The second series of the D.C. Educators for Equity book club began in early January of this year. Classroom educators, librarians, media specialists, and school coordinators gathered at Tubman Elementary (DCPS) school to explore Cornelius Minor’s We Got This: Equity, Access, and the Quest To Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be. The group held discussions centering their most thought-provoking ideas…

For this series finale bonus episode, Shamari is joined by Cornelius Minor, a Brooklyn-based educator and Heinemann author, as they discuss the impact the pandemic has had on teachers, the endurance of American racism and anti-Blackness, and imagining a better future.

In this episode, we discuss We Got This: Equity, Access, and the Quest to Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be with author Cornelius Minor. Cornelius, a former middle school Language Arts educator from Brooklyn, is a leader in equitable literacy reform across the world. We Got This is an incredible work that blends critical pedagogy, equitable community practice, and connections between relationships and research in an easy-to-read and implement fashion.

On the ninth episode of season two, Mike speaks with Cornelius Minor, Brooklyn-based educator, about his work to create equitable literacy reform, equitable schools and how his passion to do so intersects with his love of comics. Cornelius drops the secret as to how Squirrel Girl defeated both Thanos AND Galactus — and how you can apply it to your life.

I first met Cornelius Minor in 2012 when I went to work for the Teachers College Reading & Writing Project at Columbia University in New York City.  Although the entire Project Team was filled with dozens of incredibly knowledgeable and talented staff developers, Cornelius quickly differentiated himself as one of the most positive and enthusiastic people I had ever met.  Those of you who know him or have heard him speak know this to be true…

Educator and author Cornelius Minor, an ILA 2018 General Session speaker, returns to the ILA stage again this year—this time as a keynote speaker at ILA Intensive: Nevada. A well-known advocate for equity in literacy education, Minor works with teachers and school leaders across the globe to help them reflect on their practices and grow alongside their students…

Cornelius Minor, lead staff developer at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, will open the event, which is inspired by an on-the-fly discussion he led at the ILA 2016 Conference & Exhibits. ILA 2016 took place just days after the Alton Sterling shooting in Baton Rouge, LA, and the Dallas, TX, murder of several police officers gunned down in a seemingly retaliatory effort…

The work of equity in schools must move beyond intentionality and towards impact. How can personalized learning and digital instruction support students and teachers? What better way to begin this conversation than via webinar – where all can join, regardless of location? Personalized learning and digital programs can be an invaluable partner in the hard work of moving to a more equitable school society. Now is the time to go to work…

My teaching life started in central Brooklyn as a seventh grade English teacher in a highly segregated district, where extreme poverty was a block away from extreme wealth. That district encompassed everything that was powerful and inspiring about American education – and America itself – but it also represented everything that’s problematic with it…

It shouldn’t have been surprising that Abbas Manjee and Melissa Giroux sometimes delivered coffee to each other’s classrooms. Teachers at their school did that all the time. But their students always called attention to the gesture by suggesting that the two were in love. “The kids would erupt in ‘oooooooooooooooohs,’” Manjee recalls. “Maybe they knew before we did.”

It’s not often you meet someone who is both charismatic and challenges your thinking.  I had that pleasure when I interviewed Cornelius Minor, an activist for social justice and equity in education. The first time I heard Cornelius Minor speak was in 2017 at the ILA conference in Orlando, FL.  He was inspiring, forthright, energizing and engaging. I recently heard him speak at ILA West 2018 in San Diego, CA…

Cornelius Minor is student-body president at Florida A&M (Agricultural and Mechanical) University (FAMU). FAMU is in Tallahassee, the state capital, located in northern central Florida. This interview was conducted (from San Diego by phone) by Nic Paget-Clarke, March 18, 2000. “One Florida” was initiated by Governor Jeb Bush in November 1999 and passed at the Board of Regents level…

December 6, 2018. That was the day that Cornelius Minor graced our #G2Great family and touched all who were part of the experience. Cornelius had previously shared the #G2Great stage with Courtney Kinney in Brilliant Tapestries: Building Classrooms that Reflect the Lives of the Children Who Inhabit Them. This time, it was Cornelius’ powerful new book…

While challenging the teacher as hero trope, We Got This shows how authentically listening to kids is the closest thing to a superpower that we have. Cornelius Minor identifies tools, attributes, and strategies that can augment our listening, allowing us to make powerful moves toward equity by broadening access to learning for all children.

Eighth graders begin the year with a unit focused on investigative journalism, writing vivid narratives on social activism. Writers elevate their skills as literary essayists in the second unit, making arguments and counterarguments about themes in texts. In the final unit, students craft research-based position papers, using principled arguments, drawing on evidence, and addressing multiple perspectives.

This year, 2020 shifted the very foundations of our profession. That shift was not without some pain. We have mourned the losses of our classrooms— how we used to be. We’ve lost the giddy proximity of shared books on a rug, the warmth of a writing conference, or the electric thrill of sitting shoulder to shoulder sharing a calculator to solve a difficult problem…

Last week, I sat in on a meeting about the reading intervention program in one of the several schools that I support through my work at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York City. We have more kids on our caseload than we can serve this semester. Many of those public school students, who “need” reading intervention, are brown or poor.

Cornelius Minor thinks that the fuel behind inequality in the U.S. isn’t just the people making the decisions. It’s the systems set in place to keep people divided, immobile, and illiterate. So, what exactly does a modern hero look like?

When English, science, and history teachers collaborate with athletic coaches, they will find tremendous opportunities to intensify close reading, argumentation, and overall academic engagement.

Are you a well-meaning white teacher, but recognize that’s not enough? Course includes sessions by 4 leading antiracism voices–Cheryl Matias, Eddie Moore, Jr., Cornelius Minor, & Liz Kleinrock–plus readings and a resource list. (8 hr certificate)

The security guard at the gift shop grabs both me and my student athlete by the arm. I don’t know what is wrong, but he twists my arm just so and whispers a command from between clenched teeth in a tone that suggests that the thing that is wrong is both me and my student.