The Education Trust and the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) released a guide recommending ways to create safer learning environments for young females of color.
The report, “and they cared:” How to Create Better, Safer Learning Environments for Girls of Color,” highlights racial and gender disparities experienced by females of color while earning an education.
“We want to give students, families and school districts the tools to change school climate, so that girls are no longer being suspended for reasons that are informed by adults’ race and sex biases–offenses like ‘willful defiance’ and dress code violations,” said Emily Martin, vice president of education and workplace justice at NWLC. “We want to spur school districts to abandon criminalization models and reliance on school police and instead focus on creating healthy, sustaining communities within schools.”
According to the guidelines, Black girls accounted for 14% of all students suspended from school at least once in 2015–16, even though they accounted for only 8% of all students enrolled. Nationally, Black girls are more than four times more likely than White girls to be arrested at school and five times more likely to be suspended at least once.
“One of the reasons why it is so important to create school climates in k-12 that value equity and respect and social emotional health, is that otherwise lots of girls will never make it into higher education because they have been robbed of the educational experience that is a foundation for college and beyond,” said Martin.
Dr. Terri N. Watson, an associate professor in the department of leadership and human development at The City College of New York, said Black girls have their own “unique set of challenges” such as racism and anti-Blackness.
“They are not seen in their full light because they are Black girls,” she added. “They are considered different or they are marginalized even more so than just by patriarchy, meaning Black girls have to deal with this Blackness. What does it mean to be a Black girl? Those unique challenges include being objectified, sexualized, to be thought to be older, and not to be considered children.”
