Dr. Michael Browner, Jr.
June 6, 2022 Some people go through life unsure of who or what they will become. Dr. Michael Browner, Jr. is not one of those people. He was a teacher with Newport Public Schools from 1998 until last year when he accepted the position of Assistant Principal at Shea High School in Pawtucket, RI. His passion for education, his students, and their well-being, is all encompassing. We recently sat down for a conversation in his East Providence home. This is what he said … TT- We are sitting here with Dr. Michael Browner, Jr.; Why don’t we start with the basics? Where were you born, raised…? MB- I was born and raised in Newport, Rhode Island. It’s my hometown. I was born there in 1975. My parents are Michael Browner, Sr. and the late Katherine E. Browner; she passed away in 2017. I went to the public schools in Newport, K through 12—three schools, Sheffield Elementary, Thompson Junior High School, and Rogers High School, class of 1993. I went on to Rhode Island College, class of 1998, where I earned a Bachelor’s degree in secondary education and history. Then I returned to my hometown to become a teacher. So right out of college, literally out of the dorms in 1998, I returned to Newport and was hired that summer. I began teaching at Thompson Middle School in September 1998. I once was at Thompson from 1986-1989, when it was still a junior high school; Thompson became a middle school in 1994. I taught Grade 7 social studies at Thompson for 23 years, 1998-2021. Just last June was my 23rd year. I was hired as an Assistant Principal at Shea High School in Pawtucket, RI in August 2021. I returned to Rhode Island College in 2001 and earned a Master’s degree in School Administration in 2004. In 2014, I began a joint Ph.D. Program in Education with URI and RIC, which I completed in 2019. TT- So before you got to RIC, did you know you wanted to become a teacher? MB- I did. I did. TT- How old were you when you knew? MB- I’m glad you asked me that, Tom. I knew when I was a junior in high school, Mr. Kevin Burns was my 11th grade US history teacher, and I knew I wanted to be like Mr. Burns. He was a good teacher. He was good to us—he lectured a lot and I knew I didn’t want to be a lecturer (laughs) but I don’t know, there’s always been something about history for me. Even when I was a little kid, learning about different historical periods has been interesting to me, especially the 1960s. The 1960s has always been my favorite decade to learn about. I’m a big Motown fan (laughs) here’s The Supremes right here (Dr. Browner has black and white photographs around his home, of well-known and inspirational Black Americans as well as members of his family). I remember when I was in Mr. In Burns' class in 1991/92, the film ‘JFK’ by Oliver Stone came out and was very popular. There were a number of new conspiracy theories about the assassination of President John Kennedy that were in the news media as a result of the film. I wrote a history paper for Mr. Burns on the Kennedy assassination and I earned an ‘A’. I was so proud of that paper I later framed it; That paper is now on the wall in my office at Shea High School. I was so proud of that paper because Mr. Burns was not an easy teacher, and to earn an ‘A’ from him meant you had to be doing something right. So I knew in high school, in 11th grade, that secondary education and history were what I wanted to pursue as a career. TT- Now you need to have a graduate degree to teach-- MB- No you don’t. I will say, however, that certification requirements in the state of Rhode Island in 2022 make it extremely taxing for prospective teachers to enter the field of education. I would say it is significantly more difficult, and more of a challenge, to become a teacher now than it was in 1998. This is just me speaking freely with you, but I think that many state educational officials are putting young people through a lot more to become a teacher than is necessary. Because by doing that, it turns off a lot of young people, who at 21, 22 years old, would make great young teachers. It runs them off. Who wants to go through a five-year degree program beginning at age 18 for a $45,000 starting salary at age 23? And then owe an excessive sum of money in student loans because certification requirements caused the need for a fifth year? If you’re starting a teacher out at $85,000, that would be something different. But it took me almost my whole career to make that kind of money as a teacher. It takes ten years to reach the top step in most school districts in Rhode Island over ten years. My starting salary in 1998 was $27,000 and at the time and age 23, I thought I was rich! My first paycheck, when I was 23 years old, was a little over $900; I never had that much money written on a check next to my own name and I couldn’t believe it. By then I had moved out of my mom’s and gotten my first apartment. My mom and I lived in the projects (low-income housing) and I was the last of three boys to leave home, but I was making too much money to be living in subsidized housing. So to start a teacher out at $45,000, in today’s money, that’s not a strong beginning salary for the amount of work that teachers must perform. My soul looks back in wonder at how I made it through. It’s all relative I suppose and with only a Bachelor’s degree in 1998, I owed maybe $10,000 in student loans. That’s nothing compared to what young people are coming out of college owing today: Big money, $50K, $60, sometimes $100K. No young person at 23 years old should owe that kind of money for a Bachelor’s degree. TT- Especially not a state school. MB- No. No. I could see owing that kind of money to Harvard or Princeton, and even those schools often give decent financial aid packages, but young people should not owe that kind of money as a result of attending their state schools or really any schools that are not Ivy League. TT- Now the Master’s degrees for teachers. When did that start to happen? MB- I knew, well I discovered that as a classroom teacher, that in order to buy a house and set myself up for options later, that I would need to get a Masters. I said to myself “if you want to advance beyond the classroom, become a principal, or move into administration in some capacity, you’re going to need a Masters.” So I looked at programs, and RIC is very special to me. Providence College was a little more expensive, and I didn’t want to go to private school for my Masters. I wanted to remain public. So from 2001 to 2004 I worked on my Master’s degree, but after that I still remained in the classroom for another ten plus years. I will reference my doctoral dissertation to you, because it was about what’s known as the invisible tax for Black teachers. In a state like Rhode Island, where the number of Black teachers is very small, our experiences are a lot different. For many years, I was the only Black teacher at Thompson Middle School. TT- So I found an interview you gave after you got the Shea job. And you referenced that, you said it was important for you to remain an example- MB- Let me explain that, Tom, thank you for bringing that up. When I was teaching at Thompson, before I finished the PhD in 2019, at the end of the 2017-2018 school year I decided I didn’t want to be writing a dissertation and teaching 7th grade at the same time. So a dear friend and colleague, Dr. David Byrd, who at the time was the director of the School of Education at The University of Rhode Island, offered me the opportunity to teach full time at URI while I finished my dissertation. He said, “Mike, this is a great opportunity, there is a new class on education and social justice that I really would like you to teach.” Dr. Byrd explained that he wanted me to design the curriculum for this particular course. So he asked if I would be interested in taking a leave of absence from the Newport public schools to pursue this opportunity. So I made a request for a leave of absence and the superintendent and the Newport School Committee agreed to my request. However, when you take a sabbatical from public school, depending on the district, in Newport our contract said if you take a sabbatical you have to give two years back to the district. TT- So it’s a two-year sabbatical for two years owed? MB- No. One year for two years. I knew that going in, but once that year was over, I went Aghh (shivers, laughs) I have to do two more years in 7th grade or serve the district in some capacity. You don’t have to go back to that same job, but there were no administrative vacancies, so I went back to the job that I left. So I taught for two more years, and I hate to say this but it felt almost like a [prison] sentence (laughs) because I had already done 20 years! Plus I earned a PhD, Tom! I didn’t want to go back and teach 7th grade with a PhD! Not that I’m above that position, but I felt like I was now too smart to teach 7th grade. I’m kidding of course but I really was ready to move on to the next level of my career. I went back to teach for two more years because if you don’t go back and give the two years, they can make you pay. When you take a sabbatical, you get half your salary. And if I didn’t go back, they would’ve made me repay over $40,000. I didn’t want that and I didn’t want my name dragged through the mud: “Oh watch out for that Mike Browner, he doesn’t believe in following agreements. You can’t trust him.” I didn’t want to be that guy. I believe in honoring contracts, and so I owed Newport those two years and I went back and taught those two years. It was important for me to honor that commitment, and I also wanted kids to have a teacher with the highest level of education. I wanted them to have a teacher they called “Doctor.” And rightly so, my students called me Dr. Browner. TT-Right? You earned it, right?” MB- On my bulletin board was ‘Mr. Browner’ in red lettering because our school colors are red and white. And so over the years the red had faded. So I put, in a large Ziploc bag, a large red letter “D.” I saved it for when I finished the PhD. And so, come time to return to Thompson, I took off the faded red “M” for mister, and put up the fresh new red letter “D” for doctor. And the kids used to come up to me and say, “Oh look, you got that new fresh letter D up there.” And I was like. “You darn right, it’s Dr. Browner, now.” So a lot of kids who came back when I was Mr. Browner, when they were in my class when I was working on my PhD, they remembered that I had saved that large red-letter D in the Ziploc bag, and they said, “Wow! Wow! Dr. Browner you did it, you did it. We were in your class when you were working on your PhD.” I was trying to use the D as an incentive for them to know that adults have to work hard for things that they get. And the reward was, not just the title of being called Dr. Browner, but I had this degree that would advance my career. So the idea was to get them to see that learning never stops, even at 46 years old, I was saying “Guys, I’m not too old to learn, to achieve something else in my life, and you want to always keep going.” And so I remember the 7th graders that were with me when I was earning the PhD were proud to return and call me Dr. Browner. In the spring of 2021, I applied for the principalship at Thompson, was a finalist but was not offered the position. I then ventured out of Newport and applied in other districts throughout the state, and that’s when Dr. Williams, the Superintendent of the Pawtucket School Department, recruited me for Shea. TT- So this is your first Admin job. What did you find once you finally got there? What is it like to be above the fray? MB- It’s interesting, Tom, because when I left the classroom, I was really nervous because it’s all I had ever known since I was 23-years-old; I had always been a classroom teacher. I spent some time in an administrative capacity in Newport as an interim assistant principal at our school when our principal became very ill, but it wasn’t the whole year. I was not thrilled about being an administrator at the same school where I had been a teacher for so many years. To me, becoming an administrator outside of my safety net was important. When I was hired in Pawtucket, I didn’t realize Pawtucket is as diverse as it is. I did not realize that going into Shea High School, white students would be the minority. Tom, when I was first hired at Shea, and school started that first week of September, I don’t think I saw ten white kids. TT- And we’re talking about 900 kids? MB- Four grades, 930 kids, and I don’t think I saw ten white kids. TT- Is it the same at Tolman? MB- Close to it. I believe Tolman has a few more students that are non-minority, or white students; I don’t like using the term 'minority' because it’s so outdated—but just the same, I was really shocked at that. And I didn’t realize the full contingency of students of color at Shea. And so there were more teachers of color than I was used to in Newport, and so I was kind of taken aback by the number of students of color at Shea. I mean I knew that Pawtucket is an inner-city urban district, but I didn’t fully realize the number of students of color at Shea. So that first week of school, the behavior, um, Tom, I can’t even tell you the use of the “N” word like there’s nothing to it, and I have a hard time with that. A very hard time with that. And hearing that constantly, just kids passing by in the hallway, “My N-word this,” and I had to ask myself, “Mike, did you make the right decision…did you do the right thing by coming to this school?” The behavior was overwhelming. And even now, that was September and it is now June, graduation is this Friday, and I have to honestly tell you that I still question whether or not I made the right decision, in terms of my longevity, because I don’t know how long I will be at Shea. Some of the behavior exhibited by 17 and 18-year-old kids is not what I’m used to. Because remember, I taught middle school my entire career and 12 and 13-year-old kids act like that because they’re supposed to. But when you’re 17 or 18, there’s a certain level of maturity that I thought more Shea kids would have. And to me, that has nothing to do with Covid. TT- Right. Would you say, and it’s hard for me to say because I don’t have kids-- MB- I have one. He’s now 26. Product of East Providence High School. Young people are being raised differently now, Tom, it’s a different time. This millennial age, I had to work on my son with that, he was very self-centered; this new millennial age group of kids in their teens and twenties, they can be very entitled with the mindset of somebody owes them something. I tried to teach my son, “Nobody owes you anything.” I made it clear to him: I did what I was supposed to do as a parent, I fed you, I clothed you, I made sure you understood that if you’re going to continue to live in this house into your early twenties, you have to finish your education, because people who live in this house get college degrees. So if you’re not going to get a college degree, you need to find another place to live. Especially when you’re over twenty-one. Because he finished college this past May, at twenty-four. My son spent some time at PC and then he transferred to URI. I made it clear to him that my father was college educated and it was important to me that I raise my son the same way, with a high level of academic expectation and achievement. But too many of these kids today, these millennials, have this way about them that is very selfish. TT- We see it at work too. You and I are in the same generation. Nobody promised you anything. MB- We had to work hard for everything we had. TT- People had work ethic and you were proud of it. My father used to say, if you’re gonna do something, do it to the best of your ability or don’t do it at all. MB- I have two cars. There’s a Passat in the driveway that you saw, and I have a Cadillac in the garage. I always drove big luxury cars because my parents had Buicks, and my grandparents had Cadillacs, that’s what I grew up riding in. My father and mother each had their own Buicks; we always had a luxury sedan when I was growing up. So if that’s what you see, that’s what you want. And so when I started teaching, I had a Buick LeSabre. Then my second year teaching I said, “this Buick ain’t enough, I want me a Cadillac.” I wanted to be like my Grandpa Browner and drive me a Cadillac. So there I was, 24-years-old, and I went out and bought this big old green 1995 Cadillac Deville. Big old thing. Tom, you couldn’t tell me nothing. I was as cool as could be driving that big Cadillac right up to Thompson Middle School. (laughs) I tried to teach my students that nobody owes you anything. That Cadillac didn’t just appear. You have to work hard for everything that you want, everything that you get. So when I finished the PhD in 2019, it was bittersweet because my mom had passed away two years before, and she couldn’t be there for the commencement and celebration. I only had the Passat at that time because I had gotten rid of my Lincoln Town Car. And I said, “Mike, you need a car that says Dr. Browner has arrived.” That Passat just wasn’t enough, it just doesn’t say “Dr. Browner has arrived on campus.” So Tom, I went out and bought a Cadillac DTS (DeVille Touring Sedan), and I said, “Yes, this is the car that says Dr. Browner is here.” (laughs) TT- What year is it? MB-2008, I’ll let you see it before you go. It’s out in the garage. TT- Let me ask you this, because it’s hard to talk about these subjects because everyone gets all touchy, but coming from the public safety aspect, when we respond to schools for these kids that are out of control and having tantrums and throwing things, and threatening violence—having these psychological issues, and we show up and now there’s five firemen, two cops, a social worker, the school nurse, teachers, everybody’s there, and now it’s almost like we gave the kid an audience, and it’s not all the time, because sometimes the kids are very grateful for the help, but other times it goes in the complete other direction, and the whole time you’re there you’re kind of like “Junior doesn’t need all of this, he needs his parents. Or a parent.” MB-And sometimes they’re the last to show up! TT- Right. Or they show up as we’re wheeling him out. We just got him calm enough to get on the stretcher, and here they come in yelling at us before we even get the kid into the ambulance. So it’s kind of like a double-edged sword. 911 and the emergency services are being asked to do things they were never intended for. MB- I agree. Let me offer this perspective, because before this year I didn’t have much experience with what you’re talking about. And even at Shea, I’ve only experienced it a few times. My experiences in this vein, particularly in this new administrative position is you have to meet kids and families where they are. Newport has its urban elements, but it is not Pawtucket. I’ve learned, even more so now, you have to meet kids and families where they are and bring them to the next level. And so that’s the same thing, when you’re meeting kids in crisis, where a kid has had some psychological issue or breakdown such that 911 or social service have been called; I’ve learned to try to de-escalate the situation. And as more personnel show up, get some of those first responders out. So as members of your task force come on the scene, slowly teachers and administrators need to be backing up and leaving the scene, because you don’t want a kid to be bombarded by twenty people, even though all of them are there for the kid, it’s too much. It’s overwhelming. TT- Do you find—like we discussed it’s an urban environment, and it’s a challenging environment, and the kids, sometimes they don’t even have the things they need, the things they should have, like backpacks and clothes-- MB- Priorities are in the wrong place when students in low income/high poverty areas have on $200 Jordan sneakers and an $800 cell phone. That’s where the breakdown is for me but the point is, you got $200 sneakers on, you’re carrying this expensive iPhone, but you don’t have a book bag filled with notebooks and pencils, and you’re okay with that? And your parents are okay with that? And because of that, sometimes we [school personnel] end up being okay with that, as school personnel, because it becomes such a challenge to change that mentality. You can only work with kids from 8am to 2:30pm. Six and a half hours a day. After that, they’re left to their own devices. TT- So whatever you may have achieved that day-- MB- James doesn’t go to bed in my house. Because if he did, his behavior wouldn’t be what I’ve seen today. He goes to bed in your house. Too often what we have tried to instill in students at school is undone, unintentionally or not, once they get home. I’m speaking about my whole career, not just Shea High School. A lot of what I try to impart on kids as far as behavior, respect, personal responsibility, accountability, during their time with me, I’ve seen undone. But I’ve also seen it work. And many years later, 35-year-old men come back to school or see me on the street or in a restaurant and say thank you. Or, write to me in a letter from the ACI when they’re 24 years old and locked up after I had them at twelve, they write to me many years later and say, “Mr. Browner, I really appreciate what you were trying to do for me when I was in your seventh-grade class. I wish you were my dad because I would’ve listened better to you. I didn’t have a dad. I only had you at school. I wish I lived with you.” TT-That’s gotta kill you though. MB- Two letters. A boy named Anthony and a boy named Carlos. They’re both out of jail now and have become fathers and are doing quite well, but they both spent time at the ACI. I wrote about them in my dissertation because I wanted a true authentic description of what it’s like to be a black teacher. And those were my lived experiences. Getting those letters in the mail at school from the ACI…they both wrote to me to tell me where they were, and that they appreciated what I did with them when they were seventh graders. Tom, I can’t tell you, when I was writing my dissertation downstairs at my desk, and including those stories, I didn’t realize how much it affected me because I was crying while I was writing those parts. And I had to go get some tissues, pull myself together, take a little break, and then go back to writing. Then I would cry again just remembering those things. I hadn’t thought about some of those stories in years, because those kids went to the ACI at 18,19, and were writing to me when they were in their twenties. You don’t think about those things all the time. I had to go downstairs to the basement and find those letters in a box and read them again so I could include them in my dissertation, and it took my breath away because I had forgotten about that. To have a kid write to you and say thank you, from the ACI, thank you for what you were trying to do, and say “if I had listened, I wouldn’t be here locked up.” I can’t even describe the full measure of what that meant to me. It means, Tom, that I had accomplished what I had originally intended to do which was to make a difference. All I ever wanted to do was make a difference. When a child or young adult is writing to you from the ACI, you made a difference. I’ve been invited to weddings, baby showers, and a number of things by former students. My first-year kids were 13 when I was 23 years old; now my first-year kids are turning 37 while I am turning 47. It’s amazing to think that the kids I first had in my first year are 37 years old. I started getting students from my classmates, I started getting their children, and a few years back, I started to get the children of former students. This boy Isiah who's graduating from Rogers, I taught his mother. When the first kid ever said, “Dr. Browner, you taught my father,” I said Oh my God I need to hang this up. (laughs) I’m old. I taught your father? I remembered well because that boy looked just like his father too. TT- In all the years it’s easy to get jaded. I’ve got 13 years on the FD and after a while it mounts up. How have you stayed fresh? MB-I’ve tried to stay fresh and continue to work hard to do so. Teaching was hard. When you get a new crew every September, you want to be fresh and ready for them. I always tried to be that way. But Covid put a wrench in that. We had to adopt a hybrid model where we taught kids on computer and in person all at the same time. That was difficult. It was a nightmare. Because I had this one boy, Brodie, he came to the meet on Google. He and some other kids were being taught through the portal and he came to the meeting with a popsicle. I said, “Brodie, you listen to me right now. You go put that popsicle back in the freezer. Go put that back and rejoin the meet and act like you have some sense. And act like you’re ready to learn. We will sit right here and wait.” I was so mad at him, Tom, that I could hardly see straight. Here he comes sitting there licking on a popsicle like he didn’t have a care in the world. That’s the kind of thing that makes you ask, “Maybe it’s time for me to let this thing go, Mike, maybe 23 years is enough.” (laughs) Because fighting with a kid over a popsicle? I’m sure in his mind he was thinking I’m at home, I can have a popsicle if I want to; I’m not in school, I can have whatever I want. Then I would see other kids with their brothers and sisters who weren’t old enough to be in school, climbing all over their siblings and distracting them. They’re crying, parents are cooking dinner in the background, the dog’s running around, and I was just like, “What has my life become?” (laughs) How am I supposed to educate your child with pots and pans banging in the background. I couldn’t be mad at my students because they couldn’t control that. So Covid brought on a whole new genre of issues. TT- Let me just say this. During the plague, we would be showing up at peoples’ homes at noon and everyone is in bed. The parents, the kids, it was like everybody went to bed for a year. It was really gross. MB- It was horrible TT- What did the kids lose? MB-They lost that camaraderie with each other. The interactions with peers and adults. Naturally, you act differently with your parents than you do with your teachers. So when kids came back to school and started acting like we were their parents, just the respect thing, they lost a lot of that. They lost that ability to interact appropriately with others, especially adults. We are slowly getting it back. And it’s not just Shea. It’s many schools across the state and across the country. Behavior has been very difficult. TT- Are they holding kids back? MB- That’s a difficult thing to do, because so much of the learning loss, particularly for kids with special needs, the learning loss is what we’re trying to figure out and address appropriately. TT- It seems like the kids lost their structure, and then everything came crashing down. MB- Loss of structure. Loss of authority. Getting along with others. Sitting in your bedroom for six months when I’m trying to teach you about Woodrow Wilson and WW1, and you have your game system going, which I can’t see because you have the camera turned away or turned off, nobody is going to say anything because your parents are working and you’re home alone. What am I supposed to do? That was one of the things that really pushed me out of the classroom. It was very uncertain. When is this going to end? Nobody knew. So I just thought maybe this was the time to segue into the administrative side of education. TT- So when you took the job, did you have goals in mind? As far as what you wanted to achieve? Like what is your position? What are your daily responsibilities as an Assistant Principal? MB- It’s a combination of things. I’m in charge of attendance and discipline for Grade 11 at Shea. A lot that entails working with clerks to make sure attendance records are accurately kept, working with an administrative team to make sure we are on top of students as far as getting work done, working with the guidance department to make sure the kids are working on their credits toward graduation, working with our climate and culture staff members to make sure we are getting parental involvement, making sure we are providing kids with opportunities to participate in school activities, it’s a lot. It’s very different from being a classroom teacher. TT- You go from being in charge of a classroom of kids, to a thousand students, right? MB- I am a leader for one grade which is not quite a thousand students but I am an administrator in a school with close to a thousand students. I evaluate teachers and getting out of the office and into the classrooms to see what kind of teaching is taking place is a very enjoyable thing to do. Evaluating teachers is an important part of the job, but my favorite part of the job is getting to know the kids. Getting to know the kids, working with them, and calling them down to my office to see where they are academically and socially. That loss of social time with one another during Covid was something that a lot of kids lost. And we are slowly working with them to getting that back. TT- I’m a history major as well, but my specialty was colonial American, 1760-1790. MB- I taught the 1850s to the 1960s. TT- So me and history have an understanding. I defend the wall when it comes to history. I don’t like when people re-write it for any reason. History is history for a reason. When things happen in modern times, and it tries to effect history, that’s where I put up the wall. I don’t want parts of history to be erased, re-written, because if you allow it once, who’s to say it won’t happen again? And by someone who may not have history’s best intentions in mind? Because it’s more important to know the awful things that have happened, than to make everything vanilla, bland, nothing to see here. The awful things are out there. MB- They are. And we have to address them with kids. For example, I always try to make sure the kids understood that when I taught them about American society in the 1950s and 1960s, I would always begin with Civil Rights. And I tried to always start with the unfortunate death of Emmett Till. He was killed in Mississippi on August 28, 1955. I wouldn’t do a large unit on brutal murder of this 14-year-old martyr but it was important to me to make sure kids knew his name. And that, without an Emmett Till, I don’t believe there would’ve been a Rosa Parks. Even though Rose Parks was a grown woman (at 42 years old) in 1955, a lot of people don’t realize Emmett Till was murdered in August, four months before Rose Parks stance in Montgomery on December 1, 1955. TT- Now Emmett Till, for everyone who doesn’t know, was a 14-year-old black kid accused of an inappropriate interaction with a white woman. Sound right? MB- That is correct. He was from Chicago, Illinois, which is obviously up north and he did not understand the full measure of the extreme racism that existed in a state like Mississippi in 1955. I don’t think his mother, Mrs. Mamie Till-Mobley, realized where she was sending him. Because to be Black in Mississippi in 1955 was dangerous enough. But to be from the north and to travel to Mississippi in 1955 and be 14 years-old, was … TT- A recipe for disaster. MB- Yes. A recipe for disaster. And unfortunately, I don’t think his mother ever fully thought of what could happen even though he was in the care of relatives. TT- True, but who could think monsters like this existed? MB- Because you’re in 1955 and even though most Black folk knew how dangerous the south could be, for Emmett Till’s mother she probably felt that since she had relatives who lived there, who were going to be looking out for him and talked her into his safety, she let him go. And so it’s important that kids understand that before Rosa Parks ever refused to give up her seat in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955, there was a boy killed in Mississippi, one state over, for a lie. So that fueled Mrs. Parks’ reaction on December 1, 1955, when she said, “I’m not moving.” TT- “I’ve had enough.” MB- And a lot of people think that Rosa Parks sat in the white section on purpose to start some trouble. That is not the case. She sat in the section designated for people of color, but the law in Montgomery at that time said Black passengers had to yield their seats to the whites if the white section was full. Which it was. She had to give up her seat to a white man even though she was sitting in the section designated for her. So a lot of people think she was sitting in the white section on purpose, so please, Tom, help me get the word out, to fix this. There are too many people in this country who think she sat in the white section and that is not true. We’ve got to fix that with Black folk too, because some think the same thing. It's not true. Mrs. Parks wrote an autobiography called Rosa Parks—My Story, in which she clearly explains that she did not sit in the white section. TT- Even if she did, all of this was inevitable. MB- Even if she did. And a lot of people don’t know about Claudette Colvin, who was a 15-year-old girl who refused to give up her seat in September. Which was four months before Mrs. Parks. Same city. But because Claudette Colvin got pregnant, her actions were not widely publicized and the NAACP did not want a 15-year-old pregnant girl to be the test case for freedom. Instead, there was a desire for a dignified, classy, religious, NAACP member, hard-working woman to be the test case for the city of Montgomery. Because her test case as a dignified member of the NAACP, could change the law and it did, one year later in 1956. TT- Now let me ask you this-- MB- I’m not trying to teach you history, I’m telling you what I always taught the kids so that they would have the power to go out and make people understand that one person can make a difference. That was my only point to them. One person can make a difference. Emmett Till didn’t have the opportunity to live out his life and see what he would’ve become, but his life made a difference, even though it was taken at 14-- TT- It’s a horrific story. MB- Yes, it’s a horrific story. TT- Even 70 years later, the details are freaking horrific. Now let me ask you this. When the movement came, as it should, and it was completely understandable when it did, but when they started taking down the confederacy, the statues that were still in the south, my thought was these statues of these men, shouldn’t be melted down, I kind of thought they should be gathered in a park somewhere so that that evil could be taught and never die. As I said, history shouldn’t be erased. You can’t learn from nothing. MB- I see what you’re saying. If anything, Tom, this is where I stand on that. Give them back to the families. If any members of the families are still around, give it back to them. There’s no need to glorify it in the town square, in 2022, when they were first put up in 1955, in the same cities where you still saw signs that said, “Colored or White Only.” Because we’ve overcome. And since we’ve overcome, we need to start acting like it. TT- Do you think those statues were originally put up as a threat, as a reminder? MB- In some cases they probably were, but they were put up to recognize white men who were glorified for their stance--not for freedom in a democracy, but for division in a democracy. Now I don’t know the stories of every single man whose image was used for a monument, and what they stood for, because I didn’t know them personally, but God knows. TT- They swore an oath. MB- We have a responsibility to teach our young people that anyone who’s immortalized in a monument, should stand for justice and equality for everyone, and if they didn’t stand for that, in my opinion, in 2022, in every city and state, they should not have a monument. Because people that we put on a town square, represent something for this country, for everybody who lives there. And when we put monuments up, we have to be mindful of that. TT- Let me ask you this, because I’m also a big fiction guy. And there’s a whole controversy with “To Kill a Mockingbird.” They want to take out the “N” word, they want to smooth over the book, the rawness of the book, which is really what made it such a sensation. MB- Totally true. In 1962, there were still signs up that still read “Colored and White Only,” in Mississippi, where that book is based. TT- The way times change, and the way our vocabulary changes, when a book is written during a particular time frame, that writer can’t be expected to know the implications a hundred years later. MB- That’s right. To take certain themes or words out of context, when you’re writing in a specific time period, it can cause a text to lose its authenticity. That’s why the book, The Help by Kathryn Stockett, which was written in 2009, still contains certain uses of that word. My feeling, in schools, as educators, as teachers, social studies teachers, English teachers, schools have to be careful not to justify using the word, particularly when reading it aloud. So if you’re the educator, and you’re reading Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird aloud to your students, you have a responsibility as the adult in the room, not to use the word, period. You don’t know who in your classroom it may offend. We had a teacher in Newport who did just the opposite. Not realizing that a student in her Google meet didn’t want to hear that from her white teacher. And Black students should have a certain level of expectation that their teacher is going to respect them enough not to use that word in their presence. As adults, as educators, we are always modeling for our students. And we have a responsibility regardless of our skin color, to always model for our students. We should not be using words we do not want to hear from them. Even when we are reading from text. You saw the word, we are following along reading, we all see it. You don’t have to read it aloud, because we all saw it. We know what year this book is based in. A colleague who read the word aloud came to me, the only black teacher, and I was glad that she came to me, and I offered her my perspective. First, I asked her if she was sure she wanted to hear my response and she said yes. I tell her she should have known better. And I said to her, “You should’ve known better than that.” You are a seasoned educator, and you know we have all kinds of kids in this district. You have to fix this. You have to put yourself aside, own your mistake and apologize for it. Because you should’ve known better. TT- Was there any blowback from that? MB- There was, but not from the conversation we had. It got nasty, from the parent, the student, and another person outside the district got involved. I went to the principal and assistant principal and I said, “If you need support, I’m well educated on this subject.” Meaning, I’m also experienced, because I’ve had parents use that word with me, and I’ve had to figure out a way to come back at them in the most professional capacity possible. And I was able to do that. Because I know who I am. I have enough self-respect not to be offended by ignorant words. I know who I am and I know who raised me; my father always said: “you cannot control what other people say or do, you can only control how you react.”. So I communicated with the administration and told them that if they needed my support or advice, to help them get ahead of this, please let me help. They never took me up on that and I let it go after that. But I told the colleague that came to me, you need to own what you did, apologize, and learn from the experience. TT-When you hear the N-word being tossed around the halls of Shea, and it’s all in that community, meaning it’s not white on black-- MB- It’s rampant and it’s bigger than me. Meaning so many kids are using it in so many instances, that I can’t do it alone. TT- Do you feel that they are disrespecting each other by saying it? MB- I do. But if I went off every time I heard it, I would be constantly going off. They know that when they are talking to me, they are not allowed to use that word. So please, in this office, my office, my space, they know that word’s not welcome, so either you fix what you’re about to say to me, or you leave my office right now. What’s it gonna be? I have to protect my space. I can’t control what you say when you’re talking to other people, but if you’re talking to me, you can’t use that kind of language. Or else we have nothing else to talk about. And if you cannot refrain from using it, then you and I cannot have a conversation until you can. TT- What’s their reaction? MB- “Alright, mister.” And you already know that I don’t like being called ‘mister.’ I appreciate being called by my name, and my last name is Browner. I earned a PhD, which means you have to call me Dr. Browner. Simple as that. It’s not what people call you, it’s what you answer to. TT- Now let’s talk about your office, because that’s the reason, when I was in there, I’m trying to do my job (a colleague had called 911 and we responded to Shea High School,) but I kept looking around at all the pictures and said this guy must have something to say. And I didn’t have time to really look-- MB- When you said that in your email, I really appreciated that. I really did. TT- I mean we’re talking about the heavy weights, Obama, MLK-- MB- Kennedy. TT- Yeah, it felt like you were in a room of substance. MB- I appreciate that, Tom. That means a lot to me. All of the artifacts in my office came from my classroom in Newport. When I arrived at Shea it was unfamiliar territory. I needed things around me that made me feel like I was at home, that made me feel secure, and that I wanted to tell my story as an educator, and I can’t tell you the number of people that have come into my office, and before they even speak to me, they’re too busy looking around at what’s on the walls. “Wow. Where’d you get those LIFE magazines with Jackie Kennedy and Mrs. King?” I sent away for those things because I wanted the kids at school to see them. I wanted the kids at school to know that Mrs. Medgar Evers, who is also on the wall, lost her husband at the brutal hands of Jim Crow. On June 12, 1963 her husband (Medgar Evers, NAAC Field Secretary, was shot dead in their driveway in Jackson, Mississippi. JFK came on TV earlier the same night to give his address on civil rights. And then on November 22, President Kennedy was assassinated. But he wasn’t the only great American killed in 1963 that mattered. A Black man who had three children of his own, a wife, who was fighting the fight in Jackson, Mississippi, where it was dangerous to just be Black, was killed in his own driveway. His life mattered. And the picture of him, his wife, and son on the cover of LIFE magazine on the wall, is because his life mattered. And this is long before this whole Black Lives Matter. And I’m not saying we didn’t need Black Lives Matter, but our lives mattered before the people who came up with the Black Lives Matter movement were even born. I’m older than they are. My life already mattered. And I don’t like people cleaning it up by saying all lives matter. Yes, we know that. But there have been too many instances lately where Black lives haven’t mattered. That’s where that comes from. Yes, all lives matter, and I believe that fully, but you don’t get to say that to counteract Black Lives Matter. Because Black Lives Matter comes from police brutality, which is consistently rampant throughout the United States, where law enforcement has made it clear repeatedly that they don’t respect Black lives as much as other lives. And when I teach that to my students at URI they say, “Hmm, I never really thought about it like that.” You have to think about it like that. Because when Trayvon Martin was murdered for Skittles, a hoodie, and an ice tea, Emmett Till was not new. Emmett Till was just in another time. But Trayvon Martin shouldn’t have been killed when somebody just took the law into their own hands and decided that this young man didn’t look trustworthy. Who gets to decide that? Before George Floyd was killed, we saw and heard that he was having trouble breathing. Why was it decided to just take him out like that? TT- The George Floyd murder, with Chauvin, who had like 22 years-experience, it’s still mind boggling. The three other cops with him have two and three days on the job, these guys didn’t know anything, and I can only say that Chauvin murdered Floyd and led the other three off a cliff, because, especially in a public safety job, whether you’re a fireman or a cop, in the Fire Academy from day one you are told, “When in doubt, follow the senior man.” That’s drilled into your head. If you don’t know what you’re doing, if you’re in a situation you’ve never seen before, you follow the senior man. Because hopefully he’s been there, he’s done it. So that day, I’m sure those other three newbies were saying to themselves “This is wrong. This shit is going sideways.” And they froze. That being said, at some point they had a duty to act, and that senior man thing doesn’t matter because someone’s gonna die. They couldn’t or didn’t break through to him, and now Floyd is dead and four other lives are totally destroyed. MB- I really had to make sure that I taught the kids at school, because when we returned to school after the death of George Floyd, the heightened awareness of the Black Lives Matter movement and Covid, and I wanted to be very careful in the way that I approached such subjects with seventh graders. You don’t want parents thinking that you’re trying to sway their child’s thinking on political issues. So I would very quietly and calmly ask, do you know what BLM means? Do you want to talk about it? I would ask them if they wanted to talk about it. How many people want to talk about it? Let’s vote. I would let the kids direct the conversation rather than me because my mantra has always been once you become a parent or a teacher, it is no longer about you. It’s always about your kid or the kids. I’ve always lived my life like that. When you have a child or students, it’s not about you anymore. As I mentioned earlier, this new millennial era of entitlement is contrary to that. Kids these days think they’re entitled. Everybody owes you something. You know what? You’re entitled to an education at this school, because by law you have to be here because of your age. But you’re not entitled to come in here and speak to us in any old kind of way. You are not entitled to that. So we don’t owe you anything, except the education you are entitled to by law. TT- (laughs) I’m guessing they don’t like hearing that. MB- They don’t like a lot of things we have to say to them. And we don’t say enough of it. That’s why they behave the way they do. TT- Where are your folks from? Were they originally from New England? MB- My mother was born and raised in Newport. She was a Newporter. My father was born in Cleveland, Ohio. And he came to Rhode Island in the Navy in 1972. Of course he was stationed in Newport, and then he met my mother, and then of course I came along three years later. TT- We grew up in Pittsburgh and Cleveland…God’s country. MB- Oh really? TT- What did he do in the Navy? MB- He went to Vietnam, was drafted after he graduated high school in 1971. My Dad decided not to become an officer. He started going to Salve Regina University in Newport, and then got a job with Raytheon. TT- Was he an engineer? MB- He was. He stayed there until he retired. TT- My dad was an engineer too. He went to school for nine years at night to put himself through school. MB- Ha! So did my father. TT- He sold hot dogs at Yankee Stadium to pay the bills. MB- My father worked at Adams’ Drugs to pay tuition and to raise the three of us; I’m the youngest, I have two older brothers-- TT- Your brothers, are they local? Teachers? MB- No, I'm the only one that went to college. Both of them are in the construction field, my oldest brother, Donald, was born in 1968, which makes him 53, and Russell is 52. I was born in 1975. Russell and his wife live in Fall River, and Donald and his wife live in Bristol. TT- I was in construction before I got on the FD… MB- My father tried to tell them you guys can do construction all you want to, but after a while your body’s not going to be able to take it. Make sure you have something to retire from, and have a decent package so you can live. I was the pencil pusher. I didn’t want to do manual labor (laughs). TT- Let me ask you this. I have no kids, so I’m behind the curve. What’s new math? I hear that term and it makes me kind of shiver. Who’s messing around with math and why? MB- It just means that there have been so many advancements in educational pedagogy, you can educate kids using new ways of thinking, new ways of learning the same thing. TT- So they’re not changing math, they’re changing the way it’s taught? MB- Yes. And sometimes when you change the way something’s taught, it changes the way it is learned. TT- I’ve heard long division is gone. Good riddance (laughs) MB- My fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Pauline Barge, make sure you mention her because she is perhaps the greatest influence on my life in education, and you’ll read a little bit about her in my dissertation, she taught in the Jim Crow south, born and raised in Selma, Alabama, and she taught in Selma from 1956 in the thick of Jim Crow until 1968 when she moved to Newport, Rhode Island. She taught at around the time where Emmett Till had just been killed. She taught in Selma from 1956-1968, she knew Martin Luther King Jr., worked with him in Selma and had Jackie Robinson come to her classroom to be a guest speaker. Mrs. Barge moved to Newport in 1968 with her husband who was in the Navy. She taught in Newport from 1968 to 1994 when she retired. When she died in 2006, I played the organ at her funeral. I’m an organist. And I was a speaker at her funeral also. She taught 38 consecutive years, 1956-1994. 38 years nonstop is no small feat. When she retired in 1994 at the age of 70, I spoke at her retirement celebration, and four years later, in 1998 when I started teaching, I asked her to come to my classroom to help me decorate my first classroom. Mrs. Barge was there to help me get started. She was my only Black teacher, and she was very special. Every school day, you would’ve thought she had come out of Ebony magazine. She was so sharp, dressed head to toe, she had such a dignified presence with flawless make up, pearls, necklaces, jewelry, she was so well put together, and she smelled so good (laughs). She was the same age as my grandparents, born in 1924, and of course when you’re nine years old you don’t even think about how old your teacher is. But she was just the consummate educator, the southern drawl, you name it. She was the only Black teacher in the school, like I was many years later, and she just had this aura about her that oozed dignity. She was so dignified. I always carry a little bit of her with me, except for today where I didn’t wear a suit and tie (laughs). Her aura of dignity and pride was beautiful, you just wanted to look at her and be around her. TT- Doc, it’s been great speaking with you. Thank you for taking the time. MB- Take care, Tom. The pleasure was mine.
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AuthorTom Trabulsi was born in the Midwest, attended high school in Rhode Island, and graduated from Boston University with a degree in American History. He was a bike courier in Boston and New York City, worked construction in the mountain west and east coast, and is currently a firefighter in a northeast city. Archives
August 2022
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