Facing History

November 4th 2009

Today I attended a workshop hosted by teachers from Facing History and Ourselves on the topic of “Differences Among Us: Examining Perceptions, Stereotypes and Homophobia.” The workshop opened with the question “What are the experiences of students who identify as lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgendered in our schools?”

Derryfield has made improvements in this area, and I continue to think we can do better. I am certain that our adult employees are in unity around the need to create a safe environment for students to express themselves and be themselves, and I am also clear that students are routinely reminded that the world can be a difficult place for those who challenge convention.

One of the guiding questions for the day was “What impact do deeply held stereotypes and rigid gender enforcement have on our lives?” A brief, current film had kids explaining how it was not particularly safe for boys to express too much emotion, for instance, or for girls to be too tough or confrontational. The kids spoke plainly in expressing their sense of the “rules” around their social lives. The adults don’t necessarily see it, but for the kids it is pretty simple – step outside the hidden lines they see clearly, and risk the consequences.

Still, the workshop reminded me of a hopeful moment that I had my first year at Derryfield. I had been to one or two hockey games before I realized that girls were on the team (clearly I am not proud of that delayed observation – the ponytails ultimately gave it away!). In fact, the girls were some of the best players on the team. In talking with the players back on campus, neither the boys nor the girls seemed to think anything of it. You could tell that, from their point-of-view, it was an issue that spoke to my generation, and was nothing they seemed particularly conversation-worthy.

I found this to be incredibly hopeful. Perhaps not unlike my ability simply to presume that women can (and, therefore, always did) vote, the students were a part of a new world that presumed equality in this way. Their lack of guile was refreshing, and left me to dream about all the progress to come.

At the end of the day, we discussed the following poem by James Berry -

What Do We Do with a Variation?

What do we do with a difference?
Do we stand and discuss its oddity
Or do we ignore it?

Do we shut our eyes to it
or do we poke it with a stick?
Do we clobber it to death?

Do we move around it in rage
and enlist the rage of others?
Do we will it to go away?

Do we look at it in awe
or purely wonderment?
Do we work for it to disappear?

Do we pass it stealthily
Or change route away from it?
Do we will it to become like ourselves?

What do we do with a difference?
Do we communicate to it,
let application acknowledge it
for barriers to fall down?