When dreams take flight: How teachers imagine and implement an environment that nurtures Blackness at an Africentric school in Toronto, Ontario

Abstract

State schooling in North America has drastically under-served Black communities, and much educational research has explored visions of schooling that might provide a more relevant and socially just educational experience for Black students. Toronto’s Africentric Alternative School is the product of just such a vision. This article explores the aspirations, experiences, and practices of the first cohort of teachers at the Africentric Alternative School as they exercise agency to implement this vision. Findings demonstrate several key features of the teachers’ work, which they offer as their understanding of Africentric pedagogy: (1) they cooperate with each other, parents, and community to establish a familial environment for all school stakeholders; (2) they endeavour to establish classrooms that affirm students’ lived and political Blackness, that value the diverse ways in which Blackness is lived, and that help students to challenge oppressive practices among themselves; and (3) they persevere through sometimes challenging conditions created by historical and ongoing educational injustice, endeavouring to preserve the dignity of all members of the school community. Teachers, students, and parents consistently contrast these conditions to those they find in other school settings, which therefore positions these teachers’ pedagogies as a response to antiblackness embedded in public schools in Toronto.

Keywords:

• Antiblackness
• Canada
• teacher leadership
• Black education
• Black teachers

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Afropessimists refer to this condition as social death, drawing on the work of Patterson (1982). However, this is a highly contested label (see e.g. Moten, 2013).

2 Much of the literature cited in this article comes from studies of the Toronto District School Board—the only Ontario board that so far has taken the courageous step to collect race-based data. However, while the Toronto District School Board exhibits egregious antiblackness, it does not stand alone. Accounts from Black communities in the rest of the Greater Toronto Area (James et al., 2017) and other parts of Canada (e.g. Hampton, 2010; Howard, 2014; Sium, 2014) suggest the same trends exist throughout.

3 Nia, meaning purpose, is one of the Nguzo Saba. At the Africentric Alternative School, Nia Circles are used in conflict resolution, but also to build community in other ways, such as inviting students to share how they are feeling at the beginning of the school day.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Philip S. S. Howard

Philip S. S. Howard is Assistant Professor in the Department of Integrated Studies in Education at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec. His research examines the ways in which relations of race and antiblackness mediate the ways we come to know ourselves, create community, and exercise agency in educational settings in the Canadian settler-colonial context. He is co-editor of the collection African Canadian Leadership: Continuity, Transition and Transformation.

Carl E. James

Carl E. James holds the Jean Augustine Chair in Education, Community & Diaspora in the Faculty of Education, York University, Toronto, Ontario. His scholarly interests include examination of how race, ethnicity, gender, class and immigrant status/citizenship intersect and mediate schooling opportunities and educational outcomes of racialized and Black students. His forthcoming publications include: Colour Matters: The Experiences, Education and Aspirations of Black Youth.