ABOUT ANELL ECCLESTON:
Anell previously worked at the Student Advocacy Center from 2014-2019. During that time he served as a Check & Connect Mentor, Youth Action Michigan adult facilitator, Dignity in Schools Campaign Federal Liaison, and Programs Manager. From 2019-2021, Anell pursued passions of combatting the school-to-prison pipeline as a Juvenile Probation Officer for the Washtenaw County Trial Court-Juvenile Division. He returned to the Student Advocacy Center as the Director of Care and Sustainability. In this role, he supports staff in efforts of combatting school push-out and ending the school-to-prison pipeline. He is an advocate for equitable education policy with a whole-child approach and is certified in trauma-informed practices. Anell earned a Master’s of Social Work degree from Eastern Michigan University in 2018. Anell became Co-Executive Director in October 2024.
RESOURCES:
Student Advocacy Center of Michigan
Student Advocacy Center of Michigan on Facebook
Student Advocacy Center of Michigan on Instagram
Student Advocacy Center on LinkedIn
Student Advocacy Center of Michigan on YouTube
TRANSCRIPTION:
Decky Alexander: This is 89.1 WEMU, and welcome to our weekly conversation on equity and opportunity in our county and in our community. I'm your host, Decky Alexander, and I'm honored, still and always, to welcome you to this week's edition of Washtenaw United. This is someone or a hundred or a thousand-person story. A student in a public school is pushed out or not allowed or maybe it's a misunderstanding or miscommunication or a lack of advocacy, someone to help that student navigate the complexity or cautiousness or callousness of the public school system. The public school is not broken. As Anell Eccleston, co-executive director of the Student Advocacy Center says, it just needs re-imagining of what it means to see true equity in schools. Anell, welcome to Washtenaw United! We're so thrilled that you are here today!
Anell Eccleston: Yes, thank you for having me! I'm so excited to share some of the work that we're doing at SAC and just always happy to be on with you all!
Decky Alexander: All right! So, I should note that this conversation was booked before I had this gig. However, Student Advocacy Center, also known as SAC, has been professionally and personally similar to a spirit animal, my spirit organization. So, Anell, origin stories tell us a lot about an organization and how it lives now. Can you share a little bit about SAC's beginning?
Anell Eccleston: Yeah, yeah, of course! So, SAC was founded in 1975 by Ruth Zweifler. Rest in peace, Ruth Zweisler. She just recently passed away not too long ago. She founded the organization in collaboration with the NAACP of Ann Arbor, which is a pretty cool history, as we still collaborate with the NAACP of Ann Arbor to this day. They founded the organization based on inequities, inequitable treatment of Black and Brown students in our public schools, and really trying to support around literacy, appropriate education for Black students when it came to English language learning and appropriate comprehension. So, it was very deeply rooted in our community, in the Washtenaw County/Ann Arbor community that we see today. And from there, it just kind of boomed, right? And so, Ruth, I always tell stories about Ruth, how she would drive all across the state of Michigan advocating for students. Whether it was rain, sleet, or snow, she was in her car doing her thing and making sure students received equitable services when they were in school.
Decky Alexander: So, now one reason SAC came into being and has had remarkable growth and staying power is that those, like yourself, that work with SAC have proximity to the work they are doing. So, can you share a little bit about your origin story as it relates to SAC?
Anell Eccleston: I'm really grateful for all my years at SAC. I'm going on close to 10 years collectively now at the organization. And we have other staff that have been there just as long as I have, which is amazing as it shows a testament to the passion that we have for the work. For me, in particular, I'm an EMU grad, EMU alum, so I got my bachelor's and master's from EMU. In 2014, I graduated with my bachelor of social work. Then, I was able to get my start at SAC as a check and connect mentor. Then, from there, I became a youth organizer and check and connect mentor. I've had the privilege of traveling across the country with many young people. We even took a group of kids through a civil rights tour down south, and we went to Nashville, New Orleans, Montgomery, Atlanta up to Greensboro and came back to Detroit, which was completely insane in a car with ten kids for ten days. So, that was a lot of fun. But through all that work, it has sparked in me the opportunity for transformation within myself. And so, I'm always giving gratitude and very grateful for the young people that I've been able to serve and engage with in the community I've able to serve. Going into the pandemic, I had made a decision to become a juvenile probation officer for Washtenaw County, and it really gave me the perspective of the school-to-prison pipeline. And I always find it really interesting because whenever I mentioned school-to-prison pipeline, a lot of times, some administrators might cringe and say, "We don't send kids to prison!" No, you don't necessarily send kids to prison. There's a trajectory that happens when suspensions and expulsions began to happen to young people in schools. And then, when I came back to SAC in 2021, I came back as an assistant director and was fortunate enough to be coached by Perry and groomed by Perry to now become the co-executive director of the organization. So, I definitely started off at the at the bottom of the totem pole, but then, been really fortunate to be able to to climb my way to the top.
Decky Alexander: Well, I think most of us know that you have always been at the top of this organization. You are listening to Washtenaw United on 89.1 WEMU. I'm Decky Alexander. And today, we're talking with Anell Eccleston, co-executive director of the Student Advocacy Center, or SAC. Anell, can you talk a little bit about the system barriers, such as a lack of understanding of disabilities or maybe a district having so many high-need students they don't have capacity to support, and then really get to the crux of why students are pushed out and expelled and suspended from schools?
Anell Eccleston: Any disability, whether it's a student or an adult in any sector, is complex, right? So, it's important that we look at case-by-case, how do we support individuals with disabilities throughout our systems, right? When you think about it in education, there are laws that do protect students with disabilities. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, that does protect and provide services and require services provided for students with disabilities. And I think it's just really the capacity that you mentioned that really puts the strain on school districts. We've had to kind of tie things back to money. However, when you think about what our teachers are really going through in the classroom, it's really a disservice to them and the kids and the communities that these public schools are in, right? And som I think it's always important for us to uplift the hard work that teachers are doing. Unfortunately, they're underpaid and underresourced. And that's one of the fights that we're in as a state of Michigan, but then also even considering our education system federally, it's a fight that we are in. We want to make sure our teachers are equitably paid and equitbly serviced and taken care of as those that are really grooming the next future of our society, right? When it comes to supporting our teachers, schools are really at their ends of what do we do now? They don't have the resources or the capacity to implement anything new. So then, they do revert to suspensions and expulsions as kind of their last ditch effort. And I think what we're actually seeing now is a transition of students into virtual programs, right, these asynchronous virtual academies that are starting to come up. And now, we're seeing students, instead of them being suspended or expelled, they're being transitioned into these virtual programs where they're at home working on computers all by themselves with little to no support from the school, little to know support of engagement with teachers or support staff. And they're kind of left to fend for themselves.
Decky Alexander: SAC, as we shared earlier, has generational impact. So, is there one student or family member story that has impacted you and sticks with you still?
Anell Eccleston: Oh, there's a few of those. They always stand out to me. Like I said before, I've had the very, very distinct pleasure of working with a lot of young people over the years. I always kind of think of a young person that I was working with. Him and I weren't really the best of literally connect right off the bat. And I think that's kind of sometimes what happens when you step into a young person's life when they have a lot of trauma. And I kind of check to figure out what works and what sticks. And this particular young person and I, we worked together for probably about four years, I don't know if I would say this, probably from 2015 to probably 2019. And I still talk to him to this day, which is amazing! For him, I was not really a big fan of him to say the least, and I'm pretty sure he wasn't a big of me at the beginning, making him get up in the morning and go of school, right? But I remember I would pick him up, and one day, my check engine light was on and he said, "Hey, pop your hood, and we'll take a look." I was like, "What?" An eighth grade student who was struggling to read and struggling to like perform in the classroom just opened my hood and kind of found out what was going on with my car and my check-engine light. I was just like, "This is crazy!" From there, we just were able to really start to build our bond deeper, and as he continued to grow, I saw him into high school. And I think that was really when it became apparent for him is that he was very low skilled when it came to the academics. It was probably around 9th to 10th grade. And then, at that point, I was really committed to supporting him all the way through high school. I used to sit down with him, and we would read magazines on automotives and cars. And he taught me how to change a tire and how to change the oil and all these kinds of things as we were working together and partnering through through his education journey. And he had a big goal of graduating from high school. And I remember one time specifically, we took a trip to Atlanta, and we were on the airplane. It was his first airplane ride. I told him to sit by the window, and he was petrified. And I was just like, "Yo man! You got to leave the window open and actually look out as we were taking off." And as you take off in the airplane, obviously, perspective is a thing, right? And so he was like, "Oh, why is the ground getting so much smaller?" And I was like, "Man, that's perspective. Think about how big your problems really are when you're up here, right? And the world is so big that when you really have a problem for yourself, if you could reframe how big that problem is, it doesn't seem as big in the grand scheme of what you're trying to accomplish in life." I was very proud of him. Now, I believe he lives down in Monroe now with his fianceé and their children, and he's doing quite successful. So, I'm very proud of him! I look forward to going to his wedding in the near future!
Decky Alexander: That was Anell Eccleston, a transformational person in his own right, and also the co-executive director of the Student Advocacy Center, also known as SAC, for talking to us about SAC's tales of service and advocacy in this community. We are so much better because of it and because of you. To learn more about SAC, swing by our website at WEMU.org. Washtenaw United is produced in partnership with the United Way for Southeastern Michigan. And you can hear it right here every Monday. I'm Decky Alexander, and this is your community NPR station, 89.1 WEMU Ypsilanti.
WEMU has partnered with the United Way for Southeastern Michigan to explore the people, organizations, and institutions creating opportunity and equity in our area. And, as part of this ongoing series, you’ll also hear from the people benefiting and growing from the investments being made in the areas of our community where there are gaps in available services. It is a community voice. It is 'Washtenaw United.'
Non-commercial, fact based reporting is made possible by your financial support. Make your donation to WEMU today to keep your community NPR station thriving.
Like 89.1 WEMU on Facebook and follow us on X (Twitter)
Contact WEMU News at 734.487.3363 or email us at studio@wemu.org
