Denise Yull

Teaching Macro Social Work through Experiential Learning: Student Reflections on Lessons Learned in Building School-Community Partnerships

A faculty-led experiential learning project was implemented with Master of Social Work students at their field placement sites to teach macro practice skills and research methods. As part of a grant-funded school-university partnership, MSW students were placed in school social work field placements, where their practice focused on individual and small group interventions with youth. Ten MSW students participated in asset-based collective family engagement in diverse, low-income communities, using community organizing skills and community-based participatory research methods. To examine student learning, a pilot study gathered narrative data from seven of the students and three supervisors. MSW students’ learning from the project is discussed in the context of CSWE’s 2015 EPAS competencies. Participation in the experiential/service-learning project supported the ability of the MSW students to build a sense of themselves as professionals bringing value to the community, enhanced their understanding of cultural diversity and family engagement, and provided context for vulnerable students’ struggles in school and the families’ difficulties with school engagement. This project illustrates the potential of school-university partnerships involving MSW field students to help bridge the gaps in school-family partnerships, particularly in diverse and low-income communities, and highlights areas where different teaching methods can be used to reinforce competencies learned.

Bringing Sanctuary to School Assessing School Climate as a Foundation for Culturally Responsive Trauma-Informed Approaches for Urban Schools

Decades of federal economic policies that have concentrated poverty into isolated communities have devastated urban education, and expose youth and families to high stress and trauma. Disproportionately negative outcomes for students of color and those who are economically disadvantaged can be understood as manifestations of negative racial school climate and inadequate responsiveness to students’ trauma. As part of a school–university partnership to inform culturally responsive trauma-informed pedagogy, this study assessed the climate of a racially diverse high-poverty elementary school. Findings explored the application of the trauma-informed Sanctuary Model to address students’ trauma and a social justice response for urban education.

A Critical Ethnographic Approach to Transforming Norms of Whiteness in Marginalized Parents’ Engagement and Activism in Schools

Abstract While scholars recognize that parent engagement in children’s education is beneficial, much of the normative parent involvement literature rests on the assumption that marginalized parents of color must be taught white middle-class norms of conduct in order to engage with the school system. In this chapter, we describe the ways our critical ethnographic implementation and analysis of the Parent Mentor Program – a parent engagement project in a small urban school district in Central New York – re-envisions parent engagement in three interrelated ways. First, we argue that the project is race-, class-, gender-, and power-conscious, drawing on the interrelated theoretical frames of Critical Race Theory and Critical Whiteness Studies. Second, we argue that the program and research are unique in utilizing the toolkit of critical ethnography to not merely describe, but also to intervene in educational inequity. Third, we argue that the program has a more holistic goal than much of the parent engagement literature, as it seeks to connect parent engagement and activism with the larger antiracist goal of using restorative justice strategies to disrupt the disproportionate disciplining of Black students. Focusing on critical ethnographic methods in practice, we analyze the shifting positionalities of a multiracial research team as we grappled with methodological dilemmas in the first three years of the program. We document how we balanced the goals of introducing a race-conscious framework and catalyzing critical consciousness with the realities of constantly renegotiating entry in a school district characterized by colorblindness and colormuteness.

Race and the politics of educational exclusion: explaining the persistence of disproportionate disciplinary practices in an urban school district

ABSTRACT Educational research has established a link between zero tolerance disciplinary policies and increases in racial disproportionality in suspensions and expulsions of students of color. This article reports on a critical ethnography of Rivertown, a school district with urban characteristics, where we have been working with parents of color whose children are subjected to exclusionary discipline. Using the framework of Critical Race Theory in education, specifically Derrick Bells interest-convergence principle, we argue that several interrelated barriers prevent movement toward racial equity: a culture of colorblindness and white fragility that silences race talk; contested definitions of the problem that obfuscate its racialized nature; and the persistence of a zero tolerance framework even with the implementation of a restorative justice pilot. We conclude by discussing our ongoing strategies for creating interest-convergence between White power-holders and communities of color in Rivertown.

An Exploratory Study of College Choice for Southeast Asian American Students

The study of college choice among all students continues to be crucial in higher education. More importantly, a critical examination of understanding the influences of college choice for ethnically diverse groups may provide better guidance for colleges and universities particularly in increasing and diversifying their student populations. This exploratory qualitative study examines the college choice of Southeast Asian American college students (SEAA). Implications for future practice and research are also presented.

Keeping Black Children Pushed Into, Not Pushed Out of, Classrooms: Developing a Race-Conscious Parent Engagement Project:

Black students in prekindergarten through Grade 12 (P-12) schools across the United States experience persistent educational disparities involving disproportionate disciplinary practices. This research study, using a qualitative methodological approach, describes and analyzes the impact of the Parent Mentor Program, which brings together Black parents, community members, school district personnel and university researchers working together to implement a race-conscious parent engagement project to transform the experiences of Black parents and Black children in the school district. Themes that emerged from the qualitative narratives include Black parents moving from marginalized outsiders to feeling accepted, teachers’ perspectives on the impact of the program, and the final theme—pushing kids into, not out of the classroom—which delineates the critical role of Black parents in addressing pervasive racialized disciplinary practices within school systems. Findings provide support for this culturally responsive innovative parent engagement program with Black parents based on a model that does not subscribe to a traditional framework of race neutrality and colorblindness situated in educational systems. This program instead proposes a race-conscious parent engagement model.

Race Has Always Mattered: An Intergeneration Look at Race, Space, Place, and Educational Experiences of Blacks

Within school settings race continues to be one of the most formidable obstacles for Black children in the United States (US) school system. This paper expands the discussions of race in education by exploring how the social links among race, space, and place provide a lens for understanding the persistence of racism in the educational experiences of Black children. This paper examines how differences in a rural versus urban geographical location influence a student’s experience with race, racism, and racial identity across four generations of Black people in the context of school and community. Implications for research and practice are discussed.