Education EnCounter

Connecting, developing, and emboldening BIPOC leaders

Dismantling deep-rooted injustices.

TAF’s Education EnCounter relentlessly supports the development and sustainability of leaders of color in education in partnership with district, university, and community organizations and entities. Through a series of coordinated events, we help leaders continually and effectively implement liberation into their practice.

The foundation of our programming is to dismantle and replace institutionalized racist structures and practices. All students but especially students of color will be able to learn in environments that are representative of who they are and help them value the cultures of the world around them. If we are successful, five, ten, fifty years from now, the education debt owed to students of color will decrease.

Bring it to the counter.

With all that BIPOC educators and leaders experience, our Anti-Racist Leadership series are designed to cultivate a sense of celebration, challenge, and community for BIPOC leaders. The countertop is historically a place of resistance and a place where we gather to nourish and commune. Throughout history, our “countertop” conversations and various encounters in a White-dominant world have naturally prompted us to create our own powerful counternarratives about who we are.

Education EnCounter is a program designed to provide a safe place for BIPOC educators to discuss challenges specific to our identities. Each year, we embark on an exciting year of workshops to strategically plan for the change we hope for and believe in.

We’re emboldening our leaders to set boundaries and chart their course for impact.

Recognize, undo, replace, engage.

Education EnCounter uses Liberation Pedagogy to embolden our leaders of color. Our program is centered on “headwork”, “heartwork”, and rooted in community, which allows for leaders to chart their own path for growth and change.

Curated convenings for
BIPOC leaders.

Education EnCounter leaders benefit from learning and leading in a space designed for them. Our program provides leaders room to explore their own identities and challenge systems to ultimately lead liberated.

Bi-Monthly Workshops

Approximately every other month, Education EnCounter will host workshops aimed at supporting community and implementing liberation into practice. Workshops will include mindfulness, racial identity reflections as BIPOC leaders, platform to share our work and achievements, guests who can speak to relevant topics, and informal time to connect and collaborate with other BIPOC leaders.

Affinity Salons

In between workshops, Education EnCounter offers affinity salons for BIPOC leaders. Salons are an opportunity for BIPOC leaders to gather in community to share, reflect and process their lived and professional experiences, and discuss pertinent topics of the day as people of the global majority. Affinity Salons are spaces of resistance that offers community building and potential networking.

Resources and Knowledge Sharing

All participants will have access to our online library of resources that will include tools and readings for implementing Liberation Pedagogy as well as testimonials from past participants.

Hear from our network.

This is such powerful time of goal setting and planning. Assessment is key to this. I want to dig more deeply into the Liberation Pedagogy and really assess my practice in it's context. I am fairly familiar with this, however, I have a lot of work to do to be intentional.

In viewing the Liberation Pedagogy and the Recognize Resources, it allowed me time to self-reflect and self-assess. There's so much white supremacy embedded in our society that I often don't realize my role in it. I am blessed to have had this session to force myself to look upon myself and celebrate my winds as well as acknowledge where I am lacking.

I'm feeling motivated to look closely at how I maintain white supremacist culture in my teaching, what I want to undo and replace. I'm going to reflect moving forward on how as an Asian settler/immigrant I can get unstuck from the worry that I'm not BIPOC "enough" and just do the work!

Join our network.

Currently, there are close to 500 education leaders of color who convene through our various programming opportunities.

Join the list to get an alert of our upcoming events and receive helpful resources to lead liberated!