The Calling All Colors Project provides an opportunity for middle school students to learn about racial tolerance and develop action plans designed to increase appreciation of racial diversity in their school communities. Students attended the winter conference at Hope College, where they learned about cultural diversity and the ability to critically analyze race in the media. They implemented action plans within their school community over the academic year. The students returned to the spring conference at Grand Valley State University to share the results of their action plans and continue exploring critical diversity issues, including race and fair housing.

Action Plans

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Bunker Middle School
Bunker Middle School’s action plan involved organizing a campaign to orientate and educate the students and parents to the beneficial role that Calling All Colors can play in improving the school’s culture. This was important since this year was a reintroduction of the Calling All Colors program to the school. The group set three goals for themselves. The first goal was to host a Calling All Colors week of diversity awareness activities that would involve the entire student body and staff. The second goal was to redesign the unity banner that would reflect a proactive and celebrative approach to inclusion. The third goal was to create an upbeat and positive slide show, which modeled the pro-social types of inclusion that the students were seeking to achieve.

Cityside Middle School
The goals for Cityside Middle School’s group were to increase awareness about the Calling All Colors Program, to provide opportunities which would take students out of their comfort zone and to challenge the social boundaries at school. In addition, the projects would increase student’s respect for diversity and awareness of others. To accomplish these goals, the students hosted a “Diversity Colors Our World” themed poster contest open to all students at Cityside. The artwork was judged by the students in the Calling All Colors group and the top three winner’s artwork was framed, matted and hung in the school. The students also hosted a Mix It Up at Lunch Hour. All 8th grade students at Cityside were shuffled into different groups at lunch and were challenged to sit with their group at a different table in the lunch room. At each table, there was a group activity with get to know you questions.

Creekside Middle School
To accomplish their goal of raising awareness and appreciation for diversity at their school, students at Creekside held a Multi-Cultural Art show in which the students submitted art representing diverse cultures. The art was then judged and displayed for the entire school to view. In addition, the students sponsored a Hispanic Heritage Month scavenger hunt, and organized a Black History Month Trivia contest to bring awareness and celebrate diverse cultures. In addition to these projects, they also held a book fair in order to raised $500 to raise money for their group activities.

Holland Christian North Shore and South Shore Middle Schools
The goals of Holland Christian’s action plan were to provide education, to increase appreciation and to celebrate diverse cultures. These goals were accomplished by highlighting several holidays from other cultures. The students researched the culture in which the holiday takes place as well as the origins of the day, its meaning and customs. The students shared this information with the entire school and staff and celebrated each day. The holidays researched were Martin Luther King Day, St. Patrick’s Day and Cinco de Mayo.

Holland West Middle School
The Holland West Middle School group hoped to teach students about stereotyping, diversity, and showing kindness to all. They also wanted students to reach out to others that they do not normally talk to. To accomplish these goals, the students held a Mix-It-Up Day at lunch which encouraged students to sit at different tables in the lunch room. During lunch the students participated in icebreaker activities to get to know other students. In addition, they celebrated World Kindness Week by making kindness buttons at lunch and holding diversity games. The groups also made “what would you do” announcements during the week which challenged the student body to think critically about their actions in different situations. Additionally, the group sponsored a storyteller for March’s Reading Month to come and tell stories to teach the students about diversity.

Lakeshore Middle School
Lakeshore Middle School’s Calling All Colors group held an all school assembly with a concert by a multicultural musical group in order to celebrate diverse cultures. They also held a Mix-It-Up at lunch day which challenged the students to sit at different tables in the lunchroom to break down social boundaries and meet new people. Also, since many of the students were new to the groups, they also sought to get to know each other and create community within their Calling All Colors group.

St. Mary’s Catholic Middle School
The goals of the St. Mary’s Calling All Colors group were to instill appreciation, acceptance, and interest among all people. They accomplished this goal by holding a Mix-It-Up at Lunch day which challenged the students to sit at different tables in the lunchroom to break down social boundaries and meet new people. In addition, the students led the school in a Peace March on Martin Luther King Jr. day. They also organized “Random Acts of Kindness Week” to promote tolerance and respect among the student body. Finally, the students developed classroom drama presentations of folktales from different cultures.

Steele Middle School
Steele Middle School’s goals for Calling All Colors were to increase tolerance and appreciation for diverse communities and to help students develop into knowledgeable and caring young people through intercultural understanding and respect. To achieve this goal, the students in Steele’s Calling All Colors group led the entire school in reading the book “Seedfolks,” a story in which a multicultural neighborhood joins together to convert and abandoned urban lot into a flourishing garden. By working together to cultivate the seeds of the garden, the neighbors learn the beauty of working together and cultivating a healthy and diverse community. In addition, the students at Steele presented different cultures by sharing cuisine, clothing and customs from around the world.

West Ottawa Harbor Lights and Macatawa Bay Middle Schools
The Calling All Colors group at West Ottawa wanted to help promote a more positive school climate at their school where all students were valued and respected. As part of this goal, they specifically wanted to focus on diversity projects that would also work to reduce conflict and bullying issues at school. In addition, one of their goals was to recruit more students to participate in Calling All Colors. To achieve these goals, the students created a cultural games handout for the staff to use in their classrooms. They also created a bulletin board to help promote diversity that was viewed by all of the students and staff at the school. The students developed messages educating the student body on diversity which were presented in the daily announcements.

White Pines Middle School
The goal of the students at White Pines Middle School was to celebrate diversity and promote acceptance of others. To accomplishe these goals, the students sponsored two all-school assemblies featuring the African band, Biakuye, which means “Unity” in Ghana. The band taught the school about African instruments and culture. We also had The Alborada Family come to White Pines and teach us about Latin American instruments and culture. In additional, the group went to San Chez Restaurant in Grand Rapids to experience different Spanish cuisine. Afterwards, we walked to Rosa Parks Circle to honor the influential civil rights leader. They also created two different showcases in their school, one displaying Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream and another promoting diversity in our school, stating, “The real death of America will be when everyone is the same”. To promote acceptance, the students created posters throughout the year and displayed them around our school. They also spent many hours designing and creating a new unity banner, using the theme “Diversity: The one thing we all have in common”. The group also celebrated a special Diversity Day at our school and distributed colored ribbons for everyone to wear as bracelets that day, hoping to unite everyone at White Pines.

Vanderbilt Middle School
The students at Vanderbilt Middle School hosted a Cultural Evening at the school and invited the entire student body and their families. The goal of the evening was to educate people on diverse cultures and to celebrate diversity. The evening consisted of samples of different ethnic foods, displays of artifacts and artwork from around the world, live entertainment from different cultural and ethnic musical groups, the opportunity for the participants to make a craft project representing a different county, and posters of different countries with pictures and statistics on the country.

Total Number of People Impacted

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Each school submits data on their Action Plan and it’s outcomes. On this form, the schools report how many total people were impacted by their Action Plan. By adding up the number of people impacted by each school, we were able to calculate the total number of people impacted by the middle school Action Plans in the 2008/2009 school year.

Total number of people impacted by all of the Middle School action plans: 8,000 people

Racial Demographics of Participating Students

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Three hundred and twelve students participated in the Calling All Colors Middle School Conferences throughout the year, with additional students working on the Action Plans in the school. The demographic breakdown of the conference participants is as follows:

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Students
African American	57
Asian	12
Caucasian	179
Hispanic	57
Other	7
Total	312

Participant Outcomes

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Calling All Colors participants are exposed to lessons and activities designed to increase awareness on issues of race and to increase appreciation for racial and ethnic diversity. Evaluations were completed by student participants at the conclusion each conference to gauge the impact of the conferences on the students understanding of race issues.

99% of middle school students reported that they learned a new idea related to race and diversity.
96% of middle school students developed a greater awareness about race and diversity.

The following questions were asked in the evaluation. A sample of the responses shows the powerful impact the conferences have on student awareness and perspectives.

Describe one new idea you learned from participating in Calling All Colors
“Calling All Colors has made me realize that I need to get out of my comfort zone.”
“I learned that racism is real. I always thought that it was something that we just talked about but now I know that it really happens.”
“I have learned that a lot of TV shows are unfair in who they cast and the ideas they give. Now I am very aware of my world and how little diversity is represented on TV. Before, I never really paid attention to TV programs, I just watched it.”
“I learned that television goes against different races in invisible ways.”
“I learned that friendship has no color.”

Has Calling All Colors helped you develop a greater awareness about racial diversity? Please describe.
“Calling All Colors has helped me gain awareness about racial diversity because at my school everyone pretty much looks the same and I have learned that at other schools it isn’t like that.”
“I never knew how bad racism was, or that it was still out there. Calling All Colors really opened my eyes to that.”
“I used to think that racism was a thing of the past but now I am aware that it is still around.”
“I realized that racism is all over, we just don’t notice it. Calling All Colors has helped me identify racism in my community.”
“By participating in the dialogues, I now can see through other people’s eyes.”

Has your involvement in Calling All Colors influenced how you treat people from other racial and ethnic groups? Please explain.
“Even though I have always been nice to people of other races, Calling All Colors makes me want to have more friends from diverse ethnic backgrounds.”
“Before I came to the Calling All Colors conference, I thought that other ethnic traditions were dumb until I actually experienced them. Now I have a greater respect for people’s customs.”
“I realized that I could have hurt someone by some things that I have said. I used to make racial jokes but now I know that is bad.”
“Calling All Colors has shown me ways to overcome racism. It has made me more comfortable around others.”
“When I reflect on the past, I regret some of the things I have said and done.”

What did you like best about Calling All Colors?
“I like getting into groups and talking with other students, sharing experiences, and making new friends.”
“What I liked best was when we were mixed up into different groups and talked and told stories of our experiences and how we felt.”
“I liked the fact that we could meet new people who have the same purpose and are passionate about it.”

What would you change about Calling All Colors?
“I would have a time to just meet others and make new friends.”
“I wish we could all just hang out more as a group instead of just at lunch.”

Overall, how would you rank your experience at Calling All Colors?
(1= It was a great experience , 5= It was not worthwhile.)

Middle School Fall Conference	Middle School Spring Conference	Total Year Average
1 = 66%	1 = 62%	1 = 64%
2 = 31%	2 = 29%	2 = 30%
3 = 3%	3 = 5%	3 = 4%
4 = 0%	4 = 3%	4 = 2%
5 = 0%	5 = 1%	5 = 0%