AHE 577 – Final Paper

Adult Learning Narrative

Charles James Sloan – A Reflection on Desegregation, Racism and
Learning

By: Carey Schroyer

Charles James Sloan is an African American man. He was born in Oklahoma in 1943
and lived there until 1944 when he and his birth mother were caught in a flash flood. His
mother died but Charles was pulled from the water and rescued by a great uncle. Shortly
after the rescue, he moved to East Denver, Colorado where he was adopted by his aunt
and uncle. The story of Charles’s rescue was family lore. Family and friends often told
the story, many believed this was a sign that Charles was destined for something great.
Charles grew to believe this as well.

Charles recalled a mostly happy childhood with his loving, adopted parents (John and
Sally Sloan). He lived in the same home but noted the neighborhood changed as he
progressed through his formal K-12 education. Although a very small percentage of
African-American families lived in Colorado (~2%), a large percentage of them were
concentrated in East Denver (~95%). In the 1940’ and early 50’s, East Denver included
some of the most prosperous African American communities in the West. However, the
city’s de facto segregation and obvious racial discrimination were on the minds of many.
Although Charles did not fully understand the situation at first, he observed the changes
and the attitudes of the African-American adults around him. According to Moya
Hansen, the post-war years saw increasing activism as returning servicemen expressed
their belief that their service to the nation had earned them the same rights as other
citizens. Further, the influx of black families to the city from other states challenged
beliefs of long-time black residences, many of whom thought that because they did not
suffer the same indignities as African Americans in the southern states, they had little to
complain about (Hansen, 2016). In 1961 citizens who disagreed founded a Denver
chapter of the Congress on Racial Equity (CORE) (Hansen, 2001). They agitated for
equal opportunities in jobs, housing, and education. They protested unjust treatment by
law enforcement officers and the legal system (Hansen, 2001). Their efforts opened new
doors and many of the black residents left. Those who could not afford to leave stayed
and the area began to deteriorate as changes in the socioeconomic status shifted. At the
same time, more minority groups moved into the area resulting in greater ethnic diversity.

Sally Sloan understood the national and local climate. She understood racial division and
the corresponding social and political unrest. Her knowledge and experience led her to
believe there would always be a point where the white man would double down and try to
keep the black race from achieving his/her goals. In response, Sally believed she needed
to give her son the tools he needed to survive and thrive in the white man’s world.
Charles called this tool his emotional armor. He still believes it was the greatest gift she
gave to him. The emotional armor he developed with Sally’s guidance allowed him to
effectively with racist, ignorant people. As Charles noted, “she taught me to believe in
my power and not to be the victim. She didn’t give me crutches to limp along, instead
she kicked those crutches out from under me so I would be successful.”

Charles attended an elementary school with other economically disadvantaged children.

He described the student population as diverse; mostly African-American, Asian, and
Hispanic. He noted the parents of these children were usually not well educated and
many did not value or prioritize education for their children. Sally was an exception,
although his adopted mother only had an 8th grade education, she understood the
importance of communication, particularly speech and language. She understood the
value of education and instilled this in Charles. Charles still remembers Sally saying,
“you don’t have to be like them but you have to be able to communicate like them if you
don’t want to be at their mercy”. Other than the above statement, Charles doesn’t have a
strong memory of elementary school. He noted the school he attended would have been
considered diverse by today’s standards but it felt normal to him. He didn’t remember
standing out or looking or feeling different.

When Charles began attending Junior High many things changed. Charles remembered
taking tests. He scored relatively well on the AP tests and was placed in a small cohort
for academically advanced students. He remembers there were between 10-12 students
of mixed races and sexes. He recalled feeling proud, apprehensive and conflicted. At the
time, he understood that he and the other kids were special and they had been segregated
and separated because of their academic ability. Looking back, he reflected fondly on
this time the cohort. He credits much of his academic success and the success of his
peers to the cohort model. He and his peers felt safe and insulated from the negativity,
peer pressures and challenges faced by other students who had not been selected. Charles
felt supported in this environment. This is consistent with the information presented in
the Drago-Severson et al. study reviewed in theme 3. The paper examined how
collaborative relationships among women supported learning and development. All three
studies described a cohort of women who learned together. In each study the women felt
supported, nurtured and safe in the learning environment. This allowed them to be
successful. Charles also began to embrace his love for sports and pursue more formal
opportunities to play. He played basketball, football, track, and baseball. At the time, he
was particularly interested in baseball. He remembered hearing about Jackie Robinson’s
debut in the major leagues in 1947 and listening to Dodgers baseball games on the radio.
He smiled when he told me how Jackie Robinson inspired him and many other African
Americans in his community. Finally, Charles recalled a situation that occurred during
junior high. He wanted to hang on the street with his peers but Sally would not allow
him to do so. Charles began describing a scenario. Sally had given him money to get the
groceries. Sally told him to get the groceries and come straight home. Charles got the
groceries but decided to hang out and play ball instead of coming home. Charles recalled
how he felt when he saw Sally standing there watching him. “At the time, our
community was a matriarchal society. I’ll never forget the look on her face when she
caught me playing ball when I was supposed to get the groceries and bring them straight
home. I feared and respected Sally more than anyone else. ” Charles continued
reflecting, “I wanted to hang on the street, to be one of the gang. Sally understood this
and knew had to be done. She knew my struggle and she protected me from myself, she
was not going to let me get involved with gangs and the street.”

After completing junior high, Charles moved to a much bigger high school and
experienced a new set of conflicts, opportunities, and challenges. Although the high
school was still diverse, it had more white folks than his elementary or junior high
school. Charles noted he was not as comfortable in this setting for many reasons. He
was in a much bigger school and he had lost the security and comfort of the cohort group.
He explained that although he was no longer in the AP group many of his peers still
resented him because he had been part of the group in the past. He summarized his
feelings as follows, “Throughout high school, I often felt discriminated against by the
white students and resentment by my peers for both my academic abilities and my
athleticism.” He described his first year as a struggle, both internally and externally. The
struggle was minimized significantly when he effectively established his “street cred”
through numerous physical altercations. Charles is a big man and I asked if his physical
appearance was a factor in establishing his credibility. Charles didn’t think so. He noted
he was very skinny guy when he started high school. In addition, he did not grow to his
full height (6’5”) until the end of high school or early in college.

Charles continued sharing high school memories. He explained that he began focusing
more on sports and he played on many school teams. He also established himself as an
excellent athlete. He excelled in football, baseball, track, and basketball and this
increased his notoriety both in school and on the street. Charles explained, “I was lucky,
I was noticed and taken under the wing of a senior named Norman Rice. He saw
something in me that I didn’t see. He was the president of the student body and I looked
up to him. He lived up to that, he was the first person to suggest I had the potential to be
something other than an athlete. However, I did not recognize it at the time and
continued to focus on playing sports.”

Charles continued to excel in sports, particularly basketball. The head coaches (all white)
recognized Charles’s athletic ability. He played on several winning varsity teams but he
never actually learned the skills needed to strategically play and compete. As Charles
noted, “when I was in high school, my coaches relied heavily on the stereotype of the
black athlete, they relied on the superiority of our physical abilities as opposed to
teaching us the basic foundational skills of the sport. We out athleticized our components
at the time but we didn’t know it. We never learned the strategy to refine the natural
athletic skills we had due to the racist mother fuckers who were our coaches. We
suffered, all of us, white, black, Latino, Asian. We were not taught fundamentals we
needed to succeed and complete in sports but the coaches took credit when we were
recruited.” According to historical research in sport by Jessie Walters (1996), the
stereotype of the black athlete was created and embraced by many white folks to mask
the real fear of loss to black competitors in sports and elsewhere when black athletes
began to dominate certain sports in the 1920’s and 30. The myths claimed black folks
suffered from low intelligence, criminal tendencies, and inferior physicality due primarily
to their being close to the jungle (Walters, 1996). These myths were used to justify
banning interracial competition in many sporting events in the United States (Walters,
1996). However, these myths began to explode when Eddie Tolin and Ralph Metcalfe,
distinguished themselves in the 1932 Olympics, as did Jesse Owens (most famously), and
Metcalfe, among other Black athletes were to in the 1936 Berlin games, where Nazis
were like many White Americans, claiming to be of a superior race (Walters, 1996).
The myth continued to be debunked by the signing of Jackie Robinson by baseball’s
Brooklyn Dodgers in 1946. His initial signing as well as is his debut in the major leagues
in 1947 is well chronicled (Walters, 1996). For many people (including Charles),
Robinson has the honor of integrating professional sports (Walters, 1996). However, two
years before he made his debut, the National Football League had integrated when the
Los Angeles Rams signed two African-American professional players, Kenny
Washington and Woody Strode, the latter of whom became an outstanding movie start
(Walters, 1996). Similarly, in the very next year, in 1946, the same year that Jackie
Robinson was signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers, the All American Football Conference
tea, the Cleveland Browns, signed two Black players, Bill Willis and Marion Motley
(Walters, 1996). Then in 1948, the New York Giants signed Emlen Tunnel, who enjoyed
a distinguished career, finally retiring in 1961 (Walters, 1996). Charles admired all of
these athletes. He shared an inspirational quote by Jackie Robinson, “I’m not concerned
with your liking or disliking me… all I ask is that you respect me as a human being”. He
embraced this quote because he instinctively understood the inherent discrimination he
had seen and experienced even though he didn’t realize how it had impacted him at the
time.

Charles athletic abilities continue to develop. In his Junior year, Charles stared getting
college feelers in the mail. Then they began scouting his games (primarily basketball),
talking directly to his coaches, and eventually talking to Charles directly. As Charles
reflected on this time, he noted the following, “the downside of emotional armor is that
you control your expectations and you downplay your emotions. Interest from colleges
was a real surprise to me, before this happened I had no expectations of college. I knew I
was a pretty good ball player but this never occurred to me. My parents didn’t go to
college and we didn’t have the money for college. When this happened I didn’t know
what to expect or how to make the best choice.” During his senior year he began
receiving bona fide offers providing basketball scholarships. He received offers from a
variety of colleges including Stanford. Charles recounted the experience, “I was
extremely proud, but I was most impacted by the pride John and Sally showed for me.
They seemed both relieved and apprehensive. Neither of them had finished high school,
let alone gone to college and they had a son that was going to college on a scholarship.
They wanted to help me make the best decision but they didn’t know how and so I relied
on my coaches and friends.”

Charles decided to go to the University of Colorado. Charles, “I accepted this offer

because I didn’t have the confidence to leave although I did not admit it at the time. I
wanted to be close to home. My coaches and a few peers encouraged me to go to UC so I
decided that is where I would go.” However, college was a shock for Charles. Charles, “I
believed I was a smart guy but I was completely unprepared for college. I had the notion
that the coaches would take care of the academic issues. I wasn’t showing up for class
because I was here to play basketball. I didn’t think I needed to study and I ended my
first year with a 0.109 GPA. This led to junior college in Sterling, Colorado.” When
recounting the experience it appeared Charles still conflicted about the experience.
Charles knew he hadn’t done the work but he didn’t understand how he could have done
so badly. Former teachers had led him to believe he was a smart kid. He remembered
the cohort from junior high and the encouragement he received from teachers and other
adults during that time. He acknowledged he was a not a straight a student in high
school, but he had always done ok and he hadn’t struggled to get decent grades. I asked
him how he felt about these formal learning structures. Charles thought about the
question. He felt like he had learned stuff in junior high but he noted that he didn’t feel
like he had learned much in high school. In fact, he felt like he had learned the most
through hands on and some experiential learning while playing sports. As we talked he
noted that his status as a high school athlete insulated him in the same way the cohort
insulated and protected him in junior high.

Charles described his experience at junior college, “Junior college was a factory for
athletes who had fallen from grace. When I went to Sterling I didn’t have any idea what I
would do from there and it didn’t matter to me at the time, however, it never occurred to
me to give up sport or leave college. Initially I was focused on playing ball and having a
good time. There were a lot of guys and we were all focused on the moment, we weren’t
thinking about the future.” Charles continued without direction until an assistant coach
challenged him by asking him where he would go after junior college. Charles
continued, “his questions helped me, this coach was a brother, he pushed me to think
about my life. I came to my senses. I focused more on studying and got better grades.”
Charles continued, “Before going to junior college I thought I was smart. When I was
sent to junior college my confidence waned. At first I didn’t understand I was still smart,
I was just unprepared because I hadn’t learned how to learn.” Charles continued
discussing his educational experience. Once again, he felt conflicted by his own
experience. He described his feeling about his formal educational experiences as mixed.
He felt supported and nurtured in junior high by his teachers and his peers and this led to
increased felt confidence and some degree of superiority about his academic ability. He
continued to feel superior about his academic ability through high school although he
couldn’t justify the feeling through identification with a particular cohort or group.
During our discussion, he still questioned his own assumptions about his academic ability
based on his inability to succeed at UC. He also questioned his teachers and whether
they cared. He noted he had a few good teachers in high school but he did not bond with
any of them and he wondered if it would have been different if he had. I asked him if he
thought his physical appearance had impacted his interactions with teachers in high
school and/or college. He thought it may have. Charles, “this was time of racial tension
and I suspect my physical appearance may have impacted how some people perceived
and interacted with me. It certainly enhanced my athletic ability and my ability to play
basketball. I was over 6” tall and I was in great shape.”

After one year in junior college, Charles had improved his grades and received a
scholarship to play basketball at the University of Northern Colorado. He accepted the
offer and began attending UNC. When Charles went back to college he had matured and
become more focused. He was able to balance the physical demands of the sport and the
academic requirements although he still struggled to learn effective study habits and how
to manage his time most effectively. In fact he officially earned his BA and ended up
graduating with a 2.0000000 GPA. Shortly before graduating he received a special
invitation to meet with the president because of this unique ability to obtain the bare
minimum (2.0) needed to graduate. He continued to excel in basketball but he had
several severe knee injuries during this time. By the end of his college experience his
knees had gotten so bad that they often needed to be manually drained after a game.
Although he loved the sport, he knew his physical limits. Charles graduated from UNC
in 1967 with a BA. Charles: "I graduated in 1967 with a BA. My graduation ceremony
was a big deal to me and my family. John and Sally were there, along with the entire
Denver gang. Everyone was very proud, I was the first bona fide college graduate in the
family."

Shortly before Charles graduated he was asked to try out for Denver’s NBA team. He
thought seriously about trying out but knew the physical demands required to be an
athlete would be challenging and did not pursue this opportunity. I asked if he ever
looked back and regretted that decision. Charles said he didn’t. He had enjoyed the
experiences he had playing basketball but he realized he wanted to remain in school and
pursue a Master’s degree. Charles went back to UC. He continued to hone his study
skills and his academic abilities and graduated with an MA in 1969. He has worked in
human relations for a variety of different government agencies and for profit companies
since graduating with his degree. He is very proud of his educational accomplishments
and his work history. He has been able to leverage his education and experience into
higher-level management positions throughout his career. He takes pride in this because
it has allowed him to support his wife and daughter. He also takes pride in his continual
quest for knowledge. Charles, “I didn’t really learn how to learn until I was in college.
At that time, I didn’t really enjoy learning and I did what I needed to do to get by to get
my degree. As I matured and learned more about myself, I was able to identify my own
interests and pursue them outside of a formal learning environment. I was more
successful as a self directed learner because I was chose the topic and I was motivated to
learn”. Charles attitude reflects many adult learners.

Throughout our conversation, Charles often commented on the impact of desegregation

and racism. He felt it had significantly influenced his education and it has resulted in
great strides toward equality but there was still work to be done. Charles was in
elementary school in 1954 when the Supreme Court ruled on Brown versus the Board of
Education. The Court unanimously determined racial segregation of children in public
schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which states
that "no state shall make or enforce any law which shall ... deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." This was a turning point because lower
court rulings had previously concluded black and white schools were "substantially"
equal to each other. This was used as a basis for not integrating the schools and
continuing the process of segregation. However, after reviewing psychological studies
showing black girls in segregated schools had low racial self-esteem, the Supreme Court
concluded that separating children on the basis of race creates dangerous inferiority
complexes that may adversely affect black children's ability to learn (McBride, 2006).
The Court concluded that, even if the tangible facilities were equal between the black and
white schools, racial segregation in schools is "inherently unequal" and is thus always
unconstitutional (McBride, 2006). Although the decision did not succeed in fully
desegregating public education in the United States, it put the Constitution on the side of
racial equality and galvanized the nascent civil rights movement into a full revolution
(McBride, 2006).
Charles: "I believe great strides have been made in this country in terms of racism. I
don't believe my daughter experienced the same degree of racism or discrimination I
experienced. However, I do believe there will always be racist people waiting for an
opportunity (look at the political situation). I believe the best gift you can give your
children is the emotional armor to deal with the situations. We do ourselves and our
children harm if we choose to give them crutches and focus on victimization instead of
providing strength and emotional armor. Sally, with her 8th grade education gave me the
most important gift of all. She taught me how to be successful and I shared that gift with
my daughter. My daughter is a successful African American woman and I am very proud
of her, she earned a BA and Masters degree and is working in D.C. in her field of study.
She is my greatest success."

Both Charles and I agree that significant changes have continued to occur since 1954.
Educational access and equality has continued to improve but we can do more. Charles
and I discussed institutional barriers to education including racism. We are very different
in terms of race, ethnicity, age, sex, experience, etc. but we could relate to one another
and to various experiences. For example, I have not experienced the type of racism that
Charles has but I have experienced discrimination in other forms. This led to a very
lengthy conversation about equity and diversity in education. How can we create an
equitable environment in a sea of diversity? How do we define diversity and identify
institutional barriers if the barriers are unique to the individual? In the end we agreed that
we often limit our definition to predefined categories and this limits our ability to
understand students and meet their individual needs.
References:

Cuban, S., Daloz, K., Drago-Severson, El, (2009), "I Got Your Back": Looking Closely
at Women Learners' Collaboration and Leadership in Three Studies. Adult Basic
Education & Literacy Journal. Fall2009, Vol. 3 Issue 3, p140-150. 11p. Retrieved from:
http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wwu.edu/ehost/detail/detail?sid=6cf1513d-
a99b-4a5e-aba6-
315568551617%40sessionmgr103&vid=0&hid=107&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2
ZQ%3d%3d#AN=47336955&db=a9h

Hansen, M. (n.d.), Denver’s Five Points, retrieved from

http://www.blackpast.org/aaw/denvers-five-points

McBride, A. (2006, December), Landmark Cases – Brown v. Board of Education (1954),

retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/rights/landmark_brown.html

Walter, J. (1996), Changing Status of the Black Athlete in the 20th Century United
States, retrieved from http://www.americansc.org.uk/Online/walters.htm