Our Work

Our work broadens awareness of Ethnic Studies as a liberatory alternative to traditional schooling methods; expands the practice of Ethnic Studies in Chicago schools and youth-serving spaces; and protects Ethnic Studies through a multi-tiered strategy which includes the following:

Building communities of professional development, wellness & care.

In these communities, educators and youth workers deepen their practice of Ethnic Studies methodologies. Educators and youth workers need a community to come home to: spaces to sustain their hope, their wellness, and their commitment. 

Building institutional capacity for Ethnic Studies.

Through consultation and coaching, leaders will develop and enact strategic plans for shifting educational and youth serving institutional culture, curriculum, practice and advocacy to be culturally and community responsive and anti-racist.

Building knowledge & skills to counter authoritarian Right actions & attacks…

at the local, state and national levels, and to ensure robust implementation of the Illinois Instructional Mandates, the Illinois Culturally Responsive Teaching and Leading Standards, the Racism-Free Schools Act, and other policies that promote and protect racial and social equity and justice.

Building communities of professional development, wellness and care

In these communities, educators and youth workers deepen their practice of Ethnic Studies methodologies. Educators and youth workers need a community to come home to: spaces to sustain their hope, their wellness, and their commitment. 

Our current and past projects include:

Umuwi Racial Healing and Resourcing Cohort
The Racial Healing & Resourcing Cohort supports BIPOC educators through healing-centered professional development. This experience centers individual and collective racial healing and resourcing as necessary practices in order to sustain our commitments to practicing healing, justice, and liberation in our classrooms, schools, and learning spaces.

Chicago Public Schools and Umuwi Anti-Racist Teaching Cohort
Community of practice cohort for CPS K-12 social studies teachers committed to anti-racist teaching that builds, deepens and expands everyone's individual and collective beliefs, understandings, skills, and resiliency to embody courageous, healing-centered, anti-racist praxis--rooted in love, self-work, stories and solidarity--in hostile and repressive political times.

Grow Your Own (GYO) Illinois
Learning series for GYO teacher candidates across grade bands and content areas that centers oral histories/herstories/themstories as tools for culturally responsive and healing-informed teaching.

Introduction to Ethnic Studies Workshops
Partners have included Golden Apple Scholar Institute, Grow Your Own Teachers Illinois, Loyola University Chicago, and University of Illinois at Chicago

Building institutional capacity for Ethnic Studies

We are building knowledge and skill to counter authoritarian Right actions and attacks at the local, state and national levels, and to ensure robust implementation of the Illinois Instructional Mandates, the Illinois Culturally Responsive Teaching and Leading Standards, the Racism-Free Schools Act, and other policies that promote and protect racial and social equity and justice.

We have provided capacity-building and consulting services to several partners and projects, including: 

  • Chicago Public Schools Department of Social Science

  • Chicago Public Schools Sustainable Community School Leadership Team

  • DePaul University

  • Filipino School of Chicago

  • FuelEd Schools

  • El Griot & Areíto Project

  • Illinois Federation of Teachers Leadership Education and Development Program

  • Illinois State Board of Education

  • Illinois school districts including District 156 (Calumet City) and District 69 (Skokie/Morton Grove)

  • Teaching Civics for Justice Illinois

The focus of these services has included wellness, racial healing, organization-wide DEI, critical youth civic engagement, and inclusive, inquiry-based teaching.

Building knowledge and skills to counter authoritarian Right actions & attacks

We are building knowledge and skill to counter authoritarian Right actions and attacks at the local, state and national levels, and to ensure robust implementation of the Illinois Instructional Mandates, the Illinois Culturally Responsive Teaching and Leading Standards, the Racism-Free Schools Act, and other policies that promote and protect racial and social equity and justice.


Our current and past projects include:

  • Protecting Teaching and Teachers of Truth Political Education Project [insert description]

  • Providing professional development for BIPOC teacher leaders, majority-BIPOC parent leaders across Illinois, and aspiring teachers. These workshops focus on 1) culturally and community responsive, anti-racist education, and 2) how to organize and build power to respond to the "anti-woke" forces that are moving against Ethnic Studies, anti-racist teaching, and other educational rights. Partner organizations have included:

    • Golden Apple Scholar Institute

    • Grow Your Own Teachers Illinois

    • Illinois Affinity Group Network

    • Loyola University Chicago

    • Parent Engagement Institute

    • University of Illinois at Chicago