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Drawing on a youth-centered critical ethnography with 12 students, the study examines grievances, organizing efforts, and how participants interpreted a culture of ghosting and gaslighting. 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[https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero)  \nGeographies of Refusal: Understanding Racially Minoritized Youth  \nActivism in Suburban Schools  \nGabriel Rodriguez  \nUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign  \nWhile more is known about how racially minoritized youth in urban settings turn to activism to counter marginalizing schooling practices, less is known about what this looks like in suburban schools and communities. I engage with scholarship on fugitivity and critical youth studies to examine the issues that shape and drive racially minoritized youth’s activism at a suburban school in Iowa. My analysis examines how participants engaged in activism to fight for a more equitable and just schooling environment. I unpack how youth of color made sense of a school culture invested in ghosting and gaslighting when they voiced their grievances and mobilized for equity and justice. I also examine the tensions that youth wrestled with in their activism.  \nKeywords: Equity, ethnography, high schools, race, social justice, suburban education, youth activism  \nIntroduction  \nIn Freedom Dreams, R. D. G. Kelley (2002) asked,“What are today’s young activists dreaming about? We know what they are fighting against, but what are they fighting for?”(p. 8). This study explores these questions with racially minoritized youth activists at Meadowland High School (MHS, pseudonyms used throughout), a predominantly white and well-resourced suburban school located outside of Des Moines, Iowa. Despite its commitment to equity (e.g., afterschool affinity spaces, district equity director), racially minoritized youth at MHS were often left wanting more from their school. As Clarissa, a Black student, shared with me,“Overall, the message is that youth are fed up.” Clarissa’s critique reflected a frustration with a school that, despite expressing pride in their ethnic and racial diversity and commitment to equity, struggled to live up to the needs of racially minoritized youth. I couple Clarissa’s observation with Kelley’s questions to examine what racially minoritized youth fought against and for through their activism at MHS.  \nIn this youth-centered critical ethnographic study (Fitzpatrick & May, 2022), I examine racially minoritized youth’s grievances and activism to hold their school accountable for their marginalizing experiences. As such, this study is guided by the following question: How do suburban racially minoritized youth use activism to fight for a more equitable and just school? I draw from participant observations, formal and informal interviews, and document collection (e.g., student work) to learn from 12 racially minoritized youth. While this study entails the participation of Asian, Black, and Latinx youth, I use “racially minoritized” not to  \nhomogenize but rather to speak about these students as a collective. There is no question that the youth of this study came to their activism shaped by their experiences and identities, but this study does not examine those important particularities; instead, this study is about how youth from different ethnic and racially minoritized identities came together to advocate for a more equitable and just school.  \nWhile a great deal is known about racially minoritized youth’s activism in and out of urban schools (Ginwright et al., 2006; Kirshner, 2015), less is known about what this looks like in suburban contexts. Diamond et al. (2021) observe that the lack of focus on suburban schools is partially attributed to how policymakers and researchers have constructed suburban and urban schools, which has led some to believe that many of the pressing issues educational researchers examine are uniquely urban problems. Yet, urban ","cbCaiaiG9DwqkDJX","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaiaiG9DwqkDJX","pdf",680321,"English","# Introduction\n## Research Question and Study Approach\n## Background on Suburban Activism and Inequality","[{\"question\":\"What is the central research question of the study?\",\"answer\":\"How do suburban racially minoritized youth use activism to fight for a more equitable and just school?\"},{\"question\":\"Where is the study set and who participates?\",\"answer\":\"The study is conducted at Meadowland High School (MHS) in suburban Iowa and draws on participant observations, interviews, and documents from 12 racially minoritized youth.\"},{\"question\":\"What does the study say youth were fighting for and against?\",\"answer\":\"It examines both sides of their activism—responding to marginalizing experiences while mobilizing for equity and justice within the school environment.\"}]","Geographies of Refusal: Understanding Racially Minoritized Youth Activism in Suburban Schools | PDF",1792069396]