What We Learned from Our “Oakland to Gaza” K–12 Teach-In
Educators in Oakland share the dramatic story of what happened when they organized a teach-in for Palestine.
Organizing
How School Lunch Debt Creates Shame and Inequality — and Our Fight to Abolish It
Debt activists examine the shame, stigma, and effects of student lunch debt — and their successful organizing for universal free meals.
How My Teacher Union Fought for Housing Justice
A teacher union member stories the Boston Teachers Union fight for housing justice.
Teach Truth Days of Action
We asked teachers who helped organize “Teach Truth Days of Action” in various parts of the country to describe their days
of action and why they were important. Here’s what they said.
The Tragedy of New Orleans Is Not Unique
A Review of Public Schools, Private Governance by J. Celeste Lay
Building the Foundation for Police-Free Schools
On Oct. 25, 2015, student Niya Kenny filmed a white school police officer body slamming her classmate, a Black 16-year-old girl named Shakara, to the floor during math class at […]
Don’t Despair About the Supreme Court
The courts have never been on the side of justice, only moving a few degrees one way or the other, unless pushed by the people. Those words engraved in the marble of the Supreme Court, “Equal Justice Before the Law,” have always been a sham.
Oakland Youth to Teachers’ Retirement System: “Divest Now!”
It was a letter to the CalSTRS board, demanding that they dump the pension fund’s investments in oil and gas companies. It was signed “From the many young climate justice activists who will continue to be at every one of your meetings until you divest.”
Compassion, Solidarity, Care: Detroit-Area Youth Respond to the Pandemic
Just as workers are going to need unions, young people need to be organizing as students to make collective demands on the system as well as to meet their needs in an emergency.
As States Build Barriers to Racial Justice Teaching, Educators Fight Back
Teachers nationwide have been standing up to register their resistance and solidarity, organizing rallies, supporting school board candidates who reject these bills, and doubling down on their own efforts to learn and teach about race.
The Story of One Union’s Journey Toward Disability Justice
I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit. In the early 1990s, my family fought to have my brother Micah, who had been labeled with an intellectual disability with needs […]
Biden’s Broken Promise: Time to Opt Out!
On Dec. 14, 2019, I asked President Joe Biden a question about standardized testing. Seeking the Democratic nomination, he had joined other presidential candidates at a Public Education Forum hosted […]
Karen Lewis Struck a Blow for Justice
When Karen Lewis, the past president of the Chicago Teachers Union, succumbed to a long battle with brain cancer on Feb. 8, 2021, we lost one of the greatest freedom […]
Teacher Unions and Social Justice Study Groups
Teacher Unions and Social Justice is an anthology of more than 60 articles documenting the history and the how-tos of social justice unionism. Together, these contributions describe the growing movement to […]
The Teaching for Black Lives Starter Pack
Get the free Teaching for Black Lives Starter Pack when you sign up today for email updates from Rethinking Schools.
Moving Past the Trump Presidency — The Promise of Social Justice Teacher Unions
The editors of the new book Teacher Unions and Social Justice: Organizing for the Schools and Communities Our Students Deserve argue that teacher unions must move beyond strategies of the past to put social justice and anti-racism at the center of their work.
Teacher Unions and Social Justice
An anthology of more than 60 articles documenting the history and the how-tos of social justice unionism. Together, they describe the growing movement to forge multiracial alliances with communities to defend and transform public education.
Schools Reopen — and Teachers Fight for Their Lives, Their Students, and the Future of Public Education
As schools begin to reopen, within teacher unions around the country, teachers have been coming together to discuss the risks they’re willing to take — both to protect public health […]
Coronavirus, Sick-Outs, and the Fight to Close New York City Schools
New York City has become the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, and its public schools, which serve 1.1 million students and employ nearly 135,000 people, officially closed on March 17. […]
Paid Leave in the Time of a Pandemic
Educators know firsthand what lack of paid family and medical leave means for their students and families — and for themselves. Now, the pandemic has dramatically elevated the need for […]
Teachers and the Struggle for Paid Family Leave
Last fall, California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, signed a sweeping array of progressive legislation into law. Among the many bills he enacted included legislation granting collective bargaining rights to the […]
Short Stuff 26.2
International Movement for Public Education Privatization, standardized tests, funding cuts, attacks on teachers’ unions and contracts—the issues that are central to teacher activism in the United States are international. In […]
We Need to Ask Our Students to Dream — and to Dream Big
Back in the 1980s, I taught an elective class at Jefferson High School in Portland, Oregon, called Literature and Social Change. It centered around the questions “What is a good […]
From the Art Build to the Streets
The author of A People’s Art History of the United States dissects the imagery unions created and used in the streets and on the picket lines during the 2019 Chicago teachers strike.
What Can Art Do in the Perilous Present?
An artist and academic writes about art builds — how they are practices of resistance and solidarity, and celebrations of joy and justice to fuel the teachers’ rebellion and other movements.