Pushout

Inspired by the groundbreaking book of the same name by Monique W. Morris, Ed.D, Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools, takes a deep dive into the lives of Black girls and the practices, cultural beliefs and policies that disrupts one of the most important factors in their lives – education. Alarmingly, African American girls are the fastest-growing population in the juvenile justice system and the only group of girls to disproportionately experience criminalization at every education level.

The film underscores the challenges Black girls face with insights from multiple experts across the country who have worked extensively in the fields of social and criminal justice, gender equality and educational equity, giving context to the crisis and providing a roadmap for how our educational system and those who interact with Black girls can provide a positive rather than punitive response to behaviors that are often misunderstood or misrepresented.

While the challenges facing Black boys in the U.S. have garnered national attention, absent from that conversation is how girls of color, particularly Black girls, are being impacted. Pushout addresses that crisis by focusing on the challenges Black girls face and emphasizing first-person narratives from them. Hearing from girls as young as seven and as old as 19, they describe navigating a society that often marginalizes and dismisses them. At the same time the documentary lays out how adults and policy makers can address the needs of these young girls and women with positive responses that can short circuit the pervasive over punishment of Black girls.