Day #3

Dear Diary,

Today Mrs. Wallace* did something different. We finished our Pandora play and it was sooooo fun! But now she wants us to do Romeo and Juliet. I don't like Shakespeare at all. He's confusing and speaks weird. But then she made a change in the script. Instead of the old icky language, it was Romeo and Juliet in a more relate able situation. We got to play ourselves. I was laughing so hard. There were two types of students. The popular Latino students and the smart nerdy Europeans. Of course there were conflicts but the story line still contained two people falling in love. Mrs. Wallace told us about other stories based off Romeo and Juliet. One that really stuck in my mind was West Side Story because my big brother played in that at his high school. The Spanish people and the White people didn't get along. Realizing that the real Romeo and Juliet fell in love despite all the conflict between their families, I realized that all the conflict in today's world can be put aside too. It must be. There are people out there who don't care 'who' they marry as long as they love them. Love doesn't see a color or religion. Love sees straight to the depths of the soul. If everyone could just love people, I think we'd be a lot better off. But that isn't the case .I didn't know that sometimes people don't like someone because their color until my brother was called a mean word and he told my mom. In my new school, there are people like me, people of color. I feel welcome among them. But at my old school, I never realized that all my classmates were white. They accepted me. Why?? I think because we don't care. Kids don't care what color their friends are. Only if they were raised that way. My white friends weren't. My new friends don't know any better. But I don't think they would single any new white students out of the class. We have a few. And they are accepted for who they are. But why are my two schools so different?? Why can't we all be together. I think my new friends would really like my old friends. I wish my schools were the same.

Christeen

Jonathan Kozol states 'schools that were already deeply segregated twenty-five or thirty years ago are no less segregated now, while thousands of other schools around the country that had been integrated either voluntarily or by force of law have since been rapidly re-segregating.' This is proof of that. In my home town, white students are the majority. In my VIPS assigned school, minorities of all kinds walk through the halls. In our society, we are economically divided. Unfortunately, that also racially divides us because many minorities are lower class. Kozel's statistics are very accurate. Segregation still pollutes are school systems. But it shouldn't. Honestly, these kids don't care. Especially if they are raised with the belief that everyone is equal. I would like to believe one day it will happen. *The Dream of a future teacher*