MONTREAL -- In the middle of a heatwave, teachers at Willingdon Elementary in Montreal’s Notre-Dame-de-Grace neighbourhood are in a park sweating to the oldies, namely the Aretha Franklin hit ‘Respect.’
“Right, left, jump!” belts out principal Carmen Nicolas, who was a dance instructor in a previous life. She seems almost surprised by how hard the teachers are working to learn the dance, not to mention how well they can move.
“They did fantastic. Fantastic dancers, fantastic spirit, they’re always ready to take on whatever we throw their way,” she says.
The dance is the opening number to this year’s new ‘Respect’ campaign.
“We’ve always been a social justice school. We’ve advocated for social justice, taught social justice, but it’s always different things that are coming up,” says Nicolas. “And we felt that at the bottom line it was about respecting – respecting ourselves, respecting others, and respecting our planet.”
Each month will focus on a new topic, including Indigenous issues, race issues, cyberbullying, women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and more
“It always comes back to respect,” says physical education teacher Lara Belinsky who helped put the program together. “So whether it’s respecting your body, whether it’s respecting someone else’s body, whether it’s respecting someone else’s race, culture or even the environment, the common language is always respect.”
One important topic to be included is self-respect, adds Belinsky.
“I think it’s really important that children love themselves regardless of their body, shape, size, race, culture, beliefs that they love themselves allow their lights to shine and give permission to others to do that as well.”
English Montreal School Board chair Joe Ortona says they’re always looking for new ways to promote these types of ideas.
“You want to bring awareness especially to kids at a young age,” says Ortona. “Especially about respect, about tolerance about diversity.”
