Tag Archives: African American Teachers

During Black History Month, we celebrate educator and Civil Rights leader Bob Moses

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Math educator and legendary Civil Rights Movement leader Bob Moses organized Black voter registration efforts and the Freedom Schools made famous during the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer. Photo credit: The Pine Belt News

During Black History Month, we’d like to recognize Bob Moses. He was a legendary Civil Rights Movement leader who organized black voter registration efforts and Freedom Schools made famous during the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer. He was also an innovative math educator.

Bob Moses was born in New York City on Jan. 23, 1935, to a family of modest means. He was raised in the Projects in Harlem. Despite his family’s limited financial resources, Bob earned a scholarship to attend Stuyvesant High School, an elite public high school for gifted boys. Before his graduation in 1952, Bob was elected senior class president and served as the captain of the school’s baseball team.

Upon graduation, Bob earned another scholarship, this time to attend Hamilton College, a prestigious private liberal arts college in Clinton, New York. There he majored in philosophy and participated in both the basketball and baseball programs. After completing the requirements for his Bachelor’s degree in 1956, Bob traveled abroad extensively, working in a series of Quaker summer camps in Europe and Japan building housing for the poor, harvesting crops for a missionary hospital, and improving facilities for mentally disturbed children. The following year he earned his Master’s degree in Analytic Philosophy from Harvard University.

Bob was teaching at the prestigious Horace Mann High School in the Bronx when he became aware of the student sit-ins that were taking place in Greensboro, North Carolina. He decided to join them, and that decision launched the math educator’s path towards becoming a legendary figure during the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement. Bob is best known for organizing the Black voter registration efforts and the Freedom Schools made famous during the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer. This heroic teacher’s revolutionary work, which was not without risk to life and limb, transformed the political power structure of entire communities.

Forty years later, Bob advocated for yet another transformational change: the Algebra Project. When he created this program, Bob asserted that a deficiency in math literacy in poor neighborhoods puts impoverished children at an economic disadvantage. The deficiency makes students unable to compete successfully for jobs in the 21st century. This disenfranchisement, he declared, is as debilitating as lack of personal liberties was prior to the Civil Rights Movement. Bob’s solution was to organize people, community by community, school by school, to overcome the achievement gap. He believed this would give impoverished children the tools they need to claim their share of economic enfranchisement. Bob described his work in this area in his  book, Radical Equations: Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra Project written with fellow Civil Rights worker Charles E. Cobb, Jr.

Sadly, Bob Moses passed away in Florida on Sun., July 25, 2021, at the age of 86.

A chapter about this remarkable teacher is also included in my second book, entitled Chalkboard Heroes: Twelve Courageous Teachers and Their Deeds of Valor.  This book is also available on amazon; click on this link to view: Chalkboard Heroes.

Isaac Scott Hathaway: Outstanding art teacher and renowned sculptor

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Outstanding art teacher and renowned sculptor Isaac Scott Hathaway of Kentucky. {photo Credit: University Museum and Cultural Center, University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff

Many Chalkboard Champions have distinguished themselves in fields other than education. This is certainly the case with Isaac Scott Hathaway, a high school teacher and university professor who was also an accomplished artist. Isaac is probably best recognized for the masks and busts he created of important African American leaders, and as the designer of the first two US coins to feature black Americans.

Isaac was born on April 4, 1872, in Lexington, Kentucky. Following his high school graduation in 1890, he began his formal academic studies at Chandler Junior College in Lexington, and attended classes in art and dramatics at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. While in Boston, he sculpted his first bust, using as his subject Bishop Richard Allen, the first bishop of the African American Episcopal Church. Isaac’s first formal training in ceramics came from Cincinnati Art Academy.

At the conclusion of his studies and training, Isaac returned home to Lexington to teach at Keene High School. There he worked from 1897 to 1902. He also opened his first art studio, where he made plaster parts of human anatomy for schools and medical uses. In 1907 Isaac relocated to Washington, DC, where began making sculpture busts, including those of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, university president Booker T. Washington, poet Paul L. Dunbar, and scholar W.E.B. Dubois.

In 1912, this accomplished teacher and talented artist married Ettic Ramplin of South Boston, Virginia. Sadly, she died early in their marriage from complications in childbirth. Following Ettic’s death, Isaac established a course in ceramics at Branch Normal College, now known as the University of Arkansas, Pine Bluff. He taught there and at a high school in Pine Bluff until 1937. In 1926, Isaac married his second wife, Umer George Porter. The couple moved to Tuskegee, Alabama, in 1937 to inaugurate the ceramics department at Tuskegee University. Shortly thereafter, Umer earned a degree from Tuskegee and became Isaac’s assistant.

The remarkable educator made an important contribution to the art world in 1945 when he developed Alabama kaolin clay as a medium, and he became the first artist on record to “make the clay behave.” The following year, Isaac was commissioned by the Fine Arts Commission of the United States Mint to design a half dollar coin using Booker T. Washington as the face and subject. In 1950 he was commissioned to make another coin, this time combining the images of both Booker T. Washington and George Washington Carver.

During the summer of 1947, Hathaway broke a significant racial barrier when he introduced ceramics at the all-white Auburn Polytechnic Institute, now known as Auburn University. In 1947, Isaac and Umer relocated to Montgomery, Alabama, where Isaac became the director of ceramics at Alabama State College. He worked there until his retirement in 1963.

Throughout his life, Professor Hathaway received many awards, including honorary degrees, doctorates, or fine arts awards from various colleges and universities where he helped introduce ceramics as a field of study. This Chalkboard Champion and amazing artist passed away at his home in Tuskegee, Alabama, on March 12, 1967.

GA teacher Natasha Berry recognized as outstanding educator

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Elementary school teacher Natasha Berry has been recognized for her outstanding work in the classroom. Photo Credit: Valdosta Daily Times

It is always a pleasure to share the story of an outstanding teacher working in public schools. One of these is Natasha Berry, an exceptional STEM teacher from the state of Georgia.

Natasha inaugurated her career as a professional educator in 2003 after earning her Bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood Education from Valdosta State University. She also earned certification in Gifted and Talented Education. She currently works as a STEM Lab teacher for Henry County Schools in Henry County, Georgia. Prior to that, she taught third graders at Sallas Mahone Elementary School in the Valdosta City School District, and before that, she taught in the Lowndes County system for 14 years. In all, her career as an educator spans 20 years.

The daughter of a military veteran, Natasha was forced to relocate several times as a child, but she spent most of her life in Valdosta. Despite her moves, Natasha had strong support for education in her childhood home. “I come from a family of educators. My mother and many of my aunts and uncles are in the education profession,” she reveals. “I grew up watching and admiring the countless hours my mom spent using her creative talent to make learning exciting and engaging for the students inside her classroom every single day.”

For her work in the classroom, Natasha garnered a 2023 Gale Samuels Award from the Georgia Teachers of the Year Association.  The honor is bestowed in memory of Gale Samuels, a beloved educator at the Georgia Department of Education who contracted leukemia and passed away in 1998. Samuels was considered instrumental in promoting excellence in teaching in her state.

The Gale Samuels Award is not the only recognition Natasha has earned. In 2022, she was named a finalist for Georgia Teacher of the Year. In 2019, she was honored as the Sallas Mahone Teacher of the Year, and that same year this Chalkboard Champion was named the Valdosta City Schools Co-Teacher of the Year.

Maryland educator, politician, and civil rights activist Verda Welcome

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As part of our Black History Month celebration, we recognize Maryland’s Verda Welcome: Educator, politician, civil rights activist, and community activist. Photo Credit: Preservation Maryland Trust

During Black History Month, we celebrate the many African American teachers who have dedicated themselves to social and political causes outside of the classroom. One of these educators was Verda Welcome, a teacher, politician, civil rights activist, and community activist from the state of Maryland.

Verda was born on March 18, 1807, in Lake Lure, North Carolina.  She was one of 16 children of farmers John and Docia Freeman. As a young girl, Verda attended North Carolina and Delaware public schools. The young scholar always planned to pursue higher education. However, following the death of her mother in 1928, she found herself with limited financial resources to pursue her goal. Undaunted, she worked as a domestic during the day and attended school in the evening. Eventually she earned her high school diploma. “I had to make the daily sacrifices needed to keep my dreams intact,” Verda once declared.

In 1929, Verda moved to Baltimore to continue her education at Coppin Normal School. There she earned her teaching certificate in 1932. She earned her Bachelor’s Degree in History from Morgan State College in 1939. She completed the requirements for her Master’s Degree from New York University in 1943. In her later years, Verda was awarded honorary doctorates from Howard University, Morgan University, and the University of Maryland.

During her youth, Verda learned first-hand that African Americans were often underpaid, under-educated, and underprivileged. She determined to make a positive impact in the Black community as an educator, and so she taught in the Baltimore City Public Schools for 11 years.

In 1959, the dedicated teacher was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates to represent the Fourth District. She was the first Black woman to achieve that distinction. Verda served as a delegate until 1962, when she was elected to the Maryland State Senate. She was America’s first African American female state senator.

Verda served in the Maryland State Senate until 1982. Between the State House and the State Senate, she devoted a total of 25 years of service in the legislature. Significant among her accomplishments there was the passage of legislation dealing with such issues as discrimination in public accommodations, equal pay for equal work, the harassment of welfare recipients, illegal employment practices, voter registration, the abolition of capital punishment, and reforms in the state’s correctional facilities.

For her many important achievements in the area of civil rights, this amazing educator was inducted into Maryland’s Women’s Hall of Fame in 1988. Verda was 83 years old when she passed away on April 22, 1990, in Baltimore.

To read more about this amazing Chalkboard Champion, see this article published in the Baltimore Sun.

Tuskegee Airman LeRoy Battle: Educator, musician, veteran

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High school music teacher and Tuskegee Airman LeRoy Battle authored an autobiography entitled Easier Said, published in 1995. Photo Credit: Tuskegee Airmen, Inc.

As a part of our national celebration of Black History Month, I would like to share the story of LeRoy Battle, a high school music teacher who was also a heroic Tuskegee Airman.

LeRoy was born Dec. 31, 1921, in the Harlem section of New York City, New York. His father owned a candy store, and his mother worked as a beautician and cook. While a youngster, LeRoy expressed an avid interest in music. He was able to take music lessons through both the Boy Scouts and the YMCA, where it was obvious he was a natural. By the time he was in the seventh grade, young LeRoy owned his own drum set. After years of learning and practice, the youthful musician was proficient enough to give music lessons as a private tutor.

As a teenager, LeRoy attended Alexander Hamilton High School in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. There he played drums in the marching band and the school orchestra. He also performed in New York’s All-City Orchestra, the Harold Cabbell Orchestra, and the Al Bounds Orchestra. By the time LeRoy was a senior, he played with legendary singer Billie Holiday at the Three Deuces Jazz Club. He also worked with Pearl Bailey. After his graduation, the youthful musician joined a traveling band and went on the road.

Educator LeRoy Battle shown during World War II, when he served in the prestigious Tuskegee Airman group. Photo Credit: Capital Gazette

During WWII, Leroy was drafted. He served in the United States Army Air Corps from 1945 to 1947. Once he earned his silver wings and bars, LeRoy volunteered to join the Tuskegee Airmen. “I can’t say that I ever had any previous aspirations to be a pilot,” he once confessed. “But it sounded like a much better opportunity than anything else that was likely to come along.”  After completing the Tuskegee program at Tuskegee University, gunnery training at Tyndall Field, and bombardier training at Midland Air Force Base, LeRoy joined the 616th Squadron of the 477th Bombardment Group stationed at Freeman Army Air Force Base. For his heroism during WWII, LeRoy garnered the Congressional Gold Medal.

When the war ended, the former pilot continued his studies in music. He returned to New York City and enrolled at the Juilliard School of Music.Then Morgan State University, a historically Black college located in Baltimore, Maryland. There he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Musical Education. He also earned a Master’s degree in Education from the University of Maryland, College Park.

In 1950, LeRoy accepted a position as a music teacher at Douglass High School in Washington, DC. That year he established a stage band for his students. Over the next eight years, The Douglass High School Band placed garnered first place in 14 competitions. In 1958, the students became the first African American band featured in the prestigious yearbook First Chair of America. Jet Magazine also printed a spread on the outstanding young musicians. Before LeRoy retired in 1978, he also served as a guidance counselor and assistant principal. For 17 of those years, he also served as a drummer in the Washington Redskins Marching Band.

Post-retirement, LeRoy continued to make music. From 1992 to 1996 he did session work with jazz musicians Eva Cassidy and Chuck Brown.In addition, he worked as a motivational speaker for the Tuskegee Airmen’s Speaker’s Bureau. And, as if all that wasn’t enough, he authored an autobiography entitled Easier Said, published in 1995.

Sadly, LeRoy passed away on March 28, 2015, in Harwood, Maryland. He was 93 years old. To read more about this remarkable Chalkboard Champion, see his obituary published in the Capital Gazette.