Sheldon students perform to push for peace and inclusion

Students at Sheldon-Williams Collegiate used song, dance and the spoken word Wednesday to make a statement.

The school staged a multicultural celebration to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

With recent events in New Zealand and the Netherlands likely in mind, students performed in front of their classmates in hopes of eliminating discrimination and creating a more peaceful world.

“An event like this is super-important because it allows us to change the direction,” said Kyla Wendell McIntyre, an English as an additional language (EAL) and creative writing teacher at Sheldon who helped students organize the event.

“It allows us to work with young people and encourage them to be inclusive, accepting, kind and peaceful. When they learn that as a skill, they take that skill with them and then they become that way and are that way in our society and in our communities.”

Wendell McIntyre said that 26 per cent of Sheldon’s students speak a language other than English as their first language, so they try to use performances like Wednesday’s to help their fellow students understand other cultures.

“Building inclusivity in schools is complicated,” Wendell McIntyre said. “We’re working with students one on one a lot of the time, we’re working to help students change mindsets and we’re really supporting students to see that they are responsible for creating a peaceful and inclusive world.

“When each individual student understands that, that ripples out into our school and into our communities.”

There still are occasions when someone in the school may say the wrong thing to a classmate, but Wendell McIntyre said those are teachable moments. The key then is to help the person understand their mistake.

“It’s about creating an open dialogue,” she said. “If you listen to the poetry in the performances (Wednesday), you hear students talking about that: ‘How can I help you understand more? How can we all understand each other more?’ ”

— With files from 980 CJME’s Joseph Ho