Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 20:26     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
STA, NCS and BVR are racist institutions. They use confidentiality agreements to keep issues under wraps. The administration and church is more interested in protecting the brand and not the kids. I ask you to speak to parents who have left. Ask around and people will connect you.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 20:19     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
I would suggest reading through all of these: https://www.instagram.com/blackatsidwellfriends/?hl=en

When you're done, ask yourself if you really believe each of these submissions. If you do, I've got a bridge to sell you.

When you create Instagram accounts that let people submit anonymously (meaning, even the Instagram account doesn't know who is submitting it because it's just through a Google doc: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSddU6JM8MCUpWlT-vQ0D82WOgxoA7M-ut7tBMj6NwtuYYkmSw/viewform), you have a recipe for some fact mixed with some fiction. I have no idea what the motives were of the person who started all these accounts, but they've done nothing except marginalize people with real stories, who are lumped in with the fiction writers having some fun.

Having read this board for years, it's clear that there are people who take perverse enjoyment trolling on DCUM. What makes anyone think they don't do the same thing on these Google doc submissions?

The person running these accounts is irresponsible for making them look authentic when they're even less verified than what's posted on DCUM (which at least has Jeff able to see URLs to police trolling at some level).
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:56     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:I suspect something/some events likely happened there that she’s not sharing in the piece, so we don’t have the full context.

Based on reading it, my guess is that, like many of us, she reassessed some career/life choices when she saw a police officer kneeling on a black man for 8 minutes and 46 seconds while three other officers stood by and watched as a man begged for his life. It made me reassess some of these same things too, e.g., are you better off working to make incremental change in the system or just opting out entirely. I get it.

But when you read through the whole piece, it's pretty clear that whatever happened during her cup of remote/hybrid coffee at NCS didn't move the needle much, if at all. She'd be better off making that clearer to people.

Otherwise, progressive institutions that want to add diverse/progressive/radical voices like this will IMHO see what happened here and say "why take the risk" next time, since the hiring institution gets the brunt of the criticism in a situation like this. According to the piece, her anger is at her grade school (which she says subjugated her before she even began kindergarten), middle school (mean white guys), high school (where Blackface was apparently tolerated), college (frat boys committing sexual assault with impunity), public school teaching (where POC "shone more brightly than their white peers" but were passed over constantly for promotion), health care system (which leaves her to face dying in childbirth, if the cancer and heart disease don't get her first). With a list of grievances like that, how could you expect any independent school (which is, by definition, a place of privilege) to make her happy?

Going out this way, where the optics make people assume that you experienced poor treatment during your 4 months even though it's clear there's a lot more to this, is a bad look in my opinion. Institutions will look at something like this and say "see, let's opt for the safe/non-controversial choice, not somebody with a fresh perspective who might just choose to take a lifetime of anger out on us". From the standpoint of someone that agrees with a lot of her perspectives, I find her way of expressing it all counterproductive, at least in the way that she comingles each of her employers with everything that she's experienced in life.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:49     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:I suspect something/some events likely happened there that she’s not sharing in the piece, so we don’t have the full context.


Same
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:25     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
I suspect something/some events likely happened there that she’s not sharing in the piece, so we don’t have the full context.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:24     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:I find it interesting that STA, NCS, and GDS provide no data on their website about the percentage of faculty and students of color. I did find the information for Sidwell's students: 54% and Maret: faculty 37%, students 51%. Now that clearly does not guarantee equity and inclusion, but I think, OP, that would be good information to ask about.

I think it's hard to get a glimpse of the underlying culture of a school during a typical admissions season let alone now. I think you have to go in knowing that STA has a terrible reputation and is likely not very diverse. Is it fair? No, but it may well be reality, and how does that affect your decision? Your child may face a similar racial make-up if they go to an Ivy for college, but the liberal culture may provide a little insulation from constant microagressions.


STA is 43% students of color - on their website. Do some basic research.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:21     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:This is what the diversity director who quit mid-year had to say about why she left. Maybe this might help?

https://www.thewellscollective.com/post/forblackwomen

Thank you for posting this. It's an interesting piece.

My college life included fighting the power at a predominately white institution, and I assumed that doing so in a K-12 setting, on behalf of kids, would be fulfilling.

First of all, let me preface this by saying that Elvis was a hero to most, but he never meant sh** to me you see straight up racist that sucker was simple and plain...

Now that I've gotten that out of my system, I think it's fair to say that if you go into a senior Diversity and Inclusion job (whether in academia, non-profits or the corporate world) thinking that your role is to "fight the power" in your organization, you're probably not in the type of constructive mindset that you're going to need to actually have any success there. You're itching for a war before you've even begun.

I knew, somehow, that dresses from J Crew and Banana Republic fit the bill and that, for some reason, acrylic nails and fake eyelashes did not.

I assume this is a reference to Roland Park Country School... if it's her 4 months at NCS, it's strange that she came to a conclusion like this during a period when there was nobody on campus (at least, I assume).

Black people are in their workplaces to do their jobs. Expecting them to also teach about racism is… well, racist. And should come with additional compensation.

Fair enough, and I agree with the broader point she is making about the way it's typically left to Black and Brown voices to do the work in this area within their organizations. But you can't latch yourself to this argument when you're in the D&I field because in that case D&I is the only thing you are getting asked to do. If you don't like teaching/programming about it, then take a job in the English or History department and teach something else. But if you instead choose to market yourself as a D&I professional, isn't it reasonable to expect that your employer is going to want you to teach about D&I?

Predominately white spaces were not intended for Black and Brown folks to thrive. Quite often, their success is literally dependent on the subjugation and intentional exclusion of People of Color and people who are poor. This phenomenon exists everywhere from corporate America to the nonprofit world. From schools to healthcare. The foundation of this country is inherently rooted in anti-Blackness, and in order to see a different organizational outcome, we would have to dismantle the institution.

I'm sufficiently progressive/radical that I actually agree with a lot of this, but if you choose to have this "burn it all down" mentality, you're going to need to accept that no institution will ever be good enough for you. This type of attitude reminds of Briahna Joy Gray's schtick forever defending voting for Jill Stein and critiquing every Democratic policy proposal as not good enough. If you're privileged enough to occupy a professional ivory tower that lets you say thing like this, more power to you, but 99.9% of employers are not going to hire you so that you can "dismantle the institution".

In order to answer these questions effectively, white folks must grapple with themselves and the harm they’ve caused. And that brings up a whole lot of feelings that somehow end up back on the laps of Black people (namely, Black women) to acknowledge, hold, and mitigate at the expense of their own wellbeing. Nah. Refer to point number one. (Point 1 is "I don’t fundamentally believe that I owe white people anything. Racism is not my cultural inheritance and therefore not my problem to solve.")

Again... ok, cool. So why were/are you accepting a paycheck to work in the D&I field again?

When you read through the whole piece, it's pretty clear that the author is grappling with a lifetime of racial trauma. I hope she finds some healing and a career path that she finds more fulfilling than the one she started on. Separately, I have to wonder about NCS's vetting here... if this was her tone when applying the job, whatever were they thinking in hiring her? She was destined to fail at any independent school.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 19:08     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
How about this as a mission statement: we, as a school community, are interested in a good kid, with solid ethics and morals, who is looking to work hard and do the best he/she can with the resources we can provide. Oh all of that - regardless of race, color, creed or sex.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:26     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I don’t think there’s any getting around the fact that a certain percentage of parents choose the priciest privates in DC expressly because they don’t want their children in significantly black public schools.


This is so stupid. If you want the whitest school, you choose a rich public, which you can afford if you can afford a pricy private school.

True - there's a reason Whitman is known on these boards as Whiteman.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:24     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:I don’t think there’s any getting around the fact that a certain percentage of parents choose the priciest privates in DC expressly because they don’t want their children in significantly black public schools.


This is so stupid. If you want the whitest school, you choose a rich public, which you can afford if you can afford a pricy private school.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:24     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
^ "their", not "there are"
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:23     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:I don’t think there’s any getting around the fact that a certain percentage of parents choose the priciest privates in DC expressly because they don’t want their children in significantly black public schools.

This goes well beyond DC privates. Just check out the MoCo Public forum threads on cluster map reassignments - half the county has white and Asian parents primarily focused on making sure that there are schools don't have the predominantly Black/Hispanic makeup that you find in the eastern/northern parts of the county.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:14     Subject: Re:Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
I don’t think there’s any getting around the fact that a certain percentage of parents choose the priciest privates in DC expressly because they don’t want their children in significantly black public schools.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 18:01     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
I find it interesting that STA, NCS, and GDS provide no data on their website about the percentage of faculty and students of color. I did find the information for Sidwell's students: 54% and Maret: faculty 37%, students 51%. Now that clearly does not guarantee equity and inclusion, but I think, OP, that would be good information to ask about.

I think it's hard to get a glimpse of the underlying culture of a school during a typical admissions season let alone now. I think you have to go in knowing that STA has a terrible reputation and is likely not very diverse. Is it fair? No, but it may well be reality, and how does that affect your decision? Your child may face a similar racial make-up if they go to an Ivy for college, but the liberal culture may provide a little insulation from constant microagressions.
Anonymous
Post 11/16/2020 17:42     Subject: Deep Racism Problems at NCS and STA: Questions/Answers we can't get through admissions
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:My daughter is a Latina student at NCS (a pretty small group, so I'm not going to get too specific). Her experience doesn't match those described in the Instagram accounts. I note that the same accounts exist for schools like SFS, GDS and Maret, all local publics. In reading through them all, I have (and she has, based on her own experiences) a tough time believing that all of the contributions are authentic and/or objective, though there is probably a grain of truth in at least some of them (as there probably is for all the local schools). The fact that anonymous contributions are accepted and posted makes it tough to tell what's real and what's trolling.

With respect to the commentary by the recently departed D&I director, it's puzzling that she came to all these conclusions during a 4 month period when everyone was remote (and during this time, my daughter had no exposure to her at all). Her commentary says "I knew that the Black power fist tattoo on my back could be shown under no circumstances." That seems pretty absurd based on what my daughter shows me on her group texts, as her and her group of friends are about as militantly pro-BLM as you'll find. Same with the faculty and administration, and the Cathedral staff/clergy. From what I have seen, the political culture at NCS, among the students and faculty at least, is very progressive, at least among a pretty large segment of the students.

The prior D&I director, who was excellent, left at the end of last year to take a HoS job. Her diversity day programs were excellent, and my daughter loved them. Separately, Rodney Glasgow (who was then MS head at St. Andrews, and is now HoS at SSFS) came to do a presentation either last year or the prior year, and my daughter couldn't stop raving about his discussion of the intersection of race and sexual orientation. Similarly, the Director of Admissions is very committed to these issues, and walks the walk. If you don't believe me, go find out for yourself.

At the parent level, I do find the culture fairly privileged, though I like the vast majority of parents. As a family with less money than a lot of other Close families, I do sometimes feel that there's an unconscious thoughtlessness about how we might, for example, not make small talk over the lavish vacations we'll be taking once Covid is over. However, the administration is very conscious about this, and bends over backwards to try to make sure students feel an environment based on equity.

Back to the recently departed D&I head... I wonder if her 2 years at her prior school, mixed with all the trauma of this past spring/summer, just soured her on doing this type of job. Too bad, because Toni Morrison is also one of my favorite authors, and I'd have loved to see what types of programs she might have put in place if she hadn't quit.


You meant that gds and sfs are privates right? Assuming that was a typo.

Yes - I meant "and local publics".