Services for Schools

Educators strive to find meaningful ways that their students can engage in constructive conversations about race, equity, and social justice. It’s a challenge to find authentic programs that engage the students and integrate into the busy school schedule.

Justice Vanguard offers several programs that can be directly included in your school calendar, or tailored to meet the particular needs of your students and school. Our programs engage students and provide them with knowledge that serves as a foundation for building community and analyzing the world around them.  We believe that critical thinking is our most powerful weapon, and that there is nothing wrong with not knowing, only with not being willing to learn.  It is with this mentality that we create our education programs. 

We know we are awesome! Don’t just take it from us…

“Kenan and Kiyoshi were excellent and engaging speakers, and their presentation was very impactful. They covered complex and important topics in a way that was both truthful and compassionate.” - SJUSD Parent and Facilitator for San Jose Unified Equity Coalition

“Justice Vanguard’s presentations are informative and engaging. They are able to connect with students with a wide-range of learning abilities and ages. Our students have enjoyed having them speak and are excited to have them back on campus each time they come.” - Director of EBC School

“JV actually walks its talk and does the heavy lifting of building a more inclusive, positive community in which everyone can thrive.” - MVLA High School Teacher

Pilot Our Program at your School

Program Components:

  • Three large-group presentations. Timing is flexible, but generally starts in the fall, continues around Black History Month in February, and finishes later in the spring. Our dynamic co-founders will bring an energetic and captivating experience that will begin to surface some of the ways that your students already interact with inequity in our society: sometimes bound by it, sometimes witnesses to it, and sometimes complicit in it.

  • Educate365. Students, staff, and families will receive our interactive newsletter, Educate365, that reinforces what they learn in the presentations and connects those things to the everyday realities of life – through music, books, movies, and current events.

Our Program Grows with you!  The schools we work with see our value – all of the schools that we have worked with add more components after trying the Pilot. Here are some of the components that South Bay schools have found valuable:

  • In addition to our three standard presentations, we offer a variety of large-group presentation topics designed to educate students about how race, equity, and social justice intersect everyone’s lives. Example topics include: how banking and real estate practices from the 50s create and perpetuate disadvantaged communities today, or exploring the impact of representation in media on our biases.

    These are 1 hour presentations:

    • 35-45 mins presenting

    • 15-25 mins for questions and discussion on covered topics

  • Small groups allow for safe and authentic conversations. With 8-20 students at a time, we’ll explore how the foundational presentations resonate with us, and explore how we can make a positive impact in the world around us. We will conduct multiple sessions, offering a variety of days / time options to mitigate scheduling conflicts.

    These are 45mins to 1 hour conversations:

    • 5-10 mins setting goals for discussion opening exercises to

    • 15-25 mins discussing material from large presentation

    • 15-30 mins exploring connections to daily lives

  • Understand your teams and organizations exposure and education on different topics and their progression throughout the year. Using simple 5-to-10 question surveys after each presentation, we will provide insight on student comprehension of the material, the relevance of topics to your student body, how your students fit their social justice experience into the wider world, as well as diagnostics on your educational team success.

  • This is more than an internship program. We are supporting future leaders.

    Learn and work with industry professionals in areas such as:

    • film production and photography

    • project planning

    • research

    • script writing

    • presentation design

    • public speaking

    We have experience working with students of all ages but are looking for High School students whom are passionate about social and racial justice and want to have a greater impact in their community.

  • Accessible short term projects that allow students to lead their own initiatives that align with JV missions and have a real world impact.  This could be a community event, fundraiser, educational campaign, video series, podcast, community actions or more!  The goal is to give students who want to do more an opportunity to lead impact projects with the flexibility of a smaller overall time commitment.


  • Assisting teachers in adding diverse perspectives to class projects and lessons. We tap into our amazing network of leaders to bring new perspectives to the classroom while saving time for our amazing and busy teachers.

  • It seems that every week another tragedy or miscarriage of justice dominates the headlines. Those events affect our students and they turn to a combination of social media, teachers, and parents to make sense of it. We can provide support and guidance to the educators and students when those things happen, so you aren’t negotiating that tough road alone.

  • Parents play a crucial role in student engagement and education. Our parent nights bring them into the conversation and provide them with support in an entertaining way. This includes catered food, an art show, a presentation, small group conversations, and more! Each parent night is custom built for the school and its needs.

  • Interactive newsletter that serves as the connective tissue between our education topics, small group conversations, and current events. We will include a variety of additional forms for people to continue their immersion: books, articles, movies, music, artists etc.

  • This additional level of insight allows us to tailor our program to help address pain points. At the end of the year we will share results.

    Two in-depth surveys that (one pre-program & one post-program):

    • Assess the schools previous engagement with DE&I.

    • Explore problem areas for growth.

    • Track group (students, teachers, staff, parents) growth and engagement throughout the year.

    • Understand player and coach education and interaction levels.

    • Get feedback in material and delivery.

    • Gain insight on team dynamics and issues both internally and externally.

Selected Justice Vanguard Clients