Final thoughts on the book: Eyes opened wider now.. Beth -Final Blog entry

After reading this book I see myself in the community and as a future teacher differently. We were asked to investigate White Allies...I didn't know what this term was. But I looked and learned.
　
White Allies are people who advocate for diversity in the community. This link is to a web survey that you can take to see where you rank as being a white ally. It is from another local college’s website - Cortland.
http://web.cortland.edu/russellk/courses/hdouts/raible.htm

It's questions are good and helps you to think about what a white ally is.

I also checked out this article which I helped me to understand what being a white ally is
Guidelines for Being
Strong White AlliesAdapted from Uprooting Racism: How Whiteby P a u l K i v e l The full article can be read here:


The article points out many ways to be a white ally but two that I found most powerful were:
1. Assume racism is everywhere, everyday. He asks us to assume it because its true and because we are a part of the dominant cultural and do not have to face it daily. He asks us to notice it, to be aware of it around us in life daily.
2.The second request that I found really powerful was to: take risks. That even if its scary for you, to risk embarrassment or failure by trying to stop racist talk or actions that you see or hear
When I started to read this book, I don’t think I realized how much of an assimilationist I was. I am very much a part of the dominant culture and my education that embraced a melting pot approach to life in the U.S. just seemed so normal. As I child I didn’t think of anyone being hurt by the way our school was run.

As an adult today in the world, I knew that there are people with bi-cultural backgrounds but I hadn’t thought about how our educational system might impact them. I just thought, everyone who comes here becomes American and it may take time but they will learn English and blend into our culture. This book was a great example to how naïve my prior thinking was. And it was a catalyst for me to think about these things, where I previously had not considered how being an immigrant to this country today might impact education.

Embracing the differences and bi-culturalism helps students of minority groups to feel welcomed, important, understood and it helps to succeed in our schools. There are many things I think I would have done inherently, like talking to the ESL teacher and seeing what my students were doing with her or if she kept the lessons of my classroom going. Or having kids see representations of themselves in their class…but would I have taught the individual cultures? Or asked parents to?

I didn’t even know what White Allies were until this class and now that I have researched what it is to be one I feel my eyes are open wider than before.
--Elizabeth Francescotti
People Can Work for Social Justicehttp://www.paulkivel.com/articles/guidelinesforbeingstrongwhiteallies.pdf