Seems a long time since Arkansas. But with all the good news it is important that we keep thinking about how to do it again?

Dr. Tucker is asking that we consider a return visit.

Any ideas?

Have a great day.

Earl Smith

I have received great news from Benny that at least 2 of the students we worked with at Stephens High School have been admitted to and are planning to attend college.  Its so incredible and inspiring to think that in a few short days this type of difference could be made.  Imagine what would happen if we, as a society, made long-term investments in our youth.  It might just change the world!  I challenge each of you to think about how you might do that and if we work together, maybe we’ll see social justice prevail.

Happy spring

Professor Hattery

Greetings!

Not surprising my week hasn’t gotten any less hectic!
No surprises there.

But, I do want to post a couple of thoughts.

First of all, its hard to believe that a week ago we were headed to Little Rock, which was totally fun, and when I reflect back on the week we spend in southern Arkansas I am truly amazed at what was accomplished. You all touched people’s lives. I know that the real issue is sustainability and we need to have some lengthy discussion of how to sustain the support we gave to the folks at Stephens now that we are back home. I am pleased to report that Trayonna shared with me that she had received more than 20 emails from Stephens HS kids with follow-up questions. If that’s any indication of what we accomplished and what we need to continue to accomplish we have done a lot but have a lot in front of us.
All that said, since I can’t figure out how to post pictures to the blog, I’m posting the link to my photos on snapfish. You’ll find Mr. Cohen, pictures of yourselves at work, and of course more horse pictures. Enjoy.
Also, please check out the comments, my mom, shall we say well into her 60’s, posted a comment! Go Diane!
AH

Photo album

Opportunity is perhaps the most important facet of American life, it is perhaps almost impossible to underscore the importance of providing opportunities to those who otherwise would not have had those opportunities. The includes affording both the sides of the spectrum within the process of stratification an experience other than their own. Noting that conscientious ignorance is a threat to the comprehension of the institutional barriers which impede the lower-class. The main thing I take away, more importantly is that injustice is real in its consequences. Both in pro-action in policy and in apathetic attitude to the plight of those who do not benefit from the opportunities afforded to many. I have come to the realization that it is important to be a difference maker in the environment around you. It is more comfortable to rest on the laurels of personal comfort and ignore the situation but it is also inexcusable to accept injustice be it social, economic or political. In the words of MLK as he launguished in a Brimingham jail cell for fighting for equality and justice, “I know that justice is indivisible, injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” The tangible reminder of inequality is what I need personally and perhaps drives me to be encouraged and motivated to fight for social justice in my own small way. I would like thank everyone on the trip for making it a memorable one, from the Students and Faculty at Southern Arkansas University, the students and faculty at Stephens High school, Dr. Hattery and Dr. Smith and my fellow students at Wake Forest University.

Pax vobiscum

Michael Mahmoud

Dear Students:

I have been in touch with our hosts at Southern Arkansas University and Stephens High School.

The messages being sent to us is this: both sets of hosts are extremely happy with all the work we did during the “Alternative Spring Break.”

Here is what makes me happy.

From the day we were asked to do the alternative spring break and all the correspondence, meetings, organizing and planning we did, we were able to impact the live of not only high school students but all of the Southern Arkansas University students as well who sat through three courses we taught.

There has to be a more profound word than PROUD. You folks modeled for our hosts and students what advanced undergraduates can do when they set out to purposely take their classroom learning into communities not as fortunate as we are and to help out.

Thank you very much for your participation.

EARL SMITH

I will write a much longer post soon, but as soon as we got back to NC I got hit with a MAJOR DEADLINE.

So, in the meantime:  let me echo Dr. Smith’s announcement about Benny!  Congratulations, Benny!  We couldn’t be more proud.

Let me add that while we were in Arkansas Trayonna received a call from the Children’s Defense Fund that she has been accepted to participate in their Youth Advocate Leadership Training (YALT) weekend in April.  The goals of the YALT weekend are to develop young leaders to take the mantle in the fight for social justice.

When I think of these honors and when I think of the work YOU ALL did in Stephens, I have hope that my children will grow into adulthood in a world that is more equal than the one they were born in to.  I have all of you to thank for my optimism.

Welcome back to spring semester.  I know you’ll never forget the experiences of our spring break.

More to come…

AH

We decided to drive straight back Friday; with limited stops. I’m pleased to say we made it back without incident and with deeper friendships. As we begin to unload, I was internally reminded that though the WABA tour has come to an end; the work that we begin in the lives of the pupils at Stephens High School will never end nor be forgotten. Moreover, the work that took place within each WFU community member that took the journey will never end nor be forgotten. This trip embodies why I live each day and yearn to make a global impact within the education system. I would like to end by thanking all those who followed our blogs and encourage each of you to make sacrifices for the greater good of humanity, on a frequent basis.

Stay Tuned …. we are waiting for the Stephens student’s updates — and we will update you — As we begin to make calls on the students behalf’s we found out about several acceptances — and we anticipate more!

I leave you with this: One student I was working with Thursday told me her ACT scores was holding her admission decision. I called the university. They confirmed. I called the ACT folks and they further confirmed her scores were being held because she owed a balance. This was taken care of– and we left that school knowing that ACT balance would NOT keep this bright student from attending college — This is why I participated in WABA …. to provide the hope that was once given to me.

Hey All:

One of our student leaders from this Stephens, Arkansas educational experience Mr. Benny Cooper just found out yesterday that his application to Harvard University was successful. Way to go, Benny!!

As we discussed in the Deep South last summer, in the end hard work does pay off.

Be PROUD, you earned it.

Prof. Smith

Having to decide not to start out to rural Arkansas on Saturday (1st weekend of spring break, 2008) was a big decision as the weather in the south was not cooperating with our plans.

Deciding not to cancel the alternative spring break altogether was our 2nd big decision.

Overall, 4 days later we are glad that we waited those crucial 24 hours!

Although a long journey (14 hours by van) and delayed air flights, we begin to leave the state (Arkansas) and place (Stephens) today and tomorrow very, very happy to have made good decisions.

When you teach courses on the “human condition” –both in the past and present–you can only hope that your students leave the classroom understanding the nature of the human condition, over time? As they move on to their next “class”-adult life that follows graduation– is the moment that we cherish and then we start all over again.

We began the south journey back in 2002, scouting southern places of importance to teach a class about Deep South Social Stratification.

It was a long, lonely journey –no cameras, blogs, or anything else. Just two sociologists with a “sociological imagination” that Wake Forest University students would benefit from the Millisian perspective of “theory & practice” (C. Wright Mills).

Six years later we left from the Carswell Hall classrooms to travel to rural Stephens, Arkansas journeying to teach classes (4 in all) at Southern Arkansas University and work with the under resourced high school in Stephens, Arkansas.

If you fly into Little Rock it takes approximately 3 hours to drive rural back roads to Stephens.

What you see on the journey is nothing. What you do see, though, are abandoned cars, burned out homes, and a lot of house trailers. You also see the confederate flag.

For practicing sociologists there is no better laboratory of observation.

When you travel and teach in the Deep South as we have since 2002, and your “team” is comprised of a White and an African American professional sociologist, people want to talk with you.

So it was journeying to Stephens, Arkansas this week.

Where are you from? What are you doing? Where is Wake Forest University?

We have been doing this for about 6 years and used to it.

What we were not prepared for was Stephens, Arkansas.

Studying poverty and differential access sitting in classrooms at one of the Nation’s premier universities is one thing. Looking in the face of a Principal who knows that if another 40 or 50 students move away from his school district (because of the lack of employment and opportunities for their parents) then the school will be closed is something else altogether.

Telling the young women and men from Wake Forest that he checks enrollments daily, that he has to tell teachers they no longer have a job (because families leave the area because jobs have left he area and continue to leave), that his school is the biggest employer in a 25 mile radius, is something else again.

That Principal, Mr. Wendell Cohen, (a graduate of Southern Arkansas University) could also tell us that he has HOPE, brings a smile to the faces of Wake Forest students at the same time we sit in the school cafeteria looking at a menu of federally funded lunches (80% of the students at Stephens HS receives a federal lunch voucher), that looks similar to the lunch served in almost every school cafeteria in the late 1950s and 1960s - prior to the institutalization of food standards for school lunches.

Like a proud parent, it was in the classroom that we saw the Wake Students shine.

Class after class where we had the Wake students present with Southern Arkansas students and the high school students from Stephens, whom we brought to the University, we saw the modeling of EXCELLENCE.

Like proud parents we saw our students model, demonstrate their learning skills: the ability to take complex arguments and explain them at a comprehensible level for others and high school students. Truly amazing.

Yet, it all comes to an end. What have we accomplished?

First, some 300 plus people who attended the lecture now understand the deep dilemma of intercollegiate African American male student athletes who participate at the elite Division 1A level in two demanding sports: basketball and football. What they understand based on my lecture of a few days ago is that life chances comes at you and decisions have to be made. Most of these men will never play after college in the NFL or the NBA and most of the rest of their lives decisions are never captured on ESPN. They become the next batch of forgotten gladiators.

Moreso, we had an exceptional opportunity to work with 10 Wake Forest students, male and female, who are exceptional people.

Having given up their spring break to work with poor high school students is the mark of an exceptional person with not only big hearts but caring souls.

To leave Stephens knowing that with the individualized attention provided by our students maybe a few Stephens high school seniors will enroll in local colleges next fall, as opposed to hustling on the streets and heading to jail, and maybe, just maybe, one will attend college at the University of Arkansas, or even out of state, warms our hearts. What they taught our students and what our students taught them can never be undone.

To see so many young people with little hope smile, ask questions, laugh and know that our five days with them meant something as so many people in their lives could care less, means a lot to me as well.

Thanks for listening.

EARL SMITH

While many things have taken place here for me, so much that I’ve not been able to express them all; the time has not been taken to acknowledge the lovely ladies of this trip who have each inspired me in multiple ways.  I am so thankful for all that they have done for me and the other males and feel it necessary to share with others what they mean to me.  Each lady has truly been a commanding force not just in our lives, but in the lives of the Stephens students and in those of the students here on the campus of Southern Arkansas.

The search for one’s self is never complete until he or she has extended that search beyond the next individual, learning more about themselves while delving into the lives of others.  In coming to know and understand Trayonna, Mercy, Elizabeth and Duabhav better, my respect for life, love, peace and happiness has increased tremendously.  While they say that behind every strong man is a strong woman, I’ve found myself standing behind an array of strong women.  Together, we’ve kept each other moving forward and quite often, they’ve kept us afloat.  So I would like to personally thank each and every one of them.

Though there is much more that I could say, I’ll just say that each of you has brought forth a revolution (yes, because that’s how powerful you all are!) of respect, knowledge, strong character, self-love, holding one’s self to such a high esteem and so much more.  And I say all of this to those of you who read this because these ladies are life anew to all that we have done.  Words really don’t express my deepest sentiment.  I am no longer the same now that these women are in my life!