I attended the service event at the Innis Elementary School for the Scientific Thinkers Science Day on Thursday, December 5th from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. The service event was a great way to start off my Reading Day and escape from the stress of finals. I signed up for the Snowflake Borax Crystals lesson where we taught kids how to make crystals from a borax-water mixture and a pipe cleaner. It was a very fun, but hectic time. I forgot how much energy and patience it took to handle elementary school aged children. For some brief background information on Innis Elementary School, there are a total of 404 students based on the 2017-2018 year. 73.6% are underrepresented minorities in the sciences, 95% are economically disadvantaged, and 9.9% are students with disabilities. The first thing I noticed about the elementary school was the lack of funding. The ‘classrooms’ were not divided by walls, but instead they utilized boards to separate the classes from each other. I couldn’t help but compare my elementary school to Innis. I could see a very clear distinction between a well-funded elementary school versus one that did not get much. However, it was very humbling to see that despite the lack of funding for Innis Elementary School, the teachers, staff, and students all had bright smiles on their faces and grateful for what they had in their school.
Based on my personal observations on the student population, the majority of students were minorities from many different cultural backgrounds. Unlike many elementary schools where the white is the majority, in Innis Elementary School, the white students were the minority. I remember there was this one little boy who did not speak much and was very shy. He was moving slower compared to the rest of the students during the lesson. The girl sitting next to him raised her hand and asked if I could help him. She then tapped on my shoulder and whispered in my ear that the boy was a new student and did not know how to speak English. She said that she can translate my words into Spanish so the little boy could understand. I thought it was such an eye-opening experience to see that different languages were being utilized amongst the students and no one judged or taunted each other. When I was in elementary school, my school was very white. The teachers and students were majority white and my brother, and I were probably one of the only few Asians. I used to get bullied for being different and students would bother my little brother for calling me “Noona”, even though it is the respectful way for a younger brother to address his older sister in Korean culture. It was heart-warming to see a school of minorities who embraced and respected one another’s differences and backgrounds. I could feel that there was no judgement. Spending time with the elementary school kids reminded me of how much I loved interacting with kids in the past, and I hope to volunteer again next year or even join the organization Scientific Thinkers.