Learning, Sharing, Celebrating

Yesterday was the first day of Black History Month. Here are some words worth pondering from Erika Strauss Chavarria, President of Columbia Community Care:

Happy Black History Month! We celebrate Black History from January 1st- December 31st.

Amen to that.

I want to call your attention to some upcoming activities while also acknowledging that there are many many more that will be going on in Howard County throughout the month.

First, an entire five days of learning and celebration beginning tomorrow, February 3rd for Black Lives Matter at School Week. Notice the collaboration at work here. I’m really excited to see this lineup.

Anti Racist Education Alliance, Columbia Community Care, African American Coalition of Howard County, Community Allies of Rainbow Youth, Luminus, Howard County Educators Association.

Black Lives Matter at School Week of Action 2025 - - learn more and register for events here.

Notice the green stripe at the bottom: Free Dinner, Free Admission, Open to Everyone. The planners want to remove barriers that might make it difficult for people to participate.

On Saturday February 8th the African American Community Roundtable is holding a Community Read-In.

DROP IN TO CELEBRATE BLACK HISTORY MONTH AS YOUTH, STAFF, AND COMMUNITY MEMBERS READ BOOKS BY BLACK AUTHORS AND CREATE ARTS AND CRAFTS. THIS EVENT IS PART OF THE INTERNATIONAL AFRICAN AMERICAN READ-IN, A LITERACY INITIATIVE THAT ENCOURAGES COMMUNITIES TO READ TOGETHER, CENTERING AFRICAN AMERICAN BOOKS AND AUTHORS.

You have your choice of two Howard County Library locations: East Columbia Branch from 12-2 pm or Glenwood Branch from 1-3 pm.

Again, notice the community partners listed at the bottom here. This kind of collaboration makes events like this possible.

And notice the words in the red box this time, which tell you what you can expect: FREE BOOK GIVE AWAYS WHILE SUPPLIES LAST. FREE ADMISSION AND PARTICIPATION FOR ALL AGES. LIGHT REFRESHMENTS WILL BE SERVED.

Please feel free to add any other local Black History events in the comments, and keep me posted throughout the month.

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Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents. When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...

They Can Wait

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Separate and Unequal

Remember “Separate but equal”? Remember how that really meant that Black schools languished in broken-down buildings without adequate heat or toilet facilities, with cast-off, ragged learning materials, underfunded and largely ignored? The Supreme Court struck that down in 1954. The evidence was clear that separate was not equal. Plessy v Ferguson had led to - - no, endorsed - - deeply unequal schooling and opportunities. We tend to think of Brown v Board as being purely about racial integration. It was not. It was about the logical consequences of segregation. And they were not, not, not equal. The ruling in 1954 didn’t transform public education for non-whites into a land of milk and honey by any means. But it articulated some essential truths in a way that made including everyone a legal precedent which could be relied upon and built upon. It was better than what came before it but it rested upon unsteady ground. It did not necessarily change the hearts or minds ...

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