How Linking Powerful Learning to Students’ Social Action Can Transform Education At All Grade Levels
Author Steven Zemelman takes us into history class at a Chicago high school.
As Elizabeth Robbins’ juniors began the process of identifying the social action work they would tackle as a class, they spent several days surveying the assets in their heavily Hispanic Southwest-Side-of-Chicago working-class neighborhood. They listed churches and stores, interviewed neighbors to identify problems and issues, and searched the web.
Elizabeth also used news articles on neighborhood displacements over the years to get students thinking further about underlying issues that affected them. Then in small groups, students brainstormed issues they considered most important in their lives and communities.
This is a crucial moment, when students begin to realize they are going to be working on something that matters to them, and that the choice will be theirs.
The seventh period history juniors narrowed their list to these concerns:
- High unemployment rates
- Racial discrimination
- Neighborhood violence
- Deportation of undocumented immigrants
- High cost of college attendance
- Juvenile justice
Students formed groups based on their interests, embarked on initial research, and prepared presentations. They explained why their issue was important, who was affected, and what organizations were working on it.
Students researching juvenile justice learned that teens were especially impacted by automatic waivers that switched trials for serious crimes from juvenile to adult courts. Use of waivers to try juveniles sends more kids to prison, where they learn to use more violence.
The class was ready to begin researching the problem of prosecuting minors as adults, with a proviso to also include the effect of this policy on neighborhood violence, when a week later they discovered that a bill was under consideration in the Illinois State House of Representatives to end the automatic transfer from juvenile to adult courts.
Now the students were highly focused: How could they lobby legislators to pass the bill? And what was the process by which the bill would advance from committee to a vote on the House floor?
Students who would have been deeply bored reading a textbook passage on American legislative procedure were eagerly trying to learn how the bill would be reviewed by the House rules committee. While one student called an assistant to Representative Barbara Flynn Currie, the rules committee chair, the others waited expectantly.
But the news was grim: if the committee didn’t vote before the impending end to the legislative session, the bill would die.
It’s possible that too many legislators might have worried that they’d look “soft on crime” if they supported the bill, so the safest thing to do was to avoid voting on it. The students didn’t accept defeat, however.
They talked to Representative Elaine Nekritz, who sponsored the bill, and who in turn suggested they contact a Chicago organization called the Juvenile Justice Initiative. Its director visited the class and described the organization’s ongoing campaign to get the law changed. The students decided on three actions to support the initiative’s campaign:
- A letter to the editors of two major Chicago newspapers
- Web-based circulation of a petition
- A fundraising campaign selling snacks to fellow students
At the school year’s end, the students were still at work.
Carlos: It’s exciting to put a plan into action. I want to be able to make a change in the world.
Marianna: If we want to do something to improve our community, we’ll know how to do it now.
Learning That Moves From Inquiry To Social Action — A Definition
Students learn to be active and responsible leaders by actually seeking to promote change, rather than just being — supposedly — prepared to be leaders in the future.
There are at least four major steps that students take in this process:
- Identifying issues important in their lives and community, and deciding on one to address
- Researching the chosen issue and deciding how to change or improve the situation
- Planning an action, including determining a goal for change; identifying who or what body in the community has power to make the change; and deciding how to approach that person or persons
- Carrying out the action
Two features are especially crucial to making the experience authentic and empowering for students. First, they must own the responsibility to make choices and decisions and to figure out solutions to problems themselves. The teacher of course facilitates the work, but leaves as much of the decision making as possible to the students.
Second, the work should culminate in some action focused on change in the school or community. Its not enough to just talk about change, or practice mock legislatures. When students see adults actually listening to them with respect, that is when they begin to realize they have a voice and can make a difference in their world. Their efforts may not always succeed, but in being heard they come to value the studying, reading, writing, and planning that they have done.
School and learning begin to truly matter.
