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It’s the current scenes in Ferguson and Baltimore that further fuel Victoria Mizel’s drive to use English to facilitate connections and healing. Mizel will graduate in May with a bachelor’s in secondary English education from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. She plans to use her education to teach in an urban area, where she says voices are often stifled.

“Our society makes it really easy for us to ignore certain voices,” Mizel said. “I really appreciate the fact that in the English classroom you have a chance to give those voices room to be heard.”

With protests and riots becoming all too common across the nation, the need for healing is evident. As a teacher, Mizel aspires to use her classroom to encourage connection, beginning with literature, reading and writing.

“The classroom is a truly unique space where people are challenged and pushed,” explained Mizel. “It’s where we grow, and we break, and we put things back together. We step into those places that we’re scared to step into. I want to be part of that.”

Mizel says her professors at SIUE have contributed to her academic success by listening to her questions, and sometimes more importantly, teaching her which questions to ask. As a Meridian Scholar at the University, Mizel received a scholarship that paid for her tuition, fees, housing and meals. According to Mizel, this made it possible for her to receive the educational foundation with which to pursue her life goals.

“They saw something in me that they thought was worthwhile,” Mizel said. “I had no idea what I was getting into. I knew I was extremely passionate about socio-economic inequality, but had never even considered the way that race plays into that.

“When I got here, just through the people I met, I was exposed to a lot of the intersectionality. And I think that’s huge. You can’t just look at one piece. It’s all tied together and when you only look at one piece, you miss the real problem. You miss the root. You only get to the stem.”

During her undergraduate career, Mizel worked at the SIUE East St. Louis Charter High School. Now, she plans to begin her professional career teaching in St. Louis, a place where she says the lines of race and socioeconomic status are drawn.

“It frustrates me that I, because of how I look and where I was born, can be oblivious if I want to,” Mizel remarked. “There are people who can’t, and will never be able to, simply because of how they look, where they were born or where they came from.

“But I have hope,” she added. “And that’s why I’m becoming a teacher. You have to have a lot of hope to become a teacher. And you have to be able to hold onto it even when it doesn’t look like there’s any reason to.”

Mizel’s long-term goal is to work in policy, doing social justice work. Beyond teaching, Mizel wants to work with the structures that affect people.

“My hope is that someday we come to a place where people feel heard and loved without having to protest for hours in the street,” Mizel said. “That could take 5 years, 10 years, it could take forever, but we can’t stop trying.”

Photo: Victoria Mizel