Costa students organize a convention for promoting social inclusivenes

By Tiffany Feng

Staff Writer

Costa Senior Jennifer Marer and juniors Mareda Michael and Brianna Cruz inspire students of Mira Costa to become more accepting of others and their different ideals, backgrounds, and color by organizing a convention focused on promoting social inclusiveness.

After hearing about social inclusion grants being given out to people by the Clinton family last October, Marer decided to submit a proposal that would later be accepted in December, officializing her image of an open way to talk about race relations in the school and in our community. The convention will showcase student made presentations about defining beauty as inclusive and diverse will take place on March 1st in Costa’s small theater.

“I created this project because my own personal racial issues have mainly focused around media representation,” Marer said. “I also think this is a fun way to positively talk about race and create a good atmosphere around racial conversation.”

Photos: Costa students organize a convention for promoting social inclusiveness

Our Beauty is a two-hour convention supervised by English teacher Ms. Chen and created by Marer, Michael and Cruz, where creative projects such as monologues, songs, poems, videos, dances, and any other types of presentations will be premiered. The only requirement is for the work to have a protagonist of a background that is not represented often in media and television.

“In my opinion, I feel that race is appropriated, meaning that it is cool to act ‘ghetto’ or act out as someone you want to be perceived as on social media,” Brianna Cruz said. “The majority of social media is practically ran by millennials that are all trying to find themselves to which the media becomes a way to display the person that we aspire to be.”

Two years ago a local Manhattan Beach family, the Clinton’s house was fired-bombed for what many consider was an act of hate. Following the incident, the family received $32,600 in donations that they later used to give grants to anyone willing to organize a program that would inspire change within the community to create an inclusive and supportive environment for students of color, disabilities, different socio-economic classes, different religious beliefs, and different sexual and gender orientations.

Link: Visit this article about the Clinton family

“I think that if we don’t talk about this there is never going to be a solution; these ‘little’ problems are the reason that I am not as comfortable as I could be at this school,” Michael said. “So I think that if we talk about this more people will understand what we are going through and then they will be able to either relate to it, find comfort in it, or just be less ignorant about the situation.”

Link: Learn more about the Clinton family social inclusion grant

As soon as she heard the Clinton family was giving out prompts to anyone willing to create a program to promote social inclusion, Marer began planning and coordinating the convention. Several participants have already chosen their topics such as senior Asha Berkes who had chosen to present the show Steven Universe, a cartoon show aired on Cartoon Network, and talk about how queer people and women are represented through media.

“I hope others take away the message that representation in media is extremely important, especially as we head into this new presidency,” Berkes said. “It is our job as young people to embrace and understand one another, and to respect each others cultures, races, sexualities, genders, religious beliefs and beyond. Hate is born from ignorance; talking about it and promoting the beauty of all minority groups is an important part of fighting that hatred.”

Marer’s convention will focus mainly on the social media aspect of racial representation. Students wishing to participate in the event must provide a cultural perspective most Americans do not see and follow the prompt: Show the beauty in a culture, heritage, or orientation underrepresented in American media.

“I believe that race representation in media is improving but still continues to be a huge problem,” Marer said. “The issues can seem nuanced and small, but the impact is enormous;  racial stereotypes are perpetuated and enforced by media causing self-esteem and self-love to diminish from only seeing ‘beautiful’ people of the same race on a screen.”