BSD Office of Equity and Inclusion
News and Updates September 30th, 2021
Let’s Be...Equity Spotlight: Aloha Huber Park’s Living History Window
From Molly Dwyer, Aloha Huber Park Family, Student and Community Engagement Coordinator:
Aloha Huber Park is working to make our school feel like home to all of our families. Thanks to a grant from the district (thanks Vilay Greene) we were able to work with local artist Julie Keefe on a project with that goal in mind.
We Are From is an intergenerational oral history project culminating in a visual art display of who our families are. Under the guidance of Julie Keefe and the support of teachers, Ana Wieser and Brule Speck, 8th grade students interviewed and photographed one of their elders about their experiences as youth and how they made their way to Beaverton, Oregon. The purpose of this project was to both encourage students to connect with the stories and cultures of their families and bring those cultures and experiences into the school community in a way that values and honors them. Most students interviewed parents, grandparents, aunts or uncles. Most learned something new about their family or realized that they “could talk to their mom” after all.
The final product is a collage of their photographs with bilingual quotes (English/Spanish) installed as a mural on the exterior of the community room which is located in the entryway to the school. We hope that students and families see real people who look like them as honored and integral to the school.
Thank you, Aloha-Huber Park staff for creating an inclusive community of belonging!
Guidance on Social and Political Expression
Equity in Action: Teacher Connect - Grow Your Own Grant
From Carissa Marrs, Ed.D. BSD Licensed Personnel Specialist:
This past winter, Beaverton received a Grow Your Own grant from the Educator Advancement Council (EAC) to help our BIPOC classified staff, past high school students, and community members enter or continue a pathway to becoming a licensed educator. BSD worked in partnership with other Washington County districts, community partners such as Beaverton Black Parent Union, Native American Youth and Family Center, Adelante Mujeres, Mente and Centro Cultural, as well as Portland Community College, Pacific University and Lewis & Clark College. Partners collaborated to establish a system of coordinated effort to help individuals who identify as Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) become educators and to mitigate systemic barriers to their success.
Specifically, our team’s goals were:
Establish an educator workforce that reflects our students’ racial, cultural, and linguistic diversity.
Develop a coordinated system of services to remove systemic barriers inhibiting the recruitment and retention of education pathway program candidates.
The Grow Your Own grant allowed us to enroll and serve 65 diverse educator candidates who received affinity mentoring and coaching. This grant also provided stipends, scholarships, and laptops to help mitigate challenges for individuals wishing to return to school or continue their path to becoming a licensed educator. Educator candidates were offered information, coaching, advising, and support relevant to their individual interests and personal circumstances to help them choose an educator pathway, apply for financial aid, and navigate the higher education system.
Although the grant ended June 30, 2021, we received gap funding from Nike which allowed us to continue coaching and advising over the summer to help with enrollment in college classes. The Educator Advancement Council and ODE just announced the EAC will offer 2020-2021 grantees additional funds to support continued implementation of their GYO/Teacher Pathway partnership through August 31, 2022. We are excited to continue this important work!
Students in Action: Nā Kamaliʻi Talk Story
From Chloe Rodrigues, Student at International School of Beaverton:
In May of 2020, during the peak of the pandemic, Ka ʻAha Lāhui O ʻOlekona Hawaiian Civic Club of Oregon and SW Washington founded Nā Kamaliʻi Talk Story: Inquiring Minds of Todayʻs Youth; a student lead youth panel created to provide a safe platform for all. The term Nā Kamaliʻi simply translates to “The Youth.” And Talk Story is a phrase referring to a casual conversation. With these two ideas in mind, Nā Kamaliʻi Talk Story’s goal is to give young people a place where they can casually and freely express their opinions and worries.
In order to do this, we host a monthly, digitally streamed panel that elevates youth voices and helps share accurate and pressing information to other young people and community members. We especially focus on issues that are not spoken about in our school curriculums as it is most important for the youth to have an outlet and safe place to process and fully understand pressing information/events.
Many in our generation feel as though our voices are background noise, but when our opinions and perspectives are brought to the forefront, it sheds light on the fact that we too are valid and important. Additionally, with easy access to the internet, we are subject to new things and ideas that we might not understand or that are misleading.
Through this panel we get to speak with professionals who can guide us through our many questions and who will listen to our opinions on matters that affect our lives and our peers’ lives. Collectively, we founded this group with seven students, and our group’s adult supervisor simply because we wanted to do something meaningful and productive in the pandemic. We had no idea how Nā Kamaliʻi Talk Story would be received by our peers, how much our goals would elevate us to new expectations, and most of all how far our community outreach would go.
As of August 2021 we have done 15 panels with various community leaders, cultural practitioners, and field specialists.Recently, we have been able to partner with the Oregon Health Authority, Project Access NOW, and the Beaverton Resource Center to host a vaccination site every Friday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the parking lot next to Barnes Elementary. We have also been working on recruiting more students for our General Committee, open to ALL students no matter their background.
We hope to continue our positive impact on the community and allow other people with diverse perspectives and ideas to also join in. If you have any questions, please contact huinkts@kalohcc.org or for more information please visit www.kalohcc.org.
You can also look up and subscribe to Ka Aha Lahui O Olekona's YouTube channel and our Facebook page as well to view our future lives events.
Show your pride!
Remember these shirts from the first ever Beaverton Pride Parade in 2019? Here's your chance to get one if you don't have one already! Order a T-shirt (unisex or women's) or a hoodie (unisex) from Refutee's online store. Orders are due by October 11th, they will be finished by October 25th, and we will send them to your work site through inter-district mail when they are ready. Please be sure to indicate your work site on the order form. The shirts are super affordable as they are printed at cost.
Bonus: The Printory/Refutees is a local business owned by Aloha High School grad, Hussein Al-Baiaty!
Contact Gretchen Mollers with questions: gretchen_mollers@beaverton.k12.or.us
Sign up for LGBTQ+ Affinity Group or LGBTQ+ support projects group
We are creating two new email lists: one for folks who personally identify as LGBTQ+ and one for allies who would like to work on projects to support LGBTQ+ students & staff. If you are interested , please complete this very short Google form.
District-Wide Affinity Spaces
The district has affinity spaces where people with the same interests find a safe place to reflect, share, develop community, and engage in common activities or actions. You will find information about current affinity spaces, including contact information and meeting formats, at this link.
If you are interested in learning more about, joining or initiating an affinity space, please let us know by completing and submitting this form.
Areas of Awareness and Action
Hispanic Heritage Month, September 15-October 15, 2021
From the National Archives: We celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 to October 15) to recognize the achievements and contributions of Hispanic American champions who have inspired others to achieve success. The observation began in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week under President Lyndon Johnson and was expanded by President Ronald Reagan in 1988 to cover a 30-day period. It was enacted into law on August 17, 1988.
Throughout the district, we’ve seen acknowledgements and celebrations of Hispanic Heritage Month. You can learn more about ways to elevate and celebrate the richness of our Hispanic and Latino/a/x/e community through national resources like the Library of Congress, National Education Association and Learning For Justice (from 2020) and through the locally-focused Latino Network.
Filipino/a/x American History Month
From the Filipino American National Historical Society (FANHS): Filipino Americans are the second-largest Asian American group in the nation. The celebration of Filipino American History Month in October commemorates the first recorded presence of Filipinos in the continental United States, which occurred on October 18, 1587, when “Luzones Indios” came ashore from the Spanish galleon Nuestra Senora de Esperanza and landed at what is now Morro Bay, California. In 2009, U.S. Congress recognized October as Filipino American History Month in the United States. Various states, counties, and cities in the U.S. have established proclamations and resolutions declaring observance of Filipino American History Month.
Peruse these resources from the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco and from FANHS in Seattle for ideas about how you can acknowledge, celebrate and elevate the voices of our local and national Filipino/a/x community.
Indigenous Peoples' Day
2022 Minoru Yasui Student Contest
“If we believe in America, if we believe in equality and democracy, if we believe in law and justice, then each of us, when we see or believe that errors are being made, has an obligation to make every effort to correct them.” --Minoru Yasui
The Minoru Yasui Student Contest Committee is pleased to announce the 2022 Minoru Yasui Day Student Contest for middle schoolers and high schoolers! Please share this information widely, especially to students and families.
Organized by the Minoru Yasui Legacy Project and the Japanese American Museum of Oregon, the Minoru Yasui Student Contest is open to high school and middle school students and offers them the timely opportunity to explore how people can stand up to racism and discrimination. In the process, they will learn about the life and legacy of Minoru Yasui, the only Oregonian to have been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Become an AVID Tutor!
Did you know that AVID alumni who identify as first-generation college-goers and economically underserved are four times more likely to obtain a college degree in 6 years than their like peers who are not in AVID*?
Would you like to be a direct part of that phenomenal movement? Do you have any time in your day to pop in and Tutor in the AVID Elective class on your campus or another BSD secondary school?
Fill out this form if you are interested and want to know more! BSD Staff AVID Tutor Interest Form
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Pat McCreery
Beaverton School District
Dr. Tatiana Cevallos
Beaverton School District