Terry's Peeps wrote:
I'm not going to deny that things happen but this is a very telling sentence from the story in the context of today's climate:
"Students, the majority of whom asked to remain anonymous, said they often didn’t realize the severity of their experiences until years later."
There are some serious events that have occurred.
It's not productive to solicit general memories of how you, as a teen, with all the of the mental and emotional immaturity that entails, were wronged by someone who was equally mentally and emotionally immature. This isn't a community or local school where everyone might know each other or are, at least, coming from a shared experience. People come from everywhere and for many, this is the first time being in close quarters with someone different. Learning about and how to live with each other isn't always pretty. It also isn't one sided.
I had black, latino, asian and white teammates/friends. We said a lot of cringeworthy stuff to each other. Take it out of context and it would definitely be considered hostile. Maybe we hurt each other without knowing it. I remember one teammate who I used to tease who, one day, took off his shirt in the locker room and I could see whip marks on his back. Obviously something was going on at home and my actions of the passed might have added to his pain. I didn't mean to hurt him but I probably did.
I sat in on the meetings with students from a few years back about some general letter students had written about racism at SICP. They cited things like unequal disciplining. The principal had the numbers going back a decade and it simply didn't support their argument. Then it devolved into a discussion with feeling statements like "a person asked me if he could touch my hair". I think its important for teens to be able to emote once in a while so I stuck with the group but that is not really the issue I was looking to be involved in to facilitate change.
In terms of homosexuality, I'm not always comfortable with how catholic teachings are put in to practice on the subject. However, you have to remember that this is a catholic school whose mission is to follow the teachings. If you cannot tolerate anything but unfettered acceptance of school sponsored clubs and events, you are at the wrong place. You will be accepted as an individual but they cannot allow institutional promotion. Of course, you will get a healthy dose of education on abstaining from any kind of sex as well.
I think the diversity numbers are actually pretty good. It would be wrong to say a black kid is a token in a class. It would be very wrong to say a latino kid is. This is also related to the number of catholics in each of those groups. They just received some massive donation for minority scholarships.
In conclusion, I agree we need to be better. I take anything involving staff or the institution seriously. I also think there isn't a high school on this planet that could hold up to scrutiny if it asked its population if it experienced hurtful moments in its time at the school.
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