A people without knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.

—Marcus Garvey, Jamaican political activist

Roots are the lifeline of a plant. They provide an anchor so that the plant can resist the forces of wind and flow of water or mud. From the soil, the root system moves oxygen, water, and nutrients to the plant. Roots also stimulate and support microorganisms in the soil that benefit plant life and prevent soil erosion. In this chapter, we share ways to become anchored in antiracism so that you are empowered, committed, consistent, and persistent.

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Amy, White Mom of Five

I have always been a bit of a history nerd: not the war, dates, and battlefield kind but rather the one who connects people to a place or home. I grew up watching This Old House on Saturday mornings and walking through Detroit's historic home tours with my parents. Connecting with my family and where we have lived has always been important and interesting to me. So when I was reading Carol Anderson's book White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide (2016), I was surprised to hear a story that happened in Black Bottom, an area in Detroit that I had never heard of. This area was home to a large Black community in Detroit. It had hotels, bowling alleys, bars, swanky supper clubs, and a few greasy spoons. This area in the early 1900s was also home to many immigrant families before most of them moved out in the 1930s. It made me wonder where my family lived in Detroit at that time.

With the help of my dad, I started checking census records for my family's addresses. My family immigrated to the United States in the late 1800s and early 1920s from Germany. When I started to map out where my family lived in relation to Black Bottom, I realized that one set of my great-grandparents lived there. I was shocked. I had no idea that my history was also part of the history of this community. While doing this research I found redlined maps of Detroit. Redlining is the discriminatory practice of denying services (typically financial) to residents of certain areas based on their race or ethnicity. Black Bottom was designated red, and therefore Black people in this community could not get mortgages and had to rent dilapidated apartments and homes—sometimes with multiple families. This made it impossible for them to gain equity and save for owning their own home. However, the census revealed to me that my White great-grandparents did own their own home and were able to move to a nicer area of town not long after living in Black Bottom.

Because my great-grandparents were able to move within the city, this made it possible for my grandparents and parents to move out of the city and into the suburbs. They could not have done this if they had not been able to accrue some wealth through homeownership. My White immigrant family was given access to many resources in the city that Black families who had lived in the city for generations were not able to get and would take years to acquire. I had to start seeing the history of my family through the lens of systemic racism and how they benefited from that very system. They were able to assimilate into Whiteness and therefore were able to live in a way that their Black counterparts were not allowed. I have great respect for my ancestors and all that they accomplished but it would be wrong not to see their stories in light of all the other stories lived—stories of exclusion, segregation, hatred, and even violence.

While I was now seeing my story impacted by race and immigration policies from a bird's-eye view, I turned the lens inward on my own heart and mind. I was trying to be more aware of my own internal bias and bring it out into the open so that I could change the ways I had been conditioned to think of others. I started at Target.

One day, pulling into the parking lot, I noticed a Black woman dressed really chic with great shoes and a handbag. Instantly I thought, “How did she get that?”

Whoa! Where did that come from? I had to admit that part of me was jealous and that I didn't really believe that this woman was worthy of having those things if I didn't have them myself. I call this internalized thinking racist ugly. I have hundreds of racist ugly moments that happen daily that I could share. I know that we are able as human beings to make new paths in our brains and change the way we think. I wanted to try out an experiment. So I went back to Target.

As I walked around Target and saw a Black person in the aisle, I would smile and say in my head, You are my family. For me, family is very important. Family is who you root for, who you love, who you protect and care for, who you advocate for, who you laugh with and see fully. So I would go to the next aisle and do the same thing: see a Black person and say in my head, You are my family. After doing this many times on different trips to stores, I felt my heart change. I realized that I had not been truly seeing other people as simply my siblings. “You are my family” has truly changed me.

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Recall the teacher leader we mentioned in Chapter 1, who wanted measurable outcomes or fruit without the benefit of growing a root structure. Roots are the lifeline of a plant or tree. Without a strong root system, trees have no anchor, cannot mature to bear fruit, and cannot withstand adverse winds. Furthermore, roots are a place to store nutrients during times of drought, heat, cold, and virus. When we don't invest in developing a healthy root structure, we potentially set ourselves up to experience several setbacks and backslide when challenges come our way.

For cultivating justice and belonging, developing a healthy root structure entails understanding contributing systemic injustice and exclusionary policies and practices. For example, when we have working knowledge of how and why our communities, schools, classrooms, and districts became racially segregated and how they can consistently perpetuate inequality, we know where to enact change. Building racial competency is key to developing a root structure. Amy's story is a great example of how to examine your root structure.

Dr. Ali Michael (2016) of the Penn Center for the Study of Race and Equity in Education defines racial competence as having the skill and attitude required to do the following:

1. Develop and maintain healthy cross-racial relationships
2. Notice and analyze racial dynamics
3. Confront racism in the environment and in oneself

Although we are all racialized or socialized into racial groups, most of us are not encouraged to become racially competent. In fact, within the colorblind or race-blind framework, we are not allowed or equipped to recognize the historical social context that informs our current circumstances. Building racial competence allows us to understand, for example, how many of us continue to live in segregated neighborhoods several decades after President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1965, which legally ended the segregation institutionalized by Jim Crow laws, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which ended discrimination in renting and selling homes.

Building racial competency does not have to feel like walking through a land mine wrought with heated debate and explosive discussions as is often anticipated. Amy began as a participant in an introductory-level onboarding course. The course, What LIES Between Us–Fostering First Steps Toward Racial Healing (Berry, 2016) was designed to equip learners with history, context, and an analytical framework for examining race/ism in the United States. Course modules guide learners on a journey to discover the roles that pseudoscience, false narratives (or “lies” as implied in the course title), public policies, immigration, racial ignorance, and brain bias played in inventing, normalizing, and maintaining the concept of race and racial inequity.

Ultimately, in this course, Amy was equipped with a historical, political, and social context for understanding race/ism and how it is sustained. Through the educational content and reflective practices, she was able to build a sound knowledge base and expand her perspective beyond the popular uninformed, anecdotal conversations around racism. For example, in understanding that people are not inherently a “race” but over time are racialized, learners are more eager to abdicate from adhering to racist ideology as natural. Instead, they ascribe to dismantling contrived racial misconceptions and injustice. By the end of the course, learners—BIPOC and White—express being both disturbed and relieved to understand the pervasive, systemic modality of racism. In other words, though racism has shaped systems and mindsets, both can be transformed. During the course, because their racial experiences are viewed within a factual, historical context, some African American learners have expressed they feel seen and validated. Most White learners are grateful to uncover what had been hidden from them by White supremacy ideology, meritocracy, denial, and colorblindness. One White male student notably shared that he felt “corrected and respected.”

During the What LIES Between Us course, after learning a great deal of history regarding the beliefs, policies, and practices that solidified race into our national conscience, Chapter Six - Disrupting Lies, Living Truth of the study guide asks learners, “Where do you see yourself in the race story?” Amy then took the responsibility to learn how the history of immigration and racist policies formed social and economic mobility for her own family. Learning how policies inform practice and behavior equipped Amy with a critical lens. She clearly saw how her great-grandparents were invited to belong to an expanding economic opportunity, while their proximate African American peers were intentionally excluded. Amy took the responsibility to engage in heart work. She acknowledged how government sanctioned segregation shaped her perception of Black people. Though often subconscious, conformity to racist ideology dehumanizes us. Because she was honest with herself, she was able to address harmful biases and transform her thinking. In doing so, she restored her own humanity. Amy is an informed and empowered decision-maker. Her motivation for change is understood within our collective national story.

Our efforts to heal ourselves, our schools, and communities must be relational and transformative, not trendy or transactional. Our motivation and actions have to extend beyond the performance of displaying a stack of books featuring BIPOC lead characters or written by BIPOC authors. We cannot be satisfied with diversity in media representation or a racially diverse student population. If you are engaging in cultivating justice and belonging simply because it feels like the right thing to do or it is popular, as soon as you experience resistance from a peer, parent, or teacher you will find it easier to quit.

When you begin to see and understand how racism as an ideology and institution has shaped public policy and personal practices, the next step is to find your personal story within the story. It may be challenging to understand how race-based and immigration policies and social practices shaped your life, but awareness is necessary for your freedom. Think about when you pose for a group photo. When you look at the photo, where do you look first? You look at yourself first. You take account of how you look. Likewise, when we see the picture of our nation's history of structural racial injustice, we must zoom in and look at ourselves within the racialized context. For example, when people fail to examine Whiteness as an arbitrarily determined identity, they subsequently fail to view racism as belonging to White bodies and White spaces but instead perceive it to be a Black problem. Understanding that racism, though crippling to everyone, is a product of Whiteness is fundamental to knowing what needs to be dismantled.

When first realizing the truth about the racist and exclusionary policies and practices of the United States, it is tempting to dismiss it as a bygone era where “those White people back then did those things, which we no longer do.” But when we see ourselves in the picture as heirs of their choices, we are able to make connections. We see how we live in and with the choices they made. We see how we've been shaped by their ideas and practices. We understand that we do not have to perpetuate their errors. We feel empowered to make different choices. If they were able to create systems that harmed people, certainly we are able to create systems and practices that cherish people.

As we explore racial identity or learn about our racial selves, we ask: Who am I as a raced person? How do I connect to my race? Socialization feeds our racial selves. Therefore, we can ask: How have inside forces (family, friends, parents), and outside forces (media, books, acquaintances, strangers) shaped what I believe about myself and others? As Beverly Tatum shares in her book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? (1997/2017), we have been socialized to believe things about racial others that are often stereotypical, and most times incomplete. If we live in racially homogeneous communities, we get secondhand information about racial groups via the news or social media or the story from our friend's babysitter's husband. If we don't have any factual knowledge or lived experience in our schemata to challenge the information, such stories resonate as true. So ask yourself: Where are my roots in my racial schemata?

As you notice and analyze racial dynamics, past and present, you will experience cognitive dissonance, which may feel uncomfortable. But discomfort due to growth is good. Take the time to examine your discomfort. Examine the source. For example, if you feel defensive, ask yourself why. What is triggering you? What are you afraid of? What happens after this moment can either allow you to develop your roots or stunt your growth. We see this discomfort pushing back on a national stage through the manufactured fear and debate around critical race theory (CRT) and book banning. The murder of George Floyd by Derek Chauvin violently shook our country and the world in a way that awakened a realization of our collective humanity. Corporations, small businesses, churches, school districts, and homes committed themselves to identifying and changing harmful and oppressive practices, and engaged in learning about race/ism. We believe that the massive movement toward antiracism education and antiracist action occurred too rapidly for some people, who saw this movement as forced transparency, increased accountability, and ultimately, a threat to their social power. We believe that fear filled the chasm between growth toward antiracism and complicity with the racial status quo.

Author and scholar Carol Anderson attributes this type of forward movement backlash to what she calls White rage. In a 2021 Vox interview, Dr. Anderson expressed, “When Black Americans in particular make strides toward equality, the determined hand of White supremacy pushes back.” White supremacy is the ideology that White people and the ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions of White people are superior to people of color and their ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions. There are people who truly believe that White people are inherently superior; therefore, BIPOC liberation and progress feels like a threat to their existence. Anderson (2016) writes in her book White Rage:

The trigger for White rage, inevitably, is Black advancement. It is not the mere presence of Black people that is the problem; rather, it is blackness with ambition, with drive with purpose, with aspirations, and with demands for full and equal citizenship. (p. 3)

She argues that White rage has been used since the formation of the United States and aligns directly with White supremacy. White rage violently erupts to preserve White status and power.

We've seen this type of retaliation with the recent anti-CRT state legislation. As young and old people en masse began to examine the social and economic infrastructure that benefits some and dispossesses others, those who felt threatened frantically rushed to influence policies. The ban of CRT in states through legislative acts began with one bill, which was then copied, pasted, and passed along state by state. The anti-CRT bills restrict schools, districts, and universities from teaching or talking about diversity, race, racism, and antiracism, under the guise that White students will feel bad about being White. Each state lists their own terms and lessons that cannot be taught. Fortunately, many students, teachers, and families have advocated for antiracism initiatives in schools. Let's not be stalled by White rage or any other resistance to forward movement. Search your beliefs and ideas about race to eliminate any and all notions of White supremacy and resistance to BIPOC advancement.

Also, as you notice and analyze racial dynamics and examine racial identity, you may feel troubled or even enraged by what you learn. When such feelings show up, honor them by allowing yourself to feel them. Refuse to repress and separate yourself from unwanted feelings by surrendering to defense mechanisms such as guilt, denial, and rationalization. These unpleasant feelings are not telling you to retreat. They are telling you that this is important. Anneliese Singh (2019) shares in Racial Healing Handbook that we need to grieve racism. Racism happened, is happening, and will continue to happen until we are able to name it and grieve the harm it caused and continues to cause. Grieve, but do not linger into shame—for not knowing it all, or for having made mistakes, or for having White advantage and access.

Tehia

I remember reading James Loewen's 1995 book Lies My Teacher Told Me for the first time in graduate school. I was blown away. I was furious about how there were so many gaps and holes in what I was taught in my K–12 education. Loewen's book helped me see more of the full picture. In Amy's story at the beginning of this chapter, she knew a lot about “her” Detroit, but not the whole story of Detroit. The perspective of Black people's experiences was missing. Like Amy, I sought multiple perspectives to broaden my understanding. Schools can do a much better job at providing multiple perspectives so that students can explore multiple experiences of a situation and not have to do it in adulthood.

I distinctly remember learning about Native Americans in elementary school: how they were savages and lived in tepees and how Thanksgiving was a great celebration of the Pilgrims and Indians coming together to celebrate the harvest. I also remember making and wearing a headdress at school. It would be 30 years before I learned a historically accurate narrative about Indigenous people. I did three things:

1. I read Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's (2014) book An Indigenous People's History of the United States. What a different story from the one I was taught in elementary school.
2. I watched PBS specials and documentaries on Native Americans.
3. I developed cross-racial relationships with Native people like a former doctoral student who is Lumbee: Dr. Brittany D. Hunt, who also has a great TED talk on Indigenous Resilience (2020).

Because I didn't want to add to the emotional labor of Indigenous friends by having them inform me of what I should know, number three was a bit more difficult. Notice that I engaged with a colleague with whom I had a healthy relationship, not with an acquaintance that I didn't really know. Personally, I know how it feels to be asked 50 questions from a person who did no self-exploration or from strangers. Being seen as the primary resource for “teach me everything about Black people, Black History Month, food, and hair” is exhausting.

To expand my roots, I looked for scholars and voices of color who were experts by lived experience or by their research. I prioritized and read the research, publications, and creative works produced by Indigenous people. I searched for asset-oriented content and critiqued deficit-oriented content. Asset orientation acknowledges and identifies the resilience and contributions of a person or group despite the oppressive conditions. Deficit orientation victimizes people by primarily identifying them as the negative outcome of social and economic injustice. Deficit language may include words like minority, disadvantaged, at risk, and others that victimize a racial group versus discussing their strengths. Deficit language also does not address the systems that may have caused a people group to be disadvantaged or at risk. There are scholars who use deficit-oriented language within their work. I decided not to use such resources.

As I read and learned, I generated lists of questions to ask and connections I made. I call this practice the Dinner Party Scenario. When invited to a dinner party, it's normal to bring something for the meal or a gift to show gratitude to the host. Similarly, when we want to learn about people who are different from us and want to know more from a representative of that group, we should bring something to the table to show gratitude for the host. Here are some ways to bring something to the table:

1. Do your homework. Read books, listen to podcasts, and watch documentaries created by people in that racial group.
2. Take notes and write down your questions. Then try to answer the questions with the resources you have.
3. When you cannot find the answer, those are the questions you might ask your trusted person with whom you are already in community.

Come to the table having done some of the heavy lifting. Do not come to the table asking that person to do all the work for you. We want to reduce their racial battle fatigue, not increase it. Don't expect people to feed you when you are capable of feeding yourself. Some of the information you've acquired may be incorrect, but those who sit at the table with you will show you grace because you came to the table prepared and are already in relationship with them.

I moved beyond the mindset of “I don't want to say the wrong thing,” because that fear bound me to potentially saying nothing at all. Silence is harmful and expensive. I chose to put myself out there and lead with vulnerability. In her 2019 Netflix special The Call to Courage, Brené Brown says to “choose courage over comfort.” She adds that vulnerability is critical for connections and relationships and even for businesses to flourish. I came to the table prepared, curious, and genuinely interested. I chose to be vulnerable and courageous because I wanted to understand deeper.

Ultimately, I was furious that as a child I was misinformed and deprived of knowing the brilliance, history, and dignity of Native American people in elementary school. We didn't address colonization and the savagery of the White colonists via murder, lies within the treaties, and the trauma invoked on First Nation families through boarding schools like Carlisle Boarding School, where founder, Richard Pratt's mantra was “Kill the Indian. Save the Man.” I didn't learn about affirming Native American history. I was hurt that when I became a teacher, I then retaught to my elementary students. Sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat thinking about how I taught misinformation about entire nations of people to children. Since I have learned so much more, I have made it my mission to continue to learn and teach accurate Native American history. Now that I know better, I do better.

When I teach undergraduate teacher candidates, I spend a significant amount of time helping them understand the complexities and nuances of race/ism and consider pedagogical approaches to convey the information. I use children's literature by authors of color or other authors who write from a historically accurate perspective. I teach them to examine stories used for Thanksgiving and discuss how to replace anecdotal myths with precise information. As I work with teachers, I help them understand the harm of teaching the Pilgrims and Indians fairytale. If they need help with more accurate content, I am happy to supply the books, websites, videos and come in and use those resources. The books and language I use in my 5-year-old's classroom are age-appropriate. While I do consider my audience—children, college students, teaching adults and parents—I do not sugarcoat what happened to Indigenous people in this country.

Fortunately, our children are much more sophisticated in their thinking than we give them credit for. They can handle painful truths. We've heard adults say that by hiding painful truths from our children, we are preserving their innocence. However, when we erase the culture, lives, brilliance, contributions, love, conflict, suffering, and entire human experience of people groups, we teach our children that people are expendable—that some people must be thrown away so that other people, in this case colonizers, can thrive. What we are actually preserving is a scarcity mindset. It's more cognitively congruent to learn the whole story or history than to have to unlearn all the inaccuracies, and then relearn historically accurate information. And the great news is that we don't have to wait until National Native American Heritage Month (November); we can do this year-round.

As a parent and teacher, I want to be a critical consumer of information. When considering what to teach our children and students, we debate breadth versus depth. While breadth allows me to teach a wide range of content, with depth I can focus on a specific topic and drill down into the content. The same is applicable for me. I don't have to know everything, but I should be prepared to lead children and for the 50 million questions they ask as they try to make sense of their world.

How to Become Rooted

The first step in becoming rooted is to accept that building racial competency and understanding takes more time and effort than a 1-day workshop or lecture can afford. Although there are powerful learning experiences that are designed for 1- or 2-day settings, our bodies are not capable of doing all of the digesting, processing, thinking, reflecting, unlearning, realigning, reimagining, and creating required to establish strong roots in antiracism. Like learning a new language, our brain has to construct a new schema or cognitive framework. And because learning requires sustained, consistent practice, we need time. When we grow slow, we grow deep.

Like Amy, embrace a growth mindset. Seek to understand how race-specific and immigration policies impacted where you grew up and where you currently live. Be curious and open to learning about how institutionalized segregation impacted your family of origin and shaped your perspective. If you are a teacher or teacher leader, learn what role community policies, zoning, and funding played in determining your school's population.

In a few instances, parents and teachers at historically or predominantly White private schools have asked us why families of color are not attracted to their schools, don't feel welcome there, or why the retention rate for students of color is so low. One leader asked, “How can we grow more diverse, if our Black families keep leaving the school?” They blamed the lack of racial diversity on Black families either not enrolling or leaving. We invited them to ask different questions:

• Did the school's founders create the school specifically as a White space?
• Does the location of the school impact access and enrollment?
• Do services provided (or not provided) restrict who can attend? For example, are lunch and transportation provided?
• What efforts have school leaders and investors taken to desegregate the school?
• What efforts has the school community made to create a culture where historically excluded families now belong?
• Do school policies (teacher, student, school handbook) protect the dignity of everyone as opposed to centering White racial norms?
• As a historically White institution, have you identified and omitted curricula and practices that center White identity?
• Have you instituted curricula and practices that reflect BIPOC perspectives, history, stories, and lived experiences?

Perhaps families of color do not perceive that particular school as a place where their children will be safe or thrive. The school leader wanted to racially diversify the student population, but was the school willing to create a school where families of color feel seen, valued, and safe? Families of color are not mere transactions for the sake of a “diversity” trend. Families of color want roots in a school as well. No one wants to move from school to school but will do what it takes to find the right fit. All students, including White students, benefit from environments that wholly value and nurture them completely.

As a parent, understand that you may need to equip your children with a different racial toolkit than the one you had. Commit to finding your own personal story within our nation's racial story. Understand ways your social identity has been determined by public policies. If you grew up in racially segregated spaces—neighborhoods, schools, churches—consider whose stories were excluded. How often did you read books or watch movies and shows in which BIPOC were main characters who were not fighting for basic human rights? Look for, listen to, and learn from lived experiences that were considered intrinsically different from your own. Then do the same thing for your children. We can help them develop roots far sooner than we did.

Write your story. Read your story. Analyze your story. Notice where you see a learning deficit, cognitive dissonance, and potential for growth. Acknowledge wins and insights. As you build racial competence, you grow your capacity to see and analyze racial dynamics, engage in active antiracism, and develop and maintain healthy cross-racial relationships. As parents and teachers, we often worry about how we can move beyond colorblindness and nurture our children's natural curiosity without perpetuating a racial hierarchy. James Baldwin said, “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them” (1961). Our children are watching us. Your competence will lead to confident, healthy, life-giving lessons and conversations with your children that foster a healthy racial identity. Your children will learn implicitly and explicitly as you engage them in normalized racial awareness, understanding, critical thinking, and problem-solving. Those roots will grow deeper, and stronger.

Becoming Rooted Together

Working together is exponentially better than working alone. For this reason, we work with teachers and parents in cohorts. Connect with parents or teachers who are doing, or at least trying to do, what you are doing. Your colaborer does not have to be proximate to your neighborhood or school or within your family. You can build community with teachers at other schools and parents in other neighborhoods. Social media and other online spaces can be a great resource for building community. Along with our peers and colleagues, we have created the Anti-Racism Collective (ARC) at University of North Carolina (UNC) Charlotte (with Dr. Erin Miller) and Brownicity—Many Hues One Humanity, an education agency dedicated to making important, scholarly informed, antiracism education accessible to the public through designed curricula and courses, curated lessons, and consulting. We bring teachers and parents together to learn and grow together while supporting and encouraging each other.

In 2015, Dr. Miller and I (Tehia) realized that our teacher candidates needed more support in working with racially diverse students. Teachers were also requesting support in connecting with their racially diverse students. From those requests, conversations, presentations, and publications, we dreamt and created the antiracism graduate certificate program at UNC Charlotte. It is a 12-credit graduate certificate program that is 100 percent online so we could connect with as many adults as we could. The four courses in the program focus intentionally and specifically on antiracism in the fields, industries, or interests of our students: (1) History and Psychology of Racism; (2) Racial Identity Development; (3) Race in Education and Schooling; and (4) Anti-Racism Activism. It began as a program for teachers and quickly expanded its student base as more diverse industries and fields began to enroll in the program.

We have our students evaluate our courses annually to ensure we are providing the content they need to expand their roots in content and connection. Since 2017, we have had hundreds of students graduate from the program, which expands the network of other adults who are committed to antiracism, and we developed the Anti-Racism Collective as a way to organize anyone who is interested in antiracism in their spheres of influence.

As you look for opportunities to develop and maintain healthy cross-racial relationships, consider where you play, worship, work, shop, and serve. Courageously expand your circle by moving in different circles. In her 2017 book On Intersectionality, Kimberlé Crenshaw introduced intersectionality as a way to view the whole of peoples’ identity. Envision your dinner party table filled with friends diversified by race, ethnicity, culture, gender, sexual identity, sexual orientation, language, ability, religion, citizenship, socioeconomic status, and family structure contributing multiple perspectives and offering an expanded knowledge base. You all are committed to learning together—not just so you can feel good about yourself but also ultimately to normalize diversity for our children so that they have the capacity to foster justice and belonging.

We strongly believe that much of this growth needs to take place in communities and spaces that are culturally and racially heterogeneous. However, we understand that there are times when an affinity space is needed to address the specific needs of that group. Affinity groups are the informal or formal organizing of people who have shared backgrounds or interests. For example, we noticed that after each Brownicity meeting, White team members huddled together to grieve over how they had been criticized and ostracized by a family member or longtime friend for disavowing White entitlement. And Black parents whose children attend predominantly White schools sometimes huddle in the school parking lot to affirm each other's experiences. Be sure to offer space, if necessary, to groups to meet separately away from the larger or perhaps dominant racial group. Affinity groups should be given equal time, attention, and resources as the collective group.

For Parents and Educators of Color to Consider

When you are called upon to lead, you are not obligated to be everything for everyone. Set your boundaries. Know your value and worth. We are often asked and expected to do all of the heavy lifting. Also, we are asked and expected to do all of the heavy lifting without acknowledgment or compensation. While we may choose to lead our communities to freedom, we are not slaves. When you are invited to use your personal and professional experiences to add value to a learning experience, curriculum, event, lesson plan, workshop, or anything that you did not volunteer to do, expect compensation. People, corporations, communities, and districts need to normalize sowing into those they are asking to lead or contribute.

In a capitalist economy such as ours, compensation should be money. Unfortunately, in a capitalist economy such as ours, education is severely underfunded, so sometimes money is not available. Compensation can be resources, time off, release from another obligation, or something else you propose. If compensation is not offered, ask for it. If you are denied, specifically outline what you are willing to do and what you don't have the capacity to do. For example, a teacher of color needed help creating boundaries because as one of the few teachers of color at her school, she was being exploited by an administrator. The administrator wanted this teacher to lead and run the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) committee. The teacher was denied when she asked for compensation. The teacher told the administrator to give her a day to think about what she wanted to do. The next day, the teacher then created a list (i.e., boundaries) of what she would and would not do. She agreed to lead the DEI teacher workshop but chose not to do all the work that goes into organizing it like gathering supplies, sending invitations and reminders, and coordinating the lunch plans. The administrator agreed to those terms because the teacher was able to articulate that she was already overextended with other committees. In another instance, educators have agreed to curate the resources but not teach the content to their colleagues.

If there is no value, people will not invest. Cultivating justice and belonging is valuable and worthwhile toil. There must be an investment. Expect an investment. If people refuse to invest in some way, consider that they are asking you to sow seed into rocky soil. In the Sower of Seed parable in the Bible (Matthew 13), rocky soil represents people who are initially enthusiastic but have no deep roots or investment, thus no long-term commitment. And when people are not anchored to and invested, they abandon the growth process when challenges come.

When you need to say no to being exploited, here are a few phrases you can use:

• Thanks for inviting me to participate/lead; however… .
• My plate is currently full with _____ obligations.
• All my service obligations have been fulfilled.
• I don't have the bandwidth for _____.
• I must leave at __ time; therefore, I am unable to __.
• No thank you.

We also understand that there are power dynamics at play. If you feel like you cannot say no to an administrator or leader, think about how the imposed responsibility can be used to either elevate your trajectory or make connections with someone who can. Do these uncompensated roles show up on your resume? Can you consider being nominated for an award because of the work you are doing or nominated for program you are interested in? Often the awards or prestigious programs are another way to be rewarded for your work.

While supporting your school, home, or organization can be exhilarating, the heavy lifting can also be exhausting. William Smith coined the term racial battle fatigue, and described it as the cumulative effect of enduring microaggressions, discrimination, and blatant racism on a regular basis. Fasching-Varner, Albert, Mitchell, and Allen (2015) expand racial battle fatigue in the context of higher education in their book Racial Battle Fatigue in Higher Education, but their conclusions apply to K–12 classrooms as well. The reality is we don't have the luxury of escaping racism. Therefore, we have to take care of ourselves. One way to take care of yourself is by protecting your intellectual property.

We know that colleagues and friends are going to ask for help and accountability. In these instances, protect your intellectual property. Unfortunately, co-opting and appropriating the ideas and work of BIPOC is common. Remember, investing in antiracism is not yet seen as necessary and normal. Consider ways to protect your work. Make sure your name is on everything you create. Because a meme can go viral in a moment's notice, be sure that your name, logo, or watermark appear on it. In meetings when you propose an idea, make sure your contribution is noted or acknowledged. If you are considering the risk, be sure you include it on your annual report, evaluation, and resume. For too long, BIPOC's work has gone unacknowledged and unrewarded, which is unacceptable in a just and belonging environment.

Also, radical self-care is necessary! It is your responsibility to take care of yourself before you take care of others. Even the airlines tell us we have to put the oxygen mask on ourselves before we put one on someone else. From maternal death rates and state-sanctioned murder to food deserts, COVID-19, and internal and external stressors, racism is killing us. As Bettina Love (2019) shares in her book We Want to Do More Than Survive, our goal is to thrive, not just survive. Love charges us to be well so we can continue to dream about and work toward a better world for ourselves and our legacies. Implement a self-care plan. What can you do to take care of yourself for 5 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 3 hours, 6 hours, and 24 hours? Create a list that fits in those categories and a self-care plan document to detail what you can do (Appendix B). Put your care plan on your calendar and stick to it like any other appointment. Try to enact self-care at least once a week. If you don't have a therapist and can afford one, get one. In the meantime, access the Liberate app, created by BIPOC for BIPOC. The app offers a diverse array of meditations and teachers to choose from.

For White Parents and Teachers to Consider

As we said earlier, begin with self-reflection. What do you know? Where are your gaps? Have you noticed a pattern when you are around BIPOC? Who are you biased toward? When does your racial stamina begin to fade? When you are around BIPOC, are you comfortable or uncomfortable? Is it location or context specific? Is your body settled? Are you ready for the cognitive dissonance or discomfort that comes along with this work? These are questions that need to be answered before and while you prepare to engage with others. Resmaa Menakem shares:

If you're white, you may discover that when you can settle and manage your body, you won't feel a need to manage Black ones—or a need to ask Black ones to manage yours. You'll also be better able to manage, challenge, and disrupt white-body supremacy. (p. 152)

As you actively and intentionally develop and maintain healthy cross-racial relationships, be mindful of your methods for getting to know BIPOC. Be careful that your getting-to-know-you phase does not come across like interrogation. Nor should it feel like speed dating—asking 20 questions. In the first few seconds of being approached by a White person, we have been asked questions like, “What neighborhood do you live in?” “Where do you work?” “What do you do?” This type of questioning feels less like relationship building blocks and more like inquiry of suspicion, as if you are working to confirm or dispel any stereotypes or beliefs you hold. Interrogation builds walls, not relationships. Getting to know someone organically and building relationships takes time. Observe, listen, lean in, and breathe.

Also, be mindful to pull your own weight. We need you to see and understand your Whiteness so that you don't harm BIPOC. Ultimately, we don't need you to be allies. Allyship is passive and does not require action. Allyship is also self-designated, which means you decided you were an ally. But would your BIPOC colleagues agree with your self-designated title? We need you well. We need you to be antiracists, committed to disrupting harmful systems, practices, and beliefs. We need action-oriented and invested collaboration. We need you to take the responsibility to create spaces and classrooms where all children are valued and can thrive. We need you to not be asleep at the wheel while you raise your children at home and have charge over ours in the community. We need you to be willing to disrupt injustice when BIPOC are not in the room. We need you to ask:

• How do I engage my White colleagues in cultivating justice and belonging?
• How can I support my colleagues of color?
• When do I speak up for people who are not at the table and when do I invite them to the table or create space at the table to speak for themselves?

Instead of looking for BIPOC in your group to affirm your growth, set your aperture for self-praise. You are becoming antiracist for the sake of cultivating justice and belonging for all, not to receive praise or favor from anyone, nor to prove that you are not a racist. Don't place the burden on others to acknowledge your growth. Celebrate yourself. And if friends choose to celebrate you, then be sure to appreciate and celebrate them as well. The synergy is contagious.

Individually and collectively, we anchor ourselves in antiracism, not only to bear the fruit of justice and belonging but also to withstand adversity. Rooted, together we can heal ourselves and our communities. We can then grow our capacity to imagine and manifest spaces where racial harm is the exception and no longer embedded within institutions and behavioral norms.

Reflection and Practice