8.08.2016

Georgia HOBY Newsletter:
Seventy-Fourth Edition, August 8, 2016

Featured Alumna: Julia Larimar '10


I remember standing up on the last night of HOBY in a semi-darkened room, eyes squeezed shut and mouth open wide, “I want people to take me seriously.” While I did not realize it at the time, I was voicing a request that grew out of continually being silenced and undervalued as a black woman, a symptom of institutional racism in America. In my rural community, I never saw many black people in “leadership positions”. Most of my educators were white women or white men. Most of the cafeteria and custodial workers at school were black women or black men. I grew up feeling that black people were still second-class citizens meant to serve and not capable of being leaders. With this understanding came unconscious self-hate and a desire to take on as many characteristics of white-middle class dominant culture as possible to erase the blackness. To help me feel more like the leader that almost every part of mainstream American society demanded I be. But then at HOBY I met Adetinpo Thomas. She had shoulder length black hair, skin dark as mine with sapphire undertones. She was one of the coolest parts of every sweltering day at HOBY. Having her as an example of leadership alongside the workshops and readings that we did made black female leadership a reality to me. She was confident. She was bold. She showed me that I too could be unapologetically black woman and leader.

My Junior Staff leaders, John Murphy and Katie Moore, also encouraged me to be the best me that I could be. Their belief in me helped begin my thinking about what it meant to have allies outside of one’s racial in-group. I could never have had the courage to sing in the talent show without their support and that of my group at HOBY. It’s been six years since those formative days I spent as an ambassador on Georgia Southwestern University’s campus. I am now working in Tulsa, Oklahoma as an early childhood educator through Teach for America. In a country where cultural competency and high academic performance are markers of success, and schools are the mediums through which American children are socialized into their role as citizens, unequal education through racial segregation still maintains a racial and social hierarchy. Thus, teachers, as the facilitators of that socialization, have a huge responsibility to society. The school I am working in is over 90% black. As a black female educator, I consider my very presence as a leader in the classroom, and the high expectations I have for my students and myself, an act of resistance against systems of oppression working against my community.

I am thankful to HOBY for challenging me summer of 2010—in earnest—to be more service-oriented, outspoken, and to use my voice not just for myself but my whole community. I am happy that I got to come back the next year and be a junior staff member to help create a positive experience for all ambassadors to grow more into themselves. I am thankful for the places of leadership I’ve been able to inhabit since. I hope to continue being a leader in my community, using skills HOBY cultivated in me, in order to help others use their voice to make this country a better place—similarly to the way Adetinpo’s very presence influenced me. I am humbled to be doing the work of being a teacher to young people of color. I gladly “pay it forward”! #HOBY4LIFE

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