The annual Black History month school assemblies is fading away with February. The 2022 theme picked by the Canadian government for Black History Month, ?February and Forever: Celebrating Black History today and every day,? itself is an admission that Black history month is currently a performative annual ritual.
Yet the realities raised in Black History month assemblies are year-long priorities requiring proactive enduring action.
Black students and families continue to urgently express concerns about something education scholar George Dei documented over 25 years ago: the marginalization of Black youth in schools, absences of Black and African Canadian history and an absence of Black teachers in the classroom.
My research drew from data from a study that used Afrocentric approaches to explore the experiences of 17 Black youth in the Waterloo Region in Ontario. I found that most of the Black youth have never been taught by a Black teacher. These youth yearned for Black teachers to disrupt the daily silencing and dismissal of their experiences?and foster the sense of belonging that is so critical to their learning.
Absence of Black teachers
In Toronto, racial minorities represent nearly 47 per cent of the population, yet make up only 15 per cent of educators.
White people are over-represented in the teaching profession and have benefited from systemic racism and white supremacist hiring, promotion, power and influence.
Across the country, the teaching landscape looks simil...