Doing the Work of Equity Leadership for Justice and Systems Change

This book reveals the complex and crucial work of sustaining justice-focused educational systems change in the face of subtle resistance and outright attacks.

Scholars and practitioners, who have worked together in various capacities across different school systems, examine systemic equity leadership in U.S. public schools over the course of nearly a decade and across a time of profound racial and historical change.

This volume weaves together real-world insights, research-based strategies, and practical tools for transforming P–12 education systems into more equitable and just learning spaces. Contributors explore the early days of district equity leadership sparked by the Obama administration's focus on civil rights in education; Black Lives Matter (beginning with the Million Hoodies Movement for Justice); the proliferation of formal equity director roles, policies, and priorities; and the recent politically driven anti-DEI backlash.

This book is important reading for school leaders, district personnel, policymakers, and everyone who cares about a public education that works for all students.

Book Features:

• Provides bird’s-eye and on-the-ground accounts of equity leadership to address broad questions and map invisible trends that have influenced how equity leadership happens.
• Explores approaches to district-wide equity leadership that emerged on the heels of Trayvon Martin’s death, in what we now understand as the era of Black Lives Matter.
• Uses a frame of mornings, middays, and evenings to account for the cyclical nature of equity leadership and the limits and possibilities of working from within school systems to affect transformative change.
• Goes beyond the experience of any one school leader or team by illuminating organizational conditions, routines, networks, and practices.
• Includes insights on establishing district equity offices and institutionalizing equitable processes; using data to influence change and create accountability; and designing formal and informal networks that support the day-to-day work.

Decoteau J. Irby is professor of educational policy studies at the University of Illinois Chicago, codirector of the Center for Urban Education Leadership, and coeditor of Dignity-Affirming Education. Ann M. Ishimaru is the Killinger Endowed Chair and professor of educational foundations, leadership and policy at the University of Washington College of Education, and author of Just Schools: Building Equitable Collaborations with Families and Communities.

“This book embodies the concept of sankofa, looking back at school-based educational injustices in order to move forward effectively in working to dismantle injustices and embrace equity work. It is an incredible and much-needed resource, filled with critical, storied experiences, as well as tools and frameworks for doing equity work and critically caring for each other in the process. This book speaks to everyone through education (leaders, teachers, parents, and advocates) and across multiple fields (education, corporate, nonprofit, etc.). I know my own copy will have tattered pages from how often I reference it through the years.”
—Lynnette Mawhinney, professor of urban education, and founder and director of Visual Studies in Education Lab, Rutgers University–Newark

“With its timely and unapologetic call to pursue transformative leadership within K–12 schools and systems, the book does not retreat from the necessary work of equity and justice leaders as they navigate the shifting and revisionist terrain of social movements and political pressures. Decoteau J. Irby and Ann M. Ishimaru’s volume effectively centers the experiences, insights, and actions of equity- and justice-driven educational leaders. The result is a powerful resource that not only inspires, but equips readers with strategies and hard-won lessons for leading systemic change.”
—James Earl Davis, Bernard C. Watson Endowed Chair in Urban Education, Temple University

Contents

Acknowledgments  vii

Introduction: Wake Up Decoteau J. Irby and Ann M. Ishimaru  1

Part I: Morning Work

1.  Beyond Visions and Missions: Navigating Resistance to LGBTQIA+ Protections in Schools  13
Latish Reed

2.  Shocking the System: Black Women’s Equity Leadership in “Nice” White School Districts  29
Shannon Paige Clark

3.  Appreciating the Fruits of “Unsuccessful” Leadership: Looking Back to See(d) Forward  43
Decoteau J. Irby, Ann M. Ishimaru, and Terrance Green

4.  Reshaping the System: Paradoxes of Leading From Within Oppressive Organizations  64
Ann M. Ishimaru, Decoteau J. Irby, and Terrance Green

Part II: Midday Work

5.  Marathons, Not Sprints: Institutionalizing Equity Through Organization-Wide Learning  83
Teresa Lance

6.  Designing Work Routines and Process(ing) Tools: An Infrastructure of Strategic Equity Leadership  99
Maurice Swinney and Decoteau J. Irby

7.  A National View of Equity Leadership Activities  114
Andrew Matschiner and Ishmael Miller

Part III: Evening Work

8.  Sisterhood as Leadership Beyond the Central Office  133
Constance Daw, Fannie Martinez, and Ann M. Ishimaru

9.  Breathe and Rest: Designing Networks of Critical Care for Equity Leaders  148
Dayna Muñiz

10.  Holding Space, Holding On: Precarity and Turnover as a Feature of Equity Leadership Work  162
Ahreum Han and Decoteau J. Irby

Conclusion: Dream  179
Ann M. Ishimaru and Decoteau J. Irby

Afterword: Firesticks for Fretful Nights Keisha Scarlett  183

Index  187

About the Editors and Contributors  193