Exploring Educational Injustice in Iowa Through Latina Youth Poetic Praxis

Abstract

With the growing population of Latinx students in Iowa public schools has come increased attention to the educational context these students encounter. Using frameworks of LatCrit theory and Agencies of Transformational Resistance, this critical ethnography study explores the educational experiences of two Iowa Latina youth through their expression of written poetry. Poems were created in a grassroots community youth-based after-school program. They shed light on Latina youth experiences of white supremacy and institutional racism embedded in the pedagogy, curricula, and social practices of their public high school. The study also draws attention to the power of poetry to unveil Latina youth agency. This research can be used to inform both researchers and educators about the social injustice the growing Iowa Latinx student populations encounter in school, to both understand their experiences and move towards authentic allyship to engage in collective resistance to dismantle white supremacy and institutional racism in education.