Statement to principals and supervisors

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This August 23, 1957 policy statement was prepared by Superintendent Benjamin L. Smith for distribution to principals and supervisors in the Greensboro City School System. Smith clarifies the role of the superintendent in relation to the school board. He encourages school administrators to remain up-to-date on changes in education policy, and explains the current student assignment policy of the Greensboro School Board in the wake of the Brown v. Board of Education decision and the state legislature's passage of the Pearsall Plan. He addresses the recent enrollment of African American students at two previously all-white schools in the city, and commends the staffs of those schools for their efforts.

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Title: Statement to principals and supervisors
Who's responsible?: Smith, Benjamin Lee (Creator)
Additional historical information: Benjamin Lee Smith was born February 6, 1893 in, Caldwell County, N.C. He received his A.B. from Duke University in 1916, and his M.A. from Duke in 1937. He served as superintendent of schools in the western North Carolina cities of Forest City, Rutherford-Spindale, and Shelby before assuming the same position in Greensboro, N.C., in 1935. His twenty-three year tenure in Greensboro included the years immediately following the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision ordering desegregation of public schools. In 1959, he participated in the National Civil Rights hearing on school integration. Smith died in 1961. Ben L. Smith High School in Greensboro is named for him.
Original creation or publication date: 1957-08-23
Place: Greensboro (N.C.)
Decade: 1950-1959
Type of item: text
Original format: reports
Subject headings: Segregation in education--United States
Race relations
Topics: North Carolina
African-American History
Additional tags: Primary and secondary education
School desegregation, 1954-1958
Copyright information: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/
COPYRIGHT NOT EVALUATED. The copyright status of this item has not been fully evaluated and may vary for different parts of the item. The user is responsible for determining actual copyright status for any reuse of the material.
Contributing Institution: Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library, Duke University
Collection: Benjamin Lee Smith Papers
Civil Rights Greensboro
Funding source: LSTA grant administered by the North Carolina State Library -- http://statelibrary.ncdcr.gov/ld/grants/lsta.html
Contributor's identifier: Duke_RL.01210.0998
Gateway identifier: duke:510
OCLC number: 884367723

Statement to principals and supervisors

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