Love and Solidarity

At this moment I feel like I’m living in an in-between space. My family and I have recently moved from Alberta after ten wonderful years there to be closer to family in Ontario. The transition has been strange, to say the least as moving in a pandemic creates all sorts of challenges, and getting to know a new city during a lockdown is pretty difficult.

Fortunately, at this point in the pandemic, we’ve done a pretty good job setting up virtual hangouts and organizing community spaces to stay connected to friends and family. But despite the virtual connections we maintain, I can’t help but feel that my life and career are sitting in a bit of a transitional stage waiting to start the next act of what’s to come.

It has been such a privilege to get to spend this time with my two-year-old daughter and learn alongside her as we explore the outdoors and the new region we’re living in. Our days are full and this time is passing much too quickly but I can’t help but feel the itch to get back in a classroom. I’m hoping to land work for the start of the 2021/2022 school year but as those close to me know I tend to struggle when I’m not teaching as being a teacher is such a fundamental part of who I am. But what this time outside of the classroom has given me is an opportunity to reflect on the last ten years in Alberta.

For ten years I had the privilege of learning alongside incredible students, educators, parents, activists, organizers, and community members who were dedicating their lives to building an equitable and just public education system. I can easily say that I’m leaving Alberta with more radical politics and organizing than when I arrived thanks to the beautiful community that embraced me, taught me, held me accountable, and allowed me to contribute to the work of building better schools for all.

I think back to ten years ago when I arrived and terms like social justice education were struggling to find their home in our schools and how I was fortunate to advocate and push alongside colleagues and activisits to challenge teachers to take on the fight for social justice education in their classrooms, curriculum and within the entire system.

I think back to the incredible Indigenous youth I worked with at Inner City High School who challenged me to be a different kind of teacher who listens, understands, and works alongside students. I am forever indebted to them for inviting me into their community, homes, and families to learn, laugh, and build strong relationships. This was the essence of what good community building looks like and I’ll never forget the relationships I built here.

Based on these experiences I wanted to create a similar community among educators to work for equity and social justice education. After many years of struggling to organize teachers, I was lucky enough to have incredible friends who wanted to organize with me to build the RAD Educators Network and create a space where educators could organize, build and learn about how we work for systemic change within our classrooms and schools.

And most recently, I’m reflecting on the lessons learned of working alongside the incredible youth in the Ross Sheppard High School Social Justice club who taught me how important it is for teachers to take a back seat and create space for young people to learn, organize and lead within a school. These brilliant young people continue to do such incredible work and I’m so glad I got to be a small part of their story for over three years.

And lastly, there are so many conversations, community dialogues, and events I’m thinking of where I could sit alongside educators to educate, agitate and organize.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

And while I’ve left Alberta my love and solidarity will always be with the students, educators, activists, and friends I’ve worked alongside over the years. I’ll continue to support your work virtually and as long as folks welcome me, I’m happy to continue contributing to the incredible work that educators across Alberta have been doing to build better schools for all.

I was born, raised, and now once again live in Ontario but my home away from home will always be with my friends in amiskwaciwâskahikan (Edmonton).

Love and solidarity forever.