For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood... and the Rest of Y'all Too: Reality Pedagogy and Urban Education (Race, Education, and Democracy)

by Christopher Emdin

For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood . . . and the Rest of Y’all Too

although the teachers had gained insight about their profession, it wouldn’t be much help to them if they didn’t fully understand their students.

the vast divide that existed between the traditional schools in which they taught and the unique culture of their students.

In urban school districts across the country, school safety personnel are uniformed officers who are part of the police force and often engage in discriminatory practices that reflect those in the larger community.

This young man shared with me his experience in middle school, when a science teacher told him he was wasting his time going to school because all he would be when he got older was a gangbanger. He described this event and the older white male teacher in such detail, it was clear he had carried the incident with him for decades. I’ve heard versions of this story in rap songs, classrooms, prisons, and homeless shelters countless times.

They are blamed for achievement gaps, neighborhood crime, and high incarceration rates, while the system that perpetuates these issues remains unchallenged.

Students quickly receive the message that they can only be smart when they are not who they are.

I engaged in a Twitter debate with one of these educators recently and was astounded by the fervor with which he defended his school’s practice of “cleaning these kids up and giving them a better life.” With that statement, he described everything that is wrong with the culture of urban education and the biggest hindrance to white folks who teach in the hood. First, the belief that students are in need of “cleaning up” presumes that they are dirty. Second, the aim of “giving them a better life” indicates that their present life has little or no value. The idea that one individual or school can give students “a life” emanates from a problematic savior complex that results in making students, their varied experiences, their emotions, and the good in their communities invisible. So invisible, in fact, that the chief way to teach urban youth of color more effectively—that is, to truly be in and in touch with their communities—is not seen as a viable option.

In fact, the students’ symptoms of fear, anger, and powerlessness led to what Dr. Wells calls postracial tension stress disorder, which derives from youth seeing themselves as powerless in a world that conveys to them the message that race doesn’t matter, at the same time it subjects them to physical and symbolic violence (at the hands of police and schools) because of their race.

In response, I would take the bathroom pass and walk the hallways, thinking that I had won a game of sorts with the teacher. I got a chance to walk around and stretch and there was nothing that could be done about it. Unbeknownst to me, I was the loser in a larger game, missing out on what was being taught in the classroom and drawn into another game of cat and mouse with security officials who patrolled the building in search of students like me who were leaving class out of boredom, frustration, or just a chance to breathe.

Young women of color in particular are not only encouraged to be docile but are academically rewarded for being “well-behaved young ladies” and reprimanded for asking too many questions or speaking out in class. Rewarding submissiveness occurs with boys as well, but its prevalence with girls leads to what I call “pretty brown girl syndrome.” In a school system that positions black and brown boys as loud, abrasive, and unteachable, and that rewards black and brown girls for being submissive, teachers often give students good grades for being “nice and quiet” at the expense of ensuring that they are learning.