Visit the Equity and Antiracism website for more information about the Winooski Students for Antiraicm’s Demands, restorative justice, and community engagement.
Antiracism Steering Committee
Overarching Goal of the WSD Antiracism Steering Committee: To support WSD in becoming an antiracist school district.
The Steering Committee is an innovative multi-stakeholder committee that creatively guides the dynamic work of the WSA Demands, serves as a communication hub for the demand-based working groups, and ensures that the WSA Demands are centered in every aspect of the work.
The WSD Antiracism Steering Committee Goals:
- To build an equal partnership between all stakeholders in the Winooski community
- To establish process, functioning, monitoring, and structure for multi-stakeholder demand-based working groups to commence work
The WSD Antiracism Steering Committee Guiding Beliefs:
- WSA Demands must be centered in all of the work
- Full Youth-Adult Partnerships: each demand-based working group will be co-facilitated by a youth-adult team
- The stakeholder composition for representation matches our diverse community
- Community engagement and dialogue are essential to the work
- Radical Inclusion: expansively modifying boundaries in a way that creates a difference in the possibilities for engagement, as well as creating spaces that are more accessible, welcoming, and inclusive of BIPOC youth and adults.
- The work is creative, innovative, and continually evolving.
- Work to acknowledge harm, restore and seek healing.
Read about the Roles and Responsibilities of the WSD Antiracism Steering Committee.
Current Antiracism Steering Committee Members.
Racial Justice Resources for Educators, Parents & Students
Student Voice:
A speech from student Evelyn Monje
Revolution is nothing new to us. Our bodies hold the quiet power of ‘no, I will not leave this seat,’ and our voices hold the everlasting weight of ‘I have a dream,’ so no revolution is not new to us and I am proud of every single king and queen for drawing their power from their bones and standing here with me today. – Evelyn Monje (11th grade student at WSD)
Leadership Voice:
A message from the Winooski School District School Board.
We might not be able to end institutional racism across America. But we can try to end racism in Winooski. Providing an equitable education to our students is the best tool we have to accomplish this goal. We will ask our students: What do you want from your future and how do we get you there? They will see their dreams and goals reflected in our policies, practices and course offerings. The School Board of Winooski Schools is committed to providing this equitable education. We, the Winooski School Board of Trustees, call on the community of Winooski to stand with us in combating racism in all its forms to ensure each of our students are truly afforded their inalienable rights.
Antiracist Action Committees in the WSD & Updates
October 15, 2020 – The WSD leadership team is excited to see a strong group of WSD staff returning to this important work after allowing the Winooski Students for Antiracism (WSA) to lead these past few months. Together, we will move forward with all stakeholders actively participating in our antiracism efforts. As a reminder, here are WSA’s Demands. The school board has adopted demands #1 and 4-8.
Superintendent Sean McMannon is working with a UVM professor and doctoral student to form a team including 2-3 WHS students and a teacher who will plan and implement a community engagement process about broader school safety and security, including the role of the School Resource Officer (SRO). The goal is to have this completed by mid-December so the board can consider the community input in time to make FY22 budget decisions.
The description below demonstrates the current state of antiracism work at the board level which will soon move to include participation by all Winooski stakeholders in demand-based teams to plan and actualize this important work.
Goals Developed by WSA and UP for Learning
- Acknowledging harm on the path to acceptance of the Demands.
On Saturday, September 26th the school board held their retreat which was almost solely dedicated to antiracism work. The board agenda can be found here. In addition, the agenda developed by co-facilitators Evelyn Monje and Lindsey Halman can be found here. Board members, WSD Leadership, one community member, two teachers, and Winooski’s City Manager were present for this beginning of a process to move us toward a thoughtful and inclusive approach to working on demands #1 and 4-8. Unfortunately, the invited WSA members did not attend.
2. Building an equal partnership between WSA, WSD LT, Board, Spectrum, and City to move demands forward.
At the 10/14 Board Meeting, this work was continued through the facilitation of student Evelyn Monje and Lindsey Halmen of UP for Learning. Watch the meeting on the RETN website.
3. Establish process, functioning, monitoring, and structure for the inclusion of community and faculty in ‘demand groups’ to commence work.
This will most likely occur between the October 14th and November 11th board meetings so we do not have to wait another month to organize the work. And it will include how students, parents, staff, and particularly BIPOC members of our community are a part of the strategic planning process, and who the point people are for each of the demands.
July 12, 2020 – Letter from the Antiracism Action Committee
June 16, 2020 – A few Winooski community members identified the five actions below as important antiracist actions we should take. There is much more to be done to dismantle systemic racism and oppression in the Winooski School District and in our community. These five items are a starting point that is currently being acted upon, and there is a need for continued community input and feedback. Please contact Luke Dorfman ([email protected]) or Kirsten Kollgaard ([email protected]) if you would like to share your thoughts, ideas for other actions, or if you want to get involved with our antiracist work.
- Restorative Justice in Our Schools
- Review of School Resource Officer (SRO) with Potential Replacement with Restorative Justice, Community Health & Trauma Specialist(s)
- Recruitment & Hiring of Staff of Color
- Policy Review through Multicultural Lens
- Ethnic Studies Program
These groups will be meeting over the summer to continue this essential work. Updates will be posted to this page and shared on our social media pages.