Westwood School Officials Reaffirm Values Against Racism

WESTWOOD, MA — Westwood school officials are reminding parents and the school community about the district's values and core beliefs regarding racism and tolerance. The district sent a statement to parents on Monday in the wake of protests across the country against police brutality and systemic racism.

The statement reaffirmed the district's core values against racism and for tolerance and offered support to students of color.

The statement reads as follows:

"As a School Committee, the education, health, and safety of our students are our top priorities. In light of recent events in our country, we feel it necessary to reaffirm the core values of the Westwood Public School District.Let us be clear. The Westwood Public Schools do not tolerate racism or discrimination of any kind. There are no limitations, restrictions, or qualifications to this statement.So, we say now, to our students of color, we support you. We support your efforts to be heard as you call for action that will protect you and allow you to succeed. We support your efforts to be seen, as you attempt to put a face on years of systemic racism. We support your efforts to live your lives in a more perfect union, one where you can be confident in your ability to secure the blessings of liberty. And to our faculty and staff, we support you. We support your efforts to conduct conversations that would be difficult in a normal classroom and are now exponentially more complicated in a virtual environment. We support your efforts to educate and unite students who come from different backgrounds, have different life experiences, and have beliefs that run across a spectrum of emotion.And finally, to the District administration, we support you. We support your hard work to demonstrate that Westwood Public Schools are places where everyone feels welcome, heard, respected, and treated with dignity. We support your pledge to examine our curriculum, programming, and policies to ensure they support all of our students. We can’t pretend we understand what some of our students have experienced in their lives. But we welcome the opportunity to listen to and learn from members of our community who feel marginalized or silenced. We commit to guaranteeing racial equity and justice through training, policy, and curriculum. And we hope that, with this statement, our students will know they have the strength of the District not only behind them, but also beside them, as we all work to confront racism and move our educational mission forward."

Sincerely,

Anthony Mullin, Chairperson Josepha Jowdy, Vice Chairperson Carol Lewis, Clerk Charles Donahue, Maya Plotkin