Like many first-generation Chinese immigrants, I have been dealing with COVID-19 since early January, first indirectly and then directly. As one of my Chinese friends joked, from mid-March onward is but our “second-half.”

Many years later [my former teacher] acknowledged that my encounters with racism were no surprise to her. I was taken aback. “Trusted” adults had been aware of my daily encounters with racism but had done nothing.

The numbers tell the story of the pandemic's disparate impact on Black and Indigenous communities and communities of color.

This is not a talk about kindness in general, or the beauty of diversity, or how we can celebrate our differences, though those talks are also important. The talk I am speaking of is much harder for White parents to have. It is the truth about bias and racism and how we all have it.