Black students in Hamilton detail experiences with racism, make 11 recommendations for change
CBC
Black students have assembled a report detailing their experience in Hamilton and made 11 recommendations they say must be urgently adopted by local boards and the province to address racism and concerns about safety in schools.
The document titled Community Safety and Well-Being Action Plan for Black Youth in Hamilton Schools is the result of eight Zoom sessions and five surveys that collected the input of 159 students, parents and caregivers.
"I think it's pretty important because a lot of people have experienced racism and all these different things in school and they don't have supports," said Mikhail Jama.
The 15-year-old is a Grade 10 student at Westmount Secondary School.
He said his time at school has included "racist jokes," adding the report is an important tool school boards can use to help students like himself.
Fifty-two students took part in Zoom sessions and 90 responded to surveys, along with 17 caregivers.
The report found just over 95 per cent of students with the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB) who participated said they'd experienced racism and roughly 90 per cent felt unsafe in schools.
For the Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board, those numbers were 76 per cent and 60 per cent respectively.
"Black students are saying that, obviously, things aren't OK in their schools and something needs to be done," said Layla El-Dakhakhni, a member of Hamilton Students for Justice (HS4J).
The group helped put together the report, along with the Hamilton Centre for Civic Inclusion (HCCI).
"Black students are making this very earnest effort to address things in their schools, it's not just happening and people are being quiet about it, and schools boards are not responding to that in a way that's effective," El-Dakhakhni said.
The report makes the following 11 recommendations:
The organizations are calling for some of the recommendations to be applied immediately, with others to be in place by the beginning of the 2022 school year or the winter semester in 2023.
Some boards have already taken some of the recommended steps, including the HWDSB which last year voted to terminate the liaison program that put police officers in schools.
Hello, royal watchers. This is your regular dose of royal news and analysis. Reading this online? Sign up here to get this delivered to your inbox.
A Calgary biking group is calling on the city to build public dirt jumps, saying without them there is a void in the cycling community.
Hello, royal watchers. This is your regular dose of royal news and analysis. Reading this online? Sign up here to get this delivered to your inbox.
It's snack time in the barn, and Seamus fills his droopy belly.
Sault Ste. Marie city council will consider a motion at its Monday meeting to look into blocking the Chinese AI chatbot, DeepSeek, from city devices and networks.
Darlene Naugle had difficulties getting around the small community of Port Bickerton on Nova Scotia's Eastern Shore when she moved to area from Alberta three years ago to care for her sick daughter.
Skates and hockey sticks on backyard rinks are the definitive sound of winter for many Canadians.
Progressive Conservative leadership candidate Wally Daudrich doesn't seem to mind that some Tories might think his claim Manitoba schools are promoting acts of bestiality and incest is impossible to believe.
Artificial intelligence has become increasingly present in people's lives, ranging from the ability to create a generative image in a messages with simple prompts, to using data to reduce workplace injuries.
While Trump's tariffs, housing and health care have received plenty of attention during the Ontario election campaign, educators say voters should pay more attention to where the major parties stand on the province's public school system.
As the Canadian Armed Forces continue to try and dig out of a deep recruitment hole, they're starting to give new recruits with medical conditions a shot at joining the military rather than automatically turning them away.
Israel says the release of more than 600 Palestinian prisoners is delayed "until the release of the next hostages is assured, and without the humiliating ceremonies" at handovers of Israeli captives in Gaza.
