Tag Archives: Teacher Activists

Maryland teacher and community activist Rose Sommerfield

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Many dedicated educators work diligently on humanitarian projects to improve conditions for others in their community. One who did this was Rose Sommerfield, a teacher from Baltimore, Maryland, who was an activist and social worker for the Jewish community in her city.

Rose was born into a middle-class German Jewish family in Baltimore in 1874. From 1889 to 1899 she taught in public schools in Baltimore. During those years, Rose became interested in the First Grade Teachers’ Association, and greatly influenced the organization’s policies. In addition, she established the first Mothers’ Meetings held in a Baltimore public school.

Rose was instrumental in the organization of her city’s Daughters of Israel and the Baltimore Section of the Council of Jewish Women. In fact, she was the first secretary of both organizations. She was also involved in a day nursery, the First Jewish Working Girls Club, and the Maccabeans, an association of men who did volunteer work with Jewish boys. In addition, Rose authored many published articles on educational and philanthropic subjects.

In 1899, Rose relocated to New York, where she organized the  vocational course for the Clara de Hirsch Home for Working Girls. She was instrumental in the development of the Home, where she served as Resident Director from 1899 to 1926. In addition to this work, Rose also organized the Clara de Hirsch Home for Immigrant Girls, the Welcome House Settlement house, and the Model Employment Bureau. And, as if all this were not enough, she helped to reorganize the Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society and the Virginia, a non-sectarian hotel for working girls.

The indefatigable teacher and activist passed away on August 5, 1952. She was 78 years old. To read more about her, see this article published by Women of America.

Emily Griffith: Founder of Denver’s Opportunity School

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Emily Griffith

Emily Griffith, teacher and founder of Denver’s Opportunity School, often wore hats created by students in the school’s millinery classes. Photo credit: Denver Public Library

There aren’t many educators who are so revered their portrait hangs in a state capitol building, but one who does is teacher Emily Griffith of Colorado.

Emily was born on February 10, 1868, near Cincinnatti, Hamilton County, Ohio. Even at a young age, Emily knew she wanted to be a teacher. However, because her father often changed professions and frequently moved the family from state to state, and because she was expected to go to work at a young age to help support the family, Emily didn’t have much opportunity to earn a formal education.

Nevertheless, in spite of her youth, lack of formal education, and inexperience, Emily managed to convince the school board at Broken Bow, Oklahoma, she was capable enough to teach. The teenager began her teaching career in the sod schoolhouse she had briefly attended herself. How long she taught there is not known for certain, but it is estimated to be between eight and eleven years.

In 1895, Emily moved with her parents to Denver, Colorado. There she accepted a position as a long-term substitute sixth grade teacher at Central School. The following year she secured a full-time position. The students that attended Central School came from impoverished immigrants from many countries, and Emily could see that her kids’ parents needed help to learn math and how to read and write in English. Emily reasoned that it was just as important to offer educational opportunities to adults as it was to offer them to children.

In 1904, Emily was appointed the Assistant State Superintendent of the Colorado Education Department, a position she held for four years. When her term expired, the veteran teacher served a two-year stint as an eighth grade teacher at the Twenty-Fourth Street School in the Five Points neighborhood of Denver. In 1910, she garnered the position of Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction, where she served another four-year term. After the end of this appointment, Emily once again taught at the Twenty-Fourth Street School, and before long, she became the school’s principal.

In 1916, Emily inaugurated a radical progressive experiment, a nontraditional school open from early morning until midnight, available to “All Who Wish to Learn,” including adults and working youngsters. The school offered courses the students deemed useful, such as English as a second language, American citizenship, mathematics, millinery, auto repair, cooking, carpentry, sewing, needlework, typewriting, and telegraphy. Instruction was individualized, and students could attend free of charge. When Emily became aware that some of her younger students had no time or money to eat, she organized free soup to be served. After 17 years, Emily retired from her work at the Opportunity School in 1933, but her years of service were not over. For the next 12 years, she served on the State Board of Vocational Education.

After Emily completed her public service, she and her sister, Florence, retired to a rustic cabin located in Pinecliffe, Boulder County, Colorado. Sadly, on June 18, 1947, the two sisters were found murdered in their home. Authorities have never been able to prove with certainty who the murderer was.

For her tireless work in public schools, Emily garnered many honors, both during her lifetime and after. In 1911, she was recognized with a diploma and two Bachelor’s of Pedagogy degrees from the Colorado State Normal School and Teachers College in Greeley, Colorado, an institution now known as University of Northern Colorado. In 1976, a stained glass portrait of Emily was dedicated in the Colorado State Capitol. In 1985, Emily was inducted into the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame, and in 2000 she was recognized with the Mayor Wellington Webb Millennium Award for Denver’s Most Useful Citizen.

Emily Griffith: A true Chalkboard Champion.

Teacher Irene Hartley taught school out of her suitcase in a migrant camp

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There are many fine teachers in American history who invested their time, effort, and talent in contributing to their communities. One of them was Irene Hartley, who established a school for migrant children in California.

In 1938, in California’s Kern County, there were no schools for migrant children because state school officials believed migrant children didn’t live in the state long enough to enroll.

But Irene Hartley, a former teacher from Oklahoma who had relocated to California to pick cotton, opened a school with a suitcase. Her suitcase contained: eight books, twelve pencils, thirty sheets of paper, and a small blackboard that folded in half.

The photo above, snapped by famous Depression-era photographer Dorothea Lange, shows Irene teaching fourteen migrant children sitting on the ground under a cottonwood tree beside a migrant labor camp. In the photo, she holds open a book entitled “The Story of America” and the children are leaning forward to see because there is only one book. Her suitcase is open on the ground, serving as her desk.
Irene volunteered to teach every afternoon from 4 PM to 6 PM after picking cotton all day from 5 AM to 3 PM. She conducted lessons in reading, writing, and arithmetic to children ages 5 to 13 who had not been able to attend school for more than 6 months. Some of them had not been to school in two years.
In Kern County in 1938, there were more than 15,000 migrant children who had no school. About 2,000 were enrolled, but more than 13,000 worked in fields or lived in tents. Irene’s school had a rule: any child who came for lessons had to teach another child what they learned that day. So 14 children became 28, then 42. Irene kept attendance on the inside of her suitcase lid with chalk: “Feb 8 — 14 present — 2 absent picking peas.”
In 1939, the state finally opened a migrant school in a tent. Irene was hired as its first teacher. She was paid $90 a month. The amount was more money than she ever made picking cotton.

She kept her suitcase. It is now in the Smithsonian.

 

Chalkboard Champion Sandra Adickes braved danger during Freedom Summer

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Sandra Adickes was an energetic and idealistic thirty-year-old New York City English teacher in 1964, the year she ventured south into Hattiesburg, Mississippi, to teach in a Freedom School. The goal of the summer program was to empower the African American community to register to vote, and to help bridge some of the gap of educational neglect that had long been a tradition in that Jim Crow state. Both educators and Civil Rights activists realized that only through education and participation in the democratic process could African Americans hope to achieve their long-denied American Dream.
The enterprise was not without danger. On the first day of Freedom Summer, three workers involved in the program disappeared while investigating the firebombing of the church facility designated for their voter recruitment activities. Six weeks later, as Sandra Adickes conducted her classes in Hattiesburg, the badly beaten and bullet-ridden bodies of the three missing men were discovered buried in an earthen dam in nearby Neshoba County.
At summer’s end, Sandra’s fearless students decided—on their own—to integrate the Hattiesburg Public Library in what became, in effect, a graduation trip with an emphasis on civic reform. Sandra was arrested in the effort. Read her riveting story, and what became of her courageous students, in her book Legacy of a Freedom School. You can also find a chapter about this remarkable teacher in my book, Chalkboard Champions.

GA educator Maretta Mitchell Taylor served as a community activist and capable politician

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Classroom teacher and community activist Maretta Mitchell Taylor served 12 years in Georgia State House of Representatives. Photo credit: CourierNews.org

Many excellent classroom teachers go on to serve as community activists and capable politicians. One of these is Maretta Mitchell Taylor of Georgia.

Maretta was born on Jan. 25, 1935. As a youngster, she was educated in the Muscogee County School System, where she was known to be an excellent student.  As a teenager, she attended William Henry Spencer High School, where she graduated in 1953. She earned her Bachelor’s degree at Albany State College located in Albany, Georgia, in 1957. She earned her Master’s degree from Indiana University in Bloomington.

This amazing educator worked as a teacher and media specialist for 30 years, the last 20 of them spent at her high school alma mater. She retired from teaching in 1987.

In addition to her work in the classroom, Maretta was elected to the Georgia House of representatives on the Democratic tickets. She served in that body from 1990 to 2002. In fact, she was the first African American woman elected to represent Georgia House District 94 (now District 134).

While in the House, Maretta championed public education, youth advocacy, and civic equity. Gov. Roy Barnes appointed her to a special House study panel on the role of information technology in public libraries and technical institutes. She also served as Vice Chair of the House Education Committee and sat on the Committees for Children and Youth; Special Judiciary; and Intergovernmental Coordination. Within the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus and Women’s Legislative Caucus, she held key leadership roles, including first as the Secretary and then as the Co-Chair.

She also served as a board member for the YMCA and held leadership roles in more than two dozen civic, social, and philanthropic organizations, including the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, the Columbus Urban League, and the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs (NANBPWC), where she served as National Director of Communication.

For her service to the community, Maretta garnered many accolades and honors. She was named one Fifty Most Influential African Americans in Columbus from the A.J. McClung YMCA; the Leadership 2000 Award from the Kellogg Company; the Legacy of Leadership Award; Outstanding Legislator of the Year—2000 from the Professional Association of Georgia Educators; and the Sojourner Truth Award  from NANB & PW Clubs, Inc.. She also earned The Rosa Parks Award from Columbus PUSH; Woman of Achievement from Concharity Council of Girl Scouts, Inc.; and Woman of the Year from Columbus Chattahoochee Valley B&PW Clubs) Gracious Ladies of Georgia.

Maretta Mitchell Taylor was certainly a Chalkboard Champion. Sadly, she passed away in Columbus, Georgia, on Feb. 17, 2013. She was 78 years old. She was interred at Green Acres Cemetery.