Browning Participates in Annual Conference on Diversity

On Saturday, May 2, Browning was one of 24 schools represented at The Dalton School's annual conference on diversity. This year's theme was titled, "From Diversity to Community: Race, Privilege and Community." The morning began with a welcome from Ellen Stein, Dalton's Head of School, who spoke on the school's move to make diversity training a priority for its faculty, staff and trustees. Ms. Stein spoke passionately about the need for open conversations on racial experiences within each of our school communities. The conference keynote speaker was Glenn Singleton (the author of "Courageous Conversations About Race"). Mr. Singleton challenged the audience to address racial conversations in a systematic way. One such way is to undertake the exercise of writing personal narratives and sharing these stories within each community. 

During the morning session, participants broke into constituent groups (administration, alumni, faculty, parents, students and trustees) and discussed each school's challenges and best practices. Lunch was followed by a special presentation by students from participant schools who spoke candidly on their own experiences. Browning was represented onstage by Awen A. '16 and Jamil G. '17. The Browning contingent then met up as a group to share perspectives and reflections from the morning's discussions and developed some ideas for future implementation at Browning. In all, it was a thought-provoking day filled with productive conversation on what can be a challenging topic to address.

Browning attendees included the following: five Upper School boys, class parent and Trustee Wendy Brooks P'16, '18, Headmaster Clement, Director of Middle and Upper School Admission Janet Lien, Director of Diversity Betty Noel, Alumni Association member Juan Reyes '86, Head of Upper School Jim Reynolds, Modern Languages Chair Megan Ryan, Classics teacher Brett Wisniewski and class parent Rochelle Yu P '19.