Allyship on Turtle Island

To Indigenous, First Nations, Métis, Inuit, & Native Peoples

For Schools: Professional Development for Teachers

I am a former labor educator, public school teacher at Fenway High School in Boston, MA and current pre-k teacher for the Boston Workers Circle Shule (Jewish Sunday School) in Brookline, MA. I am also certified as a Professional Development Provider by the Massachusetts Department of Secondary Education.

As an Indigenous woman from the Muisca people in Boyaca, Colombia, I have done a lot of work to peel back layers of assimilation and learn how to behave according to Indigenous values since I was not raised on my land or amongst my people. I have been doing coming home work under the supervision of Native elders and Indigenous mentors for the past 10 years.

In my workshops, I put capitalism front and center, as we examine together how it intersects with racism, Indigeneity, attempted genocide, and colonization. The capitalist nation states that we live in not only shape us but also shape how we educate and raise our children. Capitalism’s goal is to remain invisible so that it can keep going as a system. To convince us all that its ills are the result of individual human failings, instead of built in features of the system that are there by design. My focus is on providing teachers with action steps that they can take to be more culturally aware educators to all students in their classrooms, aka good friends. To me this means working on collective action, individual steps, and behavior change.

Whatever kind of educator you are, I am happy to tailor my curriculum to your needs or that of your school. Please contact me or have your school do so for a quote on prices. Options that I offer are:

  • 2 Hour Key Note Presentation/Workshop

  • Half Day of Professional Development for Teachers

  • Full Day of Professional Development for Teachers

  • Extended Learning Communities

For Libraries and Community Organizations: A 1.5 Hour Workshop

If you have been wondering what it looks like to be a good guest living on stolen Native land, then this workshop is for you! Learn from my 10 years of experience implementing the teachings of Native elders and Indigenous mentors on how to decolonize. This does not mean that we are engaging in cultural appropriation, quite the opposite. It means that we are undoing the layers of assimilation that our ancestors were forced into for survival.

Together, either in person or on Zoom, we will:

  • Go over a brief history of colonization on Turtle Island

  • Review Action steps that you can take to move towards harmony with Native peoples

  • Look at what behaviors you need to change to be good guests on stolen Native lands

Love is an action. It is about how we treat ourselves and each other. My focus in this class is on teaching people from all walks of life the difference between capitalism and Indigeneity as systems and ways of being, so that they can make informed choices about which system’s values they want to let shape their behavior. Changing how we behave is what allows us to build close relationships of reciprocity, trust, and accountability. It is one path that we can walk outside of capitalism and towards Indigeneity.

For Students: STARS Residency and Teen Training

Thanks to the STARS Residency grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, I was able to offer my new curriculum: ‘Decolonization and You’ to a group of 14 and 15 year old teens in Ms. Kanku Kabongo’s 9th grade humanities classroom at Fenway High School in Boston, MA for the first time (Pictured left). The STARS Residency opens up in the fall of each year, for artists of all kinds to partner with teachers and students to bring rich cultural experiences to the classroom. Email me if you would like to bring me into your Massachusetts based school as a STARS Resident next year. I am also happy to work with schools to be hired as a guest teacher for electives, home rooms/advisories, or regular classroom time.

The 'Decolonization And You' will help students understand their relationship to the stolen Native land that they live on and tell their own stories about the effects of colonization on them and their families through poetry and writing exercises. This includes a presentation to talk about capitalism and Indigeneity as systems and ways of being, a vocabulary hand out with key terms, a writing exercise handout about responsibility and Indigenous values, writing exercises, small group work, culminating in writing a poem and presenting them to the class.

Whoever your students are, I am happy to tailor my curriculum to their needs or that of your school. Please contact me or have your school do so for a quote on price. Whether we work together using the STARS Residency program, or by hiring me directly from your budget. What I offer:

  • Session 1: Indigeneity, Capitalism, Nation States, And Your Migration Story

  • Session 2: Taking Responsibility For How We Behave

  • Session 3: Writing Poems Together

"Native Americans are essentially calling for righteousness.
By this they mean a shared ideology developed by all people
using their purest and most unselfish minds."

— Lorraine Canoe/Tom Porter, MOHAWK from White Bison Meditations with Native American Elders