Prejudice melts at diversity camp

Sixty-five Gunn High School students tackled an unusual homework assignment the other night: They scoured their brains for every stereotype they knew about African-Americans, Middle Easterners, Latinos, Asian-Americans, whites, gays, lesbians and bisexuals.

The harsh words -- 35 or more of them per group -- poured out until they covered huge sheets of paper hung on a large brick fireplace at a remote campsite. A day later, the ``wall of ignorance and pain'' was still posted -- a visual reminder of prejudices some of the students didn't even know they had.

Such was the Palo Alto students' indoctrination into Camp Anytown -- diversity training for high-schoolers. Learning to appreciate economic, gender and racial differences might seem like a no-brainer in multicultural, progressive Bay Area, but slights still can fester, and divisions can flourish here.

So high schools from East San Jose to Palo Alto are borrowing a page from Corporate America and paying $165 a student to send teens to this camp, hidden among towering redwood trees in mountainous Boulder Creek.

The popularity of diversity camp, which surged after the attacks at Columbine High School, is still strong, even as school districts deeply cut budgets. Program supporters -- from teachers to police officers -- credit the camp with everything from raising students' grades to reducing school violence.

For Gunn student Courtney Cook, 16, the experience was both provocative and productive. ``Sometimes I say racial slurs,'' acknowledged Courtney, who described the stereotype exercise after a day of reflection. But, ``Wow, I never want to say that again.''

`Unnecessary'

But at least one think tank derides the concept as ``unnecessary social retraining.''

It's ``ludicrous'' and ``absurd'' to devote class time and public school funds to diversity camps when students are still struggling with literacy, said Matt Cox, an education policy fellow with the San Francisco-based Pacific Research Institute.

Richard Valenzuela, a Camp Anytown sensitivity trainer, disagreed.

``We're getting so caught up with academics and testing that we're losing some kids'' to other societal ills, Valenzuela said.

Teaching diverse students to get along has been standard school fare since the days of desegregation. But these efforts have evolved from an afternoon on a ropes course to elaborate four-day retreats.

The National Conference for Community and Justice holds Camp Anytown in 40 cities across the country, but the program is extraordinarily popular in the Bay Area, where 25 to 30 schools participate each year.

Schools deliberately pick their campers from an eclectic mix of campus cliques -- students who usually might shun one another. Gunn teachers sent the student body president, a cross-country athlete who is Korean, a special education student who is almost blind and uses a wheelchair, a lesbian, a Mexican immigrant who is learning English, and an array of others.

Campers were uplifted with touchy-feely activities including group hugs and a campfire capped off with four verses of ``Kumbaya.''

And organizers frequently shouted for ``rainbows'' -- the command to scramble around the room until everyone was sitting next to someone of a different race, religion or gender -- and ``two ups'' -- the reminder that every critical comment must be countered with two positive remarks.

Students delved into serious discussions about how prejudices have held them back in life and how the fear of hate crimes curtails what they do and where they go.

An outdoor exercise Thursday afternoon, called ``The Privilege Walk,'' showed how race, religion, class and sexual orientation have helped or harmed each camper.

Shoulder to shoulder

In the exercise, students lined up shoulder to shoulder. An adult asked questions: Were your ancestors brought to the United States as slaves or indentured servants? Did you ever have to skip a meal because you did not have enough money?

Indicators of privilege -- being white or never going hungry -- allowed students to step forward. Students of color or those who lacked bare necessities stepped back.

After all the questions were asked, a white girl stood out in front. Several African-American and Latino classmates were scattered in the rear. Others were clumped in between. Sniffles and sobs echoed through the clearing, drowning out the singing birds.

After the exercise, Igor Hiller said he felt sad, then jealous, and even a bit angry as a boy who started out by his side surged to the front of the playing field. Igor, 15, finished near the rear.

``I'm white, and I live in Palo Alto, so I'm pretty privileged,'' Igor said he initially thought. But the fact that Igor is a Jew who emigrated from the former Soviet Union -- and thus faced poverty and prejudice -- held him back in the exercise.

Former San Jose Police Chief Bill Lansdowne is a believer in the camp's lessons. He says some Camp Anytown graduates go on to serve as peacemakers at their schools, and gang members turn their lives around.

``It gives them the idea that who they are is important, not which group they belong to,'' Lansdowne said.

Aaron Chavez, 19, said attending Camp Anytown during his sophomore year at San Jose's Mount Pleasant High School ``opened my eyes.'' It prompted him to treat women with more respect, leave his gang and return to high school to graduate, he said.

Even though gangs are less of a concern than cliques at upper-crust schools such as Palo Alto's Gunn High, students there expressed concern about subtle snubs that could escalate into violence.

Glares, accusations

Junior Sakeena Ahsan, a 15-year-old Pakistani Muslim, said students sometimes glare at her in the hall because of her head scarf. And 16-year-old Jordan Bennett, also a junior, believes a teacher accused her of stealing a pair of sunglasses because she was the only African-American student in that class.

Gunn administrators are so convinced that Camp Anytown can improve campus life that they want all of their 1,600-plus students to attend before graduating. That would mean offering eight camps annually instead of the usual two. Almost all of the other Bay Area schools only go once a year.

But that desire comes ``at the worst time possible,'' said Nik Kaestner, Gunn's student activities director, because the cost of camp is rising while the district finances are tightening.

In the meantime, Gunn sophomore Yuki Murakami is optimistic that the campers can be catalysts to make their school a better place.

``Once you realize everybody hurts,'' the 15-year-old said, ``it just gets better from there.''

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