The Fields School

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Contents

Preface.............................................................................................................................ixChoosing a Sabbatical Project.......................................................................................................xiiThe Fields School...................................................................................................................1Introduction........................................................................................................................1The Purpose of this Study...........................................................................................................3Research Questions Addressed in this Study..........................................................................................4Method..............................................................................................................................5Subjects............................................................................................................................5Data Collection Measures Used.......................................................................................................5Fields Family Tree and Fields School students (Listings from left to right and top to bottom by order of birth).....................6Procedures..........................................................................................................................9Summary of Findings of the Study....................................................................................................12Interview Data from Former Fields School Students & Teachers........................................................................12The Establishing of the Fields School...............................................................................................14Fields School Teachers..............................................................................................................18Fields School Teachers and their individual Terms of Service*.......................................................................18Students' Impressions of Teachers...................................................................................................20Typical Guidance & Discipline used by Teachers......................................................................................21Descriptions of the Physical Setting of the School..................................................................................23Responses Indicating What was in Abundance at School................................................................................24Things in Short Supply at School....................................................................................................25What they would Change about the School.............................................................................................26Fields School Curriculum............................................................................................................27How Learning and Work were Combined at School.......................................................................................30Important Lessons Learned at Fields School..........................................................................................31LifeValues Leaned at the Fields School..............................................................................................32Most Stirring Memory of School......................................................................................................33What would want for Young Children today to Experience of Fields School.............................................................34Background Information on Former Fields School Students.............................................................................36Current Residence of Subjects.......................................................................................................36Current Patterns of Residence.......................................................................................................37Education Completed by Subjects.....................................................................................................37Education Completed by Gender.......................................................................................................38Occupations/Careers by Gender.......................................................................................................39Highest Income Earned by Subjects...................................................................................................39Highest Income Earned by Gender.....................................................................................................40Discussion of Research Questions....................................................................................................40Student Responses (=26) to What the World Should Know about the Fields School.......................................................41Conclusions.........................................................................................................................50References Cited....................................................................................................................54Other References....................................................................................................................56Appendix............................................................................................................................57Acknowledgments.....................................................................................................................67About the Author....................................................................................................................69

Chapter One

A Case Study of a School in Rural Alabama which served a Community of African American children from 1933-1949.

Sabbatical Leave Report Compiled by Malathi K. Sandhu, Ph.D. and Edited with Commentary by Uriah J. Fields

... a mass movement among African-Americans must be credited as primarily responsible for the creation of public school systems in the South in the aftermath of the Civil War. (Fultz, 1996; p. 145).

... it was during the period 1870-1885 that segregated, dual systems of education were formally established in former slaveholding states. (Fultz, 1996; p. 146)."

Beginning in the later 1880s, however, and continuing on a virtually uninterrupted upward slope into the 1940s separate education in those southern states that maintained de jure segregation became maliciously un- equal. (Fultz, 1996; p. 146)."

Introduction

Many small, segregated schools which served African American children existed in the rural south during the period of the two decades from the early 1930s through the later 1940s. The Fields School, which was the object of this case study, was just such a small school. It came into being through the efforts of the then elder Fields family members. Recognizing the need for a school in close proximity to the Fields community, they requested available funds from the Washington County Superintendent of Education to support this endeavor. At the time, the only available funding for schools for blacks in the area was in the form of...