Hen Hud Combats Prejudice with Diversity Class

CORTLANDT MANOR, N.Y. – With the fourth anniversary of the Cortlandt Manor cross burning incident approaching, diversity consultant James B. Childs has spent the past week teaching students at the Hendrick Hudson School District to respect each others' differences.

The cross burning took place on the front lawn of Westley Artope’s home. Artope, the father of a Cortlandt Manor family of six, and an African-American, lived in the area for over a decade at the time of the incident. The burning took place the night before Thanksgiving, Nov. 21, 2007, sparked by what police termed a racially-motivated   altercation at Hendrick Hudson High School.

Childs said his work is about inclusion, not racial tensions in Blue Mountain Middle School.

“When you look at how we define diversity, we’re incredibly diverse,” said Childs. “I work in other places, like Nebraska, where racial diversity is little, but other diversity is huge.”

Childs worked with the district before the cross burning incident, and came in to counsel students afterward. He is the owner of Jara Consulting, which does diversity training around the country for school districts and corporations.

School officials say the district is most diverse in socioeconomic statuses, and that racial tensions take a determined back seat. “Our district has a great deal of diversity socioeconomically, so our tensions are class related,” said middle school principal, John Owens. School district officials could not produce the percentage of minority students in the district by Thursday evening.

Current diversity training in the middle school focuses on students learning about each other “below the surface,” said Childs. He said middle school is an excellent place for these training exercises because socioeconomic and learning differences become more apparent in turbulent middle school years.

“There’s a little more delineation in middle school,” said Childs, “We tend to judge books by their covers. These judgments are usually wrong, but impactful.” He added that “as inaccurate a way to judge people as it may be, we do it.”

“I like that we can trust everyone, and that we can say who we are,” said Christine McGowan, a seventh grade student in Childs’ class. “And I like that we get to work together. Some things that happened to me happened to other people too.”

Childs said other ways middle school students begin to judge each other are through body image and learning types. “These are things they can’t articulate, but are prevalent,” said Childs, adding “by the time they get to high school, they’re able to navigate a little better.”

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