Tag Archives: A Black Education Congress (ABEC)

AfroDigital Consciousness (ADC): Definitions and Callings

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Last week, at this time, I was with teachers, parents, and activists at ABEC (A Black Education Congress) who collectively offered a vision for what it means to live and be in AfroDigital spaces. This week, I am thinking about those conversations more deeply, understanding the ways that  I am accountable to a history and set of ideals for education (and technology) that go far, far beyond the scope and imaginations of the schools where I work.

ADC PosterAfroDigital Consciousness (ADC) was a term that I thought was brilliantly defined at ABEC and captures exactly the kind of ideal that goes beyond what schools intend for us.  ADC= SPIRIT+ COMMUNITY+ TECHNOLOGY (“Ego-Tripping 2.0″ is an interconnected notion inspired by the opening performance at ABEC that included a reading of Nikki Giovanni’s “Ego-Tripping.”)  ADC is multi-sensory oriented and steps into our practice and spirit. ADC creates community instead of destroying it. ADC means you play the game better… because you are on another level. 

Perhaps, one of my favorite moments was the emphatic declaration that ADC goes beyond what students of color most commonly receive in schools: a MINIMAL COMPETENCY, SKILLS-BASED apparatus.  We ask: what spirits have our ancestors left or what is the knowledge that can propel us forward in a culturally relevant way? ADC recognizes that technology is power and power is defining your own reality (see Dr. Akbar’s work here).  

When we talk about ADC, we are fundamentally talking about IDEAS. AfroDigital Ideas offer a Pan African vision, work globally, and represent an uncensored bearing of an African American/global perspective. AfroDigital Ideas preserve our history, culture, and arts and RESTORE our culture.  In particular, ADC directs a new vision of teaching:

  • Children CAN code and design; they can do it if provided the opportunity
  • Students need to be provided the opportunity to use their creativity and develop that capacity
  • We must tell the story and history of ourselves and our ancestors utilizing technology

We even talked about an AfroDigital Universe that is non-intimidating, user-friendly, AND economically freeing apps, websites, and digital experiences and includes (but is not limited to):

  • An app for health & beauty for African/African Americans that promotes natural beauty for young, impressionable girls
  • Mental health apps that will deal with: bullying, depressions, schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder (these resources will be linked to help black families receive authentic, genuine assistance)
  • An online search engine geared towards our African culture
  • An online African/African American company where all groups can create, edit, and publish books on various cultures.  This includes illustrators who have access to spaces where they can upload their art
  • An online African-centered virtual school that is developmentally friendly
  • A digital archive of our lesson plans and best practices as a resource for teachers that is community-informing
  • Online examples of a Hip Hop based education for teaching
  • A gaming platform/experience that takes you back to Kemet (with Baba Asa Hilliard as guide/avatar)
  • Kwanzaa principles that are digitally lived and offer self-love
  • Resources-focused search capabilities that access resources across the Diaspora

Of course, these apps and technologies will not be developed overnight.  That’s not the point here.  It’s about the ideological apparatus behind what we do, how and why.  And, for me, it’s about always remembering that fundamental UNDERSTANDING:  we are accountable to a history and set of ideals for education (and technology) that go far, far beyond the scope and imaginations of the schools where we often work and the dominant systems of education that enroll many of us.

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A Black Education Congress (ABEC)

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Please Click Here for ABEC website.

Please Click Here for ABEC website.

I originally intended to stop/ write/ reflect for each of my past three days at the Black Education Congress.  Yes, that was certainly the intention.  But this language and this written form of the Word just got in the way.  There were so many moments that touched me.  I wouldn’t be able to define and chronicle those moments linearly even if I wanted to.  This morning, I am left with one resonance that I am carrying with me.  I expect new resonances to fill me in coming days and weeks so I will keep that discussion going here.

I realize today the weight of an experience that I seldom receive, an experience that maybe I have never had… being in a room filled with concentric circles, nested cyphers, filled with people of Afrikan descent who have the education and well-being of Black children first and foremost in their heart, mind, spirit.  Just imagine it!  It might sound simple, but how many times have you actually experienced THAT? I needed to stop today and realize that I am never in such a space and to also realize what that space-powerfulness has given me.  I don’t mean the folk who are trying to usher black children into a middle class pseudo-bourgeoisie (I say pseudo because middle-classness means something completely different in this time, even though most folk don’t realize that.)  I don’t mean THEM folk.  These days I feel lucky if I can find a set of black colleagues, scattered across the country, who have a dynamic, critical vision for Black Education.  And I am lucky if have a sista across campus who I can meet after our classes are over and just talk.  Like I said… L-U-C-K-Y!  I had them sistas-in-the-wings at Rutgers-Newark, for instance (given the history and spirit of Newark), but you had to sustain a whole lotta foolishness in your department first. And while I attend professional conferences and panels where I do meet such soul-sustaining folk, more often than not, most black folk are busy trying to be famous and/or network so that they can become famous.  That’s the culture in which black youth must survive a hostile education and it is the culture in which we most often must fight to help them not merely survive but thrive.

I am thinking back to the opening night with the procession of elders punctuated by the opening words of Dr. Adelaide Sanford.  This is what I mean by these words not allowing the weight and fullness of a Black Experience.  Here is a video of the Queen Mother from a July 2013 talk in Philly:

As powerful as this video is, it does not begin to capture what it was like to be in that room that night at a circle with other black teachers and high school students (who were ENRAPTURED, by the way, of course!)  And as powerful as this video is, it does not capture what it is like to be in Dr. Adelaide Sanford’s presence with black educators at your side. It is THAT feeling that I am carrying with me today and that I now take with me as I educate young people of color.

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