Powerful Moments

So far on this trip, the most intriguing and powerful moments have been the visits to various schools in Mississippi and Arkansas. The first school in Mississippi was Simmons High School, an all black school with fairly run-down facilities. Driving to the school, I had the notion that it would be an extremely depressing and saddening experience, yet it ended up being the most fun I have had all trip. The school was not much worse than my school, Baltimore City College, in terms of facilities, and I found it quite equitable to my school in many manners. The students however were the most shocking aspect--rather than being upset and discouraged by their circumstances, they were extremely humorous and positive about the bleakness of their surroundings. 

The visit to Sunflower County evoked a similar response from me as well. The children of the Sunflower County Freedom Project knew of the segregation and backwardness of their society, yet remained positive and driven to gain an education no matter what. I never once found myself pitying the children because they were not discouraged by their circumstances--I spent the majority of the time talking to an eighth grader about the future she desires, and found her to be much more ambitious and driven than I am. The children were also extremely intelligent and fully knew of the segregation within their communities.

In Arkansas, we visited Little Rock Central High, home of the Little Rock 9, and compared it with the Dunbar High School--the school built for blacks during times of segregation. There was an obvious size difference between the two (Central High was three times as large due to the amount of money given to a white school over the black school) and simply displayed the racial discrimination evident at the times of building the schools. I was very interested in the present day segregation within the thoroughly integrated school of Central High because of its direct relation to Baltimore City College. We were told that within the school, all of the AP classes were majority white or international students whereas the regular classes contained most of the black students--the same may be found at City because the full IB students are predominantly white whereas certificate and non-IB students are generally black. Despite integration of schools, this inherent segregation can still be seen. The only way for this to be solved is, in my opinion, to make IB and AP more accessible to black students rather than seem exclusive. I would like to help advocate for full IB to more of our prospective black students at City to ensure a growth in population of black full IB students.

Anika, City College