I heard from my friend Phyllis this morning. I first met her when I was teaching a class at Savannah State University, a historical black college. Somehow the administration there lost their collective minds and had me teach a class on “Community Organizing” which is one of the things that I did for a living. Phyllis was one of my students.
The first day of class I strolled in as the lone white person in the room and announced that advocates must make themselves known. As a result I would not be taking roll but if I didn’t know your name by the end of the semester you would fail the class.
The class met twice so it could have been a daunting task for a shy student when there were over twenty people in the class.
Not for Phyllis. She would show up with a name plate on her desk one day and a tiara on her head the next week that spelled it out. Sweatshirts with her name on it and a banner too. She was relentless.
Whenever I called on her she would say “Phyllis here sir,” answer whatever the question was and conclude with “Phyllis reporting sir.”
I learned who she was before anybody else.
It was a good class and naturally I got them in trouble. Telling them that community organizers need money, the assignment was to develop their own fund raising plan and carry out to see how much money they could raise. I offered no help in devising or influencing the plan.
A few Saturdays later, girls in bikinis lined the circle at State holding signs over their heads that read “TOPLESS CAR WASHES.”
A traffic jam quickly ensued with students wanting their cars washed.
And the class responded by taking their money and washing everything except the top of the car.
I gave them all an “A”.
The following Monday I was summoned to the President’s office where my teaching career was quickly in jeopardy.
“Don’t ever do anything like that again,” I remember being told …not for the first time in my life so it was like water on a duck’s back.
At the time State’s dorms were not in the best of shape. The class told me that they wanted to organize against the college to get better dorms.
I love a challenge and this was a great one.
So on WTOC the CBS affiliate that night was a story of students chaining themselves to a dorm in of renovations.
I gave them all an “A”.
The following Monday I was again summoned to the Principal’s …er…I mean President’s office where I was informed that my contract would be renewed.
So a great teaching career came to an end.
But I hired Phyllis at Union Mission.
And pretty much the rest of the class too.
