Quilt Project Aims to Teach Tolerance to Youngsters

As an elementary school counselor, Pam DeBoer occasionally settles disputes among the 1,200 ethnically diverse students at Canterbury Avenue Elementary School.

The disagreements, DeBoer said, mostly arise from students’ misperceptions about each other’s culture.

To promote tolerance and unity, DeBoer asked students, teachers and staff to create squares for a unity quilt that will go on permanent display in the school’s auditorium.

The quilt project is the centerpiece of a three-day unity festival that ends today.

DeBoer said each square carries a message of unity--from dogs and cats playing together to stars and planets sharing a darkened sky--as different as the individuals who created them, DeBoer said. The squares are tied with ribbon to symbolize a unified school community.

“Each square tells an individual child’s story,” DeBoer said. “And by tying them together, we show that we are on one team and working together.”

Principal Santa Calderon said the unity quilt project is a positive way to acknowledge students’ ethnic diversity.

“Many children today think the only way to solve problems is through fighting,” Calderon said. “This project is a proactive way of saying each individual is important and that as a team we can solve any problem.”

While some students worked on quilt squares Wednesday, others viewed classroom displays on prominent African American, Asian and Latino leaders or watched the drama club perform a skit on women’s voting rights.

Another classroom was transformed into an ancient Italian village, where students dressed in laurel wreaths and togas munched lasagna, counted lira and stomped grapes in a tub.

“It makes them curious about the world around them,” third-grade teacher Bob Karon said of the display. “And makes them think more globally.”