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Jill E.
Thomas

Jill E. Thomas taught English at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience, a small public high school in Oakland, California, for nine years. In addition to teaching English, she had the opportunity to design and teach electives in outdoor education, mindfulness, world dance and food systems. She now works for the Oakland Unified School District coaching principals to provide meaningful, growth-oriented feedback to teachers. She holds a bachelor of arts in English and anthropology from Santa Clara University and a master of arts in education from the University of California at Berkeley.

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Articles by Jill E.

Clarity Comes After Viewing of 'Bully'

When a teacher accompanies her students to see the film Bully, she asks important questions about how adults in the school building handle the issue.
Jill E. Thomas

Bathroom Rules to Keep Students Safe

For transgender youth, the school’s bathroom can be a dangerous place. School administrators must set policies now allowing for students to use the facilities to match their gender identities.
Jill E. Thomas

Students Rally for Change, Peace

All over the nation people strive to answer Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous invocation: “What are you doing for others?” Many engage in projects to make their community a better place to live. My students at Life Academy in California have answered the call to service in several ways. First, they showed up on campus during a school holiday to beautify the school grounds, paint a mural, clean out an old storage room, build benches and tend to a garden. Second, they launched a 74-day fast “Season of Peace Building.” Students signed up to fast on certain days, in a kind of relay, to highlight the time from MLK day to Cesar Chavez day.
Jill E. Thomas

When a Student Dies

How does a school community deal with the violent loss of a student? Unfortunately, this is a question my school has had to answer too often. Still, no matter how many times I’ve been through it, trying to understand my own pain while holding space for my students to feel theirs is something that pushes me beyond my capacity as a teacher.
Jill E. Thomas

Student Advocates Help Realize a DREAM

Oct. 8, was a day of victory for a group of 22 Life Academy students in Oakland, Calif. They are part of a 2-year-old advocacy club called “The Real DREAM Act Movement.” Students met regularly to support in campaigning for the passage of the federal DREAM Act. After several weeks of active letter writing and campaigning, their dream had finally come true: California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law AB 131, a companion bill to AB 130, together known as the “California DREAM Act.”
Jill E. Thomas
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A map of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi with overlaid images of key state symbols and of people in community

Learning for Justice in the South

When it comes to investing in racial justice in education, we believe that the South is the best place to start. If you’re an educator, parent or caregiver, or community member living and working in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana or Mississippi, we’ll mail you a free introductory package of our resources when you join our community and subscribe to our magazine.

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