National Coalition on School Diversity Keynote Discussion with Vanessa Siddle Walker
May 14, 2020
- 2:00 pm ET
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A conversation between Vanessa Siddle Walker & Elizabeth McRae, moderated by Dani McClain. Remarks by Courtney E. Martin & Andrew Lefkowits.
 

The keynote presentation will be introduced by author and entrepreneur Courtney E. Martin. Courtney has authored/edited six books, including The New Better Off: Reinventing the American Dream and Do It Anyway: The New Generation of Activists. She also co-founded the Solutions Journalism Network and FRESH Speakers Bureau. Courtney has appeared on the TODAY Show, Good Morning America, MSNBC, and The O’Reilly Factor, and speaks widely at conferences and colleges. She is the recipient of the Elie Wiesel Prize in Ethics, a residency from the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Centre, and an honorary Ph.d. from Art Center of Design. She lives with her family in a co-housing community called Temescal Commons in Oakland. She is at a work on a new book about white parents and school integration. Learn more at www.courtneyemartin.com.

Vanessa Siddle Walker is the Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of African American and Educational Studies at Emory University (B.A. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; M.Ed Harvard University; Ed. D Harvard University). For 25 years, she has explored the segregated schooling of African American children, considering sequentially the climate that permeated segregated schools, the network of professional collaborations that explains the similarity across schools, and the hidden systems of advocacy that demanded equality and justice for the children in the schools. Her most recent book, published as The Lost Education of Horace Tate: Uncovering the Hidden Heroes Who Fought for Justice in Schools, was the winner of the Lillian Smith Book Award for 2019 and lauded as one of the Best Nonfiction Books for 2018 by Publisher’s Weekly. Walker is President of the American Educational Research Association for 2019-2020 and serves on the Research Advisory Panel for the National Coalition on School Diversity.

Dani McClain (moderator) reports on race and reproductive health. She is a contributing writer at The Nation and a fellow with Type Media Center. McClain's writing has appeared in outlets including TIME, The Atlantic, Slate, Colorlines, EBONY.com, and The Rumpus. In 2018, she received a James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism. Her work has been recognized by the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association, the National Association of Black Journalists, and Planned Parenthood Federation of America. McClain was a staff reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and has worked as a strategist with organizations including Color of Change and Drug Policy Alliance. McClain’s book, We Live for the We: The Political Power of Black Motherhood, was published April 2019 by Bold Type Books.

Elizabeth Gillespie McRae is the Creighton Sossoman Professor of History at Western Carolina University and the co-founder of the Appalachian Oral History Project. Her teaching and research interests center on the intersection of race, gender, and politics in America and in the modern South. She has published articles in the New York Times, The Washington Post, and the BBC’s World Histories. Her book, Mothers of Massive Resistance published in 2018 examines white women’s work in maintaining white supremacy in public education, social welfare policy, politics, and culture. Her next project will examine the issue of “school choice,” in American history.

 

The keynote presentation will weave together information and concepts from the following books:

 

Note: A small portion of the proceeds from book sales via IndieBound (using links above) will help support the work of Integrated Schools, in memory of Courtney Everts Mykytyn. 

 

More information about #NCSD2020 virtual offerings available here.