When you think of freedom, what do you envision? What if there was a place that could help build a path to freedom? This place is called a “Freedom School” where students gain access to vital knowledge within its walls.
Freedom Schools emerged from the Mississippi Freedom Summer of 1964, where members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) collaborated to teach Black youth about constitutional rights, true Black history, and other knowledge not taught in schools. The essence of this education was to fight for voting rights and civil liberties for Black Americans.
The Children’s Defense Fund holds the registered trademark of the term Freedom School. In 1995 the CDF opened the first two Freedom School sites; since then, “over 200,000 K-12 scholars have embraced the CDF Freedom Schools adventure.” The continued efforts of Freedom Schools reverberate globally and locally here in our communities.
This summer, high school students from Carrboro, Chapel Hill, and Durham participated in the Marian Cheek Jackson Center’s 4th annual Sankofa Freedom School program. To support their efforts, MCJC was awarded a Frontline Fund grant from Southern Vision Alliance. The educational theme for this summer was, “The Legacy of Voting,” which honored the roots of the 60th anniversary of the Mississippi Freedom Summer. Students learned about the historical context of voting in the United States as well as the suffrage for marginalized groups including women of color, noncitizens, and incarcerated individuals.
The article Freedom Summer and the Freedom Schools, describes the pivotal summer of 1964 in civil rights history, “forty-one Freedom Schools opened in the churches, on the back porches, and under the trees of Mississippi. The students were native Mississippians, averaging fifteen years of age, but often including small children who had not yet begun school to the elderly who had spent their lives laboring in the fields.” Their curriculum stated:
“We are going to talk about a lot of things: about Negro people and white people, about rich people and poor people, about the South and about the North, about you and what you think and feel and want. . . . And we’re going to try to be honest with each other and say what we believe.”
While individual beliefs and ideologies differ, a common thread of believing in a better world is at the core of social justice movements. Freedom Schools elevate students with knowledge to make more informed choices and participate in the creation of a more just society. Civil Rights Teaching describes freedom schools as “part of a long line of efforts to liberate people from oppression.” The legacy of freedom schools offers hope in the sometimes slow, but steady progress of evolving beyond oppressive systems.
In the words of an MCJC Freedom school student, “Being around people who are like-minded and also more passionate about civic subjects is very helpful because I feel like it helps light a fire in you.”
Keeping this collective fire lit is the key to sustaining our movement work. At the heart of every Freedom School is the drive to enlighten and free our minds, because if our minds are in chains, there is no room to envision and create a better future for us all. Because after all, knowledge is power. And knowing our power is liberation.
This post includes the work of MCJC’s intern, Avery Baker.
