Students from around southern Wisconsin gathered at McFarland High School for the annual Youth Unity Summit on Feb. 25.
The summit comes from We Are Many-United Against Hate (WAMU), a nonprofit that speaks out against hate and bigotry and empowers youth through teaching forgiveness and promoting peace. The Youth Unity Summit was held for the second time ever at McFarland High School after rousing success and interest from its first year to hold more events. This year saw the summit in two locations — Youth Unity Summit South in McFarland and Youth Unity Summit North in Wisconsin Rapids.
Students at Youth Summit South had the opportunity to hear from guest speakers and engage in activities pertinent to fostering unity.
First, students saw a special screening of “The Cure for Hate.” The documentary follows notable former neo-Nazi Tony McAleer on his journey to overcome hate. McAleer’s story is central to WAMU’s mission of unity. After he was endowed for years with white supremacist movements, he found his way out and pushed to make reparations for his actions.
After students saw the documentary, McAleer answered questions as the keynote speaker. Students looked for how to conquer hate through recognizing how and when someone may be going down the same pipeline McAleer had in his youth.
“The challenge is it’s not just beliefs in someone’s head. It gets all wrapped up in identity. Getting someone to admit what they think is wrong is hard enough. Getting someone to admit that who they are is wrong is next to impossible,” McAleer said. “The answer isn’t to go into the head and try to argue and change their minds. The answer is to try to go in through their heart through compassion, through human connection.”
McAleer has been traveling around the country to speak at high schools. So far, he’s hit around 50 schools and spoken to thousands of students. His main push has been for people around 13-16, an age when identity starts to become more defined for youth, he said.
Around the country during his speaking tour, McAleer has noticed a stark anxiety and heightened worry over the current state of political affairs.
“There’s more uncertainty. People are more afraid,” McAleer said. “If we don’t know what’s happening in our lives, that’s fear. That feeds fear and fear needs an outlet.”
Following the keynote address, students split into groups to tour around three different breakout sessions. Students spoke with McAleer for a more intimate Q&A, a lesson on the history of the federal government’s community relations services department and worked through scenarios on how to foster unity in schools.
Students returned together to hear from Wisconsin State Superintendent of Schools Jill Underly on the importance of diversity in schools. Additionally, there was a presentation of an award from Gov. Tony Evers, who was not at the conference due to a budgetary meeting, to McFarland High School for its continued efforts to promote unity.
Students were excited to take key lessons away from the Youth Unity Summit. Four students from Platteville High School all found that speakers and talking with other students proved to be useful for finding new ways to inspire inclusivity at their school.
“We were the leaders for the real talk scenarios in the gym. After reading those stories and seeing how the story was interpreted, we compared how different our school is from theirs,” said Alyissa Jones. “But we also communicated how it could be better.”
The four students are excited to bring back ideas to their high school. They hope to use ideas like building stronger and more inclusive communities, making students feel more involved, hosting fundraisers and cultural appreciation events, and collaborating with the people they met at the summit to reach common goals of unity.
