Race and Your Community

Race and Your Community

Kelly Mennillo

September 28, 2011

My name is Kelly Anne Mennillo; I am a 32 year old White American with an ethnic background of Irish and Italian. I have 2 children both with multiple ethnic backgrounds; they have blonde hair and blue eyes. While my foster daughter is also mixed, she is black, Irish and Italian. I try to raise my girls to never judge a book by its cover. When I say that to them, I explain it like this: never judge someone by what they look like; get to know them first before you judge them.

I was born and raised in Bridgeport, Connecticut. I had a very diverse school environment; I was in several different schools where I always felt like I was a minority. There was huge diversity in my schools. When I graduated middle school, I graduated 30th in a class of 120 students. When I got a bit older the town of Stratford, the neighboring town, collided for the high school years. In high school we learned a trade instead of a language, after four years I graduated with a trade in Graphic Communication with a 3.89 GPA and 19th out of 250 students. For the entire 12 years, I was in elementary to high school there were few White American people that also attended the same schools as I did. Most of the students were Black and Hispanic; I think that this had a certain effect on the way that I thought about other races. Luckily my parents were very down to earth people who taught my brother, sister and I starting at a very young age that everyone is equal and to not discriminate against anyone because of how they look.

Once the weather turns nice here in the great place of New England I like to take my girls for around the city, to go to the local shops, and just for some exercise. On one of my first walks around the city I happened to notice that there were a lot of people of other races around. When I got home later in the day I did a little research and the city of Bridgeport has a...