Professional Development: Off the Shelf Mollie Kasper
We Got This. Equity, Access, and the Quest to Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be: A Review I’m a teacher. I’m not a hero, a martyr, or a saint. I am, however, a highly trained professional whose work is to educate others, and I have long felt that the superhero myth is a weight I cannot carry, a standard I cannot live up to. In We Got This. Equity, Access, and the Quest to Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be, author Cornelius Minor opens by examining the “hero teacher” myth and explaining the damage it does to teachers and the teaching profession. In reality, the hero myth serves as a trap; it ignores the humanity and fallibility of teachers. As Minor states, The problem with this narrative is that it erases the complicated calculus of becoming and being a hero, a leader, a change agent, a teacher. This narrative does not allow heroes to be imperfect or to be nuanced. It does not allow them to grow tired, to fail, to learn publicly, or to grieve. As such, it is exclusive, (p. 3). Minor goes on to explain that since the 1770s, U. S. teachers have fought for equity, and there are, of course, forces working against that work. The “hero teacher” myth has arisen, in part, “[b]ecause if educators are working toward equity, one way to silence them is to deify them” (p. 4). If we, as teachers, are called to be change-makers and equity fighters (and many of us are), and if the hero myth is designed to silence us, then We Got This. is a manual for taking back our voices. It provides a road map for reexamining our teaching practices and discovering where we can increase equity, accessibility, and inclusivity in our classrooms. The book is organized in two sections of three chapters each. In each chapter, Minor introduces a topic, explains its importance, and then goes on to provide tools for implementation. Chapter one details the act of listening. Minor describes how the labels we associate with others, such as black, white, male, female, gifted, and challenged, “cannot cover our whole humanity,” (p. 11) and often prevent us from listening to them. “We lose lots of human capital each year because people bearing essential insights and experiences are wearing labels that we’ve been conditioned to ignore” (p. 11). As he does throughout the book, in this chapter, Minor illustrates his point by allowing readers to witness his own fallibility. He relates the story of a student, nicknamed Quick, who came to him for help. Minor dismissed Quick because he wore the “good student” label; Quick’s grades were fine, therefore Quick didn’t need Minor’s help. The student, who needed help on a personal matter, became frustrated; “Minor, all y’all want to… save my future, but none of y’all know anything about saving my now,” he complained. As a teacher of low-income, struggling readers, this story was a gut-punch for me. I know the importance of reading for my students’
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