Sara Suchman

Sara Suchman

Notes from the Executive Director

Black History Month at NCMPS and Everywhere

Jasmine Williams

Jasmine Williams, NCMPS Race and Equity Advisor, Instructor, and Coach

Black History Month grew out of Black American historian Carter G. Woodson’s Negro History Week in 1926. In 1970 Black students and educators at Kent State University extended this to a month, and it was nationally recognized under President Gerald Ford in 1976 . Woodson’s acclaimed 1933 work “The Miseducation of the Negro” unearthed and highlighted history that U.S. schools ignored and erased, and Black History month carries that work forward, elevating the achievements of Black Americans and empowering them in the process.

More information about the origins of Black History Month can be found here.

Historically, and continuing today, Black people have been tokenized in spaces dominated by white people.  Parity in these spaces is still far off. But recognition of Black history is not just about increasing representation in those spaces. Black folks are also creating their own spaces without the need or desire to be welcomed at a possibly questionable table.  Some mindsets have shifted and some people are consciously choosing to see Black people as human beings with inherent value.  The thoughts, experiences, talents of Black folk enrich the canon and landscape of life.  Blackness – including Black joy, brilliance, beauty, power and so much more are, now, part of the human experience.

Black history is being made 365 days of the year, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 365/24/7. Our contributions, achievements, lifestyles are not a one-off or an oddity. We are people living our full lives. 

For this post, I thought it would be interesting to hear from our team at NCMPS how they are purposefully making Black history and culture part of their everyday lives, not just because February has been designated as Black History Month. None of these came from a book study, a scavenger hunt, or anything like that. They also don’t absolve our team from the continuous work that we need to do to combat anti-Blackness as individuals and as an organization. I asked the team for recommendations of television shows, movies, literature, and events that they had watched, read, attended, etc., and to share how they honor the intent of Woodson’s efforts to elevate the achievements of Black people in America.

Here are some of their responses:

Television

Heading into its 10th year Henry Louis Gates, Jr.’s series on PBS Finding Your Roots is a favorite in our household. Gates himself is a diligent and brilliant historian, and the series elevates and isolates the complicated and often heroic lives led by ancestors of diverse people and well-known personalities from our modern culture. 


I have been enjoying shows like Bridgerton and The Great for the fact that diversity and representation of different ethnicities is such a natural part of the show and for creating opportunities for Black actors to play parts that are not solely about their Blackness but rather about the stories they are telling 


As a Gen Xer— I can’t not mention Shonda Rhimes,  American television producer and screenwriter, and founder of the production company Shondaland. Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice, Scandal, How to Get Away with Murder, Bridgerton, Inventing Anna, and Queen Charlotte are just a few of my favorites!  


Abbott Elementary—A mockumentary sitcom series created by Quinta Brunson. Amazing writing and cast. So much joyful talent. And, although I want to rush in and tell them they’ve got it all wrong when it comes to the teaching methods, they’ve got it all right when it comes to loving their students and each other.  

The show has been nominated for 15 Emmy Awards, winning four including Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for Brunson. Abbott Elementary has also won three Golden Globe Awards: Acting for Quinta Brunson and Tyler James Williams and Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy in 2023. 


High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America

Netflix’s writers said it best in their description, “Black food is American food.  Chef and writer Stephen Satterfield traces the delicious, moving throughlines from Africa to Texas in this acclaimed series.” Season 2 is out!!!


Chef’s Table, Volume 6:  Mashama Bailey

I watched this and Mashama Bailey’s entire MasterClass Catalog on a cross-country flight.  The sharing of her personal narrative and her entrepreneurial journey to convert a segregated bus station in Savannah, Georgia into a thriving restaurant is powerful stuff.

Books

Homegoing is a difficult but important multi-generational story that follows two half-sisters and their descendants across 250 years, beginning in Ghana in the 1700s and ending in the US. Gyasi’s prose is beautiful, intricate, and honest. Between the power of the story, meticulous research, and beauty of the writing, I was in awe and rapt through each page of this novel that tells a story that is as difficult as it is important.

Gyasi won, at age 26, the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Award for best first book, the PEN/Hemingway Award for a first book of fiction, the National Book Foundation’s “5 under 35” honors for 2016 and the American Book Award.


The House of Eve, a work of historical fiction that I appreciated particularly for its depiction of Black life and culture in DC after WWII. The story follows two Black women in the early 1950s: a teenage girl in Philadelphia struggling to escape intergenerational poverty, and a college student at Howard who marries into an elite family and struggles to be accepted by them (and with her own internalized feelings of inadequacy). Without giving too much away, it’s an exploration of how both women make difficult choices to create their families and live life on their own terms, and an account of how both eventually thrive and achieve their goals, within the context of the Jim Crow era. In an author’s note, the author indicates that she wrote the story as a result of exploring her own family tree, and to fill in some gaps in the historical record about adoption among Black families during this era. I would not say that it is about the achievements of Black people in America, per se, but it is a portrait of Black women characterized by agency, rich interior lives, and determination.


The Personal Librarian is a fantastic, fictionalized account of JP Morgan’s librarian who was a Black woman who “passed” as white during her time. This highlighting of her achievements in the fine art world and her legacy was truly fascinating to read about and was a wonderful way to lift the achievements of a woman who left a lasting impact on the community and culture of the art world.


This Promise of Change by Jo Ann Allen Boyce and Debbie Levy

Sharing from a personal, positive bias for Jo Ann as she’s my elder cousin and the author of this book — it’s her story of being part of “The Clinton 12” and integrating the high school where successive generations of our family would later attend.


I enjoyed reading James McBride’s The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store this past year. It was a beautiful book about a strong, thriving Black community and did a wonderful job of addressing and dismantling stereotypes.

 Movies

American Fiction is a 2023 movie based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett.  It is a satire about stereotypical “black books”, the publishing industry and Hollywood movie industry.   We found it very entertaining and thought provoking.  It is one of those movies that we keep talking (and laughing) about.  American Fiction has won the People’s Choice Award at Toronto International Film Festival; was named one of top 10 movies of 2023 by the American Film Institute; and has 5 nominations for the Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Actor (Wright), Best Supporting Actor (Brown), Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Original Score); won Best Adapted Screenplay at Critics Choice Awards.  

Hidden Figures—wonderful movie about 3 brilliant African American women at NASA who were the brains behind the launching of John Glenn into space.  The movie received some valid critique for the attention it gave to the women’s white bosses for “giving” the women a chance to show their genius. Yet, the opportunity to meet these women and learn their stories keeps this movie on my list.

Podcasts/TED Talks

Cord Jefferson, an award winning writer, director and producer, best known for American Fiction, The Good Place, and Watchman is interviewed on the National Endowment for the Arts podcast.

Get Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable by Luvvie Ajayi Jones

Using the imagery of the domino effect and speaking to her lived experience as the first domino, the one setting off the chain reaction, Ajayi Jones encourages the listener to speak truth to power — especially when it is inconvenient and uncomfortable. See also Luvvie’s books, Professional Troublemaker:  The Fear Fighting Manual and I’m Judging You.

Legacy of Speed  

When sprinters, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, raised their fists in protest at the 1968 Olympic Games, it shook the world. More than 50 years later, the ripple effects of their activism are still felt. As the daughter of an Olympic level sprinter, this story was one I grew up with and I loved learning more.  

Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey: Fawn Weaver (How I Built This)

When Uncle Nearest first hit the spirits market, the story I was told was that Jack Daniel had stolen the recipe for his whiskey from an enslaved person.  That enslaved person, Nathan Green’s relatives were now reclaiming the history and marketing whiskey that was credited to the person who really made the recipe.  This podcast speaks to the truth of this narrative and highlights the Black founder and owner of Uncle Nearest, Incorporated, producing one of the most awarded bourbon and American whiskeys since 2019.

Why Thinking About Death Helps You Live a Better Life by Alua Arthur

Alua Arthur encourages the listener to live fully, now, by speaking to her experience as a human being and death doula.  Most poignant for me is her perspective that when thinking about life from the vantage point of her own graceful death, she is inspired to decide and lean into who she is now, how she wants to spend her time now, and what she will leave behind when she dies.  See also Arthur’s sister, Bozoma Saint John, and her book The Urgent Life.

Art/Creatives

Bag Lady Meredith San Diego—A US-born returned Peace Corps volunteer, now expat living in Europe, sharing lessons learned and stories from a Black, female, solo traveler perspective.

Dr. Lorenzo Pace is a children’s book author, artist and most notably the artist of the Triumph of the Human Spirit sculpture in Foley Square on the site of a Colonial-era African-American burial site.  

Kadir Nelson is a visual artist from San Diego who illustrated many of the books I read or took silent picture walks through throughout the school year with the students, but we always read Henry’s Freedom Box during Black History Month.

Websites

bettinalove.com is Dr. Bettina Love’s website that features a media and article section. This entire website is life-giving and affirming for me as an educator and as a Black woman. I reference her work in courses I facilitate and in my dissertation writing. 

Places that are worth your time…

The Charles H Wright Museum of African American History (Detroit, Michigan)

If you get to Detroit, make your way to this museum.  Looking at actual pages from the Green Book and walking through the hull of a slave ship are unbelievable experiences and important.

National Underground Railroad Freedom Center (Cincinnati, Ohio)

A yearly field trip for the lower elementary students in my building, it was amazing to see what children noticed and discussed from year to year.  The historical artifacts are brilliant and the opportunity to walk inside a pen where enslaved persons lived was horrifying and beautiful.

Community Groups

The Popolo Project

I learned about this community from a magazine lying on the coffee table in my hotel room on O’ahu, and have tried to keep up through social media ever since.  The website provides historical information about Black folks in Hawai’i and around the world.  Author talks, film screenings and community gatherings are also highlighted to invite folks into the community as well as keep folks in the know.


True, earnest belonging of Black people in all spheres of the human landscape in the US is nowhere near complete. I’m looking forward to a day in someone’s generation when this changes. It’s not enough to have cultural markers present in spaces if it’s not impacting hiring practices, academic outcomes, disproportionately in discipline, and really the beliefs and behaviors that don’t question the value and mattering of Black people in society.

Reflections on Martin Luther King Jr.

Reflections on Martin Luther King Jr.
Dick DeMarsico, Public domain,
via Wikimedia Commons

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day Day and, as is my habit each year, I took a few moments to read something new (to me) about Dr. King. This year, I went to National Public Radio’s piece Martin Luther King Jr. was once considered ‘radical.’ Here’s how he came to be lauded.

I am reflecting on three points from this piece:

Popularity–Dr. King was not popular during his time. Even after he won the Nobel Peace prize in 1966, 2/3s of the American population had an unfavorable opinion of him, including the 44% who had a highly unfavorable opinion of him (Pew Research). These are the conditions under which Dr. King worked to move a country towards racial justice, conditions where the great majority of people did not want to be moved.  He weathered scathing and threatening criticism, ultimately paying with his life, to do the right thing. Now, 58 years later, according to the same polls, 81% of adults say he had a favorable impact on the US. 

In this era of instant “likes” and “re-posts”, what a good reminder that long term impact cannot be judged by short term popularity. Keep our heads on straight, do what is right, change the world, and history will judge our actions more accurately than our contemporaries. 

Putting yourself second to what needs to be done–According to Jonathan Eig, author of King: A Life, Dr. King was an activist and protest leader who did not like conflict and had to “push himself really out of his comfort zone to argue, to debate, to really challenge some of the leaders of this country” (NPR, 2024). But, equally apparent, Dr. King heeded a need and calling greater than his own inclinations or preferences and became skilled at it. 

I love my job. Each vision, project, and task differs from the prior, and most draw on my favorite experiences and skills. Never boring. And, sometimes what I need to do for the good of the movement or our partners requires me to step up to a task that I’d rather hide from. This is probably true for all but the luckiest of us. Dr. King offers a reminder to focus on and gather strength from the greater calling and need. 

Service–How Will You Serve Today? Martin Luther King Jr. Day was first officially observed as a federal holiday under Reagan in 1986, and in 1994, Congress passed and President Bill Clinton approved the King Holiday and Service Act, making Martin Luther King Jr., Day the only federal holiday dedicated to volunteerism. 

I feel about this in a similar way that I do about heritage months–shouldn’t this be all year? And, still, I also recognize and appreciate the strength of taking time to call out something important, to raise it in our awareness so that it may stay there longer. For many folk reading this, certainly all of the school-based educators, you are called to service every day. For those, perhaps the most important service today was in service to yourself. I hope perhaps you were able to take today to do what enriches and feeds you, whether that was service to others or to yourself. 

Be brave, do the right thing, and serve yourself and others. We haven’t yet achieved Dr. King’s dream, but I will stay the course and am grateful to Dr. King for the work he did and the inspiration he is.

In service,  

Sara Suchman, Executive Director

Judy McCartin Scheide (1937–2023)

It is with great sadness that we share that Judy McCartin Scheide, the National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector’s  original visionary and supporter, passed away on December 23, 2023.

Judy was a longtime supporter of Montessori as a parent, teacher, AMS board member, and philanthropist. Judy was a thoughtful and generous fighter for Montessori and equity, and she knew how to combine these two passions.  

In 2012, Judy gave AMS, under the leadership of then Executive Director Richard Ungerer, a significant three-year gift of $500,000 to investigate the needs of public Montessori schools and develop an approach to serving them. This original and an additional subsequent grant launched the National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector (NCMPS). 

Judy’s gift allowed NCMPS’ co-founders, Jackie Cossentino and Keith Whitescarver, to visit public Montessori schools nationwide. It made it possible for Jackie and Keith to bring on NCMPS’ current Executive Director, Sara Suchman, to develop NCMPS’ first school services. It launched the multi-organization partnership that was the basis for both the Montessori Census and Teach Montessori

The philanthropic world talks about “catalytic investments,” those gifts that catalyze movement and lead to outcomes far more substantial than what the gift on its own afforded. Judy’s foresight and gift epitomized a catalytic investment for the public Montessori ecosystem. It was the first significant gift specifically earmarked to support public Montessori schools, and it seeded an organization that would grow and connect the community, building a robust and resourceful ecosystem of schools. 

Judy’s memory and legacy live on in the lives of the children and families we touch. On behalf of the public Montessori ecosystem, thank you, Judy, for seeing a need and stepping up to meet it.

May her memory be a blessing and an inspiration.

Sara Suchman, Executive Director

With Gratitude and Commitment from the National Center

Dear Friends and Supporters,

This season, as the long days of summer give way to the short days of winter, always prompts me to turn inward in reflection. Am I present for others? Am I present for myself? Am I giving and receiving love openly? Am I putting aside judgment and building bridges rather than wedges? If I continue on this path, will I be leaving the world a better place than I found it? Am I living my values? 

Gratitude is a cornerstone of a full and joyful life. As I reflect, I feel enormous gratitude for the privilege I have to live my values through NCMPS’s work with, and for, all of us in the public Montessori community. 

At NCMPS, I get to live my values in an organization that lives its values by:

  • Centering equity, access, and sustainability in building strong schools
  • Honoring agency and empowerment in children and adults
  • Working for Montessori to be a lever of change for a just society
  • Grounding our work in academic, community, and field-based research
  • Meeting partners where they are and working side-by-side with them to build capacity
  • Approaching our work with optimism and hope for the future
  • Honoring and celebrating the strength and joy in each individual’s full humanity

I also feel enormous gratitude for the privilege I have of visiting schools across the country, sometimes on my own and other times with someone new to Montessori in tow. Here is some of what we see when we visit:

Advocacy!

  • Successful local advocacy for a full 3-year Upper Elementary option.
  • Successful local advocacy for a 3-year Children’s House even as the district introduces Universal PreK4.

Team Work!

  • Experienced teachers stepping up to mentor their newly trained colleagues.
  • Level teams looking at data, observational and test, to understand and meet their students’ needs.

Chickens!

  • At one school, parents who have worked to change town ordinances in order for students to raise chickens in the courtyard.
  • At another, a new adolescent program selling eggs from its urban chickens and baked goods from its kitchen.

And, children, so many children, manifesting engagement, joy, and hope for the future. ❤️

The National Center depends on your support to continue its work for children, families, and teachers in public Montessori schools. Whether you are posting on Teach Montessori, reading newsletters, writing for MontessoriPublic, taking courses, using tools, inviting us in to consult or coach, joining us at our conference (yes!), or donating time or money, you are part of our community and your support makes our work possible.  I appreciate and thank you.

If you are curious about our 2022 annual report, click here.

If you would like to make a donation, click here. (Donations will be matched 2:1 by NCMPS board and staff.)

May the year ahead bring joy to you and peace to the world.

In gratitude,

Sara Suchman, Executive Director

Montessori in the mainstream

By Sara Suchman

Not only accepted, but expected

NCMPS’s 2023 annual report is titled Mainstreaming Montessori. NCMPS is working for Montessori to be not only an accepted but an expected public option for every family and community. 

Over the summer two meta-analyses were published showing the positive impact of a Montessori education: One from the highly influential Campbell Systematic Reviews, and the other in a well-respected mainstream journal, Contemporary Educational Psychology. 

Last year, globally recognized Bloomsbury publishing house put out the Bloomsbury Handbook of Montessori Education, featuring in-depth analysis from a wide spectrum of Montessori voices, including former Executive Director of AMS and NCMPS Board member Richard Ungerer and NCMPS Director of Research and Professional Learning Katie Brown.

When I began my doctoral studies on public Montessori in 2006, there was so little research on Montessori that I was unable to include a Montessori literature review. Two decades later, we have research on Montessori and academic outcomes, adult well-being, enjoyment of school, executive function, racial differences, socio-economic differences, creativity, and more. 

Publication by publication, school by school, media outlet by media outlet, Montessori is moving off of the periphery and into the mainstream. 

We are succeeding. Should we be celebrating?

In 2008, I attended the research session at the American Montessori Society (AMS) conference in Washington, DC. I was a new scholar in the midst of conducting research on public Montessori schools. A comment was made that, though I don’t remember who made it, has stuck with me. The speaker put forward the supposition that Montessori has survived as long as it has and as intact as it has because it has flown under the radar, making it immune from and impervious to outside influences that might corrupt or undermine it. 

I took note. I was committed to children and families in public settings having access to Montessori but did not want to contribute to Montessori’s downfall. I knew that public expansion would mean public scrutiny, and I was seeing in my research how the external pressures manifested in the classroom. Private dollars buy private accountability. Public dollars bring public accountability. (This dynamic may be shifting as funding streams, delivery systems, and the line between private and public blurs, but that is grist for a different reflection.) 

Yet, despite the trepidation I felt 15 years ago in Washington, DC, I am still here, working with public systems that want to better serve students through Montessori. What have I seen? 

There is a role for all of the players in the U.S. Montessori ecosystem. We didn’t plan it out ahead of time; we happened our way into it. Independent schools serve thousands of children and families and  show what can be done in the absence of constraints. The folk working in independent schools are peers who share professional development, school visits, materials, etc. They are one piece of the puzzle in demonstrating that Montessori is a good thing – it is such a good thing that families will pay for it, often at great financial sacrifice. This is an important step in increasing access – If Montessori is good for those with financial means, no one who checks their biases can ethically and honestly say Montessori wouldn’t be good for all children.

More Montessori creates more Montessori. Families want what is best for their children. As more hear, see, and learn about Montessori, whether through public or private schools, more will want it in both public and private schools. 

Montessori isn’t precious, it is robust. Its fundamental view of childhood can accommodate and tolerate a lot of imposition, compromise, and less-than-ideal structures and practices and still offer so much more and better than other models to children and families. Is ideal ideal? As defined by core principles and with an eye for equity and honesty, Yes. Does NCMPS work with schools to keep moving ever closer to this ideal? Yes. Do we stop pursuing this approach for all children, even in light of there being some schools that now, and perhaps always, struggle to reach full implementation? No. 

So, here I am. With you. Until Montessori is not only accepted but expected in every district, neighborhood, and authorizer’s portfolio and every families’ choices.

Hope and Promise

February 1, 2023

This past Friday was Holocaust Remembrance Day. Today is the beginning of Black History Month. In between, in a stark reminder that hate and violence are both past and present, television and radio brought news of mass murder, conspiracy-ignited rage, police brutality, and ethnic hate. So many people living with so much pain.

In striking juxtaposition, I had the honor last week, along with Biff Maier of Lexington Montessori School and the Montessori Elementary Teacher Training Collaborative, of representing Montessori at a convening hosted by Education Reimagined of educators, researchers, youth developers, business folk, and funders committed to creating an education system that builds love and health—where children are seen, valued, listened to, and have agency in their own learning and lives. A truly learner-centered system.

A few members of the group have had direct experience with incarceration in the US penal system. They spoke movingly and with certainty about how their lives would have been different if someone had seen and embraced them during their years in school. One spoke to how her life changed the moment she started in a learner-centered environment. They are all committed to stopping the pain by creating a different path for those coming up behind them.

Montessori is one model of learner-centered education, and a model I love. Others in that room came from learner-centered models that they love. There is a growing world of people who want for children what Montessori wants for children–more seeing and less telling, more love and less pain. Many people’s understanding of a humanizing education is shifting. I spend less time now than I did a decade ago talking about why we need Montessori and more time talking about how we can get it.  It is still the case that too few children experience a learner-centered, humanizing school environment, but I feel a change coming. I am honored to be in this work with you.

The child is both a hope and a promise for [human]kind. 
–Maria Montessori

In unity,

Sara Suchman, Executive Director

Cheyenne Eete Kippenberger

Cheyenne Eete KippenbergerCheyenne is a Seminole and Chilean woman, advocate for Indigenous people and a former Miss Indian World. She has utilized her platform as an ambassador to advocate for environmental protections of the Florida Everglades, overturn adverse stereotypes and stigmatizations of mental health in tribal communities, encourage healing through identity and self love, and combat the negative, stereotypical narrative of Native and Indigenous people through education. Cheyenne also provides motivational speaking presentations, empowerment workshops, pageantry coaching, cultural and historical consulting, hosts and emcees, and presents on topics such as culture as prevention, identity, human trafficking, domestic violence, and much more. She strives for authenticity and to live a healthy life physically, mentally and spiritually through her culture and teachings.

Desmond Blackburn

Desmond BlackburnFacing History and Ourselves is a non-profit organization founded in 1976 to “use lessons of history to challenge teachers and their students to stand up to bigotry and hate.” Today, Facing History and Ourselves is a global organization with a network of hundreds of thousands of educators reaching millions of students worldwide, providing extensive curriculum, professional development, and resources. CEO Desmond Blackburn began his public education career as a high school math teacher in Florida and rose through the state’s school system, including serving as principal at a public Montessori school, to become Superintendent of Brevard Public Schools. Blackburn has served as CEO of the New Teacher Center, a national nonprofit that works to disrupt the predictability of educational inequities for systemically underserved students. He was previously Deputy Chancellor of School Leadership for the New York City Department of Education, the largest school system in the nation, before joining Facing History and Ourselves this year.