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Working to Be in Good Relationship

The Banks Center for Educational Justice, like the University of Washington and all of our lives and institutions exists on Indigenous land. We acknowledge the ancestral homelands of those who walked here before us and those who still walk here, keeping in mind the integrity of this territory where area Native peoples identify as the Duwamish, Suquamish, Snoqualmie, and Puyallup, as well as the tribes of the Muckleshoot, Tulalip, other Coast Salish peoples, and their descendants. We are grateful to respectfully live and work on these lands and to follow the leadership of our community members (including Affiliated Faculty, Research Assistants, and campus and community partners) who are Native and Indigenous, particularly those who are from these territories. This land acknowledgement is one small act in the ongoing process of working to be in good relationship with the land and the people of the land and, ultimately, toward decolonization.

Center Mission

The Banks Center for Educational Justice at the University of Washington is a central location for partnerships, program development, and collaborative research with educational settings that seek to center and sustain Native, Black, Latinx, Asian and Pacific Islander young people and communities across multiple intersections with gender, disability, language, land, migration, class, and more.

Current Projects & Partnerships

• Tulalip Culturally Sustaining Education Project, a partnership with Chelsea Craig (Assistant Principal at Quil Ceda Tulalip Elementary & Leadership for Learning Doctoral Student) and Anthony Craig (Center Affiliate Faculty & Leadership for Learning Director), funded by generous support from the Spencer Foundation.
• Black Student and Faculty Mentoring Collaborative (BMC), a partnership with the UW Black Student Union (BSU) under the leadership of Rae Paris (Associate Professor of Creative Writing & Center Affiliate Faculty), funded by generous support from the UW Black Opportunity Fund.
• Distinguished Summer Scholars Program, a summer graduate course at UW supported by the UW College of Education. Recent Summer Scholars: Sandy Grande and Leslie Williams (2019), Alexis Pauline Gumbs (2020), Eve Tuck (2021)
• Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies series with Teachers College Press. Inaugural Books: Protecting the Promise: Indigenous Education Between Mothers and Their Children by and Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Asking a Different Question by Gloria Ladson-Billings