Khalilah Harris, deputy director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans (WHIEEAA) will serve as a panelist for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, Incorporated’s roundtable discussion on “Reversing the School-to-Prison Pipeline for African Americans and Minorities: Comprehensive Programs, Practice, and Policy Solutions” on Wednesday, March 18 at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C.
Harris’s remarks will focus on the Department of Education’s federal initiatives and specific efforts by WHIEEAA to address racial disparities in school disciplinary action and lack of equity in quality education and resources for black youth. She will provide a backdrop to explaining the root cause of systematic and historical educational policies that have sent black and minority youth down the school to prison pipeline and offer policy solutions from the Administration’s perspective.
Other panelists Harris will be joining are Robert L. Listenbee, administrator, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; Russell Skiba, national expert and professor and director of The Equity Project, Indiana University; Scott Budnick, founder and president, Anti-Recidivism Coalition; and Esché L. Jackson, co-chair, Anti-Recidivism Coalition Member Board.
The panel aims to provide effective and comprehensive programs and policy alternatives for reversing the school to prison pipeline that better address the root causes and systemic trends/factors that minority youth face in and outside of the school system. The event is being held in partnership with Rep. Barbara Lee, chair of the Democratic Whip Taskforce on Poverty, Income Inequality, and Opportunity and co-chair of the Congressional Black Caucus Taskforce on Poverty and the Economy.