Founder and advisor – Connie Carter
OMS contact – Debra Bishop
Operation Breaking Stereotypes (OBS) is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, working with schools in Maine, Boston, and New York City to facilitate exchanges among diverse groups of learners. Since its founding in 2002, OBS has helped more than 2500 students address ethnic, socioeconomic, gender, and racial stereotypes through writing, reading, music, photography, and personal connections.
Orono Middle School students have partnered with students from Indian Island School and Leonard Middle School. This partnership brings together middle school-aged youth from three different communities who, despite all living along the Penobscot River, harbor stereotypes and misperceptions about each other which inhibit their development as students and community members. The exchanges between these three schools focus on identity, culture, being an ally, and understanding Native and non-Native communities and their shared histories along the Penobscot River. Students will visit each other’s schools again this year as they move towards understanding and growth as individuals and community ambassadors.
Operation Breaking Stereotypes Website
Activities:
In the spring of 2017, the OMS Operation Breaking Stereotypes students worked on a climate change PSA video with their partners from Indian Island School and Leonard Middle School. They also presented climate change information to the students in their own schools and to their school boards. Many OBS participants attended the Samantha Smith Challenge that spring.
Through the 2017/2018 school year, OBS students researched school safety. Together they developed and shared a student survey with the students in their schools and then presented the results to their school administrators. They also worked on a map to share their findings about school shooting incidents that have happened in the United States.
Click below to view the map that OMS OBS students worked on together.
Arc GIS Map Created by OBS Students
Click the link below to view information about the Samantha Smith Challenge that OMS and Leonard Middle School students participated in to showcase their work around school safety.
OBS – Samantha Smith Challenge – 6/1/2018
Throughout the 2018/2019 school year the OBS students collaborated on a song titled “These Three Towns.” Click the link below to listen to it and watch the video.