Like Water to a Rose: Relational Accountability and Holistic Education for Historically Oppressed Peoples in Settler Spaces

This paper considers the implications for repurposing mainstream schools in settler colonial societies into community responsive learning institutions capable of providing holistic education for historically oppressed peoples. Drawing from a critical ethnographic case study of the Roses in Concrete Community School (RiC) in East Oakland, California, the article centers the school’s educational program, theory of change, and use of relationality and relational accountability as a core principle for student learning and institutional operations. Using interviews with school stakeholders, observations, and document analysis, the article attempts to highlight lessons for educators who hope to forward similar goals. Peer Reviewed submission