On a recent summer day in South Seattle, Mari Ramirez wrapped up reading “Homeland: My Father Dreams of Palestine,” a picture book by Hannah Moushabeck about a father’s recollections of his homeland.
Then Ramirez gave the second and third graders, who had been listening intently and asking questions, their next task: Use watercolors to illustrate a memory from their parents’ homeland or, if they were from Seattle, their favorite place in the city, and write a few sentences to describe it.
One drew an Eid celebration with friends and family in the city, with a Gambian flag in the top left-hand corner. Another painted verdant plants in a park in Colombia, where she spent time with her grandmother. With careful, deliberate strokes, another painted blue waves to recall a trip she’d taken to a waterpark in East Africa, which she visited when she was 7.
Ramirez’s lesson was part of a week of activities at WA-BLOC’s Freedom Schools in Southeast Seattle this summer. The program at Emerson Elementary School is an incarnation of the historic education movement launched during the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the youth wing of the Civil Rights Movement, set up Freedom Schools to bridge gaps in what Black students were learning in their traditional public schools. In addition to math and literature, organizers also taught students about Black history and resistance.
WA-BLOC (Washington Building Leaders of Change), a South Seattle nonprofit, works with schools and community organizations on literacy, restorative justice and leadership.
WA-BLOC’s five-week session, which it has run since 2016, hews closely to the original 1964 program’s vision — to encourage critical literacy, go deeper in some areas than the traditional education program and spur students to advocate for change in their communities. The summer curriculum uses the common core standards, said Anab Nur, a site coordinator.
The program features weekly themes explored through books, videos and activities. The first week, for example, students explored the question, “Who Am I?” In week five, they tackled “What’s Our Freedom Dream?” At the end of the fourth week, they participated in a day of action to call attention to long-standing community issues. Students have used the day of action to bring awareness to gun violence, climate change, racism and homelessness, Nur said.
Ramirez read the book about a father’s memories of the Old City of Jerusalem during a week focused on the theme, “What’s Going on in my Community.” The day before, students in the higher grades embarked on a scavenger hunt in the Rainier Beach neighborhood to look for diversity and spot things they may not ordinarily notice and others they might want to change. They saw flowers and lush gardens but noticed that cars did not always stop at stop signs and that there were few places to get fresh produce.
Faith Richardson, who led the students on the 1 ½ hour scavenger hunt, said they saw their community differently.
Demi Garrett, 10, and Anayah Harrison, 11, noted the greenery and flowers they encountered along the route. Demi also observed speeding cars, which were not safe, she said. Anayah counted about seven fast-food restaurants.
“They should change that,” Anayah said, adding that she’d like a community garden where neighbors could get fresh fruits and vegetables.
In addition to seeing the opportunity to make changes, such experiences give students a chance to improve their literacy — in the broadest sense.
“We’re thinking of the neighborhood as text,” Nur said.
”We’re trying to expand the definition of literacy and what it means to make meaning and what it means to be literate,” Nur said. “Scholars are reading every single day while they’re at a Freedom School. Sometimes, they’re reading their neighborhoods. Sometimes, we have a ‘human library’ lesson, where we invite a community member in to tell oral stories, and students are able to synthesize information from that story to do other activities.”
Each day kicks off with Harambee — which means “all pull together” in Swahili — a half-hour, high-octane session in the gym where students get ready for the day with dance, cheers, chants and recognition.
Katie Brantley, the Freedom Schools program director and one of the site coordinators, said the initiative also allows students to build connections with educators who are Black and brown leaders from South Seattle. That provides “a level of representation and a level of connectedness … that the scholars don’t typically get in their classrooms during the academic year,” she said.
“This summer experience allows the kids to go deeper into some of these topics without the same code-switching,” Brantley said. “And [it] also allows them to feel a better sense of comfort and … belonging.”
The program, which served 55 students this year, initially enrolled high school students. But in recent years, it’s shifted to younger students. Middle school students who attended now serve as paid interns.
“The fact that they want to continue to be involved says a lot about the ability of this program to create spaces for youth and make connections that feel special,” Brantley said.
Brantley said the group has received several requests to expand to other sites, but funding is the biggest challenge. The nonprofit said it costs about $150,000 to run the summer session, with about $14,000 to rent the school bus and $10,000 for the building space. The program is free to families, and this year, it was funded primarily through grants from the city, other sources and private donations.
Some graduates who returned this year as interns said they discovered aspects of Black history that weren’t covered in school. They’ve learned about the pivotal role of Ella Baker, the civil rights leader who helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Taz’Nae Looney, 13, who worked as an intern this year, said she was surprised to learn that Rosa Parks, the civil rights activist, was not the first Black woman to refuse to give up her seat on a bus for a white passenger in Montgomery, Ala., in 1955. (Claudette Colvin, then 15, did so nearly nine months before Parks.)
As interns, Looney and her colleagues help teachers supervise classes and keep students on task. They also assist with games and activities during enrichment periods.
“I build different relationships with kids,” said Looney, who wants to be a teacher. “I have a feeling that they know they need me.”
JC Fretz, who teaches at Seattle Public Schools and works in the summer program, said Looney is good at managing conflicts and supporting others. That’s one of the reasons why she and other students who demonstrated that they cared for their peers and wanted to give back were welcomed as interns.
The hope is that those students will “continue a legacy of standing up for things in their community and caring for each other,” Fretz said.
“It’s really like being in a space with people who have a lot of shared values, about trying to create a more just system and create a space where kids can be humanized and be treated fairly,” he said. “I don’t think that’s always the case in the public education system. It’s just really nice to be able to create that alongside these young people.”
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