Understanding paras as key players in Black and Latino struggles for jobs and freedom, Nick Juravich details how the first generation of paras in New York City transformed work in public schools and the relationships between schools and the communities they served. Paraprofessional programs created hundreds of thousands of jobs in working-class Black and Latino neighborhoods. These programs became an important pipeline for the training of Black and Latino teachers in the1970s and early 1980s while paras’ organizing helped drive the expansion and integration of public sector unions.

An engaging portrait of an invisible profession, Para Power examines the lives and practices of the first generation of paraprofessional educators against the backdrop of struggles for justice, equality, and self-determination.

Acknowledgments

Introduction    In Search of Para Power

1. From Aides to Paras: Creating New Forms of Educational Work
2. “They Made Themselves Essential”: Paraprofessional Educators Go to Work in New York City, 1967–1970
3. “The Triumph of the Paraprofessionals”: Paraprofessional Educators Unionize in New York City, 1967–1970
4. "You Can Never Believe Your Good Luck”: Paraprofessional Educators and Their Allies in New York City in the 1970s
5. A Union of Paraprofessionals? The American Federation of Teachers and Paraprofessional Organizing in the 1970s
6. New Careers and Parent Implementation: New York Models for Federal Education Programs
7. “Mayor Koch, Meet a Workaholic”: Fiscal Crisis, Political Realignment, and the End of the Paraprofessional Movement

Epilogue    Paraprofessional Educators on the Front Lines, Once Again

Notes

Bibliography

Index