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student activism Panther Prowler • Sept. 18, 2020
STUDENTS
FIGHT
AGAINST
RACIAL INEQUITY
Prasheetha Karthikeyan/Prowler
Prasheetha Karthikeyan Sports Editor McGlauthon Fleming IV Staff Writer Anna Johnson Entertainment Editor Hayden Meixner Staff Writer
The death of George Floyd on May 25 sparked national outrage against police brutality while Black Lives Matter protests became prevalent across the country. This response also sparked conversations of racial inequity of BIPOC in everyday life. Ventura County is no exception to this, and with Generation Z becoming increasingly more involved in these kinds of discussions, many local student organizations addressing racism at a community level have been established.
Diversify Our Narrative
Justice in the Classroom
Diversify Our Narrative (DON) is a student led campaign started in June by two Stanford University students. The initiative branched out into several smaller community organizations, including a chapter in CVUSD. DON aims to include more anti-racist texts into the curriculum, aiding the fight for racial inclusivity in our schools. Catherine Xu, junior at Westlake High School, currently serves as DON’s Director of Communication for California and is the district lead for CVUSD. “The reason why we push for anti-racist texts isn’t because the texts we have right now like ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ are bad books, we hope to add more books that are diverse so that the students are able to connect with stories in the books and the experiences,” Xu said. After tackling English classes, Xu wants to help bring to light diversity issues in history classes as, “there are a lot of subjects in history like war on drugs and the missions in fourth grade that are very glorified or not talked about.” Montana Woods, senior at Newbury Park High School, works under Xu in the student life committee, where she helps to promote diversity and inclusivity. “I think that our goal is to just push this message of antiracism and help people feel more safe and included at our schools and get the message out to our admin that this isn’t just one-offs or things that are not happening in our areas but it needs to be looked at and they need to have a more involved role in stopping racism at our schools.” Both Woods and Xu agree that joining DON would be a good way to help support people of color who face adversity in our schools. “I mean we have kind of a bubble here in Newbury Park, and I think that just taking a look around you and what you are privileged to and how that affects your lens of what’s going on in the world [is important],” Woods said. Social media helps fight this complex of living in a bubble by helping to spread DON’s message and story. The main thing that they do on our social media is that they post people’s stories about racism they experience in our area. I think that it helps to push this message of ‘ok well here’s what’s going on and here’s ways you can help,’” Woods said. Through school, DON hopes to get their message across: racism stops now.
Similar to Diversify our Narrative, Justice in the Classroom is a student-led organization that aims to diversify the curriculum in Ventura County schools. Annika Kanugo, junior at Newbury Park High School, is the head of the research committee at this organization. She and her team work together to gather data on how they achieve the six main goals of Justice in the Classroom. These goals are curriculum change, the release of public records, diversity and inclusion, adding more educators of color, equity training and disciplinary practices. “So far, we have been able to contact teachers and put together a teacher advisory board to help us with curriculum changes. We also worked on researching current policies which helped us amend them to fit our proposals, and our new board resolution recently got passed for CVUSD. We’re currently working on a journal submission for the CSUCI Anti-Racism journal and creating surveys to send out to students.” Kanugo said of their recent achievements. CVUSD is not alone in this fight, Kanugo acknowledged that, “so far, Justice In The Classroom has established chapters across 6 chapters, ran 3 campaigns, including raising around $1000 to donate to United Farm Workers, and much more. We have made progress in all 6 of our proposals.”
Neha Davaluri, senior at Santa Susana High School in Simi Valley who works as co-Operations lead, also notes accomplishments that the organization has made outside of the educational sector. “We have created partnerships with Friday Night Live and The Therapist not Cops campaign in the city of Ventura,” Davaluri said. “We recently spoke on a panel in front of the Ventura County Office of Education, talking on their diversity and inclusion forum. And subsequent to that panel, we were able to establish a ethnic studies subcommittee.” Benecia Jude, a senior from Oak Park High School, spoke on how the organization has also tried to aid those of whom the pandemic is negatively affecting. “We are working on a campaign called ‘Remote Relief ’ because especially in the pandemic a lot of equities are being disposed for those who don’t have access to technology and different resources so we’re really trying to make those resources more accessible for people in need,” Jude said. Davaluri maintains that Justice in the Classroom has had a beneficial effect on the community. “Altogether, we have been able to just start the conversation about how much there is lacking of diversity and inclusion in the school system and just in the curriculum in general... just making the community aware of the problems in our school system and what needs to be next.”
Educate - Justice in the Classroom (JITC) holds a teacher advisory board meeting to discuss the implementation of a more diverse curriculum throughout Ventura County schools, which has been a very inspiring experience for members including Annika Kanugo, junior. “Working for Justice in the Classroom has truly changed my life for the better and has taught me so many valuable skills that can be applied in so many other areas,” Kanugo said. Neha Davaluri/With Permission
