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A 2020 SPE Outstanding Book Award Winner A 2019 AESA Critics' Choice Award Winner Womanish Black Girls/Women Resisting Contradictions of Silence and Voice is a collection of essays written by varied black women who fill spaces within the academy, public schools, civic organizations, and religious institutions. These writings are critically reflective and illuminate autobiographical storied-lives. A major theme is the notion of womanish black girls/women resisting the familial and communal expectations of being seen, rather than heard. Consequently, these memories and lived stories name contradictions between “being told what to do or say” and “knowing and deciding for herself.” Additional themes include womanism and feminism, male patriarchy, violence, cultural norms, positionality, spirituality, representation, survival, and schooling. While the aforementioned can revive painful images and feelings, the essays offer hope, joy, redemption, and the re-imagining of new ways of being in individual and communal spaces. An expectation is that middle school black girls, high school black girls, college/university black girls, and community black women will view this work as seedlings for understanding resistance, claiming voice, and healing.Perfect for courses in: Adolescent Development, American Studies, Black Studies, Educational Anthropology, Latino Studies, Multicultural Education, Social Foundations of Education, Sociology and Women's Studies.

A 2022 SPE Outstanding Book Honorable Mention Improvement Science: Promoting Equity in Schools is intended for classroom teachers, school leaders, and district leaders charged with leading improvement efforts in schools. From questions such as “how do I develop a love of reading in my classroom?” to “how can I better manage student behavior during independent learning time?” to “what should we do to make sure kids of all races read at grade level by 3rd grade” to “how could we include families of all backgrounds as partners in learning” or “how do we increase our graduation rate among underserved students," this book shares real-life examples from those who are currently leading equity-focused improvement in our classrooms and schools. If you are curious about how Improvement Science has been used, or how others have succeeded—or failed—at equity-focused improvement efforts in our classrooms and in our schools, or if you’re wondering how to spur discussions in school districts, universities, and communities about leading equity-focused improvement, this book is for you. Teachers, students, family members, community members, principals and superintendents will be inspired to embrace Improvement Science as a method to improve equity in their schools. The book helps people new to Improvement Science to understand the basic steps to implement the process. If you’re a beginner, it provides some basic steps and a resource (https://www.carnegiefoundation.org/our-ideas/six-core-principles-improvement/) to help you understand the process better; for those with some experience, the book will be an excellent refresher and tool with functional suggestions to take your practice further. 1.       Form a Team. 2.       Examine Data. 3.       Ask Why. 4.       Read Research. 5.       Get Perspective of Those Closest to the Problem. 6.       Plan the Change. After you’ve done the above, then it’s time to test one idea, using short Plan Do Study Act cycles. These are short improvement cycles. Students are only in our classrooms generally for one year, so the cycles need to be short, perhaps even as short as one week, to ensure that every instructional move we are making truly does improve the experience of the students. Readers of Improvement Science: Promoting Equity in Schools will be taking an important step toward achieving the goal of producing socially just classrooms and schools.WATCH: Meet the Authors (ZOOM recording from #CPED21 Virtual Convening, 10/20/21). To learn more about Improvement Science and see our full list of books in this area, please click through to the Myers Education Press Improvement Science website. Perfect for courses such as: Culturally Responsive Learning Environments; Educating For Equity And Social Justice; Cultivating Culturally Responsive Classrooms; Integrating Methods And Curriculum Design; Inquiry, Assessment, And Instructional Design; Foundations Of Culturally And Linguistically Responsive Practice; Math Literacy; Physical Education; Professional Collaboration In Education; Language And Literacy Development Of Diverse Learners; Equal Opportunity: Racism; Diversity And Equity In Schools; Cultural Proficiency In Schools; Language And Power In Education; Teaching For Equity In Literacy; Supportive Classroom Communities; Cultural Diversity In Literature; Engaging Students In Writing; Introduction To School Leadership; Introduction To School Improvement; Teacher Leadership And School Improvement

A 2021 SPE Outstanding Book Award Winner It’s clear that American public education has been under assault for more than the last 30 years. So much of this current "age of accountability" has focused on blame, both of teachers and those who prepare them. Somehow, unlike in other professions, declarations were made to the effect that anyone could teach better than teachers, including business leaders and people from tony universities without teacher preparation. The Age of Accountability scrutinizes the attack on teachers through weaponized data. While an effective corporate tool to improve bottom-line goals, its use in education became more sinister and misanthropic. International PISA scores imply the mediocre ability of American students, fueling a belief that American education needed more than an upgrade. The only answer that would placate many was a complete upheaval, a redefinition of a teacher and who should be permitted to become one. We teachers ceded authority to these business and legislative forces. Their subsequent fervor for testing overwhelmed teaching and drove the joy out of schooling for students. It is time for a recounting of what has been done to the profession and to our children. Young teachers need encouragement and veteran teachers need reminding of their valiant and effective efforts.

Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) is an important addition to a long list of initiatives designed to ensure educational equity for all students. Veteran educators will recognize many MTSS strategies as practices they already use, while others may feel uncertain or overwhelmed by yet another framework. This book bridges that gap—grounding MTSS in authentic classroom experience and practical wisdom.Through vivid, real-life stories, the authors illuminate both the complexity and the humanity of school-based work. Drawing on decades of experience—as a classroom teacher and as a school counselor/psychologist—their narratives span from 1982 to the present day, including insights from K–12 settings and university teaching. Each chapter presents a compelling case study highlighting student and classroom engagement across grade levels. These stories invite reflection and dialogue around research-based best practices and educational theory, with each chapter concluding in a transparent explanation of the authors’ professional thinking.Readers will trace the evolution of educational practice over time—from an era when Culturally Responsive Pedagogy was rarely discussed to today’s emphasis on inclusive, socially-constructed learning environments. The book chronicles the profession’s broader shift from behaviorism to social constructivism and demonstrates how that journey informs effective MTSS implementation.The case studies illustrate how culturally responsive practices, data-informed decision making, and authentic relationships with students create the conditions where academic growth, positive behavior, and social-emotional wellness intersect. Universal (Tier I), Targeted (Tier II), and Intensive (Tier III) supports—across academics, behavior, and social-emotional learning—are woven seamlessly throughout.Ideal as an introduction to both the theory and practical application of MTSS, this book offers clarity, compassion, and hard-earned insight. It is designed to spark meaningful discussion in teacher preparation programs, professional learning communities, school buildings, and district leadership teams.Perfect for courses such as: Positive Behavior Supports; Role and Function of a School Psychologist: Positive Behavior Supports (Practicum); Crisis, Trauma Response, and Interventions; Academic Assessment & Intervention; Community, Family, and School Collaboration; Curriculum and Inquiry in Public Schools; Fundamentals of Teaching; Access to Learning in a Pluralistic Society; Teaching Emergent Bilingual Students and Students with Disabilities

2025 SPE Outstanding Book Award Honorable Mention Whiting Out: Writing on Vulnerability, Racism and Repair is an experimental text that seeks to collapse the space that white writers create between ourselves and our ideas when writing about race, identity, history, responsibility, positionality, power and the present. The book is written as a first-person meditation grounded in a poetics of vulnerability, undertaken as an author study in two major parts – fragmented first through the work of James Baldwin and then refracted through the writing of Gloria E. Anzaldúa. Whiting Out is for both aspiring and experienced teachers (especially white folks), as well as anyone open to writing new narratives and imagining new possible worlds. Perfect for courses such as: Introduction to Education; Introduction to Teaching and Learning; Introduction to Curriculum Studies; Education and Society; Education and Cultural Studies; Whiteness in Education; Critical Race Theory in Education; Race, Racism and Anti-Racism; Examining Race, Power and Privilege; Teaching and Learning in Diverse Contexts

A 2023 SPE Outstanding Book Award Winner At a time when many individuals and institutions are reexamining their histories to better understand their tangled roots of racism and oppression, Reckoning: Kalamazoo College Uncovers Its Racial and Colonial Past tells the story of how American ideas about colonialism and race shaped Kalamazoo College, a progressive liberal arts institution in the Midwest. Beginning with its founding in 1833 during the era of Indian Removal, the book follows the development of the college through the Civil War, the long period of racial entrenchment that followed Reconstruction, minstrel shows performed on campus in the 1950s during the rise of the Civil Rights movement, Black student activism in the wake of Martin Luther King’s assassination, the quest for multiculturalism in the 1990s, and the recent activism of a changing student body. This close look at the colonial and racial history of one institution reveals academia’s investment in White supremacy and the permutations and contradictions of race and racism in higher education. Though the details are unique to Kalamazoo, other predominantly White colleges and universities would have similar historical trajectories, for in the end our institutional histories reflect the history of the United States. By examining the ways in which a progressive, midwestern college has absorbed, resisted, and perpetuated American systems of colonialism and racism, the book challenges higher education to use this moment to make the deep, structural changes necessary to eliminate disparities in experiences and outcomes among students of color and their White peers. Reckoning is a volume that can be used in a variety of courses that deal with topics such as History of Education, Social Justice in Higher Education, and more.Perfect for courses such as: Pursuing Diversity, Inclusion, Justice, and Equity │ Education and Cultural Studies │ Exploring Whiteness │ Inquiry in Postsecondary Education │ Proseminar in Adult and Higher Education │ Education and Social Struggle in the U.S., WWII – Present │ Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Student Affairs │Diversity and Inclusion in Higher Education │ History of American Education │ Diversity in Higher Education

Supporting Fraternities and Sororities in the Contemporary Era is inspired by sustained and reoccurring professional conversations and scholarship that have suggested that not just change is necessary, but that there ought to be a fundamental shift towards reconceptualizing the construct of fraternities and sororities. The co-editors curate work from scholars and noteworthy practitioners from across higher education to provide an imperative text that reflects the complexity and expansiveness by addressing diversity, programming, and support approaches. This text commences with the understanding that issues will continuously exist, requiring a greater nuanced depth of appreciation to reduce their negative impact. It also summarizes national organizations from authentic, represented voices. Chapters then focus on solutions to support the fraternity and sorority experience, providing strategies and emerging explanations for the issues described in this text. Supporting Fraternities and Sororities seeks to do exactly as the title implies: to inform all stakeholders so that they can make better decisions about the future of these institutions.

Mistakes We Have Made: Implications for Social Justice Educators, second edition, continues the conversation started in the first edition. Dr. Bre Evans-Santiago has once again collected a variety of voices from authors with a wealth of experience teaching in K-12 schools and utilizing culturally relevant practices. This new edition is current with social justice research and strategies, while connecting the audience through personal vignettes in each chapter. The context is organized into three themes: Inclusive Classrooms, Curriculum Implementation, and Professionalism. Reflection questions are provided at the end of each chapter, which will guide the practitioners to self-reflect and plan next steps accordingly. The e-book provides links to videos, strategies, articles, and other supplemental materials to make this text a "one-stop-shop." Mistakes We Have Made speaks to several audiences, from pre-service teachers to any practitioner that needs a new perspective on teaching with a social justice lens. This text can be used in a variety of college courses, professional development workshops, or as a gift for new teachers.Perfect for courses such as: Social Justice for Educators | Diverse Perspectives for Educational Leaders | Diversity and Multiculturalism | Sociocultural Foundations in Education | Issues in Education | Elementary Teacher Foundations | Sociology of Education

2026 SPE Outstanding Book Award WinnerFood Stories: Navigating the Academy with Cultural Lessons from the Kitchen is the first volume in the series Culinary Canvas: A Series on Integrating the Arts and Food into Higher Education. The purpose of the series is to explore the innovative integration of arts and food into higher education. Each volume aims to inspire a paradigm shift in academia, advocating for a more holistic, creative, and inclusive approach to learning, teaching, researching, serving, and existing in the academy. In the present volume, Food Stories makes the case that food, and the culture surrounding food, is a closely held--and powerful--reality that shapes who we are as individuals, as members of varied communities, and invariably, informs who we are as educators and researchers. This book gives space for the authors to explore not only the impact that food and culture have had, and continue to have, on them as individuals, how that culture and experiences impact them as members of the academy (in teaching, research, and service), but also in providing some guidance to graduate students and junior faculty. In effect, chapters explore navigating academic work (teaching, research, and service) through the lens of food and the transferable lessons that can be gleaned from our grandmothers’, mothers’, fathers’, and our own kitchens. It is often the case that higher education fosters both imposter syndrome and a workaholic disposition that can be detrimental to teaching and research. What this book does, then, is to not only explore the ways in which what may seem as non-academic work such as cooking a meal can have on our work/life balance but, also, how to incorporate the very lessons of food into who we are as educators, how we teach, and how we can approach the work we do more broadly. Through carefully curated chapters, this text presents a wide array of perspectives across food and cultural regions, as well as imparting insights from the academy from authors spanning the spectrum of the career. It is an important book full of valuable lessons for graduate students, faculty and teachers who wish to use its content in their classrooms.Perfect for courses such as: Cultural Studies; Culturally-Responsive Pedagogy

2026 SPE Outstanding Book Award Honorable MentionMoments & Movements: Counterstories for Critical Asian American+ Studies in Education is a collection of counterstories born from community and shared commitments to challenge the ways diverse diasporas and experiences of people from the Asian continent and the Pacific Ocean are largely made invisible, silenced, and erased. By defying reductionist narratives, the collection highlights stories built upon generations of struggle, resistance, advocacy, and joy, that impart wisdom for the current moment and for Asian American+ movements in the future, particularly movements based in education. The book’s topics, located at the nexus of multiple and interconnected fields, such as education, race/ethnic studies, policy and community studies, have broad appeal to a cross-section of university academics; P-12 teachers and leaders; and community educators and activists. Using the framing of Critical Asian American+ Studies, the chapters in this volume emphasize criticality as central to the work of educators committed to more just futures. The plus (+) symbol in “Asian American+” highlights the volume’s efforts at diverse inclusion and openness to various groups under a broad umbrella geographic category, including voices of various Pasifika, Arab and Middle Eastern communities, without eliding their distinct histories, cultures, politics, and experiences or erasing the tensions within and across the broader category of Asian American studies. The book is organized thematically into four sections that reflect key moments in an ongoing movement. This organization acknowledges that readers may be at different points in their journeys towards developing more critical perspectives or knowledge of Asian American, Arab/Middle Eastern American, and Pasifika peoples’ experiences in education. The first section, "The Moment We Begin", focuses on foundational beginnings, telling stories of how the authors made important first steps in creating the change they wished to see in their educational spheres. The second section, "Building an Inclusive Movement", examines how educators sustain and deepen their work within and outside of classrooms. The third section, "Extending the Movement", then looks at Critical Asian American+ Studies outside of classrooms and schools by attending to educational leadership, families and teacher identities, policy arenas, and educational, cultural, and community activism. Finally, in the fourth section, "Envisioning New Worlds", chapters attend to what justice-focused, future-oriented movements might look like for Critical Asian American+ Studies. All too often, critical community-grounded work can feel daunting. This collection pushes beyond prescribed borders that separate our communities and separate us into our own educational spheres (e.g. P-12, higher education, teacher education) and roles (professor, teacher, principal, student). As one of the few edited collections with such diverse perspectives, this collection provides multiple paths forward in Asian American, Arab/Middle Eastern American, and Pasifika Studies, inspires with its counterstories of struggle and success, and challenges readers to consider their own next steps.Perfect for courses such as: Asian Americans in Education; Critical Studies in Education; Multicultural Education/Sociocultural Foundations in Education; Ethnic Studies/Asian American Studies; Social Justice in Education; Critical Pedagogy and Education; Urban Education; Race, Ethnicity, and Education; Introduction to Education; School and Society