Racial Equity in Math Education Committee

Mission Statement

Formed during the writing of the ANN Statement on Racial Justice, this working group focuses on education and action to promote equity in our classrooms, teaching practice, and organization.

The work of the ANN Racial Equity in Math Education Committee centers on three questions: Where does racial inequity show up? How does it affect our students? How can we disrupt it?

High-quality mathematics instruction requires that practitioners acknowledge and address that systems steeped in white supremacy, our own learned biases, and the history of math education all contribute to dehumanizing mathematics education for teachers and students. 

  • We work to live in the community value of rehumanizing mathematics education through the disruption of racial inequity. We center our humanity and the humanity of our students as we imagine what this could look like.  

  • We offer and promote opportunities for teachers to be learners and to have and model mathematical habits of mind like being comfortable not knowing, investigating, and appreciating and learning from mistakes in the context of racial equity in math education. We will work toward our members feeling empowered to contribute to discourse around racial equity in math teaching and learning. 

The ANN Racial Justice in Math Education committee's monthly meeting is open to all ANN members. Please join us!

The ANN Racial Equity in Math Education committee meets on the fourth Tuesday of every month

Our Next Meeting is:

March 26, 2024.

  • 12:00-1:30 Pacific
  • 1:00-2:30 Mountain
  • 2:00-3:30 Central
  • 3:00-4:30 Eastern

If you'd like to attend, please register in advance for this meeting:

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZUqc-ihpzooGdLdQyV2o9KbkOQ8X9TYExlb

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. 

If you are interested in joining our committee, or have any questions, please contact Sarah Lonberg-Lew & Mark Trushkowsky

Our committee is currently reading about the characteristics of White Supremacy Culture and discussing how they show up in our lives and in our classrooms. 

Reading & Discussion Schedule

Characteristics of 

White Supremacy Culture

To be discussed on …

Fear (Disconnection)

November 16, 2023      

One Right Way (Perfectionism, Paternalism, Objectivity & Qualified)

January 23, 2024

Either/Or & The Binary

February 27, 2024

Racial Equity Principles*

March 26, 2024 

Denial & Defensiveness

April 23, 2024

Right to Comfort & Fear of Conflict

May 28, 2024

Individualism

June 25, 2024

Progress is More & Quantity Over Quality

July 23, 2024

Worship of the Written Word

August 27, 2024

Sense of Urgency

September 24, 2024

Racial Equity Principles*

October 22, 2024

* We will be discussing the Racial Equity Principles as a group in the middle and again at the end of our exploration of the characteristics. Also, please note the following from the website: “As you are reading up on some of the characteristics, take a break and go to the Racial Equity Principles page to get a reinforcement to the antidotes. Please do not read about the Characteristics without going at some point to the Racial Equity Principles page.” 


Between May 2022 and April 2023, ANN’s Racial Equity in Math Education Committee met monthly to discuss and reflect on Zaretta Hammond’s book, Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students.

Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain: A Report From ANN’s Racial Justice in Math Education Committee (from the Math Practitioner, Summer 2023)

Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain: Chapter Summaries and Invitations to Inquiry 

Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain - a blog post by author Zaretta Hammond


To learn about the movement to

rehumanize mathematics

  • Watch Dr. Gutierrez' talk "Rehumanizing Mathematics: A Vision for the Future" (2018) 

Math for Identity & Belonging

In the Fall of 2021, we started an ongoing community series called Math for Identity and Belonging as one model for rehumanizing math for ourselves and for each other. 

UPCOMING MATH FOR IDENTITY & BELONGING IN COMMUNITY

Stay Tuned. 

PREVIOUS MATH FOR IDENTITY & BELONGING COMMUNITIES 

Measuring a Meaningful Place (Fall 2021) One way to advance equity in the math classroom is to center student voice and student experience.  Inspired by the movement to rehumanize mathematics, participants in this six-week program worked toward and then reflected on a place-based math activity called Measuring a Meaningful Place.  We experienced this task together as learners and then considered ways to cultivate healthy identity and belonging with students in our own teaching contexts, whether in person or at a distance. 

Representing Data Creatively (Winter 2022, Winter 2023) - Data is all around us.  One way to advance equity in the math classroom is to give students opportunities to look carefully at the data in their lives, collect it, and share it with others in a meaningful way.  Participants in this workshop practiced this process for themselves in order to be able to bring the experience to their students.  Participants chose something about their daily lives to track, tracked it for a month, and then found creative ways to represent it and share it with the group.  We worked through the steps of the process together, sharing ideas and support along the way. 

This community series was centered around an activity developed by Amy Vickers, WI for her math class. Read Rehumanizing Math Through Collecting and Representing Data from the Math Practitioner to learn more about the activity and to see some of her students' projects. 

We share this wheel to inspire people to look for data in new places and help participants in our community consider ways that data can be nourishing and healing. 


Below are some photos of the artistic data representations created during this community series:


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