Author: Dr. Julian Vasquez Heilig
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On Friday, August 8, I am going to sing during my keynote for the Not Like Us Conference. Not as a performance, but as a promise. A promise that this will not be another safe, forgettable speech about education. It will be rhythm and resistance, melody and memory, truth carried on a beat that connects…
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So you’re looking for a new job. Maybe you’re fresh out of school. Maybe you’re burnt out. Maybe you’ve been swiping through job boards like it’s LinkedIn Tinder, and one finally caught your eye. It seems promising: competitive salary, progressive values, nice pictures of diverse people smiling on the website. But hold on. Before you…
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My love of libraries was born between two cities and two generations. In Saginaw, Michigan, my grandmother was the librarian at Houghton Middle School. I spent endless days with her, nestled between the stacks, flipping through weathered books and searching for interesting books like buried treasure. Her library was my sanctuary, a place where the…
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Across the country, the closure of public schools in historically Black and Brown neighborhoods has been sold to the public as “reform.” Politicians and privatizers claim these closures are about performance and efficiency. But if you’ve spent any time in these communities, you know that the story they tell is not the story we’ve lived.…
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At a recent curriculum development meeting in Detroit, I was reminded that some of the most powerful leadership lessons are passed between colleagues, not through formal training manuals, but through lived wisdom. JoAnn Chavez, a dedicated leader in Detroit and our work at the Michigan Hispanic Collaborative where I serve as a senior advisor, shared…
Cloaking Inequity 