Teaching for Change co-hosted author-illustrator Ricardo Cortés on a panel about his new illustrated book, A Secret History of Coffee, Coca & Cola (Akashic Books, 2012) on Jan. 9, 2013. Cortés was joined by Sanho Tree, Director of the Drug Policy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, and Carlotta Youngers, Senior Fellow with the Washington Office on Latin America. Using a good mix of anecdotal history and policy discussion, each panelist demonstrated… Read more.

Here are some of our favorite children’s and young adult titles from 2012. Please read and share. Read more.

Publishers Weekly responded to the Dec. 4, 2012 New York Times article on the lack of classroom books written by and featuring Latinos. While the scarcity is a big problem, the New York Times left out the independent publishers who have taken the lead in trying to fill that gap for many years including our friends at  Arte Público Press, Cinco Puntos Press, Lee & Low Books, Wings Press, Groundwood Books, and more. Teaching for Change’s executive director… Read more.

Teaching for Change is pleased to be planning a full-day seminar on Go Go with DCPS, hosted by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. We invite you to share this announcement with DCPS teachers. Social Studies teachers will learn about the emergence of Go Go music in Washington, DC and the role of Go Go in the development of DC culture. Music teachers will learn how to convey various stylistic elements related to the Go Go music genre to their students… Read more.

We were saddened to learn of the death of lifelong activist and freedom fighter Lawrence Guyot, who died on November 23, 2012. Born in Pass Christian, Mississippi, Guyot dedicated his life to the fight for voting rights, first with the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) and most recently in Washington, DC. We at Teaching for Change were honored to work with Lawrence Guyot in his role as an advisor… Read more.

The following testimony was given Thursday, November 15, 2012 by Teaching for Change’s Associate Director, Allyson Criner Brown, before the D.C. Council to oppose Bill 19-734, the School Closures and School Boundary Review Act of 2012. More than one hundred parents, students, teachers, and community members attended the public hearing, which was scheduled from 4-8pm. Testimony from the public did not begin until after 7pm and lasted until after 11pm.… Read More.

Teaching for Change welcomes Sarah Markes to discuss and sign her new book, Street Level: A Collection of Drawings and Creative Writing Inspired by Dar es Salaam. Street Level was selected as 2012 Honor Book for Older Readers by the Children’s Africana Book Award Program, affiliated with the African Studies Association. The introduction to this extraordinarily beautifully illustrated book gives a fascinating overview of the history and architectural heritage of Dar es Salaam, and an insight… Read more.

Since 2001, schools across the country (and in fact the world) sign up for the annual national  Mix It Up at Lunch Day campaign launched by  Teaching Tolerance. The goal is to “encourage students to identify, question and cross social boundaries.” As Teaching Tolerance explains, “It’s a simple act with profound implications. Studies have shown that interactions across group lines can help reduce prejudice. When students interact with those who are different from them… Read more.

For the past several years, I have been the music teacher at Shepherd Elementary School in Washington, D.C. This has given me the chance to combine two passions: music and social justice activism. I teach students the civil rights songs, peace songs, and union songs that I learned throughout my life. And I make links between the songs and peace and justice movements… Read more.

The Washington Nationals playoff game in Washington D.C. against the St. Louis Cardinals was held on October 10, 2012. According to the majority of the mainstream media and baseball press, it was the “the first postseason baseball game in Washington since 1933.” They were wrong.

This oft repeated line omits the championships of the legendary  Homestead Grays, the winners of the last Negro League World Series in 1948. During their era, the Grays were denied the opportunity to play against… Read more.

Teaching for Change is pleased to have been selected as a “charity” for the  Combined Federal Campaign – National Capital Area. Please spread the word and ask anyone you know who is a federal employee in the D.C. area to designate Teaching for Change. The Teaching for Change CFCNCA number is  25947. Your pledge impacts the lives of the students, parents, and teachers who use our programs and educational resources… Read more.

On September 26, just days into Latino/Hispanic Heritage Month, Teaching for Change hosted an event at Busboys and Poets in Washington, D.C. featuring author/historian  Jeff Biggers in a new show on immigration, civil rights, and states’ rights. The event was a stop on Biggers’ 30-city nationwide book tour for the release of his latest book,  State Out of the Union: Arizona and the Final Showdown Over the American Dream, in which the performance is based… Read more.

Teaching for Change is honored to participate in the  Institute of African American Affairs conference at New York University called “A Is for Anansi: Literature for Children of African Descent ” on November 9-10th, 2012 .

This is the second conference hosted by the Institute of African American Affairs to “deepen and diversify the cannon, conversation and scholarship of the literature as told by its most influential critics… Read more.

Shop, mingle, and enjoy the sounds of DJ Jahsonic at the Planet Maud Vintage & Co. trunk show benefiting Teaching for Change on  Sunday, October 14. Just steps from the Teaching for Change bookstore, shop for out of this world vintage and handmade goods  from 2-6pm at Restaurant Marvin  in Washington, D.C.’s  historic U Street Corridor. Read more.

In Washington, D.C. and in cities across the country, cultural and language barriers present some of the biggest challenges  to building effective home-school partnerships. Teaching for Change’s parent empowerment initiative has a few methods for overcoming this stumbling block: providing translation services for parent meetings, recruiting multilingual parent leaders, and promoting cultural understanding through community building and professional development are among them. Read more.

Teaching for Change launches campaign to provide K-12 teachers 
with free resources on the untold history and literature of Central America.

More than 3 million Central Americans reside in the United States today, yet the resources on Latino heritage in most schools focus on Mexico, South America, or Spain. Central America is simply a strip of land on a map connecting North and South America. Students are left to imagine that their Central American heritage, or that of their peers, is insignificant. Teachers know little about the history and there is a scarcity of literature in the school libraries. That is why for National Latino… Read more.

Teaching for Change is pleased to co-sponsor two events with the Américas Book Award in early October in Washington, DC. The first is an awards ceremony at the Library of Congress on Friday, October 5 from 3:00-5:30pm. Receiving awards will be Monica Brown (author) and Julie Paschkis (illustrator) for Pablo Neruda: Poet of the People and Margarita Engle for Hurricane Dancers: The First Caribbean Pirate Shipwreck. The ceremony is free and open to the public. Read more.

In a promising start to the 2012-2013 school year, parents at  Strong John Thomson Elementary  (D.C. Public Schools) convened for the first of many discussions with Principal Carmen Shepherd.

Just after the start of the school day on September 7, about 30 parents—a few with toddlers or infants in tow—gathered in the large meeting room for the first Principal Coffee & Chat of the year. The hour long monthly meetings over light breakfast were established… Read more.

We thank our four interns and volunteers from the summer of 2012: Truman Scholars Dominique Hazzard and Sarah Neitz, Bates College student Bridget Feldman, and early childhood classroom teacher Amy Rothschild. They worked on our Ask Me About campaign on Central America, the “this day in history” photo album for the  Zinn Education Project on Facebook, and our recommended resource list for the Ant-Bias Curriculum….  Read more.

The Langston Room was full to capacity for the Race & Education discussion at  Busboys and Poets on Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012.

Teaching for Change was pleased to serve as a partner for this event which was part of the monthly A.C.T.O.R. (A Continuing Talk on Race) series coordinated by Pamela Pinnock. Over two-thirds of the attendees were teachers… Read more.

“Never get used to injustice. It is an unnatural condition. Even if you can’t remove the injustice today, continue to call it by its correct name.” —Enid Lee

Enid Lee  is a “front line teacher,” teacher educator, researcher, writer, consultant, facilitator, and speaker. She has taught in the Caribbean, Canada, and the United States.

Lee consults internationally on anti-racist, inclusionary, and equitable education… Read more.

We are proud to announce that our very own Allyson Criner Brown has been selected by the Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington for a prestigious fellowship that will expose her to a rich network of mentors, colleagues, and other nonprofit organization leaders. This intensive experience will prepare her for a future executive directorship.

Allyson joined Teaching for Change in September 2010 as associate director and program manager of Tellin’ Stories, our… Read more.

In honor of Chuck Brown’s life and legacy, we invite teachers to share lessons and/or stories about how to infuse the history and music of go-go into the curriculum. The music and culture of go-go have been integral to D.C.’s history since the 1970s. We believe that this history should be just as integral to the study of history and music in D.C. and Prince George’s County Schools.

Teaching for Change is honored to be working with D.C. Public Schools… Read more.

On July 9, 2011, the D.C. community convened for a beat, the Go-Go beat. The Smithsonian Anacostia Community Museum hosted Evolution of the Go-Go Beat in Washington, D.C. , the second program in a series devoted to Washington, D.C.’s homegrown genre of music. Go-Go music, the history of which has been carefully chronicled in The Beat! Go-Go Music from Washington, D.C., has West African roots and is recognized for its infectious heartbeat-based rhythm… Read more.

Thank you to everyone who donated to our Spring 2012 Teaching Out LOUD campaign, the board and staff of Teaching for Change give our most sincere thanks. Social justice teaching should not be silenced, and we want to recognize the wonderful and generous individuals who helped us raise more than $10,000 for social justice books, lessons, trainings, and resources.

Please view our most recent newsletter for stories about the impact your support… Read more.