If you’ve been thinking about attending the Modjeska Simkins School, now is the time for action. To join what is shaping up to be a wonderfully diverse class, please submit your application by Monday, March 1. The session, which runs March 7 – July 3, meets on Monday evenings 6:30-8:30 on Zoom. (See class schedule at modjeskaschool.com.)
Melanie McGehee attended the school in 2019 with her precocious son Ian, then 14. So convinced of the school’s importance, Melanie used her recent birthday to encourage her friends to donate. “I would love to fund a scholarship to this year’s Modjeska School,” she wrote. “It literally brings to life SC history, and the class camaraderie brings hope and action.”
(We welcome donations of any amount to help pay for student scholarships and stipends for guest speakers. You can do that securely online or by sending a check to Modjeska School, POB 8325, Columbia SC 29202.)
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Whether you want to be a community activist or just a more effective citizen, the school offers a unique education in SC history, its racially driven politics, and its oversized influence on the national stage.
“The Modjeska Simkins School of Human Rights is a MUST for understanding South Carolina politics, said Annette P. Bethel, who attended in 2018. The school helped focus her interest in women’s rights. After graduating, she relaunched, and currently leads, the Columbia NOW chapter. “Looking at politics from a historical lens is important. If one is serious about organizing, or simply wants to be more informed about South Carolina, the Modjeska School is a great in-depth study.”
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Some students sign up for the school to sharpen their organizing skills, other want to fill a gap in the social justice landscape. Dr. Laura Cahue, who graduated from the first Modjeska School class in 2015, wanted to expand her work protecting immigrant rights in South Carolina. The school helped crystalize her ideas, and gave her the support she needed to take the next steps.
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“For all of the non-profit organizations that exist in South Carolina, very few of them are led by Latinx people,” she said. “I am Mexican American, and when I heard about the Network’s Modjeska Simkins School, I was most excited by the part about participants being expected to develop an organizing project by the end of the course. Mine was the Grassroots Alliance for Immigrant Rights, an umbrella organization designed to coordinate state-level actions for immigrant-led groups. We fight against immigration enforcement measures that seek to criminalize our communities and incentivizes law enforcement agencies to cage our people.”
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“Our local group is called Fuerza Jirasol. We raise our own funds, and use them to leverage our community’s power to get things done. We have conducted outreach in out communities, and even in a pandemic we were able to work to register Latinx votes and get them to the polls. Also during the pandemic, we were able to secure a small grant from Mijente to do the ground work for starting our own Traditional Embroidery Cooperative business, Bordados Jirasol.
The Network has supported these efforts by serving as our fiscal sponsors and an incubator for us to take the next step to establish our own 501c(3). These projects and initiatives were seeded within the Modjeska Simkins School.”
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Dr. Robert Greene, who teaches history at Claflin University in Orangeburg, will lead the session, which will be held on Zoom. Last year’s graduate Lillian Boatwright is a fan. “Hands down, he is my favorite lecturer in any course I have taken. He not only knows his stuff, but delivers it in a way that draws you in and makes you engage.”
See modjeskaschool.com for more about the school, class schedule, or to apply. The $250 tuition fee may be paid in installments. Some partial scholarships are available. Questions? Call 803-808-3384 or email network@scpronet.com.