Working Towards Inclusivity

Juniors and seniors studying the Black Experience in the 20th Century listen to ODCL Director Roderick White, who is co-teaching the elective with History Teacher Pat Miletich. The course focuses on the arts, literature, history, and cultural impact of African Americans during the 1900s.

Shaping an inclusive educational community

Although a party of one — plus an occasional college intern —the work of Roderick White’s office is a thread that weaves K-12 throughout divisions and across departments. He joined USN in 2015, nearly a decade after the Board of Trustees adopted the school’s Strategic Plan for Diversity. On a given day, he usually co-teaches the course Black Experience in the 20th Century, tends to the needs of students in his advisory, collaborates with faculty on curriculum inspection, and moderates conversations on the use of racial epithets and microaggressions in classrooms and hallways. Here he shares details on the work of the Office of Diversity and Community Life.

Q: What is the Office of Diversity and Community Life? A: At its core, ODCL is rooted in helping to lead the USN community in the areas of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Established at USN in 1997, ODCL serves all three divisions to empower students and faculty to be agents of change, facilitate the school’s efforts to reflect the ethnic and cultural composition of Nashville, and support affinity groups for students and parents.

Most of the work is making sure we present students with a safe space where they can tackle and discuss really hard topics — that we can entertain discourse without fighting. The idea is not to have everyone agree with each other; it is to have everyone respect each other. Q: How does ODCL transcend divisions? A: Some of the most progressive work done under the umbrella of ODCL is that of 40 faculty and administrators working on four different committees established in 2016 to further the work of diversity, equity, and inclusion across the school.

The Culturally Responsive Teaching Committee is charged with ensuring USN is creating a curriculum that is deliberately inclusive and diverse, utilizing identifiers such as but not limited to age, ability, ethnicity, gender, race, religion, spirituality, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status/class. This group works to examine and constantly update existing curriculum to ensure that USN can continue to offer content that is academically rigorous and also speaks to the broad palette of scholars who grace our classrooms. This time outside of the classroom is to not only

evaluate the curriculum as a whole but also to assist other faculty when they are working on learning units to make sure they are inclusive to all of our scholars as well. We want to continue our Peabody Demonstration School heritage of being at the forefront of best practices in education.

The Hiring Committee works to make sure we are reaching out to create the most diverse candidate pool we can by intentionally recruiting candidates from historically underrepresented groups. We have focused our efforts in our local colleges and universities, particularly with Tennessee State University where, after numerous meetings and discussions between USN and the historically Black university, we were able to secure a memorandum of understanding that allows USN to serve as a certification school for education majors to complete their student teaching program.

The Cultural Competency Committee is tasked with ensuring a clear understanding of the aspects of inclusion and diversity for the constituents in our USN family, while fostering an appreciation for all of the different backgrounds, perspectives, and cultures USN represents. We also are working to make sure faculty and staff continue to develop their skills through role-play situations, gathered from across the school and beyond, to work through how a difficult conversation can be held between faculty and students. This type of insightful reflection can be tough, as it typically relies on faculty to relive moments that in hindsight could have been more productive and affirming. One positive takeaway is that it allows for a space for our teachers to reflect and assist each other in increasing their bandwidth for working through difficult conversations as well as making sure that their classrooms are intentionally inclusive to all.

As an independent school, it is important to recognize inclusion is not always easy. With that knowledge, coupled with the opportunities that being a student at USN can provide, we also have created an Outreach Committee. The Outreach Committee is charged with taking the name of USN and its benefits directly to areas of Nashville that the school has not yet reached. That mission, which is typically steered towards students, is also aimed at families and the broader community.

Q: Tell us about the work ODCL does support to students and their families. A: Besides initiating and moderating conversations between students or among students, parents, and faculty, ODCL supports several student organizations. ODCL has the pleasure of also working for the second year with intern Saraya Ashley, a junior attending Fisk University, who is coordinating our Middle School conversations with ALBANIE, which stands for Asian-American/Asian Heritage, Latinx, Biracial, African American/African Heritage, Native, International, European, as well as working with our Black Student Union.

ODCL Director Roderick White, Gabrielle White ’23, Morayo Kassim ’22, Arun Gandhi, Ruby Lizarraga ’22, Jude Warren ’22, Mayowa Kassim ’21 smile after a Vanderbilt University peace vigil on September 16, 2019. Several High Schoolers in ALBANIE spoke during the event with Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson. Yenni Gonzalez Salinas ’21, Olivia Rhee ’20, Neha Saggi ’21, Victoria Christianson Galina ’20, Jadyn Sheats ’22 pause during the National Association of Independent Schools’ Student Diversity Leadership Conference held in Seattle, Washington in December 2019.

USN parents Yvette and James Floyd speak with fellow USN parent Felicia Tibbs during a Black Parent Network gathering at the Buhl House on September 24, 2019. (Right) Dean of Students Nicole Jules, Sixth Grade Math Teacher Ida Fields, Head of High School Quinton Walker, and Assistant Head of Middle School Kelicia Cox socialize during the last in-person BPN event.

ALBANIE in High School has led dialogue among peers about social ills in the world. CORE has taken on building an understanding among peers of -isms like labelism and able-bodyism. There’s also the Latinx Student Group. These students host cultural events and lunchtime viewing parties and conversations. They go to protests downtown and even spoke at a Vanderbilt University peace vigil with Gandhi’s grandson.

While our students remain the primary focus of our efforts on campus, we can also never forget our families’ importance and their need for support as they traverse the USN terrain. The Black Parent Network has been a part of the thread of USN for more than 22 years. Its primary mission is to attend to the needs of our students of African heritage. BPN typically holds several events each year, beginning in early fall with a meet and greet to welcome new and returning parents of African heritage students to USN. This meeting offers our families the opportunity to share and discuss the unique experiences associated with attending USN as Black students and time with our school administrators to discuss expectations and areas of concern.

The sustained success of the BPN has also influenced the creation of the Hispanic Or/and Latinx Organization, known as HOLA, the parent network for the support of Latinx students. By their very nature, independent schools are exclusive, so to be inclusive of all requires intentional work on the part of faculty and staff to make sure no group or individual is made to feel intentionally excluded. The Gathering of Families is another event held to connect our students and families of African heritage and provides another opportunity to meet and socialize. The Senior Celebration hosted by BPN and the Fiesta de Celebración hosted by HOLA acknowledge those graduating seniors’ individual accomplishments each year. Q: What impact have the events of summer 2020 had on your work at USN? A: May 27, 2020 is a significant date for me in my household and in my career. That was the day I found myself during a Zoom meeting with other administrators and teachers explaining to Alexander, my rising USN first grade son, why a Black man had just died under the knee of a police officer. That date also began the renewed purpose of ODCL in not only helping students to process current events but also pushing faculty to be more inclusive in their teachings and the entire school community to unbraid patterns of racial injustice that have been woven in the United States for more than 400 years.

Despite our efforts to be proactive, we are well aware that the work of diversity, equity, and inclusion does not occur in a bottle or the Edgehill bubble. Last summer also brought to USN the opportunity to learn from our students as well as alumni about what we need to address to make USN a better, more inclusive, and equitable experience for all of our students. Through the voices raised by students and alumni, an area of opportunity that was made clear is that we, as a school, need to more clearly and intentionally articulate and educate all of our community about the work being done here in our classrooms on Edgehill as well as beyond these walls. nn