Applying a Transformative Justice Approach to Encourage the Participation of Black and Latina Girls in Computing

Global protests and civil unrest in 2020 has renewed the world’s interest in addressing injustice due to structural racism and oppression toward Black and Latinx people in all aspects of society, including computing. In this article, we argue that to address and repair the harm created by institutions, policies, and practices that have systematically excluded Black and Latina girls from computer science, an intersectional, transformative justice approach must be taken. Leveraging testimonial authority, we share our past 8 years of experience designing, implementing, and studying Digital Youth Divas, a programmatic and systemic approach to encouraging middle school Black and Latina girls to participate in STEM. Specifically, we propose three principles to counter structural racism and oppression embedded in society and computing education: computing education must (1) address local histories of injustice by engaging community members; (2) counter negative stereotypes perpetuated in computer science by creating inclusive safe spaces and counter-narratives; and (3) build sustainable, computational capacity in communities. To illustrate each principle, we provide specific examples of the harm created by racist policies and systems and their effect on a specific community. We then describe our attempt to create counter structures and the subsequent outcomes for the girls, their families, and the community. This work contributes a framework for STEM and computing educators to integrate transformative justice as a method of repairing the harm that both society and the field of computing has and continues to cause Black and Latinx communities. We charge policy makers, educators, researchers, and community leaders to examine histories of oppression in their communities and to adopt holistic, transformative approaches that counter structural oppression at the individual and system level.

Invasive Plant Relations in a Global Pandemic: Caring for a “Problematic Pesto”

In Spring 2020, amidst a COVID-19 state of emergency, the City of Toronto's Parks & Urban Forestry department posted signs in the city's remaining Black Oak Savannahs to announce the cancellation of the yearly ‘prescribed burn’ practice, citing fears it would exacerbate pandemic conditions. With this activity and other nature management events on hold, many invasive plants continued to establish and proliferate. This paper confronts dominant attitudes in invasion ecology with Indigenous epistemologies and ideas of transformative justice, asking what can be learned from building a relationship with a much-maligned invasive plant like garlic mustard. Written in isolation as the plant began to flower in the Black Oak savannahs and beyond, this paper situates the plant's abundance and gifts within pandemic-related ‘cancelled care’ and ‘cultivation activism’ as a means of exploring human-nature relations in the settler-colonial city. It also asks what transformative lessons garlic mustard can offer about precarity, non-linear temporalities, contamination, multispecies entanglements, and the impacts of colonial property regimes on possible relations. Highlighting the entanglements of historical and ongoing violences with invasion ecology, this paper presents ‘caring for invasives’ as a path toward more liveable futures.

Solidaritas Mendorong Keadilan Transformatif: Menjemput Pemulihan Bagi Korban Kekerasan Seksual

The slow ratification of the elimination of sexual violence draft law is evidence that the political system in Indonesia insensitive in responding to the issue of sexual violence victims. Meanwhile, the existing justice system has not been able to provide justice for sexual violence victims. That is why feminists formulate a justice that can meet the needs of sexual violence victims, which is called transformative justice. Transformative justice supported by community solidarity can bring about recovery for sexual violence victims to have courage to speak up and regain their destroyed self-esteem.

Challenging Criminalization in Los Angeles

Chapter 5 documents the ways organizing groups have confronted a vast school district and militarized system of police control in Los Angeles. It features the role of Black and Brown parents in CADRE as key leaders. These parents won the first district-wide breakthrough against zero tolerance discipline approaches in the country when they got the LA Unified School District to adopt schoolwide positive behavioral supports in 2006. The movement “nationalized” this local victory, inspiring groups across the country to launch campaigns against zero tolerance. The chapter also highlights the youth-organizing work of the Labor Community Strategy Center to end police ticketing of students, one of the pioneering efforts to address policing in the school-to-prison pipeline movement. It examines the Youth Justice Coalition and its Free LA High School that supports young people returning from the juvenile justice system and attempts to create a model for police-free schools based upon transformative justice.