In 1964, a recent Yale law graduate by the name of Marian Wright Edelman moved to Mississippi at the start of the Freedom Summer Project. College students from around the country came to work with the local black community for human and civil rights. Freedom Schools emerged from this initiative.
In the words of Ms. Edelman, founder and president emerita of the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF), Freedom Schools “were designed to keep Black children and youth out of harm’s way and give them a richer education experience than Mississippi public schools offered them.” From church basements, back porches, and parks in Mississippi a half-century ago, CDF Freedom Schools now have served 11,830 children at 183 program sites including CAC’s Adventures in the City (AIC) Freedom School.
2018 was AIC’s fourth year as a Freedom School site. We enrolled 100 students for the six-week literacy and enrichment program. As usual, over 95% of our students successfully maintained or gained in institutional reading levels. Freedom School works!
In addition to a dynamic literacy curriculum, fun field trips and exciting enrichment courses opened up a world of adventure for the scholars. This year, AIC partnered with the Women’s League Freedom School site to host a joint National Day of Social Action that included a personalized tour of the Capitol, a mock ballot, and community Harambee* in Bushnell Park with Read-aloud guest, Reginald Freeman, Hartford Fire Chief.
A hallmark of the program are the Student Leader Interns (SLIs) who teach and serve our young scholars. We employed 12 SLIs. Each one completed extensive training at the Ella Baker Child Policy Training Institute at CDF’s Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee prior to starting. To get a glimpse inside the world of AIC SLIs, click the video below.
“All CDF Freedom Schools ‘scholars’ will be encouraged to dream big, set high expectations for themselves,” wrote Ms. Edelman, “and determine what they can do to help make their communities, nation, and world better just as children and poor adults in Mississippi in 1964.”[1]
At the daily morning Harambee, young scholars and SLI’s aptly sang along to Labi Siffre’s hit song “(Something Inside) So Strong.” Indeed, AIC’s Freedom School sparks something deep inside not only our students, but SLIs alike. Yearly, we have witnessed this magical — yet tested and proven — program continually buck the detrimental trends of summer reading loss in children from similar low-income families.
*Harambee is Swahili for “to pull or work together.” It is a time of cheers and chants.
[1] https://www.huffpost.com/entry/from-freedom-summer-to-fr_b_5340364
