10/9 - Class Recap

Students shared their racial autobiographies today in class - I am sure that many of our backgrounds are related to people who immigrated through New York City. Photo taken in 2010.

Hello everyone,

Welcome back to another week of DSJ! We had plenty to do with our continuing work. Here's what happened in class today:

Learning Targets Addressed:
I can communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place, or region.

Soundtrack: "Thugz Mansion" by 2Pac. Selected for today by Harley, who suggested it last class.

AGENDA 10/9/17:
Check In/Review Agreements
Current Events
White Like Me Debrief
Racial Autobiography Work

Homework: Read the blog! Make sure you have everything turned in, especially your Where I'm From poem and Racial Autobiography!
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Check In/Review Agreements: At the beginning of class, we went over the Courageous Conversations Agreements, as always, to begin our work together for the day.

Current Events: After checking in, we talked for a bit about Indigenous Peoples Day (vs. Columbus Day) today. Jay shared a great list of resources and links with us - check them out here if you want to learn more about the experiences of First Nations people today, especially in Oregon.

Here was the slideshow (courtesy of Bernadette, the PSU professor for Senior Inquiry) that we went though in class today:

Google Drive - Indigenous People's Day in Oregon

White Like Me Debrief: The next part of class was diving into a book that I (Mr. Fritz) talked about last class as a part of my racial autobiography, White Like Me by Tim Wise. Link to buy the book from Powells here.

Last class, we read and annotated this, and this class, we used a new protocol for sharing our thoughts, in the hopes of getting more students involved in the discussion. I really enjoyed hearing from some newer voices today! We will continue to do this in the future, as well as take volunteers.

Racial Autobiographies: The rest of class was devoted to sharing our racial autobiographies in what we call "affinity groups" where students selected where they felt like they identified most with, in the hopes of having some commonality in the discussion. Here is the assignment for students who want an electronic copy or who missed class:

Google Drive - Racial Autobiography Assignment

We shared the racial autobiographies and developed a list in the affinity groups about top issues that the group felt like they were facing. Next class, we will have a discussion about these issues (I know many groups did not finish with this), with the hopes of engaging everyone in meaningful dialogue.

10/5 - Class Recap

This weekend, I (Mr. Fritz) will be travelling through Vancouver, British Columbia (pictured above) to get to Victoria, British Columbia. I am treating my wife to an overnight getaway using airline points for her birthday!

Dear class,

Thank you for your work today together, as we soldiered on without Ms. Labossiere for the day. Here's what happened in class today:

Learning Targets Addressed:
I can communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place, or region.

Soundtrack: "Colored People" by dc Talk. Selected for today because I talked about the song during my sharing of my (Mr. Fritz's) racial autobiography last class. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 10/5/17:
Check In/Review Agreements
Grades
What is Whiteness?
White Like Me: Awakenings
Racial Autobiography Work

Homework: Read the blog! Racial autobiography assignment (PRINTED) due at the start of next class.
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Check In/Review Agreements: At the beginning of class, we went over the Courageous Conversations Agreements, as always, to begin our work together for the day.

As part of the check in, we talked for a while in class about gun control vs. gun rights as a reaction to the Las Vegas shooting. Here were the two articles I (Mr. Fritz) showed in class:

WashingtonPost.com - Just three percent of adults own half of America’s guns

BBC.com - Las Vegas shooting: NRA urges new rules for gun 'bump-stocks'

Thank you for the spirited conversation here. I apologize that I eventually had to cut it short so we could do everything else we needed to in class!

Grades: I wanted to talk about the grades you are seeing in StudentVUE, which have been updated. The major assignment so far in class was the Where I'm From poem. The other grade in the gradebook is a +/=/- grade for the collection of evidence, meaning the letter to me, blog comment, and syllabus signed. If you did all three of those, you got a +, if you missed one, it was an =, and if you missed two, it was a -. If you would like to improve your grade, please resubmit work to us.

The next big graded assignment will be the Racial Autobiography, due next class. We originally said that the Socratic Seminar would be graded, but due to how short that Wednesday class was, we will most likely just include that in a Behavior grade.

What is Whiteness?: For this section of class, I went over what a working definition of "Whiteness" could look like, by showing the following material:

Google Drive - Tim Wise: White Like Me Discussion Guide

The page I showed in class was #12, which goes into some history regarding the social construction of Whiteness.

The second image I showed in class is here:

I wanted students to know what it means when we say, during the Courageous Conversations conditions "Examine the presence and role of Whiteness," what exactly that means.

White Like Me: Awakenings: The next part of class was diving into a book that I (Mr. Fritz) talked about last class as a part of my racial autobiography, White Like Me by Tim Wise. Link to buy the book from Powells here.

In particular, we wanted to have students read about Tim Wise awakened to this field of work, as a white man. I read part of an excerpt from the book, and then had students finish reading it, while annotating and making questions. This was intended as a way to look at another racial autobiography as you continue to put thought and care into crafting your own.

Racial Autobiographies: The rest of class was devoted to continuing to work on our racial autobiographies. Here is the assignment for students who want an electronic copy or who missed class:

Google Drive - Racial Autobiography Assignment

This will be due at the start of next class on Monday, October 9th. Please bring a paper copy. Writing a racial autobiography forces us to consider all of the ways that race has impacted our lives. Please continue to put lots of thought and effort into yours! See you next week!

10/3 - Class Recap

Part of my (Mr. Fritz's) racial autobiography today in class was about my experiences with one of my best friends in life, Ryan. Here we are in 2007! Can't believe this was 10 years ago!

Hi everyone,

Welcome back to another interesting (hopefully!) week of Diversity and Social Justice! Here's what happened in class today:

Learning Targets Addressed:
I can communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place, or region.

Soundtrack: "Runnin' Down a Dream" by Tom Petty. Selected for today because of Mr. Petty passing away yesterday at the age of 66. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 10/3/17:
Check In/Review Agreements
News Updates
Racial Autobiographies

Homework: Read the blog! Racial autobiography assignment (PRINTED) due at the start of class on Monday, October 9.
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Check In/Review Agreements: At the beginning of class, we went over the Courageous Conversations Agreements, as always, to begin our work together for the day.

News Updates: Plenty to talk about at the start of class! First off, we moved the position of the "front" of the room to be Ms. Lee's side, due to the class next door to us. We checked in about the weekend and what students were up to. Next, we discussed the shooting in Las Vegas and discussed what we knew about what happened. Related to that, I showed this visual of mass shootings in the last 5 years, via Axios on Twitter:

I also showed the video clip that the district made about our time with Jordan Thierry last week! Here it is:

Equity Conversations at Westview High School from TeacherSource Videos on Vimeo.

Along with that, we showed students that your work has been highlighted in multiple emails to all staff, both here at Westview and across the entire Beaverton School District. Not bad, right?

Next, I showed a news story that Ben B. sent me about his dad, who works for the Portland Police, and implicit bias in a traffic stop with a man of color:

KPTV.com - Portland man, officer share story to help shine light on implicit bias

Super powerful and interesting! We have asked Ben if his dad and/or Mr. Jones might be willing to come talk with our class about this experience.

Finally, we talked about the Dia Nelson Scholarship fund. Details of that can be found here:

It is with great joy--amid our shared grief--that we can announce that the Dia Nelson Memorial Scholarship is up and ready to start honoring a wonderful and dearly missed colleague.

Option #1: Online contributions (VISA only) can be made by going to the "Online Payment System" page of the BSD website.  Once there, please follow these steps (you do not need to create an account in order to donate):

Click the big blue button, "CLICK HERE TO MAKE A DONATION";
Fill in personal donor information;
Under the "School" drop down menu, choose "BEAVERTON SCHOOL DISTRICT";
Under the "Item"drop down menu, choose "DIA NELSON MEMORIAL SCHOLARSHIP";
Both "Memo" and "Amount" are optional.

Option #2: Lenee Gower is able to take cash or check contributions directly in her office here (or mailed to her at Westview). Checks need to be made out to the "Beaverton School District" with a note indicating it is for the "Dia Nelson Memorial Scholarship".

Please contribute if you are able. Dia was a close friend of both Natalie and I. We would love to have her impact on the Westview community memorialized in this way!

Racial Autobiographies: After this opening section, we moved on to our next major assignment of the semester, which is called a Racial Autobiography. Both Ms. Labossiere and I have done this activity ourselves with colleagues on the Beaverton School District Equity Leadership Team, but I have never before read mine before students, and I don't think Ms. Labossiere had, either! Thank you for your patience as we introduced this assignment. Here it is for students who want an electronic copy or who missed class:

Google Drive - Racial Autobiography Assignment

This will be due at the start of class on Monday, October 9th. Please bring a paper copy. Writing a racial autobiography forces us to consider all of the ways that race has impacted our lives. We asked students to identify major themes from our shared autobiographies, and then we asked students to start working on the assignment for the rest of class.

Next class, we will start looking into another racial autobiography of sorts, as Ms. Labossiere will be out and I will introduce a chapter of a book for us to read.

See you on Thursday, everyone!