White Girl: A Story of School Desegregation

In the Classrooms

67 In the Classrooms In a way, the schoolwork was the easy part. It was abstract, something that required concentration, something that distracted me from feeling so white. My mother expected me to take school seriously and make good grades, just as she had done. She was always proud when my sister made the honor roll at TJ; I was supposed to do the same at Binford, and I usually did. My teachers, some black, some white, did not seem to play racial favorites in class. They focused on teaching. Mr. Palmer, who taught American history, was young, black, and cool. He could get away with wearing pink Oxford shirts, loafers, and wide, striped ties. He made us all write a composition from the points of view of a plantation owner and a slave about to be freed in 1865. He also asked us to pick a side from the Civil War (which he did not call The War Between the States) and justify our choice. Showing my liberal upbringing, I sided with the Union, though I did point out that I would have a dilemma if the rest of my family wanted to side with the South. Another day, Mr. Palmer showed a Bill Cosby film about the “lost, stolen, or strayed” aspects of black history. We learned about leaders like Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass. Toward the end of the film, an elementary-school-aged black boy stood up and announced, “I am Afro-American and I’m proud!” This was the first time a teacher had shown me the black perspective on history. My parents had made sure I knew all about Martin Luther King—in fact, our elementary school in Chicago was cancelled the day of his funeral to keep the city quiet. But Mr. Palmer was the first one to make me realize that Virginia plantation life was not just a well-organized enterprise for growing tobacco. However, he had to be careful not to seem too militant in Mr. Harper’s school. He said nothing about the Black Panthers or Malcolm X. Most of my white teachers at Binford were nearing retirement and perhaps were reassigned to a majority-black school so they wouldn’t have to endure what was perceived as a hardship for too 68 many years. The young, white teachers probably got preference to stay in the majority-white schools, where they might have longer careers. Mrs. Gregg, my homeroom and social studies teacher, combed her gray hair into waves across the top of her head and wore her horn-rim glasses on a chain around her neck. She wrote in every girl’s autograph book, “May you always be the same with the exception of your name.” One day, as I lingered after class, gathering up my books, she said wistfully, “I used to really enjoy teaching.” Startled, I looked up. Her hands were on her large hips, and she was staring out the window. She had spent her entire career teaching white students. Now, she had to accommodate black kids, who probably made her nervous. “I didn’t have to worry so much about discipline. The students were so polite, so well-behaved. Here,” she paused, gesturing around at the empty desks, “well, here, anything goes.” I didn’t know how to answer her, so I shrugged. Students at Binford were divided into four teams according to academic ability, which was the school’s way of tracking us. The teachers never gave us labels, but we all knew there was a dumb team, a smart team, and two in between. I was on the so-called smart team. There were more white kids on my team than on the others, perhaps because we scored well on standardized tests, perhaps because the white principal wanted a group of us to show off as the best students. In class, students seemed more sensitive to race than the teachers. One of the smartest kids on my team was a light-skinned black boy with wire-rimmed glasses. He usually wore a white, button-down shirt and dark slacks, just like a businessman. In math class, while I erased my papers so many times I made holes in them, he always knew the right answers. Classmates of both races always marveled at his ability, as if it was such a surprise to find a brilliant black boy. Liz was on the so-called dumb team. She didn’t make good grades, but...