This piece was also published in the Oak Park newspaper Wednesday Journal. If we value humanity, we white people must co-create and work in spaces that aspire towards antiracism. If we work in these spaces, our family, friends, colleagues, and neighbors of color will, at some point, call us racist or white supremacist, will say…
Should students earn Fs during a pandemic?
What are grades for? And now, during a pandemic, what purpose do they serve? Should grades measure how many assignments students complete? Student work is affected by the relationships we form with them, but right now we are unable to form those relationships as we usually do. Depending on our district and the age of…
What is entwining?
Entwining holds immense power within and through itself. Those existing within the entwining hold the power of relationships with one another. Each single-celled organism, each plant, each animal, and the living systems they comprise hold the power of those relationships -- they have evolved with and because of one another to be as they are,…
Inauguration
“All that you touch You Change. All that you Change Changes you. The only lasting truth Is Change.” - Octavia Butler Today is the Inauguration of Joe Biden, our 46th President. Today, the administration of Donald Trump ends. And amidst all the doubts about the possibility of renewed attacks, about what will happen next, about…
Reckoning
A reckoning means a settling of accounts. I've heard the word numerous times in the past week, since the insurrection in Washington, D.C.: "a day of reckoning", "a racial reckoning", "reckoning with our history". It seems that we need to account for what has been taken in and paid out over the four centuries since…
Incomprehensible
I heard the news this evening. I cannot believe that two of my former students are dead, ages 27 and 30. I can comprehend neither the pain that these deaths must cause nor the pain that caused these deaths. We all feel pain. Sometimes we are so consumed by our own pain that it blinds…
Spinning out of control
Each bit of news I hear knocks me further off of my axis. In my own village of Oak Park, a local resident has filed objections against the candidacies of the only two Black men who are running for Village Trustee, and the hearing on those objections is today. This local resident, of course, says…
Disproportionate impact
This piece was also published in the Oak Park newspaper Wednesday Journal. Oak Park resident Kevin Peppard has filed objections against the candidacies of Anthony Clark and Chibuike Enyia for Oak Park Village Trustee in the April 6th municipal election. Over the years, Mr. Peppard has filed numerous objections against various candidates for village offices.…
Coiling
The winter solstice gives us the shortest daylight of the year. It is a time to prepare for the growing light that is to come, for coiling in upon ourselves and making ready for renewal. Traditionally, it is a time for staying warm and gathering with those we love. But this year, there is no…
A zealous commitment to stories
Some of us wear our moderation like a badge of honor, as if it represents our intellectual fortitude in discerning the true path between opposing extremes. And in some cases, moderation is a virtue -- in our diet, in our exercise, in caring for our bodies. But when discerning a stance on issues of moral…
