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Whitmore Celebrates Diversity
The Whitmore community is very lucky to be made up of many different cultures, races and diversities which form a very rich community both in the school and in the wider community. Last year, we celebrated Black History not only for the month for the entire year. During this celebration we created a large wall display, delivered assemblies and PSHE lessons about prominent notable people who had made an impact during their lives. Our aim this year, is to continue to encourage young people to talk about and understand issues of race and equality in a post 2020 world.
This month the students have been introduced to the ‘Proud to Be’ campaign to mark Black History Month 2021. The national campaign invites Brown and Black people to share what they are proud to be. It is aimed at making Black History Month personal and unique to individuals, families and communities. In morning and afternoon registrations, students have been given an opportunity to read about the contributions and achievements of Black people throughout history to modern day. Our new Black History Month display, has been inspired by ensuring we givestudents an insight into some of the positive changes that have started to take place nationally as a result of last year’s events. Videos to mark the start of the month as well as articles and quotes from noteworthy black role models have been shared in assemblies and placed on registration powerpoints. Departments such as Drama have created lessons based around influential young black people, like Marcus Rashford, to inform our students about their positive influences. Students have also been given an opportunity to learn about the many different events, such as photography from the British-Ghanaian photographer James Barnor, whose career spans six decades. This and many events like it are happening across the capital to mark Black History Month. We invited students to find out more about the history and contributions of black British people in a cultural setting.
To continue to encourage and inform students on cultural literacy, different cultures and races will now continue to be celebrated through student work, assemblies, displays and within departments.
We have begun with a display about the cultures and traditions of countries within the region of South East Asia. Whitmore students from all year groups have researched and contributed to our new celebrating diversity South East Asia display. They have been working hard to create posters, flags and factual information about the cultures and traditions of countries such as Sri Lanka, India, Nepal, Vietnam, Mongolia, Philippines, Thailand, Japan, Bangladesh, Pakistan and many more.
As the year continues we will be working with all students to create displays celebrating their background and culture. Our future foci include the traditions of Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Europe and the U.K. We are immensely proud of the positive response from our students towards both this and up and coming diversity projects.