Wednesday, March 12, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.
Teaching kids how to respect themselves and others is a valuable tool in the classroom, many educators discovered at a three-day multicultural conference.
More than 200 local and national educators attended the 14th annual Multicultural Conference, co-sponsored by the Las Vegas Alliance of Black School Professionals, the Clark County School District and others. Organizers estimate half the attendees were teachers.
Diversity training, while readily available, is not a requirement for teachers in the nation's 10th largest school district, but advocates argue the persons most in need of supplemental training may not realize they should request it.
"They do not see that they are not sensitized," LVABSE president Jeri Cooper said. "The awareness has to be brought to the conscious part of your mind.
"We need that training because there are those that are going out there not realizing something is offensive to others," she said. "We have too many diverse cultures in the classroom."
That's why many of the conference's 25 educational sessions focused on the history educators themselves may not have known. One workshop featured a panel discussing Asian-American folk tales. Another had an actor portraying the life of W.E.B. Dubois, a trailblazing social activist whose agenda helped shape the civil rights movement.
So accurate was the portrayal that reading teacher Patricia Lyle said, "I just felt comfortable and thought, wow. He's doing a great job. It gave us a great insight into the past. Everybody was kind of in awe."
Music teacher Diana Volker believes these kinds of face-to-face experiences are the most valuable tool educators take home from the event, because it creates a connection among people.
Volker especially enjoyed one workshop that dealt with ebonics, the so-called black English that many students take into the classroom.
"It really helped me understand how the students who are bused into my school transition in and transition home," linguistically, Volker said. "It will help me to be a more accepting of certain language."
Eligible teachers received credits for attending the weekend event, which apply toward re-certification requirements.
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