By Rae Norman
Imagine a school that teaches “young people to function productively and meaningfully in society, or [gives] them the tools to change—dare I say revolutionize—society; an education that enables them to possess their own lives instead of living at the mercy of others.” That’s how Charles Cobb Jr., a former activist with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), describes Freedom Schools.
Cobb declares that as long as the United States has existed, so has the criminalization of education systems by and for Black students— and the struggle to create and maintain these opportunities despite oppression.
In 1739, South Carolina adopted the “compulsory ignorance” law, making it illegal to teach enslaved people how to write. In 1831, Black churches were banned in Virginia, after Black preachers were caught teaching reading in Sunday School. While laws such as these were being passed, education continued in secret— the “freedom schools” before Freedom Summer. Even in the 1950’s -- at the dawn of the civil rights movement -- South Carolina had organized schools to teach reading to Black students, connecting political knowledge to literacy.
The Freedom Schools of 1964 were actually following a long tradition of “education for liberation” that continues to this day. In the 1960s, despite rulings striking down segregated schools, Mississippi still maintained segregated education systems. The disparity in the state’s spending was massive; while an average of $81 was spent to educate each white student, barely a quarter of that was spent to educate each Black student. In some areas, schools for Black students were prohibited from teaching foreign language or the history of the Civil War.
Towards the end of 1963, Charles Cobb --- then a student at Howard University -- pitched an idea to the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) -- that they coordinate a network of Freedom Schools in the face of this inequality. Across the nation, in Virginia, Chicago, and New York City, students temporarily boycotted public schools, attending Freedom Schools organized in their communities instead.
This success paved the way for the Mississippi Freedom Schools; alongside the broader Freedom Summer project to register Black voters, a network of “Freedom Schools” was created to involve elementary and high school students. These Freedom Schools not only offered the opportunity for students to get involved in the movement, but also offered academic courses, discussions, and a sense of community and solidarity. By the end of Freedom Summer, dozens of these schools had been created across Mississippi.
But it didn’t end there. Freedom Schools are not a thing of the past; the idea of “education for liberation” has continued into the present.
The idea of Freedom Schools traveled from Philadelphia, Mississippi, to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. John Churchville, an activist and jazz musician from Philadelphia, traveled to Mississippi during Freedom Summer to register voters and work in Freedom Schools, helping students pass the state’s restrictive literacy tests. Realizing the importance of such education, he opened the “Freedom Library” in North Philadelphia when he returned, collecting thousands of books on Black history and starting tutoring programs. Eventually, the Freedom Library became the Freedom Day School. The school lasted a couple of years without interference until 1966 when local activists created the Black People’s Unity Movement (BPUM), which met at the Freedom Day School. The school was raided by the FBI, who falsely claimed it was being used to store weaponry. Churchville left the school right after this.
Fortunately, that’s not the end of the story.
Other organizations carried on the Freedom School legacy. The Friends Neighborhood Guild, a Quaker-founded neighborhood center in North Philadelphia, started a summer Freedom School in 1995. One year later, the Women’s Christian Alliance joined the movement, creating one of the longest-running Freedom Schools in Philadelphia. Then, in 1999, a network of Philadelphia Freedom Schools introduced programs to educate high school students by placing them in class with college interns. Over the years, the movement grew, and by 2006, Philadelphia Freedom Schools had evolved into an independent network, resulting in several such schools across Philadelphia, providing Black students with a place to learn and grow, both in terms of their academics and culture. Isaiah Thomas, the executive director of one such program, said, “the cultural and academic components are both significant” but “the cultural component is irreplaceable.”
Schools from the Freedom School network continue to educate Black students today. Stay tuned for our next post, when we’ll dive into a present-day Freedom School of Philadelphia.
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