Hold My Hand

I have been called to break what generations before me have accepted. I feel like something in me should respond to the problem in front of me. I identified those feelings early in life by being reared in a southern town filled with fixed ideas of how to treat Blacks.

When my first summer job of camp counselor coupled me with a roommate from Sierra Leone, my feelings turned into self- awareness that I needed to recognize my biases and change my traditional teachings into actions of reaching out and loving the Black community. My white preference teachings had not acknowledged or believed those prejudices existed. My journey continued with best Black college friends in theater that shaped my understanding of the divide they lived every day of their lives.

After graduation, I was hired to teach in an all Black inner-city school in New Orleans. I wrote a book about this experience and the lessons learned from the staff and students. DIO Press will publish it this summer. I decided while waiting for it to be published, I should begin a new blog sharing quotes, stories, art, and experiences in how to discover and overcome the closed mindedness or biases that have invaded our lives. We all have seen the problem surface repeatedly. Now, will you hold my hand and reach out and give acceptance of equality to all and be a part of this change?

#white preference #Black inner-city school #New Orleans