Dearborn, MI
Mix It Up at Lunch Day can be very flexible. It's not hard to do, and students have the drive and energy to make it a success.
We targeted 150 ninth-grade students and divided them into three lunch periods (50 students per lunch period). They were hand-picked from among the following subgroups: blacks, whites, Lebanese, Yemenis, Iraqis, jocks, band members, cheerleaders as well as students in special education and bilingual classes.
Our theme: Making the Invisible Visible [1]
We had two team leaders (one 11th-grader and one 12th-grader) per table. We mixed up the students and had team leaders ask ice-breaking questions such as: “What would you rather have, a car without a license or a license without a car?” and “What are some of the rumors you’ve heard about Fordson? What was true and what was not?”
We paid for the pizza, soda and cookies.
How did students benefit? Many of them walked away with new friends. Also, Mix It Up brought down walls of race and ethnicity. At the same time, it built new relationships among the team leaders and the staff members who supported the event.
How
did the students react? Many of them felt great that they were invited. Bilingual
newcomers and students in special-ed often get left out and feel isolated. New
friendships were made, the kids who participated no longer felt alone in a
student population of 2,500. Most importantly, the students saw each other as people and looked
beyond issues like race and ethnicity.
Responding to students’ requests, this year we plan to have a Diversity Day off
campus, hosted by an outside agency. It’s still in the works. We’ve formed a
working committee to continue examining issues of race and ethnicity, and we are
working on other projects for Fall 2010.
Links:
[1] http://www.tolerance.org/blog/making-invisible-visible-preparing-mix-it-lunch-day