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In a PR360 session focused on the challenges associated with culture wars, Celia Richardson, director of communications and marketing at the National Trust, gave delegates advice shed taken from a political podcast.

According to the comms director, the advice was: Dont close down attacks on yourself too quickly when you are being attacked for doing the right thing.

She believes the approach offers a helpful way of having a conversation about what an organisation or brand stands for. For the National Trust, it allows the team to talk about the organisations mission that nature, beauty and history are for everyone.

Richardson, whos led the comms at the biggest conservation organisation in Europe for the past five years, told delegates that culture war issues are now part of the territory.

The National Trust has been getting shells from the print media for years, she said.

The idea is we are pandering to minorities, the idea is that weve gone woke, that we are no longer who we were, and we are a great breeding ground for culture wars.

Richardson later said: If you work on anything like climate, or if your organisation is vociferous or even just open about ED&I these hot-button issues that can be devisive you have to accept its how we live now, its part of the terrain.

She added that these challenges are no different to logistically or financial problems for brands and comms teams.

Its part of the industry we work in now get ready if youre the sort of brand that might be attacked.

Richardsons advice when facing challenges or attacks is to remember brand values.

How can you use this situation to serve that purpose? I think thats always got to be the question when you hit obstacles. What might you learn from this? What might you gain from this?

She also advised delegates against courting the culture wars.

Richardson, who worked for Historic England before joining the National Trust, admits shes no stranger to culture wars.

According to the comms boss, the National Trust faced some of its worst controversy when it published a report on the links between its properties and places in its care with slavery and colonialism.

You have to listen to everybody, you cant start disrespecting people and getting into rows with people that disagree with you when you are a national institution, she explained.

You are there to serve everyone, whether they agree with your current pursuits or not.

But we made some mistakes we tried to reason with people who didnt want to be reasoned with.

She said: What we did learn was, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

The National Trust employs12,000 members of staff and has 40,000 volunteers across its 400 historic sites.

Richardson urged brands to listen to everyone in the organisation, saying that its everybodys job to combat the challenges associated with cultural conflicts everyone in the whole organisation has to get involved because you need a lot of different opinions and voices.

She also advised delegates to ensure senior decision-makers arent illiterate in media,becauseconsistent attacks can destabilise an organisation.

I think you have to make sure your board is exposed to whats going on in the world and if you find that they are not, then you are going to have a much harder job, she warned.

Comms professionals shouldnt block social media channels by having controversial debates online, said Richardson.

Referring to the National Trusts social media channels, she said: They are coming to look at pictures of horses, daffodils, we dont do counter-disinformation there. We try to use other places, including my personal Twitter (X), she explained.

As a director of communications, Richardsons personal account is followed on Twitter/X by journalists and politicians offering a way of actually talking to people.

I found, actually, youve got a lot more power and authority than you might think that you have as a third source for your organisation.

Youve got to be really careful, of course, because youre using your own personal channel to talk about something work-related, but I just think in the modern time you have an opinion... organisations do need a plethora of voices to speak for them and a plethora of personas.

However, she warned PRs not to debate people on their own terms and to avoid race-baiters online.

They are trying to have an ideological battle with you and sometimes they will lie and spread misinformation. Dont try and debate the ideology with them, just go for the method. Just always be clear on what youre doing and why you are doing it.

Commenting on how to handle the spread of false information, Richardsons method is to take a broken windows approach to repairing disinformation.

Repair every window, otherwise its much easier to break more windows, she said.

You know what sources are like now, you get the Woozle effect that a lie becomes the truth by sheer repetition.

So we unfortunately had to put a lot of time and effort into insisting [on] corrections to stop journalists casually reproducing [false] stuff about us. Its intensive if youre a small organisation.

When asked by an audience member if the comms team gets blamed for negative coverage caused by operational issues, she said: Yeah. Someone once said to me: You cant talk your way out of a situation you acted your way into.

Often they put the pressure on to do a U-turn when often you havent done anything wrong. I think thats one of the real dangers of being involved in situations like this.

Ive learned that sometimes, your job isnt to stop it, she explained.

PRWeeks two-day PR360 conference was held in Brighton on 8 and 9 May.

See more here:
'Don't close down attacks too quickly' National Trust comms boss on 'culture wars' - PR Week

A western Sydney community rejected discrimination when its council overturned a library ban on a kids' book discussing same-sex parenting, advocates say.

Ahead of Friday, which marks the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia, Equality Australia praised Cumberland City Council for rejecting "American-style culture wars" and reversing the recently imposed ban.

But the council decision only came after fiery protests outside the chambers, while religious leaders and local families were among those packing the public gallery inside.

Equality Australia's legal director Ghassan Kassisieh said the council had reached a unifying verdict.

"The message sent last night was our communities are united, we don't want to be divided, books are there for everyone to read and they represent all of our families," he said on Thursday.

"I'm a gay man who grew up in western Sydney and I know what it felt like when many of our community had a very difficult conversation about marriage equality.

"(Wednesday) night to me was that moment where we could open that conversation again."

The council, which covers a population of about 240,000 people living near Parramatta, narrowly voted earlier in May to "take immediate action to rid same-sex parents books/materials in council's library service".

Mayor Lisa Lake, who evicted multiple unruly attendees during the meeting, apologised for the hurt caused by the debate following the initial motion, which she did not support.

"Cumberland council is actually quite an inclusive place and very welcoming, one of Sydney's largest multicultural communities where we all manage to live together pretty harmoniously," she said.

"It was a very divisive and unnecessary debate about a little book that had been in our libraries for five years with no complaints."

Only two councillors - Steve Christou and Eddy Sarkis - voted to keep the ban, despite six councillors having voted to implement it just a fortnight ago.

Five copies of the book A Focus On: Same Sex Parents had been in the council's libraries since 2019.

It forms part of a series that aims to inform children about "difficult realities" and "healthy ways for children to process and understand them".

Cr Christou, the former mayor who first suggested the ban, maintained the community wanted the book gone from its libraries.

"It was important that myself, as an elected representative, represented the views of our local community, and that was proven when thousands of people turned up to actively protest," he said.

"There's plenty of time for two-, three-, four- and five-year-olds to ask questions and explore their sexuality and same-sex parenting later on in life."

The book had only been borrowed once since being installed in the council libraries and Cr Christou previously admitted he had not read it before calling for the ban.

Rainbow Families executive officer Ashley Scott said the vote sent a "clear and powerful" message that every family mattered.

"Our job as parents is to help children understand the world around them and reading plays a pivotal role in this, as does seeing their families reflected in the books on their library shelves," she said.

Read the original:
Same-sex book ban reversal 'a rejection of culture war' - Yahoo News Australia

The coming general election, whenever it is called, will be the most crucial yet when it comes to climate change. The time to act is running out. The choice is between Conservative climate delayers and deniers and a Labour government which can deliver the biggest investment in home-grown clean energy in British history. Labours aim is to cut energy bills for good and make our country energy-secure, all while supporting good jobs, restoring nature and making sure Britain becomes a climate leader at home and abroad.

Fourteen years of failed energy policy from the Tories, set against a backdrop of low growth, high taxes and crumbling public services, has left us beholden to dictators like Vladimir Putin for our energy needs, and exposed us to sky-high bills. It is shocking but unsurprising that at the start of this year 3.1 million households found themselves in fuel poverty.

Labour has been clear that tackling the climate crisis is the best route to tackling the energy bills crisis, because it is our reliance on fossil fuels that is driving both. This means, as one of Keir Starmers five missions, we are committed to clean power by 2030, which would make the UK the first major economy in the world to decarbonise its energy grid.

Our green prosperity plan promises green growth, energy independence, enhanced biodiversity, average savings of up to 300 on annual household energy bills, and over 650,000 new jobs in our industrial heartlands and coastal communities. It will include a warm home plan to upgrade cold, draughty homes and cut energy bills; a National Wealth Fund to invest in British industries such as electric vehicle production, ports, clean steel, hydrogen, and carbon capture and storage; and a plan to rewire Britain, unlocking billions of private investment by reforming the planning system and the grid, accelerating stalled energy projects and expediting grid connections for industry.

We already have publicly-owned energy in the UK its just not owned by the UK. According to the Common Wealth think tank, 44 per cent of our offshore wind assets are owned by state-led companies, from countries such as Denmark and Norway. Labour plans to switch on Great British Energy, a publicly-owned energy company that will invest in clean homegrown power, capitalised with 8.3bn. With our local power plan we will support community-owned and community-led energy projects: a place-based approach that puts real power back in the hands of local people.

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These plans will be part-funded by a proper windfall tax on oil and gas giants, many of whom are currently earning record profits. With Labour, economic prosperity will also mean prosperity for the environment as we improve the well-being of people and the planet. Our green prosperity plan embodies this idea, integrating economic growth with environmental sustainability, an industrial strategy with social equity.

Ive been incredibly disappointed by the Conservatives decision to opt for culture wars over climate consensus. Cross-party collaboration is crucial, as the Conservatives net zero tsar Chris Skidmore noted when he resigned as an MP in January: We should be taking the long-term decisions for the future of our country that protect our citizens, our economy and our planet, not playing short-term politics with legislation that achieves so little but does so much to destroy the reputation of the UK as a climate leader, he wrote in his resignation letter.

Yet as we see a global commitment at Cop28 to transition away from fossil fuels, the UK government has doubled down, committing instead to drilling every last drop of oil in the North Sea, watering down climate targets and blocking the roll-out of home-grown solar and onshore wind projects: the cheapest, cleanest forms of new energy. What message does this send to countries looking to the UK for leadership? This government has consistently talked down Britain in an effort to minimise or absolve our responsibility on the world stage. Its time to change that. We want to make London the green finance capital of the world and Britain a clean energy superpower, and to work with the most vulnerable and the most ambitious nations to pressure the most polluting countries to act.

This is the message Labour has been sending to communities, to businesses and to other nations around the world Labour is ready to work with you to support you on your journey to net zero. This is the thinking behind our ambition to establish a Clean Power Alliance: a global alliance of countries at the forefront of climate ambition.

Any discussion on net zero is incomplete without mentioning the natural environment. My colleagues in the shadow environment, food and rural affairs team have been setting out Labours plans to protect and enhance nature for future generations: whether that involves clearing up after the governments sewage scandal, or targeting a zero-waste economy by 2050 that will end the scourge of plastic pollution and the depletion of our precious natural resources. Together we are looking at nature-based solutions to climate change. Our peatlands, wetlands and woodlands are crucial carbon sinks, but also part of helping us combat domestic climate consequences such as flooding and food insecurity, and providing essential habitats for flora and fauna.

Ive been an MP for 19 years now but have never been so excited by an opportunity such as the one we have before us to put climate and nature at the heart of government. Never have I been so enthused by the potential social, economic and climate benefits that this scale of green investment in clean energy could deliver. The world is at a critical juncture and the time for complacency has long passed. Labour is ready to deliver change, and its time we got the chance to do it.

This article first appeared in a Spotlight print report on Sustainability, published on 10 May 2024.Read it in full here.

[Read more: Chris Skidmore The Conservatives no longer conserve]

Originally posted here:
The Conservatives have chosen culture wars over climate consensus - The New Statesman

I have a Polish gay friend who is a second-class citizen. This kind of a statement if said between 2015 and 2023, west of the Oder-Neisse line (Polands Western frontier), would have been understood as little more than an anodyne boutade. But deployed around the countrys last legislative race, in October 2023, to score outrage points against the social conservatism of the defeated Law and Justice (PiS) government, it attains all the persuasive power of a five-year-olds temper tantrum. If indeed homosexuality is a category against which PiS has discriminated in its eight years in office, then that second-class citizenship should correlate with the entire demographic being targeted. If true, this would turn any individual testimony, on either side, into a statistical irrelevanceone that hinders, not aids, the rhetorical frame into which that statistic is slotted.

The statement shifts focus away from the legal rudiments of the discrimination being alleged (an omission which insinuates it may not be as blatantly evident as suggested) and redirects it towards one loneand potentially impartialwitness, whose anonymity need not be mendacious, but suggests at least some degree of self-perception. This is supported by a cursory survey of Polands long-brewing culture wars over sexual mores, which long predate Law and Justices (PiS) legislative victory over the liberal-centrist Civic Platform (PO) in 2015, and which are unlikely to be decisively won by either side. This glance reveals, unsurprisingly, that a substantial segment of the Polish LGTB community is at odds with the countrys conservative majority in a tug-of-war whose battlelines dont always track with partisan cleavages.

A non-trivial segment of Polands LGBT votersto the extent a sexual orientation can be assimilated to an electoral blocfind a home within PiS, and even further to the Right. And some in the anti-PiS opposition are less amenable to the maximalist, sexually libertarian views prevalent in the West under the same LGBT rubric. Whereas the right to legal succor against homophobic hate crimes, same-sex unions, and adoption by gay couples features more prominently in the Polish agenda than in the Western European countries that have already turned these rights into law, one feature is common with the West. Other rights are being lumped into Polands ideological struggle, too, including the right to align school curricula with understandings of sexual education deemed outlandish by a majority of the electorate, the right to fly LGBT flags on public premises, the right to transgender bathrooms, and more.

There are several striking features about the quote which opens this article. It was made to a group of young professionals taking a Saturday morning class at a Catholic university in Madridan odd setting in which to import woke and socially unscientific tropes. The luncheon speaker was a young former entrepreneur, now a right-of-center member of the European Parliament (MEP), who proudly holds onto her pro-life legislative record even as her party gradually embraces abortion. This lawmakers parliamentary allies, Civic Platform (PO), are purporting to restore liberal democracy in Poland, which they allege had been suspended under PiS. It is worth noting that POs restoration of democracy is being carried out through the purging of civil servants deemed disloyal, the takeover of public media, and the storming of the presidential palace to detain and imprison two legally pardoned politicians.

Our guest MEP was naturally loath to find fault with her Polish allies so close to the June 2024 EU election cycle, even off-the-record. In the background, Spains socialist PM is staging his own coup against the rule of law through an unconstitutional amnesty for seditious Catalan politicians. In nominally opposing Snchezs coup, but not Civic Platforms, she thereby normalized the very double standard that her voters have sent her to Brussels to oppose. But whats more salient is that a self-hyped elitist of her sorta cognitive meritocrat who attended top schools and worked for the World Bankwould attempt to persuade a group of young Catholics that gays in Poland are persecuted because someone told her soand to hell with the facts. In choosing not to disclose this persons identity, I am not doing her party any favors, for her colleagues would all likely reason along the same dumbed-down lines.

It is possible to intuit that the inferior rights this speaker alleged are in part self-perceivedfueled by cultural battles unrelated to the legal possibilities of living a fully homosexual life. The conflation of LGBT rights with the right to legislate a whole-of-society agenda that is not even majoritarian among homosexuals is becoming the political norm in both Western and Central Europe. At an earlier session of the aforementioned forum, a prominent national leader of the same party, who had also been governor of a large Spanish region, took aim at the right-populist VOX party, which, in the lead-up to our July 23 general election, saw one alderman in a small village throw the rainbow flag off a balcony. This leader claimed the party had, then and there, revealed its homophobia. Naturally, she had nothing to say about the policy, decreed by that villages previous left-wing local government, to place the flag on par with Spains and the EUs.

It is not hard to see why. For this second oratoras likely for the firstthe rainbow flag snugly fills the representational space of sexual orientation, even if no other sexual orientation has waved a flag in the past, and even if breaking this millenarian pattern may open a Pandoras box of cultural conflict. She omitted that flags arent usually flown to symbolize feelings towards other human beings but instead to command loyalty and arouse political action. Theyre waved on behalf of nations, causes, lobbiesnot on behalf of pet lovers or poetry readers. She ignored arguments that, whereas the rainbow flag may appeal to the identitarian impulses of a substantial section of the homosexual community, it doesnt represent these individuals as homosexuals, but as members of a cause, a political lobby working to advance an agendaworthwhile though it may sometimes be.

By conflating homosexuality with the willpower to mold society, these two self-proclaimed liberal stalwarts blind themselves to the many tyrannical ways in which the LGBT lobby is already remodeling society. It not only crassly instrumentalizes the sexual orientation of millions of well-meaning citizens, but also risks turning their fabled homophobic stigmas into reality. If they do desire to pit society against itself over the many ways of feeling sexually attracted, they should keep treading their current path: depriving parents of the ability to teach their children sexual morality, aligning language with political correctness, and reputationally persecuting wrongthinkall while claiming its done in the name of homosexual freedoms. But even then, their disastrous endgame will be in vain, for the sleaziest campaigns of social engineering cannot bend the true meaning of freedom.

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When a Culture War Becomes a Truth War The European Conservative - The European Conservative

Since the late 2010s, a wave of state laws has reshaped how schools can teach about race and racism in U.S. history. This legislative push has been coupled with a surge in book bans on a range of controversial topics, including books about race and racism or featuring Black characters. According to a recent RAND survey, two-thirds of U.S. teachers have chosen to limit their instruction about political and social issues of all kinds in the classroom.

But people like Kaya Henderson are finding creative workarounds. Henderson, a FutureEd senior fellow, is the CEO of Reconstruction, a curriculum and technology company that offers supplemental materials inAfrican American history and culture.She began her career teaching middle school Spanish with Teach for America, where she rose to the position of executive director for TFAs Washington, D.C. program. During her tenure as chancellor of the District of Columbia Public Schools, the system saw the greatest growth of any urban district on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) over multiple years.

FutureEd Editorial Director Maureen Kelleher recently spoke with Henderson about the origins of Reconstruction and how current political dynamics are affecting the response to curriculum focused on Black history and culture. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Why did you launch the company?

We launched Reconstruction for a few reasons. First of all, it came directly out of my work at DC Public Schools, where we instituted a district-wide curriculum.One of the key priorities for us was to make sure that our students saw themselves and their community in the things that they were learning. That was new. What we saw as a result was kids deeply engaging in the content of their academic work. We saw academic progress soaring. We saw confidence soaring, leadership soaring, agency, all of these things. Quite frankly, I could not put enough culturally-relevant content into the curriculum because we only have seven and a half hours and 180 days.

I had thought for a long time about the fact that I grew up in a pretty diverse community where my Jewish friends went to Hebrew school. My Chinese friends went to Chinese school. My Sikh friends went to Sikh camp. And these other cultures that didnt wait for school to teach their kids their history and their culture, but actually took it upon themselves to do it, reminded me of our African-American traditions around citizenship schools right after the Civil War, freedom schools in the 60s, and Sunday school and how our churches often teach Black history and Black culture.

I thought, What would it look like to take this offline, out of school, stop trying to fit it into the school box, and think about what it might look like to create supplemental classes that kids could take?We ended up starting this in the middle of the pandemic, and there was a real hunger for academics online when schools were closed.

So we developed a number of hardcore classes, you know, reading, writing, arithmetic, science and social studies classes, but also cultural classes like Cooking for the Soul, where kids learn the history of five soul food dishes and then learn to cook those dishes with a chef from New Orleans.Or games of the culture like spades and dominoes, or the history of step, which is a dance that originates with South African gumboot dancing and draws a thread all the way through to historically Black colleges and universities.

Oftentimes, when we think about African-American history, we think about enslavement, civil rights, and Obama. It was really important for us to help our young people understand that there was a super-incredible period of history called Reconstruction, which is the least-taught period in American history.

In the 12 years immediately after the Emancipation, the African-American community thrived in the United States. We owned more than 20 percent of the farmlandowned, not sharecropped or rented. We created our own businesses, banks, and insurance companies in communities all over the country. We founded 37 historically black colleges and universities. We founded over 5,000 community schools. Yet and still, were told that were a culture that doesnt value education.

You know, more than 500,000 black men voted in the presidential election which elected Ulysses S. Grant president, and he only won with 300,000 votes. People tell us that our vote doesnt count; it always has counted. We wanted our young people to have a touchpoint where they understand that weve experienced success, not just in Africa, but weve experienced success here.

We wanted to anchor the teaching of historyReconstruction, and beyondin Black excellence, in Black joy. Not in Black trauma, not in a deficit-based perspective, but to really pull through the values that make us proud as a people and have made us successful, frankly, against the odds. And we wanted to teach that to our young people. So thats why we founded Reconstruction.

As you mentioned, you launched during the pandemic, when there was tremendous demand for quality educational content online. Im curious how your customer base, your target audience, has developed since your launch. Who are you reaching and how do you get to them?

Its interesting. We thought when we started that our customers would be parents and families; that like Hebrew school, families would elect to take Reconstruction classes.

It ended up, straight out the gate, being schools. I think part of that is because I went to a number of my superintendent friends, having formerly been a superintendent, and said, How do I get this opportunity out to parents in your districts? And they said, Well pay for our kids to get on Reconstruction. Because, one, they were looking for academic content online because many of their teachers werent able to provide it straight away.

But they were also looking for enrichment and things to engage young people. If you remember, young people were deeply dissatisfied with online learning. When we started, we werent even sure that kids would be willing to take classes online. And when we were teaching spades or dominoes or Black Shakespeare or whatever, kids really just glommed onto this. We watched kids get into these Zoom rooms that look just like their regular classrooms, right, but engage at a completely different level because we create a space of belonging, because the content is different, because we try to make it feel not like school, and we saw kids really be into it.

I think over time, a couple of things have happened. One is people just are tired of being online, and we are back outside. So we have tremendous, tremendous pressure from our clients to teach our classes in person.

We are experimenting. Were a super-small shop, right? So the thought of going to a bunch of different places and running programs is a lot for us. But part of the way that we have dealt with that is to begin to license our curriculum for teachers to teach in districts.

Because were supplemental, people use us in their summer school programs. They use us in their after-school programs. They use us for electives and enrichment. And so it is fairly easy for us to share our lesson plans, our unit plans, and to train other people how to teach lessons the way we do.

We run programs year-round in Jackson, Mississippi, in person. Weve learned a lot from that, and thats been really incredible to be able to see and touch kids and teachers in a way that we dont usually. So one change is more demand for in-person engagement. The second thing that has changed since we started is the culture wars.

Right. What are you seeing, and how is it affecting your business?

We see hostility towards the teaching of accurate history and culture. We see states banning conversations about race and diversity. We see legislation that forbids teachersunder penalty of losing their jobs and their licensesfrom teaching complex and complicated pieces of our history and culture.

On the one hand, it means that we cant operate in some schools, right? We cant operate in schools in Florida without endangering peoples jobs and livelihoods. And thats not what we want to do at all.

But because we have a flexible format, it also means that in churches, Boys and Girls Clubs, or Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts or community-based organizations, we actually can operate. So we see demand coming from community-based organizations in places where you cant teach our curriculum in schools. Now its just very clear that it is important for us to teach our own history, our own culture. So theyre finding other ways to do that.

I think on the other hand, there are lots of places where there is still deep commitment to teaching accurate history, to exposing kids to the kind of content that we have. And so Im not fighting to be in places that dont want me. I just go with the coalition of the willing. There are lots of areas around the country that still want to engage in this type of learning. So we find those people.

I think the other piece that has insulated us a little bit is we are in the supplemental space. Im not fighting with school board members about what should be in the core, right?

When we first started Reconstruction, before the culture wars started, my business partner said to me, Oh, my God, this content is so good. It has to be taught during the school day.

And I said, No way. There will always be a school board member who thinks that this is not important, this is not what kids should be learning. I dont want to fight those fights.Nobody really cares about what happens in after-school or summer school as long as kids are engaged and learning. So lets stay in the supplemental space.

People ask me, Are people attacking you? Do you get death threats? Nobody is paying attention to Reconstruction because were positioned in a way that doesnt force anybody to learn this.

If you dont want to learn this, go do your thing. Thats great. But many people do, and not just African American families. Yes, we serve schools and school districts with heavy populations of African Americans. But we serve all kinds of folks who have said to us, This has helped us open up a conversation about our Mexican heritage, or This has helped me be able to tell kids our stories about our Lebanese heritage.

While the culture wars have been heating up and playing out in school boards, a lot of the same school districts now have ESAs and ways that parents have direct control over money that they want to spend on their childrens education. Has any of that come back to Reconstruction? Are folks coming to get it?

Not yet, but I think it will. Were looking into the ESA markets. They arent places where weve usually worked before. Were beginning to market in those places. But I would expect that parents will use their ESA dollars to leverage opportunities like Reconstruction.

Lets talk a little bit more about what makes Reconstructions curriculum and learning experience different. For example, tell me about your Black Shakespeare class.

Black Shakespeare is an awesome class. We created that curriculum in partnership with the Folger Shakespeare Library here in Washington, D.C. It actually won the American Shakespeare Associations Public Award. Were super-proud of that.

One of the super-cool things about Reconstruction is we can dream up anything that we want. I have a former colleague who runs the education program at the Folger, and I called her up and said, We should have a Black Shakespeare class.

She said, What is that?

And I said, I dont know. But it seems to me that if we can get African-American kids to understand that Shakespeare is relevant for us, if we can give them a positive black encounter with Shakespeare before they get to school, maybe he wont be some crusty old white dude who doesnt speak the language that kids speak. Maybe they will be able to engage in a different way.

So they took that on with us as a partner, and we co-created these five classes which look at Othello and the Merchant of Venice and Titus Andronicus and a couple more. For example, in Othello, one of the threads explored is: who are the people who have played Othello? Othello is a Moor, he is an African. And when we look at the history of actors who have played Othello, it is everything from white actors to Black actors. And what does that mean? And you know what does blackface mean and all of these kinds of things?

You cant do that in school, right? We dont have the time. But academicians at colleges and universities who studied Shakespeare and race collaborated with my curriculum team and together, they came up with these five classes that are our Black Shakespeare series.

Reconstruction offers supplemental classes. Theyre not formally graded. What are you hoping that students take away from the classes?

Theres not a formal evaluation, but the students going to walk out differently at the end than they were in the beginning. We want kids to feel like they learned something and had a good time.And our student satisfaction scores are like a 4.7 out of 5. And we see kids asking to take more Reconstruction classes.So that feels very good, right? We want kids to really enjoy and to learn.

We also want kids to have a different perspective about themselves and about African American culture. We want young people to think critically and to question when you know they hear things that dont make sense to them based on stuff that theyve learned. We hope that it incites intellectualism and continued pursuit of learning. We want our young people to also feel a sense of agency and responsibility. We want them to feel like, Oh, yeah, it is up to us to be the ones to make the changes in our community. Because historically, thats what has happened.

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Q&A: Kaya Henderson on Teaching Black History During the Culture Wars - Future-Ed