It’s easy to feel discouraged as the Trump/Project 2025 regime threatens, attacks and oppresses just about everyone who’s not on board with its barrage of previously unspeakable atrocities.
Many of us are resisting, but I’m also inspired by people – especially young people — who are embracing the diversity, equity and inclusion that has made our country great.
For a quarter-century, the Arnold Delin Education Fund has been promoting these principles in Schuylkill County high schools.
All 12 schools at its April 28 awards ceremony listed impressive accomplishments, but Shenandoah Valley was particularly notable. Although its diversity club was just winding up its first full year, it received an honorable mention after listing an array of activities aimed at bringing people together within and outside the school.
This was particularly heartening because the school had made headlines in 2008 when several of its football players beat Mexican immigrant Luis Ramirez to death.
For the five rising seniors I interviewed from the Diversity Club, that hate crime was a lifetime ago. And much has changed at Shenandoah Valley, which is now 65% Hispanic, up from about 35% two decades ago.
“When it comes to hate, you’re talking about like a fringe group of people that try to amplify their voice,” said club adviser Tony Pytko, a social studies teacher who’s been with the district since 2006. So the members are trying to “flood the conversation with positivity and inclusion” in hopes that these attitudes will catch on.
In the middle of the 2024-25 school year, district officials approved a proposal by Angelique Zamudio Carmen, who was then a senior, and Jayden Mulkusky, a sophomore, to start a club to bring out the best of all cultures.
Jayden, who’s now the club’s president, said he and Angelique identified a need for inclusivity. Despite Shenandoah Valley’s diverse population, students “kind of just lingered around with who we did without really recognizing … cultural aspects and any other forms of diverse ideas within our school.”
The club now has about 30 members.
MORE: Schuylkill County Schools Get $2 Million in Safety, Mental Health Grant Funding
Welcoming newcomers
“We aim to be role models for younger students, especially in clubs like these … but to also have this comfort of a club where you are included and you are welcomed,” Jayden said.
The members recognized that a new school might seem intimidating to students from another state or country, so the club’s first big project was to take each of them on a tour– if necessary, by a bilingual guide – and present them with pencils, a notebook and other supplies.
Now an established procedure, this orientation also gives newcomers “someone to go to in case you’re ever feeling lost,” said Valeria Hernandez.
Sam Mentusky, a fairly new member who was named the school’s 2026 football scholar-athlete, does something like that for his team.
Because new players might be nervous, he said, “I always introduce myself, try and make them feel a little more welcome.” And since joining the Diversity Club, “I feel like all the players just get along better.”
Quite a few of the activities the club showcased at the Delin Awards involved other organizations.
Pytko said he wanted to celebrate what the school as a whole was doing because nearly all of the Diversity Club’s members are in other organizations or on sports teams.
Valeria said many clubs came together to hold a volleyball tournament to raise money to buy toys for local families in need during the holidays. “One of our advisors went over to deliver these gifts, and all the families were so happy and the kids were excited.”
Jayden said another fundraiser provided a holiday dinner for a cancer patient and her family.
“We really want to build that comfort and … reliability on each other,” he said. “Especially outside of school because we all grew up together — we still are growing up together — and we just want to be a big community.”
His favorite activity was Shenandoah’s annual Heritage Day parade, which features the music, dance and traditional costumes of the ethnic groups in the borough. “It is really just beautiful to see all of everything that we have in our community,” he said.
Other projects included decorating classroom doors to depict various cultures’ holiday celebrations, a canned foods drive, a mentoring program for elementary and middle school students, and an information table at a football game during Suicide Prevention Month.
The club hopes to visit the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington this fall to learn more than what is in textbooks, Jayden said. (The Arnold Delin Education Fund sponsors these trips so students can see how inhumane people can be to each other.)
Bullying and Cliques
Shenandoah Valley hasn’t escaped the typical problems of high school.
Aubrie Monaghan said she joined the Diversity Club fairly recently because “not everybody is all together; it’s just you’re in your separate groups.”
And the seemingly universal problem of bullying persists, although Pytko says the school’s doing a good job in addressing it.
Victoria Hernandez, Valeria’s twin sister, said anti-bullying efforts go hand-in-hand with diversity clubs, where people who are “different” in some way can express themselves without being harassed or excluded.
Speaking of bullying, I asked how the club felt about our federal government’s war on diversity, immigration and even empathy.
“The group I have right here,” Pytko said, “they’re really stepping up when nobody’s really asking them to. They’re not looking for recognition. They’re just doing it to try to make this place a better place to live.”
Canary note: Opinions expressed in any Op-Ed column appearing on this site are the views of the writer and are not necessarily the opinions of Coal Region Canary.
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Photos: SV Diversity Club interviewees (standing in front of a blackboard) — L-R: Aubrie Monaghan, Victoria Hernandez, Valeria Hernandez, Jayden Mulkusky, Sam Mentusky
Club members presenting their activities to the Delin Awards committee
Club members helping out with a local Easter egg hunt
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