1. BEGINNINGS, BUY-IN,
AND BELIEF IN
PARTICIPATORY ACTION
RESEARCH WITHIN A
SCHOOL COMMUNITY
Urbana High School Social Justice Class
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA-CHAMPAIGN
RESEARCHERS
UCEA Indianapolis 2013

2. ELEMENTS OF SCHOOL
IMPROVEMENT
Student Voice?
What about the voices of
those most impacted by
the school improvement
decisions of educational
stakeholders?
School Leadership:
Administrators must take
responsibility to foster,
support, and embed
student voice into school
improvement initiatives.

3. STUDENT VOICE, YOUTH
PARTICIPATORY ACTION
RESEARCH & SCHOOL
IMPROVEMENT

4. MEANINGFUL
COLLABORATION
UIUC & UHS
• “Schooling” those in the “ivory tower”
• Challenging the “ivory tower” notion by learning from experts
within the field.
• Who are the experts?
• Teachers
• Students
• Administrators
• Community members
• Understanding our socio-political context & nurturing stronger
community relationships
• Fostering a more democratic school improvement effort:
• Equity centered
• Inquiry based & participatory
• Student voice in school improvement
• Critical reflection & feedback

5. MS. MOYER
• Teaches English at UHS
• Dually certified in English and Social Studies
• Chair of the Social Justice Committee
• Serves on the School Improvement Administrative
Advisory
• Taught Social Justice elective course for the first time
this year
• Committed to Culturally Responsive Pedagogy and
disrupting traditionally asymmetrical power dynamics in
the classroom

7. COURSE OVERVIEW
• In the first half of the semester, I led lessons
that helped students engage with issues of
identity and power
• In the second half of the semester, students
engaged in Youth Participatory Action
Research (YPAR)

8. FIRST HALF OF THE
SEMESTER
• Learned key vocabulary and frameworks
related to identity and power
• Reflected on our own identities
• Studied historical & current events
• Engaged in debates
• Discussed the issues in our community and
decided to take action

9. NOTABLE
VOCABULARY
Social construction: a perception or
idea that is 'constructed’ (or made up)
through cultural or social practice; a
product of human interaction
Intersectionality: the overlapping of
identities
Who’s marginalized? Who’s
privileged?

10. NOTABLE READINGS
• Select chapters from The Latinization of US Schools
by Jason Irizarry
• “Colorblindness: the New Racism” (Teaching
Tolerance)
• “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack”
by Peggy McIntosh
• Excerpts by Gloria Ladson-Billings
• Excerpts from Courageous Conversations about
Race by Glenn E. Singleton and Curtis Linton

11. NOTABLE
ASSIGNMENTS
• Gender autobiography
• Race autobiography
• Counternarratives
• Co-authored an article for Leadership for
Social Justice SIG The Social Justice
Leader with Dr. Welton and Mr. Wiemelt

12. “STANDARDIZING” SOCIAL
JUSTICE: COMMON CORE
ALIGNMENT
Alignment to English and Social Studies standards
Reading
Example: RH.11-12.1. Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis
of primary and secondary sources, connecting insights gained from
specific details to an understanding of the text as a whole
Writing
Example: WHST.11-12.4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which
the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task,
purpose, and auidence
Speaking and listening
Example: SL.1..-12.1. Initiate and participate effectively in a range of
collaborative discussions with diverse partners on texts, issues, building
on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively
Research
Example: WHT.11-12.9: Draw evidence from informational texts to
support analysis, reflection, and research

13. “EVALUATING” SOCIAL
JUSTICE: DANIELSON
DISTINGUISHED RATING
CLASSROOM
ENVIRONMENT
• Students indicate through
their questions &
comments a desire to
understand the content
• Students assist their
classmates in
understanding the
content
• Students take initiative in
improving the quality of
their work
• Students correct one
another in their use of
language
INSTRUCTION
• Teacher invites student to
explain content to their
classmates
• Students suggest other
strategies they might use in
approaching a challenge or
analysis
• Teacher uses rich language,
offering brief vocabulary
lessons where appropriate,
both for general vocabulary
& for the discipline
• Students use academic
language correctly

14. SECOND HALF OF
SEMESTER
• Youth Participatory Action Research
(YPAR)
• Youth gathering together to solve real
problems through research
• Students and teachers work
collaboratively to incite change within
communities

15. www.mikvachallenge.org

16. HOW WE CHOSE OUR
TOPICS
Voting
Root causes and rationale
• Institutionalized racism: the cumulative effects of
policies and systems which have the effect of
disadvantaging certain racial groups; describes a system
of inequality that can occur in institutions
• This does not include individual acts of blatant racism
 Color blindness: claiming that race doesn’t matter
 (“I don’t see race”)
 White privilege: unearned advantages white people
benefit from because of their light skin (ex: white people can
go shopping pretty well assured that they will not be followed
or harassed)

17. ROOT CAUSES:
BRAINSTORMING

18. OUR TOPICS
Teacher-student relationships
Lack of faculty racial diversity
Underrepresentation of students of color
in honors courses
Disproportionate dress code enforcement
on females of color
Overrepresentation of students of color in
DRA

19. RESEARCH PROCESS
Developed guiding research questions
Consulted a variety of sources to find
answers
Established claims based off of findings

20. LETTERS TO THE
ADMINISTRATION
We summarized our findings and offered
recommendations for the future to 2013-14
UHS administration in letters
 copies available during the poster
sessions

21. STUDENT
PRESENTATION
May 10th and 17th, UHS library
In attendance: teachers, counselors,
deans, administrators, U of I students and
faculty, community members, central office
staff, students

22. MAY 10TH
PRESENTATIONS

23. TEACHER-STUDENT
RELATIONSHIPS
CLAIMS AND FINDINGS
We claim that culturally responsive teaching affects
students’ learning in positive ways because students’
identities are affirmed; relationships between
students and teachers matter
 We learned that teachers can better relate to
students by developing relationships and
embracing their students’ cultural identities

24. DISPROPORTIONATE DRESS
CODE ENFORCEMENT ON
FEMALES OF COLOR
CLAIMS AND FINDINGS
We claim that females of color get more dress code
infractions than any other group at UHS
 We learned that the vast majority of students
believe that the dress code is enforced more
severely on black girls

25. LACK OF FACULTY OF
COLOR
 CLAIMS AND FINDINGS
 We claim that diversity is a strength; we
believe the diversity of the faculty should
reflect the diversity of the student body
 We learned that the faculty at UHS is 92%
white

26. OVERREPRESENTATION OF
STUDENTS OF COLOR IN DRA
CLAIMS AND FINDINGS
We claim that the higher level of referrals black
students receive may be “pushing” kids out of
school
 We learned that 74% of students that receive
DRA are black

27. UNDERREPRESENTATION
OF STUDENTS OF COLOR
IN HONORS COURSES
CLAIMS AND FINDINGS
We claim that there is a lack of racial, ethnic, and
linguistic diversity in Advance Placement courses
 We learned that the rate of white students
enrolled in AP courses is over three times the
rate of black students enrolled in AP courses.

28. NEWSPAPER FEATURE

29. STUDENTS & TEACHER
AS ACTIVIST
Our next steps will be to…
…work with administrators to implement as many of our
recommendations as possible
…work with the Social Justice Committee to advocate
for and facilitate these changes
…propose a second social justice class to the
Curriculum Development team
…Social Justice class & UIUC researchers collaborate
in order to continue this work

30. RESEARCH
COLLABORATION
PROCESS
Leadership
• Support from school administration
• District level leadership
Coalition Building
• Community organized support that
• Motivates teachers & students
• Challenges resistance & whiteness
• Brokers resources & capital
• Encouraging educators to include student voice in the classroom
The research
• Developing theories based on classroom pedagogy & community
building
• Co-authoring papers with high school faculty
• Students & teacher on the “speakers circuit” facilitating PD for
educators