Social Justice Education Project

This paper is written in a reflective format which aims to outline, discuss and introduce topics which were examined and discussed during panel discussions which took place during Social Justice week at Ryerson University and the “Workshop on the Global Governance of Migration: Perspectives from Canada and Europe”. The overarching topic reflected on throughout this paper is migration and practices and rhetoric surround it. One of the panel’s attended was titled “Migration and Social Justice – Supporting Refugee Communities” during Social Justice Week. Two additional panels were attended during an ad-hoc event organized by the Department of Criminology, Ryerson University and Queen Mary University of London. This workshop took place on November 2-3, 2017. The panel

“The Black Studies Program: Strategy and Structure” was published Fall of 1972 in The Jounal of Negro Education. It’s contents are a relection on the years before when colleges and universitys were allowing African Americans to attend , but did not provide curriculum about or for African Americans.

The topic of social justice was not always a passion of mine to pursue in life. Growing up in a small town it was always difficult to see the gaps in our society. It was not until I started working for a Christian nonprofit that helped change my philosophies. For the past three years, I have been working as a missionary with Destino; a Christian nonprofit that focuses on raising up a generation of Latino college students to go out and change the world wherever God has called them. Since moving out of my small town and into an urban environment I have been able to witness firsthand the struggles Latino college students face. The worries they face as an undocumented student paying their way through college because they do not qualify for financial aid. The problems within Latino culture and the importance of providing for their family rather than receiving a college degree. The difficulties of fighting racism as a minority student attending a majority culture university. These are only a handful of struggles my students face everyday living in Denver. Although working with Destino, I have learned the importance of being culturally aware and to continue fighting on to be a voice to others who are unable to

Board of Education children of color had safer conditions than before, thus, it did not prevent them from receiving an education. Students like Linda Brown were not equal even when they were separate because the people in her neighborhood had the privilege of going to a school that is closer to their house. “Equal protection” did not exist for colored students, even with equal facilities because the schools’ were not equal in locations. An African-American should not be intimidated and discouraged to continue an education because of a proposed danger of reaching school every day. They all deserve an opportunity to succeed, and an education is essential for one to prosper.

In the mid-to-late 1950s African Americans were not allowed to be in the same breathing space as a white person, let alone the same school. Now today, any individual of any race can freely enter into any building and still receive quality teaching. A special thanks are for the nine brave history changers; Minnijean Brown, Terrance Roberts, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Patillo, Gloria Ray, Jefferson Thomas and Carlotta Watts. If it wasn’t for these students who endured the discomfort, students today will not be able to enjoy the comfortableness of being a high school student.

Enrollment of Blacks in white universities and colleges increased initially after Brown v. Board of Education, through much struggle and government intervention, but after reaching its zenith in the 1970’s numbers started to decline. Economic disparities between Whites and Blacks have increased and one of the major factors is the unequal educational opportunities and the disparity in funding between schools in urban areas as opposed to suburban conclaves. Facts noted in the pre-ceding paragraph were taken from “The Battle for Education,” (pgs.

In schools during the 1930’s, the education system failed to present authentic African American History in schools and African Americans were taught that their history meant nothing because most history books gave little or no space to the black man's presence in America.

Education has always been valued in the African American community. During slavery freed slaves and those held captive, organized to educate themselves. After emancipation the value of education became even more important to ex-slaves, as it was their emblem of freedom and a means to full participation in American Society (Newby & Tyack, 1971). During this time many schools for African Americans were both founded and maintained by African Americans. African Americans continued to provide education throughout their own communities well into the 1930’s (Green, McIntosh, Cook-Morales, & Robinson-Zanartu, 2005). The atmosphere of these schools resembled a family. The

"We need to activate people," said Thomas Allison, "Activate everyone—those who are suffering and those who are not."

“In the United States you can practice free speech and speak your opinions freely, but only if I agree with those opinions and those opinions don’t go against my thoughts”. It may seem hypocritical to call it free speech when there are limitations like the above statement says, but that is exactly how majority of social justice warriors think. They try to push their beliefs onto others and if you disagree with them or question them they attack you with slander and hate speech, labeling you all sorts of things such as racist, homophobic, sexist, and any other word they can think of to make it look like you hate them in the eyes of the media and their peers. There are many issues that are heavily affecting many people

Social, cultural and political changes have immense influences on the education sector. This has been witnessed from the onset African and Asian immigration into the United States from 1954 till present times. During the last quarter of the 20th century, immigrants to the US were denied education and those who received education did so under great threats. The dominant view of society about immigrants during this period was extremely negative and rejecting; thereby not deserving of an education. Currently, the education has been made affordable to everybody due to changing atmosphere of unprecedented social change. In education, this change resulted in the legal dismantling of segregated education for African American children (Collins, 2008). As African American children integrated the schools in the United States, they came to school with the stigma of slavery and the negative attitudes held by the agents of the educational institution. Attitudes and held perceptions were the catalyst for constructions such as biased assessment and the retardation paradigm. From these constructions emerged practices in special education that held large numbers of African American students captive in not only the educational milieu, but also limited their work potential. For this reason, the sociopolitical landscape as a context for curriculum, instruction, and assessment has continued to play a significant role in the education

Personally, I love school and I love all of my classes. However, I still have my favorites, and those are the ones that make me think about the world I live in. Biology, physics, and world history are some examples because it urges me to question my surroundings. Social Justice has that aspect as well, so I can most definitely say it has the potential to be one of my favorite classes for this semester.

This first paper assignment for me was very fair and was also one that was very enjoyable. The reason being we were able to choose a social justice organization that has some interest to us. This assignment had a very loose feeling in terms of structure. Aside from analyzing the organization's’ website, the rest was a free write about how we defined social justice in our own words. In my revision of my paper, I adjusted certain sentences to help provide some clarity of my message to the reader. I took out chunks of the essay that seemed to be out of place, intending to help reconstruct the fluidity of the paper. I also extended some sentences that were unclear by providing more details to help explain and strengthen the so what of my sentences.

Over the last eight weeks, we have visited and deeply discussed many topics that surround social justice in the classroom. These topics have ranged from social justice in the world to how to create a socially just classroom and everything in between. In class, there has been a few times where it has been uncomfortable because the topics can bring out many opinions in the room. Many people in the room shared their opinions, including me, which brought up many other discussions. In this essay, I will be discussing our navigations through the social justice issues that classrooms face by talking about the key points of our class throughout the last eight weeks.

What is social justice and how does it relate to liberation theology? How do sin, love, grace, and human freedom affect social justice? What restricts freedom and social justice? And how does all of this play a role in the Kingdom of God?