I Don’t Know If the Plane Has Really Landed: Flanbwayan Members on the Challenges, Omissions, and Potential of Culturally Responsive, Sustaining Education in NYC Public Schools

Abstract

This interview centers the voices of four Black women of immigrant origin, all of them members of the Flanbwayan Haitian Literacy Project, a community-based organization formed 15 years ago in New York City to promote cultural pride and biliteracy in newcomer youth. In this paper, two administrators and two youth participants are in conversation with each other as they reflect on their cross-generational experiences with culturally responsive and sustaining education in schools, share models of welcoming and culturally sustaining school cultures, and offer advice to educators on the types of dispositions and knowledge required to implement this education model with fidelity. They share the particular challenges they experienced as emergent bilingual students in their online learning classes, their concerns for the remainder of the year, and their hopes for the future.