CLX Racial Equity Team Newsletter
Spring Newsletter for Thursday folders
Giving our students space to talk about race with Paideia seminars
In a Paideia seminar, students are given a text or picture with a chance to reflect independently prior to the seminar itself. Faciliators give ground rules of expectations which include letting others speak and that is okay to agree or disagree with others. We also provide prompting questions to help keep the conversation going and on topic. What our team noticed is that our students are all engaged and interested in discussing race and are able to speak their truth. We hope to complete a Paideia seminar with every 3rd through 5th grade class by the end of April.
Claxton Parent and Caregiver Workshop
A shout out to Claxton staff for helping with childcare on those evenings and to the Loving Neighbors community for providing a meal each night.
Take a Stand Against Racism day at Claxton!
For more information on how you can help with "Take a Stand Against Racism" day on Thursday, April 27th, contact Claxton parent, Sarah Thach, sarah.thach@mahec.net.
For more information on how you can help with "Mix It Up at Lunch" day on Tuesday, April 25th, contact Claxton guidance counselor, Mark Ackerman, mark.ackerman@ashevillecityschools.net
Claxton and Racial Equity: A recap on our work
In 2014, Claxton received funding to help train our staff on what racial equity and structural racism means with the help and support of Craig White, a consultant from outside of ACS. Through his experience with non-profits and various other racial equity training, White helped us create norms and better understand what racial equity means.
Our staff identified the racial disparities that we felt exist in our school community: transportation, parental/family involvement, student leadership roles, testing, discipline, food & nutrition, communication, AIG, technology/access to information, messaging, and staff composition. In Spring 2015, we included racial equity as our first goal in our school improvement plan and bridged the work between racial equity and the Leader In Me training.
During the 2015-2016 school year, our team decided to focus on the discipline and student leadership disparities. Staff, especially those who facilitated student clubs, were encouraged to consider referring back to staff trainings such as our foundational racial equity training, implicit bias trainings, and micro-aggressions traininings via a racial equity lens to ensure that these student groups mirrored the racial demographics of our student population. To learn more about last year and its outcomes, our final report can be found on our website: https://goo.gl/dcRX4O