Join us for a candid conversation with leading local and national voices for equity in urban public education. As part of the Louisville PTO's 1st Annual Membership Meeting, we are excited to welcome the following guest speakers, intertwined with our first year of annual meeting traditions and awards, which is being presented virtually due to a pandemic:
Dr. Marty Pollio is the superintendent of the 24th largest school district in the country. A former teacher, coach, and principal, Dr. Pollio became the interim superintendent in July 2017, and was selected for the position permanently seven months later.
Jitu Brown is the national director of the Journey for Justice Alliance, a network of more than 30 grassroots organizations in 23 cities that are organizing for better community-driven schools. He has organized in Chicago’s Kenwood Oakland Neighborhood for almost 20 years, including a hunger strike that saved Dyett High School in Chicago’s South Side from closure. But Mr. Brown is not just a parent and a community activist; he is also a teacher. He teaches African-American history at St. Leonard’s Adult High School, the only accredited high school in that country that exclusively serves people who were once incarcerated.
Lois Weiner is so many things: an author, an intellectual, a union activist, a democracy organizer, an expert in pedagogical preparation around the world, an urban educator, a professor at New Jersey City University’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. But most of all, she’s an advocate for public school teachers and an advocate for ALL kids.
Kumar Rashad is a math teacher at Breckinridge Metro High School, a board member of JCPS’s union Jefferson County Teachers Association, and a former candidate for Louisville’s Metro Council. Mr. Rashad is a longtime advocate for minority-teacher recruitment and at-risk youth.
Tiffany Dunn is a National Board Certified Teacher and a teacher of English language learners at a JCPS middle school and a longtime opponent of high-stakes testing. She is also an organizer with National Opt Out, which advocates for parents and teachers who wish to exercise their right to challenge abusive testing practices. She is also a co-founder of the statewide organization Save Our Schools Kentucky.
Gay Adelmann is the co-founder and president of the parent-teacher sounding board Dear JCPS and one of the co-founders of the statewide organization Save Our Schools Kentucky, which battles against charter schools, vouchers, privatization, and all efforts to defund or tear down our public schools.
Latasha Harrison is the founder of the Louisville Parent-Teacher Organization. Before that, she was PTA president at Price Elementary for two years and that first year Price won the National School of Excellence Award. She is a parent of four JCPS students.