What Jim Crow’s Teachers Could Do: Educational Capital and Teachers’ Work in Under-resourced Schools

Abstract

This article explains how Jim Crow's teachers-former teachers of legally segregated schools for blacks-prepared and motivated disadvantaged students in spite of funding and resource deprivation. According to the author, black teachers fashioned situated pedagogies for the acquisition of educational capital that could be used in exchange for jobs, rights, and social power. Findings reveal three strategies of opportunity which provide some clues to how urban teachers today can educate poor children of color in under-resourced schools, such as generating materials and supplies, situating curriculum and instruction, and mobilizing human resources. The analysis draws upon 44 oral history interviews with former teachers in the coastal plains of North Carolina, as well as secondary historical sources.

“Why Seek the Living Among the Dead?” African American Pedagogical Excellence: Exemplar Practice for Teacher Education

“…Exemplary African American teachers are conscious of sustained societal racism, and understand how social inequalities create challenges for children. These insights inform their instruction (Hayes, 2007;Kelly, 2010;Philips, 2011;Roberts, 2010;Ware, 2002Ware, , 2006. Using a critical perspective on race, ethnicity, and identity, these teachers reject deficit perspectives of students, and use this understanding to connect, care, and teach children well (Lynn, 2002;Morris, 2001).…”

Retaining Black Teachers: An Examination of Black Female Teachers’ Intentions to Remain in K-12 Classrooms

“…During desegregation, Black teachers, who were instrumental in the academic success of Black students (Kelly, 2010), experienced a mass exodus (Fultz, 2004). Black students were removed from an educational setting that promoted their cultural background and were placed within an educational structure that advocated a "White-framed curriculum taught by White teachers" (Rogers-Ard et al, 2013, p. 454).…”

Hope and Despair: Southern Black Women Educators Across Pre- and Post-Civil Rights Cohorts Theorize about Their Activism

“…D. Anderson 1988;Bond 1994;Dingus 2006;Fairclough 2001;Foster 1990Foster , 1993Foster , 1997Franklin 2009;Fultz 1995;Kelly 2010; V. G. Morris 2000, 2002;Preston-Grimes 2010;Sherer 1977;Siddle Walker 1996Tillman 2004aTillman , 2004b. Black Southern women educators during this era, in particular, promoted positive images of Blacks in a White supremacist culture, instilled a strong sense of racial pride in their students, and spearheaded efforts to liberate Blacks through literacy (Collier-Thomas and Franklin 2001;Dingus 2006;Harley 1982;Johnson 2000Johnson , 2010A.…”