SWAMPSCOTT — Tamy-Feé Meneide hasn’t been in town for very long, but she has already seen the town deal with months of racially-charged controversy and protests, and she is trying to help the community do better.
“We’ve had a lot of harm done in Swampscott, and that has come to light particularly during the pandemic,” Meneide said. “But I don’t want to think that this has just started. It’s been happening much longer than my tenure here.”
Meneide was born in Jacmel, Haiti, and came to the United States with her family as a child before starting first grade. She attended school in New Jersey and received a full academic scholarship to Boston College, where she completed her undergraduate degree and a Master’s degree in higher education administration.
She moved from Roxbury to Swampscott in April 2019, but because she still worked in Boston, Meneide said she didn’t truly connect with her new community until she was all of a sudden forced to be there by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Having the opportunity to get to know my neighbors and be in Swampscott 24/7 is a different experience for sure,” Meneide said.
Meneide joined Neighborhood House Charter School in Dorchester four years ago as the director of college and career pathways, where she says she enjoys helping students find the best path for their future. She is also the co-chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Steering Committee for the school, where she is currently helping the school rework its curriculum to include a more diverse group of voices.
“We predominantly teach Black and brown students from Dorchester, Mattapan and Hyde Park, and they’re not represented in our curriculum,” she said. “That’s not OK.”
She has also been helping to run monthly professional development workshops on different topics in DEI, which have been helpful in preparing her to do the same thing with the community in Swampscott, acting as a consultant for the town administration with the title of critical partner in DEI.
In December 2020, Meneide facilitated an anti-racism forum with town officials, which touched on everything from Swampscott’s majority-white population, to the experience of students who attend Swampscott schools via Boston’s Metco program. In addition, last month, Swampscott for the first time officially recognized Black History Month, which Meneide says gives her hope for the town’s future.
“It was really stark to hear that we had never recognized it before,” she said. “The town administration has been leaning into Black History Month 365 days a year, and so I hope that when we celebrate Juneteenth we’ll be able to see the town decorate a little bit more, and the same thing with pride and with the other cultures that we want to be celebrating.”
Next, she hopes to work with the Swampscott Police Department on anti-racism training.
“We’ll take them through the training that they need in order to defuse situations, de-escalate situations and remove that fear of the other and the unknown,” Meneide said. “Getting them to step outside of that and acting as a good ancestor. We all want to leave this Earth a little bit better than what we came into.”
Meneide said that she doesn’t feel she is able to separate her identity as a Black woman into two separate issues, as it affects everything she does in her work. However, she always has to ensure that she isn’t stretching herself too thin.
“Just being a woman in general, you have that motherly nature to want to give, give, give and pour into the community and others before you even think about yourself,” she said. “What I try to focus on in my work is making sure I’m not pouring from an empty cup, because I’m not going to be the best version of myself if I haven’t invested in myself.”
She said she is motivated to continue by spending time with her 5-year-old son, Elijah, who attends a Catholic school in Dorchester right by the school where she works.
“He’s really my own guiding light in all of this, because bringing joy and finding ways and moments of joy for him has really replenished my energy in this work,” Meneide said. “We have grown so much closer and have created such a cool community here in Swampscott. It really, truly feels like home now.”
