In 1963, Brazilian educator Paulo Freire helped launch a revolutionary literacy campaign in the impoverished northeastern Brazilian town of Angicos, where hundreds of rural workers learned to read and write in just 40 hours of instruction. Freire’s approach was about much more than literacy. Rather than emphasizing memorization and repetition, he developed “Culture Circles” where participants…
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Sixth-grade history teacher Sarah Inama was told by administrators in Idaho’s West Ada School District to remove a poster from her classroom that carried a simple but profound message: “Everyone Is Welcome Here.” Beneath the words were hands of many different skin tones. Although upset about the directive, Inama initially complied. But the decision weighed on her. She began asking herself…
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“A lot of people in power view knowledge as dangerous,” says organizer Mariame Kaba. In this episode of Movement Memos, Kelly Hayes speaks with Kaba and organizers Alison Macrina and Katie Clark about why public libraries matter, not just as places to borrow books, but as vital public infrastructure. They discuss libraries as spaces where people can gather without spending money, learn together…
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On a humid June afternoon, I arrived at Florida International University expecting to give what I thought would be a standard talk on my new book, Teach Truth, about the escalating assault on antiracist education. But when historian and freedom fighter Dr. Marvin Dunn took me to the campus, he made clear this would be no ordinary event. “This is Florida,” he said.
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A board of commissioners in North Carolina decided earlier this month to dissolve the entire library board of trustees in response to that board refusing to remove a single book featuring a transgender child character from the shelves. The 3-2 decision by the Randolph County Board of Commissioners was based, in part, on the debunked concept of “social contagion” — the belief that children…
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On September 3, Illinois prison officials moved — by emergency rule — to replace most physical mail with scanned copies, though a key legislative panel has already pushed back. At the same time, New York is installing mail scanners in prisons, raising alarms about privacy and attorney-client privilege. Texas has already shifted to “digital mail,” where letters are scanned and delivered on tablets…
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