Having discussed in class the article by Wilford Shamlin III regarding charter schools, an interesting conversation began, which was the discussion of what actually differentiated public, private, and charter schools. At the end of class we had come to the conclusion that private definately was not public; however, the distinction between private and charter was not defined as well as that between public and charter. It was clear that private schools are privately owned and receive donations and that public schools are owned by the state and receive government funding but charter schools remain a blurred line in between both.

I grew up attending public school in Brunswick, Maine, a town that is 93% white in a state that is 95% white.  For many years, the naval base was located in our town, but in 2006 or so, the government started to close down the station, removing the majority of the people who were “out-of-towners.”  Of course there is still a variety of views and beliefs in the northeast, but people tend to be pretty similar. 

In the Chemerinsky reading, I was struck by the influence of choice upon resegregation of schools. According to the reading, "Some school boards adopted so-called 'freedom of choice' plans which allowed students to choose the school where they would enroll and resulted in continuted segregation." This began after the Brown vs. Board of Education 1954 decision, but is still in practice to this day. I have always been a proponent of choice as I myself attended a choice school and benefited greatly from it. However, though it has occured to me that choice may play a role in resegregation, I had not realized that it's origins were directly correlated to white students leaving schools that were being desegregated. I question whether this was the first instance of this practice.

"These decisions are wrong--tragically wrong in holding that there is not a fundamental right to education."  (Chemerinsky, 1613)

Opening Reception: The community is warmly invited to an opening reception on February 5, 2015, immediately prior to the Naomi Tutu Black History Month Keynote lecture in Thomas Great Hall.

Panel Discussion: Date 2/25/14. Kalala Ngalamulumr, Associate Professor of History and Africana Studies; Alicia Walker, Assistant Professor of Medieval Art and Architecture, BMC; Linda-Susan Beard, Associate Professor of English, BMC; Whitney Lopez, BMC '15, moderator.  The focus of this panel will be evolving methods for talking back, with attention to the tensions and synergies between scholarly and political discourse.

The reading of “Morris Woods: Living History,” written by Rachel Ohrenschall, has opened up my mind to something deeper and meaningful; history does not need to be written in ink. Thus, my saunter in Morris Woods became quite reminiscing.

"Desegregation will not occur without judicial action; desegregation lacks sufficient national and local political support for elected officails to remedy the problem."