Personal Narrative: Maryland My Home

To sit down and choose one salient and defining aspect of my education was like asking me to choose which one of my Godchildren I love more—nearly impossible. Thinking though some defining events in my schooling, many of the events that stuck out to me were those related to my race. This came as a huge surprise to me because I had a very non-conventional schooling experience. Due to my dad’s job I attended 5 elementary schools, 2 middle school and 1 high school in 5 different states. In each state and through every move, we lived in a fairly affluent area and I attended a school with a GreatSchools rating between 8 and 10. The schools weren’t lacking diversity by any means but they were also far from exceptionally diverse. It is for this reason that I chose to analyze how my race has affected my education, is continuing to affect my education, and will affect my impact and experience as an aspiring educator.

I analyzed that four of the six (67%) respondents lived in a predominately white community and attended a predominately white high school for a duration of their childhood. Furthermore, three of three (100%) WOC respondents lived in a predominately white neighborhood for a duration of their childhood and two of the three (67%) WOC respondents attended a predominately white high school. When analyzing the respondents answers to specific questions regarding the lack of diversity within their immediate spaces, I was able to identify how a lack of diversity shapes the understanding of race, for both WOC respondents and white respondents. Specifically, the WOC respondents are made hyperaware of their race and even singled out for being racially different. The two of three (67%) white respondents embody this lack of diversity in their actions and mentality of their own whiteness. However, I will analyze diversity in a school setting from two respondents, a WOC and a white respondent, to exemplify the importance of integration in

When reflecting on my own personal journey and experiences with racism and diversity, I find myself initially feeling incapable and the wrong person to ask, after all, I was born and raised in Eugene, Oregon. However, when I really started to think about it, diversity especially in racism is being seen more than I ever remember when I was growing up. In elementary school l remember sitting next to a boy who was of African American culture. He and I were always working on projects together and never once did I think to ever treat him differently because of the color of his skin. One day, I saw him with his parents at the grocery store. His mom was white and his dad was black. I remember as a child I waved and stared wondering why I hadn’t seen more mixed families. That moment is something I remember very vividly, not because it changed my thoughts about my classmate, but it made my seven year old mind stop and think.

On August 13, 2015 I went to watch a Baltimore Ravens preseason game. While I have been living in Baltimore City for the last five years, I had never been to a Ravens game before. It usually takes about 45 minutes to get from College Park to Downtown Baltimore. On the game day, it took us almost two hours to get there. The highway was jammed because of the game, and traffic was even tighter near the stadium. On the way to the M&T Bank Stadium, there was a short bridge that connected the highway to Downtown Baltimore. Under the bridge was a place where many homeless people were living. Some of them had beds, but many were laying on the concrete floor. On the road that led to the Stadium, there were people with signs, begging for food and money. Almost everyone that was on that road passed by those people without any consideration.

When I started teaching in Baltimore City, I was sure I would be able to connect with my students. I believed it was inevitable. On paper, my students and I were the same. I grew up in a low income neighborhood. The schools I attended had limited resources. My mother worked late hours and made a disrespectful amount of money. I’d lived in a shelter and been in some pretty rough spots during my childhood. However, there was something different about my life and the life of my students; I got the opportunity to move. In 9th grade, my father realized that the neighborhood I lived in wouldn’t help to propel my forward. We moved and just like that I was living in a suburban district with some of the best schools in the state. As a teenager, it

The place that I went to was Maryland over the summer. The very first time we went there was four summers ago, when my aunt and uncle first moved there. They moved there with their five kids, (oldest to youngest), Courtney, Jaron, Cevanna, Heritage, and Skylar because my uncle Aaron got a job there, and because his parents lived there. Then they moved to a different house in Accident, MD, which was closer to Aaron’s parents. The second time that I went there was last summer, because Courtney was graduating from high school. I rode in the car with my grandparents and my cousin Aleana. My sister Natalie rode in a different car with my uncle Rex, his wife Tonya, and their kids, Brandon and Brooklyn. My parents left the day after we did. We drove

Whether it was my persistent requests for my mother dreadlock my hair at the age of 8, or the immediate connection I had to the dancehall mixes played in the backgrounds of family gatherings, I was very proud of the person that my native land was bound to shape me into. But this held opposite to those of the “outside world”. Soon, I became one of the very few minorities in my classroom, with those of fairer skin and origins rooted in European countries becoming the majority. At the sight of them, the thought “am I truly as beautiful as my mother told me I am” popped into my mind, with the image that I had to carry being seen as substantially different compared to those who now surrounded me. My youth soon persisted of me being completely aware of how “different” I truly was, however, this awareness only consisted of a [blank] percentage of negative feelings. But then, age 11 hit. The year I was pushed to experience a much larger scope of the world than elementary school had allowed me: a 6th grade academy. Sure, the neighborhood and the friends that I had known prior were still present, the new setting and set of people that this school added into my life proved to have its lasting

“ We’ll be there soon.” My mom announced excitedly from the front seat of the car. We had finally made it to my grandmas and grandpas house in Michigan after a five hour long car ride, to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary and a day later something shocking happened.

In my childhood, I had the pleasure to travel across America. I had seen the vast mountain ranges of the Appalachian Mountains and the countless crystal clear beaches of Martha’s Vineyard. I always loved going on these trips, but now when I look back it’s not the various the trips I miss the most. The most expensive or luxurious place could not surpass my childhood utopia, my old neighborhood of Millersville, Maryland.

On June 20th, my family and I went on a road trip to Virginia. We decided to visit Kings Dominion, which is a theme and waterpark. It was a sunny, hot day with a lot of people there. My siblings and I got on “The Volcano”. We had to wait in line for about forty five minutes but it was worth it. First, we took out our phones and shoes so they wouldn’t fall off during the ride and put them in a storage they had off to the side. Then, we buckled ourselves in and I was so excited for this ride to take off. After the workers came around and made sure we were buckled in, the ride moved very slowly into a dark tunnel. Then, all of a sudden we were all pulled back into our seats because the coaster zoomed so fast forward into the tunnel. When it sped

Although society encourages all of us to embrace diversity, it was hard to do so when I first moved to South Dakota. As my picture shows, I was one of the very few Asians at my school, and it was not easy trying to simply blend in. Humans may collectively condemn judgments based on skin color, but it really is inevitable for visual creatures like ourselves. Though my white classmates did not show their sentiments outright, they regarded me as an outsider. They were not familiar with the Asian culture or people, so they took the convenient route to figure out my identity – stereotyping. I was expected to excel at math, be buried in textbooks and SAT study guides all day, and act awkwardly among my peers. Whenever I did not fit the Asian “mold,” they were genuinely surprised and even threatened. I wanted my identity to be judged upon my individuality, accomplishments, and characteristics. Instead, my Asian heritage consumed the entirety of my identity. I was not “Doha Kang” in their eyes. I was “that one Asian kid.”

In society, children can retain implicit information passively from the people around them all the way to adulthood. Information about the way humans interact with each other through culture, ethnicity, and race is staples for the psychological understanding and social construction of a child's mind. There are correlations between contemporary racial discrimination and the dominant “white” socialization process that influences kids from an early age. Much of the controversy today on race is whether we should give racial equality the acknowledgment it deserves after the end of a Jim Crow Era, and Civil Rights Movement from 1954 to 1968. It has been nearly 48 years since great achievements have been made for minorities; but yet, we still seem

The first time I was exposed to racial diversity awareness, I was seven years old. The earliest years of my life were spent growing up in Philadelphia, a city well known for its diversity. All of that changed though, when my family moved to a much smaller city, and lived in a much smaller town. For the first time in my young life, I realized that there were places that lacked diversity, particularly racial diversity. And with that lack of ethnic diversity, prejudice and negative stereotypes were an everyday occurrence. It was quite different from the brotherly love mentality of Philadelphia. From third grade and through middle school, I struggled to fit into an exclusive environment.

Banks’ (2010) third dimension of multicultural education is prejudice reduction wherein teachers organize activities or lessons that help students form a positive attitude toward cultural groups different from their own. During his University of Washington faculty lecture, Dr. Banks (2006) tells a story of a three-year-old girl who is told to take her cot and lay down for naptime. The little girl refuses. When the teacher asks why she will not lie down for naptime, she says she cannot sleep next to a black girl because “Blacks are stinky.” As shown here, many students innocently arrive at school with negative attitudes about different racial and ethnic groups. Since schools are the point of contact where many children interact with the many diverse groups of society, teachers have a duty and a very special opportunity to help students develop positive interracial attitudes. When multicultural education is integrated into the curriculum students engage in discussions and solve complex

My personal experiences have impacted my teaching. I went to a public school in a predominantly Caucasian town and I often stuck out amongst my peers, as a result, I learned to assimilate. I was under the impression that in order to succeed, “conformity to mainstream society is a necessity” (Olivares-Orellana, 2015, p. 194). As part of the majority in my work environment, I am able to understand aspects of shallow culture and deep culture (Globalcompetency, n.d.) which allow to form close and caring connections with my students, a strength which I feel is essential to student success (Olivares-Orellana, 2015, p. 183). Students must feel supported by their teachers and a sense of belonging in the classroom, “children who don’t belong, who