Mix It Up promotes tolerance Diversity-themed events provoke range of reactions from students

Different isn't the only definition of diversity, a rock musician told students.
By DEBORA SHAULIS
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
BOARDMAN -- Boardman High School freshmen Brittney Gordon and Ciera Forest were two of millions of students nationwide to Mix It Up on Tuesday by sitting in an assigned seat at lunch, rather than with their friends.
Gordon didn't like it. She was the only black student at the table. No one talked, she said.
Forest, also black, enjoyed the change. Her group chatted and shared snacks, she said.
The Mix It Up campaign is promoted by Tolerance.org, a Web project of the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center. Boardman High's faculty took it one step further, designating Tuesday as Diversity Day and scheduling an assembly that was part TV talk show, part rock concert.
At Boardman High -- where 91 percent of students are white, according to the School Matters Web site by analytical firm Standard & amp; Poor's -- Principal Tim Saxton also notices economic diversity. "Kids tend to express their personalities through clothes, cars, neighborhoods," he said. "You see that in groups of kids."
The school staff's goal this year is to connect all students. "This was a small piece of a bigger puzzle," Saxton said.
During the assembly in Boardman's Performing Arts Center, a counselor from Lakewood's Teen Health Center asked students how they would have treated professional golfer Tiger Woods, who is biracial, if he had been a Boardman High student.
Then Boardman alumni Matt Toka and Jason Levis, both of the band Cherry Monroe, shared their perspectives as twenty-somethings whose high school memories are still fresh.
"These are kind of the weirdest times of your life and the best times," Levis said. Diversity, he noted, doesn't only mean different. It also means unique, well-rounded, creative, even genius -- all good things. "The more unique you allow yourself to be, the better chance you'll have of doing something you enjoy," he said.
Cherry Monroe has released an album with Rust/Universal Records and soon will announce plans for the band's first national tour. Toka said he's realizing his dream, even though the band has had good reviews and bad.
"Diversity is about being proud of who you are and believing in yourself," Toka said.
Toka said he contemplated suicide during his high school years. He's still not comfortable talking about it but acknowledged it Tuesday at his alma mater and during similar appearances his band has recently made at Westlake High near Cleveland and Lincoln High in Ellwood City, Pa. Toka's past is one reason Cherry Monroe works with The Jason Foundation, a nonprofit organization for prevention of teen suicide.
The event ended with a performance by Cherry Monroe, a five-man band with another Youngstown connection in wild-haired guitarist Frankie Bennett.
Mixed opinions
Afterward, students showed their diversity with a variety of opinions about the day. I got to realize how diverse the school is," said senior Keith Shingleton, 17.
Mackenzie Burkhardt, 16, a junior and a member of student council, was pleased with the way students participated in Diversity Day, acknowledging that it had created "some uneasiness and tension." Her friend Emily Bush, 17, also a junior, was neither for nor against the idea. "Nobody really talked at lunch," she said. "I don't think anybody made a life change."
Sophomore Janice Peacock, 15, was excited to have attended her first concert. "We need more concerts," she said.
Ne'asha Taylor, also 15 and a sophomore, liked "the way they played their guitars," she said.
"I liked that the band was diverse," Forest said.
Fifteen-year-old Chris Mullins -- also known as rapper Ceenial -- wants more rap music in school and a chance to perform for his peers. As for Diversity Day, "I like how everyone met each other," he said. Cherry Monroe's music may not be his first choice, but "Anybody that is true, I accept in my life," he added.
shaulis@vindy.com