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Published on 02/22/1999 All articles from this issue

Diversity forum gets students thinking about discrimination

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By Linda Taaffe / Town Crier Staff Writer

Going to a school where the student population represents a multitude of racial and economic backgrounds, it's not difficult for misunderstandings to occur.

"It's easy to say things without knowing about the effects on others," said Tinea Plunkett, a student at Mountain View High School. Plunkett seemed optimistic though, that change can happen if "people just change their way of thinking."

And that's exactly what Plunkett and 225 teen delegates from 205 local high schools and 20 junior high schools attempted to do this month at Silicon Graphics in Mountain View during the second annual Youth Forum on Diversity, titled "Beyond Barriers: Race, Gender, Class - A Bridge to the New Millennium."

Sponsored by Oriki Theater, the Mountain View Chamber of Commerce and Global Culture & Arts, Inc., the forum serves as an avenue for young people to discuss diversity issues.

Myriah Cornwell, a student at Mountain View High, served on this year's planning committee. She said the committee came up with the forum's theme based on experiences common to students. Cornwell said she sees a lot of isolation between ethnic groups on her campus. Cornwell said she hoped that what students learned at the forum would spark some dialogue and trickle down to others on campus.

"I hope people walk away with more of an understanding of ways to be more conscious in their actions and words," Cornwell said.

That message came across for Nikki Reyes, a student at Pinewood School in Los Altos Hills. Reyes said she hoped to use the different opinions she had heard to help her view situations from a different perspective.

For much of the day, students talked about ways to dispel ethnic stereotypes. They agreed that change could come about through educational reform, such as textbooks that include more examples of different ethnic groups.

"Whoever is writing, is writing history," Plunkett said. "We have a right to learn about our culture. We shouldn't wait for anyone else to teach us. We need to ask for new texts."

Cornwell said she believed the forum was an eye-opening experience for many of the students. She said by the end of the day, all of the delegates had realized that they had experienced some degree of discrimination based on gender, race or class - whether it was as subtle as not finding a Band-Aid to match their skin color or being excluded from a certain sport because of gender. "We all had that in common," she said.