San Marino High School Group Will Go Silent On April 15 to Make A Loud Point About Acceptance
You might be complaining about your tax bracket on Friday, April 15, but scores of students at San Marino High School won’t be saying a word.
That’s because they will be acknowledging ‘Day of Silence,’ a national, student-led event that brings attention to anti-LGBTQ name-calling, bullying and harassment in schools.
The LGBTQ stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning, a recent addition to the emblem.
“This exercise helps people learn to feel when you are muted and unable to express yourself,” said Justine Ramos, a senior, who founded Everybody Loves Everybody, an on-campus organization created to start a movement of acceptance and happiness and to alleviate the academic, personal and social pressures of life at SMHS.
“It’s ironic,” said Laura Ives, a counselor at San Marino High School specializing in student support services. “You are speaking out by being muted. It mimics the kind of pain and restriction that individual go through when questioning their gender or sexuality.”
Students who choose to participate in Day of Silence must get signed permission slips and prior consent from all teachers. Students will meet in the school’s career center where they will have the option of placing tape over their mouths or affixing a name tag to explain their silence. They also have the option of distributing cards that describe the event. Participants will attempt to remain silent the entire school day before assembling in the career center for free pizza, cookies and ice cream after the final bell at 3:00 p.m. Justine and senior Ivan Brizuela will make a public address announcement explaining the exercise.
“What is important about this movement, it isn’t specific to the LGBTQ community,” Justine said. “It’s for anyone who feels shunned by society and allows people to speak out on how they feel. Anyone can relate to the silencing effect of the criticism. Anyone.”
Everybody Loves Everybody took the lead during Kindness Week at San Marino High School, which was held in January. The club provides “a safe place for anyone who has issues, but doesn’t have anywhere to discuss their issues,” according to Justine. “The group exists to remove social, academic and personal pressures people experience. We hope to raise awareness. You never know what people are going through.”
Ives agrees.
“We don’t know people beyond what we see on the surface,” she said.
Ives feels that San Marino High School enjoys a mostly peaceful, accepting environment.
“We don’t have a huge bullying issue on campus,” she said. “But through competition, people can feel that way. We are trying to reach the entire student body.”
“People here aren’t so much socially distressed but rather academically pressured” Justine added. “I agree that it is important to work hard, and succeed, but sometimes students pushed themselves beyond their limits to the point where they have broken down. They don’t feel good enough, when in reality they are the best that they can be, yet many fail to recognize that. High school is about respecting about all the people around you no matter who they are because you can never correctly assume what stresses and pressures one is going through.”
