As there have been increasing efforts through state laws encouraging the exploration and representation of all identities in classrooms, Palo Alto High School students have been empowered to pursue their dreams, regardless of their race, gender, or sexual orientation. However, the issue of representation in the highest offices of our nation fails to show that everyone has a right to representation.
Laphonza Butler has recently stepped into the role of U.S. senator after Diane Feistein’s passing. She counts as the third Black woman to have served in the Senate, after Carol Mosely Braun and Kamala Harris. There have been great strides for representation of the African American community with Obama’s election as the first president of color and Harris’s inauguration as vice president in 2020.
With these new developments in our political sphere, the need to maintain this trend in the coming years will be crucial for the future of our government. But how can we engage with more diverse politicians and leaders in our community? All education system need to equally emphasize sucess for all students and provide resources.
Since 1979 to 2023, there have been 18 Black women who have ever held statewide elected executive office. Even today in the California State Legislature, straight white males make up 41% of all legislators while they only account for about 18% of the state’s population.
This is a problem — in the United States, we cherish our right to representative democracy. Emphasis on representative.
However, women and people of color have historically been discouraged from participating in politics through the implementation of systemic and societal barriers. We can look to Palo Alto High School for a more localized perspective: there have been strides with diversity in administration in the PAUSD district. Brent Kline, our principal, and Don Austin, our superintendent, have made hiring diversity a priority during their tenure.
In the PAUSD District, 70% of those in the highest level positions are women, which includes administration, board and cabinet members. In the cabinet, 68% are women — half of them being of non-white ethnicity — in which 26 of 38 cabinet members were hired by Don Austin.
There have been efforts to create a more representative and inclusive political sphere. Butler’s work as president of EMILY’s list, is evidence enough that making sure to empower the voices of women in politics is beneficial to all.
EMILY’s list works to train and build campaigns for Democratic female candidates. Through main values such as anti-racism, diversity, equity and inclusion, this organization bases practices on intersectional feminism to reach a morally just and equitable society.
These values and diversity is important as research conducted by the Brennan Center of Justice has shown that diversity proves beneficial to lawmakers as it conveys legitimacy of the legislature. According to Kenneth Lowande, a professor of political science at the University of Michigan, women, racial minorities and veterans serving in legislatures are more likely to legislate for their respective groups, meaning that a representative lawmaking body does lead to representative legislation. Therefore, the outcomes may lead to increased public trust in these institutions. As demonstrated, the implementation of diversity would further push our government to challenge the injustices unheard of by the male populace.
Palo Alto High School Principal Brent Kline says that students better relate to administrators when they share a commonality in identity.
“When you’re looking at bringing diversity of people into different kinds of roles, it’s to ensure that they bring their story, but [that] they’re able to share their story with our students,” Kline said.
Palo Alto Unified School District Superintendent, Don Austin explains why the hiring process in the district has been changed to an internalized process rather than an interview which values their work ethic and products done on the job. He recounted a situation where an employee was not hired due to the system in place and motivated him to make a change.
“One thing that was clear to me is that if we were going to actually make progress in this area [diversity in higher positions] we needed to change the process that was holding candidates back,” Austin said. “Our diversity has gone way up … you can’t use the same old processes that have been barriers for certain people and expect a different result. It just doesn’t happen. You have to change the game.”
Austin says that the benefits of having diversity in the district leads to wave of different thinking, countering like-mindedness. By amplifying different perspectives and viewpoints, groups that were once marginalized feel secure enough to speak out.
“You got a diversity of thought,” Austin said. “You want people that have different experiences and paths. When we’re talking about hiring here [PAUSD], we want to blend … look at our team, now it’s represented by multiple countries in backgrounds, languages, experiences.”
According to Austin, PAUSD works hard to ensure that all voices are enforced due to the impact on students.
“There’s a lot of effort to silence people that don’t have your same opinion,” Austin said. “When you can’t find other people that have your own opinion, then you’re silenced.”
Diversity is a hallmark of American society, and lacking that element in our government officials is an injustice. Representation and public trust is imperative in our day and age as we Paly students navigate our young adulthood in a much more politically polarized society. Just as PAUSD has amplified diversity to reflect their student population, so too must the federal government adopt this practice.