This NOVEMBER 19th is the ELEVENTH Annual Chicago-Area Teaching for Social Justice Curriculum Fair!

Our theme for this year's fair: Defend and Transform Public Education!

Come help plan one of the biggest Chicago-area popular education events of the year!
Saturday, Sept 10
1-3PM UIC College of Education
1040 W. Harrison
3rd Floor "Commons" Room (big room on 3rd floor)
ALL are welcome!

AGENDA:
1:00    Meet and intros
1:15    Brief report-back on recent TSJ trip to study Cuba's education system
2:00    Curriculum Fair planning-Committees, Media, Art, Workshop planning, etc.

Get involved and help make the Curriculum Fair a continued success as we continue to make this road while walking! Read the Full Story

Edited by Tara Mack and Bree Picower


Order online from Rethinking Schools for the discount price of $15 each for the hard copy ($14 each for bulk orders of 10 or more) plus shipping and handling, or $9.50 for a downloadable pdf.

Planning to Change the World: A Plan Book for Social Justice Teachers 2011-2012 is a plan book for educators who believe their students can and will change the world. It is designed to help teachers translate their vision of a just education into concrete classroom activities. 

The newest edition has all the things you would expect in a lesson plan book plus:

• Weekly planning pages packed with important social justice birthdays and historical events
• References to online lesson plans and resources related to those dates
• Tips from social justice teachers across the country
• Inspirational quotes to share with students
• Thought-provoking essential questions to spark classroom discussions on critical issues
• Reproducible social justice awards for students
• and much more

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Join us in welcoming from Honduras, members of human rights and resistance organizations with the latest news from Honduras and a discussion about the real situation in the country, the human rights crises and the perspective for the struggle for a new Honduras.

June 14, 2011
7-10pm
Casa Michoacan
1638 S. Blue Island Ave (Pilsen)

While the US State Department and the Organization of American States are declaring that everything is 'normal' in Honduras, the teachers continue on hunger strike, campesinos continue to be murdered, and the resistance continues.

Special Guests:
Alex Navas Alvarez from the Lawyers' Collective for Justice (CAJ) and the Lawyers' Front Against the Coup. Alex is under special protective measures from the Interamerican Commission on Human Rights.

Alejandro Mairena, member of CAJ and the Lawyers' Front Against the Coup and lawyer representing human rights victims in the rural area of Aguan.

Gloria Vasquez, member of CAJ, and an active member of the public employees union, SITRARNP. Gloria is also under special protective measures.

Sponsored by La Voz de los de Abajo and Teachers for Social Justice.

Event on Facebook

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Read the Full Story

At March’s General Meeting, TSJ took a look at Mayor-Elect Rahm Emanuel’s plan for the future of public education in Chicago. We had a robust and interesting discussion both in small groups and as a whole. There were so many insightful views and ideas on this plan; here we will share some of those points that resonated most with the group:

Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss:

This plan is largely a continuation of education policies set in motion under Daley.

• Privatizing & corporatizing public schooling.
• Pushing merit pay and other measures that make up part of a larger, national attack on teachers & their unions.
• Withdrawing resources from neighborhood schools and building a 2-tiered education system. 

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On Saturday March 12, TSJ held an event to mark the end of our second cycle of Inquiry to Action Groups (ItAGs).

Held at Marwen, this event served as the finale for an eight-week session of ItAGs, groups that met to study a topic together and plan action addressing the issues uncovered through their learning. TSJ adopted the ItAG structure from our partners in New York City, NYCORE, who developed this condensed model of reflection and action as a way to make study groups more accessible to teachers and more relevant to the communities where we work. This was the second year TSJ has held ItAGs, propelled by the effectiveness of last year’s cycle which included 5 groups.

This year’s four groups were LGBTQIA/Queer issues in education, ESL/ELL and Popular Education, the Chicago Grassroots Curriculum Task Force, and Media Literacy.

The LGBTQIA/Queer issues in education group had several actions including a list of recommendations for TSJ to make queer issues and visibility more present in our work. They also are supporting a screening of the film This Is Reteaching Gender and Sexuality followed by a discussion with the filmmakers on April 27 at 6:30 p.m. (Location TBA).

The ESL/ELL and Popular Education group is creating “codes,” curricular materials modeled after those used in literacy campaigns in Latin America that were rooted in Paolo Freire’s theories. These codes are designed to incite critical conversations within a political framework as a vehicle for language learning. In addition, the group is in conversation with Casa Juan Diego, a youth center in Pilsen, about ways to support them in incorporating popular education into their approach.

The Chicago Grassroots Curriculum Task Force is creating a curriculum about the history of education and education-related struggles in Chicago. It will be available on the web database of social justice-related curricula currently being compiled by the Chicago Grassroots Curriculum Task force (an organization independent of this ItAG currently creating and documenting radical curricula).

Finally, the Media Literacy ItAG is creating curriculum to support people developing a critical consciousness as media consumers. Their curricula covers issues related to media and identity, social media, politics and media, and advertising.

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