“Ready to show them who you are?” Angela asked, resting her hands on Jasmine’s shoulders.

Jasmine smiled at her reflection. “I feel like a queen.”

When she walked into Lincoln Middle School, her beads caught the light in the hallway. A few students stared, others whispered, but Jasmine held her chin high. She was one of only a handful of Black students in the school, and while that sometimes made her feel invisible, today she felt seen.

But in Ms. Miller’s seventh-grade English class, everything changed.

Jasmine slid into her seat, beads clicking gently as she opened her notebook. Ms. Miller’s sharp eyes darted toward her, then narrowed. Halfway through the lesson, when Jasmine leaned over