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All children deserve to have access to a quality education. They deserve to feel safe and supported in a place that exists to prepare them for their futures. Yet, for Black youth and other youth of color, this is far from the reality. Every day, Black children and other youth of color, some as young as six are being pushed out of classrooms and schools because of deep racial profiling. Across the country, Black high school students are twice as likely to be suspended as white students. In Oakland, while Black youth made up 26 percent of the Oakland Unified School District’s enrollment, they represented 73 percent of arrests. This vicious cycle continues to fuel pathways to prison and confinement, where Black youth are consistently over-represented, which creates additional barriers for our young people to realize and achieve their full potential.

As we consider our roles, it is important to remember that justice is defined not by our own definitions but by the communities directly experiencing injustice. It is also important to keep in sight how our roles align with, support and uplift the existing work of community organizers who have long advocated for restorative and healing justice as common practice, rather than forms of justice defined by the same systems and institutions that uphold structural racism.