August 28^th will mark the 50^th anniversary of the great March on Washington and the now famous “I Have a Dream” speech given by Dr. Martin Luther King.  By most estimates over 250,000 people from all over the United States converged around the Reflecting Pool near the Lincoln Memorial marking the pinnacle of the Civil Rights Movement in America. It would not be until after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination (which occurred 3 months after the event), that President Lyndon Johnson helped pass the Civil Rights Act.

I suspect that many school students today do not know who John Lewis or Julian Bond are. Nor do they know about Medgar Evers, Ruby Bridges, or Ralph Abernathy. Hey are probably unaware of the significance of the US Supreme Court case, Brown vs. the Board of Education. Now is the time to change that. This is truly a teachable moment.  Whether you will be just staring the new term or getting your classroom ready, you can make a difference by creating lessons to raise your students’ awareness of the historic significance of this event.  Here are some suggestions for obtaining information to develop appropriate lessons.

1)     Read the article: We Shall Overcome” in the July/ August edition of Smithsonian Magazine. You will find candid comments from several of the players who made that day historic.

2)     View the website of the LBJ Library, located in Austin, Texas (http://www.lbjlibrary.org/). Johnson was a hero to the civil rights movement and his interest predates his presidency.

3)     The website for the Martin Luther King Museum, church, and homestead in Atlanta also will provide you with a great deal of information about his life, career and his vision for equality.(http://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/atlanta/kin.htm)

4)     If you happen to teach in New Jersey the African Americas Heritage Museum of Southern New Jersey has programs for school students and a traveling exhibit that you can arrange to come to your school. Contact (http://www.aahmsnj.org/travel.html)

5)     The National Civil Rights Museum, located in Memphis, Tennessee has a great web site as well as in- house museum exhibits. (http://www.civilrightsmuseum.org/)

6)     Don’t forget to access the archives of the Library of Congress. This national treasure of article and photos and document is a crucial foundation for any lesson about the Civil Rights Movement. The web site also has lesson plans for teachers of various grade levels. Go to

(http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/themes/civil-rights/lessonplans.html

Don’t miss this opportunity to make a difference in the lives of your students.

c. 2013 J. Margolis

School and Sports- Getting Students on Your Side

Schools and Sports

 Many of you may have seen the film, Blind Side, the story of Michael Oher who went from being a homeless boy in Memphis Tennessee, to a standout football player at Ole Miss and eventually on to the Baltimore Ravens where last February, Oher and his teammates earned Super bowl rings. I am in the process  of reading,  I Beat the Odds, Michael  Oher’s own story.( c.2011, Gotham Books). Oher focuses on the importance for getting an education and how his coaches and teachers worked with him to obtain the goals of both an education and an athletic career.

Oher is one of the lucky ones, finding a loving family in the Touhy’s of Memphis and the supportive teachers and coaches of Briarcrest School in Memphis. Sports are the hook that coaches use to help students stay focused on getting their education. School and football provided the path out of the drug and crime infested ghetto where Michael lived and into college, in Oher’s case the University of Mississippi where it wasn’t until 1962 that James Meredith became the first African American student to attend.

I recently came across this mission statement from the Princeton University Athletic Office. Princeton, a venerable institution known more for its academics than for its athletic success (with apologies to Sen. Bill Bradley), has the right idea for blending academics with sports.

“The Princeton University Department of Athletics is committed to its core philosophies of having intercollegiate athletics serve as an extension of the overall educational mission of the institution and that, for the student-athletes, participation in intercollegiate athletics at Princeton University is a co-curricular experience.  These philosophies are at the heart of the Department's official motto: "Education Through Athletics."Princeton University as an institution strives for excellence in fulfilling its central and primary purposes of teaching, scholarship, and research and places particular emphasis on the quality of undergraduate teaching.”  (From the Princeton University Athletic Office.)

As we get ready for the fall semester and we begin to think about those students who will be in our classes, it is important to know how the interplay of academics and athletics can help to produce a successful student.

C. 2013 J. Margolis