Unity Week Educates Students on Ableism
STEPS teacher, Ms. Cunningham, is pictured with student Gabriel Peña. The fifth day of Unity Week focuses on ableism and is meant to connect our community as a whole by depleting discrimination one day at a time.
March 7, 2023
Ableism is any discrimination against someone with a disability.
This was the focus of No Place for Hate’s final Unity Week presentation on Mar. 3. The presentation discussed the proper ways to refer to someone with a disability, the best ways to communicate, and encourage inclusivity throughout campus.
“What I want students to take away from the presentation is just overall a better understanding of how to communicate with people who have a disability, because a lot of people don’t know how to approach them or actually refer to them,” said ableism group leader Brandon Sotelo, who presented on Mar. 3.
STEPS teachers Rishika Slezak and Hailey Cunningham believe that as a school we should strive to be more inclusive, and that is exactly what they wanted students to take away from the presentation.
“At the end of the day, our students are humans too, and they have feelings and they want to be included. As much as students think they don’t, they always get a smile on their face when students come to say ‘hi’,” said Slezak.
Both Slezak and Cunningham spoke alongside Sotelo during the presentation to bring awareness to this topic, as students with disabilities are often met with a lack of empathy from their peers.
“Because they don’t speak up for themselves, they are easier targets. We just had an incident right now where some kids were calling them certain names that they didn’t appreciate. Our students don’t know how to either brush it off or they don’t know how to defend themselves and say ‘hey leave me alone,’” said Slezak.
At the end of the day, our students are humans too, and they have feelings and they want to be included. As much as students think they don’t, they always get a smile on their face when students come to say ‘hi’
— Rishika Slezak
The STEPS teachers say that students that are able-bodied often make assumptions about students with a disability, instead of just asking a question.
“Asking questions and not presuming, if you just come up ask us like ‘oh hey why is he in that stand?’ we can explain it to you,” said Slezak
They hope this presentation will help bring awareness to the issue at hand, and students will become more familiar with how to be an ally to the community. They believe it is extremely important that the student body continues to educate themselves on this subject and asks the needed questions to do so.
STEPS teachers say connecting and communicating with students in the STEPS programs can help heal any divide between groups on campus.
“All of our kids are out here eating snacks and just acknowledge them. A lot of our kids are in electives and PE and just kind of include them in class, like if they have a group project. Just kind of including them in them any way you can. Even if it’s just a conversation,” said Cunningham.
Sotelo and the rest of his No Place for Hate group dedicated lots of their time in order to promote inclusivity on campus.
“I just feel like everyone on campus should be included in some way or another and they shouldn’t feel left out of anything. So I feel like being able to spread the message on this topic about them being people too and that they can communicate with you is very important because it allows us to be inclusive of everyone,” said Sotelo.
