Liberatory Data and Research Principles  

 

Data and Research Philosophy Statement

  1. We believe that structural racism and other forms of oppression perpetuate educational inequities.  
  2. We believe that systemic inequities are deeply ingrained in the beliefs, practices and policies that shape our education systems.  
  3. We believe that it is possible to create education systems that nurture students’ emotional, physical, cognitive and spiritual well-being.  
  4. We value the cultural wealth and wisdom of Black and Indigenous communities. 

 

Data and Research Principles  

Our Data and Research Principles serve as the foundation to guide how we disrupt white-dominant norms and power dynamics across data and research strategies, resources, relationships, approaches, analyses, data stewardship, and impact. 

  1. Projects align to our liberatory philosophy.  
    1. Be grounded in critical theory and frameworks that challenge and disrupt the status quo by engaging these frameworks to inform each stage of our initiatives.  
    2. Center the lived experiences of Black and Brown students and communities by prioritizing nuanced stories that guide expanded qualitative and quantitative analysis and recommended actions. 
    3. Seek to emancipate and/or empower disenfranchised communities through the redistribution of power and resources by providing platforms and resources that support their advocacy. 
    4. Align with CCER’s Black Community Statement of Love by assessing projects’ intent, goal and impact.  
  2. Engagement strategies  center the experiences of students and community members. 
    1. Designed in collaboration with students and the community for whom the project serves.  
    2. Accessible to students and community through intentional, equitable and creative dissemination  
    3. Outreach, activities are culturally relevant in structure, format, process and execution.  
    4. Facilitated with care and respect for the inherent dignity and worth of people. 
    5. Offer meaningful opportunities for connection and relationship building.  
  3. Measurement and monitoring practices center the success of Black and Brown Students AND focus on the systems responsible for their success.  
    1. Capture measures that track progress toward systems improvements.  
    2. Identify opportunities to catalyze systems change by uplifting successful strategies created and led by community-based organizations in the RMP.  
    3. Protect student, educator and community privacy through strong data privacy infrastructure 
    4. Inspire individuals, institutions and communities to take collective and strategic action through data-assisted storytelling  
  4. Dissemination of data and research is accessible and catalyzes systems change.  
    1. Translated and made available in multiple languages by working with multi-lingual communities to ensure that translations accurately and appropriately capture linguistic and cultural nuances.  
    2. Conveyed in terms that everyone can understand by using plain language, avoiding jargon.  
    3. Shape liberatory narratives that empower students and communities to be change agents by interrupting problematizing narratives and adopting affirming, asset-based language.   
    4. Catalyze systems change by recommending and advocating for shifts in practices and policies that hold systems accountable to advancing educational equity  
    5. Promote ethical and responsible interpretation of data and research findings by using qualitative data to ensure that narratives are humanizing.  
    6. Be Aware and Reflective of the changing environment and current equity challenges by staying abreast of local and global social movements.  

 

Critical Theory and Frameworks  

Afrocentrism | Asante, M. K. (2007). Afrocentricity, the Theory of Social Change. Chicago: African World Press. 

Black Feminist Theory | bell hooks, Patricia Hill Collins, Audre Lorde, and Alice Walker, Kemberle Crenshaw 

Centering the Margins | hooks, B. (1984). Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center. Cambridge, MA: South End Press  

Critical Consciousness | Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed (30th anniversary ed.). Continuum.  

Cultural Wealth | Yosso, T. J., & Burciaga, R. (2016). Reclaiming our histories, recovering community cultural wealth. Center for Critical Race Studies at UCLA Research Brief, 5, 1-4.  

Decolonizing Methodologies | Smith, L. T. (2012). Decolonizing methodologies (2nd ed.). Zed Books.  

Double Consciousness | Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt), 1868-1963. (1968). The souls of black folk; essays and sketches. Chicago, A. G. McClurg, 1903. New York :Johnson Reprint Corp.,  

Mapping the Margins | Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review, 43(6), 1241–1299. https://doi.org/10.2307/1229039