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In early 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders continued plans for a Poor People’s Campaign. It would take place in the spring in Washington, D.C. The poor and those in solidarity with them would take up temporary residence and march peacefully on the Capitol and advocate for substantial anti-poverty legislation from Congress. They would demand jobs, healthcare and decent housing.

After a candid classroom discussion, this high school teacher marvels at the questions and concerns that educators like herself must confront at school.

When we teachers get a so-called “problem child” in class, it’s crucial to ask ourselves, “What is causing this behavior to manifest? What is occurring in this child’s life that we can’t see?”

Thirty years ago, I heard the news that John Lennon had been shot. Every year since, the morning news on NPR reminds me again of that day. I was a young, second-year teacher then, with four sections of grade nine “World Cultures” and one section of A.P. United States history. Mine was a Catholic school, and we’d had Monday, December 8 off because it was a holy day, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

In more than 100 U.S. schools, black educators and students see Confederate names on their walls, jerseys and diplomas. That’s a problem.