Both personally and on behalf of the Committee for Equity and Excellence in Education (CEEE), I want to say thank you for your end-of-the-year article, “2016 was the year of equity” [News, Dec. 28] and your article “Activists call for greater effort on equity” [News, Jan. 4].
I believe your articles provided a sweeping look at efforts that have been intently underway for the last 15 months but that also stretch back to the beginning of the years of Stephen Isoye as District 200 superintendent when CEEE began.
In addition to our Viewpoint articles on curriculum equity and our “One Book-One OPRF” activities of last spring, we have done work for racial equity through policy statements at the board level, and through conversations with individual board members in non-board venues like APPLE meetings and even in our one-book dialogs that some board members joined.
In September we joined in coalition with APPLE and the Suburban Unity Alliance in proposing a set of actions toward racial equity for the board to adopt. We will make the case for those actions in the near future in WJ.
In addition to board members reading our proposed book, On the Same Track by Carol Burris, they examined reports we submitted on equity efforts with restructuring curriculum that have been successfully underway at Evanston Township High School since 2009.
Other board members have carefully studied additional informative texts on how districts across the country have made significant progress in building racially-just schools and more equitable learning opportunities for all students. These texts include Despite the Best Intentions, Leading with Equity and Excellence through Equity. The stories of the schools and people in these books have provided us a mirror to look at ourselves more closely and critically. Most importantly, in an affirming manner they have led many members of our community to say, “If these successes in making school more racially just and equitable can happen there, why not here?”
We believe the current D200 Board of Education has been responsive to new ideas around racial equity on key fronts, including discipline, course offerings, teacher development and most recently with the hiring of Dr. Pruitt-Adams who very closely mirrors a set of hiring guidelines CEEE and APPLE shared with the board on July 1 of last year, even before we knew Dr. Pruitt-Adams.
In another board initiative around racial equity, Dr. Steve Gevinson, in early December, led a team of a dozen or so faculty and administrators for a day-long visit to Evanston to see their programs in action and hear firsthand the unique and inspiring progress they have made with student achievement.
Dr. Gevinson enthusiastically reported to the D200 board on his findings during the Dec. 22 school board meeting. We encourage you to examine the transcript of his report and to personally study the compelling documents and evaluations of the Evanston curriculum reform efforts.
Again, thank you for your coverage of the resurgence of our community’s efforts around racial justice and equity in our schools. We will keep you informed of developments and actions that CEEE and the coalition will sponsor in 2017.
John Duffy is the founder and chairperson of the Committee for Equity and Excellence in Education.