Voices from the Classroom

A Found Poem of Room 204’s Voices

“Race”

Race is labeling someone of their skin color without even getting to know them.
Race is when someone is judging you.
Race is when you see someone and you say I know what you are going to be when you grow up.
Race is how you classify someone by their skin color or by how they look.
Race is separation of people. Race is something that is a big problem.
Race affects and hurts people’s feelings or attitudes.

Race is only the color of your skin.
Race is a word to say that people are different.
Race is that people have different backgrounds.
Race is a made up group of people that are separated.
Race is a theory that scientists haven’t proven. It is not real because we are all equal and people think different races to be better at other things even though they are not.

Race is not what creates who you are.

We can be an upstander…
by not being racist yourself,
standing up for others if they’re made fun of by someone because of their skin color,
defending yourself like, for example, if someone tells you you’re a certain race, you can say, “Yes, we are and we are happy for it!”

We can be an upstander…
by standing out and working together,
getting to know someone before judging them and try to persuade others to do that as well,
treating everyone equally to make our union a better place to be in,

We can be an upstander by explaining that people who look different are not different because they have feelings, hopes, and joys.