Robin Appleberry is the parent of children in middle school and high school in Washington D.C., and co-leads Integrated Schools’ D.C. chapter. Recently, on a walk home from school, she introduced a young friend to fresh figs from a neighbor’s tree (photo). In this post, Robin shares the sobering details of what back-to-school looks and feels like this fall in Washington, D.C.
Last year, the office of US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy wrote a nearly 30 page health advisory about the mental health issue of parental stress. Anna, a White parent in Phoenix, who also serves on the leadership team at IS, shares her thoughts about the advisory and how it relates to integration.
The problem, of course, is school segregation. And in 2024, fully seventy years after the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that separate is inherently unequal and that segregation itself is unconstitutional, it is a problem we all still live with.
In White-normed parenting culture, the pull to follow the “herd” of what others are doing can be very strong. A mom shares how the Integrated Schools Two Tour Pledge helped her reorganize her thinking and priorities around choosing a school.
White mom, Emily Moores, reflects on the parallels between tending to a garden and tending to the relationships necessary to participate in meaningful integration and living in true community.