I shared this essay during Harmony & Healing: National Day of Racial Healing Community Circle on January 28, 2025 in Austin, Texas.

Socialism found me gradually throughout my twenties. Sure, I engaged in fights against the death penalty as a teenager in college at Howard, and I more swiftly came to the conclusion that police and prisons needed to go. Still, the affirmative vision of what I sought mentally evaded me for years. 

I finished law school in Louisiana in 2016 and returned to D.C. right on time for the first Trump Administration. I eventually found myself as a young lawyer at Advancement Project, a multi-racial civil rights organization. I worked on a few issues while I was there; most notably for tonight, I want to focus on my efforts to build and sustain quality public schools for all. 

My colleagues and I studied and sharpened our politics on this front. We read Eve L. Ewing and reflected on what accessible intergenerational schools might look like in the United States. I couldn’t stop thinking about her reflections of Indigenous schools in the Pacific Northwest she visited, where community elders work in classrooms just to foster connections between generations. I pulled from my personal history, namely my assistant-principal-mother and my junior-high-math-teacher grandmother to consistently remind myself just how much an education means to a person, a community, & a society. Though I greatly enjoyed this intellectual and meaningful exchange, I left D.C. in 2019, while this work was still in its early planning stages. I remembered it quite fondly. 

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Two weeks ago, I returned to DC with a colleague from Texas Appleseed to attend a convening focused on ending school closures organized by Advancement Project. It represented such a full circle moment in good and bad ways. These days, I am nearing a decade as a civil rights lawyer – with all the experiences that characterize such a declaration. In fact, being in this space takes me back to November 2023, when I co-hosted a Texas-specific convening of the National Campaign for Police Free Schools here. I’ve been an open socialist since 2021; I ran for office under a socialist banner in 2022, and I built my expertise in school safety and school climate policies to meet the moment.

On the other hand, during my time in D.C. two weeks ago, the second Trump Administration was days away from taking power, and it felt like my efforts to halt the closures of public schools had been paused for six years. I was eager to dive back into the work, especially since my socialist politics increasingly revolve around achieving quality public schools for all. 

We heard from several comrades across the convening who have engaged in fights to keep the doors of public schools open. A pair of organizers and a lawyer from Oakland spoke about their efforts to prevent the closures of schools that primarily served Black children in the Bay Area. Using provisions of California state law, and some previous organizing relationships with the California Attorney General, they submitted a complaint to the Attorney General’s Office in 2022 and got a favorable ruling. Because the Oakland Unified School District had not completed an appropriate & required equity review, the state government prevented the school district from moving forward with the school closures. As a lawyer who seeks to work in deep partnership with community organizers, this victory felt incredibly resonant. 

During this convening, we also heard from organizers with the Denver-based non-profit Movimiento Poder, as well as a national organizer from the Alliance for Educational Justice. In late 2024, Dr. Marrero, the superintendent of Denver Public Schools, attempted to rush through a slate of school closures that would’ve disproportionately impacted Latine children.

When these organizers received word of this grave injustice, they swiftly & efficiently moved to action. Across a month, they reached out to various parents and young people in the community, tracked Dr. Marrero’s presentations at undemocratic forums that entertained no voices from the public, and held actions outside of the headquarters of Denver Public Schools. They put their heart and soul into actualizing their theory of change – that directly impacted working class people are intrinsically the leaders we seek across time. They saw people transform their heartache into action, with a number of people pushing through their initial nervousness to speak to the media. They took Dr. Marrero’s justification for the school closures, like under-utilization and declining enrollment, and eloquently conveyed that a school is not a business – it is a community institution, with benefits for the public across generations. 

The organizing in Colorado did not yield the same result as the success in California. The district voted to move forward with Dr. Marrero’s plan. Despite that fact, to witness the passion & brilliance in the voices of these organizers just a couple weeks ago was to understand that hope is a discipline. Last week, a lawsuit was filed to enjoin – or prevent – the district from moving forward with them in the next academic year. Even in the face of specific defeats, we march onward toward a public infrastructure for all. 

Hearing these stories earlier this month informed my approach to today’s story. I considered the prompt – where have I experienced the beloved community? What place holds the best hope for it? Schools consistently emerged in my mind as the answer. 

Schools, their own sites of intergenerational joy for so many families, represent an incredibly powerful avenue for the multiracial working class movement we require to defeat fascism. As a socialist, I recognize that public schools are homes of democratic engagement, relationship building, and exposure to the diversity that comprises our beautiful world. The present fight for quality public schools across the country pushes back on the cynicism that seeks to grow in times of despair; people are engaging in powerful organizing to protect & strengthen this fundamental human right for future generations. I can hardly think of better examples of socialism in action. 

It is worth noting that the districts in both major cities I mentioned took significant steps to turn away from school policing after the murder of George Floyd in 2020. In the years since, both districts have stalled and walked back their commitments to remove predatory police from the halls that our students walk.  The ruling class is also aware of how powerful well-functioning public schools are on the road to socialism, which is why the attempts to privatize them are so relentless.

Be encouraged, dear beloved community. As you’re gathered here tonight, take my example of public schools and reflect on times in your life when you felt the radical possibility of connection – without the hindrances of capitalism, racism, and classism. It is possible to win socialism across the globe – and thereby consistently experience the beloved community of which Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. dreamed. Meditate on these thoughts as we continually journey & labor toward a better world.