Mississippi Freedom Summer
1964 saw the development of the Mississippi Freedom Summer. A number of Queens College students participated in the initiative, with the majority involved in the Meridian Freedom School as teachers.
The QC students participating in the program were required to raise funds and supplies for school, all of which were not available to the black community's school in Meridian. Along with this, lesson plans were quickly developed incorporating subjects requested by the community as well as teaching techniques that the volunteers wanted to test out and practice.
A Freedom School Convention was held too, gathering representatives from other Freedom Schools accross the state. At the convention there were numerous speakers, including Robert Moses who developed COFO and the Mississippi Freedom Project, James Forman, then a SNCC leader, as well as a performance by Pete Seegar
The volunteers were housed within the local community to help foster relations and reduce costs as well as ensure that the program stayed rooted in community development at all times. The families that hosted the volunteers did so at great personal risk, since there was the possibility of violent backlash by white supremacist and the Ku Klux Klan. This violence was also directed towards the Mississippi Freedom Project as a whole, resulting in beatings and harassament
Cover for a booklet describing the Platform of the Mississippi Freedom School Convention
Meridian Freedom School volunteers in a meeting
Art class was a sought after class since it was not taught as part of the regular school program
Students shown with their desks arranged in a circle, a new teaching technique for that time
Mrs. Polly Heidelberg set up most volunteers with housing and arranged for lunches to be brought to the school
Robert Moses speaking at the Convention
Role plating was important part of the program, teaching students how be empowered in an integrated school
Black History was another new subject taught that the regular school did not provide
Roscoe Jones and Joyce Brown were both elected representatives sent to Meridian from their local Freedom School chapters
A flier made by COFO providing information on the Mississippi Freedom Summer Project
Mark and Betty Levy, QC volunteers, with some students outside of the school building