The Coordinating Committee is made up of DSC member groups from across the country that meet monthly to provide oversight and support for the campaign and to ensure that DSC works towards the priorities set by our membership. 

- 2012 DSC Coordinating Committee
- Former DSC Interim Core Group Members
- DSC Anchor Organization

Photo: current(*) and former members of the Interim Core Group with DSC staff. L to R from top row: Harold Jordan*, Joyce Parker*, Marsha Weissman*, Sarah Biehl, Matthew Cregor*, Chloe Dugger (Staff), David Payne, Maisie Chin*, Monami Maulik*, Anna Lambertson, Liz Sullivan*, Joao Da Silva (Staff).

DSC’s Transition from Interim Core Group to Coordinating Committee

The current Coordinating Committee formed in January 2012 after a transitional period during which time an Interim Core Group helped steward the planning process to develop the membership and decision-making structures of the campaign.  In 2012, several members of the Interim Core Group transitioned into the current Coordinating Committee made up of organizational representatives. 

Later this year we will hold an election and selection process to recruit additional DSC member groups to join the Coordinating Committee.  In 2012, there were also several members who stepped off of the Interim Core Group, but who continue to be involved in the campaign. We want to thank them for their many years of work to support and help grow the DSC!  The current Coordinating Committee members are:

Community Asset Development Re-Defining Education (CADRE) - Maisie Chin is Executive Director and Co-Founder of CADRE (Community Asset Development Re-defining Education), an independent, grassroots parent membership organization in South Los Angeles comprised of low-income African American and Latino parents/caregivers launched in 2001. CADRE’s mission is to solidify and advance parent leadership to ensure that all children are rightfully educated regardless of where they live. Through parent organizing, monitoring and accountability campaigns, and coalition building, CADRE has successfully influenced school discipline policy and practice at the Los Angeles Unified School District level and is moving towards addressing state and national policies using the human rights framework. Ms. Chin is a native Californian and child of Chinese immigrants. She has been part of the educational and social justice movement for 18 years, dedicated to fighting institutional racism by protecting and transforming public education in low-income neighborhoods of color. She also has over two decades of experience in facilitation, training, and organizational development.  In addition to directing CADRE, Ms. Chin also serves on the Boards of Directors of Justice Matters, a national racial justice policy and research organization based in Oakland, California, and the Schott Foundation for Public Education, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Inc. - Matthew Cregor  is the Assistant Counsel of the Education Practice at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. where he has worked full-time since 2010 after serving as a consultant for LDF’s “Dismantling the School-to-Prison Pipeline” initiative.  Matt provides support for community-led efforts to improve school discipline and is working to integrate these efforts with the national push to reform No Child Left Behind (also known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act). Matt joined the Dignity in Schools Campaign’s Coordinating Committee in 2008 and facilitates the Campaign’s Federal Strategies Working Group.  In this role, Matt works with Campaign members to engage Congress and the administration in support of disciplinary policies and practices that end school pushout and improve school climate. Prior to LDF, Matt worked on district-, state-, and federal-level discipline reform efforts as a staff attorney at the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama.   He is a graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center.  Before practicing law, Matt taught fifth grade at a middle school in the Bronx, New York.

ACLU of Pennsylvania - Harold Jordan works as a Community Organizer at the ACLU of Pennsylvania, where he has served as the editor of the ACLU's Know Your Rights: A Handbook for Public School Students in Pennsylvania. Harold was a public school parent in Philadelphia, PA for 19 years. He chairs the leadership board of The Philadelphia Public School Notebook, an independent, nonprofit news service reporting on public education. He is a member of the core group for the Dignity in Schools Campaign. In Philadelphia, Harold works with two organizations combating the school to prison pipeline: Community Responses to Zero Tolerance and Education Not Incarceration.

DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving) - Monami Maulik was born in Kolkata, India and grew up in the Bronx.  She has been an immigrant and racial justice organizer for over 15 years. After graduating from Cornell University in 1996 with a major in Globalization and Development and minors in Women's and South Asian Studies, she began organizing in New York City for racial justice, police accountability, youth, and global justice.  From 1997-2000, she was an Organizing Committee member of the NY Taxi Workers’ Alliance, and then worked as Director for TICO (Training Institute for Careers in Organizing). Monami has served with: Coalition to Free Mumia Abu Jamal, United for Peace and Justice, Grassroots Global Justice, Racial Justice 911, and the NYC Organizing Support Center.  In 2000, Monami founded DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving)  as one of the first low-income South Asian community-based organizations for social justice in the U.S.  Since then, she has continued to serve as the Executive Director and leads campaign strategy in immigrant and racial justice, national security, education reform, and global justice programs. She is as a board member of National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and the national Dignity in Schools Campaign, an Advisory Board member of the North Star Fund, and a national Steering Committee member of the United National Anti-War Committee

Youth Justice Coalition - Kim McGill is with Youth Justice Coalition, which is working to build a youth-led movement to challenge race, gender and class inequality in the Los Angeles County juvenile injustice system.  Kim previously lived and worked in the South Bronx. There she was one of 13 founding members of Youth Force, a youth-led project that established the South Bronx Community Justice Center. Its initiatives included supporting youth in juvenile detention to fight for better conditions; Teens and Tenants (TNT), youth-led tenant organizing to rehabilitate and protect low-income housing; Street University, which connects youth involved in street level drug trafficking to jobs, education, housing and other resources; and Politrix, which enables youth to affect the design and implementation of public policy, city and state budgets, as well as to register and educate youth voters.  In 1998 Kim was a community fellow with the Open Society Institute and in 1999 received a Union Square Award from the The Fund for the City of New York.

Citizens for a Better Greenville - Joyce Parker is Executive Director of Citizens for a Better Greenville of Greenville, MS.  She is a licensed social worker and has a bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice.  Joyce has over five years of experience in law enforcement, including as a Juvenile Officer, as well as many years of experience as an educator in various settings, including as a school attendance officer, counselor, substitute teacher, school bus driver, and program developer for a drug education program.  She is a board member of Southern Echo, Delta Consortium for a Positive Change, WDSV 91.9 Community Radio Station, Pushback Network, Southern Partners Fund, and Camp Looking Glass.   

NESRI (National Economic and Social Rights Initiative) - Liz Sullivan is the Human Right to Education Program Director at the NESRI (National Economic and Social Rights Initiative) , the current Anchor Organization for the Dignity in Schools Campaign. Liz works in partnership with youth, parents, educators and advocates to promote policy change in public schools to guarantee students’ rights to dignity and a quality education.  She has worked with local community-based groups to carry out participatory research projects to on human rights violations in New York City, Los Angeles and Louisiana public schools, and developed trainings with parents, youth and organizers about how to incorporate human rights standards and strategies into advocacy campaigns.  She has worked as a consultant with Human Rights Education Associates and as Project Coordinator at the Center for Economic and Social Rights. She holds a BA from Brown University and a Masters degree in Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

CCA (Center for Community Alternatives) - Marsha Weissman is the founder and Executive Director of the CCA (Center for Community Alternatives). CCA’s mission is to reduce the use of incarceration for juveniles and adults through services, organizing, research and policy advocacy.  CCA views the problem of mass incarceration as human rights and civil rights issues. Marsha first began working on criminal justice issues in the early 1970s as part of the Attica Brothers Legal Offense/Defense Team where. She holds a Ph.D. in Social Science from the Maxwell School of Citizenship, Syracuse University. Dr. Weissman is the author of several publications focusing on issues of mass criminalization. In 2002, Dr. Weissman testified before the U.S. Senate Health and Labor Committee on the problem of the “school to prison pipeline” and ways to reduce school suspension and expulsions.  In 2008, Marsha accompanied youth from CCA’s juvenile justice programs to Geneva Switzerland where they testified before the U.N. Committee to End Racial Discrimination about the problem of racial disparities in the U.S. juvenile justice system and the school-to-prison pipeline.

The following Interim Core Group members stepped off of the Core Group at the end of 2011:

An Ohio native, Sarah Biehl received both her undergraduate and law degrees from Ohio State University and clerked for the Honorable James G. Carr of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio before being awarded a Skadden Fellowship with the Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago. While in Chicago, Sarah designed and operated a legal clinic inside a public charter high school on the west side of the city and developed a strong commitment to community-based lawyering as a means of working for systems change.  Sarah moved back to Ohio in early 2008 to focus on systemic advocacy on education law issues as a staff attorney at the Ohio Poverty Law Center. Sarah is deeply committed to empowering low-income children and their families and has represented children and their parents in a variety of areas. Sarah has done presentations on special education law and students’ rights, published articles on school discipline and safe haven laws, and chairs the statewide task force in Ohio on education law issues. 

POSITIVE VISION: "I hope for DSC to be a place where advocates, organizers, community members, educators, etc. can all come together, not judge or assume, and learn from and support each other.  We've made tremendous progress toward making this happen, and I'm confident we're moving in the right direction.  I also think DSC is moving toward being the pre-eminent national source of information, analysis, and tools on school pushout, the school to prison pipeline, and school discipline reform.  Our mission/message is strong and resonates powerfully and its influence and impact will only continue to grow!"

Anna Lambertson is the Executive Director of Kansas Health Consumer Coalition in Topeka, Kansas. She previously managed a program for the state’s social service agency to improve access to services for immigrants and refugees with limited English proficiency, and she coordinated a community-based initiative for Spanish-speaking parents of children with mental health and special education needs. It was in this latter role that she became involved with the Dignity in Schools Campaign as she sought organizations that embraced a human rights framework to address school discipline and reform. In addition to the Dignity in Schools Campaign, Anna serves on the board of the Mother & Child Health Coalition where she chairs the Legislative Committee, and previously served as Chair of the Topeka Human Relations Commission. She was a member of the Sunflower Foundation 2011 Advocacy Fellowship Class.  Anna holds a BA in French and International Studies and a MA in International Studies, both from the University of Kansas. Her studies include coursework in French, Spanish and Portuguese language studies at the University of Franche-Comté in Besançon, France. Anna also completed a Certificate in Advertising and coursework in business and marketing from the Graduate School of Management in Clermont-Ferrand, France. 

POSITIVE VISION: "I look forward to watching the DSC continue to strengthen its geographical representation across the country and become a force to be reckoned with. Hopefully we can play a role in making education a human right in the United States. I am excited about what the future may hold!"

Monica Llorente works on various local and national campaigns with parents, youth, educators, and others to advocate for changes in education and juvenile justice, and she teaches different courses, such as Community Lawyering, at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. For many years, Monica represented young people in juvenile delinquency proceedings and school law matters, and recruited, trained, and supported pro bono volunteer attorneys from law firms in these cases. Before going to law school, she was a teacher. 

POSITIVE VISION: "I envision a powerful DSC guided and truly led by the students who have been pushed out of school and their families.  I hope that we all continue to take the time to get to know and understand each other, so that we can figure out how we can best work together in implementing real solutions. Together, we can prove to people across the country that it is possible to have a public education system that provides the same quality of education to every student (regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, socio-economic class, or any other factor), and that we must continuously strive for this, since it is our duty to provide every student with their human right to a quality education."
                            
David Payne is currently the Managing Partner of CCM (Cooperative Consulting & Management, LLC), a community development consulting firm. From this position Mr. Payne is able to pursue his passions, serving the community and nation. Mr. Payne is currently involved many programs and projects, including the Becoming An Agent of Change mentoring program at the Joseph E. Lowery Institute for Justice & Human Rights at Clark Atlanta University, the  2025 Black Men & boys Campaign and serving as Executive Director of Atlanta Community Engagement Team (ACET).  David and his wife Blanche have been married for 19 years. They have 3 children – Robert (Graduate North Atlanta High), Gabriel (Sophmore at North Carolina AT&T) and Sara (12th Grade Decatur High). The Payne’s are members of Providence Missionary Baptist Church. 

POSITIVE VISION: "My one wish is that those who are most affected will fully be empowered to lead DSC at every level of the campaign. I hope that as we grow, we create a space for the next group of new leaders to shine."

Lori Turner is a staff attorney at the ACLU of Illinois working to protect the rights of vulnerable persons in Illinois--from children in the child welfare system to adults with disabilities warehoused in nursing homes. Lori spent her first two years at the ACLU as an Equal Justice Works fellow working to assure that children in foster care have access to an adequate and stable education and receive appropriate mental health services. This work has continued and expanded through the ACLU's efforts to stem the so-called school-to-prison-pipeline, including involvement in the national Dignity in Schools Campaign. Before coming to the ACLU, Lori was an elementary school teacher in public schools in Los Angeles. Her teaching experience was the impetus for her to go to law school to become a more effective advocate for children and to work for equity in public schools. *Lori is away on maternity leave and was unable to attend this weekend.

POSITIVE VISION: "My hope for DSC is that it continues to evolve and expand so that students, families and advocates in communities all over the country have a local resource to help them fight against unfair policies and practices that keep kids out of the classroom where they belong."

DSC Anchor Organization

The National Economic and Social Rights Initiative (NESRI) is the current Anchor Organization for the DSC.  Since Spring 2010, when DSC received its first grant, NESRI has managed DSC funding and supervised DSC national staff.  Liz Sullivan represents the Anchor Organization on the Core Group and participates in DSC Working Groups and activities. NESRI is also a Steering Committee member of the local DSC-New York chapter. 

NESRI’s organizational mission is to work in partnership with communities to build a broad movement in the United States for economic & social rights, including health, housing, education and work with dignity. The Human Right to Education Program at NESRI works in partnership with youth, parents, educators and advocates to ensure that our public school systems create learning environments that protect human dignity and support the full academic, social and emotional development of every young person. NESRI works with community partners to conduct research and participatory documentation, policy analysis, advocacy and training to change school policies and practices that push young people out of school and promote positive approaches to school climate and discipline that guarantee students’ human right to education.