Open Windows, Open Minds & Ridgewood Schools Strategic Plans

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, I read it so that you do not have to: Open Windows, Open Minds: Developing Antiracist, Pro-Human Students by Afrika Afeni Mills.

In her introduction, Afrika Afeni Mills allows her own co-conspirators and accomplices to make an emotional plea to the reader. The book opens with a story where two young children, best of friends, are torn apart by messages received from the adults in their lives. When the young black child asks his father why he can not sleep over his white friends house, the father tells the child:

“Cornelius, Robert’s parents do not carry the same kind of worry for Robert that we are forced to carry for you in this country. I’ve never seen Robert’s parents seriously consider the history of racism in this country; and I have no way of knowing if they even understand how it impacts you every day, son. I value their friendship, but without that understanding, I cannot trust them to keep you safe in my presence” (xiv).

After some time, Cornelius and his father sit down together. The father reveals an unfortunate reality where others likely exist. The father tells the son: “You and Robert will grow old together, and even though you love him, he will inherit his parents’ silence. One day, what Robert does not know about his own Whiteness will hurt you” (xvi). This exaggerated assumption is similar to claims that Critical Race Theorists make about racism in America. In their book Black Eye for America: How Critical Race Theory is Burning Down the House, Carol Swain and Christopher Schorr write that Crits “find racism nearly everywhere, including in day to day interactions where the uninitiated might never think to look” (12).

What follows from Open Windows, Open Minds is a book framed into two parts that looks to correct the ideas, traditions, and values of White teachers and students. Part I is titled “Why Windows are Crucial for White Teachers and Students.” On page xxxi, Afrika Afeni Mills invites all readers to become “an active ally, accomplice, and co-conspirator.” (“Co-conspirator” appears in the dictionary as “someone who plans secretly with one or more other people to do something bad or illegal.”) It appears Ms. Mills assumes the reader of this book will be like Neo from the Matrix movies and accept her vision of reality. She does not mention Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.

Just some of the points she envisions for readers are below (xxxi, xxxii):

“ To see how you were harmed during your K-16+ educational experiences.”

“To see that it is imperative to keep students from continuing to be harmed.”

“To equip you with strategies for decentering Whiteness in your literacy curriculum in order to manifest true antiracist teaching practice.”

Chapter One subtitles include: “Antibias Training Is Not Enough: Learning From the Testimonies of ABAR Practitioners” and “Stages of White Racial Identity.” Chapter Three is titled: Instructional Strategies That Help Students Develop Racial Identities and Understandings. Ms. Mills presents a lesson where White teachers and students compose a poem titled “Where I’m From.” She uses this poem exercise to help White people break free from their idea that “Whiteness is normal.” It is an opportunity to have young minds consider something they have likely never considered: an introduction about racial segregation and a conversation about how the “White experience” is one a White child should start disassociating from. The objective is to make White teachers and students believe that racism is an inherent trait, that American systems are racially motivated and constructed, and that each should be dismantled starting at the individual level. Ms. Mills and Ridgewood educators seem to think that this best practice should start at a very young age.

Ms. Harwin and the DEI committee appear to agree as Afrika Afeni Mills gave two presentations to elementary school educators and parents in 2024. Now, the Superintendent has used this author visit as leverage to frame the district’s second goal of the 2024-2025 District Goals: “Empowering Students with Systems of Supports.” The two-pronged approach of DEI worked as planned: introduce an unassuming topic to children and families, but then dismantle public education from within. Even if it requires using children to push the political agenda. The members of the Board of Education and district administrative team have now allowed activists, with political ambitions and legal experience, to influence budgeting, goal setting, and curriculum. District DEI representatives and graduates of Ivy League universities are following the template of Yale, Harvard, and Columbia University.

Part II, titled “How to Provide White Students with More Windows” provides pedagogical practices for teachers to incorporate into their classrooms. All practices that Afrika Afeni Mills presents are standard tools used in classrooms across public schools; however, she adds a biased twist to each one of them in an effort to assume “White Students” require additional learning to understand another’s perspective. She writes that “prior to the beginning of K-12 learning experiences, children are inundated with the message that Whiteness is the dominant culture” (126). There is plausible deniability that this book does not promote a Critical Race Theory ideology, but the themes of fear, hopelessness, anger, judgment, and pride alert any discerning reader to the idea that this is more a framework for indoctrination than it is to educate. The practices being used in the classrooms condition students to become strict social activists rather than actual diverse and thoughtful citizens.

Open Windows, Open Minds is a propaganda pamphlet filled with stereotypes, hypocrisies, judgments, double standards, and assumptions. Ridgewood Blog recently reported on Ms. Mills’ visit to Ridgewood Public Schools last school year. Invited by the Ali Harwin chaired Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, Ms. Mills presented her educationally and socially divisive ideology to a group of village parents and district educators during the 2023-2024 school year. This opportunity was all that was needed to allow the likes of those who have a political agenda to crawl through open windows and doors. These open windows and doors have allowed racism and stereotypes to breeze right into district classrooms. These voices now have a captive audience of vulnerable children.

In an effort to use the training and knowledge of Ms. Harwin and other village co-conspirators, the Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Mark Schwarz, has invited these DEI activists to advise on the district’s long-term strategic plan. According to the 2024-2025 District Goal Report presented during the February, 24, 2025 Board of Education meeting (presentation starts at the 2 hour 15 min mark) the district is using the “efforts of school diversity, equity, and inclusion committees” to promote the district’s second goal of “Empowering students with systems of support.” This system is designed to tear down any “tradition of excellence” that remains.

In addition to allowing this special interest group a seat at the table, Ridgewood Public Schools has partnered with Montclair State University, who recently hired a Critical Race Theorist- Dr. Regina Berry– as Dean of Bloomfield College of Montclair State University. Dr. Regina Berry is in charge of Curriculum and Instruction and is the “ideal leader to foster effective partnerships and support innovations while maintaining our institution’s commitment to high-quality education” according to the University press release.

Ridgewood Public Schools are no longer operating in the shadows. Their doors are wide open but expect them to be shut in April when the Strategic Vision plan is introduced to the public.