My name is Sharif El-Mekki. I’ve been an educator for almost 30 years. 10 as a classroom teacher, 16 as a principal. In the last few years, I’ve been a proud CEO for the Center for Black Educator Development. Between my time as a student and my career as an educator, I noticed a deep disconnect between the education of Black students— or what we should continue to call their miseducation— and their daily lived experiences.
I grew up in the great city of Philadelphia. But I was fortunate because I did not experience the traditional American schooling system. My earliest memories of school was in a pre-K my mother started or helped to start, in Masjid Mujahideen. She insisted that faith-based institutions should not just be for the nourishment of adults, but they should also support the intellectual development of children.
From this pre-K, I transitioned to Nidhamu Sasa, an African free school in the historic Germantown section of Philadelphia. From there we transitioned to Qom, Iran, where I attended Tabatabai Middle School, before returning for high school at Overbrook, an iconic and legendary school in West Philadelphia.
The partnership between my home and my elementary school, Nidhamu Sasa, was grounded in the histories that stretched from the freedom schools of the north to the deep south, to enslavement, to reconstruction, to Jim Crow and redlining, to the Civil Rights, Black Power, and independent Black school movements. But it went deeper than that. My educational experience was rooted in how people on the continent of Africa viewed their relationship between teaching and learning, scholars and scholarship, and self-discipline, self-determination, and education. After Nidhamu Sasa, we went to Iran. Qom, Iran. And from there I gained an international perspective of how people viewed education and their children. From there, we returned to the States. And I enrolled at Overbrook High School.
I loved my high school. And it was the first time I experienced low expectations as a student. It started with my placement test. Based on my score, my mother was encouraged to allow me to skip two grades. She declined— but she did let me skip one. I remember my sophomore year and cutting English class for almost a month. And sometimes I would run into my teacher in the hallway. And I was so nervous. We would lock eyes and she would look away and go about her way. But I also had Mr. Charles Mosley. One of the few Black teachers that I had in high school. He would connect history to his literature class. He had the audacity to believe that an English class should include the works of Black authors. One of the few times in high school that I experienced seeing myself in the curriculum.
It was my high school experience that convinced me that there was something deeply troubling with the American education system and how I and other Black students were being educated.
But it also helped propel me into a career and mission. My teaching career was grounded in the intellectual genealogy of Black educators who were immersed in Black history and Black culture, and Black social and political perspectives. I knew from intimate experiences the connection between activism and teaching Black students superbly; the inextricable linkages between education and racial justice.
You see today, in schools and classrooms around the country, educators use the foundations that were provided to them by educator prep programs. But most of these educator prep programs derive their understanding of the art and science of teaching and learning from white, educational and behavioral theorists— Horace Mann, John Dewey, B.F. Skinner, Piaget, and Freud. Theorists who couldn’t even fathom that the majority of public school students today would be made up of students of color. So it goes without saying that they did not create these practices and educational frameworks with Black students’ well-being and learning needs in mind.
Today, almost 80% of public school teachers are white. And often they enter America’s schools trained and armed with theories and practices that do not address Black students’ needs or their lived experiences.
But I believe there’s a better way. And it resembles how I was taught: with methods and mindsets that stretch from pre-colonial Africa to today.
Dr. Greg Carr has taught about this extensively, and my friend Dr. Akosua Lesesne wrote her dissertation on it. She coined it the “Black Teaching Tradition.”
The Black Teaching Tradition is a lineage of practices, values, and belief systems that stretch across time and centers how Black people have always taught and learned, regardless of the time and space. The Black Teaching Tradition is grounded in the humanity of students and is meant to support them specifically, but not exclusively. Because these practices and mindsets can be applied to the humanity of all students. In our work at the Center for Black Educator Development, we have 20 competencies that we believe fuel the healthy mindsets that educators must have in order to be effective educators of children and be able to serve and partner with communities.
Behind these competencies are three core tenets: communities centered on care, content that is rich, rigorous, and accurate, and the courage to implement both, in often hostile environments.
So, let’s start with community.
This educator is not well known. But she should be considered one of the matriarchs of Black education and Black school founders. Her intellectual genealogy can be traced through the work of Black Educator Hall of Famers, who she mentored and inspired. Educators like Nannie Helen Burroughs, Charlotte Hawkins, and Mary McLeod Bethune.
Lucy Craft Laney would convene with other educators to evolve and advance the education of Black children in America. And during that time, this was no easy feat. They weren’t hopping in Zoom rooms and DM-ing each other on social media, or hopping on jets. This was a slow and deliberate process. Lucy and her colleagues would come together to plot and plan for their people. For the education of the children and their students’ grandchildren. Lucy and other educators were relying on word of mouth and handwritten letters to come together to do this very important work.
And it’s because of her understanding of and proximity to the Black community, that Lucy and her colleagues understood the racial stress that Black children were often subjected to in school. And from this understanding they tailor their teaching, and design schools to accelerate student achievement. From Lucy Craft Laney and her protégés, hundreds of schools for Black children were opened and thousands of Black students were taught.
From Lucy Craft Laney we can learn the importance and impact of communities centered on care, but also the ripple effect that it can have on generations to come.
This next educator may be a little bit more well-known. His dedication to Black history led to Black History Month, formally known as Negro History Week. But what many people don’t realize is that this educator was fired from Howard University, an HBCU. At that time, talking about Black history and centering it in education was looked at as too radical. He should be considered as the father of Black history: none other than Dr. Carter G. Woodson.
Dr. Carter G. Woodson believed that in order to be an effective educator of Black youth, you had to have both content mastery and understand the sociopolitical conditions that undermine their education. He believed that the content mastery and understanding of the historical importance of their contributions is what will allow Black students to thrive.
The first part, content mastery, is pretty straightforward. Because how can you teach effectively if you’ve not mastered the content that you’re trying to teach students? But the second part, understanding the sociopolitical conditions and accurate Black history, is equally as important. Because how can you teach with an affirming lens if your understanding of their historical identity and contributions is minimized to enslavement? And how can you teach them and lead them effectively if you’re ignorant of the barriers that fence in their success? Dr. Carter G. Woodson teaches us that you can only be an effective educator if you have subject mastery and deep understanding of the context in which students are situated.
Last, but definitely not least, Septima Clark was born to a laundry woman and a formerly enslaved father. Her parents were not educated, but they insisted on education, and Septima eventually became a well-respected teacher-activist in South Carolina. Her activism included work with the NAACP. And she participated in a class-action lawsuit against disparate pay between Black and white teachers. This eventually raised the ire of her employers, and they passed a policy where teachers could not belong to a civil rights organization.
Septima and many Black educators had to decide between their activism and their employment. Septima chose courage. And she was eventually fired.
But that did not stop her teaching. She continued teaching at the Highlander School in Tennessee. Rosa Parks participated in Septima’s workshops mere months before heading back to Montgomery to help lead the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In 1976, 20 years after being unjustly fired, Septima’s pension was reinstated by the governor of South Carolina.
Septima teaches us today that courage may be educating despite anti-CRT legislation. And it may be at the risk of losing our teacher certification or our livelihood. And it may come at a great cost. But we also cannot continue to abide by the ramifications of staying silent.
I invite everyone to join us in the Black Teaching Tradition. We know that teaching and centering communities of care, mastering content in the sociopolitical context that our students grow up in, can lead to better educational outcomes. And not just for Black students, but for all. Thank you.
