I’m so proud to introduce my long time friend, Brandee Blocker Anderson, to the Womanly community. Watching her grow as a human and professional has been inspiring to say the least. Brandee is a lawyer, educator, former Teach for America corps member, the founder and CEO of The Antiracism Academy, and a Chief Racial Equity Strategist for the City of Philadelphia's Office of Community Empowerment and Opportunity (CEO). She’s also a mother, wife, and friend to many.
As a North Philadelphia native, Brandee grew up with an acute awareness of the systemic racism and daily discrimination at work in her community. This awareness ignited a real passion and drive to educate people on the challenges they’re up against. She fights every day for racial justice and seeks to create better social and economic outcomes for the Philadelphia community and beyond. In 2020, after working in corporate law for many years, Brandee founded The Antiracism Academy to dismantle racism and promote social justice through educational videos, trainings and workshops. And this year, she joined the City of Philadelphia as a Chief Racial Equity Strategist, working in the Office of Community Empowerment and Opportunity
In this interview, I speak to Brandee about her path from teacher to lawyer, to CEO, to holding an important and prestigious position in one of the biggest cities in the country. She also shares advice on how to maintain work-life balance and being a wife and mother on top of it all.
“My work is focused on dismantling systemic racism, and being able to look at the harm that the city has caused and pulling whatever levers that we can to stop that harm, mitigate it, alleviate it.”
Attia Taylor: Before you founded The Antiracism Academy, you worked as a teacher and a lawyer. What made you decide to make the switch to become a CEO?
Brandee Blocker Anderson: My interest in [anti-racism] work really started back in high school. After college, I came back to Philly and taught at Sankofa Freedom Academy Charter School, which strengthened my resolve to serve the community where I'm from. My vision going into law was to gain the skills of contract law and real estate, because I saw that connection between homeownership and economic mobility.
I learned so much practicing as an attorney, but I got sick of the toxic environment that the legal profession can be for Black women. I decided to found [The Antiracism Academy] as a passion project while I was working at Comcast as in-house counsel. We all saw George Floyd be murdered, and there was a whole tidal wave effect from that. So, I started putting together YouTube videos and making short content to give people basic information; to use the privilege that I've had through my education to make this information more digestible for other people. I decided to take a leap of faith, and quit my job at Comcast to pursue this work full time.
Attia Taylor: Did you feel like you had to take off your legal hat when you were doing The Antiracism Academy, or was it hand-in-hand?
Brandee Blocker Anderson: Everything went hand-in-hand. A lot of [DEI work] is based on compliance work that came out of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title VII (Seven), lawyers helping employers avoid litigation and discrimination claims. It's helpful to have that lens but, in my mind, that's the floor, the very bare minimum. Don't break the law. My background as a teacher has helped inform how we educate people, so that the conversation moves beyond just talking about implicit bias or tolerance.
When I started the company, the vision was to raise the next generation of anti-racist leaders from preschool to pre-college. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, as early as six months, babies start to recognize race based differences. By age 2 to 4, they start to internalize and demonstrate evidence of racial bias and by 12, kids are pretty much set in their beliefs about race. Even if you have the most non-racist parent, we live in a racist society where kids are constantly being bombarded with implicit and explicit messaging about who belongs, who's worthy, who's rich, who's beautiful, all of these things. My vision was to create content for children and parents so that as children are learning, parents and teachers are being tricked into learning themselves and are more invested in the learning because they're working with their children.
Attia Taylor: Let’s talk about your new role as Chief Racial Equity Strategist for the City of Philadelphia!
Brandee Blocker Anderson: My role sits in the Office of Community Empowerment and Opportunity, which has a long history going all the way back to President Lyndon Johnson’s administration, around the war on poverty. We're charged with thinking specifically about poverty alleviation, and issues of economic mobility. There's work specifically within this office, and then working with the other city agencies to make sure that racial equity is embedded in everything we do: from our budget, to our human resources, to our communications. It's making sure that our city partners, and nonprofits are also embedding racial equity in their work and are outcomes driven, and that we're collecting the data to make sure that the money that we're using is actually solving the problems that we are trying to address.
I could tear up just thinking about the moment that we live in right now, the fact that there is a role called Chief Racial Equity Strategist in this city. We're actually looking to reckon with race; we are leading with race as the focus, we're not shying away from that. My work is focused on dismantling systemic racism, and being able to look at the harm that the city has caused and pulling whatever levers that we can to stop that harm, mitigate it, alleviate it. We can also influence our business stakeholders and other actors, thinking about how we can right the wrongs of the past while moving the entire city forward.
Attia Taylor: I would love to hear about what you are bringing into this role as a lawyer, a Black woman, a Philadelphian, a mom, and CEO.
Brandee Blocker Anderson: There's so many lenses that I come into this work with. I stand on the shoulders of giants who've been doing this work, all the way back to abolitionists in a long line of social justice work. I'm bringing all of these life experiences into the work and thinking about all the lives we can touch. I'm coming into this from a reparative perspective. When I went to college, I really honed in on studying urban poverty because I wanted to understand why my world was the way it was. A big part of my vision is changing the narrative around how we talk about our people, really humanizing people, and pushing back on the idea that poverty is an individual failure, as opposed to a systemic failure.
“Don’t be afraid to walk away from situations that no longer serve you. You have to be fearless... You have to be willing to get up from the table when you’re full, or if they’re not serving you at all.”
Attia Taylor: In wearing all these hats, what does work-life balance look like for you?
Brandee Blocker Anderson: In law school, I was thinking about why certain professions are male dominated, and I came to the conclusion that spouses, in most cases wives, are the reason men have been able to dominate in many professions. I'm so fortunate that I'm a millennial woman with a millennial partner, who understands that this is a partnership. I would not be able to do this without my partner. When we met, I was a teacher, and I was, you know, cooking and cleaning because I had more time off and I got off work at three. So it made more sense. It goes back and forth and you find the balance.
One of the perks of these higher ranking jobs is more money. I'm all about ‘time is money.’ I have no shame in saying that somebody comes to my house to help us out. I never thought I would see the day, coming from where I come from.
Attia Taylor: What advice would you give to somebody who's looking to go into anti-racism work?
Brandee Blocker Anderson: Be very clear about why you're doing it, because this is hard work. You may encounter the same kinds of discrimination that you're trying to help people solve for. It takes a lot of internal fortitude to be able to turn down a gig because it doesn't align with your vision of what social justice or anti-racism work looks like. Also, make sure that you're grounding your work in something. You need more than just life experience. That's important, but there have been so many amazing scholars who've been writing about this work. We have data, we have social sciences, things we can add to our arsenal to bolster what we're saying.
For folks who are more junior in their careers, don't worry, it will all come together. As long as you're walking in faith, and you are living on purpose, you'll find your way. Know your worth. Don't be afraid to walk away from situations that no longer serve you. You have to be fearless. You have to know when it's time. You have to be willing to get up from the table when you're full, or if they're not serving you at all. No one will care more about your career trajectory more than you. No one's going to tell you when you've been sitting here for too long, you have to have that level of awareness.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Connect with Brandee Blocker Anderson on LinkedIn.
Resources for further reading:
