Jeanes Foundation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

To comply with Wikipedia's quality standards, this article may need to be rewritten. Please help improve this article. The discussion page may contain suggestions.

The Jeanes Foundation (also known as the Negro Rural School Fund^[1]) was founded by philanthropist Anna T. Jeanes who was a quaker woman that inherited money from her father and brother’s estate. She was the sole owner and because she was single the money was all hers. She wanted to assist in the black education school system so she donated $1,000,000 and created the Jeanes foundation^[2]. which trained and taught teachers in the south who had very little education and experience within the education field. The teachers were trained in schools such as Tuskegee and many other HBCUs. The teachers often had to teach students in one big school house or churches. The establishment also encouraged and raised money to fund field trips and graduation. The Jeanes foundation consisted of mostly black women, because women of color were those who had the worst advantage of obtaining a job in the south. The charity gave negroes a chance to receive elementary legitimate education. Long term, the foundation encouraged blacks to vote. By 1952 there were over 510 Jeanes teachers in the south. The Jeanes foundation is still known to be a success that has created a place with the NAACP as well as clubs and PTA committees within the minority community.

The Southern education foundation, a not-for-profit foundation, was created in 1937 from the Negro Rural School Fund and three others, the John F Slater Fund, the Peabody Education Fund, and the Virginia Randolph Fund^[3].

[edit] Jeanes Teachers In Georgia

The Jeanes Teacher program that started in Georgia began with six individuals in 1908 and progressed to a 53 person program by 1939. In addition to the Jeanes Teachers efforts to educate African American Students, The Jeanes teachers took a holistic approach in their mission, not only did they education black students, but they were alsoinfluential in the development of black communities in Georgia. They improved the physical buildings of schools, organized clubs, and overall wanted to enrich the communities and social life of the black community. The Jeanes Teacher program ended in 1968. Their work benefited black communities because prior to their help black communities lacked adequate schools and good teachers. The success of Jeanes Teachers stretched beyond African American education in Georgia. The same Jeanes Supervisors became prominent leaders during the civil rights movement. The Jeanes teachers, and their work in the 1950’s are credited for laying the groundwork for the civil rights movement of the 1960’s.

[edit] Response to the Jeanes Teachers

Professor Botsch of the Political Science department of the (University of South Carolina Aiken) says: "How can one sum up the contributions of the Jeanes Supervisors, these educational pioneers? One scholar likes to refer to them as "pre-cursers of the Peace Corp," women who didn't make much money, but did anything that they could to help. Another sees them as early resource people, similar to today's resource teachers who try to make sure that children have what they need to learn. Another comments that these women provided African-American children with a sense of pride by teaching them black history at a time when it was not found in any textbooks. "We took straw and we made bricks and we built houses," says one retired supervisor. Perhaps, though, as stated by Eldridge McMillan, their slogan sums it up best: the Jeanes Supervisors always did the 'next needed thing'."

[edit] References