Hedreich Nichols

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If A Picture Paints a Thousand Words

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Visit my YouTube channel for previous Small Bites episodes.

Small Bites Friday Five 07-24-20:

20-30m – Watch 30 minutes of Black America Since MLK: And Still I Rise.

15-20m – Visit Yaritza Villalba’s website with history, engagement and equity resources.

10-15m –Review Kahn Academy’s lesson on Richard Nixon employing the ‘Southern Strategy’ in 1968 and explore the hyperlinked resources.

5-10m – Buy a mask, support a cause. You’ll find several companies designing tons of styles to support various causes.

0-5m – Follow Antiracism Calendar on Instagram from 16 year old Tilly Krishna out of Vermont.

When John Lewis died last week, I realized that I, like most Americans, knew very little about the man, the civil rights icon who organized with Martin Luther King, won a Freedom Medal from President Obama and fought for human rights, from the marches on Washington to the congressional halls of Washington.

I knew we’d lost someone important but I didn’t realize the depth of his lived experience. If a picture paints a thousand words, then video footage speaks volumes. John Lewis’ life is a testament to tenacity and a deep well of hope; hope, not as a strategy, but hope that breathed life into decades of fighting and winning in a system stacked against people who looked like him.

Through reading John Lewis’ stories, I found raw footage of the civil rights protests. The brutality of the attacks against the marchers in Selma, the Little Rock Nine or even the threats against a 6 year old Ruby Bridges made my heart hurt. Looking at the ugliness just below the surface of our founding principles of freedom is difficult, painful.

When we look back on the protests of the 1960s now, we use words like powerful, world changing, heroic, but those were not the words being used then. They are often not the words used now, as protests against police brutality and systemic racism continue.

Much has changed since the 1960s but too much hasn’t. Now that we are beginning to understand that racism is about a system built on stacked inequities, I hope that we, as a nation, won’t look away.

My question to you is, what side of history will you be on? Will you turn away or start your own journey to help realize the dream of equality still deferred for so many?

Even if you have been a supporter of racially divisive rhetoric until now, it’s never too late to change. Big steps and baby steps, just keep moving forward. Our communities depend on it, our future as a great country depends on it. And whether you believe it or not, your children’s future depends on us owning our wrongs and righting them so we can move forward.

We are in the middle of a movement and everyone is welcome to the party, late or not.

If A Picture Paints a Thousand Words Read More »

Keep On Keeping On

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Small Bites Friday Five 06-19-20:

20-30m – Google anti-racism or something simple like “how to be a more culturally responsive teacher”. Nothing beats finding your own rabbit hole to fall into.

15-20m – Google “HBCU”, pick one and then read about its rich history and even consider giving your support. Here’s one option.

10-15m – Read or watch a social justice story from your favorite news outlet then read or watch a story covering the same topic from your least trusted news source. Reflect on perspective vs. fact.

5-10m – Have a conversation with at least one child or teen about race in America. Don’t proselytize, just listen. Consider it a fact-finding mission.

0-5m – Read “Teaching as Activism, Teaching as Care” from tolerance.org.

Every January I start a new health and fitness routine. Like clockwork. And every March I start the slow slide into the next January when I have to start all over again. The excitement of a new chance to do something big is always a huge draw at the year’s beginning. So is the likelihood that it won’t stick. According to a University of Scranton study, only 19% of those resolutions are kept long term.

The current social awakening to systemic disenfranchisement of marginalized populations bears every hallmark of a January 1st new beginning. Outrage and the opportunity for sweeping change is fueling a movement around the world. But I wonder, what will change look like 2 months or even 2 years from now?

The truth is, as much as we want to say we’ll keep pushing for change, life happens. You will have to learn new tech to teach in a blended environment, figure out how to work out without your 5AM spin class, give your personal kids more learning support or find new childcare for a totally new routine.

It will get cold and you won’t want to stand outside at a rally. Christmas will come and you may face balancing taking the kids to see grandma with Covid 2nd wave health and safety concerns.

Life will happen and, unless racism is causing you personal pain or at least personal difficulty, you will re-prioritize. You won’t want to, you may not even mean to but you will—unless you have a plan.

Decide now what your priorities are. Are you a letter writer? Grant writer? Check writer? Are you a relationship builder, library collection builder, a content connection builder? Do you see yourself making a difference with one? With a few? With many? In your family? In your classroom? In politics and policy?

Where and how can you keep pushing change forward when life hits? Whatever you can see yourself doing, make a plan now to do it when it’s cold, uncomfortable, busy and 100th on a list of 150 things you need to have done yesterday. Put your supports in place and make a plan to do it even when your best laid plan has gone wrong or made you the object of constant “oh-here-she-comes” eye-rolls.

Make a plan because when the protests stop, the real work will just be starting. Small Bites can be your go to. But even if it’s not, find one thing you can do even in the busiest of times because we can’t afford to lose one voice. We can’t afford to lose your voice.

You can get tired, you can get it wrong but you can’t give up.

Keep On Keeping On Read More »