Throughout the school year, Gaynor has been doing important work with regard to diversity and inclusion initiatives as well as hosting and being part of important conversations on those topics. On Thursday, April 6, seven members of Gaynor’s Community Values Committee (CVC) attended the NYSAIS Diversity Conference 2017 at Lycée Francais in New York City.
Dionne DeLancy, Andrea Patti, Jackie Smith, Sue Sortino, Jill Thompson attended the conference as well as Dr. Scott Gaynor and Meredith Akins (not pictured.)
Subtitled, “Acts of Resilience,” the conference intends to help build, create, and maintain the infrastructure for resilience, keeping our communities inclusive and safe.” According to NYSAIS, “As educators, we all have a role and responsibility to highlight the resiliency of our school communities to counter bias, stage solidarity with those that have been targeted, and recreate the narratives to prevent further marginalization.”
The Community Values Committee, which is working to incorporate diversity discussions into Gaynor’s curriculum, took what they learned at the conference back to Gaynor, sharing their experiences at the different workshops with one another to see how their conference experience could inform advancing the work already being done at Gaynor.
“The conference is always an opportunity for educators, who are working in the areas of diversity, inclusion, social justice, equity and global citizenship to get together, exchange ideas, support one another and be energized to continue this incredibly important and ongoing work,” said Sue Sortino, Gaynor’s Director of Student Life. “This year’s conference succeeded on all fronts.”