You Don’t Know Me

I had a student come into my acting class today and declare, “I was just the victim of racism.” This student is black, has an outstanding disposition towards race and a strong vision of his identity. He was not angry about it – more amused. I’ll recount his story as best I can.

During the passing period, he was walking through the hall with a comb in his hair – the handle of the comb was molded in the Black Power fist. Just outside his classroom, a dean asked him to remove the pick, which he did after telling the dean it wasn’t a pick, it was a comb. His teacher asked “what was that about?” The student told her the story, to which she responded “Maybe you should stop whining.” The student responded, “I’m not whining, I’m simply explaining what happened. We obviously grew up in different situations if you classify that as whining.” The teacher said, “You don’t know me,” to which the student responded, “You don’t know me.” The teacher then sent the student to the office.

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Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP): The Original Fly Girls

“This is not a time when women should be patient.  We are in a war and we need to fight it with all our ability and ever weapon possible.  WOMEN PILOTS, in this particular case, are a weapon waiting to be used.”
Eleanor Roosevelt, 1942

Yesterday this story aired on NPR.  It was a story perfect for celebrating International Women’s Day, except it came out a day late.  It was a story that covered women pilots during WWII, women who were born into the Depression mentality, women who were looking for a little excitement, perhaps, while their men were away fighting the Nazis.  They were all women with some flight experience, as the Airforce was not accepting women they needed to train.  And the Airforce was insistent on recognizing these women as civilians as opposed to military, so as the funerals of these amazing women were carried out, these women who died for their America, there were no flags, no condolence letters from the president, no horns blown.  After the war, men took the pilot positions back, these brave women returned home, tended to their families, had their children, and didn’t talk about their war experiences much.  At least according to pilot Lillian Yonally, who you can read more about by clicking here.

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Receiving Gifts from Students

Here are two scenarios involving generous students:

1)      My first semester of teaching at a community college, I received a gift from a student at the end of the semester.  It was a lovely little beaded necklace, bought at the local fair trade store.  The student gave me this gift on the last day of class, before grades were posted.   Based on what I had learned about her throughout the semester, I knew that the student was not trying to bribe me for a good grade—and after all, it was a small inexpensive gift—so I graciously accepted it. Read more…

Why Equality101 Exists

On my way to work Monday morning I was surfing through the radio stations to find something that would motivate me to start the week before Spring Break (a terribly difficult week for most teachers).   I heard this on National Public Radio (NPR):

Duncan To Step Up Civil Rights Enforcement

Some of the statistics cited in this report are staggering, but by no means surprising to most educators:

African-American students are six times less likely to be college and career-ready in biology than their white counterparts, or four times less likely to be college-ready in Algebra. We see districts where only 3 percent of high school English language learners are performing at grade level in math and in English.

In addition the issue of immigration rights can get woven into this discussion as well:

Latinos, on the other hand, pose a very different set of civil rights challenges. Tom Saenz of the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund says in some states, Latinos can’t even register for school without proof of their immigration status.

In a nutshell, this is why we at Equality101 do what we do.  We are striving for equal educational opportunities for all, and thankfully, we’re not the only ones.

Going Beyond International Women’s Day In Our Classrooms: We Are All Responsible

The following post can also be found at Ileana’s blog,  Feminist Teacher.

Yesterday was International Women’s Day across the world. Were you able to observe the day in your classroom or school in some way?

Depending on the school and its mission, a variety of schools across the U.S. celebrate National Latino Heritage Month in September; National Coming Out Day in October; Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in January; Black History Month in February; the Day of Silence in April, and many more important dates of observance.

But how many schools observe International Women’s Day? Probably not many schools, if any at all. Read more…

Title IX

Title IX helps ensure equality in education, including in the arena of sports.  As a coach of female athletes, I have had the pleasure of being around many female and male coaches that, similarly to me, respect and see the female athlete as talented, hard-working and significant as the male athlete.  We must not forget that female athletes put forth the same effort and deserve as much attention as male athletes.  Through coaching female and male athletes, I have come to understand the physical fitness, confidence, and character athletics can bring to students.  If I have children, I will encourage my daughters to participate in sports as much as my sons.  Since there is as much skill, toughness, and sacrifice in female athletics as there is in male athletics, we must continue to support and fund our female athletics as much as we support male athletics.

Women’s Academy…at Least for a Night

With last night’s Academy Award for Best Director going to Kathryn Bigelow, the Academy has awarded that Oscar to a woman for the first time in its history. There could not be a more perfect way to commemorate the strides women have made in entertainment and society. Bigelow’s win helps celebrate today’s theme: “Equal rights, equal opportunity: Progress for all.”

What I most enjoyed about her victory was not the fact that that a woman won, but that the best film-maker did. Bigelow put it best in her post award comments, “I’d love to just think of myself as a film-maker, and I long for the day when a modifier can be a moot point. But I’m ever grateful if I can inspire some young, intrepid, tenacious male or female film-maker and have them feel that the impossible is possible and never give up on your dream.”

That is what International Women’s Day is about.

Justice is Sweet: Astraea’s Funding the Fight for Queer People of Color

The following post can also be found at Feminist Teacher in honor of International Women’s Day, March 8, 2010.

The Astraea Foundation funds LGBTI social justice activism both in the US and globally. (photo courtesy of Astraea)

Do you know who is funding the fight for queer social justice in Africa?

Do you know who is funding the fight for queer social justice in Latin America?

Do you know who is funding the fight for queer social justice right here in the US?

The answer to all of these questions is Astraea. No other public foundation is working harder for sweet justice than the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, the world’s only foundation solely dedicated to funding LGBTI organizations in both the United States and internationally.

For more than 30 years, Astraea has been a major leader in the social justice feminist movement. Astraea began in 1977 in New York when a small group of women created a multi-racial, multi-class, feminist foundation in order to address the lack of funding for women—specifically lesbians and women of color. According to Executive Director Katherine Acey, the founding mothers—including Stella Alvo, Audrey Barnes, Nancy Dean, Barbara Grant, Joyce Hunter, Roberta Kosse, Cynthia Long, Achebe Powell, Joan Watts and Leslie Kanes Weisman—“believed that even the smallest of gestures, when combined, could create, nurture and strengthen significant social change. And they were right.” Read more…

Putting the “Trans” in International Women’s Day

Today is International Women’s Day. This is a day to celebrate women’s advances and to contemplate how we can continue to make the world equal and equitable for all. This is also a day to consider what we mean and who we signify when we say “women.” Read more…

We don’t need no education

 Confession: I grew up in the O.C. Yes, I know what you’re thinking–and no, I don’t know any of those Real Housewives or the kids from Laguna Beach. But I did have more than I needed when I was growing up, including access to an amazing education. In fact, I have been in school literally my whole life– my high school education set me on fire, and I went straight through undergrad, to M.A., and now PhD. Education is what allowed me to grow, stretch, challenge myself, and ask questions about the world. I learned critical thinking, I learned to believe in myself, and I learned how to jump through the hoops of professionalism when I need to.

One of the prompts for Blog for International Women’s Day is ”What does Equal Rights for All’ mean to you? It’s no surprise at all that as someone who is indebted to her teachers, my answer is education, education, education. Read more…