March is Women’s History Month
Kicking off Women’s History Month, President Biden announced his nomination of the first Black woman Supreme Court Justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson. And, if appointed, Jackson would join the first Latinx justice Sonia Sotomayor. Diversity on the court – as diversity among our families in our great school – has the potential to bring new ideas and expand thinking and reasoning about decisions.
Bigelow Middle School FORJ 7-Day Anti-Racism Challenge Recap
On March 1st, Bigelow Middle School Principal Chassity Coston joined a group of parents and a few middle school children on Zoom to discuss some of the materials available in the posted 7-Day Anti-Racism Challenge – originally hosted by the Heller School at Brandeis University. We discussed some of the viewable materials (some more accessible to families with kids than others) and talked about what it means to garner generational wealth and the historic and cultural influences on who has access to generational wealth. In our brief hour together, we also discussed the materials on Reparations and “Redlining.” Participants agreed that the video on Redlining was very instructive. And, we looked at a striking map of the Newton Corner area when Redlining first began.The challenge materials remain available online and are parsed out into categories with great prompts to develop thinking and practice to be anti-racist (that’s non-racism in action!).
Check out A Virtual Tour: Women’s Heritage Trail
Visit the City of Boston website: https://www.boston.gov/departments/womens-advancement/womens-history-month to take a tour around Boston featuring women who made an impact. Includes addresses or locations so, when the weather improves, let’s take a walk to see them for ourselves! See https://bwht.org/ for more details about the women and sites.
Next CityWide FORJ Meeting – Thursday, March 10th
Contact Lanni if you’d like to join and learn more!
FAMILIES ORGANIZING FOR RACIAL JUSTICE (FORJ) is a group of diverse Newton families helping our children learn about issues of power and inequality and how to stand up for racial justice. We seek to generate understanding and curiosity about differences in our society, and to work together towards racial equity.
For more information about FORJ, contact Lincoln-Eliot FORJ PTO Liaison Lanni Isenberg, lanni_harris@yahoo.com.