Interrupting/Examining the Impact of Oppression and Resistance on Student Wellness

This is the fifth session for Healing School Communities: Shifting the Dominant Paradigm to Center Student Wellness, a Community of Practice intended for students, families, educators and school mental health professionals who are navigating the ongoing impact of racial violence in all forms on student mental health. In this session, we attempt to better understand the underlying roots of oppression within schooling spaces (i.e. anti-blackness, colonization, etc.) and identify impactful strategies for countering, refusing, and moving away from these different manifestations of violence. This Community of Practice session also offers opportunities for participants to:

1. Name and examine the organizational structures that lead to Racial Violence within School Communities.
2. Explore the various mental health implications of racial violence on school ecosystems.
3. Identify and elevate community strengths, wisdom and voice as effective strategies for healing and place them at the center in supporting mental health.
4. Become familiar with resources and tools to address the detrimental effects of racial violence in schools, that further build protective factors, power and agency.

Download the slides for this presentation here.

NOTE: This session is part of a Community of Practice running from February 8, 2022 to March 22, 2022. For more information about the other sessions in this Community of Practice, please click here.

MHTTC Resources

• Central East MHTTC - Reimagining Wellness: Preventing Suicide Among Black Boys
• Central East MHTTC - Saving Young Black Lives: Reversing Suicide Trends
• Racial Equity and Cultural Diversity Resource Collection
• Responding to COVID-19 - Mental Health Disparities
• Responding to COVID-19 - School Mental Health

Additional Resources

• Decolonizing the Psyche
• If These Cells Could Talk - Apocalyptic Education

Speaker:

Kenjus Watson is a son, brother, nephew, cousin, uncle, father, and partner who often shares space, energy, and dreams with radical educational communities. He aims to root and bridge this work in memories that attest to the inextricable link between the wellness of Black people, our autonomy, and the abolition of school.

Questions? Please email Ricardo Canelo at [email protected]