The Legacy of a Freedom School - by S Adickes (Hardcover)

About the Book

The story of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee's Mississippi Freedom Schools.

Book Synopsis

In 1964, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee decided to establish Freedom Schools as part of its Freedom Summer campaign in Mississippi. With a curriculum developed by dedicated educators, SNCC workers, and an equally dedicated staff of teachers and student volunteers, the schools provided a learning experience and teaching style that revealed to students who had known only the "stay in your place" experience of segregated education what schools should, and could, be. The achievements of the students involved in Freedom Summer lifted the expectations of students who followed them and hastened the end of segregated schools in Mississippi. In Legacy of a Freedom School, Sandra E. Adickes recalls her experiences working with the SNCC, reminding us all of the powerful Freedom Summer.

Review Quotes

"This book illuminates one of the lesser known accomplishments of the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer Project. The establishment of some 37 Freedom Schools in 20 communities enabled hundreds of young black students to learn their history and legacy and understand activism as a road to social change. The author, one of the teachers in a Hattiesburg, Miss Freedom School, tells the story first-hand and enlightens us on what is still missing from our public education curriculum in and beyond Mississippi." - Constance Curry, author, activist

About the Author

Sandra E. Adickes is Professor Emerita, English, Winona State University. She is the author of To Be Young Was Very Heaven (Palgrave Macmillan).