Peace and Social Justice at Peace Rose Montessori

At the core of its mission, Peace Rose is striving to create global citizens who are compassionate, empathetic, and unprejudiced. In all of our programs we emphasize lessons that are anti-racist, LGBTQIA+ inclusive, and teach cultural competency.

We value diversity— diversity in race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, neurodivergence, country of origin, religion, native language, ability, family structure and more. It takes all sorts of people to build a rich community, and we work to make Peace Rose a safe, welcoming, and accessible place for everyone.

At Peace Rose, our commitment to peace and social justice does not end at a DEI statement on our website. These are the steps we take to prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion:

  • We hire with a diversity centered mindset. We recognize that when it comes to increasing the diversity of the Peace Rose community as a whole, an area that we can directly control is the diversity of our staff.

  • We support our teachers through training, professional development, and growth into leadership. Our goal is to hire amazing teachers and retain them for as long as possible. We work hard to help our teachers reach their potential and goals. Together we create a work environment that is fun, welcoming, and comfortable.

  • We put an emphasis on educating the global citizen. In every classroom from infant through middle school we read books about different kinds of people, families, and cultures. We hang art that is representative. We use the appropriate terms for our bodies and keep our language gender neutral even with our youngest students. We learn about and celebrate holidays from every religion and study cultures from every continent. We present different ideas and ideals from the lens of “some people believe”, working never to elevate our own personal beliefs but rather to stress that the world is full of billions of people who believe and experience many different things, and that is what makes humanity interesting.

  • We don’t shy away from the hard conversations. Beginning in the Primary classroom we introduce an honest and truthful perspective about human history. This includes talking about the impacts of colonization, slavery, and the oppression of women, the LGBTQIA+ community, and people of the global majority. We engage in anti-racist conversations with the children and trust that they are able to rise to these complex conversations and lead with empathy.

  • We celebrate our differences. It is important to us that we are not only telling stories about communities of people that are filled with struggle, pain, or overcoming oppression. We emphasize the joy in every community and culture and educate beyond the stereotypes. We incorporate books and media that show different kinds of people living every day lives. In our Primary and Elementary programs each student chooses a country, region, or state to do a presentation on each year. Sometimes students choose countries that their family has a personal connection to, and sometimes they choose countries that they are interested in. Each year we have a robust, year long celebration about what makes humanity amazing all over the world.

  • We continue our education. We’re never done learning! Both our administrative team and our staff regularly engage in diversity centered professional development from organizations like the American Montessori Society and from local diversity consultants such as Bright Star Diversity Consulting.

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