Brad Lander for NYC Comptroller [[link removed]]Dear John,
On this pandemic MLK Day -- after a year of profound racial justice reckoning -- I called up my friend Mark Winston Griffith to talk about the urgent organizing still underway for Black freedom and what we can take from the lessons of the past.
Watch and share our full conversation on Facebook. [[link removed]]
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Mark is the director of the Brooklyn Movement Center, a Black-led organizing group based in Central Brooklyn that centers racial justice in their campaigns around housing, health, food, and economic justice.
Last summer, Mark and I marched together after the killings of George Floyd & Breonna Taylor, as we have too many times after incidents of police brutality. But, the place where I’ve learned the most from him is around systemic racism in education.
If you listened to the podcast “Nice White Parents,” which looks at the ways white parents like me have reproduced segregated schools, then Mark’s podcast “School Colors” is a must-listen. It goes deep into the tensions between fighting for integration, and demanding schools grounded in the Black freedom struggle.
Listen to our conversation now on Facebook and follow the links in the comments to subscribe to School Colors. [[link removed]]
After years of organizing by young people of color, the Department of Education is finally taking some steps to combat school segregation. In recent weeks, the City announced that it will follow the lead of District 15 in eliminating middle school admissions screens, and is taking steps towards addressing geographic and academic segregation in high and elementary schools too. It’s long overdue and not near enough, but is some progress.
As Mark says in our conversation, there’s no guarantee the Biden era will herald bold progress for racial justice -- even with the uprisings and reckoning of the past year. It is on all of us to continue that organizing. And, for those of us who are white, engaging actively but humbly by listening more carefully to Black voices, and trying hard to follow Black leadership.
Brad
Lander for NYC
456 5th Avenue
Third Floor, Suite 2
Brooklyn, NY 11215
United States
[email protected]
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