A Women's Resource at City College that we ALL NEED!

As a woman of color I Leontyne Smith am a part of the Women’s Resource Center in San Francisco and it helped me gain a knowledge of myself and the history of other women. I as a human believe feeding into the positive energy this program offers has tremendously impacted my life. Now im not ashamed of being disabled and a woman of color that has difficulties in school because of the lack of academics from high school. From this resource center comes a lot of good people, a library of all women’s books, free food and coffee, free access to Internet, support groups, and movies. This program was basically my backbone in college because of the opportunities and the initiatives that took place. The woman’s resource center is the best thing on campus but as we know City College is being attacked. I and a lot of other people will be distraught if this program gets cut off. City College of San Francisco is one of the largest community and junior colleges in the United States and an extremely important resource for poor women of color like myself. The Women’s Resource Center is known to be the most effective organization for black women. It is an initiated and student run organization and their funding comes from the Women's Studies Program. The Woman of Color Gathering was one of the annual events coming from the Women’s Resource Center. Its purpose is to bridge the gap between Black History Month and Women’s Herstory Month. This year the Women’s Resource Center is focusing the gathering on education, with guest speakers Shanell Williams, Associated Student Council President at CCSF, and Sekani Moyenda, teacher and co-author of TAKING IT PERSONALLY: Racism in the classroom from kindergarten to College. The first speaker, Shanell Williams, who is the president of student council and the student chair for the Black Student Union, is fighting for City College students and she is an example of excellence from the background she has. As education was the focus Shanelle talked about how from the first experience as an African American woman being in school disinterested her because she wasn’t gaining a knowledge of self. Shanelle got kicked out of three high schools prior to her graduation. She excelled in school after attending Wallenberg and finally graduated. Though she received her high school diploma she didn’t want to go to College. She expressed the anger she had from living in Hunters Point and because all she saw was violence and self destruction. Coming against all odds to fight for the community she attended City College of San Francisco, because she wanted a positive outlet. Other than doing drugs, black on black crime, and the misconduct of women in the neighborhood. As she spoke about her entry into school at the age of twenty five, people in the audience literally cried when they heard her story of being that at risk youth in the black community yet now she is graduating this semester of 2013 and continuing in an Ivy League College. Women in the audience talked about cancer, asthma, dust, and health care in Bay View as well. One woman had lung cancer from living in hunters Point all her life. There are so many stories out there that people do not know about but as Shanelle expressed her relief of living in the black community became a gift to her dreams. This is to go back into the community and help others go to college and start a non profit organization working for the black community. She left a key note on asking people are they in College to get money or fulfill a purpose? She said if you do what you love and work at it the money will always come. The beauty of the program was destined to be because the other keynote speaker for the event works at the elementary school Shanelle went to when she was a kid. When Sekani Moyenda, an African American elementary school teacher, accepted an invitation to speak at a graduate education class, neither the students nor Ann Berlak, their professor, could guess that her presentation would spark an outpouring of emotion and a reexamination of race from everyone involved. The "encounter” as it was called was an expression of Moyenda's anger at the institutionalized racism of our educational system, a system whose foundations are reinforced and whose assumptions about race are reproduced in the graduate school classroom. Forcing everyone involved to rethink their own race consciousness, Taking it Personally is a chronicle of two teachers and their own educational progress. In processing their own responses to the encounter, along with their students', Berlak and Moyenda meditate not only on their own ideas on teaching and learning, but also redefine the obligation a teacher has to his or her students. Personal in its approach, yet grounded in significant currents of educational thought, Taking it Personally will be a must-read for any educator or educator-to-be who is committed to teaching in our diverse classrooms. I sat down with her after the presentation of this scenario she put together and talked about, and she expressed that everyone has racism in their lives. Her approach to me was so warming, because not only was she a good teacher she is a good person who wants to help the community. As an outcome everybody wants to purchase this book, because it is not just black and white anymore she deals with diversity and the environment she works in is of all different nationalities. At the end of her presentation her main point was to come to the students who are black and fighting for their education so they can help themselves. They are cutting so many things with education that teachers are being laid off left and right. She said she keeps on fighting and when people knock her down she stands up even stronger. She said if people aren’t talking about you something is wrong. The whole audience loved both speakers and there was an announcement for people of color to do a walk out and march. This will help our education and the future’s education. I am proud to be a black woman especially after analyzing these strong women in the community and the stories they shared.