Social Justice Week, an event in which students participate in equity-themed workshops and activities, will take place the week of April 8 with the main event on April 10: one period where students attend a workshop, as well as an opening and closing assembly.

Students chose from 29 peer or faculty-led workshops, offering a wide variety of content and activities. Mahi Shah, a co-president of Social Justice Committee, the student organization that organizes Social Justice Week, said these workshops are the focal point of the Social Justice Week experience.

Mahi: “I think that honestly the workshops themselves, that students and faculty members do, deserve a lot more because I think that they’re all incredible, and they’re all over such different issues that are all important. It’s kind of great that we get a whole day that people can pick whatever workshop they want to be part of and talk about whatever social justice issue they’re most interested in. It’s not like they’re confined to just talk about one.”

Along with the workshops there are speakers and events happening April 10 and at lunch that students are encouraged to check out.

Mahi explained these extra events are to make the event a week-long activity again after pandemic distance learning shortened it to just a day.

Mahi: “Before COVID it used to be an entire week, so we’re trying to bring that back by having lunch events and speakers throughout the entire week.”

Sonakshi Mutreja, another co-president, was first drawn to Social Justice Committee because of its unique ability to engage the student body, and the school as a whole.

Sonakshi: “I think it’s a really cool opportunity for students to be really involved. Because they run all of the workshops they get to propose the ideas and anything that people feel is really important or something the Lab community can really benefit from. I think that’s a really cool aspect of it: bringing in the students and the faculty. The faculty can run some really amazing workshops too. So just kind of the way that we work together as a community to put on the workshops is what drew me to it.”

Sonakshi is running a workshop called “Gender in Basketball,” focusing on NCAA women’s basketball stars and their roles as inspiring figures. She explains that a lot of thought has gone into her workshop to make sure that students are engaged and feel comfortable. 

Sonakshi: “In terms of preparation, a lot of research, a lot of thinking about ways to make it engaging, so participants, beyond just listening to a presentation, can actually be a part of it and feel like a part of it. And create this community aspect to it so that people feel comfortable participating in discussion. Those are the kinds of things I am thinking about: what kind of icebreaker or beginning activity. And how I specifically want to run the workshop in terms of how I present information, is it slides or is it a video? All of that stuff is things that we think about.”

Sophomore Camila Bravo is helping to run a workshop based around identity with other students who attended the Student Diversity Leadership Conference. Along with five other students, she is running “Identity Molecules: Exploring the Big 8 Identifiers,” which features activities they learned at the conference in November.

“We wanted to bring back something that we learned such as the Big Eight Identifiers. We spent a lot of time talking about them. So it’s like race, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, age, ability — all those things. It’s just kind of how much they apply in your own life. So we did an activity which is called identity molecules, and it’s when you get all of these eight identifiers and you create this big molecule with them. It depends on how much they impact your life and how much you think about them. ”

Social Justice Week provides an opportunity for students to learn about each other and the world through lunch events and workshops. 

Mahi: “Everyone be engaged in your social justice workshops! People worked really hard on them.”