Guidance

During our second period class, we visited the guidance counselors, asking for their generalized experiences with teenagers dealing with being stereotyped. The confidentiality with guidance counselors and students is very important so we asked questions that wouldn't be describing any specific visits.

 The questions included:  1. Do students ever come to the guidance office with problems as a result of feeling stereotyped?
 * Callanan-"Yes, most of the time if they're upset it's cause they feel isolated or something that's being done to them and often can be some form of stereotype ("they think i'm fat") they don't always it but if you dig deeper you'll find out"
 * Struncis- "I don't know."
 * Georgalles- "Not so much, guys have been called gay, but in my generation it didn’t mean what gay means today. It’s really upsetting, a lot of it must happen, kids keep it silent, but it’s going on."

 2. Do you feel stereotyping is very prevalent in Pascack Valley?  3. Do you have any suggestions as to how we could prevent stereotyping or lower the frequency it occurs?
 * Callanan- "Not very prevalent, but it definitely exists."
 * Struncis- "No"
 * Georgalles- "No"
 * People need to learn to accept each other with all of they're flaws and realize they're all equal, people look at each other like they're not the same but i think we need to be more open
 * Educating students about what it is and how it can be hurtful the importance of self respect and the respect for others, you have to take the time to work with people. Education I think is the key helping younger people understand
 * Martin Luther King day teachers don’t have the day off, think about it, how many teachers are African American? (At least in our school)


 * Teenagers suffer from lack of acceptance for many reasons, however the largest stereotypes we've found are:
 * Over-Weight kids
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Jewish kids
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"Gay" kids
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Mexican kids


 * As a result of our guidance visits, I think that we discovered that although many adults may not be as aware of it as most teenagers, minorities specifically in teenagers are stereotyped and discriminated against. It definitely affects them on multiple levels.