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  Case: White Intern in a Black inner-city school
My sister, Gina, who is a young White girl, started her student teaching in a predominantly Black school in inner-city America. She initially approached her job with optimism and purpose. However, she began to experience her first doubts with the presentation of an emotionally charged poetry reading at an all-school assembly. The poem painted a picture of the oppression of the African Americans by the European American majority. My sister was moved by the poem and accepted the historical truth of its message. At the same, she said she wondered what educational effects of the poem were and whether it would affect her legitimacy as a White teacher in a Black school. She talked to me about her experience. I am an experienced teacher, but I could not answer whether poems like that have any educational value, and whether or not my sister should worry about her legitimacy as a White teacher. I don't what she should do in this specific situation.
Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!)
Students may at first be wary of a teacher of a different color, but time can change that. Most students are able to see past color with their teachers if they can see that teacher as a person who respects her class and all her students. I am white myself and teach at a school that is mostly non-white. I do not feel like an outsider and I am not treated like one. I have adapted my teaching style to meet the needs of the students I teach and we work together to achieve the goals that we want to reach. It all comes down to respect for each other.