Professional Hopes and Goals

Throughout this course, I have acquired knowledge about the many ways in which I, as a professional can support children and their families who come from diverse backgrounds. This support will allow me to:

• build better professional relationships with families
• foster equity and social justice
• develop partnerships within the community
• create a welcoming and diverse environment

By utilizing these perspectives, my hope that my classroom is one that provide inspiration parents, children, community members and others as it relates to diversity equity and social justice.

One goal that I would like to set for the early childhood field in relation to diversity, equity and social justice is to continue to foster change as rapidly as society changes.

I would like to thank my colleagues for their words of wisdom, encouragement and for sharing their personal and professional experiences. I wish you all success and good luck in the future.

Welcoming Families From Around the World

The country I found that piqued my interest in is Malawi. Malawi is located in southeast Africa that is encompassed with beautiful land and wildlife. With a population of 13,603,181 natives, who speak the native tongue of Chichewa and also English, this country maintains its rich African culture and heritage.

If I was working in an early childhood setting in a hospital and a family emigrated from Malawi, I would prepare myself to be culturally responsive towards the family by: 1) conducting personal research on the country's deep culture as well as surface culture 2) begin to learn the native language of Chichewa to have effective communication with the family 3) communicate with the family about their wants, needs and expectations from the hospital as it relates to their culture and heritage 4) create a training for those working with the family to provide an understanding of the culture and 5) create an environment that will be welcoming to the family by labeling the hospital in both Chichewa and English.

By preparing myself and the hospital for the family, I hope that I will be able to assist the family, myself and the hospital by providing an environment that encourages cultural differences. I also hope that the family would educate both myself and others to increase our knowledge on their native land and daily activities to decrease the instances of microaggressions and any form of an "ism."

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice and Oppression

Being an African-American woman entails having countless incidents of bias, prejudice and oppression directed towards you in both overt and overt ways. One particular incident involved myself and some childhood friends of mine. We were walking to school as we were all middle school-aged children. During the early to mid-nineties there was an influx of skinheads in our area and increased racially motivated violence. Skinheads are a subgroup of youth that make their stance of white power known through violence and antagonizing other races of people. As we were walking and talking we head a car speed behind of really fast and the dreaded "n-word" being used numerous times. Our initial reaction was to run to a safe place, which we did but we never left one another's side. Safe to say we made it to school without further incident and reported the information to the proper authorities and school personnel.

As I think about this incident feelings of anger, frustration, fear, relief and trust pop into my mind. Anger and fear come to mind as I remember being fearful for what may happen to a group of children from black, white and bi-racial ethnicity's. The feelings of relief and trust come about as I am thankful and blessed that we were safe. I also say trust because that incident brought us pre-teens closer together. My feelings of frustration as it is 2012 and I continue to hear about incidents such as this and some incidents more graphic and violent that involves bias, prejudice, oppression and some form of an "ism."

This incident diminished the diversity that is prevalent in this country and in my local neighborhood by continuance of the overt use of white privilege, the use of power over others, racism, and superiority. At that time, I believed that the rights that my ancestors and other fought and died for were in vain. This incident also taught me that anyone can be treated in an unjust and unfair way. In order for such as incident to changed for an opportunity for greater equity, the mindsets of both the skinheads and even the group I was with would have to change. These mindsets and beliefs include:inferiority and superiority, power, and so on.