Introduction:

Earlier this semester while writing our autobiographies which made me think of my past

and my life in many different ways. I'm an African American woman and I grew up in

Frederick, MD. I've lived in the same house my whole life. Throughout my life I've

experienced things the average person wouldn't experience on a day to day. In my

autobiography, I expressed that diversity, multiculturalism, and getting to know my

identity was big throughout my life. I interviewed my close friend and former teamate

from high school, Kareema Rushing. This interview was over facetime because she

currently goes to Delaware State University. I chose Kareema because although we

may have some similar views and experiences, we also lived different lives and did

different things. I hope to see throughout this paper, the differences both of us have

experienced outside the ones we share.

Compare Experiences:
Me and Kareema both grew up in the same town. But Kareema during her elementary

school years went to a private school, while me on the other hand went to a public

school. At her private school it was predominantly white, they didn't have events to

teach students about inclusion or multiculturalism. She stated it was a very strict school

that didn't celebrate much. While my public school also didn't have many events to

make students feel included no matter race or identity, my school was pretty diverse.

I’ve had teachers of color throughout my elementary school years. We did go to the

same middle school and high school which was very diverse. We were on the same

cheer team in middle school and high school. In middle school it was about the same for

me but it was a change for Kareema. Coming from a predominantly white private school

to a diverse middle school made her feel left out and out of place. I first met her in

middle school, I remember introducing myself to her and making her feel a sense of

belonging no matter who she was. As we came into high school together, we

experienced racism when cheering for our school plenty of times. This both made us

realize as Black African American Women in America require us to be confident,

powerful, overachieving, and fearless. We wanna be able to make a difference and

stand up for ourselves no matter what. With both of us going to different colleges,

Kareema wants to make a difference in the sports industry by going to a HBCU and

joining the cheer team, as well as becoming an athletic trainer in the NFL or NBA. While

I'm making a difference here at Towson with joining black organizations like NAACP and

on my way to becoming a black elementary school teacher while about 70% of the

teaching workforce is white.

school during her early years as a child really set her apart from me. She explained to

me how they wouldn't have events including culture or identity. Although private school

may seem like the more privileged, the lack of cultural relativism and belonging was

shown. She also explained how her neighborhood wasn't very diverse. It was mostly

people of the same race as her, African American so she wasn't able to explore inside

her identity or others outside of school and inside of school. When she was younger she

didn't see these things as important because she wasn't taught them. As for me, I went

to a diverse elementary school as well as having lots of diversity in my neighborhood. I

was introduced to different cultures at a young age which helped me understand to

accept others for who they are. My elementary school had some events to represent

other people's culture, to teach others, and to acknowledge others. As for middle school

and highschool, we both did have problems with discrimination and racism. In middle

school we both recall on racial slurs going around about African Americans for about a

week and it stopped, nothing really happened after that. Everyone moved on to their

day to day lives. In high school is where it gets worse for the both of us. With us being

on the same cheer team, we got racial sluts from rivalry teams or just inappropriate and

racist posts about the cheerleaders or the players before games. This happened to us

multiple times throughout our freshman-senior year in high school. After a while we got

used to it. But we did our senior year speak to administrators about these many

incidents and try to stand up for ourselves.

This interview made me learn that me and Kareema grew up in the same place but that

doesn't mean we have the same experience. We grew up in different elementary

schools and different neighborhoods which put Kareema behind in lots of things like

multiculturalism, a sense of belonging, or cultural relativism. She grew up in a private

school which caused her to see more people in the high middle class while I've seen

people in the middle class, low class, or even high middle class. Things like

intersectionality didn't occur for her until about late middle school, early high school. I

had the resources to do so. As much as you would think a private school would

introduce identity, inclusion, multiculturalism,and many more, they lack these things

based on Kareema's experiences.

Conclusion:

Overall, this interview showed how things can be different for people even if they grew

up together. People have different perspectives and different childhoods that can dictate

where they are in life now. Kareema was inexperienced about her race and identity

going into middle school and didn't learn much until freshman year. I learned my early

years starting with elementary which put me ahead of the game but not too ahead. But

at the end we both learned the importance of these things with the experiences we went

through together today. Our years together made us who we are and made us want to

do more in the future.