Romona's Kids: Berea-Midpark High School Leader Workshop

BEREA, OH (WOIO) - Racism is headline news again as the scandal over hateful comments Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling continues to play out. So, we wanted to know how our young people deal with bigotry and racism. We were invited to watch as a local group tackled the issue. Tonight's Romona's Kids are in Berea.

The Titan Pride Leader Workshop at Berea-Midpark High School is sponsored by The Diversity Center of Northeast Ohio.

"Pride" stands for Perseverance, Respect, Integrity, Diversity, and Excellence.  Students from various clubs learn important lessons, such as creating a community where everyone is respected and included, and supports each other.

"The program is called YouLEAD, and it provides the students with an opportunity to think about their personal leadership style, and how they're diverse; everybody has assets and we want to tap into what those are," said AmariYah Israel, School and Youth Director for The Diversity Center of Northeast Ohio.

The teens get into groups and tell stories about themselves, and it makes them realize that they're not all that different from each other. The students also learned conflict resolution, which is especially important at Berea-Midpark, because the school is a brand new merger between two former rivals.

"Groups from both schools are now becoming one big group," said student Mariah Kleem.

"I think for the school it's going to lead to a more unified front towards combating the negativity that many people face," said student Tylor Mahany.

"We opened up to different views, there are a lot of different personalities in this group," said student Josh Pedraza.

The students are already working on an action plan for next year.

"This is something that we feel is going to bring the building together and the pride, perseverance, respect, integrity, diversity and excellence are things that we want to instill in every student," said teacher Sherri Fox.

"I'm going to take this to the whole school and make sure that next year is even better, and that this merger will not only benefit our school but it's going to benefit our community and maybe the nation as well because we're raising the future leaders," said student Leanne Tang.

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