COMMUNITY ORGANIZING, SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT, AND EDUCATIONAL JUSTICE

This chapter draws lessons from a multi-case study of community organizing groups from across the country that have made a significant impact on the quality and equity of our public education system. It describes the ways that parents, young people, and community members have organized to demand school improvements and greater equity but also their efforts to collaborate with educators to create deep, transformational change. In contrast to dominant “top-down” school reform paradigms that focus on expert-driven technical or organizational changes, community organizing represents a “bottom up” process that incorporates community voice at its center. The chapter provides concrete examples and analysis of the ways that organizing groups build the capacity for change in school communities, develop strong forms of family participation and leadership in schools, foster respectful collaborations between schools and organized communities, and create the power to address profound issues of equity and social justice in schools and communities. The chapter also describes newer developments where locally based organizing groups have formed national alliances to build a larger movement for educational justice like the movement against the school to prison pipeline. In the end, the chapter argues that in a country that remains deeply unequal, community organizing efforts are finding new ways to make the democratic promise of public education a reality in our lives.