Understanding Culture to Help Foster a Culturally Proficient Workforce

1. Understanding Culture to Help Foster a Culturally Proficient Workforce

2. Activator • Stand up if….

3. Check-In • Sign-In • Reflection Packet with Articles • Vocabulary • Partners

4. The Data 78 students dropped out of Sun Prairie Schools over the last 3 years. 49 – 63% were boys 43 – 56% were African-American

5. In the 2010-2011 school year, there were 306 disciplinary incidents that resulted in out-of-school suspensions. 114 or 37% of those students were Black.

6. Last year 218 students in grades 9-12 took at least one Technical Education Course. 8 or 3% were English Language Learners 12 or 9% were girls

7. A Black student in Sun Prairie is 5 times more likely than a White student to be referred for Special Education evaluation by Sun Prairie staff members. • A Black male student is 11 times more likely than a White male student to end up labeled Emotionally/Behaviorally Disabled.

8. Last year a total of 260 Advanced Placement (AP) exams were taken by Sun Prairie Students.  Only 19 or 7% of those AP exams were taken by students of color.

9. Having a disability is the greatest barrier to participation in 'performance music' when students enroll for 6th grade. Greater than language, race, or poverty.

10. For Sun Prairie students, race is a greater factor over poverty in reading and math achievement.

11. The Vision All students, families, school employees, and community members unified by mutual respect and the shared purpose of seeking successful learning for every student.

12. The Priority Goal • District Goal #4 • Develop a highly qualified, diverse, and culturally proficient district workforce • Action plan 4c • Ensure that every employee receives training in skills of cultural proficiency

13. Agenda • Reflection on Culture • Privilege and Racism • Culturally Responsive Practices

14. Workshop Goals • To develop an understanding of my own culture and how it impacts my beliefs, values, and actions

15. Workshop Goals • To understand how institutional racism marginalizes groups of people

16. Workshop Goals • To develop an awareness of white privilege and its influence on my belief, values, and actions

17. Ground Rules • Everyone has a right to express his/her point of view. • Listen respectively to others without judging. • Share “air time” with others. • Limit sidebar conversations.

18. What is culture? • “What is culture?”

19. Culture • Thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs, values, customs, behaviors and artifacts that are shared by racial, ethnic, religious, or social groups of people.

20. Why do I need to understand my culture? • Culture shapes the way we see the world, ourselves, and others. • It is the predominant force in shaping behaviors, values, and institutions. • The more we understand ourselves, the better able we are to understand others.

21. Factors that Influence Culture Race Personality Traits Religion Me Gender Ability Economic Class

22. Language Space/proximity Attitude towards time Gender roles Family roles Grooming and presence Life cycles Status of age Education Dimensions of Culture

23. Exploring the Features of Culture Reflection Activity #2 Review/Read the following documents: • Identity Quilt • Features of Culture • Complete the Features of Culture Survey. • Reflection Packet

24. Partner Share • Share the completed survey with your 12 o’clock partner.

25. Culture is Like an Iceberg

26. Iceberg Activity ReflectionActivity #3 Using the features of culture list within Activity #2 in your Reflection Packet, place the number of features that you believe are observable above the surface of the water and the number of the features that are not directly observable below the surface of the iceberg.

27. Cultural Features Below the Surface #3, #4, #6, #8, #9, #10, #16, #17, #18, #22, #23, #24

28. Table Discussions • On chart paper at your table, list specific examples of how features below the surface influence your behavior.

29. What is my cultural identity? • Reflection Activity #4 • How did my cultural identity develop? • Who are the people who have been influential in shaping my beliefs, values, and actions? • What experiences within my family, school, church, and community shaped me? • How did the media influence my thinking? • How has my cultural identity changed over time?

30. Diverse Views • Reflection Activity #5 • Based upon your cultural biography, write down a belief or value that you hold. • Next, write down another view of that value/belief. • Where may this differing viewpoint have originated? • What could be an advantage to having a differing viewpoint?

31. Appreciate Diverse Views • Resist the urge to make a judgment about people or behaviors, instead make a conscious effort to understand their cultural perspective.

32. Power and Privilege: The Invisible Feature of Culture • Whenever one group of people accumulates more power than another group, the more powerful group creates an environment that places its members at the cultural center and the other groups at the margins.

33. Race • Political concept • Arbitrary division of humans according to physical traits and characteristics

34. Connecting Power and Privilege • People in the more powerful group are accepted as the norm, so if you are in that group it can be very hard for you to see the benefits you receive. • This accounts for the reason that whites have difficulty recognizing their privileges in society.

35. What is white privilege? • advantages that whites as a group hold in society.

36. “White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools, and blank checks.” Peggy McIntosh

37. “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” by Peggy McIntosh

38. I can, if I wish, arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.

39. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.

40. When I am told about our national heritage or about “civilization,” I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.

41. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.

42. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods which fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser’s shop and find someone who can cut my hair.

43. Whether I use checks, credit cards or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.

44. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.

45. I do not have to educate my children to be aware of systemic racism for their own daily physical protection.

46. I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.

47. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.

48. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.

49. I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to the “person in charge”, I will be facing a person of my race.

50. If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven’t been singled out because of my race.