Black History Nerds Saturday School

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Abstract: TThe reading achievement of Black students is often cited as deficient and representative of a larger reading “crisis” in the United States to advance the Science of Reading (SOR) and other mainstream approaches to reading instruction. Yet, Black educators’ historical and contemporary reading expertise and practices with Black students are not seriously studied or even considered in prevailing debates around effective instructional methods for reading proficiency. For this reason, Nyachae cautions Black educators against hastily taking any side in current reading debates. Merging her personal experiences as a literacy teacher, the reading instructional practices of Black educators in segregated schools and the concerns of Black educators today, Nyachae invites educators to consider the reading processes, expertise and sciences of Black educators who were successful in developing reading proficiency among Black students while remaining rooted in liberation and social justice. Significantly, what constitutes science, sound reading instruction and evidence matter in efforts to eradicate reading inequities.

Abstract: August First, or Emancipation Day, which marks the abolition of slavery in British colonies in 1834, was commemorated in Canada and places in the United States well into the early twentieth century. These events were often attended by Black people on either side of the Canadian-US border and at times were co-organized. Dr. Henry-Dixon will discuss the history of Emancipation Day and the binational nature of observances. This talk will highlight the ways in which cross-border commemorations symbolized collective visions of freedom, citizenship, and community and will identify lessons that can be learned in contemporary efforts to resist the attacks against Black history.  

Abstract: Traditional sexual education frameworks, particularly those embedded within school-based sexual health curricula, often fail to account for the lived realities of Black girls, who navigate intersecting forces of racialized adultification, gendered stereotypes and heightened surveillance of their bodies. Within this context, Black mothers and mother figures’ engagement in sexual and reproductive health education emerges as a critical practice of care, protection and resistance that both supplements and contests institutional instruction. This study examines how historical, cultural and social forces shape the ways Black mothers and mother figures perceive, interpret and transmit sexual education to Black girls in relation to formal school curricula. Centering their navigation of “the talk,” the study explores how these caregivers prepare girls for reproductive health milestones while addressing gaps, silences and misrepresentations within school-based sexual health education. By foregrounding maternal and caregiving knowledge alongside intergenerational strategies of survival, this research contributes to broader conversations on bodily autonomy, culturally responsive sexual education and the role of Black motherhood and mothering practices in disrupting dominant frameworks that pathologize Black girlhood and regulate Black girls’ sexuality.