My name is Mélina, I teach English in a secondary school in Scotland and I am an avid anti-racist activist.

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With a particular interest in academic research, I am currently completing a Masters dissertation on anti-racism in Scottish educational policy and I recently received a scholarship to visit the USA and explore racial dialogue in education.

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A lot of my anti-racist activism also stems from my involvement in the Scottish and British trade union movement. It has given me opportunities to engage with racial matters in education and society at wide, network with local communities, speak at conferences and design and facilitate workshops on racism. All of the above experiences feed into my contributions to this platform.

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I have multiple identities that I wish to share here – some of them tend to privilege me, while others may lead to disadvantage. All of them will have an impact on my perception and my experience of the world. I choose to share some of these identities because, too often, people forget the identities that privilege us and instead they tend to focus on the ones that make us different. I am biracial (South Asian and white); a French citizen and immigrant in the UK; a cisgender, heterosexual woman with light-brown skin and straight hair; bilingual in French and English; able-bodied; atheist of Catholic background; a vegan from a middle-class background and in my twenties.