This lecture by Dr. Muhammad Khalifa will suggest that leaders must be central to culturally responsive school reforms, and will demonstrate how leaders can engage students, parents, teachers, and communities in ways that positively impact learning by honoring indigenous heritages and local cultural practices.

Dr. Khalifa will explore three basic premises. First, that a full-fledged and nuanced understanding of “cultural responsiveness” is essential to successful school leadership. Second, that cultural responsiveness will not flourish and succeed in schools without sustained efforts by school leaders to define and promote it.
 
Finally, he will talk about how culturally responsive school leadership comprises a number of crucial leadership behaviors, which include critical self-reflection; the development of culturally responsive teachers; the promotion of inclusive, anti-oppressive school environments; and engagement with students’ indigenous community contexts.
 
Based on ethnographic research of a culturally responsive school principal who exemplifies the practices and behaviors of culturally responsive school leadership, the lecture will provide educators with pedagogy and strategies for immediate implementation. Khalifa's talk will conclude by highlighting a central theme of community and how community-based knowledge should be positioned in all aspects of schooling.

Cost: Free

Contact: Amy Summers at 217-333-0960 or
arsummer@illinois.edu

Sponsor: College of Education, The Bruce Nesbitt African American Cultural Center student cultural programming fee, and Office of Community College Research and Leadership