My take on: Social Justice

Hello Readers. 

What do we mean when we discuss social injustice? Rather, what's social justice? Apart of these questions are terms that I feel society uses, but do we really know what they mean or look like? I'm hoping to shed some light on that with this post. First off, lets define social justice, "is the fair and just relation relation between the individual and society" (Wikipedia). Are you wondering why I just quoted from Wikipedia? Yes, I did; deal with it! This example from Wikipedia shows social justice as a relation between a person and their society. This relationship can either be good or bad, but nonetheless is a relationship one has in society. Rather than the bleak definition provided by Wikipedia, I found another idea on the definition of social justice, "a process, not an outcome, which (1) seeks fair distribution of resources, opportunities, and responsibilities; (2) challenges the roots of oppression and injustice; (3) empowers all people to exercise self-determination and realize their full potential; (4) [and] builds social solitary and community capacity for collaborative action" (anonymous). From this, I've determined that a nameless author has a better definition than Wikipedia did for social justice. Along with that, I also determined why social justice is important for our future classrooms. To me, social justice is the teachers ability to proved the best "care" so that students are able to succeed without any oppression or oppressive acts getting in their way of learning. By reviewing this author's definition, one could see how this way of breaking down what social justice is can help a teacher better their classrooms environment by using the steps in the very definition! I loved the idea that this breakdown provided for me as a future teacher! This idea of social justice needs to be in classrooms to prevent "banking" for students and provide a service that will help the students not only meet testing standards, but also be able to break barriers within their own educational goals. Great topic of study and I plan on personally using this idea in my classrooms. 

Cheers. 

Ryan