Maria A. Raspallo

Teach Out

FNED 502: Social Issues in Education

Dr. Lesley Bogad

July 17th, 2018

When I began to think about the topic that I wanted to further explore for this project, I know immediately that I wanted to address the topic of racism and how it has personally touched my life.

I am a certified early childhood/ELL  educator, teaching kindergarten in an urban district in Rhode Island. The majority of the population I work with are families of color, many are newcomers/immigrants, and most live at or below the poverty line.  I would like to first share with you an experience that has affected me in ways that are still revealing themselves to me.

One afternoon last year, close to dismissal time, we had a fire drill.  What made this drill different from other drills, is that it was not planned.  As kindergarten teachers, the practice was that we would get some prior indication that a drill would be happening.  For this drill, we were instructed that this ‘was not a drill’. As I ushered my students out of the building, we encountered many parents waiting to pick up their children.  Remember, this ‘drill’ occurred just prior to dismissal. One particular parent was trying desperately to enter the building. As protocol dictated, we were trained to not let anyone in the building during any type of evacuation.  This mother was insistent that she was going to enter the building. I was just as insistent that she was not. At this point, I should note that this mother was Black; I am Caucasian. While I understood her frustration and her fear, for at this point she did not know where her child was and I, nor anyone, could tell her with any certainty why we were evacuating.  This mother charged at me, calling me racist and that if she were white and her child was white, I would have no problem letting her in the building to find her son. I was stunned; then sad; then I became angry. At the time, I really did not see her color as a reason to not let her in the building. I was lost in trying to make sense of being accused of being a racist.  

And, I remained dumbfounded, angry, hurt, and quite offended. HOW DARE SHE CALL ME A RACIST…..

Then, I took this class.  In this class, I learned about the word privilege and how it is defined as,”There are some things I will never have to think about or worry about because of who I am”,(from the video: 5 Tips for Being a Good Ally).  Privilege is the fact that I have rights that others do not because they are identified as being a member of a marginalized group.  I am a straight, white, middle-class, well-educated woman who identifies as she; I am married, live in my own home, and professionally employed.  My sons will never be pulled over in a traffic stop and risk being killed because of the color of their skin. I have never felt judged by the color of my skin walking into a store or high end restaurant; I have never had incidents of micro-aggression due to my appearance, my spoken language, or how I am dressed.  

In the article, ‘ “Ever Been Told to Check Your Privilege?” Here’s What It Really Means’ by Sam Dylan Finch, (July 27th, 2015), Finch admits he was offended, angry, and defensive when he was asked to check his privilege.  Sound familiar….just like I was when I was called a racist. This resonated with me on such a personal level. I was angry and offended as well. I had no real understanding how my privilege affected my life since I defined privilege in a completely incorrect way.  

Yes, I do have privilege.  As Finch goes on to write, “..we may, unknowingly have certain advantages over others”.  This is what Allan G. Johnson wrote about in his book, Privilege, Power, and Difference, (2001).  Johnson brought the words racism, sexism, and homophobia to the table.  He states that ‘people can’t help fearing the unfamiliar..”

To the mother that called me a racist, she fears for her child’s life everyday because she lives a reality that I can never know.  My professor, Dr. Lesley Bogad of Rhode Island College made a statement that I will carry with me for the duration of my teaching career.  When I was called a racist, my knee jerk reaction was to be defensive. What I could have said, was, “I hear you. I do not think I am racist, let’s talk about it.  I hear you. I see you. I believe you. I am sorry”. To have that hard conversation, to say the words racist, to acknowledge that I will never know what her reality is, would have gone a long way to understanding, from her seeing me and me seeing her.

In Lisa Delpit’s Other People’s Children: The Silenced Dialogue: Power and Pedagogy in Educating Other People’s Children (Culture and Conflict in the Classroom) (1995/2006), she discussed the concept called the Culture of Power.  She listed the following five aspects of the culture of power as it pertains to the classroom.  They are as follows and taken directly from her book.

-Issues of power are enacted in  the classroom.

-There are codes of rules for participating in power; that is there is a culture of power.

-The rules of the culture of power are a reflection of the rules of the culture of those who have power.

-If you are not already a participant in the culture of power, being told explicitly the rules of power, makes acquiring power easier.

-Those with power are frequently least aware-or at least willing to acknowledge-its existence.  Those with less power are often most aware of its existence.

For my TEACH OUT Project, I had originally set out to interview a colleague on the subject of racism and privilege in the classroom as well as taking a look at this from the perspective of two children; one Black and one Caucasian.  Due to time constraints, I needed to make adjustments as to how I was going to gather information. Due to scheduling issues with the two children I had planned to interview, I was unable to secure those interviews. My goal with interviewing a colleague was to bring to the table for discussion, how we, as white teachers, may not be fully addressing the issue of racism within our classes.  As I have discovered in this class as well as in Digital Media/550, we are surrounded by images, books, digital media, movies, and curriculum that promote racial stereotypes and prejudices. As members of society that are not marginalized, I wanted to learn more about how my colleague viewed the subject of racism in her classroom. Since, this topic enters every aspect of the classrooms we teach in, from the curriculum, to the assessment tools for data collection, to classroom libraries, to interpersonal relationship and classroom dynamics, I need to narrow down my objective.  The area that I narrowed my research on became what my colleague’s classroom library looked like. My colleague works in the same school, teaching kindergarten. Her classroom is made up of 22 students; nine girls, four of whom are children of color. Of the female children of color, all were born in the United States. There were 13 boys. Of the the thirteen male children, ten were children of color. Of the ten male children, all but two were not born in the United States. For the purpose of this project, I concentrated solely on the races of her students. However, there is more to them than race: many are from families who are living at or below the poverty line.  There are children in this class who are from non-traditional family structures. There are three children who are homeless. Looking at the concept of intersectionality where there are many facets that make up the children, race is just one of those factors.

As we looked at the books in her library, my colleague became physically uncomfortable.  It was noted that there was not ONE book that showcased a family or child of color as the main character(s). Nor did she have any books that showcased other nationalities or ethnicities.  However, it should be noted that she did have books in her library that showed differently-abled people, children and adults. My colleague also had books that told stories about kindness, addressed bullying, manners, inclusion, as well as various picture books, story books, and simple readers.  

Since I was upfront about the nature of this project and how children of color are included in the culture of the room, I asked her why it was that there were no books depicting children/families of color or any other race other than Caucasian.  At first she became defensive, explaining that the books she has are the one that came with the room; and that she did not have the money to buy books out her own pocket. When I suggested getting books from the school library or the public library, she said she didn’t have the time.  It was becoming obvious that my colleague simply did not grasp the importance of addressing this issue head on.

So, I put the spotlight on me.  She was not aware of the incident that had occurred last year during the drill at out school.  I shared with her the story and how it had affected me. I further talked about how a shift in my perspective, looking through a different lens if you will, guided me to  better understanding of the power I held simply because of the color of my skin. I then asked her about privilege..and sure enough, she had the same reaction as I did, as Finch did: she became defensive and QUITE offended. Then I showed her the video, 5 Tips to Being A Good Ally.  What she took from this video is what I had hoped she would: a better understanding of the word privilege.  After seeing the video, we further discussed our privilege and how it affects the way we teach, the way we interact, and the way we discipline our students; do we interact differently based on the skin color of our students; do we hold all our students to the same standards of what is or is not acceptable?

The discussion that came about was eye-opening for the both of us.  For positive changes to take place, we must recognize we have privilege.  Once we do that through meaningful, honest, and humbling reflection, then we can take the steps needed in our classrooms that will insure not only equal but equitable experiences and education for all our students.

Follow-Up to this project:  I will be working with my colleague to build a library that showcases various races, ethnicities, and family dynamics to address the many facets that make up each of our students.