Lisa Maxine Blogs

I can’t remember when my disdain for To Kill a Mockingbird began, but I suspect it was early in the assault against literature. This time coincided with graduate school — the beginning of my journey into applied psychology and the field of mental health counseling, where conversations about cultural competence and aversive racism took shape. Graduate school professors encouraged me to question everything — whose voice was being centered, and whose comfort was being protected.

In response to Chalkbeat contributor Alex Zimmerman’s article, “Racist comment at NYC parent meeting ignites fury as Black leaders call for accountability” (Zimmerman, 2026), one question immediately surfaces: Why is accountability framed as a Black demand? Why is accountability racialized? When accountability is framed as something Black leaders are calling for, the implication is subtle but powerful: that racism in public schools is primarily a concern of the Black communit