The Power in the Room

The Power in the Room is a visionary tour de force built on a rock-solid foundation of teaching and organizing young people in communities marked for failure. Here Jay Gillen applies the 'two-eyed approach' one eye focused unblinkingly on the mud and muck of the world as it really is, while the other eye envisions an expansive world that could be or should be, but is not yet. He dives headfirst into that contradiction and illuminates essential steps toward an earned and effective insurgency. For those targeted and crushed by the system of racial capitalism, the message is clear: you have every right to be here, you need no one's permission to interrogate the world, and the power to understand and transform all that you see before you is in your own capable hands. A phrase uttered by the great Ella Baker at the memorial for a martyred freedom fighter long ago--We who believe in freedom . . . --becomes a refrain that Gillen repeats throughout, whether urging an action or making an argument, and as it echoes throughout the book, it becomes an invitation to join one another--arm-in-arm, heart-to-heart--in an urgent and incipient beloved community. We who believe in freedom! --William Ayers, Distinguished Professor of Education (retired) at the University of Illinois at Chicago and coauthor of You Can't Fire the Bad Ones! And 18 Other Myths about Teachers, Teachers Unions, and Public Education