Many educators profess, as a virtue, that they treat all students the same. But when a student’s specific needs and story are erased, it’s not equitable—it’s damaging.
Educators who connect their teaching to students’ cultures, languages and heritage create classroom environments that value critical home-school relationships, affirm student identities and challenge stereotypes.
Racism, white privilege and white supremacy are challenges that people of color neither created nor should be expected to resolve. This scholar encourages white allies to step up.
Gloria Ladson-Billings is the Kellner Family Professor of Urban Education at the University of Wisconsin. She is credited with coining the term "culturally responsive pedagogy," and is one of the leaders in the field of culturally relevant teaching. Her book, The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African American Children, offers a close look at the qualities to be found in teachers whose African American students achieve academic success. She is a past president of the American Educational Research Association. Among her accomplishments as AERA president was a presidential address that