondary MAT program as we constantly receive pressure to accelerate the program even further in order to compete with the other universities in our region.
With this knowledge of competition, I mentioned to my MAT students in the spring, 2004 that more than likely this course would be the first to be sacrificed in the effort to accelerate. While this is less of a chance now as I have assumed the role of Graduate Chair, the students at the time were mortified at the possibility that this course/opportunity may be lost for future graduate students. Moreover, some students recognized this course may be the last substantial opportunity they could have to critically engage and struggle with issues of social difference and social justice. Literally minutes after this particular class ended, two students approached me about the possibility of forming a group that would transcend this semester and keep the discussion alive. Encouraged by their reaction and energized by their commitment related to issues of social difference and social justice, I put the word out to several former and current graduate students as well as professors who shared a commitment to social justice. The Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support (PrESS) Network was born in April, 2004.
Role of teacher education: Given all of the requirements and pressures being heaped upon teachers and schools of education by local, state and federal education agencies, it is becoming exceedingly more difficult to prepare teachers in a progressive and humanistic fashion. Recently, in an online discussion with our Social Difference and Social Justice class, Dr. Brown and I wondered aloud: Are we (schools of education writ large) really preparing teachers to teach? Can one course/(accelerated program) provide (1) the grand tour of the issues of culture, oppression, knowledge, structural injustice, and power, (2) the tools/lessons/units to implement in the classroom to subvert the dominant power structure without getting flak from administration and colleagues, and (3) the knowledge to dismantle the structure of injustice beyond the school walls. While an answer of “Of course not,” is obvious, it only reemphasizes the importance of forming coalitions such as the PrESS Network in order meet what teacher education may not be able to accomplish.
Importance of Coalitions and balancing despair with hope: The importance of coalition building is becoming more and more apparent as civil liberties in the US vanish, more and more governmental and economic control is held by fewer and fewer people, and the possibility of democracy in public education is under vigorous assault. We take our inspiration of coalition-building from Global South theorists such as Freire (1970) and Robotham (1998), social justice activist organizations such as the Zapatistas, the recent world-wide protests prior to the invasion of Iraq, and the possibility of nations banding together to subvert free trade agendas. Recognizing that our ‘flattening world’ is more and more organized by the flow of global capital across porous boundaries and that economic hegemony is not solely US-engineered, but corporately-engineered (soon we will pledge allegiance to corporations, not nations), we are democratically experimenting with the possibilities of what may arise when a movement of educators and social workers coalesce to (1) build a community of dialogue, (2) support each other in the progressive work we do in our professional lives, (3) come to a more critical consciousness of the world around us, and (4) serve the local and global community. We hope the experiment evolves such that we can incorporate not only more educators and social workers, but other local constituencies such as parents and students who share our desire to create more humanizing possibilities in our schools and communities. We also seek to connect globally with teachers and other progressively minded peoples such as those I work with in the rural countryside of Montego Bay, Jamaica.
None if this will be possible, though, without heaping spoonful’s of hope. While we trace our understanding of hope back to Freire (1992), we were recently reinvigorated by a reading of Solnit’s (2004) Hope in the Dark. Her short but powerful manifesto on hope reemphasized that social justice is a process and not a product. Through two powerful metaphors, Solnit suggests possible action within our coalitions. First, she argues that our work should not focus on saving the world. Instead, we should focus our process on keeping alive moments of creation, in which social justice and democracy take one step forward. She also offers that our work should subscribe to a politics of prefiguration. That is, if our movement is democratic, creative, and peaceful, then, in one small corner of the world, those things have prevailed. By what Warren (2005) would describe as “relational power,” the power to get things done collectively, social justice, then, becomes more possible.
The following presentations offer a glimpse at our politics of prefiguration and how we have attempted to keep alive those moments of creation. Through a re-telling of some of our stories, an articulation of what our reading circles and professional development have contributed to our professional lives, and an analysis of some of the service in which we have already engaged with the broader community, we hope to expose the possibilities of coalitions such as ours and open ourselves to critique from the broader community such that our efforts might be refined and retooled toward an even more democratic and socially just future.
Couldn't ask for a more intellectual, critical, humanizing, empowered, life-affirming group. I only hope, Jon's, Milton's, and my portion of the presentation can measure up to what you all have offered here. Powerful stuff.
Here is Jon's post:
Presentation 4: Service and Action
The PrESS Network is a critically-engaged, hopeful, and supportive voice for change. It's members are dedicated to affirming the basic rights of and creating realistic solutions with children and families who are disenfranchised by an unjust socio-economic structure. This empowering partnership seeks to facilitate system-wide change through respect for social difference, humanistic teaching, service to others, transformative dialog, and an ever-evolving journey toward connectedness.
As educators and social workers we all hear it, feel it, suffer from it; the “countrafactual,” “hypotruthful,” the “misinformation.” George Orwell, in his novel, Nineteen Eighty Four, called it ‘doublespeak’ and ‘doublethink.’ Our lives are buzzing with euphemisms; vailed attempts at placating our understanding of the world around us. In Leaving Safe Harbors (2002), Dennis Carlson deftly describes this buzz in our ears using Plato’s description of the instability of democracy. “Politicians appeal to the desires and self-interest of the mob, telling them what they want to hear, using a form of sophistry – a speech designed to distort and mislead – that says one thing and means another, that appeals to emotions rather than reason” (p. 27). This “spin” keeps us from a true understanding of the well-being and social welfare of our brothers and sisters, our neighbors. Whether used to justify and unjust social policy, or redirect attention from what a government should have done for its people, we are left in a state of challenged reality. Even so, individually, in the service we provide as educators and social workers and as members of the PrESS Network we attempt to reach beyond the sophistry of governmental systems, and back into the real world, which is just outside our doors. What we find, hidden right in front of our eyes is the truth.
This past August, at the New Albany Boys and Girls Club in Indiana, the truth was in the eyes of 50 youngsters who joined us for five days of creativity, exploration and emphasis on the importance of reading. From groups of very young children who focused on theme based reading activities, to middle and senior high students who used their own creativity and photography to engage, ours was a journey towards the truth about each other, how we learn and the unique differences that brought us together.
Adam Renner
Our process brought peace, creativity, and democracy into the lives of 50 children. This experience is now a part of their living history--one that could be used to launch them in several different trajectories. Now, I'm not trying to oversell this thing here--we didn't save the world this week, but as Solnit points out, we don't have to--we just have to join the struggle.
Rachel Bryant
We sometimes don’t realize the impact we make on an individual child. Most children will have forgotten our experiences this week by next month, but some might never forget. My boys will not forget soon, if ever. They wish “real” teachers were as cool as all of you. I keep telling them that we are real teachers!
Cindy Smith
I found they worked best when I sat with them, allowed them to express themselves and have some control over their work. They asked…if they could make one collage page together and were allowed to do so. I watched the boys work together and they did produce good work. I think if a teacher had insisted that they each do their own page, more battles would erupt.
Angela Morgan
The one teenage girl was not as quick to speak up in the group as some of the boys were but when I took the time to sit by her and really LISTEN to her, she quickly opened up and talked about her hopes of becoming a photographer. This leads to my third point...
I was thinking about how the teens = our students = fellow community members really need to know that someone cares enough to listen. Listening is such a challenge for all of us…
There are times within our community when the greatest challenge is to do just that - be still and listen. We need to hear things we might otherwise miss. Most importantly, we must sometimes even put aside our own agendas and let our students/community members take the wheel rather than take what we bring to them.
Rebecca Solnit, in Hope in the Dark, cautions us to view the journey as our guiding light, not to “…mistake a light bulb for the moon…” (p. 84). Using the journey as our guide we are more likely to hear the truth from those that we serve, and in so doing, we join together with them. In addition to project-based collaboration and our commonality as Bellarmine students/graduates/educators the support we share through connectedness cannot be overlooked. It is both an electronic and in person support system. By getting together for meetings, socials and sharing through emails and the blog we have a lifeline that has become important for all of us.
Paulo Freire taught us that true praxis is simultaneously reflective and active; describing the world around us while taking action to change it. Through the PrESS Network, we actively engage others in dialogue regarding our progressive principals, as we strive to serve our brothers and sisters and join together as one voice.
“Thus, to speak a true word is to transform the world” (Freire, 1970)
References
Carlson, D. (2002) Leaving Safe Harbors. Great Britain, London; Routledgefalmer.
Freire, P. (1970, 1993, 2003) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York; The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc.
Orwell, George. (1949). Nineteen Eighty Four. Plume Books.
Solnit, R. (2004). Hope in the Dark. New York, NY; Nation Books
Wow. Truly, a gifted man we have in our midst.
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