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In Verona public schools, BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and people of color) have been marginalized, degraded, and underestimated. In New Jersey, bias-incidents and bias-crimes are on the rise with the highest increases observed in children and adolescents. Given these local circumstances, coupled with the racial violence and police brutality transpiring on the national level, incorporating racial justice and anti-racism in Verona public schools is urgent and pivotal to recognizing and dismantling racist systems and institutions that enable white supremacy. Anti-racist and justice-oriented instruction and curricula would benefit all students in the Verona community. Moreover, no student is too young to learn about race and racism. Children begin using race to reason about people’s behaviors at two years old, using race to choose playmates at two and a half years old, and expressing racial prejudice between ages four and five. Explicit conversations with five to seven year olds about interracial friendship can dramatically improve their racial attitudes in as little as a single week.

Therefore, we believe the Board of Education is duty-bound to enact an anti-racist agenda that prepares our students in every grade level, the next generation of leaders, to become critical and moral thinkers, develop skills necessary for success in college as well as any professional field, and engage in the overdue struggle for racial justice. We acknowledge that there are already faculty and administrators who are committed to anti-racism in the district and hope that they will be invited to help in leading the below initiatives. As a dedicated group of community members, we ask that the Board release a comprehensive plan delineating how it will address the following changes in the upcoming school year:

1. Hold cultural competency and anti-racism professional development for existing faculty, staff, and administrators while actively recruiting BIPOC who are well-versed in teaching about race and ethnicity and/or have specialized knowledge in Pan-African, African-American, Latinx, Indigenous and First Nations, Asian American, Pacific Islander, South Asian, and Middle Eastern studies.
2. Critically examine and revise the K-12 humanities and social sciences curriculum to address systemic and institutional racism, micro- and macro-aggressions, white power and privilege, cultural competency and sensitivity, intersectionality, productive allyship and co-conspiratorship, implicit bias and systems analysis, anti-racism and anti-bias, oppression, colonization, colorism, white supremacy, and color blindness. 
3. Request an action plan from the Director of Curriculum on additional ways to incorporate content and methodologies that promote justice and equity into the school curriculum and course schedule.
4. Release the curricular revisions to the Verona Public Schools District community for comment and discussion.
5. Encourage surrounding school districts to execute the previous four demands and partner with them to develop an anti-racist education network. Potentially develop a plan to become a member of the Montclair State University Network for Educational Renewal, a network of 32 school districts that are committed to collectively teaching for social justice.

We ask that the Board of Education officially respond to this petition on or before September 15th with an initial action plan and timeline to address our requests and revisions.

ACTIONABLE DEMANDS

Faculty and Staff:

We recognize that implementing anti-racist curricula across the district takes time as well as professional development and that this work can only be accomplished if faculty are committed. We believe that the following requests over time will foster an inclusive, justice-oriented environment and hope that current faculty who have already designed this type of curriculum will be invited to co-lead these initiatives:

(i) Hold cultural competency and anti-racism professional development for existing and future faculty, staff, and administrators to further educate them on applying intersectionality theory to promote inclusivity and an enhanced understanding of privilege, incorporating the personal lens and narratives of BIPOC, and teaching about race and ethnicity, systemic and institutional racism, micro- and macro-aggressions, white power and privilege, cultural competency and sensitivity, productive allyship and co-conspiratorship, implicit bias and systems analysis, anti-racism and anti-bias, oppression, colorism, white supremacy, and color blindness. This is crucial for nurturing students as critical thinkers, productive citizens, and social justice advocates. 

a. Work with faculty and staff to ensure that their materials, syllabi, and lectures diverge from the Eurocentric canon and are not included as only one section of their curriculum but rather are integrated into as many sections as possible.

b. Work with faculty and staff to ensure that they know how to correct students and other faculty and staff who commit micro- or macro-aggressions or promote racist behavior.

c. Some recommended professional development programs include: the Center for Racial Justice in Education, Undoing Racism, Teaching Tolerance, and Rethinking Schools. “We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom" and White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism are also phenomenal books to guide faculty and staff.

(ii) Improve our hiring process by identifying ways to maximize the District’s outreach in the job application process and provide full transparency in the interview sourcing and processes.

a. Prioritize and hire BIPOC who are well-versed in teaching about race and ethnicity and/or have specialized knowledge in Pan-African, African-American, Latinx, Indigenous and First Nations, Asian American, Pacific Islander, South Asian, and Middle Eastern studies. 

b. Employ particular platforms designed to recruit BIPOC and outline a plan to increase the hiring percentage of BIPOC by 50 percent. Recommended sites include HBCU Connect and Jopwell.

(iii) Encourage the development of faculty book clubs or study groups around these topics.

Curriculum:

Many students graduate from Verona public schools with the notion that our society is post-racial rather than understanding how slavery has widespread ramifications to this day and systemic racism impacts all aspects of modern life. We ask for revisions, when appropriate, to the predominantly whitewashed K-12 humanities curricula that water down the historical and present racist atrocities in the United States, neglect the multiplicity of voices and experiences, and enable white supremacy.

(i) Require anti-racism and justice-oriented texts, articles, films, and other materials that are produced by BIPOC during all years of the English and other relevant curricula. Incorporate an intersectional focus that connects race to class and gender while addressing sexism, ableism, xenophobia, homophobia, antisemitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of prejudice. Ideally, these materials would be purchased from black-owned bookstores. 

a. Use these works to facilitate mandatory in-class conversations regarding systemic and institutional racism, micro- and macro-aggressions, white power and privilege, cultural competency and sensitivity, productive allyship and co-conspiratorship, implicit bias and systems analysis, anti-racism and anti-bias, oppression, colonization, colorism, white supremacy, and color blindness. 

b. Ensure that BIPOC feel welcomed during these conversations and do not feel obligated or pressured to speak and educate other students on racial matters. Ensure discussions are student-led and situate marginalized voices at the forefront when appropriate.

c. We expect backlash over the incorporation of race-based materials and conversations; parents may insist that they are biased or too political and demand that the Board maintains color-blind practices. However, we implore the Board to embrace a racial lens, as racial injustice is a societal reality rather than an opinion, and color-blind teaching neglects the trauma and suffering experienced by BIPOC at the hands of white people throughout history. It is also critical to uphold that no student is too young to learn about race.

(ii) Transform history, social studies, and other relevant curricula to address the struggles of marginalized communities by incorporating the following topics.

a. Work with faculty and staff to ensure that they have the support and resources necessary to implement  critical race-based curriculum.

(iii) Implement mandatory cultural competency and anti-racism workshops as a requirement for graduation for all students at the beginning, as well as during the middle, of the school year.

a. Topics that must be addressed include white power and privilege, cultural competency and sensitivity, implicit bias and systems analysis, decentering whiteness, intersectionality, productive allyship, active listening, micro- and macro-aggressions, making space for BIPOC, anti-bias and anti-racism, identifying passive racist rhetoric and behaviors, and addressing racist attitudes of peers, friends, and family members.

b. These workshops must be student-led while accentuating the marginalized voices in the room.

(iv) Implement new courses that focus on the history, experiences, and perspectives of BIPOC, including Pan-African, African-American, and race and ethnicity studies when acquiring the capacity to expand course selection.

(v) Perform audits on classroom libraries, school libraries, and summer reading lists to ensure representation of BIPOC.

a. Address the eurocentrism in currently used texts and other materials and work with faculty and staff to ensure that they are able to critique these materials in classroom discussions.

Diversity Committee:

(i) We believe that there is an urgency to establish the Diversity Committee immediately.

(ii) We implore the Board of Education to invite members of the whole Verona community to participate on this committee. 

(iii) Practice direct-democracy and community-run styles by ensuring that the Committee members routinely involve the community for input rather than practice decision-making on their own.

(iv) The Diversity Committee should be involved in making decisions with the curriculum committee.

(v) If parents, students, or other community members have issues with race-based curriculum and conversations in schools, it is important for the Diversity Committee to help educate the community about these changes.

a. This includes protecting teachers as they implement anti-racist teaching. They should not feel that their employment is in jeopardy when they are teaching anti-racism as a moral and education obligation.

Student and Community Engagement:

(i) Hold assemblies and invite BIPOC to present on Black Lives Matter, racial justice and equity, systemic and institutional racism, white power and privilege, cultural competency and sensitivity, productive allyship and co-conspiratorship, anti-racism and anti-bias. Do not strictly reserve these presentations and discussions for Black History Month.

a. Ensure that these topics and conversations are incorporated into general assemblies (i.e. introductory assemblies at the beginning of the school year).
b. Do not strictly reserve these presentations and discussions for Black History Month.

(ii) Require community service hours for all Verona public school students to amplify Verona’s presence in nearby underserved BIPOC. We suggest implementing hours in social studies and other relevant courses.

(iii) Work with faculty, staff, and students to establish cultural and social-justice oriented clubs and organizations.

(iv) Develop a series of take-home suggestions and support groups for parents and community members hoping to teach their children about racism.

Student Conduct:

The Civil Rights Data Collection shows that certain young people — including Black, Latino male and Native American students — face harsher discipline than their white counterparts. According to the National Women’s Law Center, Black girls face high and disproportionate suspension rates across the country. Following racial incidents, BIPOC are dismissed and denied justice by faculty and staff, while white students are often not held accountable for their racism. To uplift the voices of BIPOC and hold those who discriminate accountable, we ask the following:

(i) Revise the Code of Student Conduct and implement policies that explicitly condemn racist slurs and actions propagated by faculty, staff, administrators and students, supplemented with appropriate punishment for offenses.

a. Students who use racial slurs or partake in other racist behaviors must face consequences such as revoked participation in sports, band, chorus, debate, color guard, cheer, clubs, and other extracurricular activities, along with participation in field trips, award programs, graduation, and similar events.

(ii) Racial incidents must be framed as teaching moments rather than punitive ones. Require individuals who commit an act of Harassment, Intimidation, and Bullying (HIB), or otherwise engage in prohibited conduct and/or language that targets a protected class, to submit an essay to the Superintendent (with the length to be determined by the Principal or Superintendent) about the historical use and emotional weight of their language, the racial, cultural, or other implications of their actions and an explanation as to how and why they will improve their behavior in the future.

(iii) Racial incidents must be framed as teaching moments rather than punitive ones and be handled with a restorative and transformative justice-oriented frameworks, which are powerful tools for addressing HIB and other violations of student conduct.

Student Wellness:

(i) Devise a plan to recruit more BIPOC in counseling, nursing, and other areas relating to support and wellness.

(ii) Commit to expanding Restorative Justice philosophy, practices and support systems, including but not limited to counseling, intervention, peace circles, peer mediation, de-escalation, conflict resolution, restitution, safe spaces, and community service.

(iii) According to the ACLU, students are 21 times more likely to access on-site mental health services. If the district does not have funding for this, it should partner with local nonprofit organizations and health providers to offer these services.

Student Testing:

(i) Track how existing and future BIPOC are placed in different educational tracks. Ensure that BIPOC have access and are encouraged to enroll in accelerated courses, especially during elementary school. 

a. This begins with reading groups in elementary school. Establish support systems for BOPIC, including a reading specialist for students who are reading below grade level by fourth grade, which is often cited as the beginning of the school-to-prison pipeline.