Neema Avashia, a Civics teacher in the Boston Public Schools, joins Justin Reich to discuss the power of bringing real-world challenges into the classroom. We hear how Neema and her students rallied the community to challenge the closing of their school, McCormack Middle in Dorchester, and won. Neema speaks to the importance of empowering students to express themselves, and shares some of her best classroom moves.
About Our Guest: Neema Avashia
Neema Avashia has been a Civics teacher in the Boston Public Schools, since 2003, and was recognized as city wide Educator of the Year in 2013. A graduate from Carnegie Mellon in 2001, Avashia has written and performed for The Moth Story Slam, and has become a powerful voice on WBUR’s Cognoscenti, where she has published work about the urgent issues of our time, including, “My Parents May Be Acceptable Immigrants, But None of Us Is Safe” which looks at a violent crime against an immigrant in the midwest, and “Newton North High School: Talking To Students When A Symbol Of Racial Hatred Is Unfurled Close To Home” She has also published work in The Aerogram, and in Eat, Darling, Eat. When not working on essays about inequity in education and racism, Avashia writes about the complexity of growing up Indian in West Virginia.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
https://www.neemaavashia.com/my-writing - Check out Neema’s published writing
https://www.dotnews.com/2019/mccormack-leadership-academy-would-merge-under-bps-plan - The latest news on the McCormack Middle School
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/neema-avashia/transcript
Join our next course on edX!
Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
Follow Us On:
This week on TeachLab, our host Justin Reich joins a panel of education leaders with Superintendent Dr. Baron Davis from Richland School District Two …
This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by research scientist Joshua Littenberg-Tobias PhD. and Elizabeth Borneman M.Sc. to discuss a recently published Teaching Systems Lab …
This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by Dr. David Joyner, Executive Director of Online Education at the Georgia Tech College of …
This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by a panel of teachers from across the country to bring their personal experiences of teaching during the pandemic and to discuss a recent …
This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by Neema Avashia to discuss the recently released Teaching Systems Lab report Healing, Community, and Humanity: How Students and Teachers …
TeachLab returns! Our host Justin Reich is back in the studio and excited to bring you a new season of episodes, starting December, 9th, 2021. Stay tuned!
You can listen to episodes right here on the website, or if you prefer, in a podcast app. Listening in an app makes it easier to keep track of what you’ve already heard, listen without using your data plan and many other conveniences.