Social Justice

I chose the article by the National Council of Teachers of English, the NCTE, called, “Beliefs About Social Justice in English Education.” It outlines seven beliefs about social justice in education. The first belief is about defining social justice. The authors say it’s “definitionally complex,” meaning social justice varies by person and the authors don’t feel they are able to write a blanket statement that encompasses all people and all of their life experiences. They do believe that social justice allows teachers to teach all students more fairly and want it to exist in schools by giving the same opportunities for academic achievement to all students “regardless of background or acquired privilege.” They go on to say in order to achieve this, educators must teach about injustices and discriminations. I like this idea because I think not talking about issues or problems doesn’t make them go away. In our last reading about critical pedagogy and popular culture in urban schools, the teachers paired a book about low-income schools with a movie about a teacher making change in a school that compares to the schools in the book. The students who were also in a similar school with a lack of resources seemed to take a lot away from studying and talking about social injustice. While I agree talking about injustices is necessary and important, it can also be a touchy subject and students will probably have differing levels of experiences with social injustices.

The article says that we, as educators, need to bring students up to their capabilities and prepare them to take on challenges in the future. “If any student is left behind, the system has failed, no matter how well some may have succeeded.” This line resonated with me because it’s really what social justice is about, equality regardless of background. If one student isn’t treated or challenged or prepared as the other students are, then that’s not equality.

The NCTE gives a lot of statistics in the article. They say less than 10 percent of teachers are non-white, while more than 40 percent of public schools are African-American, Latino, Asian and Native American. They say that more than 4.4 million second language learners enrolled in U.S. schools are expected to take standardized tests that are evaluated in the same way as students whose first language is English. These numbers really surprised me. It just seems like the system is failing these students. I don’t know what the solution is, but it’s proven that students from lower socioeconomic background perform worse in school. The article says that educators should be committed to interrupting practices that reproduce these outcomes.

While talking about social justice pedagogy, the authors say that social justice to one person might not be social justice to another. Different students have different needs. The article says that we must seek to offer the same, “educational, sociocultural and psycho-emotional opportunities.” But we will have students at different stages in their lives, having different experiences and won’t all be on an even playing field. It’s interesting because while reading, I kept thinking social justice was treating everyone equally. But it seems it’s more treating everyone based on experience so that we are all equal. This is a journey, one that can’t be attained in a day or maybe even in a school year, but it should be the intention to honor all students, all the time.

http://www.ncte.org/cee/positions/socialjustice