About Southern school news. (Nashville, Tenn.) 1954-1965 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 6, 1955)
SOUTHERN SCHOOL Analysis Continued From Page 1 ing comments are typical of this group: An Army officer, pursuing graduate courses in New York writes: One of my “papers” I am working on this vear centers around the problems resulting from the Supreme Court’s recent decision on segregation in public schools. Since your organization has material on this problem I would appreciate receiving t Most of my information so far has been secured from newspapers of this area or from national magazines. I did write to the attorneys general of all the states in the South and received some information from them. I still feel that I am getting a biased interpretation based on northern reporting. Since I am a southerner, I should like to receive additional information originat ing in the South since that is where the problems will arise. A student at an Ohio college: Although I go to a northern school, I am from Kentucky and am very interested in the problem of integration. From Centralis, Washington: I am interested in receiving your pam phlet giving information on removal of segregation in the schools. I may add that I was born in Kentucky and lived for years in the deep South and consider this order of the Supreme Court to integrate unconstitutional and the greatest outrage visited upon the white people of the South. Los Alamos, New Mexico: As a citizen of North Carolina, I am interested in any news concerning the present attack upon our schools, as well as in any other politically inspired aggres sions against my state and my race. From Boise, Idaho: I am a deep-South southerner and was overwhelmed to read just a small notice of the new Southern School News which you are to edit. I find that people in, this part of the country are completely un aware of the southerners’ problem. I want to say that all southerners will be eternally grateful to you and your staff if this t°~ rible Supreme Court decision and results are explained in detail in your paper . . . How my heart bleeds for our beloved Southland. Teachers with southern back grounds, now teaching in northern areas, commented as follows: From Northampton, Massachusetts: As I am a southerner who is very in terested in this problem, I am very anxi ous that college students here have a real comprehension of what is going on now in the South. Broad generalized state ments are extremely prevalent, and I think your paper is an extremely good one. From New Jersey: I am a southerner by birth and was educated in the South. I now head a high school history department which includes twelve teachers. I’m sure we can make good use of your publication and would hke to receive it. Morristown, Pennsylvania: I am white; bom in Memphis, Tennes see, and have many relatives in the South. ince I am a teacher and have seen the socio-economic situation in the mid- ^th, I am very concerned about their school conditions with respect to deseg regation. There are those “interested citiz- ens ’ who viewed Southern School ews as a positive device and had the following to say: From Prairie View, Texas: Excuse the expression, but this first issi ‘h School News is a gem— c °Py came today. I am i so of j on fh e mailing list and a nonJrf° t° ^ now all the good things haj a no ? j ° r my husband and I have ov< of ahnost 50 y ear s taught ar ed for this day of simply—a chanc From Baton Rouge, Louisiana: serv*in TH * RN ScHOOL News will be of gre pr ejudice° my effort t0 COmb ' A minister in Alabama: a h^f e ! y that your pa] n _"f lpful instrument in the e transit tllat must come aboi tiom tl0n period with regard to i irA retire d superintendent of sci 111 -Tennessee: serreMf Very definitely interested i: ra*"? P r °gram. I believe that i a Period e o ,° y U e t am y ^ SCh ° 01 pe ° ple mt^ ) - USineSS man in Florida 1 ®* Ven a copy of the first iss Would it k exeen ent round-up of issue as P?* 511516 to secure the Oc hooves , as fu t u re copies? I ihformaSm 11 to obt ain as much fi and n.mi! n Up ° n an admittedly cor he don?=_ n ^ situation that justice as calmly as possible. Another Florida citizen: A friend of mine showed these c to me and I am sure the publication will be most helpful as we try to work toward integragtion in this community. We find factual information very necessary, and very difficult to obtain much of the time. A retired school teacher in South Carolina: Your publication will be of great help in broadcasting the plans and procedures as developed in the several states and in keeping the leaders informed as to pro gress being made over the nation. After 40 years in the schools of South Carolina . . . I am now retired. However, I am still actively interested in our schools and am trying to help solve the problems of seg regation in every way possible. Thank you for this help as will be given by a copy of SSN. PARENTS SHOW INTEREST Occasionally a parent addressed himself as “concerned” over the de cision; one father referred to himself as “the father of three blonds,” living in New Jersey and anxious to receive SSN. However, for the most part, pa rents simply identified themselves as “a parent” with the comment that they were interested in learning all they could about the decision, or that they expected Southern School News to “provide some of the answers to problems” which may lie ahead. Typical comments of parents who addressed themselves at length to the problem follow: From Miami, Florida, a mother of five: I think it well behooves every parent, to study this desegregation law in our schools with open minds and remember ing that in better and equally educating the Negro youth of today we shall be creating more useful Americans. A Virginia mother: Recently I read the copies of your paper sent our public library. It offers more un biased thought on segregation than any thing I have read yet. My 18 year old daughter is a freshman at a northern College and has been as signed a term paper on “What the Seg regation Decision by the Supreme Court will mean to the South.” She has had to answer many questions asked by col lege youngsters from other sections. Could you send her a subscription to your publication from its beginning, and until June, 1955? Out of West Virginia comes the comment: I would like very much to receive your paper. I might add that when this segrega tion issue was touched off by the Supreme Court ruling in May, I was moved to write an article on ‘The Right of Seg regating Children in Public Schools.’ In the meantime, I have been revising it, though as yet my basic viewpoint remains unchanged, and has been verified bv th~ action of those standing up for segrega tion ... It has been written from the viewpoint of a mother who will be sub merged in perspnal problems of her child should segregation be legally outlawed. From Albuquerque, New Mexico: My husband and I are very interested in the subject of segregation, being bom and reared in South Missouri and South ern West Virginia, respectively. We have a small boy not yet school age whom fath er declares will be privately tutored. Therefore, we would like to collect as much information and articles as possible concerning this important subject. Out of Jackson, Mississippi: As a parent, I assure you that nobody in the South is more interested in the mat ter of segregation than I am, and will be most grateful to have the factual and ob jective information that will appear in your paper. I’ll pass my copies of this monthly around and see that they are read. OCCUPATIONAL GROUPS Among the occupational groups, it is not surprising that teachers and educational administrators, profes sional workers associated with estab lished local and national organiza tions, librarians, newspaper editors and newspaper employees, business men and ministers would lead in the requests for Southern School News. The teacher seems to regard South ern School News not only as a valu able resource for use in the various high school and college courses, but teachers of journalism are using the News as an example of a new kind of journalism worthy of study and emulation. Comments from teachers employed in some of the nation’s leading colleges and universities may serve to illustrate some of the uses which Southern School News is be ginning to serve: From Dartmouth comes the re quest: May we receive issues of Southern School News? We would like to use it in our Great Issues Course, Public Affairs Laboratory. A professor of education at Harvard University: This material will be most valuable for our classes here. How excellent Volume I is. An associate professor of educa tion, Teachers College, Columbia: For several years I have given attention to the problem of segregation in a course dealing with legal and administrative as pects of public school issues of social sig nificance. Your new publication will be of inestimable value. A professor of education, Washing ton University: I would like to receive copies of South ern School News. I saw an issue recently and thought it was very good. I would like to have copies of the back issues. I want students in my classes to use this material as a basis for a report. A professor at Boston University: Our class in “Changing Social Atti tudes” here at Boston University School of Theology would profit greatly by your publication. A professor of education, Duke University: A copy of Southern School News has been brought to my attention. I find that it would be most valuable to me for my classes in school law and administration. An assistant professor of educa tion, the University of North Caro lina: I have heard a great deal about this publication and would find it of great value in my work here in the School of Education. Professor of psychology, Georgia Institute of Technology: Please put me on the mailing list for the coming issues of Southern School News. I have heard much about this pub lication and wish to use the information in college social science classes. Assistant professor of sociology, Mississippi State College: I have just seen your publication and I think it is a very valuable publication. I am teaching a course in which this ma terial would be a valuable asset. Will you please enter my subscription and also send me copies of Vol. I numbers 2 and 3? The college minister at North Carolina College at Durham: Please send me your factual reports on developments in the Southern education field. We would like to use them as a basis for student discussion on these is sues in our college community. From the University of Virginia: I would very much appreciate being put on your mailing list to receive copies of Southern School News. Since the gen eral problem of segregation is being used as a topic for debate by the Virginia de baters, as well as a topic for discussion before off - campus audiences by the speakers bureau, I am sure that we would find your publication invaluable. From the University of North Carolina: The first issue of Southern School News has just come to my attention and I am wondering if it would be possible for you to add my name to your mailing list. I feel that this is an excellent and much needed publication which would be ex tremely valuable to both faculty and stu dents in studying and understanding health and related problems in North Carolina schools. From Louisiana State University: For the past 15 years, I have been teaching and doing research in the field of race and minority group relations, and I feel that the data of your publication should prove to be challenging collateral readings for students. From Wheaton College, Massachu setts: I should appreciate it if you would put my name on your mailing list for SSN. I teach a course in Race Relations and am very anxious to keep in touch with southern developments in this general field. I have found the first issue of your News to be most helpful in its factual data. Another in Tennessee: I am a high school sociology teacher and have been assistant director of Sem inars in Human Relations for two sum mers. Therefore I am intensely inter ested in objective information on the segregation problem and would like to receive SSN. And another in Florida: As a teacher of social science in a high school, I could use your publication ad vantageously. Being a native Georgian I have a definite Southern viewpoint which probably could be modified by a better knowledge of the facts as carried in your paper. A professor at Goucher College, Baltimore: I am very much interested in the prog ress of integration and would very much appreciate having my name on the mail ing list of your news service. Your ma terials will be used in my teaching pro gram and can, I hope, combat some of the distortions resulting from the newspaper emphasis on the unpleasant “incidents” rather than on the day-to-day progress. A social scientist at Rusk College, Mississippi: In your plan to disseminate informa tion concerning the implementation of the Supreme Court decision you are ren dering a real service to the people of the South. We want to pass on this significant and helpful information to our students and in-service teachers. From the University of Kentucky: Southern School News is a very impor tant publication and the staff is to be con gratulated on the excellence of Numbers 1 and 2. This is to request that the attached list of addresses be added to the mailing list if possible. In addition to the normal con cern of these units in the University of Kentucky there is an extra factor of in terest in that personnel from the staff of these departments and bureaus are jointly involved in planning seminars, workshops, and consulting services for school officials, teachers and lay leaders involved in de segregation. USE BY STUDENTS Students are using southern school news almost as a text in some col lege courses and as a base for reli able research in others. Prompted by their teachers and also following some research interests of their own, at Boston University students are using SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS as a basis for discussion in a class on Press and World Affairs. A graduate student majoring in journalism is interested not only in the “content of the paper, but in its general for mat.” At Indiana University a class in Federal Government is to use southern school news as a reference source, and at Fisk University a class in Sociology is using the news as a basis for reports on education. A senior at Harvard, another at Smith, an honor student at Vassar, a student at The Citadel, a high school student at Chevy Chase, Maryland, another at Sunburst, Montana, all requested Southern School News as an aid in their re search on segregation which they are doing in connection with theses and “honors” papers. Graduate students at the Univer sity of Chattanooga, Mississippi Southern College, University of Louisville, the University of Mary land, Valparaiso University (Indi ana), New York University, Brook lyn College, Columbia University engaged in research projects dealing with some aspect of segregation are relying upon Southern School News because of its “factual and objective” presentation. A Brooklyn college student writes: On October 19, at the New York Herald Tribune Annual Forum, held in the main ballroom of the Waldorf Astoria, I was given a copy of the newspaper the Southern School News. I read it through carefully and was very unpleased with what I encountered. It is very hard to believe that such a thing as segregation still exists in the United States. Another student who attended the Forum: At the recent sessions of the New York Herald Tribune Forum copies of the Southern School News were distributed. The response, as you are aware, was tre mendous. As a student of political science, and one deeply interested in the dynamics of American society, may I offer my con gratulations for the significant contribu tion which your news bulletin represents. If at all possible, I would appreciate re ceiving future copies of this most worth while and vital educational effort. A senior at Hofstra College, Hemp stead (New York): I have read with a great deal of interest in a number of publications of the estab lishment of your project and its program. If it is at all possible to receive copies of your publication Southern School News I would deeply appreciate same. Some years of residence in the South, plus more than an interest in the South and its problems—particularly its educa tional problems prompted me to send this request. A student from Holland studying at a southern university: Could I possibly be put on the list of subscribers to the Southern School News? I saw the first copies of it and am very interested in it. I am a student of history from Holland. I am studying Negro his tory, on which subject I hope to publish some study when back in Holland. I won der if it would be possible to receive it there too? SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS Perhaps more than other groups, and this is understandable, school administrators and members of school boards have recognized Southern School News as one of their most useful instruments as their comments reveal. A superintendent in Kentucky: Your presentation of the problems of desegregation in the Southern School News was most timely and needed. As a superintendent in a city which expects to accept rather than evade the decision of the Supreme Court in this regard, it is my feeling that such a course of objective NEWS—Jan. 6, 1955—PAGE 15 treatment of the problems involved is vitally needed. We should appreciate hav ing you send copies to our board mem bers and key administrators. If possible we would also like copies for fifteen addi tional principals of both white and col ored elementary schools. A superintendent in Arkansas: Appreciate the completely objective re ports on developments in the segregation problem. I am confident your organiza tion will be tremendously helpful to all of us who want to meet the difficult prob lems ahead with all the information we can get and all the wisdom we can bring to bear. A superintendent in Texas: Of course we are interested in any help you can give in trying to make an intelli gent adjustment to this serious problem. A high school principal in Ala bama: I would like to receive the SSN as a medium for supplying information to our educational and civic organizations. We are an elementary school with an enrollment of 720 pupils and a PTA mem bership of about 350 parents. We are won dering if we could be sent some copies of the SSN—some for the PTA for distri bution, one for the library, and a few for the teachers which we could circulate. Information has come to us that good objective articles on segregation are be ing printed at this time and we are cer tainly in a position to use that kind of material. A superintendent in North Caro lina: I want to thank you for including me on the mailing list to receive Southern School News. I have read the first two issues with a great deal of interest. The factual information that you are provid ing for our guidance is both interesting and helpful. Would it be possible for you to send me ten additional copies of the second issue? I would like to distribute them to members of our board of trustees. A principal in South Carolina: I am very interested that our faculty which consists of 22 teachers should re- ceive Southern School News. We are vi tally interested in factual information which pertains to schools in our general region. LAWYERS ARE INTERESTED Significantly represented in this group of requests were members of the legal profession. Again, as among other groups, whether the interest is in continuing segregation or work ing toward its elimination, there was the unanimous belief that Southern School News provides a reliable base upon which they could establish valid arguments. Commented an attorney in West Virginia: “You are doing what we need in trying to solve the problems created by the U. S. Su preme Courts decision on desegrega tion.” An attorney for the U. S, Depart ment of Justice: As I am presently assisting in the preparation of the brief of the Department of Justice in conection with the school segregation cases, I am very much inter ested in your publication. It would be greatly appreciated if you could place me on your mailing list for future issues of this publication. Counsel for the Plaintiffs (Wash ington, D. C.): We are counsel for the plaintiffs in a suit which we have filed in the U.S. Dis trict Court for the District of Columbia for an injunction to prevent the Board of Education from proceeding with de segregation until the Supreme Court of the United States shall make its decree on the subject. We would find your publica tion very useful. An attorney in North Carolina: I should like to receive your bulletins reporting the progress of integration of the public schools in Southern States. My long standing interest as an attorney particiDating in some of the school cases and my current interest in education are such that I have an unusual interest in matters of this nature. An attorney in Mobile, Alabama: We find Southern School News of great value and do not know how otherwise we should have succeded in approaching the fund of helpful information that it con tains. A lawyer in Indianolo, Mississippi: I was fortunate to be able to examine briefly your September 3rd issue of Southern School News and was very much impressed with the thoroughness of the reporting therein regarding the school situation. I would like to subscribe to your newspaper and would appreciate your advising me as to the subscription rates. COMMUNITY GROUPS Groups requesting issues of south ern School News range from the small neighborhood clubs, church and fraternal groups, local legislative and advisory committees concerned with studying the problem of desegrega tion, to nationally recognized bodies such as the League of Women Vot- Continued On Next Page
