What are the Freedom Lessons?

1.     Treat others as you would like to be treated. Speak to others with respect. Listen with empathy. The simplicity of the Golden Rule is to help your neighbors. Treat your family with kindness. Imagine how others would want to be treated. Walk in their shoes. As members of the black community in this story Frank, Evelyn, and Annie Mae practiced this rule every day.  “Do unto others” was embedded in Colleen’s upbringing yet practicing the Golden Rule clashed with the unwritten rules of Jim Crow she wasn’t familiar with. 

2.     Have courage to confront uncertainty, intimidation or danger. Colleen quickly realized that what she expected to be an adventure was full of uncertainty. Her marriage to a man with a Spanish surname and her willingness to teach in a black school was judged and placed her on the defensive. Frank’s courage was evident daily by his efforts to protect his family from the secret he kept hidden. Evelyn guarded her dignity and self-worth by refusing to comply with unjust decisions by white decision makers. 

3.     Family provides security, identity and values. Colleen, Frank and Evelyn each came from families that expected them to follow their moral compass. Colleen set off to live and work in Louisiana with her husband, with confidence in who she was, and a set of values gained from her upbringing. She believed that her students should have an equal education and she strived to offer it despite the lack of materials. Frank’s father left a legacy of perseverance as he operated his own auto repair shop part-time and worked a full-time job. After his father’s death, Frank’s mother made ends meet by taking in ironing after she cleaned houses for local white families at the same time, she raised four children. Evelyn returned home after college and her mother’s sudden death to teach and assist her father in his funeral home business. 

4.     Prejudice is taught and learned. Colleen was taught that everyone deserves equal rights and to be treated with respect. She knew that prejudice existed right in her own town back in New Jersey, but she didn’t believe that it would impact her. And she didn’t understand the deep resistance for her beliefs from her neighbors and colleagues in Louisiana. She was judged daily by the color of her skin, by her name, and by her decision to associate with people of other races. Walking in another’s shoes became a daily challenge to her integrity. The unfairness of the poorly planned black school closure and the integration into the white school is magnified by the unfair assignments for the black teachers as support staff when their school was closed. Most lost their own classrooms. High school students lost their leadership roles on Student Council, school sports teams, cheerleading squads because when the schools were combined those positions were already taken by the white students of the school. At the end of the school year, the black students were recommended to be kept back and repeat the grade they had just finished, including the high school seniors. The second-class status of all the black teachers and students was imposed by the past practices and the unwritten rules of prejudice. 

5.     Social Justice: It takes individual actions to create social change. Laws are necessary to protect our civil rights but laws don’t change people’s opinions. Be the Change we want to see in this world. (Ghandi). In 1954 & 1955 it was determined by the Supreme Court that separate schools for black and white students was unconstitutional. In 1964, the Civil Rights Act signed by President Johnson allowed the federal government to enforce desegregation. The little known Alexander v Holmes Supreme Court decision of October 29, 1969 marked the end of the five years states had to comply or loose federal funds. Fifty years later our country has made changes and progress but there are still public schools that operate as segregated schools. At the end of the book Colleen leads a class of students in an exercise designed to teach students about discrimination. The reader doesn’t learn the results of that experience. The author believes that it is the responsibility of each of us to insure equality in education.