The School's Out reading group spent our last session talking about the short book From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun by Jacqueline Woodson. The book takes us through Melanin's journey as he processes new information about his mother's sexuality, and considers what that means (or doesn't mean) about him as a person and about their family unit. We all felt that the portrayal of Melanin was pretty accurate - he had so many of the responses that we could imagine a middle school student having to these events! Additionally, he finds it hard to disconnect his mother's identity from his own - this is the first time he's realizing, perhaps, that there are things about her that don't directly involve him, and vice versa.
The book started a great conversation about action steps that WE Caucus members might be able to take to amplify the issues we discussed all summer within the school district. From direct advocacy at school board meetings to more trainings around existing platforms like Policy 252, there are a lot of positive steps that group members plan to take in the coming months! This was a wonderful reading group to be able to join and I am so grateful to all the members of School's Out for being willing to share their perspectives and their stories.
Hetali Lodaya is a legal intern at Education Law Center and a student at the University of Michigan Law School.
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| Book group members discuss action steps they can collectively take during the 2018-2019 school year. |
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