Part One:
IS IT TOO RISKY TO REOPEN SCHOOLS & COLLEGES?
Our guests are Valerie Endress, professor of political communications at Rhode Island College, and Steven Greene, professor of political science at North Carolina State University. We discuss the difficult decisions facing colleges and local school districts in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
Students would suffer harm either way. If schools do not reopen with in-person classes, then students will lose out on some or all of the year’s education, including sports and extra-curricular activities, as well as the benefits of experiential learning. They will also miss the social learning and community-building education that they would derive from interacting with their peers (in and out of the actual classroom). Emotional harms such as depression have been well-documented.
On the other hand, if colleges and schools re-open their physical spaces, there is a very real risk that COVID-19 will mushroom and many people will get sick — students, teachers, staff, the surrounding community. Indeed, a number of schools and colleges have already chosen to open their campuses and then, within a very short time, closed down again as the virus quickly spiked.
We are concerned that the risk seems greater than the benefits of reopening the campuses, but that colleges, especially, are choosing to reopen for the wrong reasons. They are hurting financially, and they cannot afford to lose the higher tuition payments they would receive if students returned to campus. Putting people’s health in danger for financial reasons would be contrary to the student-service mission of these institutions. We hope that safety will prevail.
Part Two:
SHIRLEY CHISHOLM AND OTHER BLACK WOMEN LAID THE GROUNDWORK FOR KAMALA HARRIS
We speak with Sharon Austin, professor of political science at the University of Florida, about the debt that Kamala Harris owes to Shirley Chisholm and other Black women who have run for the White House. Chisholm ran for president in 1972 — and persevered in her campaign — even though everyone told her it was a Quixotic endeavor. Even Black male politicians discouraged her and refused to take her candidacy seriously. (Perhaps they felt threatened by her.)
Even after the election, Chisholm continued to travel the country and speak to idealists, young people and especially Black women. She encouraged them to stand up for their beliefs, to get involved in politics, including running for office themselves.
Over the years, in addition to motivating women to run for school board and local office, Shirley Chisholm began urging them to run for higher office, where the power is. It may have seemed daunting to her listeners. But, as she herself had proven, the simple act of running — of confidently asserting that you are good enough to lead people, that your ideas have value and must at least be listened to, that your bold policies can make America a better country — will have a hugely positive impact on the future of our nation and the world.
Regarding the possibility of a Black woman achieving the highest office in the land — as in other contexts — “if people can’t see it, then they won’t believe it,” and they won’t expend their energy to support it. That is why Kamala Harris’s being on the presidential ticket with Joe Biden is such an achievement. Today, almost 50 years after Shirley Chisholm’s historic run, many Americans have evolved to the point where they can see it as a real possibility.
Some people get to open doors, and others get to walk through those doors. Kamala Harris may not have known Shirley Chisholm, but Harris’s career serves as testament to the prescience of Chisholm’s long-view philosophy.
IS THE UNITED STATES AT A TIPPING POINT?
We also discussed whether the United States is at an important tipping point right now. We’ve seen a national reawakening to the horror we feel as Pres Trump tries to lead us into chaos, hatred, and exclusion, sickness and financial ruin. In addition, broad and diverse groups of people have risen up in outrage over the murder of George Floyd, police excesses, and systemic racism. Together, in many cases led by our younger generations, Americans have vowed to build a more cohesive country. Perhaps we are on the verge of a tectonic shift in the fabric of our society, where America returns to its true self, reclaims its revolutionary values of freedom, equality, unity, and compassion. We’re all in this together. E Pluribus Unum (Out of many, one).
