Action Plan

Jordan Stoyek

Action Plan

Promoting Social Justice

EL 520

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Jordan Stoyek
Promoting Social Justice

Background

The school and community that I work in is a predominantly white, middle class

community. The high school consists of approximately 1,876 students and 109 professional

staff. The racial distribution of students if 87% White, 5% Hispanic, 3% African American, 2%

Two or More, 2% Asian, and 0.2% Native American. Approximately 11% of the students receive

Special Education services.

I am a member of the Social Justice Committee in my school district. As a committee, we

went through training and learned about the issues of race, ethnicity, and gender that are

prevalent in society and education today. After the training, we developed an Action Plan

specific for our school district in regards to promoting social justice and growing in our cultural

responsiveness. We decided to conduct and film a fishbowl discussion with a diverse group of

secondary students to gain an understanding of the social issues of the school from the

perspective of the students. Many issues emerged in the discussion, including the treatment of

minority students (i.e. comments/remarks made to students by other students in the hallway),

lack of teacher knowledge in cultural/race issues, and teacher comfort level in facilitating

conversations on cultural/race issues. All of the students agreed that there is an issue of race at

the school. I did not find it surprising that there is issues of race in a suburban school after going

through the Social Justice training.

As a secondary staff, we viewed the fishbowl film for a Professional Learning session. All

staff members engaged in thoughtful discussion on the student perspectives and conversations

that took place during the film. Many staff felt that there is a gap between the perspectives of

students and teachers, which can lead to students not feeling supported. Staff members also

discussed how difficult it can be to facilitate a conversation on cultural/race issues when they

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are not equipped with the knowledge to do so. According to the discussion of students and

teacher conversations, there is a disconnect between students and teachers.

Research Application

According to Hines-Datiri (2015), the public school system is changing in demographics

at a rapid pace which will require the teachers to understand the racial and ethnic backgrounds

of their students. Hines-Datiri refers to the work of Ladson-Billings (1995) that argues “not only

must teachers encourage academic success and cultural competence, they must help students

to recognize, understand, and critique current social inequalities” (p. 476). At the professional

learning session, a topic of discussion was the demands and expectations that are placed on

teachers in society today. The sole responsibility of a teacher is no longer to educate students

academically but also to get to know each individual student’s background and culture. Although

educating the whole child is a challenging task, especially with the amount of students a

secondary teacher is responsible for, it’s a necessary task if we want to reach our students from

diverse backgrounds. One issue is that many teachers do not feel culturally competent enough

to teach their students how to be culturally competent.

An article written by Slesaransky-Poe (2014) discusses a comprehensive plan as to how

schools can become a safe place for all students, specifically the LGBTQ community.

Slesaransky-Poe explains that if schools want to become a safe place for all students to thrive,

they should provide education to the teachers on sex,gender, and sexuality education. Schools

should also review and revise anti-discrimination policies, implement an inclusive curriculum in

all courses, and strive to provide a supportive environment for students who may be

discriminated against. Although the article is reference to the LGBTQ community in schools, I

believe the comprehensive plan that is discussed can have a positive impact on all students,

especially those who are marginalized.

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Action Plan

I believe that promoting Social Justice and continuing to work on student-student

relationships/teacher-student relationships is a positive step in creating an environment for all

students to feel accepted. The district and high school has taken initiative by focusing on the

whole child and wellbeing in students, staff, and parents, developing the Social Justice

Committee, and beginning a seminar class that focuses on strengthening relationships between

students and staff. Last school year, the high school started a Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) club.

It would be beneficial for the high school to continue working on it’s efforts in Social

Justice. The Professional Learning at the school is based on a cohort model, where each

individual cohort works on a specific area of need throughout the school year such as

Project-Based Learning, Data, Literacy, etc. I propose that we begin a Social Justice cohort that

consists of a select group of teachers that are passionate about the issue. The cohort group

could continue the work of the fishbowl film, because there has not been a concrete next step

since we met as a staff. They could also work with students on addressing social justice issues

in the school, which could have a positive impact on teacher-student relationships. Research

suggests that staff should be adequately trained in being culturally responsive. Therefore, I

would recommend having the social justice cohort involved in cultural competency professional

learning which is provided each year by Oakland Schools. I believe educating the staff and

students would be a positive first step in addressing the Social Justice issues in the school and

community.

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References

Hines-Datiri, D. (2015). When police intervene: Race, gender and discipline of Black male

students at an urban high school. ​Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership, 18​(2),

pp. 122-133.

Slesaransky-Poe, G. (2013). Adults set the tone for welcoming all students. ​The Phi Delta

Kappan, 94​(5), pp. 40-44.