The Jamesville-DeWitt Board of Education is postponing its public forum that was originally scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 17, so it can instead concentrate on setting up facilitated small group dialogues focused on race.
The board has heard from the community that more opportunities are needed to engage in discussions about race, build relationships and come together to talk with one another and thoughtfully listen to each other.
To help it do this and further the board’s desire to become a more culturally-responsive board and district, as well as to address the impact of racial incidents in the district, Superintendent Peter Smith and the board of education will be setting up facilitated community wide dialogue opportunities in small group settings across the Jamesville-DeWitt school community.
The board and district’s goal in doing this is to provide greater opportunity for reflective and thoughtful dialogue about race and diversity, equity and inclusion at Jamesville-DeWitt. These small group dialogue sessions would be an opportunity to begin to restore relationships and build bridges of understanding across the district’s diverse community.
Once dates and times are finalized for these dialogue opportunities, the district will share that information directly with the school community via SchoolMessenger as well as post the information on the district website.
The forum’s planned topic of school climate surveys will be shifted to an upcoming board of education meeting so that information will still be shared with the community.