Let Your Voice Be Heard

On display in the main lobby is an interactive, thought exhibit that is informed by our Quaker values, and inspired by the civility campaign of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Teaching Tolerance program. The exhibit invites Friends students, parents, faculty, and staff to consider ways we might pursue, through our individual and collective actions, a more civil dialogue in the public spaces of our democracy.

The driving forces behind this civility initiative were the concerns from student leaders, faculty, and administrators, who, as witnesses to this vitriolic election, have wanted to find a response that calls for something better. As Parker Palmer wrote in Healing the Heart of Democracy, “There are times when the heart, like the canary in the coal mine, breathes in the world's toxicity and begins to die.” This exhibit of civility affirmations invites community members to consider how our timeless Quaker testimonies and practices can inform how we learn about and discuss politics and other complex issues.

The question the exhibit calls us to ask ourselves is: In our classrooms and at home, what are ways we might pursue these values and practices more fully during the election and beyond? Our school environment aims to be one in which it is safe to explore—and disagree on—important topics. Recognizing that individual truth is always partial, we need to listen with openness and respect, especially to “the other,” as much as we need to speak up with clarity and conviction. The exhibit aims to encourage dialogue within our community that models for others how to “create a politics worthy of the human spirit, one that has a chance to serve the common good.”