More and more colleges are leading trips through the South -- to cities such as Memphis, where King was shot in 1968, Little Rock, Arkansas, Atlanta, Selma, Alabama, and Jackson -- to help students understand the long, bitter struggle for equality.
The trips bring events of that period to life and provide students with insights they could not get in a classroom, say officials of Southern Methodist University, sponsor of the tour Matlock joined.
"Seeing Medgar Evers' house was sobering because we saw how that family had to live back in that time," said Matlock, describing the home where the Mississippi NAACP field secretary was fatally shot. It is in Jackson, the tour's first stop. "The house was designed with no front door. They had to live on the floor. They were prisoners in their home."
In 2005, SMU created its Civil Rights Pilgrimage Travel Seminar, which takes students during spring break to historical sites. Matlock, who works in the university's Human Resources department, traveled with 40 others, including four from another Dallas school, historically black Paul Quinn College. Their chartered bus stopped in eight cities over eight days.
This from CNN.
No comments:
Post a Comment