Alpha Secondary School held its first Human Library event, in over 10 years, on April 24th. The Human Library is a project created by the Danish youth organization Stop the Violence, in 2000. It is now operational in more than 60 countries. It’s purpose its to challenge societal prejudices and to help people form a better understanding of those who are different from them through conversation.
How it works is that members of the community with interesting life stories and intersectional identities volunteer to act as ‘books’. Our grade 11 and 12 students were then given the opportunity to sit down with the books and ask them questions about their lives and identities. The group of books was varied in terms of age, race and sexual orientations. We had 14 books volunteer in total, with their identities ranging from an Indigenous Olympian, to a Queer Urban Planner to a retired Funeral Home Director who was also a Steampunk Professor.
In total 15 classes attend the all-day event, meaning over 300 students participated. Feedback from students was very positive, with most wishing they had more time so that they could have chatted with more of the books. One student even wrote,
“It was interesting to hear the perspectives and life experiences of people coming from unique environments. Their outlook showed me that everyone has their own book…humanity is a library and to discriminate would be simply missing out on some good stories.”
We thank all the students who participated and the teachers who signed their classes up for the event. We were pleased to see such a wonderful community building event take place in the library again, after such a long hiatus.