As participants in our Black Teacher Leadership and Sustainability Institute (BTLSI), Black teachers and educators will deepen commitment and agency in their work while developing strategies for leadership and sustainability. Attendees will virtually receive caring guidance and facilitation to collaboratively explore the personal and professional challenges they face as Black school-based educators. Through this experience, participants will have an opportunity to share, reflect, and set intentions for how to lead and thrive as Black educators in their different contexts. This Black affinity professional development offering provides a space to build community with and learn from Black teachers and educators from across the country.

Participants will learn, examine and discover:

• Frameworks and protocols that foster equity-centered teaching, learning, and leadership

• The implicit and explicit work of Black teachers in the United States

• How to navigate individual and organizational dynamics that impede the development and sustainability of Black teachers

• Deepened understanding of socio-political contexts and how racial oppression effects education policies and practice. We believe working toward liberation means understanding how oppression plays out!

• The importance of emotional intelligence and wellness for Black teachers in schools

• Concrete skills for health, wellness, and leadership in challenging contexts

• Research, strategies, and tools to support the leadership and sustainability of Black teachers in an oppressive system

“This has been an amazing experience. Being in community with so many amazing Black, proud, and unapologetic educators just gave me the encouragement needed to continue on this journey. The concepts taught, life changing…”

"This Black Teacher Leadership and Sustainability Institute was straight water and fire for me being in education for over 25 years. It was the water that I needed to nurture me and put me into a community of Black educators that I meditated on and received. It has been the fire because the skills and strategies offered motivate me to manifest my radical dreams as a Black educator."

“It is so necessary for Black educators to have space together to grow with our own. So often professional development for "teachers" centers white teachers and I am used to just being ignored and having to make my own way in those spaces. But here, everything was carefully designed for my growth and development. And, I felt the love and attention and I was able to thrive here in ways that I could NEVER in my home district. So, thank you to everyone who was involved in putting this together. It has literally changed my world and helped me heal. I now know that I am a blacktrovert and that my thrivlihood matters!!!”