Their Highest Potential: An African American School Community in the Segregated South is a 1996 non-fiction book about Caswell County Training School in Yanceyville, North Carolina by Vanessa Siddle Walker, published by the University of North Carolina Press. It was written by a former student of the training school and daughter of one of the teachers. Despite the school's poor resources, Walker argued that positive influences happened in the segregated school. Her research came from 100 open-ended interviews with former students, teachers, and parents associated with the school.
Caswell County Training School (CCTS) was an all-black high school located in Yanceyville, North Carolina, during the years 1934 to 1969. As a former student and the daughter of one of the school's long-serving teachers, Walker approached her research as an endeavor in "historical ethnography", which emphasizes the group's culture and perspectives. [1] While she incorporated some archival materials and other documentation, her primary insights came from a comprehensive series of 100 open-ended interviews with former students, teachers, and parents associated with the school, conducted over six years. [1] Through thematic analysis of these interviews, she identified key themes or "threads" that weaved together her narrative. [1]
The first three chapters of the book explore the connection between the school and the black community, highlighting the importance of parents as supporters and advocates for the school. Chapters 4–6 make a case for a unique "school ethic" at CCTS, which reflects an educational approach grounded in a collective dedication to students by both the principal and teachers. [1] Walker stated, "Although Black schools were indeed commonly lacking in facilities and funding, some evidence suggests that the environment of the segregated school had affective traits, institutional policies, and community support that helped Black children learn in spite of the neglect their schools received from White school boards." [2]
Clarence L. Mohr of The American Journal of Education said, "Whatever her intention, Walker has written a book that is likely to be welcomed by black and other minority educators and elected officials who favor the creation of racially monolithic learning environments." [1] Michael Fultz, writing for History of Education Quarterly wrote, "Walker has crafted an interesting argument: namely, that 'to remember segregated schools largely by recalling only their poor resources presents a historically inaccurate picture.'" [2] Eric R. Jackson of Educational Studies said that despite the book's strengths, it has multiple weaknesses such as the "lack of definitions for many qualitive terms" and "the lack of quantitative evidence used to assess the accomplishments and achievements of the students that attended the school". [3]
Education reform is the name given to the goal of changing public education. The meaning and education methods have changed through debates over what content or experiences result in an educated individual or an educated society. Historically, the motivations for reform have not reflected the current needs of society. A consistent theme of reform includes the idea that large systematic changes to educational standards will produce social returns in citizens' health, wealth, and well-being.
Caswell County is a county in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is located in the Piedmont Triad region of the state. At the 2020 census, the population was 22,736. Its county seat is Yanceyville.
North Carolina Central University is a public historically black university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by James E. Shepard in affiliation with the Chautauqua movement in 1909, it was supported by private funds from both Northern and Southern philanthropists. It was made part of the state system in 1923, when it first received state funding and was renamed as Durham State Normal School. It added graduate classes in arts and sciences and professional schools in law and library science in the late 1930s and 1940s.
Inez Beverly Prosser was a psychologist, teacher and school administrator. She is often regarded as the first African-American female to receive a Ph.D in psychology. Her work was very influential in the hallmark Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court ruling. After growing up in Texas, Prosser was educated at Prairie View Normal College, the University of Colorado and the University of Cincinnati. She was killed in a car accident a short time after earning her doctorate.
The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America is a 2005 book by educator and author Jonathan Kozol. It describes how, in the United States, black and Hispanic students tend to be concentrated in schools where they make up almost the entire student body.
Dorothy Cotton was an American civil rights activist, who was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States and a member of the inner circle of one of its main organizations, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). As the SCLC's Educational Director, she was arguably the highest-ranked female member of the organization.
The racial achievement gap in the United States refers to disparities in educational achievement between differing ethnic/racial groups. It manifests itself in a variety of ways: African-American and Hispanic students are more likely to earn lower grades, score lower on standardized tests, drop out of high school, and they are less likely to enter and complete college than whites, while whites score lower than Asian Americans.
Caswell County Schools is a PK–12 graded school district serving Caswell County, North Carolina. Its six schools serve 3,012 students as of the 2010–2011 school year.
School segregation in the United States was the segregation of students in educational facilities based on their race and ethnicity. While not prohibited from having or attending schools, various minorities were barred from most schools that admitted white students. Segregation was enforced legally in the U.S. states, primarily in the Southern United States, although segregation could occur in informal settings or through social expectations and norms. Segregation laws were met with resistance by Civil Rights activists and began to be challenged in 1954 by cases brought before the U.S. Supreme Court. Segregation continued longstanding exclusionary policies in much of the Southern United States after the Civil War. Jim Crow laws codified segregation. These laws were influenced by the history of slavery and discrimination in the US. Secondary schools for African Americans in the South were called training schools instead of high schools in order to appease racist whites and focused on vocational education. School integration in the United States took place at different times in different areas and often met resistance. After the ruling of Brown v. Board of Education, which banned segregated school laws, school segregation took de facto form. School segregation declined rapidly during the late 1960s and early 1970s as the government became strict on schools' plans to combat segregation more effectively as a result of Green v. County School Board of New Kent County. Voluntary segregation by income appears to have increased since 1990. Racial segregation has either increased or stayed constant since 1990, depending on which definition of segregation is used. In general, definitions based on the amount of interaction between black and white students show increased racial segregation, while definitions based on the proportion of black and white students in different schools show racial segregation remaining approximately constant.
William Nicholas Sheats was an American educator and politician who was called the "Father of Florida's Public School System." He was state superintendent of public education in Florida from 1893 to 1905, and again from 1913 to 1922.
Bernice Robinson (1914–1994) was an American activist in the Civil Rights Movement and education proponent who helped establish adult Citizenship Schools in South Carolina. Becoming field supervisor of adult education for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), she led political education workshops throughout the south, in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, and other states to teach adult reading skills so that blacks would be able to pass literacy tests to vote. Between 1970 and 1975, Robinson worked for the South Carolina Commission for Farm Workers, supervising VISTA workers and directing day care centers. In both 1972 and 1974, she unsuccessfully ran for the South Carolina House of Representatives, becoming the first African American woman to run for a political office in the state.
Louise A. Reeves Archer was an American teacher and activist who fought to educate African Americans during the 1930s and 1940s. During this time, racial barriers limited a black student's access to education. They had limited resources compared to white children and were deprived education beyond seventh grade — when twelve grades was already common practice.
Unequal access to education in the United States results in unequal outcomes for students. Disparities in academic access among students in the United States are the result of multiple factors including government policies, school choice, family wealth, parenting style, implicit bias towards students' race or ethnicity, and the resources available to students and their schools. Educational inequality contributes to a number of broader problems in the United States, including income inequality and increasing prison populations. Educational inequalities in the United States are wide-ranging, and many potential solutions have been proposed to mitigate their impacts on students.
The Fultz sisters were a set of American quadruplets who gained notoriety for being the first identical African American quadruplets on record. They made promotional appearances for Pet Milk in a deal that provided their family land, a house, and a full-time nurse. The sisters were later adopted by the nurse. Throughout their childhood, they received attention in the media, where they were also termed the Fultz quads.
Vanessa Siddle Walker is the Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of African American Educational Studies at Emory University and was president of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) in 2019–20. Walker has studied the segregation of the American educational system for twenty-five years and published the non-fiction work The Lost Education of Horace Tate: Uncovering the Hidden Heroes Who Fought for Justice in Schools.
Carver High School was a public secondary school in Tupelo, Mississippi, United States. It served as the high school for black students until the public schools were integrated in the late 1960s. The buildings are now Carver Elementary School.
Horace Edward Tate was an American educator, activist, scholar, and politician who spent most of his life and career working toward educational equity for Black Americans, particularly in the south.
Bartlett Yancey High School (BYHS) is a public high school located in Yanceyville, North Carolina, serving students in the ninth through twelfth grades. It is in the Caswell County Schools school district.
A training school, or county training school, was a type of segregated school for African American students found in the United States and Canada. In the Southern United States they were established to educate African Americans at elementary and secondary levels, especially as teachers; and in the Northern United States they existed as educational reformatory schools. A few training schools still exist, however they exist in a different context.
History of education in the Southern United States covers the institutions, ideas and leaders of schools and education in the Southern states from colonial times to about the 2000s. It covers all the states and the main gender, racial and ethnic groups.