Without a community of care, we cannot care for our communities. Webs of care have long shepherded our building of solidarity with one another to foster endurance during our most difficult times. This solidarity building and flow of reciprocity in webs of care as defined by the concept of comadrismo is what strengthens us to endure and fight back. Barragan Santoyo & Perez (2023), explain that comadrismo describes the relationship between “...women who share common goals, values, and seek to utilize their bond to advance the betterment of their surrounding community.” (p. 44) and that women use their lived experiences to build community and trust while taking care of each other. We extend this spirit of comadrismo to describe the webs of care we develop to resist current attacks on our communities.

It is through the webs of solidarity which we form with colleagues, families, and community members, that we can find the strength to resist, fight back, and ultimately change the trajectory of our generation. This journal has created its own web of care as it brings intodialogue/diálogo the perspectives and leaders who shape our educational settings: students, teachers, counselors, researchers, practitioners, and community members. In this issue, juntos, we want to extend the ideology of comadrerismo, to harness its spirit and attempt to describe our newly created realities by webs of care, endurance, and solidarity which folks are creating to resist the ongoing assaults on our communities.  In the following pages, we highlight experiences, contributions, and tejidos across K-16 that serve as testament to the endurance of our collective communities.  

During the last few years, we were forced to transform our realities to adjust our lives and innovate as educators, as human beings, in ways we might not have thought possible. We innovated even while so many around us and around the world, sometimes those we loved, transitioned, were hospitalized or were in despair, directly affected by the pandemic. The pandemic, how we were forced to adjust to it, irrevocably changed how we live and who we are. Still, many choose to hold on to the hope that we will “return to normal.” We, however, argue that our normal will never be what we once knew, and we embrace that tension and our new realities. In the chaos of our current moment, grief, joy, and healing are intertwined and are generating a novel form of critical praxis and ways of being.  

We recognize that while our existence has been in turmoil, our humanity, and our ability to find joy and heal and be intentional in our experiences persisted. In this inaugural volume of In Dialogue/ En Diálago, we want to honor the messiness that comes with this transformation. We want to honor the seeds we planted, the roots that have begun to grow and the sprouts we wish to cultivate. The pieces herein reflect these transitions and growth. Sustaining dialogue/diálogo about grief, innovation, joy, healing, and uncertainty is critical not only to support one another, but to also generate new ways of being and doing in and out of our educational contexts. Readers, as you embark on these pages, you now become part of the dialogue.