Education for All
Lorain is a diverse city, and it has about 9 % African American adults; and it has a high rate of African American children, about 9.7%. However, this diversity does not reflect equity, especially in education. The recent study by Emily Campbell at The Center for Community Solutions reveals that the English and language arts scores in. African American children are less likely to be enrolled in an educational program. This pattern reveals the failure of our education system which has been ingrained with (color-blinded) racism. When African Americans live in lower income, they are forced to enroll their children in free education schools, and these schools don't have the same structure or curriculum as higher-income school districts. The answer to change this is to offer accessible resources and customized assistance to meet various needs of the public schools in under-resourced school districts. The article also states that adult African Americans are more likely to graduate or get their GED over receiving more education like a bachelor’s degree. The graphs in Racial Disparities also show that African American students are more likely to be suspended than their white counterparts. [see the graphs below]
From "Racial Disparities in Lorain County," by Emily Campbell, published on July 21, 2021, page 3. The Center for Community Solutions.
From "Racial Disparities in Lorain County," by Emily Campbell, published on July 21, 2021, page 4. The Center for Community Solutions.
This picture shows a line of 800 children following Charles Avery walking 10 miles to Birmingham City. Photography by Bill Hudson for AP.
There have been laws that could offer equal and equitable opportunities to students of color since 1884; they were the Ohio Public Accommodations Law of 1884. The Ohio Public Accommodations Law of 1884 prohibited public buildings to turn away anyone depending on their race. The law was enforced by the Civil Rights Commission, one member of which was African American Ohio representative and the editor of the Cleveland Gazette, Harry Smith. This commission was set up to report any kind of discrimination in any public establishment. However, the state of Ohio not fully enforcing the until the Ohio General Assembly enacted the Ohio Civil Rights Act of 1959. Demographics of African Americans in Lorain typically follow the trends of the Second Great Migration movement, effectively raising the nonwhite population in 1940 from less than 2% to very near 5% by the 1950 census. This was a very important step for Ohio because people of color and Indigenous people were denied access to many places, no need to mention jobs with respect and livable wages for them.
The Ohio Civil Rights Act of 1959 actually banned discrimination in public places against African Americans. And this information makes their education and finding a job more feasible. This law also helped Lorain, Elyria, and Oberlin to conclude in 2020, that racism is a public health crisis. This law changed Lorain County for the better, as our future generations can see a kinder, more accepting society. The society we live in is still trying to achieve the perfect balance of inequality, but we have moved in the right direction toward a better future.
Founded Feb. 12. 1909, the NAACP is the nation’s oldest, largest and most widely recognized grassroots-based civil rights organization. Its more than half-million members and supporters throughout the United States and the world are the premier advocates for civil rights in their communities, campaigning for equal opportunity and conducting voter mobilization. From NAACP Cleveland Branch website.
Social changes for justice in Ohio were initiated by grassroots efforts instead of top-down policy changes. Organized in 1963 by the Cleveland chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the United Freedom Movement constantly fought to end segregation in schools, empowered by the result of the passing of Brown v. the Board of Education and the ongoing Civil Rights Movement. The organization was made up of African American women from Cleveland, Ohio, their goal was to end segregation in schools. Before the law of 1959 passed, African American children were not allowed to have lunch or any extracurricular activities. Although African American children were allowed to attend the same school as white children in some cities including Lorain, the racial line on the hierarchy was perceptible. As the law passed, the desegregation in schools didn’t end completely until 1973, when a mom sued the Board of Education in a case called Reed v. Rhodes.
The United Freedom Movement (a.k.a. UFM) in 1963 went after the Cleveland public schools because they were allowing unequal issuing of materials in certain schools. In 1964 the UFM did a series of sit-ins at the Cleveland Board of Education to get predominantly white schools to allow integrated classes where they were being bussed. The United Freedom Movement didn't want new schools built because this would encourage racial segregation in schools. Instead, they wanted African Americans to be allowed in all-white schools. As the whole point of this movement was to end racial segregation in schools, the UFM employed African American women from Cleveland to bring the Civil Rights organizations together. African American women were the best candidates for this job, especially if they were mothers; because parents would be more passionate about their children getting a better and more inclusive education. They wanted a fair school system that they could send their children to, with no separation from other children because children thrive being around other kids who had the same learning opportunities and resources. After the success of the movement in schools, the United Freedom Movement turned to racial segregation in the workplace.
The photograph depicts a line of United Freedom Movement (UFM) picketers on the East 6th side of the Cleveland Board of Education Building. The picketing was organized to protest de facto segregation in the Cleveland Public Schools system. September 27, 1963. Photography by James A. Hatch for Cleveland Plain Dealer. Cleveland Photography Collection. Courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library.
For example, African American children in Glenville had to endure such violence from adults. They had to travel to Case Western and had to go through Murray Hill, and adults would throw things at the children when it is obvious that no child should have to go through that. A teacher in the district, Evelyn Davis, caught a fellow teacher giving black jellybeans when a student got an answer wrong as if the negative connotation of "black" was ossified through this "punishment." To end segregation and racism no one should be singling out anyone. The teacher should've just not handed out any candy for the students who got it wrong, while making the children's racial identity a target of mockery.
The United Freedom movement was very involved in fighting the Board of education, they were part of every meeting they were able. And in 1964 they gave multiple demands, and the big one was to stop separating the children; no one should be isolated from the other children. The board of education agreed to the terms and established a council of fifteen members to ensure that the laws set in place were followed. Nevertheless, Glenville ended up being an all-white community within a year because of never-ending racist attacks and policymakers' reluctance to change for educational justice. And even though these laws and councils were put into place, it is still happening in many communities now.
Ellen Walker Craig Photograph Series Collection. Courtesy of the Ohio History Connection.
There are many heroes in the African American community that are from Ohio who actualized the ideals of the civil rights movement in their fields. One of many famous heroes from Ohio is Ellen Walker Craig-Jones (1906-2000). She was the first African American woman to be elected as mayor. She is another hero for African American girls to look up to, she opened doors so those little girls could dream to be anything. Education and acquiring a job would be a mere bump in the road, that one day wouldn’t be a struggle. Ohio was almost a safe haven for African Americans, as they were able to open doors for education and better employment. Here is her motto:
"Old may get me, but I'll never get old."
Before Ellen Walker Craig-Jones swore in as the mayor of Urbancrest, Ohio, the town lacked any water or sewage systems. She went to the mayor at the time, William Johnson, and in 1970 the town finally got the water systems they desperately needed. Craig-Jones founded many civic organizations while volunteering, such as the Urbancrest Volunteer Civic Improvement Association and the Urbancrest Community Recreation Club. As she was coming to her elder years, she focused the most on the elderly, helping them with fixed income and affordable housing. She not only was big on city activism, but she and her first husband donated to a lot of charities. In 1994, Ellen Walker Craig-Jones was inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame.
Photograph by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders. Retrieved from Kevin Nance's "The Spirit and the Strength: A Profile of Toni Morrison" in Poets & Writers, published on November/December 2008.
We cannot miss our best Lorain native, Toni Morrison (1931-2019). She wrote Beloved, Jazz, and Paradise. This trilogy breaks down the traumatic history that African Americans have endured. She made it possible for young African American women to reach for the impossible, as she was the first woman to achieve the Nobel peace prize. Little girls could have someone to look up to, and there are now so many African American entertainers that they can achieve greatness just like Morrison. To see her life and Lorain-based novel, The Bluest Eye, check the story map below.
Toni Morrison graduated with a B.A in English from Howard University. While she attended school in 1949, she faced segregated trials for the first time in restaurants and buses. In 1965 after her divorce, she became a textbook publisher at The Random House. Two years later she became the first African American Woman to become a senior editor at Random House. Morrison didn't want a school named after her or even her alma mater named after her, she wanted a place that she held near and dear to her heart. She spent most of her childhood in the Lorain Public Library, she wanted a room to be named after her. This is another way for her to not just leave her legacy, but to show little girls and boys that they can do anything.
Chloe Wofford or as we know her as Toni Morrison, her family moved to Lorain, Ohio in 1931. She never wanted an autobiography of herself or a memoir, she wanted people to remember her by her works alone. She made a comment about teaching creative writing:
"I don’t want to hear about your little life, OK? Because you don’t know nothing.”
She only cared about writing stories of African Americans, especially women and children, and I think that she did this because she wanted to create stories, which she would have wished to read when growing up in the segregated Lorain. Her goal was to share her success to teach young girls what they could look forward to. They could see Morrison's literary imagination as an opportunity for expanding their own lives. As she accepted her Nobel peace award she said this:
“We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.”
She didn't want African Americans to only see violence and segregation, she wanted them to see they can change and end racism.
References
Racial Disparities in Lorain County Racial Disparities in Lorain County - The Center for Community Solutions
Segregation https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Segregation
Toni Morrison's Quarrel with the Civil Rights Ideology in Love https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/IFR/article/view/4231/4764
Growing up in Northeast Ohio played a major role in the prolific and monumental writing of Toni Morrisonhttps://www.news5cleveland.com/news/local-news/ohlorain/growing-up-in-northeast-ohio-was-a-big-part-of-the-prolific-and-monumental-writing-of-toni-morrison
Notable Black history abounds in Ohio’s past https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/02/03/notable-black-history-abounds-in-ohios-past/
Ellen W. Craig-Jones https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Ellen_W._Craig-Jones
United Freedom Movement https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/United_Freedom_Movement
Toni Morrison https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison
Ellen Walker Craig-Jones 1906–2000Mayor, activist https://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/craig-jones-ellen-walker-1906-2000
UNITED FREEDOM MOVEMENT (UFM) https://case.edu/ech/articles/u/united-freedom-movement-ufm
The rise of Black Glenville: Education — The Rise of Black Glenville
Lorain’s Toni Morrison captured African-American lives in luminous fiction that won over the world: Karen R. Long https://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/2019/08/lorains-toni-morrison-captured-african-american-lives-in-luminous-fiction-that-won-over-the-world-karen-r-long.html
TONI MORRISON ROOM https://www.lorainpubliclibrary.org/locations-hours/main-library/toni-morrison-room