Calvin Millham-Berry, a Vermont Student Anti-Racism Network member, reads to elementary kids as part of the Book Project. Photo courtesy of VSARN

Molly Kane is a student at Colchester High School working with the Underground Workshop, a network of student journalists partnering with Community News Service.

Hundreds of people from all over Vermont came to the Statehouse lawn for the Day of Racial Equity and Education on Sept. 30, 2022. The event, hosted by the Vermont Student Anti-Racism Network (VSARN), included workshops, student speakers and conversations with Vermont legislators. The number of participants was almost five times what organizers were expecting.

“It really showed me that people, especially young people, do care,” Addie Lentzner, co-executive director of VSARN, said. 

Lentzner, a student at Middlebury College, founded VSARN as a 10th grader in high school, during the summer of 2020.

 “I remember being in school during COVID and during the George Floyd protests. Seeing the racial reckoning, but not seeing it in my school,” Lentzner said.

“We started with a small group of people and we started with the Book Project in the elementary school,” she said. “We got a grant and we started going around schools and grew from there.”

The Book Project involved a group of VSARN members reading books to elementary school children. These books informed the kids about how serious of a problem racism is, in a way that they could understand. Before the group left, they donated several copies of the book to the school.

But the Day of Racial Equity and Education and the Book Project are only two of the many things that VSARN has achieved.

Since its founding, VSARN has gained over 300 people in the activist network of VSARN, and around 40 people who are consistent members.

Its “Let Me Be Great” campaign focuses on showing older kids how systemic racism is connected to the system they live in.

“[We present] survey results about what’s going on with racism in their own schools to give them that context,” Lentzner said. 

The campaign aims to educate kids in Vermont about microaggressions, bias and the psychology of racism. The group strives to “achieve education without racism through education about racism,” Lentzner said. 

“It’s just so powerful to also be able to open up the idea of racism to students in a way that our education system doesn’t typically do,” Lentzner said. “I believe [that] living in a state like Vermont, we have to do better at spreading awareness and fighting systemic and interpersonal racism.”

Although Lentzner said that being a young activist is a rewarding task, it can have its disadvantages.

Lentzner sees adults who are actively supporting youth activists, but she also believes that “a lot of the times [adults] don’t follow through and listen to [their] voices.”

“It can be as though adults don’t treat you seriously,” Lentzner said. 

Activism is already a lot of work, but when there are factors that get in one’s way, Lentzner acknowledges that it can become a very difficult task.

“Someone is going to disagree with us in a dangerous way,” Lentzner said.

Lydia Beaulieu, a Milton High School graduate who is currently taking a gap year, joined VSARN in 2021. She and other VSARN members planned on making lesson plans for Teacher Advisory (TA) at MHS. TA is like a homeroom, a time when every student meets in a small group every day.

“I wasn’t sure if [other students] were going to agree with me back when I was in high school. That was the hardest part,” Beaulieu said.

Beaulieu knew that reorganizing MHS’s learning plan would be a tedious job, so she requested student support from her school. But by the time they joined, she had already finished. 

After a whole month of planning out the discussions and information she wanted to share with her fellow students, students from her school who joined late decided to delete it all without checking in with her first. Their reasoning: it was “too advanced” for high school students, Beaulieu said. 

“It’s spirit-crushing when you believe that an institution you care about can make those positive changes, and you’re treated as though you don’t matter,” Beaulieu said.

But this hasn’t turned Beaulieu away from activism. As a woman majoring in neuroscience, she has experienced what it’s like to be in a field where men have traditionally been the majority. 

Once you experience injustice, “you can’t unsee it in the world,” Beaulieu said.

It isn’t just personal experiences that can make one realize there needs to be a change in a community. Carter Via, a senior at Burr and Burton Academy in Manchester, said he knew something needed to be done about injustice when his mother had to purchase ponchos as a safety precaution.

“My mother (an Asian-American woman) bought ponchos made to protect the wearer from acid attacks after seeing on the news that more and more Asian-Americans have been subject to acid attacks on the street,” wrote Via in an email. 

“Her fear of such a thing happening to herself and her mother really enunciated the need for change,” he wrote.

Via got connected with VSARN after joining his school’s Students of Color Alliance, where students of color can meet once a week to support each other and spread awareness of racism through posters, a website and even going to the Statehouse.

“Personally, activism has only impacted my mental health in a positive light — the knowledge that I am helping the community deal with such a problematic issue is comforting,” Via wrote. “Activism shouldn’t be making you feel bad, or else you might be doing it all wrong.”

A moment that made Via “more confident” in his activism work was after doing a presentation at a school with VSARN. Several students from the school joined VSARN, which made him feel like he made an impact. 

“This connection of community really showed me how VSARN has been acting as a means for students around Vermont to come together and get involved in working for the greater good,” he wrote.

Although activism can be rewarding most of the time, Via agrees that it can be difficult when the people you talk to “don’t value your efforts.” 

“[VSARN] recently lobbied for a bill to be passed that delineated new approaches to recognizing racism within the school system (courtesy of our legislation project group), which was denied in a surprising turn of events,” Via wrote.

While this was very frustrating and discouraging, Via claimed that “activism is [about] not giving up in adverse situations.” 

“A lot of the work of being an activist is getting other people to help you with your activism — a little goes a long way when it comes from many different people,” he wrote.

“My hope is that the next generations of Vermonters will be groups of people who understand racism and why it is wrong, and who have the drive and willingness to help fix it,” Via wrote.

Lentzner agrees that making change will require just the participation of many people, rather than just one individual.

“[Activism] is definitely a lot, and it feels overwhelming because there are all these issues and as one person, it feels like I can’t solve all these problems,” Lentzner said. 

It’s especially hard when she, like most young activists, has to juggle school on top of it.

“It’s a struggle that can get people burned out and turn a lot of people off activism,” Lentzner said. She claims that balance is key when it comes to school work and activism. 

“[Remember] that activism is just about being human and being able to rest. That’s what we’re fighting for: a world where we can all be human and rest.”

This story, one in a six-part package on student activism, was produced during the recently completed school year.