Fostering and Creating Safe Educational Spaces

Last night I had the honour of attending the *Trans Inclusive Vagina Monologues at my alma mater UTSC. I also teach there as a sessional instructor so this is a place that I hold near and dear to my heart for many reasons. A former student whom I had the pleasure of teaching last semester was performing and had the kindness to put me on the list of the sold out event. The energy in the theatre was incredible and well deserved. 

I am writing this mini-blog as a tribute. As a tribute to the incredible work that I witnessed and experienced last night.  To honour how these students created and fostered a wonderful safe space to share and be vulnerable. It was an evening I will not soon forget:

• A wonderful spoken word piece by a student honouring her sister
• A heartbreaking story of growing up in a single parent immigrant home and the medical, social, cultural, and emotional struggles her mother faced; and the power and strength it takes to overcome these hardships.
• A poem honouring our beautifully complicated  selves 
• Poems which included  such glorious lines as “I am my negative space”
• A spoken piece that addressed  diasporic existence
• A spoken word piece on the importance of feminism and the need to address rape culture 
• A spoken word piece which reminded me to harness “my boyfriend material” (such a good line)

There were many more moments, too many to honour, too many to give proper voice to and it would be disrespectful for me to try to even voice them, for it is not for my story to retell; it is for my heart to listen.

And to my former student who recited a powerful poem, a poem inspired by the strength of her mother, a poem that had echoes of things we spoke about in our women’s literature class last semester – how women are part of a tradition, how in each woman lives the history and traces of all the women who came before them- to you, Kosan, I honour you and the work that you all did in defining an educational space where the members of the audience learned and engaged with your experiences.  Thank you!

You are the future leaders of our social and cultural spaces and for that I have much faith in what the future will bring.

Your Colleague in Learning,   Ann