J U S TI C E I S N’ T BL I N D
What would happen if we collaborated
with our diversity directors to help adults
consider cultural differences? How might
we grow as a community and reflect on how
our own identities influence perspective?
How might we collaborate across roles to
address faculty and student needs? In sum,
could we explicitly teach/learn how to make
amends and repair harm in ways that were
inclusive, addressed diverse perspectives,
and were developmentally appropriate for
students in a K-8 grade school?
“What would happen if
we collaborated with our
diversity directors to help
adults consider cultural
differences? How might we
grow as a community and
reflect on how our own identi-
ties influence perspective?
How might we collaborate
across roles to address faculty
and student needs?”
Conflict is inevitable, combat is
optional. –Max Lucado
Over the course of four years, our team has
guided discussions with faculty, circles with
students, and conversations with families.
One assumption we continue to test is: If
our community (and world) becomes more
diverse, we may have more conflicts as vary-
ing ideas, perspectives, and experiences
converge. Rather than avoid conflicts, per-
haps conflicts can be teachable moments
for students. Every student has an oppor-
tunity to reflect and tell “what happened”
as a means of articulating their perspective
while learning the perspective of others.
students, perhaps there is something we
can do about it. Instead of blaming stu-
dents, perhaps our own biases may influ-
ence patterns of behavior and responses
to student conduct? If so, what could we
do to support students better so that they
could achieve their educational goals? Af-
ter an exercise led by our diversity team,
one teacher acknowledged, “I didn’t realize
how much this student upset me. Each time
he doesn’t follow my directions... It reminds
me of my first year teaching and I had a
hard time working with boys.” Having this
insight from a teacher created an oppor-
tunity for us to support both her and our
students. It also provided an opportunity
for our broader faculty to engage in new
ways of empathy-building and validated
During our faculty meeting times, we have
incorporated research and identity work into
our conversations, shifting from focusing on
negative student behaviors to delving into
our own identities. 2 If social biases can in-
fluence our interactions with and towards
2. NAIS has provided a sample of cultural identifiers that can help school communities consider the diversity of their
stakeholders. Visit https://www.nais.org/articles/pages/sample-cultural-identifiers.aspx. We couple this with Dr. Steven
Jones’s warm-up activity “who are you” to help acknowledge the multiple identities/cultures we may participate in.
Continues on page 14
CSEE Connections
Winter 2019
Page 13