Vajra Watson - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Dr. Vajra M. Watson is the UC Davis Director of Research and Policy for Equity. In this capacity, she seeks innovative ways to align people and systems that advance social justice. As a community-based scholar, she examines the culture of schools, the broad ecology of education, and the relationship between human development and social change. Watson is originally from Berkeley, California and was deeply impacted by the courses she took in the Black and Xicanx Studies Departments at Berkeley High School in the mid-1990s. In 10th grade her final exam question was: “What are you doing to stop and/or curtail the spread of white supremacy in yourself, community, and this world?” This question still shapes her path and purpose.
In 2008, she founded Sacramento Area Youth Speaks (SAYS), a social justice movement that breaks the barriers of underachievement by elevating the voices of students as the authors of their own lives and agents of change. In this capacity, she designed an award-winning training program that pairs community-based poet-mentor educators and teachers together to develop grassroots pedagogies that reclaim and reimagine schooling: www.says.ucdavis.edu.
In addition, Watson serves on a number of Board of Directors, including United Playaz in San Francisco (Board President), the National Urban Education Teacher Policy Project, the Urban Education Justice Project, the National Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning, Kingmakers of Oakland, and Fathers and Families of San Joaquin in Stockton, CA.
As a scholar-activist, Dr. Watson examines both the perils and promises of education and the potential of innovative community-university-school partnerships. She is the author of two books, Learning to Liberate: Community-Based Solutions to the Crisis in Urban Education (Routledge, 2012) and Transformative Schooling: Towards Racial Equity in Education (Routledge, 2018), and has published dozens of peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters. She is the recipient of the UC Davis Early Career Award, Sacramento’s 40 Under 40 Leadership Award, the NBA King's Woman of the Year Award, the Chancellor’s Soaring to New Heights Individual Achievement Award for Diversity, and the American Educational Research Association’s Social Impact Award as well as AERA’s Social Justice Leadership Award.
Watson received her B.A. from UC Berkeley and her Doctorate in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy from the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University.
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Papers by Vajra Watson
University of Arizona Press eBooks, Apr 9, 2019
Routledge eBooks, May 11, 2018
Springer eBooks, 2016
This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators i... more This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators into low-income middle and high school classrooms to devise curricula that excavates student experiences as a basis for learning. Building upon research on multiple literacies, my findings demonstrate that learning is a social practice, situated in the lives of students. To unearth young people’s capabilities, homegrown experts from the neighborhood shifted the classroom culture and opened the space up for courageous vulnerability and soul-stirring spoken word performance poetry. Throughout this process, young people and the teachers in this study came to use writing as an educational and emancipatory tool for reading the word, the world, and themselves anew. This form of social justice instruction turned nouns, like hope, into verbs for marginalized youth in the inner-city.
Routledge eBooks, May 11, 2018
Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrog... more Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrogated as a symptom of white supremacy. As an act of disruption, award-winning scholar Vajra Watson pierces through the rhetoric and provides a provocative analysis of the ways schools can become more racially inclusive. Her research is grounded in Oakland where longitudinal data demonstrated that Black families were sending their children to school, but the ideals of an oasis of learning were being met with the realities of racism, low expectations, and marginalization. As a response to this intergenerational crisis of miseducation, in 2010, the school district joined forces with community organizers, religious leaders, neighborhood elders, teachers, parents, and students to address institutionalized racism. Seven years later, Watson shares findings from her investigation into the school district’s journey towards justice. What she creates is a wholly original work, filled with penetrating portraits that illuminate the intense and intimate complexities of working towards racial equity in education. As a formidable case study, this research scrutinizes how to reconfigure organizational ecosystems as spaces that humanize, heal, and harmonize. Emerging from her scholarship is a bold, timely, and hopeful vision that paves the way for transformative schooling.
Preface: Gems in the Gutter 1. Introduction: Gangstas, Gunshots, and Grades 2. Dereca Blackmon: P... more Preface: Gems in the Gutter 1. Introduction: Gangstas, Gunshots, and Grades 2. Dereca Blackmon: Pedagogy of Communication 3. Rudy Corpuz: Pedagogy of Community 4. Victor Damian: Pedagogy of Compassion 5. Jack Jacqua: Pedagogy of Commitment 6. What Does (Not) Work 7. Community-Based Urban Education 8. Grindin for all we Got from the Bottom to the Top Appendices A: Terminology B: Methods and Validity C: Participant-Observer or Observing Participant? D: Interview Protocols and Youth Questionnaire E: Website and Contact Information for the Community-Based Educators Bibliography
Equity & Excellence in Education, Jul 1, 2013
International Journal of Education Through Art, Jun 1, 2019
Arts integration, viewed holistically, values the arts as a conduit for the development of K-16 s... more Arts integration, viewed holistically, values the arts as a conduit for the development of K-16 students into whole selves – bodies, minds and souls. Building on arguments for the importance of the arts in education made by Maxine Greene, John Dewey and others, this article puts the arts at the centre of learning, as a means of drawing out and restoring the soul to humanize education. We provide examples for ways arts integration is modelled and applied across English and education, art education, and English as a second language (ESL); our work is interdisciplinary and intersectional. This transformational work reveals possibilities for educating active members of a democratic society through the development of imagination, creativity and expression. Integrating a variety of arts, including visual art, photography, storytelling and poetry-writing, among others, can make these developments visible. We see this arts integration work as drawing out the soul.
Journal of Curriculum Studies Research, 2021
Racial injustice has traditionally been observed from the viewpoint of its impact and outcomes. S... more Racial injustice has traditionally been observed from the viewpoint of its impact and outcomes. Subsequently, educators and policy makers have generally focused on outcomes; unequal oppor-tunity structures, disparities in educational achievement, the school-to-prison pipeline, dispropor-tional health indicators, incarceration rates, and harsher punishment in school and judicial sys-tems, are just a few of the contexts by which this nation’s racialized roots can be measured for present day mistreatment and disparate outcomes for minoritized populations. As policy makers and educators look to the impact of racial injustice, a true ontological vantage would reveal the cause as well as the perpetuation of these outcomes. As the current COVID-19 pandemic contin-ues, and with increased interest in online learning, it is vital that teachers and professors seek new pedagogy and tools to teach about racism. Our study examined whether a virtual 1-hour presen-tation on white humanists influenc...
University of Arizona Press eBooks, Apr 9, 2019
Routledge eBooks, May 11, 2018
Springer eBooks, 2016
This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators i... more This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators into low-income middle and high school classrooms to devise curricula that excavates student experiences as a basis for learning. Building upon research on multiple literacies, my findings demonstrate that learning is a social practice, situated in the lives of students. To unearth young people’s capabilities, homegrown experts from the neighborhood shifted the classroom culture and opened the space up for courageous vulnerability and soul-stirring spoken word performance poetry. Throughout this process, young people and the teachers in this study came to use writing as an educational and emancipatory tool for reading the word, the world, and themselves anew. This form of social justice instruction turned nouns, like hope, into verbs for marginalized youth in the inner-city.
Routledge eBooks, May 11, 2018
Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrog... more Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrogated as a symptom of white supremacy. As an act of disruption, award-winning scholar Vajra Watson pierces through the rhetoric and provides a provocative analysis of the ways schools can become more racially inclusive. Her research is grounded in Oakland where longitudinal data demonstrated that Black families were sending their children to school, but the ideals of an oasis of learning were being met with the realities of racism, low expectations, and marginalization. As a response to this intergenerational crisis of miseducation, in 2010, the school district joined forces with community organizers, religious leaders, neighborhood elders, teachers, parents, and students to address institutionalized racism. Seven years later, Watson shares findings from her investigation into the school district’s journey towards justice. What she creates is a wholly original work, filled with penetrating portraits that illuminate the intense and intimate complexities of working towards racial equity in education. As a formidable case study, this research scrutinizes how to reconfigure organizational ecosystems as spaces that humanize, heal, and harmonize. Emerging from her scholarship is a bold, timely, and hopeful vision that paves the way for transformative schooling.
Preface: Gems in the Gutter 1. Introduction: Gangstas, Gunshots, and Grades 2. Dereca Blackmon: P... more Preface: Gems in the Gutter 1. Introduction: Gangstas, Gunshots, and Grades 2. Dereca Blackmon: Pedagogy of Communication 3. Rudy Corpuz: Pedagogy of Community 4. Victor Damian: Pedagogy of Compassion 5. Jack Jacqua: Pedagogy of Commitment 6. What Does (Not) Work 7. Community-Based Urban Education 8. Grindin for all we Got from the Bottom to the Top Appendices A: Terminology B: Methods and Validity C: Participant-Observer or Observing Participant? D: Interview Protocols and Youth Questionnaire E: Website and Contact Information for the Community-Based Educators Bibliography
Equity & Excellence in Education, Jul 1, 2013
International Journal of Education Through Art, Jun 1, 2019
Arts integration, viewed holistically, values the arts as a conduit for the development of K-16 s... more Arts integration, viewed holistically, values the arts as a conduit for the development of K-16 students into whole selves – bodies, minds and souls. Building on arguments for the importance of the arts in education made by Maxine Greene, John Dewey and others, this article puts the arts at the centre of learning, as a means of drawing out and restoring the soul to humanize education. We provide examples for ways arts integration is modelled and applied across English and education, art education, and English as a second language (ESL); our work is interdisciplinary and intersectional. This transformational work reveals possibilities for educating active members of a democratic society through the development of imagination, creativity and expression. Integrating a variety of arts, including visual art, photography, storytelling and poetry-writing, among others, can make these developments visible. We see this arts integration work as drawing out the soul.
Journal of Curriculum Studies Research, 2021
Racial injustice has traditionally been observed from the viewpoint of its impact and outcomes. S... more Racial injustice has traditionally been observed from the viewpoint of its impact and outcomes. Subsequently, educators and policy makers have generally focused on outcomes; unequal oppor-tunity structures, disparities in educational achievement, the school-to-prison pipeline, dispropor-tional health indicators, incarceration rates, and harsher punishment in school and judicial sys-tems, are just a few of the contexts by which this nation’s racialized roots can be measured for present day mistreatment and disparate outcomes for minoritized populations. As policy makers and educators look to the impact of racial injustice, a true ontological vantage would reveal the cause as well as the perpetuation of these outcomes. As the current COVID-19 pandemic contin-ues, and with increased interest in online learning, it is vital that teachers and professors seek new pedagogy and tools to teach about racism. Our study examined whether a virtual 1-hour presen-tation on white humanists influenc...
Routledge , 2012
Few problems in education are as pressing as the severe crisis in urban schools. Though educators... more Few problems in education are as pressing as the severe crisis in urban schools. Though educators have tried a wide range of remedies, dismal results persist. This is especially true for low-income youth of color, who drop out of school-and into incarceration-at extremely high rates. The dual calamity of underachievement in schools and violence in many communities across the country is often met with blame and cynicism, and with a host of hurtful and unproductive quick fixes: blaming educators, pitting schools against each other, turning solely to the private sector, and ratcheting up the pressure on teachers and students. But real change will not be possible until we shift our focus from finding fault to developing partnerships, from documenting problems to discovering solutions. Learning to Liberate does just that by presenting true and compelling community-based approaches to school reform. Drawing on over three years of ethnographic research, Vajra Watson explores the complicated process of reaching and teaching today's students. She reveals how four nontraditional educators successfully empower young people who have repeatedly been left behind. Using portraiture, a methodology rooted in vivid storytelling, Watson analyzes each educator's specific teaching tactics. Uncovering four distinct pedagogies-of communication, community, compassion, and commitment-she then pulls together their key strategies to create a theoretically grounded framework that is both useful and effective. A poignant, insightful, and practical analysis, Learning to Liberate is a timely resource for all educators and youth-serving practitioners who are committed to transforming "at-risk" youth into "at-promise" individuals who put their agency and potential into action in their schools and neighborhoods.
The Whole Person: Lectio Divina as Transformative Practice in Teaching and Learning, 2019
Exploring this sacred connection between pedagogy and possibility oc- curs in the teaching of spo... more Exploring this sacred connection between pedagogy and possibility oc- curs in the teaching of spoken word performance poetry through the lens of lectio divina—divine reading. This investigation is guided by an overarching question: How do we educate the whole person in ways that nurtures personal transformation and collective belonging? To answer this query, the research context will be provided followed by three core concepts in the literature that frame the analysis: research on spoken word performance poetry, the connections between art and activism, and the spiritual practice of slowing down to become more fully present. How these ideas are enacted and embodied will then be demonstrated inside disparate spaces—from continuation schools to juvenile hall facilities, from urban high schools to university lecture halls, from junior high school kids to professional development trainings for adults. Irrespective of the environ- ment, these findings suggest that as we deeply and divinely read each other’s words, we enact what I call "rituals of awakening."
Lift Us Up! Don't Push Us Out! Voices from the Frontlines of the Educational Justice Movement. , 2018
The transformation of education is not solely the work of the K-12 school system, but demands a n... more The transformation of education is not solely the work of the K-12 school system, but demands a new kind of involvement from higher education. Research should not merely be conducted for knowledge production, but in service to social change. Scholar activist Vajra Watson offers a collaborative model that connects the university, schoolhouse, and adjacent neighborhoods. She tells the story of Sacramento Area Youth Speaks, which pairs community-based poet educators with classroom teachers to provide young people with the opportunity to empower themselves through hip hop, poetry, and performance. Drawing upon the powerful words of young people, Vajra shows what can happen when a university-based researcher reimagines her role and relationship to young people and their communities and schools.
Routledge , 2018
Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrog... more Discussions of achievement gaps are commonplace in education reform, but they are rarely interrogated as a symptom of white supremacy. As an act of disruption, award-winning scholar Vajra Watson pierces through the rhetoric and provides a provocative analysis of the ways schools can become more racially inclusive. Her research is grounded in Oakland where longitudinal data demonstrated that Black families were sending their children to school, but the ideals of an oasis of learning were being met with the realities of racism, low expectations, and marginalization. As a response to this intergenerational crisis of miseducation, in 2010, the school district joined forces with community organizers, religious leaders, neighborhood elders, teachers, parents, and students to address institutionalized racism.
Seven years later, Watson shares findings from her investigation into the school district’s journey towards justice. What she creates is a wholly original work, filled with penetrating portraits that illuminate the intense and intimate complexities of working towards racial equity in education. As a formidable case study, this research scrutinizes how to reconfigure organizational ecosystems as spaces that humanize, heal, and harmonize. Emerging from her scholarship is a bold, timely, and hopeful vision that paves the way for transformative schooling.
This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators i... more This chapter explores a creative writing poem that places community-based poet-mentor educators into low-income middle and high school classrooms to devise curricula that excavates student experiences as a basis for learning. Building upon research on multiple literacies, my findings demonstrate that learning is a social practice that is situated in the lives of students. To unearth young people's capabilities, homegrown experts from the neighborhood shifted the classroom culture and opened the space up for courageous vulnerability and soul-stirring spoken word performance poetry. Throughout this process, young people and the teachers in this study came to use writing as an educational and emancipatory tool for reading the word, the world, and themselves anew. This form of social justice instruction turned nouns, like hope, into verbs for marginalized youth in the inner-city. KEY WORDS social justice instruction, critical literacy, spoken word performance poetry, community school partnerships, urban education, student empowerment
CV_Vajra Watson, 2019
As a campus administrator and scholar, my work focuses on access, equity, and belonging. I suppor... more As a campus administrator and scholar, my work focuses on access, equity, and belonging. I support social justice as a daily practice inside classrooms (micro-level) as well as at the institutional level (macro-structural). I purposefully aim to disrupt and dismantle narratives of underachievement and inequality by uncovering how to make school systems (P-20) socially just, democratic sanctuaries of revitalization and community empowerment. I strive and am deeply committed to use research in service of social change.