BLHF Unspoken Curriculum

Shedding a light on what goes unsaid to Black students, but never unlearned.

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CHALLENGE

According to the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights, Black students make up only 16% of enrolled students, but account for 27% of students referred to law enforcement and 31% of student arrests. 48% of Black students receive one or more suspensions throughout their academic career. Experts have even identified a “Fourth Grade Failure” syndrome, where the treatment of Black students leads them to experience lower motivation and self-expectation.

The racism that Black students face in their education system compounded with their anxieties around COVID-19, the murders of countless Black people at the hands of police, and the challenges of pandemic in-person instruction has created a national mental health crisis among Black youth.

INSIGHT

In school, the most impactful lessons about race aren’t found in our textbooks. They’re learned through the racist realities that undermine, ignore, and criminalize Black students.

And while those racist realities may go unsaid, they’re never unlearned.

IDEA

Expose The Unspoken Curriculum: The hidden lessons taught to Black students that aren’t found in the lesson plans, but stay with them for the rest of their lives.

In partnership with BLHF, we launched a fully integrated campaign to speak the truth of the racist realities of our education system and provided mental health resources to mitigate the detrimental impacts of these realities on Black youth today.