Darius O. Johnson recommends Teaching on Days After

Teaching on Days After: Educating for Equity in the Wake of Injustice

By Alyssa H. Dunn (Teachers College Press, 2021)

As I prepared for bed the evening of Feb. 13, 2023, I imagined my wife’s smile when she received three dozen roses at work the next day. But those thoughts were soon interrupted when I saw the “Breaking News” chyron at the bottom of my TV screen: “Michigan State University Police Order Students, Staff to Shelter in Place.” My wife and I, both educators, both Michigan State Spartans, watched in shock as dozens of police searched the campus where we studied, taught, and even brought our children. We watched the news coverage for most of the night. When it was over, three students were dead and five were critically wounded. As a teacher educator, I wondered how I would even begin to engage in conversations about such traumatic events with my preservice teachers, while managing my own emotions. Similarly, how do K-12 teachers hold space for students to make sense of the next inevitable mass school shooting, the next instance of racial injustice and violence, the next national crisis?

In her timely and necessary book, Teaching on Days After: Educating for Equity in the Wake of Injustice, Alyssa H. Dunn provides a practical guide for educators and students to have critical and substantive conversations on the days following these events. Through stories, essays, and analysis, Dunn centers the experiences of students and teachers who grappled with the issues found at the intersections of our national sociopolitical realities, teaching, and learning. I highly recommend Teaching on Days After to teacher educators, preservice and in-service teachers, and school leaders who are committed to supporting all students in these unprecedented times.