I was excited to see that Jen and Aaron referred to Tim Wise, I read his book 'White Like Me' when I was younger and it really helped me understand white privilege and gave me some words for the things I was thinking about race in our society. One issue that he wrote about in the book and that was brought up in our workshop 'skit' on Monday was dealing with white coworkers who make negative comments about students of color. I was working in a few public schools in a conservative Oregon town and have run into this problem and felt frustrated about how to best handle the situation. Tim Wise pointed out that in our society, one example of white privilege is that white people assume that they can make racist comments to other whites without feeling inappropriate or worrying about their response. I have seen this to be the case with many of my coworkers in the last two years. This is a difficult situation because I felt torn between my personal beliefs and my desire to maintain a good relationship with the staff.
I believe that with my privilege comes responsibility: in this case I felt that I had to work to change their attitudes about minority students because they were obviously unwilling to listen to their students or their families. I also felt that it was important for the children to have an advocate in a school where the majority of the staff was white. I was glad we had a chance to work through some of the racial conflicts in class because they are all something we will most likely have to deal with in our careers. It is important that we use our privilege to in a positive way to be agents of change in our schools and surrounding communities.
I want to use the outrage I feel about the inequalities in our society and the attitudes of white people I encounter in my daily life to fuel my ambition to become a better teacher. I will empower my students and and use my privileged position to advocate for them whenever there is a need. I will strive to create an anti-biased curriculum and my students will be encouraged to feel pride about their racial and ethnic identities in the classroom. I do not want to perpetuate the racism of our society in my classroom; instead, my students will be taught to identify and challenge the powers that be and the injustices that are inflicted upon them. I will work to help them become critical thinkers and give them the tools needed to challenge the system and have a better chance for success in school and beyond.