Why Cultural Awareness Matters

A person’s identity, race, class and culture strongly influence his/her ability to learn.

Although I have always believed that students thrive in an environment of safety and inclusion, 30 years in the classroom have taught me that students are more likely to succeed and be happy when they are around others who are like them.

When a person knows that an affinity group exists in the school, then he/she is more likely to focus on the important work taking place in the classroom. On the other hand, when a young person feels marginalized because of his/her ethnicity, background, socio-economic history, sexual orientation, gender, class, race, religion, or any other word used to label a person's identity, then that person will not feel comfortable in the classroom, practice room, or other setting where growth is supposed to happen. Consequently, he/she will not be fully engaged in the process of intellectual, social or emotional maturity that is a student’s right.

It is not enough for a teacher to have his/her awareness of these issues awakened. A teacher must engage in honest and meaningful conversation with colleagues and students about issues of social identity, and, whenever possible, include these issues in course goals and syllabi.

Some of the important innovations a teacher might explore are: To include discussion of multicultural issues in every course; To fight against aversive racism in a school’s hiring and/or admission practices; To work harder to include administrators, families and alumni in identifying and achieving the school’s diversity goals; To create a mission that embraces diversity and to develop a rationale for such a mission; To make sure that everyone who studies, lives and works for the institution respects its commitment to Diversity, Equality, Freedom and Inclusion, as they are articulated in the school’s mission.

As teachers and leaders, we need to ask ourselves questions like:

• What does it mean to belong?

• Does every member of the school community feel safe and comfortable there?

• When an individual feels alienated, confused or frustrated, does he or she have a safe place to go? an advocate to talk to?

Many schools pay lip service to diversity and acknowledge the value of including multicultural perspectives in their activities, traditions, and curriculum, but more can be done. Education is a basic human right, and it is the job of everyone, not a school’s diversity directors, to provide an excellent secondary education to every student.

Schools must establish and uphold the principles of justice, peace and respect for very human being. It is a promise they make and a responsibility they accept as soon as the first child steps through the front door each year. On every level, from preschool toddlers to school boards to the U.S. Secretary of Education, we must diligently seek and actively create, vibrant and diverse school communities, such that all students feel inspired to develop and pursue their individual talents. This means having a curriculum rooted in multicultural practice; it means asking students to investigate concepts from multiple perspectives; and it means that students, faculty and staff must come from many different cultures and backgrounds.

Schools can get better, and they will get better when they commit to the simple truth that cultural awareness matters.