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Please comment any questions that you may have throughout the presentation here. I will answer them throughout, end, or after the presentation. *If you need for us to connect offline, please leave your email and name*

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Red= I need an answer from you.
Purple= Information to know.
Yellow: Optional

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Cultural identity

Intersectionality

Cultural curriculum relevance

Social paradigms

Equity (especially during pandemic)

Reforming the status quo.

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1. Teaching in a virtual setting
2. Teaching a testing subject.
3. Censoring myself
4. District's curriculum was not relevant to my students.
5. Low participation.

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A Texas school district has reversed its decision to place a teacher on leave over Black Lives Matter, feminist and pro-LGBTQ posters displayed on the walls of her virtual classroom.

Taylor Lifka, an English teacher at the Roma High School in Roma, a border town of about 10,000 people, was placed on administrative leave Sunday after parents complained about the posters.

Speaking to NBC News, Lifka, 25, said the experience of having national attention turned toward her small classroom has been "overwhelming."

"Our nation is in a really divisive state right now, and so when something like this comes out that a teacher is being placed on administrative leave because of parents' concerns over teaching tolerance in the classroom, that's a bigger question," she said.

In a statement shared with reporters, Roma Independent School District Superintendent Carlos Guzman said the district "regrets that this matter has become a point of controversy."

"It was never the intention of the district to indicate anything less than full support for the concepts of equality and student safety," Guzman said.

Prior to her reinstatement on Wednesday, Lifka said she told the administration that "this isn't the first time that a parent's been upset and this isn't the first time that a parent has asked for a child not to be in a specific teacher's classroom."

"I've already told the administration that I do not envy their position," Lifka said, adding that she told them, "Your job sometimes might seem like a job where you need to please, and while this might be challenging, I think that sometimes we need to do the right thing even though it's going to upset some people."

This week, an online petition was started urging the school district to reverse its decision and reinstate Lifka.

"Please sign this petition to let the school district know that inclusivity and acceptance are not taboo ideas that deserve censorship; that high school students can and should be allowed to discuss the realities of the world instead of being sheltered inside a sanitized bubble; and that by reprimanding the teacher for trying to create a safe space for her students, the school is not being neutral, but is actively taking a stance that is antithetical to justice," the petition states.

The petition, which was started by the local LGBTQ rights group South Texas Equality Project, had 30,000 signatures as of Thursday, the day after the district reversed course. It is not clear whether the petition played a role in getting Lifka's leave reversed, but Lifka said she was inspired by those who signed on, saying they were calling not just for her reinstatement but for "antiracist" policies in a small town in Texas.

In her online profile for the Roma Independent School District, Lifka writes that she fell in love with the "vibrant border culture and the tight-knit community" of the Rio Grande Valley in 2017 when she worked there as a Teach for America member.

"Let us continue to take care of ourselves and one another at this time," Lifka wrote.

Lifka said she was told in a Wednesday Zoom call that her administration leave was being reversed.

"They say I haven't been punished, and that's fine, but at the same time I'm a human being and this has been challenging," Lifka said. "To think about re-entering the classroom tomorrow gives me a lot of pause, because I need a moment to collect myself."

"I need support from the administration, knowing I can re-enter the classroom, that we are all on the same page knowing what I can and cannot say to my students," she said.

Lifka said she was told by a school administrator that their small town is "not ready" for some of her progressive views.

"If you're not ready today, you're not ready tomorrow, and if you're not ready tomorrow you're not going to be ready five years from now," she said. "If I'm not going to say something now, then when am I going to say something? It's been clear that people have a lot of things to say."
Follow NBC Out on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram

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Teacher reinstated after parents complained about Black Lives Matter, LGBTQ posters

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A Texas school district has reversed its decision to place a teacher on leave over Black Lives Matter, feminist and pro-LGBTQ posters displayed on the walls of her virtual classroom. Taylor Lifka, an English teacher at the Roma High School in Roma, a border town of about 10,000 people, was placed on administrative leave Sunday after parents complained about the posters.

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1. Brought my poster back

2. Used my district's Scope and Sequence (for mandated standards) and Seattle's Ethnic Studies Framework for essential questions and additional resources.

3. Switched platform from Google Classroom to Padlet

4. Incorporated whole person instruction

1. readings, discussions, and even the occasional personal care packages I delivered.

5. Got powerful excerpts from various communities.

6. Tried always making to connections to our time.

1. Diary of Anne Frank

1. Holocaust concentration camps related to the Immigrant detention center that is in our backyard.

7. Made instruction bilingually, English and Spanish.

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Growing up on the Texas southernmost border all

Before starting my bachelor's, I was naive about my formative education. I never questioned why the symbol of history, and even my knowledge overall, was a Puritan, Anglo-Saxon, Heterosexual cis-gender individual. I believed that everybody was equal, so I never asked for the other side.

However, when I came to Wabash College (an all-male liberal college), my whole world turned around because I realized how different the world was and how unprepared my formative education left me. I was not prepared for change. I was not ready to transition from high school to college. I was not ready to find my voice. I was not prepared because I only knew about necessary state standardized exams, which do not provide the essential resources to survive in college or life.

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1. Class was more engaging and more comfortable for students and myself.

2. Equity can also apply to technology literacy.

3. There was an increase of understanding, participation and response.

1. Class assignments, attendance, and scores from District's Benchmark 1 (October) and Benchmark 2 (February)

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1. I am a fifth-year teacher

2. I am a Second-year Curriculum and Instruction doctoral student through University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, and principal-in-training through Texas Region 1.

3. Have taught from kindergarteners to adults as old as 56 in the K-12 setting.

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If you could complete this optional survey being that constructive feedback is a gift, and any academic suggestions to expand my research.

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Feedback is a gift since that helps us grow; therefore, please answer the following questions.

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John Dewey

Student centered education and curriculum

Martin Buber

Other and power dynamics

Paolo Freire

Awareness about power dynamics

Changing the current status quo

Counter narrative about the oppressed communities

Paul Feyerabrand

Education pluralism

Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic

Critical Race Theory

Theodorea Berry

Intersectionality

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1. How can we push the momentum for K-12 to transition from education to Education, especially during testing subjects.

2. What should be our focus(es) post-pandemic?

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Buber, Martin. I and Thou. 2d ed. New York: Scribner, 1958.

Beaudrie, Sara M., Marta Fairclough, and Guadalupe Valdes. 2012. Introduction: Spanish as a Heritage Language in the United States. In Spanish as a Heritage Language in the United States: The State of the Field, edited by SARA M. BEAUDRIE and MARTA FAIRCLOUGH, 1–18. Georgetown University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt2tt42d.5

Dewey, John. The Child and the Curriculum,. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1902.

Feyerabend, Paul. Against Method. Revised ed. 32.

Potowski, Kim. 2012. “Identity and Heritage Learners: Moving Beyond Essentializations”. In Spanish as a Heritage Language in the United States: The State of the Field, edited by Sara M. Beaudrie And Marta Fairclough, 179–200. Georgetown University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt2tt42d.14.

Rodriguez, Richard (2004-02-03). Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez (p. 14). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Paley, Vivian Gussin. The Girl with the Brown Crayon. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997.

Delgado, R. & Stefancic, J. (2017). Critical race theory: An introduction (3rd Ed.). New York University Press.

Freire, P. (2018). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Bloomsbury Academic. (Original work published 1968)

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- Bring multicultural curriculum back post-state assessment.
- Look into into other established models.
- Expanding community outreach
- Finding ways make our resources more accessible and manageable