The Stand
By Sydney Gold
When schools shut down in March 2020, a response to the novel coronavirus pandemic which would come to define the next year, educators were thrown into a minefield of unknowns. How would classes be held? How would students be assessed? Could extracurricular activities continue?
These concerns only grew more varied for disenfranchised students. How could a kid attend class if they don’t have WiFi in the home? What do you do if a child’s only reliable meal is their school lunch? Two months later, George Floyd was murdered. The country sprang into a racial reckoning that rivaled the civil rights movement of the ’60s. Educators were confronted again with how inequity impacts students. How can they make students feel safe?
School Administrators Association of New York (SAANY) hosted a panel Thursday, March 25, addressing this very issue. “SAANYS Connect – Student Voices and Coalitions: Bridging the Racial Divide” featured Syracuse City School District students, school administrators and educational equity experts, all sharing their insight on creating safer, more inclusive schools for marginalized students.
One major example was this summer’s SCORE program. SCORE, or Student Coalition on Race and Equity, allows Syracuse city high schoolers to learn about issues of racial equity in education. The program culminates in several presentations by the students to community educators, giving teens the opportunity to share school experiences to the very individuals empowered to change the climate.
Tashia Thomas-Neil, director of Equity and Inclusion at the Onondaga County Department of Children and Family Services and architect of the SCORE program, explained its origins to the group.
“We were figuring out how we were going to support students during the pandemic,” Thomas-Neil shared. After meeting with her colleagues, they thought “wouldn’t it be cool if students led workshops on race and equity for the community, starting with educators.” The six-week program met daily, pushing students to confront the issues they see in their own schools. They not only learned the program’s content, which ranged from Black history to white privilege, but how to speak truth to power in actually presenting their findings to community educators. The student participants were also compensated.
“We secured funding to pay the students as experts,” Thomas-Neil said.
One such student, Albert Scipio, a senior at Syracuse Institute of Technology, spoke as well.
“I learned certain things they won’t teach in schools,” said Scipio, encouraging educators who participate in programs like these to “be mindful of what you’re learning and really pay attention.”
Panelist Natalie McGee is a lead cultural proficiency consultant at Progression Partners. Her work too centers building sustainable structures to make schools more equitable and inclusive. “This allows for schools to begin to close the achievement gap,” she explained. But working in this field isn’t without challenges. This summer’s wave of demonstrations reignited the conversation about race in America. Still, the issue remains divisive — people aren’t always willing to talk. When asked what obstacles she faces in her work, she shared:
“Oftentimes it is the barrier of our divided nation. So the barrier that we encounter is systemic oppression.”
Dr. Scott J. Comis, principal at Brooklyn Avenue School in Valley Stream, New York. and member of SAANYS executive board of directors and SAANYS diversity committee, explain how he incorporates the principles of this mission into his own work.
“Nothing is learned in calm seas,” Comis said. The pandemic’s disruption of last school year was disorienting, but Comis says it helped bring the school community closer together and accelerated improvement that might otherwise have been years down the line, like ensuring that parents whose first language isn’t English can access and understand all school communications.
As the event drew to a close, the floor was opened to panelists and viewers alike, educators sharing tips and best practices for developing inclusive curricula. Yet time and time again, the conversation returned to the work outside of the classroom.
“Doing your own personal work,” Thomas-Neil began, “Is the only way you can authentically center others.”
Sydney Gold is a Newspaper & Online Journalism student at the Newhouse School
