By Dakota Antelman, Contributing Writer
Hudson – A busy summer of reworking curriculum for COVID-19-era instruction also involved discussions on the place of social justice and racial reconciliation in education, Hudson Humanities Curriculum Director Todd Wallingford told School Committee members, Oct. 13.
Presenting alongside Forest Ave. Elementary School assistant principal Judith Merra, Wallingford explained the process school leaders undertook, this summer, to evaluate gaps in existing curricula and to discuss ways to improve school cultures.
“This is a monumental change in how we teach,” he said of altered lessons in particular. “…But we’ve made some steady progress.”
All this, Wallingford, was sparked by the death of George Floyd in late May, as well as the broad protests that followed that atrocity.
Faculty members first convened to discuss the news. Those individuals, in turn, broke off to lead smaller focus groups talking about race, diversity, and oppression in both Hudson schools and in the materials teachers use.
“It was a really rich discussion,” he told School Committee members.
Beyond teachers, Wallingford said administrators contacted civic minded recent Hudson High School graduates to gather their input on these topics.
“They felt their curriculum was very white,” he said. “They felt like, in their high school experience, they really didn’t talk about race enough.”
Moving forward, Wallingford said he and other district administrators want to specifically focus on how to support students who are learning English. These students, many of whom immigrate to the US from South or Central American countries often see few options to initially connect with lifelong English speaking peers.
In total, 14 percent of Hudson’s student body identifies at Hispanic, leaving roughly 80 percent identifying as white. Two percent of students then identify as Black.
Teachers want to reach all those students, regardless of race. They want more inclusive discussions. And they want those discussions to foster an inclusive atmosphere for those students.
In the end, they say, all this comes back to an issue of representation and exposure.
Even amid a pandemic, this is progress that they say must be made.
“We want students to see themselves in texts, where texts can be mirrors,” Wallingford said. “And we also want students to see others in texts, so that texts can be windows.”
