Building A Diverse Community Movement For Integration
In this workshop, participants will learn about successful organizing strategies that have mobilized parents and students in support of school integration in different contexts. Participants will develop an understanding of how to encourage and foster grassroots movements in places where none currently exists. Participants will hear from grassroots organizers, movement lawyers, and other education advocates regarding strategies to engage local elected officials, policymakers, clergy, families, and community leaders around the issue of diverse schools. Discussion will include the educational, economic, and social impacts of resegregation, and challenges faced by organizers.
FEATURING:
- Rebecca Copeland, Chair, Citizens for Education and Economic Security
- Sarah Camiscoli, Founder and Director, IntegrateNYC4me
- Timothy Martinez, Student Advocate, IntegrateNYC4me
- Karen Taylor, University of Hartford Magnet Parent and Member, Sheff Movement coalition
Moderated by Elizabeth Haddix, Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Civil Rights at the University of North Carolina School of Law at Chapel Hill
SUMMARY
The organizing workshop was interactive and inspiring. Sarah Camiscoli and one of her students in the Bronx, Timothy Martinez, opened the workshop with IntegrateNYC’s strategies for organizing for integration: research, political advocacy, and school-to-school collaborations, which include the temporary student exchange program in which students from the Bronx attend their peer Manhattan school, and vice versa. Next, Rebecca Copeland shared some of the unique challenges that confront rural school organizing efforts. Karen Taylor rounded out the panel with lessons on sharing personal stories with decisionmakers. She talked about how being vulnerable, and checking one’s own biases, can be persuasive to those decisionmakers.