Debbie Langston: Her battle against racism started as personal, now it's professional

CBC ishighlighting Black people in Atlantic Canadawho are giving back, inspiring others and helping to shape our future.

Last fall, members of the public submitted over 350 nominations for 161 Black leaders, teachers, entrepreneurs and artists from across the East Coast.

A panel of Black community members in Atlantic Canada selected 20 people to highlight for CBC Black Changemakers. This is Debbie Langston's story.

Debbie Langston and her family moved to rural P.E.I. from the U.K. in 2004.

Langston decided to go back to school to become a child and youth community worker andsays that decision led her to where she is today.

Langston is thediversity consultant with the provincial Department of Education and Lifelong Learning, ajob she's creating as she goes.

"When you walk away and people are saying to you, 'That was really powerful, that was really life-changing,' or 'I understand things in a deeper way than I did before'.... And if one teacher is saying that, then the effect that might have on the students they are working with is huge," she said.

"I gointo this with the understanding or the knowledge that I won't get to see the benefits of all the things that get set in motion while I do this work. But there will be a benefit, and I hope it will be a benefit for my children and my grandchildren andI content myself with that."

Advocate, board member, student

Langston is also working towarda psychology degree, and sits on a number of boards.

She'spresident of the P.E.I. Rape and Sexual Assault Centre board, a board member of P.E.I. Women in Government, a member of an RCMP diversity committee, and a board member of the P.E.I. Writers' Guild.

Langston also serves as a justice of the peace, issuing emergency protection orders in cases of gender-based violence.

"Social justice is just huge for me. It goes to my heart," she said.

"It's about seeing the humanity, and seeing individual humanity regardless of identity. And not wanting people or groups of people to be excluded from opportunities and quality of life because of a facet of their identity, which shouldn't define them, but so often it does."

Debbie Langston: Advocating for children

2 years ago

Duration 2:31

Debbie Langston is one of CBCs 2023 Black Changemakers in Atlantic Canada.For more: cbc.ca/BlackChangemakers Video producer: Kirk Pennell/CBCCommunity producer: Kyah Sparks/CBC

Started advocating as a parent

Langston saidher work is also personal a direct result of her children's experience growing up on P.E.I.
Her son in particular, she says, experienced racist bullying.

Langstonand her husband spent a lot of time advocating for their children within the school system.

At the time, Langston said, teachers, staff and administration didn't have a lot of experience dealing with racism. She said she understands more now about systems, structures, marginalization and advocacy and that learning doesn't stop.

"If you were to ask me 10 years ago, if I would be in this position now, I would have never believed it," she said.

"Idon't want children to experience some of the things that my children experienced. And so that's why I do the work I do."

If we could start there, regardless of how people identify and just see people for who they are, as human beings,that would be huge. Debbie Langston

Langston's son recently returned home to P.E.I. from Halifax and told her it was the first time he realized the Island was beautiful.

"Because his experiences were so tied up with the Island, he was unable to separate them and to see the esthetic beauty of P.E.I. because it was so caught up in all the things he had to go through living here," she said.

Langston said she experienced microaggressions and discrimination while attendingschool in the U.K. She remembers anelementary school teacher touching her hair andinvitingeveryone in the class to do the same.

"It wasn't a nice experience and I don't know if I could have even put a word or a name on it at the time," she said. "But that feeling has always stuck with me."

Langston's stepfather was a police officer, she herself married a police officer and she worked for the police in the U.K. but that's not a world in which herkids have grown up feeling comfortable.

"It's been an environment I'm fairly comfortable with, and then understanding my children have grown up with a different perspective of the police because partly what they see in the media, and those horrific stories," she said.

Inspiring the new generation

Langston was nominated as a Black Changemaker by her daughter, Ellie. The university student said her mother is a role model, pointingto her appointment as the first Black chairperson of the P.E.I. Advisory Council on the Status of Women.

"I'm getting into advocacy as well, and she's inspired that. I've learned how to stand up for people, and how to boost others up and elevate their voices, in a way to kind of advocate for a community as a whole," Ellie said.

Langston saidshe continues to be driven by herworkencouraging people tosee the humanity of others.

"I think if we could start there, regardless of how people identify and just see people for who they are, as human beings, that would be huge," she said.

"That's one of the big things, I guess, that's one of the things that baffles me, but also drives me. That people would know the things I do, and the reason I do them is that. That's the underlying motivation."