heritage month celebrations in school

[Anonymous]

Why doesn't every elementary and middle schools or even the cluster have heritage or international night or even a week and let that be the educational learning the school provides instead of spending so much time on this each month or each quarter. Don't know what they do in HS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why doesn't every elementary and middle schools or even the cluster have heritage or international night or even a week and let that be the educational learning the school provides instead of spending so much time on this each month or each quarter. Don't know what they do in HS.

What is your school doing? At our ES, some teachers (not all) will talk briefly about someone from the group in question for a little bit in the morning. It's hardly a lot of time, and it's the kind of little thing that gives flavor to a day that's often pretty repetitive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why doesn't every elementary and middle schools or even the cluster have heritage or international night or even a week and let that be the educational learning the school provides instead of spending so much time on this each month or each quarter. Don't know what they do in HS.

What is your school doing? At our ES, some teachers (not all) will talk briefly about someone from the group in question for a little bit in the morning. It's hardly a lot of time, and it's the kind of little thing that gives flavor to a day that's often pretty repetitive.

Agreed, I don't think the time spent on cultural heritage stuff is significant enough to be a distraction. In addition to maybe talking briefly about it in the morning, our kids have typically done something for Black History month where they pick a person and write about them/do a class presentation. This is in ES. I don't know that our MS does anything specific within the classroom (I assume this is teacher dependent) but both ES and MS have an international fair or cultural heritage night sponsored by PTA where families volunteer to staff a table with information/stuff about their heritage. The variety is completely dependent on how many parents volunteer.

[Anonymous]

They don’t care and don’t feel it’s inclusive.

[Anonymous]

A lot of unreflected racial beliefs on this thread.

[Anonymous]

I have mixed feelings. I’m staff in a school that celebrates a lot of Black and Hispanic culture events, because that’s our population. They’re fun and festive, and it’s nice to have theme weeks with music and talent showcase etc. But was have plenty of kids who are minorities in the building who, even if there is a month on paper that is dedicated to them, don’t have any kind of actual celebration or recognition. The events are very much student run, so if kids aren’t organizing them or asking for it, it doesn’t happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Easier to do this than actually teach our kids Math / Science / English.

The school system gets to highlight how it celebrates diversity and that draws attention away from our abysmal proficiency rates.

It's a win-win for everyone involved.

+1. So much emphasis on "diversity." We are ALL diverse and we all or our ancestors came from some other land. Why not read about Cesar Chavez which they do but is it necessary to spend a whole month discussing his and his movement's contributions, or have students do a biography on a notable African American to present to the school etc..?

You know they do other things during that month?

[Anonymous]

They spent almost an entire quarter talking about corn. Why not beans too 😂?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid loves diversity but doesn't like heritage celebrations. DC feels they celebrate big groups at the expense of smaller ethnicities.

For real? How old is DC? Hopefully old enough to understand that all people experience many different kinds of belonging?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have mixed feelings. I’m staff in a school that celebrates a lot of Black and Hispanic culture events, because that’s our population. They’re fun and festive, and it’s nice to have theme weeks with music and talent showcase etc. But was have plenty of kids who are minorities in the building who, even if there is a month on paper that is dedicated to them, don’t have any kind of actual celebration or recognition. The events are very much student run, so if kids aren’t organizing them or asking for it, it doesn’t happen.

There are mixed raced and mixed heritage students. Let's say one is Latino-Australian. Have international and heritage night or week or even one month and be done, mcps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid loves diversity but doesn't like heritage celebrations. DC feels they celebrate big groups at the expense of smaller ethnicities.

🙄🙄🙄

Aren't Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July all holidays at the expense of others?

Halloween is Druid (European)
Thanksgiving (celebrates the killing of Natives and being grateful that Europeans could come here to settle with their families)
Memorial Day (commentates the people who died fighting in wars started by Europeans)
4th of July (celebrates freedom from England while keeping African people as captives in America)

I could go on ......

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny how there is never a French heritage celebration or anything european.

LOL.

[Anonymous]

What do they do for 'identity' months if anything? Women's history etc.. versus heritage?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid loves diversity but doesn't like heritage celebrations. DC feels they celebrate big groups at the expense of smaller ethnicities.

🙄🙄🙄

Aren't Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July all holidays at the expense of others?

Halloween is Druid (European)
Thanksgiving (celebrates the killing of Natives and being grateful that Europeans could come here to settle with their families)
Memorial Day (commentates the people who died fighting in wars started by Europeans)
4th of July (celebrates freedom from England while keeping African people as captives in America)

I could go on ......

They’re not celebrated at most MCPS schools anymore.

[Anonymous]

I’ll consider it inclusive when we add Irish heritage month, Anglo-American month to the roster. Otherwise, it has nothing to do with inclusion.