Approximately 2.4 million Black youth throughout the United States participate in a wide range of after-school programs that focus on tutoring, academic achievement, sports and play, organizing and activism, cultural identity, and more.

Today on the show, Carousel sits down with Bianca J. Baldridge to talk about the youth workers who run these programs—who are often understudied and undervalued in society—through the lens of her new book, Reclaiming Community. Their conversation touches on race and racism in the educational system and the role of after-school programs and community-based organizations in Black and Latinx youth development.

Bianca J. Baldridge is an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Her scholarship examines the political and social context of community-based educational spaces and after-school education. She is the author of Reclaiming Community: Race and the Uncertain Future of Youth Work (Stanford University Press, 2019).

Bianca J. Baldridge is presenting at the Wisconsin Book Festival on Friday, October 18, 4:30 PM in Community Room 301 at the Central Library (201 W. Mifflin St., Madison). The event is free and open to the public. More information available here.