CVU students propose new equity requirement

Students from Champlain Valley Union High School are asking administrators to consider implementing a new ethnic studies and social equity credit as a requirement for graduation.

The proposal would require every CVU student to earn a half-credit in a course that focuses on justice, equity, diversity and inclusion, according to a presentation given to the Champlain Valley School District School Board.

“To fully implement the (school district’s) equity policy, CVSD must not only implement curricula which reflect the history and culture of students of all backgrounds, but also make engaging in these experiences a requirement,” Nisha Hickock, a junior at CVU from Hinesburg, said. “This also gives students the opportunity to meet the graduation standard of the responsible and involved citizenship.”

CVU “already has routes to fulfill the equity credit in place,” said Bageshree Blasius, a social studies teacher at the high school and a diversity, equity and inclusion coach. Those include courses in art and activism, global literature and media and society, for example, among other options.

“If we make this credit as a mandatory class, I think that would also motivate us into expanding some of our offerings as well,” Blasius said. “We’re hoping to do both: create new classes and electives and incorporate ethnic studies into required classes like the ninth grade and tenth grade curriculum. That’s one of the equity audit recommendations — a review of the curriculum and doing some work on horizontal alignment.”

The equity credit, students said, could also potentially meet future state recommendations to integrate ethnic studies and social equity learning. Act 1, signed into law by Gov. Phil Scott in 2019, created a working group tasked with finalizing recommendations to make Vermont schools’ curricula more inclusive, and to better include the history and contributions of underrepresented groups in Vermont’s classrooms.

The curriculum is ultimately made at the local level, but the State Board of Education does set academic standards.

The Act 1 working group has been working to iron out those recommendations, and last year proposed a slate of changes in rules that would require schools to incorporate ethnic studies into pre-K-12 school curricula — although it is now hung up over whether it can apply those standards to private schools, according to a report from VTDigger.

But CVU students are hoping to get ahead of those recommendations to help “manifest the new CVSD diversity, equity and inclusion vision to create and sustain safe, diverse, equitable and inclusive learning ecosystem that would meet individual needs, foster belonging, acknowledge histories, and cultivate and celebrate identities and stories,” Lexi Hall, a junior at CVU, said during a recent school board meeting.

“Students have repeatedly requested more diversity of voice and perspective in our curriculum – mandating an equity credit (and expanding class offerings) would honor our students,” Hall said.

Angela Arsenault, chair of the Champlain Valley school board and a state representative in the Vermont Legislature representing Williston, said that “on this, students and administrators are aligned.”

“I know that we’ll have a lot to consider, sometime soon, when the Act 1 working group recommendations are actually adopted. This is right in line with a lot of those recommendations, but in a way even better because it’s coming from students asking for this education,” Arsenault said. “I really appreciate that and your willingness to ... share this with us.”

The new proposal comes as the school district has worked to establish work in diversity, equity and inclusion into students’ educational experience. CVU is the largest high school in the state.

The district hired its third director of diversity, equity and inclusion, Dr. Asma Abunaib, in September. Several weeks later, an equity audit found that marginalized groups in the district have not been achieving comparably outcomes compared to their peers.

Those historically marginalized students in the district had graduation rates of 82.6 percent in 2019 and 86.6 percent in 2021, compared to 97.2 percent and 98.3 percent, respectively, for their peers, according to the audit.

Two incidents added urgency to the district’s work: in October, a homophobic slur was levied at CVU field hockey players during a game in Manchester. Then, in January, two CVU girls’ basketball games were postponed — one by Rice Memorial High School and another by Burlington High School — after students at the schools learned of a social media video that a CVU player posted that included racist language.

Merrill Jacobs, a member of the high school girls’ basketball team, said at the board meeting that “many communities were hurt by my teammate’s actions and if we had that ethnic studies requirement for graduation, we could build an education for students that could prevent future actions like that from happening.”

“We can’t allow students to keep ignoring such a present and ongoing issue in our community and leave high school without the proper knowledge of what those injustices are and how they occur within society,” Jacobs said.

CVU, the students said in their presentation, has had “over 50 bullying, hazing and harassment incidents this year, most of which are related to DEI issues.”

“Throughout my time at CVU I have had to endure, as well as witness, all kinds of microaggressions: Whether this is a comment on how tan I am, or people want to touch my hair, or just jokes made in the classroom when people think that no one is listening,” Hickock told board members. “Although these may seem like insignificant events to many, these events build up for students of color and leave them feeling like they don’t have a place to belong in our community.”

“What’s most frustrating about these ignorant acts is that they’re avoidable,” Hickock added. “They’re taking place not because students have vicious intentions, or because they want to hurt others, but because they simply don’t know. If they haven’t been told what’s right or wrong, how are they supposed to?”

Arsenault said the board will plan on discussing the proposal among administrators at their next meeting.