Pushout

by Monique W. Morris

Others felt that classes, speakers, and volunteer opportunities that enhance their ability to advance their personal academic and career goals would be an essential component of their quality educational experience.

  For example, Faith said, “You know how they be having computer classes? They should have a class on jobs and stuff. Research on jobs, like what job you want to do. Like they should research it with you and help you, you know?”

  Girls also suggested that the instructors for these courses should possess knowledge of “street” culture and be willing to share information about how to overcome the common obstacles (poverty, parental drug addiction, etc.) that they have found overwhelming in their own lives.

  This was stated poignantly by Stacy, the self-described “problem child,” who felt that any intervention program needed to “have people that can relate to the young people . . . to help them talk about whatever they need to talk about,” adding that parental involvement was key.

  This same notion was reinforced by Samantha, an eighteen-year-old emancipated foster child in Southern California who was homeless and in search of resources to help her complete high school.

  “We need people who been there,” she said. “And I really hope [they] can do this, because I really need it.”

  Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice.

  —Martin Luther King Jr.

  For love to implement “the demands of justice,” as Martin Luther King Jr. called them, we must shift our lens. We must consider what social innovations might arise when we come together and mobilize our collective wisdom, and thus begin to maximize the power of our input toward social change. Building an adaptive platform for innovation, one that allows us to rethink what we “know” and what we think works, will reduce the criminalization of our children in schools.

  This process will include a transformative, collective decision-making process that removes our public officials from the center of the discussion about how to initiate change and really begins to distribute the locus of accountability in ways that give our local jurisdictions—where these decisions are made—power to build community around girls. If our goal is really to interrupt the practices leading to the criminalization of our girls, then we want to disrupt “business as usual” and take on processes that give us an opportunity to work alongside girls toward implementing plausible, shared long-term visions and opportunities.

  Part of this process requires us to envision a new ecosystem for our girls. Whom do we invite to help develop this process? Ultimately, we would want people with multiple and varied experiences to come together and examine the issues from multiple angles. We want girls, their parents, educators, health professionals, sexual abuse and trauma experts, justice professionals, the business community, artists, faith leaders, scholars, and advocates to work together toward a shared vision of collective uplift, of cooperative investment in the well-being of Black girls.

  Our goal is to develop schools that our girls don’t describe as “jails” or “prisons.” This terminology has become so ingrained in their consciousness and experiences that it can be difficult for them to consider what a school that is not governed by discipline looks and feels like. Our expectations for our young people need to elevate. While many of our girls are in school districts where violence and victimization present real concerns for student safety, for a large number of girls the fear of violence is greater than the actual demonstration of it. Sociological theories about the ways in which violent conditions flow between institutions and public spaces suggest that our society may need to reconsider how it views the school, its function, and its relationship to the community in which it is located.13 As a locus of learning, our schools can serve a greater purpose than just indoctrinating our girls with the politics of surviving racial, class, and gender bias. These institutions can be bastions of community building, where healing is at the center of their pedagogy and where our girls learn more than just how to behave in the presence of adults to be considered “acceptable” in a school environment.

  Historian Manning Marable wrote, “Freedom is first and foremost a public understanding among the members of a society to protect and defend any opinions that are unpopular or at odds with opinions held by those who actually exercise power and privilege. Freedom is the fragile flower that must constantly be protected—not from those at the bottom of the social order but from the whims and desires of those at the top.”14 How we address the conditions facing Black girls—and protect the “fragile flower”—must include more than just slogans or symbolic marches. Defining freedom cannot amount to simply substituting it with inclusion. Countering the criminalization of Black girls requires fundamentally altering the relationship between Black girls and the institutions of power that have worked to reinforce their subjugation. History has taught us that civil rights are but one component of a larger movement for this type of social transformation. Civil rights may be at the core of equal justice movements, and they may elevate an equity agenda that protects our children from racial and gender discrimination, but they do not have the capacity to fully redistribute power and eradicate racial inequity. There is only one practice that can do that.

  Love.

  EPILOGUE

  This book presents the voices of Black girls on the margins. It offers their perceptions of what contributes to their poor academic and behavioral performance in school and how that relates to their risk of incarceration. Together, their stories form a larger narrative that I hope inspires us to include our girls in the broader racial and gender justice movements, making them an integral part of the healing that will ultimately forge a path toward reaching real equality.

  I closed this book with a call for us to embrace an alternative paradigm for exploring how our schools respond to Black girls in crisis, but I also recognize that a broader set of policy reforms is apropos. Reports referenced in this book, including those produced by the National Women’s Law Center and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the African American Policy Forum, the Human Rights for Girls Project, the Georgetown Law Center on Poverty and Inequality, and the Ms. Foundation for Women, each contain a comprehensive set of policy recommendations aimed to address data collection, referral and decision-making processes, and legal remedies that may transform the way that schools and their surrounding communities treat and respond to Black girls. I am also keenly aware that I did not fully engage in a critique about the role of media and entertainment in reproducing negative images of Black femininity, or focus on the issue from the vantage point of law enforcement or campus-based security. Though connected to the topics covered in this book, in many ways these perspectives were outside the scope of inquiry.

  There is still so much to explore about the lives of Black girls. We need scholars to center Black girls in their research, educators to immerse their pedagogy in intersectionality, and advocates and policy makers to measure impact outside of a linear framework. I sincerely hope that within the next five years, we are able to develop a robust and coordinated strategy to change the racial justice narrative in a way that authentically and earnestly includes girls and women.

  In these girls, I see a raw and uncultivated version of myself. As a preadolescent, I participated in cultures of school-based and after-school-based violence. Like many of the girls in this project, I became a survivor of sexual assault as a child, and throughout my adolescence I had to negotiate the traumatic experience of responding to unwanted stares and touches. But for the empathetic educators who sought to cultivate my intelligence as a clear path toward personal freedom, who knows where I would be. In many ways, I empathized with the girls who shared their narratives with me. What I learned and now know with certainty from this experience is that the education of Black girls is a lifesaving act of social justice.

  I think often about the girls whose voices are represented in this book. They trusted me to share their words with integrity, and for that trust (which I consider a gift) I am thankful. It was my intention to
be honest in my representation of how these girls articulated their experiences, which in some cases may differ radically from what might be described by the adults in their lives. But we owe it them to listen and respond.

  I leave you with this last reflection, a moment that I shared with Jennifer in a California detention facility. We were wrapping up our interview, and I asked her, as I did with all of the girls I spoke with, if she had anything else she wanted to add or ask me.

  She cocked her head to the side, folded her arms, and asked, “So, what you gonna do with all this again?”

  “Well,” I responded, “some people think I should write a novel, and others think I should write it as nonfiction. . . . What do you think?”

  She didn’t respond at first, but then she relaxed her arms and stood up, responding to a prompt from the detention center staff that our time was up.

  As we approached the door and moved toward her cell, she said, “I think you should tell the truth . . . Yeah, just tell the truth.”

  APPENDIX A GIRLS, WE GOT YOU!

  A Q&A for Girls, Parents, Community Members, and Educators

  I want Black girls to know that they are that important, that powerful.

  —Yejide Ankobia, Bay Area

  Our girls are sacred, and they are loved. With a deeper understanding of the complex challenges and dynamics encountered by Black girls, and a framework from the final chapter for altering and expanding our vision of their education, it’s time for a closer look at the everyday concerns and obstructions Black girls grapple with in order to shape the path forward. The collected wisdom gathered here is intended to aid anyone searching for insight on how to improve conditions for Black girls.

  What follows is a series of questions and answers, organized into three sections: one for girls and young women, one for parents and the extended community of loved ones that embrace girls’ healthy development and well-being, and one for teachers and educators working with Black girls. Share this appendix, especially the first section, with the young women and girls whose experiences mirror or relate to the ones included in this book—and the adults who support them.

  For Girls

  Why should I care about school? I need to make some money.

  How much money do you want to make? Black women who have some high school education and no diploma earn just $861,353 over their entire lifetime; but those with a high school diploma will earn $1.07 million! Black women with a bachelor’s degree from college earn $1.86 million in their lifetime, and those with a master’s degree earn $2.3 million in their lifetime.1 In other words, school is about giving you options and the skills that will make you more marketable in the workforce.

  Life can sometimes get hard, and that can make school seem less important. But remember that if you want a career, something more than just a job that pays the bills, you have to plan and prepare for it. That planning includes completing your education. Consider it an investment—in yourself, which will produce the maximum return. Once you have an education, no one can take that from you. And in fact, being educated will only make you a stronger candidate for success in life, not just for the moment.

  Sometimes I feel like school is not for me. How can I get motivated?

  First, take a moment to think about why you are feeling this way. Ask yourself: “Why do I feel this way about school? Who is associated with how I feel about school? Is there something about school itself that makes me not want to go, or is it about something else that’s happening around me? When did I start to feel this way about school? What happened?” Once you have collected your thoughts, get a piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. On one side, list all of the things you like about school, and on the other, list all of the things that you don’t like about school. Now, turn the paper over. Make a list of the things that you want to accomplish in life. Sometimes these can be as basic as “leaving this town” or “having a house of my own,” but you can also dream big, like “own my own business” or “become a lawyer.” Sometimes women fail to give ourselves as much energy as we offer to others around us. Love is supposed to make you stronger, but sometimes we allow fear to drive our practice of love—and this is more prone to happen when we haven’t laid our foundation first. As a young woman, a central part of your foundation is your education. Make a promise to focus on your own well-being. Here are two active steps you can take:

  Find someone at school, at home, or in another part of your community (such as a community center or agency) who can help you create an educational plan. Ask this person to help guide you toward fulfilling your plan. Find an academic mentor or coach who can check in on you to make sure you’ve finished your homework and to encourage you to focus on going to school. Their support will help you to be the strongest student you can be.

  Surround yourself with people who want to achieve, like you do. People who encourage you to stay away from school—whether they are girlfriends, boyfriends, family, or other adults with power—do not have your best interest at heart. People who love you want you to have your best chance in life, and that begins with staying in school and taking care of yourself.

  What do I do if I feel like my teacher is picking on me?

  It’s hard to feel picked on or bullied by your peers or your teachers. Truthfully, this is an issue that probably can’t be resolved with a few words of advice, or even in the course of a school year. In general, you would be best served by taking the high road. Take control of the situation by documenting (writing down or recording) what is happening and what you are observing. If you’re struggling with this, try to find an adult you trust to help you record your experiences. As you document each incident, be sure to include a careful description of what happened just before the teacher acted or reacted, and what you did in response. Record every detail and be sure to honor how you might have contributed to escalating the situation. Just thinking about what is happening will help you slow down a heated situation and be more aware. Paying close attention to the situation might even cause you to choose or act differently, even if you are being disrespected or treated unfairly. Once you have collected enough information to support your claim, and if you feel safe enough doing this alone, first try talking to your teacher one-on-one about how the situation could be resolved. Schedule a meeting to talk about behavior—yours and theirs. If your first meeting only results in a one-sided rant, or if you do not feel that you otherwise have a respectful enough relationship with your teacher to have a helpful conversation, then try to schedule a meeting to have a conversation that includes you, a parent or loved one, your principal (or a dean or counselor), and the teacher. Keep track of the following questions in this meeting:

  Is there anything different about how everyone involved is seeing the situation? What is the difference?

  What is similar about each version of the story?

  What do I want to change about our relationship?

  What actions will I take to change the situation between my teacher and me? What or who do I need in my corner to help me do the things I’ve agreed to do?

  What actions has my teacher agreed to take to change the situation? Who will hold the teacher accountable?

  How will we hold each other accountable for our agreements? Is there a written agreement? Are there regular conversations and check-ins? Do we need other people to be there for these meetings?

  How should I respond if I keep being challenged to fight in school?

  First, stop and breathe. Let’s start with some facts: You are the only person who controls your actions, no one else. No one can make you hit that other person who is provoking you, and no one is making you walk away. You control your own behavior. Now, let’s deal with reality: It is possible that you are feeling pressured to fight. There might be social pressures, or maybe you want to feel in control. You could also be triggered to fight after being bullied by other girls or boys who talk about you, spread rumors about you, call you names (in person or on social media sites), or try to
intimidate you in some way (in person or on social media sites). You could be feeling pressure to fight in order to keep your relationship with another person intact. Take a moment to check in with yourself about why you are feeling like you want to fight. Learn your triggers. As soon as possible, find an adult or another friend who can intervene. That adult should be able to guide you both in a conversation that allows you to get to the bottom of why you are fighting and think about how you can overcome the urge to come to blows.

  How do I know if I’m in an unhealthy relationship?

  Every relationship has its ups and downs. But if a relationship is causing physical or emotional reactions in your body or your spirit that are not positive, then you need to check in to see if this is the right relationship for you. How frequently do you feel upset with your partner? Do you feel jealous, suspicious, or envious of your partner? Is there constant arguing? Do you feel put down, controlled, or manipulated? If you are nodding or answering yes to these questions, then you might take some time to think about why you are in this relationship. These are not feelings that you should feel in a committed and loving relationship. Sometimes the thrill of a relationship, especially if that person is popular or powerful in some way, can make us overlook these feelings. Maybe you feel like you have no one else who understands you, or no one else to rely on. But if you are more unhappy than you are happy, love yourself enough not to ignore your own well-being. In other words, remember that you are sacred and loved. If your relationship does not honor this basic idea most of the time, you may want to reconsider if your partner is the right one for you, even if you love or have love for this person.

  Why do people call what I do “human trafficking” or “sex slavery”? My boyfriend takes care of me, and I don’t feel like a “sex slave.”

  Love feels good. But it’s not love if it brings you harm—physically, emotionally, or sexually. If you are under the age of eighteen and in a relationship with someone who asks you to share your body with them or someone else in exchange for money, clothes, shoes, jewelry, or other goods, then you may be in a situation that is considered “human trafficking.” Let’s be honest. Prostitution is a hustle—one that gives some people a chance to buy things that make them feel good about how they look, and to be treated (at least at first) like they are not invisible. But human trafficking is a serious thing, and love or “being taken care of” should never come with a price, especially one that requires you to sacrifice your body.