T. Elijah Hawkes

…Several years ago, courageous students formed a Queer Straight Alliance (QSA) and began having regular meetings. Attendance was modest though consistent. As efforts to make the school a safe place for queer youth became public, there were some reactionary responses. QSA meeting signs were torn down occasionally. We heard slurs in the hallway and saw scrawls on the bathroom walls...

“Those Who Carry Bias” is about steps one school has taken to challenge and undo bias toward LGBTQ youth. This essay appears in Rethinking Gender, Sexism and Sexuality, published by Rethinking Schools, edited by Annika Butler-Wall, Kim Cosier, Rachel Harper, Jeff Sapp, Jody Sokolower, Melissa Bollow Tempel.

Published by Teaching Tolerance:

“Summer Violence and Educator Silence”

“Youth Voice and the Quiet Work of Teachers”

“Permission to Walk Out: They Didn’t Ask and I Didn’t Give It”

“Heavy Topics, Strong Classrooms”

Essays published on Medium.com include:

Taking Down the Black Lives Matter Flag

Do You Teach the Children of White Supremacists?

Dear Principal of A School in A Divided Country

Lives Are Matter: Teach Bodies

You are a teacher troubled by the paradox. You believe in the creative and liberating power of education, and yet you work in a system that has perfected regimentation and confinement…

From “School Justice,” an essay about restorative practice in schools, a chapter in Teaching When the World is On Fire (The New Press, 2019), edited by Lisa Delpit.

On school shootings and threat incidents in schools:

Hechinger Report: A letter to my colleagues in the wake of the Parkland high school massacre

Burlington Free Press: A dialogue with a reporter about threat incidents and school shootings

VTDigger: Teachers: In service of what?

Schools: Studies in Education is a journal published jointly by the University of Chicago Press and The Parker School, featuring writing on “the subjective experience of school life.”

Essays in this journal include:

“Circles and Parallels: Democratic Governance in a Small School”

Miracles and Monstrosities: John Dewey and the Fate of Progressive Education

School in a Time of Cholera

Resilience Conversations Podcast, Feb ‘23

Human Restoration Project Podcast, June ‘22

SPLC “Sounds Like Hate,” Sept ‘20

Innovative Education Podcast, June ‘20

Public Radio: How Schools Identify Students In Crisis, Heal from Trauma, Feb ‘19

Public Radio: Schools Deal with How Social Media, Troubled Homes Affect Students, Nov ‘17

Articles published in Rethinking Schools Magazine include:

Exile Has Its Place: A High School Principal Reflects on School Discipline

What Names Us: How the Work of James Baldwin Shapes Our School

“School Safety Starts in the Classroom,” Special Issue: School Safety and Violence, September 2021

The teaching and learning that happen in the classroom—both what is taught and how it is taught—are dominant forces in determining whether a school is healthy and safe. Drawing from my own work as a teacher and principal, I describe several essential ingredients for curriculum and pedagogy that enable classrooms to be places of trust, healthy risk-taking, empathy, democratic practice and, ultimately, safety.