The group putting parents in power

Love or hate the National Parents Unions, they're getting unheard parents in powerful rooms

About five years ago, I had dinner with Keri Rodrigues at a low-light Italian restaurant in Times Square, not knowing what she would pitch me on. Her request to meet was vague and without details, creating suspense. Over dinner, she told me about her plan to start a new organization. She was energetic about it and had a wild glint in her eye, the kind you get when you finally find something you thought was lost.

She was fresh from an organizing victory in Massachusetts, something she accomplished with good old-fashioned pavement pounding and disciplined organizing methods that were uncharacteristic of many education advocacy groups. I knew little more about her than whispers about her being the next big thing.

She planned to create a national parent movement. Everybody was aiming to do that because, at that time, anything with the word “parent” in it could get funded. The field was crowded with people who got a Master's in Public Policy and became serial social entrepreneurs, saving our kids one white paper at a time. They get funded with numbers written on a napkin over Dim Sum.

But Keri was different. She was scrappy, a little bit hood. She was a real mom who experienced real issues with actual schools. I was all ears. Her proposal hit all my buttons. Too many advocacy groups were trying to empower parents, while some of us demanded that parents be in power.

Could Keri be the one to deliver on that nuance? I didn’t know, but her labor-organizing background was novel, and the buzz about her was good.

That was the first I heard of what became the National Parents Union (NPU), a group that is currently getting mothers and fathers from neglected and abused communities into the White House and the halls of Congress. They speak directly to power without a ventriloquist standing behind them, pulling every string.

My false start in parent power-building

In 2015, I made a trial run on an effort similar to Keri’s.

I took 30 parents from around the country to Washington, D.C., for the Congressional Black Caucus’ massive annual meeting. The year before, I went alone and was underwhelmed by all the corporate propaganda and self-serving networking, which gave me a window into why my people were making too little progress. Bringing parents from marginalized communities allowed me to see it through their eyes, get their reactions, and hear their opinions about the leaders who speak on their behalf.

I did not offer coaching or behavior parameters for what they should say, how they should act, or their goals. I was their travel agent and concierge.

Few pictures have survived, but they are in this room, asking questions that made the panel uncomfortable:

I learned three important lessons during that trip.

First, parents and guardians who don’t know each other and live thousands of miles from each other have similar experiences that impact their parenting. Three of the mothers from different states exchanged details of how each had been banned from their children’s schools because they asked too many questions of special education staff about their Individualized Education Plans (IEPs). They did not have advocates, elected officials, reform organizers, or unions to make their voices carry.

The system was designed to make them mute in a way that suburban college-educated moms never experienced.

Second, when I asked my 30 travelers if they felt represented and heard by the fancy people in suits and dresses speaking for them from podiums and panels, the answer was “hell no.” Each session was in a room where Exxon, Monsanto, and the American Federation of Teachers had purchased the carpet, chairs, stage, microphones, and PowerPoints. In one session on education, Randi Weingarten appeared to watch the discussion, and they added a chair for her to be an impromptu guest on the panel. I was so antagonistic to the AFT back then that I seethed about it.

That’s the power of the purse that demands we have the power of people. Our parents in those rooms got a little unruly and pierced the decorum, and I did nothing to stop it.

Finally, my biggest lesson was how messy and annoying it is to plan and execute a trip to D.C. with people from around the country who aren’t accustomed to traveling. The logistics were a colossal pain in the ass. Flights, lodging, meals, unforeseen needs, roaches in our hotel rooms, parents missing the pick-up times for our ground transportation, disputes, and so on.

When we use the word “organizing,” we have a picture of a drum major with a bullhorn followed by a sea of parents in t-shirts chanting about what our kids deserve. It’s so much more than that. The work it takes to move people, literally and figuratively, is a lot.

After my trip, I realized that there was a there there. Getting parents into rooms where they could confront power brokers was the “it” we were missing.

I also realized that it wasn’t my ministry.

A better plan for parent activism

That’s a lot of background to make a straightforward point: I was primed to be Keri’s cult member when she shared her plan for the NPU. She solved the problems I had experienced and witnessed in parent organizing. She was an actual organizer, not a grant-funded McKinsey dropout, making a career out of saving the poor souls who couldn’t save themselves.

Today, love or hate her, she’s delivered on her goals.

Last week, the NPU brought hundreds of parents to Washington, D.C., to urge Congress to expand the child tax credit, which could help millions of families overcome poverty.

I felt gratified by this show of force. I’ll be petty and tell you why.

Last year, an imperious Massachusetts Avenue scribe wrote an idiotic piece [I won’t link to it because I don’t like to litter] exalting Moms for Liberty as a real parent movement, totally not born out of philanthropy.

Ironically, the piece casually smeared NPU as a front operation for deep pockets.

Update: Moms for Liberty, mired in hypocritical sex scandals that would make Rick James say, “damn, y’all going too far,” has accomplished little more than harassing librarians and making white mothers fearful of every shadow.

By contrast, NPU regularly puts parents before the Biden administration.

It gets no more real than that.

Giving credit where it is due

Last week, a hefty package addressed to me arrived on my doorstep. I’ve been on an Amazon diet, so this package had an element of true mystery. [By the way, I love mail].

When I opened it, this is what I found:

This crystal trophy is NPU’s 2024 Aisha El-Mekki Education Justice Award, with my name on it.

My eyes feel the mist.

Why?

Getting an award with Mama El-Mekki’s name on it is an honor I haven’t earned. For the decade I’ve known my brother Sharif El-Mekki, I’ve wondered how he balances militant advocacy with a stable sense of peace and good nature. Meeting his parents answers that question. Mama Aisha was an educator and an unfailing warrior for our people, a living example of what good looks like in the struggle for Black liberation.

I saw her last at the inaugural NPU convention in 2019.

Here we are:

After my brothers in the 8 Black Hands did a live-on-stage podcast at the event, she told us through Sharif to keep fighting and doing what we were doing.

That’s in keeping with every message the El-Mekki family sends to the world: be vigilant and peaceful. I cherish that, even if I have no earthly idea how to achieve it in my own life.

I don’t get awards. I piss people off and get kicked out of cliques. No one understands that more than Keri, a woman sometimes criticized for having sharp elbows.

We’ve had moments of serious disagreement that I thought we wouldn’t come back from. I’d be lying if I didn’t say there were times I hoped for her failure. That’s scandalous but honest.

Strangely, it was in those moments when she would text to check on me and see if I needed anything, especially when people were after me.

That’s what the universe does to launder my heart when it’s dirty.

So, here we are. I’ve found my lane, and she’s exceeding the vision for parent efficacy that I dreamed of years ago. She is securing access to decision-makers at the highest level for forgotten families. She’s doing it without the gross maternalism seen in organizations that put “empowered” all over their grant applications when, in practice, they are just inventing new ways to deliver condescension to the poor.

I didn’t expect Keri and NPU to get this far. I didn’t expect to sing their praises.

But their record speaks for itself.

Power to the parent.