Organizing Change

Associate Professor Mark Warren's Course, "Education Organizing"  “I always felt that to teach a course on education organizing was contradictory if we didn’t also get involved,” says Harvard Graduate School of Education Associate Professor Mark Warren. For students in his Education Organizing course, learning is not confined to the classroom—they are required to participate every week in some direct way with an institution or school active in school change and community-building. [caption id="attachment_8472" align="alignleft" width="185" caption="Associate Professor Mark Warren (photo by Karlyn Morissette)"]

[/caption] Underpinning this unique blending of pedagogy and practice is Warren’s belief in the importance of involving the wider community in education reform. Looking beyond the traditional notion of the PTA bake sale, Warren wants to see parent and community groups become involved in leadership positions and decision-making within schools and in district policy. “We need the involvement of people whose children actually attend the schools and people in the community in which these children are growing up if we are to bring about lasting changes in our school system,” he says. Warren’s students are scattered across Boston in a variety of public and private organizations. Some are working in schools to promote parent engagement. Others are involved with parent-based community groups: the Allston Brighton Community Development Corporation (working to create a dialogue among parents on local education issues, including assignment processes for schools), the Black Ministerial Alliance (working to improve the quality of Boston public schools), and City Life/Vida Urbana (working with a group of Latina mothers advocating for their special-needs children). Still others are engaged in neighborhood youth organizing, collaborating with groups like Project HIP-HOP (Highways into the Past: History, Organizing, and Power) and the Boston Youth Organizing Project (which aims to structure youth groups around congregations and schools).

"The students are supposed to make a real contribution and bring something to it,” Warren says. “They’re not supposed to be doing it by themselves, but rather learning how to collaborate.”

In talking about the sort of work students do in the field, Warren frequently refers to ideas like collaboration and partnership. Learning how to work with others is just as important as mastering the specifics of an assignment. “The students are supposed to make a real contribution and bring something to it,” Warren says. “They’re not supposed to be doing it by themselves, but rather learning how to collaborate.” Keen on setting the same standards himself, Warren sees the classroom as another kind of working community that involves the same democratic principles of equal engagement. “In a sense we are modeling our discussion and conversation in the classroom on organizing groups, where people have to learn to work together in a community.” The class follows a set of discussion guidelines entitled Norms of Interaction, which Warren devises with the students to ensure that “it’s not just me delivering information into the heads of the students, but instead we’re trying to learn about these issues together.” Warren is committed to active learning—not only for the students, but also for himself—but such an organic approach is not without its challenges. The learning model is significantly experiential: rather than only applying theory to the outside world, students are also encouraged to think from the bottom up, beginning with their own experiences. “Bringing issues back into the class is messy, because the real world is messy,” Warren says. “A successful reflection paper [in this class] could end with a profound question, rather than a conclusion, and I find it pretty challenging to grade something like that which doesn’t fit the traditional academic mold.” Students, too, face a rather particular set of challenges. There is an element of unpredictability in working in the field. “I can’t guarantee you a ‘successful’ experience,” Warren says. “Things can definitely go poorly or not as planned in the real world.” Moreover, collaboration with the organizing groups can be difficult because many don’t have enough resources. There are other, more general, interpersonal hurdles to face. “Whether it’s by race, or social class, or gender, or anything else, students also have the challenge of working with people who are different from them.” According to Warren, developing problem-solving skills is key. “I want these students to be able to build working relationships with people in whatever field they are in,” he says. He believes their ability to do this is a matter of civic importance. “My philosophy on organizing is that we are all members of this society. We all have a responsibility.” About the Article A version of this article originally appeared in the Winter 2004-2005 issue of Ed., the magazine of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. For More Information More information about Mark Warren is available in the Faculty Profiles.