Uppity minorities and courageous, equity-minded leaders are sometimes in the spotlight—but we also find ourselves in the crosshairs. Today, I want to talk about both. It’s important to celebrate the moments of honor, but also to reflect on the moments of pressure—because it’s in those crucibles that the commune of courage begins to rise.

This week, I received one of the greatest honors of my life from an organization that is not only in my ancestry—but in my blood. On July 16, 2025, I was awarded the Benjamin L. Hooks “Keeper of the Flame” Award at the NAACP National Convention in Charlotte—an honor for those who have “carried forward the fight for civil rights, justice, and equity with unwavering commitment.” I accept it with deep gratitude—and with full awareness that the road to this moment was anything but smooth.

What follows is a story I don’t believe I’ve ever told publicly.

There was a time when I lost my role as a civil rights leader within this very organization. Not because I broke the rules, but because I stood firmly for our values. In 2016, when the national NAACP passed a resolution calling for a moratorium on charter schools, I supported it. I didn’t write the resolution. The San Jose NAACP originated it. Our California delegation submitted it to the National Resolutions Committee. It then passed a delegate vote at the national convention, and then was ultimately approved by the NAACP National Board.

I believed in it.

I believed that our children deserve schools governed by the public, not managed for private gain. I believed that equity demands accountability. And I believed that we had a duty to listen to communities—especially Black communities—that had experienced displacement, disruption, and disenfranchisement from school privitization.

The backlash was swift. School privatization advocates, flush with foundation money and political access, launched a campaign to undermine the NAACP’s stance. They targeted individuals, distorted the resolution, and applied immense pressure to our leadership behind the scenes. In California, they didn’t just attack the policy—they tried to seize control of the narrative by attempting to take over three local NAACP branches and even removed the name of our state NAACP president from a charter school that had once honored her. In the midst of that pressure, I was temporarily demoted from my role as Education Chair of the California NAACP.

The temporary demotion was one of the most trying moments of my entire leadership journey. Much more difficult than resigning as Provost this past January. I had given years of my life to the civil rights movement. I had helped build coalitions across labor, education, and civil rights spaces. I had stood side by side with parents, students, and teachers.

I love the NAACP. I come from a long line of members. My great-grandmother stood on the National Mall in 1963, attending the “I Have a Dream” speech with her NAACP chapter from Michigan. I am a life member and I’ve had the honor of representing the NAACP across the nation and around the world.

But if you are an Uppity Minority or an equity-minded leader, they will come for you when you are effective. When you refuse to look the other way. When you build something that wasn’t supposed to be built. They came for me—not from within the NAACP, but from outside it. It was external pressure—from well-funded school privatization advocates and political operatives—who couldn’t stand the idea of a national civil rights organization taking a principled stand for public education. So they tried to make me the target. They thought if they could isolate one voice, they could find a way to undo the resolution.

The school privatization supporters came for me not because I failed, but because we succeeded where others were too afraid to try. Because we challenged problematic norms that were being quietly protected by a profit-driven education industry. Because we made the invisible visible. Because we brought the students on the margins to the center.

The Attack They Think Will Silence You

You can tell a lot about people by how they respond to truth.

Look at Regent Wanda James in Colorado. She spoke up for transparency and equity. She challenged racially-charged public communications and asked hard questions about governance. And for that, her own board censured her. Not because she broke official rules—but because she refused to play politics as usual. They didn’t know what to do with a Black woman who wouldn’t bow.

Here’s what I learned from the Regent Wanda James situation and would like to discuss as a matter of my own academic freedom and educational leadership scholarship. After the first attack, they expect silence. They expect that you’ll disappear into the shadows. They expect that the door they slammed shut will stay shut forever. Maybe they hand you a nondisclosure agreement—the professional equivalent of organization disfunction duct tape. Maybe they cut you off from future references, scrub your name from press releases, or whisper poison into the ears of potential employers. They circulate just enough doubt to taint your name without saying anything they can be held accountable for.

They think this will be the end of your story. They think you’ll shrink, accept your exile, and fade into irrelevance. But they have completely misread the story. Because when you lead with integrity, courage, and a commitment to justice, you don’t walk that path alone. You are never really alone. You walk it with your community. With the people you mentored and supported. With the families you showed up for when no one else did. And most importantly, with those who saw in your leadership something they had never seen before: the audacity of truth, unflinching and unsanitized.

The Commune of Courage Begins to Stir

The commune of courage is not a formal institution. It has no charter, no official title, and no designated leader. It is a quiet, powerful force that forms around those who lead from principle. It is made up of people—colleagues, students, allies, community members—who have witnessed your integrity, your risk-taking, your refusal to back down. It grows not from press releases, but from presence. Not from applause, but from alignment.

When they try to erase your name, your work, your voice, something begins to stir in the silence. At first, it is subtle. A late-night text. A direct message from a former colleague. A whisper in the hallway. Someone who still works inside says, “I can’t say this in public, but I want you to know I saw what you did. You made a difference.”

These early moments are quiet, even hesitant. The people reaching out are often still on the inside. They are watching every word. They fear retaliation. They know they’re being monitored. But silence does not always mean complicity. Sometimes it means strategy. Sometimes it means survival. And even in silence, they offer you something priceless: the truth that you mattered.

From Whispers to Thunder

Then, slowly, the volume increases. As we see in the Regent Wanda James situation, a colleague posts an open letter. A journalist starts digging deeper. The Governor speaks out. A community member supports your name at a board meeting or public forum. The narrative begins to shift. The story that was meant to disappear is suddenly front and center. This is not accidental. It is the product of people deciding they are not willing to let you be destroyed. It is the result of the lives you touched while doing the work. And now those people are asking: How do you want us to show up?

Do you want public statements? Do you want them to organize? Do you want legal support? A campaign? A policy intervention? If you say go all the way, they will. If you ask for a slower burn, they will wait with discipline. But if you go public, they will stand with you in the light. And if you go nuclear, they will not hesitate to meet power with power. And let me tell you, Regent Wanda James went nuclear and she should because even the Colorado Attorney General is saying what happened to her is probably illegal. Because this is not performative allyship. These are not fair-weather supporters. These are people whose lives and work are better because you were brave enough to lead when it wasn’t easy. In my acceptance speech I said,

“The flame of justice is not self-sustaining. It must be tended. It must be shielded. And sometimes, when the winds of oppression blow hardest, it must be reignited.”

That’s what happened for me. That’s what happened for Wanda. And that’s what’s happening for a generation of rising leaders facing coordinated attacks simply because they refuse to be silent.

When Communities Defend Their Own

After I was temporarily removed as Education Chair in California, I braced for silence. But I found something else. I found quiet support from Executive Committee members who wouldn’t speak publicly, but who reminded me I had not lost their faith. I heard privately from national union leaders and community advocates who knew this wasn’t about misconduct. I saw students, educators, and organizers keep pushing the truth forward even when the spotlight shifted.

Then came the NAACP High Quality Education Task Force. The national listening sessions. The testimonies from communities across the country who had been harmed by the unchecked expansion of school privatization. And the resolution—once controversial—was vindicated by lived experience and testimony. Eventually, I was reinstated to Education Chair by the state president. No announcement. Just a quiet reversal. But I had already been restored, not by title, but by the commune of courage who never stopped believing in the work.

From Uplift to Uprising

This is the heart of the commune of courage. It is not a formal institution. It has no charter or bylaws. But it is real. It is a network of people whose loyalty is earned, not demanded. It is a force that grows in the shadows of injustice and emerges in moments of truth. And the most beautiful part? It grows stronger with every attempt to suppress it. That’s what the people who come for you never understand. Their attacks don’t erase you. They reveal you. They reveal your impact. Your legacy. Your courage. They reveal what kind of leader you were when it mattered most.

The Real Test of Leadership

The true test of leadership isn’t whether you face opposition, it’s how your community responds when you do. Did you build trust? Did you create something that endures? Did you invest in people when no one else would? If so, the support will come. Maybe not from everyone. Maybe not right away. Maybe not even in public. But it will come.

That’s why I was deeply honored to receive the 2025 NAACP Keeper of the Flame Award at the national convention this week.

The commune of courage will write the reference they denied you. The commune of courage will amplify your work when others try to bury it. The commune of courage will clear a path when others try to block your future. The commune of courage will rise for you, because you rose for them.

And when we see leaders like Trustee Rema Reynolds being punished for doing the right thing, it forces us to ask: What does it say about those trying to silence her? What does it say about their comfort with truth? It tells us they are terrified. Terrified of losing control. Terrified of leaders who don’t perform for power or money. Terrified of the people who remember.

But it also tells us who we are.

We are the ones who rise.

We are the ones who remember.

We are the ones who communities organize for when the attacks come and remind the world that leadership rooted in justice is not easily erased because the people won’t let it be.

Please share and read the past articles from the Uppity Minority series by Julian Vasquez Heilig:

• The Uppity Minority: Executive Leadership, Power, and the Price of Speaking Up
• The Uppity Minority: How They Will Come for You, Be Ready
• The Uppity Minority: Radioactive or Ready?
• The Uppity Minority: Is Resigning the Right Thing to Do?
• The Uppity Minority: When the White Ally Isn’t
• The Uppity Minority: Hunted, Surveilled and Secretly Recorded
• The Uppity Minority: When the Betrayal Comes From Inside the House
• The Uppity Minority: You Spoke Up—So They’ll Call a Lawyer