Refusing the Master's Tools: An Abolition Feminist Framework for Career and Technical Education for Black Girls

Overview & Synopsis

The contemporary reconceptualization of Career and Technical Education (CTE) often emphasizes the need for more post-secondary opportunities for racially marginalized students. Yet CTE typically functions as a mode of social control for the racial capitalist project, and increased exposure and more CTE for students of color, particularly Black girls who have been notoriously neglected across the profession, without a refusal of its extractive purpose, will not radically shift possibilities for their futures. In this article, we apply Critical Race Feminism to analyze the current contextual landscape for Black girls in CTE, and argue that CTE educators and school counselors must turn toward the politics of abolition feminism to radically transform future possibilities for and with Black girls. We offer five life-affirming tenets of abolition feminist praxis that refuse the master's tools (Lorde, 1984) of traditional CTE and center and elevate the humanity and world-making of Black girls.