Mid College Crisis

 I think all college students go through a moment where they feel like they aren't doing the right thing. The wonder is the degree they are perusing is really right for them. A lot of students change majors at least once, but for some this can be a huge inner struggle of self identity. I mean lets face it as adults we define ourselves by our careers so this concept of picking a field that will define us for life is not an easy choice. 

I changed majors twice. When I first entered college at 18 fresh out of high school I was tracked as Pre- Nursing at The Community College of Rhode Island. My goal was to become a pediatric trauma nurse, and work in a pediatric hospitals ER. After two and a half years of working my way thorough pre requirements to even apply to the program and a failed attempt at anatomy, I realized Nursing was not for me. I wanted to help people especially kids but this was not the way I was going to do it. I sat with my advisor and decided Teaching was what I was meant to do and I was going to do everything I could to get into The Rhode Island College School of teaching. After one more semester at CCRI I was accepted into RIC and my goal was to apply to the school of edu at the end of that year. 

My first semester at RIC I took a fundamentals of teaching class, my Professor Corinne McKamey was one of the smartest people I had ever met. Her background in education was astounding and her kindness and compassion radiated in every lesson. About half way thought the semester she asked me to stay after class for a few minutes and she asked me if I had ever heard of Youth Development. It was a major that she had helped create and after hearing my hope and dreams about helping youth she felt it would be a perfect fit. 

September of 2019 I was officially declared a Youth Development Major at Rhode Island College. 

Fall of 2020 came around and I was faced with a another college crisis. I knew I cared about youth. I knew that my heart was designed to love and appreciate kids and give them all the help and support I could but what if I was not the support they needed? I had now taken two semesters of social work and youth development classes and the echoing theme I kept hearing was that schools and kids didn't need more white women telling them what to do. I felt horrible, I cared so much about my students but what if me caring wasn't enough. What if I didn't know how to care for them the right way? What if I was just contributing to the bigger issue? What if me caring about youth was not enough to actually support them? After a lot of soul searching and research and a few meetings with my teacher at the time I came to a realization.

I am willing and able to put the work into myself so that I can still lead with compassion but also with education. 

I am a white women and I can not change that about myself anymore then my students can change that they are not white, however I can do my part in educating my self on the actual needs of my students. I can use my ears to listen to there stories, there history and there culture and do my best to honor it in my youth space. 

Above all I can still care about my students, but saying you care without action and education is like trying to save someone who is drowning with out knowing how to swim your self and not having the life preserver to throw.  

A B C, one, two, three, baby, you and me girl!

"A B C ..."

A- "Because of the ways it disrupts dominant school discourses that position young people as part of the problem, rather then part of a solution" 

B- "Youth Development, is complex, multifaceted and challenging work"

C- "As youth work leaders, they know who they are and what they believe"

its easy as one, two, three...

1- I am an example of how focusing on youths problems in a school system leads to a failure to thrive in an academic setting. Every singe time I work in a youth setting my number on goal is to focus on where the student is at celebrate there strengths and then work from there. I try my absolutist hardest to use a positive youth development approach at all times.

2- Working with youth is never the same one day to the next, it is an ever changing environment and hopefully one that grows every meeting. As a youth worker you have to be prepared to face the daily challenges and how ever fast they change. So many things can happen over the course of a child's day that by the time they arrive in our care they could be exploding with emotions and energy that they couldn't express all day.  Its a huge challenge but that is one of the things I love about it so much. 

3- When I apply to any job or any position working with youth. I have such a strong sense and vision of my values and what I bring to the table. I have had so many parents express how impressed they are with interviews I give but the truth is that youth work prepares you for being absolutely firm and grounded in your beliefs. When you work with youth you have to be firm in your beliefs because they will test you, and question you and push you to question everything you believe in. 

A Perfect Little Country School House

 

This very famous painting is called, "A Country School" , by Norman Rockwell. It is a very famous painting by an amazingly famous painter. Aside from the wood stove in the center of the classroom,      (which I wish we had in schools still) this image could have been my elementary school classroom. I would probably be the little girl reading a book by her self and ignoring the teacher, an act I got in trouble for at least once a week in elementary school. I bet that most of you look at this painting and think what a nice painting, cute kids, look at the art work on the wall, but does anyone see anything weird here? I didnt, and I lived it.

I didn't start to realize that my youth experience was so far removed from the word "typical", or "normal". My experience in a classroom looked exactly like this Rockwell painting, from Kindergarten all the way though senior year of high school. It was in High School that I started realizing how truly limited my experience was. It was actually one of my favorite teachers that first called it out. It became a running joke which in reality is horrifying. " To live in this town you have to be white, republican, Christian, and upper middle class"  this statement probably sounds ridiculous to you but in all honesty it was true. This statement completely encompasses my primary school education experiences. My graduating class walked the stage with about 125 students. We were the largest class to move through the school in over 10 years. The past few classes had about 70-80 kids in a class. My elementary school classes never had more then 25 kids in a class, and my high school classes had typically around 15. Each item in that seemingly rude list holds completely true.

You have to be....

White: My classrooms looked just like this painting, we had absolutely zero diversity in my entire school. In my 22 years of living in my town I have only ever scene one Black family ever live there. We are a completely white washed community and over the past several years have fought legally at the state level to keep it that way.

Republican: My town has been ruled by a republican town council until 2017 when a group of 4 independents came in and took the vote, there were practically riots, town council meetings had to be moved to the high school auditorium because over 70 people would show up to every single meeting to shut down and boycott every action of the new town council including the yearly budget which was held for three months due to the citizens voting it down. Previously you were luck to have 5 residents show up for a meeting. 

Christian: This one is almost rooted in the make up of the town, we have a church on almost every major rode, the kids I graduated HS with I went through CCD with, I made my first communion with, town businesses still function around the church sechudal on the weekends, before this year the school only took Christian holidays off.

Upper Middle Class: Most of my friends first cars they got for there 16th birthday and they were all new, now I do want to be careful here and make notice I used the word most. The funny thing about growing  up in a rural community is some people were very happy to drive there dads old pick up truck they had been driving around the back roads since they were 14 however MOST of my friends received brand new cars, at 16 years old. Kids in my school all had the newest IPods as soon as they came out and later IPhones. Money was some what disposable, something they never worried about.     

So race was not something we talked about. Why would you talk about something so taboo when your town and your school looks like a Norman Rockwell painting? 

Fall of 2016 I started classes at the Community College of Rhode Island. I think the term culture shock is not a strong enough term for the earthquake of diversity I was suddenly experiencing. I distinctly remember sitting in a general physiology class my first semester and looking around realizing I was the only white person in the room. I very clearly remember how this felt for the first time in my life to be the minority in the room. I remember actually noticing how uncomfortable I felt. 

The biggest part of this day that stood out to me though was the thought that came in my head next. 

"wow, good for them for making it this far, and actually going to college." 

The moment this thought came into my head I was ashamed of my self. I instantly backed up and thought wow that was super rude of me to think that just because they are Black and Brown they must have not come from a good school. But I think now the bigger problem is that I didn't realize how raciest this thought it was, I knew it was rude but I didn't identify that it was racist.

What I was not able to identify until I was entering year 2/3 of college is that although I always labeled my self as an open, loving person, who did not care what race or gender or sexual orientation someone was, I still had a lot of underscored ideologies that were due to being raised in such a narrow community.

This moment in my first college class made me really reflect on my experiences and why I had thought this way.  Pretty much my entire life I had been told the reason we moved to the rural town of Scituate from our apartment in Pawtucket when I was a year old was because of the better school district. Teachers in the school frequently reminded us that we were a top performing school, there was always this very suddel undertone that schools that looked like ours and ran like ours were better schools. It was never explicitly said that schools with diverse populations were less then or that the students at those schools were not smart but it was made clear that if you wanted to be smart and succeeded in school your school should look and run like ours, so even though I knew that the kids in my college class were smart, individuals I couldn't erase the racist biased that had been in my head. 

Now I am apart of a thriving diverse school community and it actually makes me angry how narrow minded and exclusive my primary school education was. I truly believe it hurt me in the long run not being exposed to different languages, cultures, and races, I am truly, now in college playing catch up, trying to educate my self as fast as possible as my friend circle becomes more diverse. Its not easy and I am constantly fighting with my roots and my education. THIS is important however. I am willing to fight for it, I am willing to make mistakes, say the wrong thing and grow as a human to become a more compassionate individual. That is the important part, you can blame your upbringing for the lack of knowledge that you approach a situation with but if you do not do your part to break that cycle and educate your self as an adult that is on you and ultimately what is wrong with our society.    

"Those Whites whose lives are structured so as to limit their interaction with peo-

ple of color, as well as their awareness of racial issues, may remain at this stage indefinitely."