VALDOSTA — Brittany Bell recalls standing in front of her high school class posing the question: How many countries are there in Africa?

Some students said five. Some responded 20. None of them said 54, the correct answer.

A familiar face throughout the community, Bell is an educator who spearheads youth events that offer both resources and knowledge.

Having been in the school system for about seven years, and now teaching a multicultural course, she sees firsthand how students learn about black history in school.

She says the reason why students do not know the number of countries in Africa is due to their education which has led them to believe the contributions of African Americans initiated during American slavery.

“All of the great civilizations from their ancestry all over the continent, not just from those contributing heavily to the slave trade, just all over the continent; it was a mastermind,” Bell said.

“Why were so many different countries there? Why were so many entities coming to Africa, for what? If there was nothing there, why would they be there? So that right there speaks volumes of the greatness that was in that part of the world; and so, if we don’t explain that to children, then all they know is my people were in bondage. … They’re not thinking further back,” she said.

Dr. Beverley Richardson-Blake, another community leader in Lowndes County, shares the sentiment that youths are undereducated on the topic of African American history.

Bell and Blake agree while curriculum focuses on slavery and segregation that the lessons taught in school leave out a past forgotten; that black history goes beyond the natives of Africa being held captive with their freedom languishing behind them.

This report further explores this thought and expounds upon it while touching on the school system and its role in helping students understand a history they may not learn about otherwise.

Alternative Learning

The African American culture is visibly important to Bell, who can be seen on any day donning skirts and head wraps reflecting African tradition.

“If you don’t recognize both the contributions of African Americans and the disparities over time of African Americans, I think there’s a piece in solution making that would be lost,” she said. “You can’t really understand where you should go if you don’t understand where people have come from. You just can’t.”

Bell relates to words believed to have been said by Rev. Nadine Drayton-Keen. It explains that “captors didn’t steal slaves” but rather “they stole scientists, doctors, architects, teachers, entrepreneurs, astronomers, fathers, mothers, sons (and) daughters and made them slaves.”

Re-educating students, specifically African American students, to teach them about their ancestors is a “game changer,” she said.

Blake is a former school teacher and university adviser with a strong community presence at African American cultural and historical events. She said many people believe that Africans were at their homeland not doing anything though there were some Africans embarking on greatness to contribute to their native land.

“I think it needs to be known that no, we did not just show up as slaves,” she said.

Bell believes that equality does not equate to equity as she explains that what works for one person in a society may not work for another. She says African American history is still not considered to be American history.

“All the time when you look in textbooks and you (see) American history, our contributions are not highlighted as often,” she said.

Blake says several facts are omitted from history books.

“Some things that even in this area that happened have been overlooked,” she said, explaining that it seems as if a lot of information is just excluded from textbooks or is just not covered adequately in the classroom setting.

The Valdosta Daily Times reached out earlier in the week to both Valdosta City and Lowndes County schools to inquire about how students learn of African American history.

A statement from Valdosta City Schools indicates students are taught what the schools call “standards,” rather than just studying chapters in textbooks. The VCS Teaching and Learning Department released a statement that expressed curriculum goes beyond the month of February, Black History Month, and extends throughout the school year.

“Our students learn about important figures in all subject areas as they are taught according to Georgia Standards of Excellence,” the statement reads. “Many of our schools celebrate Black History Month with special programs scheduled by their administration that includes most of their student population.”

A question arises: Are students learning material pass the fight for inclusion and justice, or are they only being taught about slavery, equal voting rights and segregation?

Bell said it depends on the teacher. She added that if a teacher believes strongly in the importance of a topic, it will be taught in the classroom.

She said teachers have freedom to utilize all available resources to convey concepts.

“That’s what I mean by the craftiness of the educator. It will depend on that educator if the student gets the information,” Bell said. “The textbooks have been whitewashed over the course of time; however, there (are) plenty of resources out there.”

She talked about the internet and its many resources to push across the message that “progress was diversity and diversity was what pushed progress. If that’s your goal to teach it that way, then it can be taught without the textbook.”

Students suffer when courses that lack diversity of African American history are being taught, she said.

She also believes that parenting must go hand-in-hand with formal education.

Passing Along History

Bell said several students do not know about Juneteenth, a nationally recognized day that marks the 1865 independence of Texan slaves and more generally the emancipation of African slaves in the South.

This independence came two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation abolishing slavery. Bell claims the kids are not informed because their parents are not informed.

The mother of a 2-year-old and a 5-year-old, she has adorned her children’s playroom with a map of America and a map of Africa. “I’m trying to teach them now that you have ancestry and that your history is deep,” she said.

She gave the example of her children one day walking into a classroom and learning about slavery. “My children will be like, ‘so we’re just going to skip (2,000), 3,000 years,” Bell said.

It is her hope that no matter what their teacher says, her children will know who they are, who their “people” are and what they have done.

“I’m taking away some of the miseducation that may happen in the classroom for my children, and it all goes back to family because you don’t know what you don’t know,” she said. “That’s what we’re dealing with; we’re dealing with parents who don’t know.”

Though she wasn’t raised in a home that taught black history, she would have loved to have been, she said.

Blake also believes education starts at home.

She is the mother of one daughter who frequently accompanied her to any program she led or attended.

Blake said she would challenge her daughter to learn historical facts before the two would have a conversation about them. While other children were playing outside or watching TV during the summertime, her daughter was busy doing book reports.

“We’d sit down and we’d talk about it and she’d share her information,” Blake said. The duo would also visit sites such as the Harriet Tubman Museum and any historical sights in Atlanta.

All of the at-home teaching that Blake gave her daughter as a child benefitted her down the road as a young lady experiencing college. Her daughter took that information and used it as a reference for class assignments.

Though her daughter has graduated college, Blake continues to dedicate herself to educating the youth through various community events such as the Juneteenth celebration and the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Founders Banquet.

“I feel like it’s important that our young people know some of the events that have taken place down through the years and get that exposure,” she said. “It’s an opportunity to educate the young folks, particularly, but some of the older ones.”

Now retired, Blake will continue her passion, not just teaching her daughter but also other residents about the history of African Americans.