Etta T.

Princeton brings back standardized test requirement after five-year review | The College Fix School found students who submitted test scores performed better academically…

The College Board has run a massive campaign to disparage “grade inflation,” and it has won.

While GPAs have increased in parallel for PoC, SAT scores typically favor rich, white/Asian, men over black/Latino, low-income, first-gen women (Hur. & Lee, “Grade Inflation…,” 2018, Figs. 3.9 & 3.10).

The racist edict that allowed Columbus to colonize and slaughter Indigenous people is still the law in the U.S. today. What holiday we celebrate on the second Monday in October matters because it reflects the beliefs we hold about who we are and where we come from as a country.

After years of advocacy and growing awareness of Columbus’s human rights abuses, some states and cities switched to celebrating Indigenous Peoples Day. Now, we are witnessing the backlash to that modicum of change. Full post on my substack now:

Happy Indigenous Peoples Day! 💖

If you’re in the Boston area today, check out MFA Boston for me — free admission, basket weaving lessons, and dancing.

Many of these are the aims for education outlined in Project 2025.

Be aware.

These Activists Want to Dismantle Public Schools. Now They Run the Education Department. Under Trump, the Department of Education has been bringing in activists hostile to public schools. It could mean a new era of private and religious schools boosted by tax dollars — and the end of publ...

A policy expert described Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s push in favor of private schools as a “great American heist,” funneling money from public schools: “It’s a strategic theft of the future of our country, our kids and our democracy.”

By @megomatz.bsky.social & @jsmithrichards.bsky.social

A copy of The Years That Matter Most by lamplight.

Started the day right with Paul Tough’s THE YEARS THAT MATTER MOST / THE INEQUALITY MACHINE.

#AcademicSky #BookSky

“Columbus Day” only became federally recognized in the early twentieth century to fix relations between the U.S. + Italy after lynch mobs killed Italian-Americans.

As a Cherokee-Italian American, I’m so tired of this argumentum ad antiquitatem. Celebrate Enrico Fermi instead. Hell, Sinatra.

This case was stayed on July 10 but both parties were required to file a joint status report by this past Wednesday.

Fingers are crossed that it’s set back in motion and justice is served soon.

MIT becomes first college to reject Trump’s higher education compact University President Sally Kornbluth said some of the terms would restrict the institution’s free expression and independence.

BREAKING NEWS: MIT is the first college to formally reject Trump’s higher education compact, citing that they meet/exceed most of the expectations already set forth + that they are not interested in having their free speech/expression restricted.

#AcademicSky #BreakingNews

Two federal programs to support college students in limbo • Daily Montanan Funding was in limbo Monday for two of the 29 TRIO Student Support Services programs in Montana after initial denials.

TCU Chief Dull Knife College (on the Northern Cheyenne rez) & Blackfeet Community College have been denied TRIO funding, which helps first-gen, low-income, and/or disabled students. This funding pays for programs like Upward Bound and Veterans Upward Found.

#AcademicSky #TribalCollege

They don’t want it perfect. They want it by Friday.

#AcademicSky

Some Ralph Lauren models wearing a Native American belt buckle and pin. Also photos of Native American repoussé pin and handmade silver rings in different styles.

Native American silver cuff bracelet, rings, and belt buckles decorated with turquoise stones.

Native American cuff bracelets and pendants, many decorated with turquoise stones.

Native American squash blossom necklaces.

Some things I saw recently that I think are cool (Native American jewelry edition):

— Neil Zarama. New Ralph Lauren collab coming (IG whirlinglog_and_arrow)
— Troy Oviedo (IG troyoviedo) 😮‍💨
— Falcon Trading Company (IG ftcjewelry)
— Samuel Sumpter (IG nabaahii_bizhiil_creations)

Every time I see this gif, I think of @thehallucination.bsky.social’s “Sisters” (feat. Northern Voices).

🎧: open.spotify.com/track/6ZzHtu...

And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the people-pleasing has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

I must not be a people-pleaser. People-pleasing is the mind-killer. People-pleasing is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my people-pleasing. I will permit it to pass over me and through me.

Their eyes are sooo gorgeous. 😍

My black Lab/Dachshund mix glamming into the camera.

Omigosh, what kind of dog is this?? They remind me of my own sweetie pie, who’s a Black Lab/Dachshund mix (we think).

ICT's Guide to Indigenous Peoples Day events - ICT A list of more than 100 events celebrating Indigenous Peoples Day in October 2025

Hey, babes — what are you doing for Indigenous Peoples Day?

With over 100 events, ICTNews might have some ideas. ⤵️

#NativeAmerican

After having a member of faculty yell at me on Thursday, #NorthOfNorth has been the escape that I *need.*

What good indigenous shows, films, or books are you binging right now? I need more comfort. 😭

Why aren't we talking about the real reason male college enrollment is dropping? We would rather talk about literally everything else.

This blog post posits that higher education is becoming devalued because of “male flight” — men leaving industries as large numbers of women enter (similar to white flight).

For every 1% increase in the proportion of women in the student body, 1.7 fewer men applied.

#AcademicSky

Four-panel comic: A mouse and a turtle discuss reading. The mouse states they are trying to read more, but haven’t started yet. The turtle interjects that sounds like not trying. The mouse insists it's different. Signed "Poorly Drawn Lines".

Relatable #AcademicChatter #PoorlyDrawnLines

School is not a service to be consumed. School is meant to create democratic efficiency, yes, but it is also meant to inculcate self-actualization in our students + create solidarity by exposing them to different people.

Private schools are typically homogenous and homeschooling, isolated. #EduSky

Yeah, The Life of a Showgirl is super good, innit? I especially loved the blue tiger.

“…the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.”

— Audre Lorde

Alaska Vowed to Resolve Murders of Indigenous People. Now It Refuses to Provide Their Names. When the nonprofit Data for Indigenous Justice filed public records requests with the Alaska Department of Public Safety concerning cases it had investigated, the state rejected them.

Alaska vowed to resolve the murders of Indigenous people.

But when one nonprofit asked state law enforcement officials for a fundamental piece of data — a list of Indigenous murders they’d investigated — the state said no.

By @kylehopkinsak.bsky.social, w/ @adn.com

"Unprecedented." "This isn't us."

Please read a book. Try Joanne Barker's 2021 "Red Scare: the State's Indigenous Terrorist," to start. On pages 28-29:

"In 1703..the Massachusetts Bay Colony offered.. between 250 and 300 pounds for Indian scalps." (1/4)

Education Department employees surprised to find their email automatically changed to blame Democrats for shutdown Five furloughed employees told NBC News they had put up nonpartisan out-of-office messages, only to see they were changed — without their permission — to partisan ones.

Hey, babes, wake up. A new violation of the Hatch Act just dropped.

This past week was so much. We’ve gotta talk ribbon skirts, internship opportunities, issues with a faculty member, and continued federal-on-tribal college nonsense.

This past week was too much.

But for right now? Right now we start #NorthOfNorth.

An image of Jane Goodall and a chimpanzee, from 1965. Photo courtesy CBS Photo Archive / Getty.

The naturalist Jane Goodall died today at 91. Hope, she argued, is not merely “passive wishful thinking” but a “crucial survival trait.” Revisit a conversation with Goodall, from 2021: nyer.cm/F55JtsS

Spent all day at work, but I got halfway through my (long overdue) Culturally Sustaining pedagogies reading.

My biggest annoyance? They rail against racism (yay!) while using unqualified slurs and/or argumentative fallacies (boo!).

I know people aren’t perfect, but who is editing these articles?