“Don't let the tall weeds cast a shadow on the beautiful flowers in your garden.”

—Steve Maraboli, Speaker, Best-selling Author, and Behavioral Scientist

Weeding is a necessary part of gardening. Weeds can aggressively dislocate healthy plants, robbing them of the nutrients that they need. We want to ensure that helpful, healthy things bloom. We weed out the things that do not add value and prohibit healthy growth. Just as editors delete words that don't work or photographers crop out the distractions, we can uproot beliefs, practices, and policies that work against cultivating justice and belonging.

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Susan, Latinx High School Teacher

In 1980, I arrived with my family of origin from Costa Rica. We lived with relatives in Long Island. Because we moved around a lot, we moved from school to school. We attended schools where often we were the first and only Spanish-speaking students. We were placed in classrooms based on our English proficiency or lack thereof. At one point, one of the schools hired a Spanish-speaking woman for us. She was like our personal angel.

I was tested and skipped a grade. Meanwhile, my brother and male cousins were removed from regular classes and placed in a special education class. Our parents were not happy about this, but they respected the school's decisions and didn't question it. On the other hand, I questioned everything, including why I was not allowed to read the same book as my classmate. I also had to consistently advocate for myself—from questioning why others had book choices and I did not to inquiring about why certain classes were selected for me versus choosing them for myself.

Meanwhile, I observed that my brother was stigmatized and labeled. The school determined that he was not going to excel. This really bothered me. Even as a child, I wondered why my brother and cousins were placed in a special education class. Afterall, we came from the same home and background. And my brother would even help me with my homework. I knew he was bright and fully capable of being in classes alongside me.

While I saw my brother and cousins being put on a pathway to prison, I learned to advocate for myself. Because I was in proximity to other students talking about college, I put myself on the path to college. While working in the guidance counselor's office, I asked how to prepare for college and was enrolled in Upward Bound, a college preparatory program. Through Upward Bound, I received help and support and saw people who looked like me go to college. When I saw other Latinos go to college, I knew I could. I can still recall at the young age of 12 how, at home, I constantly asked my mother if I was legally able to attend college. This is when she began the process for my siblings and me to start the green card process.

I believe that due to being placed on a special education track, my brother and cousins internalized that they were not good enough. Although my family discouraged them, my brother and cousins were encouraged by the school counselor to join the military. Eventually, they served time in prison and therefore were never allowed to become U.S. citizens.

My family believed that my brother would get his citizenship. But after prison, my brother was deported immediately. As soon as his sentence was done, Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) officers rearrested him and deported him. In fact, in the courtroom, after being given his release, immigration immediately came in and took him away. My brother, who could no longer speak Spanish, was sent back to Costa Rica, where he had not lived since he was a small child.

Now, as a teacher, I wonder how no one in the school saw my brother and cousins for their value. Not a single professional educator expected them to do well. Instead, my brother and cousins were treated like failures. It's heartbreaking to think how the school system purposely and intentionally failed them.

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Based on our experiences, we believe that any great garden will have weeds. Along your growth journey, you will not get things right all the time. There will be mishaps. You will make mistakes. There will be conflict that you have to confront. But remember that a setback can be a setup for a comeback. You can learn from the experience and keep growing. We hope that what we share here will help you identify potential weeds and offer insight for pruning.

Extraction

Ideally, you will get to work alongside and glean from people who have professional or lived experience with antiracism. Please remember to recognize, honor, and compensate your colaborers for their time, innovation, and resources. If we had $100 for each time a well-meaning parent, teacher, leader, or institution has asked us to give generously of our time, attention, and expertise without compensation or citation, we would be millionaires. We, separately, have been invited to “brainstorming” meetings with well-resourced people and organizations who want to learn more about what we are doing—not to collaborate with us or fund our innovation but to extract our ideas and recreate what we are doing for themselves. Extraction is injustice.

I (Lucretia) personally have been invited to meet with leaders who expressed an appreciation for my work. One educational institution wanted to employ me to teach a core subject but use my antiracism education expertise to help a group of White men create an antiracism program. They were not planning to pay me for my contribution to their antiracism education program. A few other leaders of well-resourced organizations, after meeting with me, used my course model to create courses of their own. These leaders were recognized, honored, and paid well for what they “created.” Years ago, I designed an arts program for youth and presented the proposal to a few local churches who had youth groups. One youth pastor was really excited about my idea. Enthusiastically, he said, “I'll get back to you.” He did not. Some time later when I visited the church for an event, I saw that he had removed my image from the art program description, added his own, and implemented the program. My/his flier hung on the church bulletin board. Recently, a leader of an organization asked for my insight via private message. She then copied and pasted my lengthy, well thought out, carefully crafted personal response into a public post to her mass of followers as her own statement. I was shocked and disappointed.

We surmise that because the United States has such a long history of extracting from Black women—chattel slavery, mammying, science experiments, rape, maids, minimum pay—perhaps it feels normal to take from us without giving anything in return. Stop stealing. Stop expecting something for nothing. Instead of extraction, try appreciation, compensation, and collaboration. As an antiracist, you get to disrupt the violent practices inherited through structural racism. Because you cannot do this work in isolation, think about how you will appreciate and honor your colaborers when you

• Change your behavior because you are inspired by another parent.
• Implement a great new lesson due to the time you've spent working with a teaching team member.
• Schedule a chat or time with someone to get their take on something.
• Use a colaborer's product as a starting point to create your own product.
• Are able to create and grow an initiative due to working with someone who has been at this for a long time.

You are benefiting from their emotional labor, education, professional experience, creativity, courage, innovation, and skill.

Think about how to give back. Too often, White people get funded, supported, paid, published, acknowledged, celebrated, and rewarded for less or the same antiracism efforts for which BIPOC have been ignored or divested. Each time this happens, monies that should be reinvested in BIPOC creatives are instead allocated to people, companies, organizations, and spaces who have no roots in antiracism. As we collaborate, let's normalize paying, citing, supporting, and honoring those who are helping us grow. Push and pull your colaborers up instead of stepping on their necks for leverage.

Perfection

You don't have to be perfect or an expert. Give yourself grace to be human. Expect to mess up. Let go of the pressure and stress of perfectionism, and accept the fact that you will not always get it right. Consider that at times you might say the wrong words, miss the mark on a response, have well-planned lessons or conversations fall flat, or have students accuse you of not being fair. Because you've built trusting relationships with families, students, and coworkers, the mistakes you make are viewed in the context of the community's collective learning journey. When the whole community of parents, teachers, and leaders are learning together, no one within the community gets ostracized for making a mistake. Additionally, when your community (parents, leaders, teachers) contributes to your curriculum and practices, those little hiccups are less detrimental.

Isolation

A White teacher reached out to us to get our advice about a very important and necessary piece of content. In the reenactment of a historical document, the narrator reads aloud the N-word. She wanted to discuss and explore the risk versus the rewards of including the audio from a pedagogical and critical perspective. Together, we went back and forth listing pros and cons for which approach to take, the prework for contextualizing the audio, and how the audio might impact the few Black students in a classroom where most of their peers are White. We gave her space to make her own decision based on student and class readiness.

We also talked about the importance of teaching White students to not turn and stare at Black students during lessons about America's subjugation of Black people and chattel slavery. Students of color have asked us why White students peer over at them when the lesson is about someone of color. The teacher recognized this behavior. She then noted how when lessons are about White suffragettes, the class does not turn and stare at the White girls.

This was the teacher's response to having access to support:

Thank you both so much for your insight. You have given me a great jumping off point and have added perspectives in your responses that I wouldn't have thought of. I've looked into an intergenerational trauma TED Talk that I think, moving forward, would help my students to understand the concept.

Lucretia, I agree that reminding students that [staring] at anyone belonging to any group that they don't identify as their own, isn't deemed polite or appropriate. We talked yesterday about a way to address this issue. I think I'll approach it from the standpoint of, because this is OUR collective history of the United States (as you pointed out in your earlier email, Lucretia), let's make sure we are reflecting on how we as individuals are processing this. Not as someone on the outside of the directly mentioned group but rather, how OUR history is affecting all of us. Staring seems to suggest that students are processing this history as “that's THEIR history” when really, we should make the shift to “this group was directly affected during X-time period, AND we all need to process how this continues to affect ALL OF US today, including the group originally targeted.

Again, I really appreciate both of you taking time out to look over the video, give suggestions, and continue to help me navigate through this.

You don't have to have all the answers or figure things out in isolation. Remember to collaborate with and glean insight from other teachers, parents, and leaders. Don't let your ego get in the way of asking questions and asking for help. You deserve to have support.

Denying the Dignity of Others

Content is important. But people are more important. At the beginning of the school year, instead of introducing new content, we recommend implementing a unit zero. Inspired by Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain—Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students (2015) by Zaretta L. Hammond, a unit zero allows you to dedicate the first 2 weeks of school to building community with your students and families. This is a time to lay a foundation and nurture your classroom culture. For early elementary teachers, the first 2 weeks of school is a great time to incorporate Hues of You—An Activity Book for Learning About the Skin You Are In (2022) by Lucretia Berry. Also, we designed the Brownicity bKids course Let's Learn About to give learners a healthy, belonging language and a framework for building empathy, respect, understanding, and connection. Your students can get to know you, and you can get to know your students. You get to see them in their full humanity, and they get to see you in your full humanity. Each of you gets to bring your whole self to the classroom.

On one occasion, we were asked to help plan a day-long interactive exhibition for middle school students. The living exhibit was inspired by RACE: Are We So Different?, a project of the American Anthropological Association and funded by the Ford Foundation and National Science Foundation. The middle school event was designed to address the topics of race from three different perspectives—history, science, and everyday experience—to tell a dynamic story with a deep social impact. On the day that we were training teachers to lead the various activities and presentations, we sensed that a teacher either was not ready to lead or did not appreciate the content. So, we paused the project.

The teachers who were excited about the exhibit and ready to lead were disappointed. But we knew it would not be wise to bring students into a learning experience that teachers were not ready for. Later, we met with the teacher who was uncomfortable with the content. Among other things, she did not believe that middle school children should be learning about race as a construct and structural racism. Although the project featured resources from the American Anthropological Association, the teacher believed that the resources were politically progressive. Gaining clarity about her reluctance helped us see potential walls and stumbling blocks for people with a similar background and political affiliation. Pausing to hear her perspective helped us better prepare for future participants.

In a different setting, I (Tehia) had to leave a group that I loved because the White women coleaders were toxic to the Black women who were also in leadership. I was talked over and interrupted. I was subjected to passive-aggressive comments. Though I was the lead on the design, if my work did not meet their expectations, I was discredited. The most frustrating part of this experience was that because they are White women with social and political capital, I felt like I couldn't be honest with them without fear of retribution.

As we dismantle brutal systems, we need to be gentle with people. We must truly see each other—as humans who have been shaped and formed by the very thing we are disrupting and breaking apart. But we must not break people. We must hear the biography over the ideology. Otherwise, we might cause more trauma and injury. Systems have been careless, and we want to do better. We have to be caring.

Fear of Discomfort

“What if being called a racist, or doing something racist is the start of the conversation, and not the end of it?” I (Tehia), was at American University's Summer Institute on Education Equity and Justice conference when professorial lecturer Traci Dennis asked this, and a light bulb went off in my head. That simple sentence articulated what I'd been doing all the while. How can we help folks turn toward rather than turn away after hearing the word race or antiracism? We cannot be afraid of being “called in” as Smith College professor Loretta Ross describes in her 2020 New York Times piece. If someone offends, “calling in” allows for attention or correction in a private way so there is opportunity for the offender to learn what they did and how they caused harm, versus “calling out,” which is more of the public shaming of someone for the harm they may have caused. Calling in is contextual—someone you are in community with, or your discernment tells you the harm was unintentional can be called in. On the other hand, people who intend to harm may not get access to being called in. They may need public correction or an immediate conclusion to the conversation.

Lack of Fortitude

Intentionally misleading efforts to weaponize and spread disinformation about critical race theory (CRT) have nurtured a resistance to teaching and learning for justice and belonging. This age-old political strategy of fearmongering and spreading confusion to garner partisan allegiance unfortunately invades our homes, classrooms, communities, and worst of all our psyches. This strategy is not new; it's simply rebranded—recall resistance to school desegregation. While this type of resistance is a pain, you can use it to establish boundaries and a protocol for how to engage when the confusion attempts to cast a shadow on your lovely garden.

On several occasions, we have been asked to help quell CRT dumpster fires in families, communities, churches, schools, and minds. But if we commit all our resources to putting out fires, who will cultivate the garden? We would rather use the water to nourish growth than extinguish every fire launched by political pyromaniacs! With each request to address fears invoked by politicized bureaucracy, we ask ourselves: Is this an educational opportunity? Will this help teachers and parents? Or will this drain our resources and waste our time?

Leaders should consistently share a schoolwide vision for justice and belonging. Clarity is kind. Administrators and teachers must institute protocol for engaging with parents and community members who lack clarity regarding your direction and intention. Because conflict is stressful, having a plan in place will help navigate the rough terrain. For example, if a parent is concerned or worried about school and classroom practices, who do they address first, an administrator or a teacher? How are parental concerns documented and filed? Does your plan to resolve conflict include a pathway for maintaining trust between parents and the school? How will you care for traumatized teachers and students? How will you make sure that each person involved is seen, valued, and heard?

Lack of Self-Care

Parenting brings us joy. Teaching brings us joy. Both require so much of us. As parents and teachers, we are the constant, consistent caregivers—giving care to our families and giving care to our communities and schools. However, we rarely give care to ourselves. The old saying goes, “You can't pour from an empty cup.” We have to prioritize care for ourselves—not just so that we can continue to consistently take care of others but also because we need and deserve care!

Many of us who are choosing to cultivate justice and belonging are being met with resistance from forces fueled by political propagandists. We won't give attention, time, and space to the resistance here, as we have dedicated these pages to supporting and encouraging you. However, we must acknowledge that the trauma from the drama is devastating and at times debilitating. When someone uses social media to spew misinformation about us or our work, it hurts. And as parents, teachers, and leaders, we cannot bring the trauma into our homes, classrooms, or schools. We cannot internalize it or allow it to shape and inform how we parent and teach. If we don't make space for our wounds to heal, they will fester. We don't want to bleed all over our children and students.

Kimberly Owen, MA LCMHC, EMDR, therapist and founder of Sage Healing and Wellness, talked to our facilitator cohort about how people working on the front lines of dismantling systemic racism and unraveling social injustice experience exhaustion:

Social injustice fatigue can alter the body in many ways to the point of affecting sleep, foggy thinking, and emotional dysregulation. This can affect your whole being—mind, body and spirit. The danger in this is that people resort to coping mechanisms that don't serve them well. Maladaptive coping mechanisms are compartmentalization, impulsivity…, along with overwhelming emotions that lead to deregulation… Some people just shut down and freeze while the amygdala goes into high gear.

—Kimberly Owen, MA LCMHC, EMDR, therapist and founder of Sage Healing and Wellness

She advises that we prioritize self. Healing and recovery are essential to justice and belonging.

Punishing Ideological Differences

Learning about the unjust, exclusionary policies and practices we've inherited is liberating. While people may feel embarrassed about what they did not know, they also feel empowered to be positioned for change. But we've witnessed a disturbing trend: Sometimes a newly empowered learner turns to judge and shame someone who has yet to begin a learning journey. If you had the privilege of learning, why would you punish someone for not having that privilege? How is it that a bud, who was graced with a teacher (e.g., guide, courses, books learning experiences) shows no grace toward a seed? This behavior is the antithesis of justice and belonging.

Shaming people for not knowing what you just learned feeds resistance. Furthermore, intentionally crafting learning experiences to be intense, painful, and shameful is an indication that you are attempting to perform a perverted version of antiracism and have not embodied justice and belonging. Compassion and grace are central to this work.

Finally, we've witnessed that cancel or call-out culture has caused our students to be stressed out about saying the wrong thing or asking the wrong questions in our classrooms. Cancel or call-out culture is the contemporary practice of exerting social pressure to boycott socially immoral views and actions. As parents and teachers, our children need to be able to be vulnerable with us. They need to be able to ask questions, be curious, and take risks. As we build racial competence, let's not become less humane.

Imbalanced Teaching

Recently, I (Tehia) was in a panel talk and a question was posed to us:

I'm a seventh-grade Latina student in middle school, and I asked my teacher if we were learning about the Latinx Heritage this month ’cause it's Latinx Heritage Month. She said that it will cause problems between White and Latinx students, so we are sticking to the normal curriculum and not doing critical race theory. Is learning about my heritage in school critical race theory? And why is critical race theory a bad thing?

All of us on the panel were disappointed that this student's teacher did not take advantage of the opportunity to intentionally cultivate respect and value for cultural difference. It was a missed opportunity to cultivate respect and value not just for the Latinx student but also to strengthen the social relationships among the class. The student wanted historical validation. All students would have benefited from learning about Latinx people, contributions, and influences. The teacher did not see the value in building a shared racial, ethnic, and cultural understanding. Or perhaps the teacher felt unprepared to teach about the heritage, traditions, perspectives, histories, and lived experiences of Latinx groups.

When we don't feel equipped, we can admit that. We can affirm the student's request and then work with the student or student's parents to outline a plan of study. We can then set aside time to learn and create a plan to infuse lessons. All students will benefit from this expanded content.

In another instance, a few years ago, I had my most racially and culturally diverse undergraduate child development class. Typically, elementary education majors are predominantly White women who are monolinguistic and middle class. But this class included men and students of color who were also diverse in their experiences. Like every other semester, I spent time building community with them, and them with one another. We laughed, we learned, we raged at the racism in schools. One day, the students of color told my colleague, Dr. Miller, “Both you and Dr. Glass are teaching about race and racism and are trying to convince the White students that equity is important and valuable. But what are you teaching us [students of color] about ourselves?”

Dr. Miller and I agreed with the students. We were so focused on helping White students build their capacity to cultivate just and belonging classrooms that we had not dedicated time to affirming our students of color. Dr. Miller and I made a shift. We began to invest time and attention to affirming and validating by explicitly detailing the contributions, brilliance, and resilience of BIPOC. We also implicated systems even more. What I appreciate about this group of students is that they were comfortable “calling us in.” We are in community with one another, so I need to do what is best for all of us.

Valuing Ideology over Empathy

We tell our children that it's easy to like someone who is like you. And for us adults, it's easy to hear someone whose ideology is like ours. But do we know how to hear someone with whom we do not agree? When we make space to listen, we can appreciate someone's biography over their ideology. We don't have to agree, but we can empathize.

During our foundation-building year, a teacher's religious perspective made it impossible for her to accept the science we were sharing. Although we did not agree with her perspective, we valued her and accepted that her perspective was valid and meaningful to her. Ultimately, we all shared in the desire and responsibility to participate in making our learning community better.

Ignoring How Children Experience Race/ism

Children's natural curiosity plus adult indifference and silence equals missed opportunities. Researchers and child developmentalists say that children are naturally curious. Asking questions is how they make sense of their world. In my (Tehia) TED Talk, Conversations That Cultivate Seeds of Curiosity (2022), I shared how adults ask, “How do we respond to our children when they ask about the injustices they experience, see on the news, or talk about in conversations with their friends?” We should not wait for kids to see something or experience something before we are forced to have a conversation about it, nor should we silence them with our silence. The evidence-based education about race that we offer children should cultivate seeds of curiosity in a way that encourages them to learn about self, history, systems, and actions. We have an opportunity to foster curiosity, inquiry, and critical thinking. As we work toward justice and belonging, let's equip our children to do the same.

Consider the conversations you are having with our children. Are you creating a space at home and in your classrooms where students see the value in one another—a space where the dignity of students is preserved and maintained. As we were writing this book, my first-grade son was told by a White classmate, “We don't want to play with you because your skin is brown.” Three weeks prior, my son was told by another White schoolmate, “I don't like Black people. All of y'all are bad.” Fortunately, my partner and I have prepared our sons for this type of ignorance and harm. It's sad and infuriating that we have to do this. Because we already affirm him in the beauty and wonderful legacy of Blackness, we hope it did not impact him the way it could have.

Because White parents and teachers do not equip White children to be antiracist, we parents of color have to prepare our children to experience interpersonal racism. And when confronted about the racism their children exhibit, White parents respond with, “I don't know where they got that from!” One, this is not a helpful response. And two, the research on how children develop racial identity and racialized norms is clear about how children by the age of 7 can mirror social biases. We shared this research in Chapter 1. Phillip Goff and his research team in 2014 shared that children of color are racially dehumanized and traumatized inside and outside of school. This must end!

Bystander

Bystanding is when harm is being committed but no one steps in to stop the harm or help the victim. Bystanders assume that, at the moment, it is not their responsibility to step in and help. Some bystanders may approach the victim later and offer an apology for what happened to the victim or what was observed. However, an apology or a judgment about an incident or microaggression, for example, is not helpful. Instead such an act confirms that the bystander intentionally chose not to confront the offender.

“When no action is taken and people remain silent in the face of racism, it causes pain and suffering to the targets, it creates guilt in the mind of onlookers and it creates a false consensus that racism is OK,” quoted by psychologist Dr. Derald Wing Sue in a 2020 New York Times interview by Ruth Terry. Our actions and specifically our inaction should never comply with racism or any type of social injustice. As you build racial competence, indignities and injustices that may have gone unnoticed before will become glaringly visible. When you see something, say (or do) something. Sometimes in the moment of harm, we don't know the best way to help. But you can at least discreetly do a small thing, like visible disapproval through body language.

You can plan and practice actions or words for when you observe disparaging behavior toward a group or person. Here are examples we've either used or seen others use:

• Stop, pause. This sets a boundary to define the harmful act or words.
• Show that you are confused by behavior—show that the behavior is not the accepted norm.
• Ask for clarity: What do you mean by that? Can you elaborate? Do you have facts to support your statement?
• Report the harm to the school, group or community leader, or classroom teacher.
• If a person is victimized, show them support and concern.

Not Noticing and Confronting White Supremacy Norms

Jones and Okun (2001) describe White supremacy norms as behaviors existing within an organization such as home or school, which acting as culture enforces adaptation or conformity. White supremacy norms are not solely perpetrated by White people. BIPOC can be informed by and exhibit White supremacy normative behavior as well. Here are some of the norms that Jones and Okun list:

• Perfectionism
• Sense of urgency
• Defensiveness
• Valuing quantity over quality
• Prioritizing the written word over oral and other forms of communication
• Denoting one right way
• Paternalism
• Either/or binary perspectives
• Power hoarding
• Fear of open conflict
• Individualism over collective identity
• Objectivity
• Possessing the right to comfort

Often these norms serve as primary assumptions, premises, and the standard by which other cultures and values are measured. Leaving White supremacy norms unchallenged and unchecked will make it almost impossible to cultivate justice and belonging. Jones and Okun offer ways to expand our perspectives and experiences beyond these norms to see the dignity and value of people and cultures that are not organized by White supremacy.

During a professional development (PD) break, a few teachers walked up to me (Tehia) and began talking negatively about the children in their classes—lack of parental support, the children's’ neighborhoods, and lack of motivation. I responded by asking the teachers to elaborate on why they could not be culturally responsive. I asked them if the strategies were too complex or if there was something in particular that they didn't understand or know how to do. I was trying to get the teacher to see their own resistance to being culturally responsive. They were placing the blame on students who they believed did not deserve culturally responsive classrooms and teachers.

White Tears

On the podcast We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle, Dr. Yaba Blay (2022) shares a powerful perspective about how White women often weaponize their tears. Blay regards White tears as a performance to avoid accountability—especially when accountability is needed. Crying can be a quick way to stop the momentum of a learning experience—during a personal or professional development session or in a real-life moment. White tears are not authentic cleansing tears. Instead, they demand that everyone stop what they are doing and engage in comforting them. Furthermore, Blay adds that comfort often does not look the same way for the BIPOC during such learning experiences. For example, when we Black women cry, often we are not perceived as worthy of sympathy. We want you to honor your genuine emotions. But consider how White tears may impact others. If you need to cry, perhaps you can dismiss yourself from the space so that the learning can continue. If you choose to remain in the public space, be mindful to not take attention away from the instruction and learning and place it on yourself. Oh—and when BIPOC women cry, show us love.

Thinking We're Done

We can pause. We can rest. We can recover. But we cannot stop. Cultivating justice and belonging requires commitment and consistency. The antiracism journey is lifelong. Gardeners reap a harvest from all their care—tilling the soil, planting, rooting, and blooming. Then the cycle begins again. Likewise, you will experience a harvest. You will see growth and change. Remember to acknowledge and celebrate. Then reset for a new cycle. One way to do this is to continue to invest in personal and professional development opportunities.

For example, our organization Brownicity.com hosts a learning community membership where learning content is regularly created and added online. EmbraceRace.org hosts monthly workshops for parents. Organizations like Facing History & Ourselves, the Abolitionist Teaching Network, and Learning for Justice host webinars. You can also look for local, in-person organizations that support ongoing growth. In our area, the Racial Equity Institute helps people and organizations who want to understand and proactively address racism in their organizations and communities.

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We listened to Susan's story (shared at the outset of the chapter) in disbelief. We clearly saw how within systemic and cultural norms, her brother was discredited and devalued. As a child, not only was Susan forced to navigate education spaces that did not see her family as worthwhile, but she also had to develop skills and savvy to place herself on the pathway to college. She learned to become an advocate for herself. Susan is now a brilliant teacher whose respect for students and their families is informed by her painful past. She sees and values everyone. She even sees students who don't want to be seen. Although Susan was able to become a gift to teaching despite her family being devalued, we can't help but wonder what might have been if there had not been so many obstacles. Perhaps her brother and cousins would have realized their aspirations as well.

Reflection and Practice