Spell Freedom: The Story of the Underground Schools that Built the Civil Rights Movement

The UMBC Shriver Center, School of Education, and Community Leadership Programs invite you to join them for a conversation with author Elaine Weiss and UMBC’s Dr. Brandon Beck!

Spell Freedom: The Story of the Underground Schools that Built the Civil Rights Movement

Elaine Weiss is a journalist, popular speaker, and media commentator. She wrote an award-winning account of the women’s suffrage movement, The Woman’s Hour. Her acclaimed book Spell Freedom highlights the story of Black activist Septima Clark and her Civil Rights colleagues in creating schools that trained tens of thousands of aspiring Black voters across the South.

Dr. Brandon Beck is an Assistant Professor in the UMBC School of Education. His scholarship and teaching center on the history of Black education, community- based pedagogies, and the use of oral history for reparative social justice. His research examines how historical narratives can be reclaimed to highlight the transformative role of Black educators and community organizing in Civil Rights history.

Registration is required: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfTu-0sfLW6RI-jXTacTnWuqJdQDwyVDLRZDxnM6o2oCKEBDQ/viewform

Co-sponsored by Center for Social Justice Dialogue; the Department of Political Science; the Dresher Center for the Humanities; the George and Betsy Sherman Center; the Orser Center for Public Humanities; the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Center; and the Women's, Gender, and Equity Center.

This event is open for full participation by all individuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or any other protected category under applicable federal law, state law, and the University's nondiscrimination policy.