A Student Without Fear, How I Used my Voice to Bring Change to My School

By:Ja’Loni Owens

As an Afro-Latina, race and gender issues influence innumerable decisions regarding my education, my career, and my safety. Fortunately, I have been blessed with two loving parents who have taught me to embrace my culture and to never allow ignorant educators to discourage me from reaching my goals. My parents and I are so career-focused that I am enrolled in a vocational high school in which I have chosen a trade or “shop” to study in addition to my academic courses. Despite these teachings, I am sometimes unable to escape these feelings of discouragement and anger.

At the end of April 2015, a teacher at my high school participated in a discussion on Facebook regarding the protests in Baltimore. Everyone has the freedom to voice their opinions, but this teacher’s comments were racist, dehumanizing, and violent. Screenshots of these demeaning, racist comments floated around for months without any condemnation from school administration.

Several teachers expressed anger and disgust towards these comments, but were told to be silent about the situation and not to inform students. It was not until June 2015 that the local media began to get involved and parents began to demand answers from the school. After an article was printed in a local newspaper and city officials began asking questions, the teacher resigned.

Once this incident became public, students as well as teachers brought forth many of their experiences with discrimination, prejudice, and harassment. After hearing various stories relating to gender, race, sexuality, and gender identity, six of my peers and I began organizing a public forum and reaching out to various organizations and community leaders to inform them of what was happening in my high school and invite them to our forum.

I received responses from ACLU Massachusetts, The Massachusetts Democratic Party, city councilors, and even Senator Elizabeth Warren’s office. Approximately 100,000 residents live in my city; naturally, word circulated that a number of students demanded an open forum to address administration’s poor leadership. Hundreds of people attended.

At the public forum, I gave a timeline of the events since April of 2015, my peers shared some of their experiences, some students spoke on behalf of their friends and classmates, and I concluded the forum with a list of our demands, which were published in a local paper. Local media outlets covered this entire ordeal and many community members were stunned at the frightening and heartbreaking stories my peers and I shared at this forum.

My peers and I were confronted with mixed reactions to the forum. Many teachers, most I had no history with, thanked me and commended my peers and I for our efforts. One teacher specifically said, “…you and the other students are more courageous than the entire faculty combined!” Following the forum, many local officials and community members reached out to my friends and I offering help and giving us support on our mission to draw attention to prejudice within our high school.

There are currently ongoing investigations for each incident brought up at the forum. In the words of Frederick Douglass: “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will”. Without demanding the resignation of the academic principal and making our voices heard, my high school would still be the intolerant, hostile environment it always had been. My peers and I were able to give a voice to the students who were either too afraid or too ashamed to come forward.

Though many positives came out of this public forum, there were many negatives as well. Students, parents, teachers, and other residents began to target my peers and I. Some of the teachers of my career technical area, specifically, have gone out of her way to create trouble for me within my high school. A parent of a recent graduate went onto the private Facebook account of one of the students who spoke at the forum attacking her and attempting to discredit her.

Numerous teachers, most I have never met, began to speak negatively about my peers and I. Many began to make up lies about my father, the director of guidance and pupil personnel at my high school, and went as far to mistreat my younger brother in the classroom. There have been a few times since the forum that I have felt overwhelmed and unhappy due to the miserable environment school is becoming. To get myself out of those periods of unhappiness I remember how many students and teachers now feel heard and safe because of my peers and I. Knowing that many students feel a little bit better about coming to school in the morning is worth the petty digs and discomfort I feel at school.

In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” From the very start of this ordeal my peers along would ask, “Why are you making such a big deal out of this? He was fired; isn’t that what we wanted”?  Each time I was asked this question I would give the same reply: “I’m not sure what you want, but what I want is change.” I want a change in the way each student, especially those who were too scared or too ashamed to come forward, feels when entering this building.

I want a change in the culture of the building. I want to change the indifference administration, faculty, and students feel towards these incidents of racial, gender, sexuality, and gender identity based discrimination. Until this incident, I have never been put in such a position that would require me to speak out against injustice in the way my peers and I have.

The part of all of this that has resonated the most with me is the impact this call for change has had on the lives of my peers, my teachers, and other members of my community. One student used to be in a male-dominated trade at my vocational high school. Every day she would either be the target or a witness to sexual harassment or race-based discrimination. She had written letters to the principal in the past but no one would address these issues within her shop. After the forum, this student went to administration again and was granted her desire to switch into a gender-neutral shop. This student is now thriving in another shop and aspires to be a businesswoman. This future businesswoman can do for all of those she encounters, what my peers and I have done for her, and that is to give them hope.

I have become much more socially aware and more confident in my ability to orate. I have been so grateful to be apart of this call for change and creation of a healthier working and learning environment. Most importantly, I want to share this story with others to ensure them that one voice can most definitely make a difference.