DeKalb 428 administrators say curriculum is changing to reflect diversity. Some in the district disagree

DeKALB - Following a summer 2020 which included calls to expand diverse curriculum in DeKalb District 428, some say that change is happening, and others say it’s not quite there yet.

“I feel that I have noticed a bit of a difference, especially in history,” said Natalyia Ayres, a junior at DeKalb High School. “The classes are different every year, but Black history is something more than it used to be. It’s not the same topics as it usually was.”

Amid local Black Lives Matter protests this past summer, the district held a meeting with community members about racial issues in the schools, and both Board President Sarah Moses and Interim Superintendent Griff Powell acknowledged the importance of curriculum content.

One of the big refrains echoed by those who spoke in that June 2020 meeting was that Black-centric history about Black stories and Black historical figures is mostly only taught in February, and often doesn’t go beyond Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks or the history of slavery. Many called for inclusion of positive Black stories, celebratory, to echo the complex and in-depth ways white-centered history is taught.

Dominique Gunn, the Black Student Union advisor at the high school, said neither she nor her students have noticed much change in curriculum.

“I hope they stick to what they preached over the summer,” Gunn said. “But again, I’ve been the BSU advisor for five years now, and outside of BSU I can’t honestly say there’s anyone else putting forth a Black history celebration. It solely falls on the students of BSU to present a Black history program for the high school.”

Curriculum changes

Billy Hueramo, elementary curriculum coordinator for the district, said that last year the school implemented a program called Caring School Community, which is a social-emotional program aimed at teaching diversity. Sarah Montgomery, secondary curriculum coordinator, said at the upper levels Why Try was implemented, teaching the same thing.

Hueramo said there was some pushback from parents regarding a change of curriculum, but district officials responded explaining the importance of teaching diverse and factual history lessons.

Ecila Scaife, a parent of a freshman, said there hasn’t been any change she has seen.

“I have not seen a change,” Scaife said. “And I spoke with [my daughter]… and I asked her. I remember her mentioning at the beginning of this month she had to watch a video in one of her classes and she kind of sighed and said ‘It was the third year I have to watch this video with the same worksheet.’ That was really the only mention of anything like Black history related this whole semester.”

She said she then asked her daughter if there have been other times Black history or literature have come up throughout the school year.

“She kind of looked at me like I was insane,” said Scaife, herself a 2003 graduate of the district. “She just shook her head no. So it’s not what you would think when then the school district said they’re going to make an effort.”

There are some who have noticed change in younger grades, however.

Holly Nicholson, whose son Micah is in the kindergarten bilingual program at Littlejohn Elementary, said she’s seen an emphasis in the class on teaching diversity even at that young age.

“They focus on emphasizing they are all friends, they are all kind to each other,” Nicholson said. “I’m seeing in the work they’re doing the kids can see themselves in it.”

She said the representation is obvious in classroom activities.

“I’m coming at this from a kindergarten mom perspective,” Nicholson said. “I recognize in kindergarten they’re really too young to get into heavy topics, they’re really not doing history. In my son’s class, what I like to see, is they are reading books by Black authors and illustrators, and the videos that they watch and worksheets they do, all the kids in the class see themselves represented.”

Laura Powell - who has one child currently in the district, a sophomore, and two others who have graduated - said she thought the change was more on a teacher-by-teacher basis than anything else.

She said she remembers a 2016 incident at the school, a Black History Month presentation led to racially charged exchanges and rumors about threats against the school according to administration at the time.

“I think stuff has changed since then,” Powell said. “But I don’t think it was as big of a change as it should be and I think some of it was out of a fear of backlash.”

She said part of the reason things may not have changed that much is because of the turnover at the top of the district. There has been a new superintendent and a new interim superintendent in that time, with new superintendent Minerva Garcia-Sanchez scheduled to take over in July.

“I think it’s something that they have to take more seriously than they have in the past,” Powell said. “With all the administration change we’ve had the past few years, it’s hard for everybody to get on the same page and know what the rule is going forward. Hopefully with a new superintendent coming in, she will last a few years and keep that momentum of change going.”

Gunn, also a graduate of the district, said she hopes the district follows through on the promises made last summer, and said while she hadn’t spoken to Garcia-Sanchez yet, said she hopes that leads to some positive change.

“I stay optimistic, but again I’ve been in the district for 10 years,” Gunn said. “And it’s the same battle we’ve been fighting for 10 years, and probably even before that, being a high school student. I think it’s changing slowly but we still have a long way to go.”

Ayres said a lot of Black history, especially during Black history month is still falling on the Black Student Union group.

“I would like to see certain subjects branch out a little more, not just the same topics,” Ayres said. “Just seeing representation in our school and especially in our Black Student Union. We’re having trouble expanding that. It’s mostly up to the students to branch out. We only really get that recognition during Black history month.”

Hueramo called the process a work in progress. He said the district’s diversity plan - cited by Garcia-Sanchez multiple times in interviews prior to her being hired - helps the process as well.

He said a big goal of the plan is making sure to close the opportunity gap and make sure everyone has equitable access to all district systems and programs.

“Within that goal, we’re going to be able to say at the elementary, we are embedding culturally relevant text within our curriculum,” Hueramo said. “These are the standards we are teaching, but we need to make sure our students of color are seeing themselves in these stories, different beliefs they might have that we’re seeing and keeping a diverse mindset.”

And Montgomery said programs are being put into place outside of social-emotional learning to diversify the curriculum.

“That’s the part we’ve really attacked this with, that Black history is not just about four or five key figures and it should not be siloed in one month,” Montgomery said. “To make sure it’s embedded in our curriculum. We looked at, for instance, the middle school is transitioning to a program called TCI - Teacher Curriculum Institute. It’s making sure it’s contemporary resources and diverse resources.”

Scaife said that’s the change she wants to see too, but said she doesn’t think the district’s quite there yet. Though she remains hopeful it will get there, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic potentially slowing things down.

“I remember growing up we kind of always learned about the same group, right? So Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks,” Scaife said. “It always kind of a repeat of that bunch. I don’t even think she’s even experiencing that, not that I want them to go back to learning about only that. But there’s a lot of different ways to do it.”

Have a Question about this Daily Chronicle article?