Group XIV goes to Arkansas to investigate issues of race, poverty, and education

By Kelly Westlund

As fellows in the Leadership Wisconsin program, Ashland & Bayfield County League board members Linda Jorgenson and Kelly Westlund recently had the opportunity to embark on an educational journey of a lifetime.  With twenty or so other fellows, they visited the great state of Arkansas to investigate issues of race, poverty, and education.

When Kelly and Linda first arrived in Arkansas, their first activity was to attend an interfaith service at an African Methodist Episcopalian church on Sunday, September 11.  The church service was a highlight for many on the trip- to see people of all colors, Christian and Muslim, sharing their faith as the congregation remembered those who were lost when the twin towers fell ten years before.  The service was followed with a fantastic meal of old fashioned soul food at a favorite local restaurant and an impressive panel of local leaders on race issues.

The fellows had the opportunity to visit Central High School in Little Rock, which operates as both a high school and national historic landmark, complete with guided tours from the U.S. National Park Service and students hurrying from class to class.  The school was home to the famous Civil Rights conflict in 1957 when nine African American students (now known as the Little Rock Nine) attempted to attend the school after the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision, Brown v. Board of Education.  They faced a nasty mob and a cordon of the National Guard was called out by Governor Faubus to block their entrance into the building.  Ultimately, President Eisenhower won the showdown after federalizing the Arkansas National Guard and sending in federal troops who provided the armed guards to police their integration efforts throughout the following school year.  However, in 1958, the governor of Arkansas and the school district decided they would rather close public schools than integrate them, resulting in the “Lost Year” for students at Central High and other schools.  When more moderate school board members replaced the segregationists, the public schools began to reopen, despite the governor’s wishes.

While the racial tensions may have eased in the more than 50 years since, they were renewed this year when a Little Rock high school appointed a “co-valedictorian”, not because two students shared the same high GPA, but because the woman who should have been the sole valedictorian was black in a majority white high school and school officials thought it might cause “a big mess” if she were the sole recipient.  The case is pending in federal court.

Fellows also had the opportunity to visit struggling public schools in the Delta town of Helena-West Helena. Since the early 1960s almost all white children have attended private “academies” and the public schools have been all black. Serious financial malfeasance and apathy on the part of the public school boards and staff had created a situation where students were expected (and destined) to fail.

Test scores are some of the lowest in the nation. One librarian lamented that she had trouble finding appropriate books because her 7^th and 8^th grade students were reading at a 4^th or 5^th grade level, making appropriate and interesting subject matter hard to come by.  The situation there is changing rapidly, however, as the Arkansas Department of Education has taken control of the school district and replaced much of the staff with people who have more interest in making sure the students succeed.

As a result of the failing public school system, a charter school program has flourished, and the KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) schools have succeeded in teaching the so-called “un-teachable”.   A panel of students included some who said they chose KIPP because the public schools weren’t challenging enough.  One student, though, said that he didn’t know how to do subtraction coming in to the ninth grade from a public school and that the support and encouragement he received at KIPP had made all the difference.  Amazingly, with KIPP’s focus on preparing students for higher education, the school boasts a 100% acceptance rate for their graduates into four-year colleges.

All in all, it was both a heart-wrenching and heart-warming trip to Arkansas, where fellows had the opportunity to get a first-hand look at racism, inequality, education and poverty, as well as the hope, ingenuity, perseverance, and the people who are working to make a difference.

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