The Collaborative for Educational Services is in the final stages of planning for the fourth regional Transforming Education for Social Justice conference for PK-12 educators, leaders, students, and community members, on March 29th, 2025. The conference will take place at Easthampton High School in Easthampton, MA. Youth are central to the conference and shape the experience in various ways including through presentations, planning, and participation.
In the current environment for education, tensions at the national and global levels have been accompanied by an increase in anxiety among young people and adults alike. The CES Joy and Justice team coordinating the conference noted, “Locally, we believe it’s imperative to create a space for school community members to learn from, challenge, and support one another to navigate polarization and fragmentation in our communities and find paths forward through our anxieties. During this conference, we frame and explore tensions across social differences and ideologies that are present in our schools as we seek to find ways for all students and staff to feel a sense of true belonging. We focus on ways to find shared values and bridge across differences in order to make lasting change that supports every student.”
This year’s conference is expected to host over 200 attendees, and will focus on Bridging and Belonging without Othering: Youth Civic Engagement. The agenda includes an opening keynote with Tiffany Jewell, author of Everything I learned about Racism I learned in School (2024), and over 25 conference sessions spanning topics for elementary, secondary, and early educators as well as administrators and school/district leadership. These sessions are facilitated by young people, educators, school leaders, and scholars, most of whom are part of our Western Mass school communities.
At this year’s conference, the conference coordinators will be proudly presenting the first-ever Illuminary Award. The award celebrates visionaries whose work in education sheds light on liberatory practices that center students, joy, justice, and healing in schools. The Illuminary Award honors educators, researchers, and thought leaders of any age, who have made exceptional contributions to illuminating transformative pedagogies and fostering environments where all students can flourish. Recipients of this award embody the conference’s dedication to reimagining education as a powerful catalyst for social change and equity. This year, we are excited to be recognizing the incomparable Dr. Barbara J. Love for her lifetime commitment to sharing deeply loving and transformative liberation work in education and beyond.
The goals of the Transforming Education for Social Justice 2025 conference will be to bring together people interested in equity and belonging in a setting that supports skill building for bridging and belonging and uplifts the brilliance in our school communities. Presentations and activities will focus on finding shared values and building connections through stories, with opportunities for both youth-led and intergenerational collaboration. As a regional conference focusing on education, planners have worked to align conference content with Massachusetts law, like the new Educators Diversity Act, DESE’s Educational Vision, and resources from DESE’s programs, such as their Safe Schools Program for LGBTQ students.
To read more about the conference, please visit the website.
/
