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We are so happy to live in a part of FL where everyone is pretty much integrated. We have a very diverse population. In western NY where our families live, there is a very bad area where a lot of people of color live, and that's it. In the city downtown there is some diversity but not much at the grocery store, mall, public schools, etc... there's very little. Hubby says "their birthparents wanted to get them out of those bad situations so I'm not going to seek them out." We wouldn't go to bad neighborhoods for church or activities with our babies. We were looking at a nice house and saw all the little white kids playing hockey in the street on the cul de sac, and I wondered, would my Kee fit in here? Would they accept him? How would it be for my kids growing up in this sort of neighborhood?
If you are in a more segregated area like that, how do you find diversity for your kids?
PS I also feel very strongly that white kids need exposure to diversity just as much as anyone else.
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I live in a diverse area so I don't reallly have to look but I was suprised to find out that our black church "district" although located in a part of town I would not normally walk through, is super safe on Sunday mornings. Going into a bad neighborhood for church to be part of a black church might not be taking them into a bad situation.
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OK, this is theoretical, because S is 2. ( Just turned 2 in fact :cake: ) But we live in the the extreme example of segregation, as you've probably read from my previous posts. S is from a 3 percent minority here that is segregated from society and ostracized in the extreme. We live in a nice safe little town just outside the city. Financially we can't move but even if we could there aren't really much better options. Most areas where the Romani minority live in any concentration are horrendous ghettos, extremely dangerous, mafia stuff, nightmarish... There is a small Romani middle class but they are pretty well scattered around individually, so you can't really move to them. There are probably areas of Prague where there are a few foreigners of various stripes but never anything close to the majority.
So, my plan is to sign up for specific after school clubs in the city. I have visited a Romani kids traditional singing club. We live close enough to the city to make this a possibility, though a strain if we don't homeschool, which we probably will. I think the specific Romani clubs are only music and dance
I also have thought of volunteering for a summer at a community center in the city, serving ghetto kids. I can teach English just about anywhere and I can probably find a volunteer post. In the best scenario, I know of a "integration village" where a group of Romani, white and mixed families who were victims of a major flood built new homes together as a way to make a statement. There are more middle-class Roma there and they have a community center with an apartment for volunteers. It is 6 hours from where we live but I have thought that maybe someday, I could volunteer there for a summer or two and that would give my kids a fighting chance at some relationships.
I will be honest it is tough. We live in a sum what diverse area but not as much as my 8 year old daughter would like. However what we find is the rough spot for her is not being a child of color but being a child of color with white parents and siblings.
She has had some rough times at school with girls giving her trouble about her white family. What we have tried to do is be very visable in our community and school. Which has helped a lot.
Also I make sure the school knows if she is having problems at recess with other children. I have to say I just had a conversation with her teacher last week about recess. The teachers feel the kids should work it out themselves if there is a problem. I told the teacher- that might work for some problems but not all. And my child should feel like she can go to an adult if she needs help working out a situation with other kids. I also told the teacher what was being said and she was shocked she didn't know. I told her she didn't know because - they make the kids work it out and don't listen to the children.
Needles to say the best advice I can give you is get involved in the community and the schools. It will help a lot.
If I'm being truly honest, this is one instance where I'm really happy to be the single parent. The city I live is diverse and full of interracial marriages and/or relationships of every kind so while my DD may get the "daddy" question a lot and that's what I also need to prepare her for, most people just naturally assume I gave birth to her.
That being said, I'm all about social groups, literacy, and family field trips to engage in all sorts of enrichment.
I am so blessed to live in probably the most diverse area in San Diego.
I don't know how it is in your area, but in San Diego some of the 'newer' areas do not have a very dominant ethnicity yet. Some of the older neighborhood are more segregated.
With that being said, I think I am trully blessed to live in such a diverse city.
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LeighM, this is slightly off topic but really gets an emotional reaction out of me. I was extremely harassed in school because of my physical disability and teachers, at best, took the "let the kids work it out themselves" approach. It does not take much of that to make for a very bad situation, especially if a child is isolated. You're right that there are different kinds of harassment and, if the root is something basic where the child is the only one of their kind, it is different and has to be dealt with openly. I've seen this sort of thing stopped rapidly, when teachers called in a harassing child or group of children and their parents to meet with the child in question and a parent. When it was made clear (firmly but non-threateningly) by adults that this is definitely not OK, the situation gets better.