Without a proper support system, high school can be even more difficult than it is already. In order to create a community and let students know that her classroom is a safe space, English teacher Kynda Faythe wears a safety pin on her shirt every day.
“I wear the safety pin essentially to tell people that I’m safe to be around,” Faythe said. “I don’t necessarily have like a big emblem anywhere, I just want to be as real as possible.”
After a violent encounter on a commuter train in Oregon, Faythe wanted to make it known that she is a trustworthy adult that students are welcome to talk to.
“There were two Muslim girls, they were teenagers and three guys. And there’s a white man who was essentially just throwing at a tizzy, right and he’s like swearing at them and yelling at them and I mean it was awful. So much so, three just random strangers went up to try to protect these girls. Long story short, they were stabbed. So three guys died because of that,” Faythe said. “Ever since then, a bunch of people in Portland started wearing safety pins to tell other people that ‘hey, if you’re in public and you’re not feeling safe that, you know it’s okay to sit next to me, and then you’re going to be fine.’ So that’s my reminder.”
For some students, it’s very important to have a trustworthy adult who they can talk to outside of home.

“[It is important] because some people don’t feel safe talking to some teachers like that,” sophomore Reagan Gay said.