Journal of a Black Teacher

The lawsuit between Minneapolis Public Schools and the U.S. Department of Justice could be fixed overnight, if only someone dared to say the obvious: the district is too big to succeed. That’s right, shrink it. Fewer layers, fewer “executive directors of innovation equity leadership,” and more actual teachers who know their students' names. Instead of bloated bureaucracy and selective “diversity” programs that only help insiders, a smaller, leaner system might actually... function. Imagine that. The DOJ wouldn’t need to sue if we stopped outsourcing equity to policies that protect the privileged few. Cut the district, trim the egos, and maybe, just maybe, Black and Native male educators would be hired for their qualifications, not their connections. Wild idea, right? Common sense. Too dangerous for policy. Read the filing here PDF. By Don Allen (Editorial Opinion) Journal of A Black Teacher (2025) The lawsuit that the United States Department of Justice filed against the Minneapol...

By Don Allen, Ed.S., M.A. Ed., MAT Within the heart of the Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul Public Schools remain bastions of education, grounds for changing the lives of thousands of students yearly. Still, in their halls and classrooms, there resides a looming, daunting question: What is the plan for teaching Black Twin Cities high schoolers? While the question does not simply point to academic performance indicators or graduation rates, it goes to the core of educational equity and social justice. The academic success of Black students has had systemic barriers placed in its way. Together with resource and funding discrepancies and biases in disciplinarian practices, the path to education in Minneapolis and St. Paul for Black students has not been made smooth. One really important issue that needs critical attention is the process of credit recovery. Sometimes considered a last-ditch effort in the case of students failing in their academics, credit recovery programs were suppos...

                         Photo: MSNBC " For eugenic sterilization victims, belated justice . ( Fair Use ) By Don Allen, M.A. Ed./MAT - Editorial Opinion        After each year goes by unaddressed, our Black children sink further into the depths of not knowing important life skills and the importance of well-rounded education. Education and life-skills are an at-home and at-school combination of real-time experiences sometimes replaced with human trauma and the need to survive their circumstances. Many of us have watched the television programs and read the New York Times about how many Black American children and other BIPOC kids in the United States have to walk to school with guns because they are not safe in their own neighborhoods (Read: Black Mothers are the Real Experts on the toll of Gun Violence).  Activating premature independent learning without the ability to discern (undeveloped brain) ...