Voices Magazine

What We’re Reading

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

What We’re Reading Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

A quick look at the recent books from our faculty and community.

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What Remains

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

What Remains Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Adriana Alvarez and photography by Mónica Lozano

Braiding and honoring migration dreams and stories

Growing up on the border certainly shaped the worldviews, visions and life trajectories that brought four mujeres fronterizas [border women] together to create the project What Remains.

What Remains draws together artistic production and academic research to reframe the migrant experience as a global and timeless human experience, one that occurs before, during and after the passage itself. It is a tribute to those who have taken this journey but have been silenced, or whose voices were never heard. Our main mission is to incite broad social change through art and research in order to turn awareness into practices and actions of solidarity, compassion and support for those who endeavor in the global and timeless phenomenon of migration.

We both spent many years capturing stories of migration; Mónica through photography and Adriana through research in schools. We dreamed of collaborating across our work toward social justice and the topics of migration and border crossing. The presence of children in Mónica’s work always moved me in profound ways thinking these are the children I now work with in schools and with their teachers.

In 2019 the dream of working together became a reality when we joined the Renée Crown Wellness Institute at CU �鶹ӰԺ and worked on the Trust and Belonging research study, which focuses on the relationships between Latinx families and school districts. Mónica’s photography captured research findings visually and supported the multimodal testimonios of families, children and youth, illuminating the realities and the invisible borders they continue to face after political and geographical borders have been crossed.

Our main mission is to incite broad social change through art and research in order to turn awareness into practices and actions of solidarity, compassion and support for those who endeavor in the global and timeless phenomenon of migration."

In 2022, Mónica and the ArtsEverywhere team (a Canadian organization that supports art projects focused on social justice) visited a remote part of the border wall between our hometowns of Ciudad Juárez, México and El Paso, Texas, and discovered a graveyard of abandoned objects that included clothes, backpacks and toys. The objects laid discolored and dusty in the desert carrying the unknown stories of their owners who at one time stood there and were forced to leave their remaining belongings behind. It was disheartening, especially seeing the stark presence of children. The team rescued these abandoned objects with the hope to honor the owners and their unknown stories.

At the same time, our Crown Institute team was working with a group of sixth graders in the Authoring Our Stories research study. The group of students used their own multimodal testimonios (created the year before) as inspiration to write a bilingual children’s book that also conveys a special message to other children at their former elementary school. These stories addressed relevant topics in their lives and shared messages of hope, dreams and resilience. The result was a selection of bilingual children’s books, written by and for Latinx children from immigrant backgrounds, which are now on display at the Crown Institute on CU �鶹ӰԺ’s campus.

In one of our interviews, a mother in our project shared that one of the most difficult moments during their long journey was when the coyote (the person paid by migrants to guide them across the border) demanded that her 9-year-old daughter drop the precious toy she had been carrying since leaving her hometown in Honduras. With tears and heartbreak, her daughter had to leave her fluffy toy and the comfort it gave her behind. Our hearts dropped knowing one story behind the many toys abandoned in the desert.

We wanted to find a way to weave together the objects of families who have made the journey with those objects abandoned during the crossing as a symbol of solidarity and unity. We asked families from immigrant backgrounds across Colorado if they had an object or piece of clothing to share that represents their migration story. The mother whose daughter had to abandon her toy, brought a blanket out and told us, “I give you my best friend along the way, it protected us from the cold, and it dried our tears.” The Trenza [Braid] was born the moment the mother sat down with her two daughters to braid their stories and dreams together.

In 2023, we brought all the items, both abandoned and donated, to the dry riverbed in El Paso, Texas, and we braided them together. When I sent a photo of that moment to the mother who gave us her blanket, she told us she was very moved to see her blanket now uniting her with other people’s stories and dreams. During our next visit, our team gifted her a new blanket to fill with all of their new dreams and hopes. With tears in her eyes, she turned to her daughters and said, “Sus sueños no se quedarán en el vacío” [Your dreams will not remain in emptiness].

This summer we had our first full exhibit at the International Meeting on Human Mobility hosted by the Office for Human Rights of the state of Nuevo León, México. The exhibit included the Trenza, Mónica’s photography and the research studies at the Crown Institute, including the children’s books. We hope to continue to humanize and bring awareness to the many unknown journeys of resilience and hope.

The What Remains team includes Adriana Alvarez, a CU �鶹ӰԺ alumna (PhDEdu’17) and assistant professor at CU Denver, Iris Morales, Mabel Weber, and Mónica Lozano.

The team wishes to acknowledge the Renée Crown Wellness Institute, ArtsEverywhere and the Ilse Nathan Foundation for believing in and supporting the What Remains project.

They also wish to thank the entire Trust and Belonging Team at the Crown Institute: Leah Teeters, Michelle Shedro, Emily Gleason, Julia Zigarelli, Kathy Schultz, Adria Padilla-Chavez and Blanca Elena Aguilar Trejo.

Braiding and honoring migration dreams and stories at the border wall Ciudad Juárez - El Paso.

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Alumna earns SVVSD Teacher of the Year

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

Alumna earns SVVSD Teacher of the Year Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Tears of joy flowed the night Lori Lopez learned she is the 2023 Teacher of the Year for St. Vrain Valley School District (SVVSD).

“When the video announcing the winner started, I immediately recognized the flyover shots of my school and then my voice came on,” she said. “I'm pretty sure I grabbed my husband's arm really hard. There were a lot of tears, especially when the video showed my students.”

Then she realized her three children and parents were in attendance at the awards ceremony, and there were more tears. Education has always been important to her family, with her mother a veteran middle school teacher and her oldest son interested in teaching.

Lopez knew she wanted to teach in first grade, and now she is a first-grade teacher at Alpine Elementary School in Longmont. Colleagues and her students complimented the warm and joyful learning environment that she creates.

Lopez earned her master’s degree at CU �鶹ӰԺ in 2009. She said graduate coursework allowed her to expand her skillset, delve deeper into education research and apply best practices immediately to her classroom. It also provided a community of educators to share successes, struggles, brainstorming and encouragement.

Being in community with other educators is central to the “adventure of teaching,” she said, and it is one of the reasons the Teacher of the Year honor is so meaningful.

“There are so many amazing teachers who often don't receive the recognition they deserve, so when we do get honored, especially something to this degree, it is very special,” Lopez said.

“It was humbling looking at the audience when I took the stage and seeing so many deserving educators. I appreciate being recognized for my hard work and dedication day in and day out.”

Lori Lopez was named 2023 Teacher of the Year for the St. Vrain Valley School District.

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Lorrie Shepard’s legacy

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

Lorrie Shepard’s legacy Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

In the Fall of 2022, we planted a Flashfire Maple tree on campus in Lorrie Shepard's honor.

Lorrie Shepard has been a pillar of the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education since 1974—first as a faculty member and then as Dean from 2001–2016. Even as Dean Emerita, Shepard continues to mentor students and guide research as Distinguished Professor in the Research and Evaluation Methodology program. We caught up with Shepard, who retired last fall.

What are you most proud of from your time at CU �鶹ӰԺ?

“As dean, I was most prideful about the people I was able to recruit and support. I recruited incredibly accomplished and caring faculty; I still watch their careers and take pride in their successes and contributions. With Dan Liston, the generosity of Bill and Connie Barclay, and the admonishments of my dear colleague, Ofelia Miramontes, ringing in my ears, I helped create the Miramontes Doctoral Scholars program, which profoundly enhanced the diversity of our PhD program. Led by Margaret Eisenhart, the faculty developed the full-time, cohort-based doctoral program that, today, enhances cross-program-area connections. I supported Bethy Leonardi and Sara Staley in their founding of A Queer Endeavor, which has helped thousands of educators learn how to provide safe and nurturing learning environments for LGBTQ+ students and their families. And, I recruited Ben Kirshner and Roudy Hildreth to conceive and then build CU Engage, which brings together programs where student learning in academic coursework is integrated with experiential learning in reciprocal, community-based partnerships.”

Now in retirement, what have you had time to grow and cherish?

Lorrie Shepard with her daughter and granddaughters.

“I haven’t been 100 percent successful at retirement, as I am still chairing two committees for the National Academy of Education, and I continue to advocate for policy changes against high-stakes accountability testing and in favor of professional development to support formative assessment embedded in interactive, dialogic instructional practices. Happily, Jim and I have been able to spend more time with our five grandchildren. We had visits from our two granddaughters this summer. I took care of 5-year-old Rosie every day while her parents worked remotely; she loves swimming and hates sunscreen, so that meant indoor pools almost every day. Fourteen-year-old Io came with her best friend for the first time since COVID-19; their first request was that we go to the Animal Sanctuary, (even more important than shopping for school clothes). Following the annual American Educational Research Association meeting, I’ve been able to spend about 4 hours per day gardening. Gardening an acre is like painting the Golden Gate Bridge. By the time all the pruning and weeding is done in each area, it’s time to start again.”

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From Columbine to CU �鶹ӰԺ

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

From Columbine to CU �鶹ӰԺ Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Dan Strain

How this teacher educator supports future teachers in the face of school violence

Deena Gumina at the Columbine Memorial next to Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado.

Deena Gumina was in elementary school in 1999 when a mass shooting at Columbine High School devastated her hometown of Littleton, Colorado and shook the nation. Two decades later, gun violence has become increasingly common, particularly altering U.S. schools and the lives of educators.

Gumina (PhDEdu’21, MEdu’15, elementary licensure, 2012) graduated from Columbine High School and taught elementary school in Denver before becoming assistant teaching professor in the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education, where she sees the emotional toll that gun violence has had on her students as future teachers. Yet, she sees room for hope and change.

Why speak out about challenges aspiring teachers face?

My students came into class the morning after there was a gun-related incident near campus in �鶹ӰԺ. They were scared and not sure what to do. I didn't know what to say. My students were looking to me to say, ‘It's going to be okay.’ But I don't know that. I don't know that they will be safe in their jobs.

How does violence affect your students?

Some students have been in active shooter situations themselves. All of them have been in shooter drills. This has been their reality for their entire educational lives. It’s not new, but it's also impossible to normalize.

We’re all expected to hold this space for our students when we can't even hold it for ourselves: I'm here to be a safe space for you, but I don't feel safe myself. It’s event after event, and there’s never enough time to recover.

How has gun violence in school changed your life?

I was in third grade during the shooting at Columbine, but I have vivid memories of that day. That was the first time many people understood that this could happen.
It landed on me then, and it lands on me now. I felt it again every time I would do an active shooter drill with my students, because I knew this was real.

Have school shootings shifted how we prepare teachers?

I’m preparing students for a job that we see over and over again is under attack on many levels. It’s not just that your job is hard. Your job can also be dangerous, and that can color everything we do.

Students have to come into class and think about: ‘What would I do if this happened? Where would I put my children? Where would I hide myself? How would I lock the door? Could we get out the window?’

That was really hard for me when I was a teacher. Now it’s equally hard as a teacher educator looking at my college students and telling them, ‘Unfortunately, this is part of the job, even though it shouldn’t be.’

What gives you hope amid horrific events?

There is so much hope in the youth, among our college and high school students. In March, students in Denver took their mental health day to protest at the Colorado State Capitol (following local gun violence). They are not okay with this. It’s not a hypothetical situation for them in the way I think it is for many of the adults who make policy decisions.

Students here at the university and those who are facing this in high school are so strong and resilient. It’s time that adults show up for them. It’s not enough to just be sad anymore.

How are teachers taking action?

I think action is possible if we continue to show up. It's my job to show up for my college students. It's my college students’ job to show up for their elementary students. There is power in numbers, and there are many of us who feel this deeply and urgently.

That’s the message that I try to send to my students about everything they are up against in schools: If you don't like it, work to change it.

Assistant Teaching Professor Deena Gumina supports future teachers in the face of school violence.

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The complexity of “trauma” in trauma-responsive teaching

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

The complexity of “trauma” in trauma-responsive teaching Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Elizabeth Dutro , Erica Caasi

Hard, challenging, difficult. Painful, disorienting, life-altering. There are so many words we reach for in response to the difficult experiences of life. We feel how words fail, how they are all inadequate. None can capture a story of loss and hurt in the way it is felt and held in the body.

If this is true for all forms of expression in the face of hardship and suffering, it is certainly true of the word trauma itself, the term most often used to capture those experiences. Attention to trauma in educational policy and practice has grown exponentially in recent years and, as we have explored with teacher colleagues in K–12 classrooms, “trauma” is a term ripe with potential to accelerate justice and fuel oppression in schools and classrooms.

As educators, we know that vibrant learning is fueled when children feel that their lived stories—of joy, pain, oppression, identities, connections to family and community histories—are seen, heard and valued as a source of knowledge and resource for learning. Experiences, from the hard to the celebratory, matter in classrooms. Yet, holding that commitment doesn’t alone ensure students’ lives get to matter in ways that honor and humanize their experiences. Here, we share some reflections about what stories of challenging life experiences urge us to consider about the complexities of trauma in classrooms.

Why is it so important to recognize the complexity of the word trauma and how it is used in relation to students in schools? That word is always heavy with the certainty of hard things, hurt, loss, pain, despair, violence, oppression, to name but a few of the experiences it might suggest. Because it is a word often laden with assumptions and a vast range of experiences, the risks of oversimplifying or emphasizing some impacts over others can be consequential for students.

We can consider the multiple dimensions of trauma in relation to schools, including:

trauma as personal and shared;
trauma as part of the human condition and systemically targeted; and
trauma as carried into schools and inflicted by schools and systems of schooling.

For example, the COVID-19 pandemic was a shared trauma across all students and families, while individual families experienced loss and fear in specific, personal ways. We can also agree that no one gets through life unscathed. Human bodies are finite and fragile, so loss and grief and physical and emotional pain happens in all lives, in some form. However, many traumas, including the pandemic, illustrate how trauma is targeted, arising from oppressive systems of societies and institutions that create or exacerbate pain, loss and struggle.
Many approaches to trauma in relation to schools focus on trauma as issues that are carried into schools. However, there is too often less emphasis on how schooling inflicts trauma on students.

Black, Brown, indigenous and queer students are far more likely to experience targeted trauma or institutional harm. Layered into these complexities is the risk that centering trauma can feed false narratives of damage about students, exacerbating the histories of toxic deficit myths that are pervasive in U.S. schooling.

Without a doubt, justice-centered, compassionate approaches to trauma can and do exist in schools. However, the policy push to center trauma in schools demands that we contend with the risks embedded in well-meaning attention to trauma and sharpen our vigilance and explicit attention to anti-oppressive practices. We can never fully know the depth and breadth of others’ lives, but we can commit to honoring the sources of knowledge children bring to their learning. We can respond with love, advocacy and tangible actions toward the schools students deserve.

This essay is excerpted from Dutro, E., Caasi, E. (May 2022). “The Complexities of Trauma in Responsive Teaching.” Language Arts. Vol. 99, Iss. 5

Elizabeth Dutro is Professor of Literacy Studies, Associate Dean of Faculty in the School of Education, and author of the book, The Vulnerable Heart of Literacy. Erica Caasi (PhdEdu’23) is an alumna of the PhD program in Literacy Studies.

Professor Elizabeth Dutro and alumna Erica Caasi discuss the multiple dimensions of trauma in schools.

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Game-Changer

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

Game-Changer Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Hannah Fletcher

How an NBA star, alumna, teachers and others are centering mental wellness in schools

Professional basketball player Kevin Love remembers lying on the training room floor, heart pounding, after leaving his bewildered Cleveland Cavaliers in the middle of a televised game.

Emotions, heartbreak and challenges are all part of the human experience and modeling helps illustrate that for students, and it also welcomes them to talk about those feelings and emotions in the classroom,” Ellie Haberl Foster said. “When their stories are met with an empathetic witness in their teacher, it encourages them to continue to open up and share.”

On the surface, the NBA star had “made it” in life and was at peak physical health. On that day in 2017, with his trainer repeatedly asking “what do you need?” it became clear that mental health challenges can happen to anyone at any time.

After his public panic attack, the basketball power forward could have stayed silent about the anxiety that has plagued him since his early teens, but he shared his story in the media as an attempt to destigmatize mental health struggles. Support letters came pouring in, especially from young people.

Love launched the Kevin Love Fund in 2018 to use education, research, grants and advocacy to support people, youth in particular, who are suffering. The centerpiece of the foundation is a free curriculum for middle and high school teachers that was co-designed by Ellie Haberl Foster (PhDEdu’19), the foundation’s co-director of education.

The 18-lesson program assists educators in modeling vulnerability and works with students to express their emotions through multimodal creative projects while also learning skills that support their mental health, Foster said.

Within the flexible curriculum teachers have a deep bench of supporters. It opens with Love’s story alongside other videos from youth and guest artists—including actor Bryan Cranston, basketball player Chris Paul and other famed performers—sharing their nuanced strategies for mental wellness.

Students report that modeling from their teachers and others help them express vulnerabilities and feel a sense of belonging, Foster said.

“Emotions, heartbreak and challenges are all part of the human experience and modeling helps illustrate that for students, and it also welcomes them to talk about those feelings and emotions in the classroom,” she said. “When their stories are met with an empathetic witness in their teacher, it encourages them to continue to open up and share.”

Foster is no stranger to this teaching method. As a high school English teacher, she remembers reading an emotional poem about her father that unlocked deeper levels of vulnerability in her students’ work and classroom connections. Her powerful teaching experiences led her to the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education to work with her advisor Elizabeth Dutro in the Literacy Studies doctoral program.

The Kevin Love Fund team including Executive Director Regina Miller, Co-Director of Education and CU �鶹ӰԺ Alumna Ellie Haberl Foster (top right), Kevin Love and Co-Director of Education Sara Hahn.

“Elizabeth’s work is about making school spaces where people feel seen, cared for, nurtured and supported—where students and teachers can bring their whole selves,” Foster said. “Her cutting-edge research challenges the notion that students who have experienced trauma or difficulty are broken and need to be healed and the deficit perspectives that often surround students’ vulnerable stories.

“Our training helps teachers learn a new way of thinking about difficult life experiences—that students can bring these stories to their writing and art and that teachers can model this by sharing their own stories of difficult life experiences.”

Foster is grateful for Dutro’s compassionate mentorship, and she sees her work as an opportunity to share what she learned from Dutro with educators nationwide. The alignment with Love’s mission is kismet.

The Kevin Love Fund is the athlete’s response to the question left echoing in his ears following his panic attack: what do you need? With help from Foster and others, the foundation offers the kind of educational support that Love needed as a youth. Since the curriculum’s launch in September 2022, it has reached over 30,000 students with more than 80% saying they are more likely to reach out to a teacher if they are struggling.

“We have hundreds of stories of kids who talked about what a game-changer this was for them,” Foster said. “We also did focus groups with teachers, who said things like, ‘I saw a reduction in bullying, not just in my own classroom, but in our whole school.’

“We think about this as a paradigm shift in what school can be. There are still norms that make kids think school is a place for thinking not feeling, but our curriculum helps students to know that you can bring your whole self into the classroom. You don’t have to pretend if you're going through something. That message is such a relief for teachers and students.”

How an NBA star, alumna, teachers and others are centering mental wellness in schools.

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On the Shoulders of Giants

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

On the Shoulders of Giants Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Building namesakes opened doors for so many

The new name for the School of Education’s renovated building honors the rich legacies of two pioneers in education who have transformed educational practices and advanced equity and justice: Ofelia Miramontes and Leonard Baca.

Last year, the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education embarked on an historic opportunity to rename its new campus home. A committee of alumni, students, donors, staff and faculty thoughtfully reviewed around 40 submissions to select the building’s new name, the Ofelia Miramontes and Leonard Baca Education Building.

“The name has so much meaning for our school,” said Dean Kathy Schultz. “As mentors, leaders and teachers, Ofelia and Leonard opened doors for countless educators and students of color, modeling new ways of being scholars and activists that remain important to us all.”

The name was approved by the Board of Regents and new signage installed earlier this year. As students repeatedly hear and see the Miramontes Baca name—from classes to course schedules or homecoming events—they will be reminded of the compassionate mentorship and progressive scholarship that Miramontes and Baca, and those who followed, represent.

Ofelia Miramontes was a beloved and respected professor and a pioneering bilingual education scholar. She grew up in San Diego, California, where she developed the first federally funded bilingual education program for the city. In Colorado, she was instrumental in creating bilingual programs at elementary schools.

Miramontes was CU �鶹ӰԺ’s first Associate Vice Chancellor for Diversity, long before many other higher education institutions had elevated such critical work. She created the CU-LEAD Alliance and an undergraduate scholarship program for first-generation college students and students of color. After her passing, a fellowship program for historically underrepresented education doctoral students was established in her name.

Miramontes’ legacy lives on through the students, educators and communities who have benefited from her research, mentorship and leadership. Her vision embodied and exemplified justice principles in ways that continue to enrich and influence the School of Education and campus perspectives today.

Diverse nominations of Leonard Baca painted a beautiful picture of a well-regarded researcher in the field that he initiated, earning him the title of “father of bilingual special education.” The area addresses the overrepresentation of emergent bilingual children in special education classes as well as misunderstandings of the differences between language and learning issues.

Baca, who grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, co-authored the seminal textbook, “The Bilingual Special Education Interface,” which has been touted as the central work at the nexus of bilingual and special education. He was hired as an assistant professor in 1974, and the following year, he conceptualized and created the BUENO Center for Multicultural Education, the School of Education’s first research center.

In the decades that followed, Baca and the BUENO Center generated over $100 million in grants and created critical programs to support educators and provide access to education for students from historically marginalized communities seeking GEDs to PhDs.

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Kabby Hong

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

Kabby Hong Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Hannah Fletcher

Alumnus using Teacher of the Year platform to fight for Asian American-inclusive education.

Kabby Hong grew up in a small town in Missouri, where he was the only Asian American as the son of South Korean immigrants. He did not like feeling different, and like many first-generation Americans, he did not see his experiences reflected in school.

“When you're the only (one), you kind of stick out, and when you're a kid, you don't want to stick out,” he said.

Today, as Wisconsin’s first Asian American Teacher of the Year, the CU �鶹ӰԺ alumnus is more comfortable standing out and publicly advocating for more diverse, enriching curricula.

Hong’s journey to teaching and advocacy was a winding one.

An English teacher “opened up a whole different world” for him when she recommended he enter his essay in a statewide contest—and it won. That encouragement sent Hong on a path toward journalism and a successful early career in corporate public relations before he felt the call to teach.

“I knew that I wanted a profession that contributed to society, and I also wanted to be around the energy of young people,” he said.

Attracted to CU �鶹ӰԺ’s reputation and its Master’s Plus (MA+) Teacher Licensure program, Hong graduated in 2001 with an MA+ in secondary English teaching. He secured a position in a sought-after middle school in Colorado before moving to Wisconsin and teaching English at Verona Area High School for the past 20 years.

My curriculum is 180 degrees different (than at the start of my career). It has to do with feeling more confident, but it’s also about growing with the kids. They are always ready for conversations about identity, and diversity is something they don't question. I love that teaching allows you to evolve, professionally and personally."

In 2021, Hong discovered he was one of the state’s Teachers of the Year amid a year characterized by the COVID-19 pandemic. He recalls ignoring a Zoom-meeting invite from someone he didn’t recognize, because the meeting was in the middle of his 3rd period teaching students in person and online. Then his principal called saying he needed to join the meeting and sent a colleague to cover class.

Hong ducked into the hall and joined the meeting from his phone to find his principal, superintendent and the state superintendent waiting.

“I was like ‘Oh my god, what is happening?’” he recalled. “The state superintendent congratulated me on being the Wisconsin Teacher of the Year on a call on my phone in the hallway all by myself. It’s the pandemic (experience) all rolled up into one.”

The pandemic also ushered in increased hate crimes and discrimination toward Asian Americans, and Hong used his platform to raise awareness about this troubling trend.

His work focuses on the lack of visibility for Asian Americans as authors, historical figures and contributors to American life in schools and its direct connection to intolerance toward Asian American communities.

Hong was selected from the small group of Teachers of the Year to represent his state and his work on the national stage. Last year, he attended the coveted National Teacher of the Year gathering in Washington D.C., his first time traveling since the start of the pandemic. He joined a diverse, supportive cohort of educators.

“It was surreal,” Hong said. “Teachers are emotional people, and I think all of us had been in our own little bubbles for too long. To be able to be in a community of people where we were joyful with each other was incredibly rewarding.”

Back home, Hong continues to fight for change. He is part of a coalition seeking state legislation that would require Asian American history be taught in Wisconsin schools. Similar laws have passed or are under review in other states.

Hong is proud of the ways his curriculum has expanded with his students’ desires. His AP class once featured almost exclusively white male authors from the canon—Shakespeare, Steinbeck, Orwell—and it mirrored literature selections from his rural upbringing.

“My curriculum is 180 degrees different (than at the start of my career),” he said. “It has to do with feeling more confident, but it’s also about growing with the kids. They are always ready for conversations about identity, and diversity is something they don't question.

“I love that teaching allows you to evolve, professionally and personally.”

Alumnus using Teacher of the Year platform to fight for Asian American-inclusive education.

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Intertwined

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 07:00:00 +0000

Intertwined Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/04/2023 - 00:00

Hannah Fletcher

The power and possibilities of interlacing healing justice and education

“Don’t let them see you cry—it will make you seem weak.”
“I learned to police myself.”
“I tended to my body only when it could no longer carry me.”

These are some of the experiences that women of color reported to a team of education scholars about what they heard, felt and then embodied while navigating higher education.

“These are the dominant narratives in graduate schools—these are not individual experiences. We see it across institutions and in the literature,” said Susan Jurow, CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education professor of learning sciences and human development. “Based on what we know about learning, you are not going to learn in that kind of environment.”

Led by CU �鶹ӰԺ alumnae Liz Mendoza and the late Christina Paguyo (both PhDEdu’14) and University of Pennsylvania collaborator Krista Cortes, Jurow joined the Healing, Empowerment and Love (HEAL) team to counter these narratives and transform graduate school experiences for women of color.

The HEAL co-founders know these experiences all too well, and through the program, they aim to use their experiences, scholarship and agency to change it.

Trusting intuition

From an early age, Mendoza felt a calling to become a Curandera, a traditional Mexican healing art, but she dismissed those urges until her graduate school tribulations triggered her body’s distress signals—headaches, illness, vertigo.

At the time, she felt disconnected from her true self in an effort to fit into the expectations of the academy. Her mentor reminded Mendoza that her body holds knowledge. Though she was studying learning theories, she had not fully appreciated the knowledge her body could teach her.

Mendoza followed her instincts and dove into her healing art, or Curanderismo. Today, her mind-body-spirit connection is intertwined with her scholarship, her work at the Council on Foundations and the HEAL program.

“Now when I do healing and energy work or even in my everyday life, I rely on the mind-body-spirit alignment in the decisions I make,” she said. “I call it my superpower—my intuition is my superpower.”

Now when I do healing and energy work or even in my everyday life, I rely on the mind-body-spirit alignment in the decisions I make. I call it my superpower—my intuition is my superpower."

Mendoza and HEAL co-founders aim to foster academic and racial healing by exploring ways to connect women with their intuition and inner strength and increase interconnectedness with themselves, each other and Mother Earth.

HEAL intentionally designs educational spaces for women of color, who are disproportionately underrepresented in graduate-degree attainment when compared with white counterparts. Across the program’s multiple iterations, Mendoza and Jurow have witnessed that “when given the space to be whole, radical new ways of being, doing and knowing racial and gender equity can emerge,” they write.

Systems need to change

The co-founders believe in breaking faulty systems rather than its people, and they hope healing work in higher education could have a ripple effect throughout educational systems.

The timing is ripe as schools and universities are increasingly focused on wellness. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, 70% of public schools reported an increase in students seeking schools’ mental health services, yet only 56% strongly or moderately agreed they can effectively support students, according to the U.S. Department of Education data.

Nearly half, 46%, of public schools added or expanded social, emotional well-being programming, and many states, including Colorado, passed legislation allowing mental health days as excusable absences.

However, researchers like Jurow believe that if wellness initiatives are not structured into educational policies and practices, they are not complex enough to address the emotional toll on marginalized students and educators, who face racism and mental health disparities.

Jurow’s work explores how disrupting systemic forms of oppression requires educational systems to recognize the full humanity of students, staff and faculty by honoring lived experiences, building community and cultivating social imaginations.

Youth-led healing justice

Ben Kirshner, CU �鶹ӰԺ professor of learning sciences and human development, notes that the focus on mental health in schools, while important, tends to focus on individuals rather than community or intergenerational healing.

Meanwhile, educators can learn from the community and youth activists who have been organizing around what some are calling healing justice, first coined by Cara Page and the Kindred Southern Healing Justice Collective.

“Healing justice connotes the idea that as we’re working on social change as activists, we are also wanting to take care of ourselves—to heal—along the way,” Kirshner said. “We’re trying to embody the world we want to see through activism in our interactions with each other.

“For educators and youth workers, it also means responding to mental health symptoms such as stress, depression or anxiety not only as a problem of the individual student, but as linked to historical and structural factors, such as intergenerational trauma or institutional racism.”

Kirshner is partnering with Solicia Lopez, Lex Hunter, Beatriz Salazar-Medina and youth activists on the Voices of Healing project, which supports youth organizations engaged in healing justice work by co-designing healing resources with and for young people.

The power of community-building

Hunter, a CU �鶹ӰԺ doctoral student in educational foundations, policy and practice, is no stranger to the power of youth voice at the intersection of activism and well-being. Her research explores how marginalized youth use social media to build community, engage in healing practices and dream about new worlds.

As an undergraduate student at University of Missouri-Columbia, Hunter was part of student-led activism around the hashtag #BlackatMizzou. The university, which is 6% Black, has a history of anti-Black practices as well as Black activism, or Blacktivism. The hashtag allowed Black students, faculty, staff and alumni to share their experiences while calling for university-policy changes.

“The main goal was to care for each other,” Hunter said. “If other people outside witnessed it, that was cool, but the hashtag was really about us and creating a digital counterspace where we could be transparent about our experiences.”

Hunter, who’s a triplet, saw her siblings face similar oppressive experiences at their respective universities. As a striving scholar-activist, she came to terms with the idea that her long-term healing is “constrained without the transformation of systems,” she said.

“If you’re experiencing systemic oppression like racism, homophobia, sexism or ableism every day, you need systems to change alongside healing,” she said. “There’s no end date when you’re going through something that is rooted in the fabric of how the country thrives and operates, and you cannot engage in longstanding healing until that thing is removed.”

Micro-affirmations are a way to care for each other in the everyday while we also dream up new ways for the institution to be, new ways for ourselves to be and new ways for the world to be."

Radical rest and micro-affirmations

That harsh fact allowed Hunter to give herself and other activists grace while working toward change. Rest and love are radical forms of healing for historically excluded communities while navigating a culture that thrives on productivity, she said.

“Micro-affirmations are a way to care for each other in the everyday while we also dream up new ways for the institution to be, new ways for ourselves to be and new ways for the world to be,” she said.

Hunter studies and prioritizes everyday rituals of care—like eating together, listening to music, praying together and being in nature, she said.

A former high school teacher, she has seen these practices in her students, and she believes many teachers can and are incorporating them into classrooms. Practices like breathing techniques, checking in and shifting class content when something significant is happening in the world can be interlaced with classroom content.

“In those moments, we remember we're not in this struggle alone,” Hunter said. “I find great joy and responsibility in knowing that I'm a part of this long line of educators, abolitionists, scholars, community organizers and people who are committed to everyday practices of care.”

Listening to the body

Kachine Kulick, a doctoral candidate in Teacher Learning, Research and Practice, is also committed to the struggle required of lasting change. She came to CU �鶹ӰԺ to study whiteness, eager to loosen white supremacy’s grip on education—what she embraces as her “soul contract” work.

A former teacher who grew up in a small Pennsylvania town, Kulick acknowledges anti-racism work is a life-long practice. When curiosity about those most implicated in anti-racism work arise, she remains anchored by the wisdom of Black, Indigenous and Brown elders and colleagues, including a friend who said, “we got us; you need to take care of your people.”

Early in her doctoral studies, Kulick was introduced to the rich possibilities of somatic practices as an important resource for anti-racism and abolition in the classroom through the transformative work of scholar and activist Resmaa Menakem.

Somatics is about listening to your body and what it’s telling you in those moments of discomfort or openness,” she said. “It’s about noticing your patterns—to either sit with discomfort or shift it."

“Somatics is about listening to your body and what it’s telling you in those moments of discomfort or openness,” she said. “It’s about noticing your patterns—to either sit with discomfort or shift it.

“This work comes from legacies of folks of color doing this work out of necessity and survival. For me, I heed the often uncomfortable—but necessary—call to sit with and alongside other white-bodied folks, so that we may develop the somatic capacities to engage in conversations about anti-Blackness and racism when they arise. I am called to galvanize the power of truth, not from shame, but as a sacred responsibility for our collective freedom.”

A new take on teaching

Kulick partnered with Ashley Cartun, director of teacher education, to revamp the “Step Up to Social Justice” required course for first-year elementary education students.

While education courses often intellectualize about race, class, gender and sexuality, this course centered on a social-emotional and embodied understanding of justice through somatic practices, like pausing and listening to the body.

“I noticed what I call ‘little subtle shifts’ of embodiment,” Kulick said. “During moments of charge, teacher candidates used somatic practices in class and in their dorm rooms with their roommates.”

Though it was only a start, Kulick noticed a “softening” and “stamina” in conversations about white supremacy rather than dismissal and defensiveness. The course revealed the potential of somatic practices for future teachers to connect with themselves and their students through “pausing and slowing things down”—practices they noted they would use in their classrooms.

Interweaving healing and education

Kulick, Hunter and the next generation of scholars bring hope for people like Kirshner, Jurow and Mendoza.

The co-founders of HEAL say they are learning from each iteration of the program, as they explore different tools and traditions for healing in education.

“Everyone brings multiple strengths, and we are learning from each participant,” Mendoza said. “There are so many different modalities, we invite them to share and we try to expose them to what might work for them…

“By paying attention to the body, learning from Mother Earth and sharing our experiences, we are reframing (education) toward possibility. If we could each walk in our own light, if we are strong in our own light, that is how we heal.”

The Art of Healing

Coming from a family of musicians, Marlene Palomar knows the healing power of creativity.

A first-generation college student who grew up in Denver’s racially diverse Montbello neighborhood, Palomar studies the intersection of race, mental health and education. She often uses music and poetry to process trauma.

She is a CU �鶹ӰԺ doctoral student and graduate research assistant for the Lyripeutics Storytelling project with Learning Sciences Assistant Professor Kalonji Nzinga and school partners in her home district. The project investigates how learning environments can facilitate opportunities for BIPOC youth to learn and share wellness narratives as they use hip hop and artistic expression to explore their community cultural wealth.

As Lyripeutics teachers and students create art and reimagine schooling, Palomar sees activities that are very different from her schooling experiences in the same district.

“We're talking about culture and educational experiences, and that's something that I had been missing from my education,” she said. “I went to a very underfunded school, and a lot of times I was craving so much more from my education.

“I am excited to be part of (Lyripeutics), because this is my community. This is my district where my little cousins, neighbors and just people in general deserve an education that is centered on our community and knowledge. It is fun and enriching.”

Palomar said young people can take some time to open up, so she models sharing her story—which includes a lack of educational experiences and offerings at her school, systemic barriers and racist environments and interactions.

She has often experienced and witnessed trauma, yet she believes art and healing have so much potential.

“Like in music, I see (healing) as waves, and there are different things that we’re healing with and from,” Palomar said. “We’re able to add to current healing practices and add to certain strands of those healing waves.

“I don't see healing as one thing, but multiple waves that are in conversation with each other through time and community.”

The power and possibilities of interlacing healing justice and education.

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