Presidental Message: Celebrate Diversity

"Obama Urges Students to Celebrate Their Diversity" was a recent headline that was featured in a USA Today article.

The story that followed focused on the President's visit to a Philadelphia school for 5th to 12th graders as they were returning to classes after a summer break. "Life is precious and part of what makes it so wonderful is its diversity," President Barack Obama said. "We shouldn't be embarrassed by the things that make us different. We should be proud of them," he said, "because it's the things that make us different that make us who we are, that make us unique."

The President's words certainly speak to children of immigrants, who can feel different (in a negative way,) when they try to bridge the different worlds in which they travel each day.

In my interviews with adults, who grew up as children of immigrants in the United States, I have heard from several who say it's been a tight rope they have walked between the homes in which they have lived and the outside world where they have attended school, work, and carried on their daily lives. Some of the interviewees continue to have parents who do not speak English and they carry on their roles as interpreters and a link to understanding and negotiating American ways.

It's fascinating to hear how some of the interviewees have changed their views about being a child of immigrants from the time they were young to their adulthood! For several, what had been embarassing about being different has now become a sense of pride and appreciation for their parents' sacrifices to raise their children in the United States.

The people I have spoken to are proud Americans who celebrate the diversity of the Unites States and appreciate their being part of this country's "flavorful" Melting Pot. If given the opportunity that President Obama had, they also could have carried the same message to the school children about the beauty of diversity.