The 2023 School Redesign In Action Conference was not just for educators. 54 student leaders from Rhode Island, Vermont, and Massachusetts also attended our conference, discussing possibilities for re-imagined schools and classrooms along with the adults. Many of these students participated in the restorative circles pre-conference workshop, learning to use circles as vehicles for connection and deepened understanding. They also attended many other workshops, bringing the clarity of their vision to a wide variety of discussions.
The students had a room that served as their meeting place and home base, and on the second day of the conference we hung a poster on the wall with the following prompt: “What I want my teachers and school leaders to understand.” The student leaders wrote their own answers and emphasized each others’ answers; we wanted to share this list with as many teachers and schools leaders as possible.
What I want my teachers and school leaders to understand:
The statements below were written in response to our prompt by students who attended SRIA 2023. Each heart represents a student who wanted to emphasize and share their agreement with the statement.
- Students all learn differently ♥♥
- Not every student is the same
- Students also have lives concerns outside of school
- Empathy is essential in every educational setting
- We’re still kids, let us have fun every once in a while! ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
- Sometimes it’s harder for some students to ask for help ♥
- Give us the same respect that you want
- We are not failures, we are trying
- Our voice holds as much value as adults’
- We are all just trying to get by and take it day by day.. Be understanding of our struggles too ♥
- We need breaks! ♥
- Field trips are a necessity for learning ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
- We like it when you ask us how we are and really mean it. ♥♥♥♥
- I appreciate my teachers ♥
- Not every person articulates the same… listen carefully to students
- OUR VOICE MATTERS – don’t make decisions for us without us ♥
- We really appreciate having teachers who share our identities in some way and we also appreciate when teachers who are not like us try to understand us