When she was younger, Deethya (pronounced dee-tee-ya) heard it all. 

“You’re smart for an immigrant child.”

“You’re pretty for an Asian.” 

Put-downs veiled as compliments and encased with sexism and racism. 

Now a senior at the International School of Beaverton, she’s passionate about teaching others about the harms of misogyny -- which she defines as dislike of, contempt for or ingrained prejudice against women -- and how people can intervene when the comments turn cruel. 

Deethya, a senior at the International School of Beaverton, led a workshop on misogyny during the Cascade Alliance for Equity fall summit. She hopes her advocacy will encourage people to change their behavior so the students who come after her don’t go through what she has. “That is how you see change in society,” she says. Photos by Tracey Goldner. 

Deethya recently participated in a student-led conference called the Cascade Alliance for Equity Summit. In her training, she used her personal experiences to examine the ways misogyny shows up in schools and in our society at large. 

In one activity, she asked the participants to close their eyes and raise their hands if they had experienced misogyny.

When the group of teachers, paraeducators, principals, superintendents and fellow students opened their eyes, they saw a room full of raised hands. 

She broke apart misogyny into its elements: sexism, discrimination, microaggressions and dark humor. 

“I think people often blur that boundary between what is a joke and what is harmful,” she says. 

She also emphasized the difference between being a bystander -- someone who stands idly by while these types of comments are made -- and what she calls an upstander -- someone who speaks up and interrupts that kind of language. 

She acknowledges the difficulty of becoming an upstander. After all, you are sitting in classrooms with these people all day, she says. But she believes change is possible and was excited to talk with participants so openly about a stigmatized topic. 

A sophomore at Southridge named Dashon who attended her workshop said the training really opened his eyes to what his friends might be hearing in their daily lives. 

He plans to speak up when he overhears comments in the future. 

“There’s really no excuse when it comes to stuff like that,” he says. 

Giving students the floor to speak directly and honestly to the adults who exercise so much control over what happens in those students’ daily lives is a great lesson for all of us adults, he says. 

He was moved by Deethya’s presentation and hopes her lessons resonate with the teachers and students who attended. 

Down the hallway, another group of students presented about what belonging means to them.

Ellie, who recently moved from Texas to the coastal town of Rockaway Beach, talked about how isolating it is to be one of the few Black people around.  

Ellie, right, with co-presenters Meena and Acacia, during their presentation on how to help students feel like they belong.

She says she wishes there were more racial diversity, but she realizes it’s difficult on the Oregon coast. 

She hasn’t heard any disparaging comments but hopes teachers acknowledge the loss of community she experienced with her move to a smaller, much whiter place. 

Fellow presenter Starla, who has overcome a difficult family life, talked about how important it is for teachers to acknowledge the diversity of learning styles that exist. 

“The way you learn depends on what your brain is like,” she says. She hopes teachers think more about how individual students learn and that they intentionally try to meet those needs. 

Acacia talked about the isolation she experienced after moving from Tillamook to Garibaldi after her mom got a new teaching job. 

“I was alone for four months with no friends,” she says. One teacher in particular, Ms. Clifton realized she needed help and introduced her to the person who is now her best friend. She says this one small act changed the trajectory of her life. 

The students also presented portraits of their classmates along with quotes about what belonging means to them. They played videos, and the featured students talked about what they need to be successful. 

Students asked teachers to hold them more accountable, offer more designated one-on-one time for questions and include more knowledge checks in their lessons to make sure students are understanding the concepts.  

Reeva Wortel, the art teacher who helped the students develop their presentation, says her students have interviewed members of their community -- artists, social workers, organizers, farmers -- in addition to students at their school. 

A mix of nearly 200 students, teachers, paraeducators, principals and superintendents attended the fourth Cascade Alliance for Equity Summit on Oct. 31 at the International School of Beaverton. The summit featured 23 student-led presentations on topics like engagement in rural schools, suicide prevention, educator diversity and hearing loss simulation stations.   

At the end of the year, they’ll host an art show and invite everyone they’ve photographed. Giving them the tools and skills to talk about their experiences has helped them learn how to listen and also helped them feel that sense of belonging, she says. 

“When people tell stories, we listen,” Reeva says.  

Another group of students -- this time from Forest Grove High School -- has been analyzing their own stories and experiences. Now they are asking tough questions about which students get to participate in leadership experiences and which students don’t. 

“We don’t see Latinos on student leadership,” says Luz, a junior at Forest Grove. 

The students outlined the many benefits that come along with student leadership -- developing confidence, learning how to work on a team, speaking publicly and gaining skills for life after high school -- and talked about how some students are missing out on these opportunities. 

Forest Grove students, including Luz, second from right, lead a session about how to expand leadership opportunities for students.

They say a lot of exclusivity comes from barriers like requiring a certain GPA, a certain level of attendance or not sharing the opportunity to join widely. 

The group asked participants to think about how barriers like these could be excluding certain students and what it would mean to include them. They offered up students who don’t speak English well or students who have just arrived in the county as examples. 

They also wondered whether having race-specific leadership groups like Latinos in Action is the best structure and asked participants to imagine what having one large, well-funded leadership group could look like. 

Then they passed out worksheets in Portuguese and asked teams of four to complete them. The exercise was meant to simulate what it’s like to be dropped into a classroom without knowing a word of the language being spoken. 

Then they graded the worksheets and called out scores. 

Many people in their school have differing opinions about the ideas they discussed, they said, but they were honored to have the platform to offer their observations and share their own experiences with the attendees.

“Equality is good,” Luz says. “But equity is greater.”