by Erin Prentiss
Seventy students, faculty, and community members came out to hear the Brown v. Board of Education panel on school segregation and integration on February 25. The panelists included Dr. Joseph Hobbs, chair of GRU’s Department of Family Medicine; Dr. Lola Richardson, retired chairperson of the Division of Humanities at Paine College and tutor in GRU’s Supplemental Instruction Program; Mr. Walter Wright, a retired salesman; Ms. Virginia Wright, a retired veteran teacher of the Richmond County School System; and Dr. James Carter, III, retired Assistant Dean of Student Affairs at the Medical College of Georgia. Dr. Charles Jackson, Professor of Counselor Education, Leadership, and Research, served as moderator for the panel.
Dr. Richardson described the event as a “stimulating and relevant discussion where faculty, students, and members of the community assembled and participated in intellectual discourse about past and current issues like the Brown v. Board of Education case.” Certainly, the attendees were well rewarded for braving the cold and rainy roads to attend. Dr. Jackson began the program by providing historical context of the Brown era, setting the stage for the discussion to come. The panelists’ poignant stories of personal and local experiences with school segregation and integration riveted the audience. The audience responded with thought provoking questions in the question and answer period.
