We speak with Justin Cohen, whose work focuses on the intersections of education, race, privilege, and public policy. Cohen’s recent book is Change Agents: Transforming Schools From the Ground Up. He looks at ways a faculty can systematically improve its school. Knowing the community and having honest and difficult conversations about race are critical.

Overview

00:00-00:33 Intros

00:33-01:44 What Change Agents is about

01:44-03:55 Results-Oriented Cycles of Inquiry (ROCI)

03:55-04:31 School Organizing as a form of community organizing

04:31-10:25 Conversations about race

10:25-13:54 A fishbowl exercise about race that went wrong and what happened after that

13:54-16:46 Achieving early wins

16:46-19:39 What accountability can mean

19:39-23:06 Strategies for improving school-parent communication

23:06-24:05 Working on listening as a school

24:05-26:33 Improving existing schools vs. starting new ones

26:33-29:46 Urgent policy changes

29:46-31:11 Relevant Ethical Schools episodes

31:11- Outro

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode. 

References

Book Change Agents: Transforming Schools From the Ground Up by Justin Cohen 

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear