Sophomore Izi Kalyoncuoglu lives in two very different households.

At her mother’s house, Kalyoncuoglu celebrates the Hispanic heritage that has traced her mother’s ancestry for generations; at her dad’s, she explores her Turkish culture with the language, food, and traditions from her father’s history.

She loves nothing more than caring for and supporting her family, no matter how different they can be. Displayed on the ofrenda in her mother’s home, Kalyoncuoglu smiles at the nostalgic photos of her late family and friends, happy to recall the way her family comes together, celebrating their love for each other and their culture.

“Both halves of my family are extremely different, but I’m used to it,” Kalyoncuoglu said. “There are many aspects of our home cultures that we stick to; my parents speak the languages that relate them to their history. This is great for me because it gives me a unique opportunity to relate to the cultures and to be exposed to things that others in America may not get to experience.”

She loves that her heritage allows her to share different cultures, and she doesn’t understand how anyone could attempt to hurt the communities she loves so much. Kalyoncuoglu knows that cultural appropriation is a common problem in the United States; she believes it is a problem that will always be around, hurting her community with each and every instance of incorrect assumptions and stereotypes.

“Our education system often speaks about history and cultural developments through a single, white, colonial perspective,” Kalyoncuoglu said. “Not everything they say is correct, and it is very biased. We aren’t taught from multiple perspectives, so we are shown depictions of culture that often give misleading or incorrect information.”