Alumni Address Peer Mentors

Nine alumni returned to the Governor's School for the Leadership Lunch sponsored by the Peer Mentors Program. The goal of the lunch was to connect African-American students with alumni who have started their careers and who are interested in offering advice and act as role models for current Governor’s School students.

Pictured above from left to right are Tania Bolden '07, Counselor Joy Davis, Britney Robinson '07, Latonya Johnson '98, Ashante Smith '95, Rasheeda Creighton Matthews '95, Michael Wilson '96, Stacy Lee '02, Tiffany Preston '98, and Kathryn Brown '07.

Uruguay Teacher to Visit MLWGS

Congratulations to Spanish teacher Donna Bennington and MLWGS for being selected by the U.S. Department of State to host Ana Maria Szephegyi Striegl, a high school teacher from Montevideo, Uruguay.

Ms. Szephegyi will be an integral part of our school community from the 5th to the 18th of February, 2010.

The Uruguay Teacher and Principal Educational Seminar Exchange Program is administered by America Councils for International Education and the Commission for Educational Exchange between Uruguay and the United States. The goal of the program is for the participating schools to exchange professional expertise, increase cultural knowledge and establish lasting ties between the host schools in the U.S. and Uruguay.

Alumna Publishes Political Science Text

Andra Gillespie '95, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Emory University, edited Whose Black Politics? Cases in Postracial Black Leadership, which was just published by Routledge Press.

Here's from the book's website [http://www.whoseblackpolitics.com/]:

The past decade has witnessed the emergence of a new vanguard in African American political leaders. They came of age after Jim Crow segregation and the Civil Rights Movement, they were raised in integrated neighborhoods and educated in majority white institutions, and they are more likely to embrace deracialized campaign and governance strategies. Members of this new cohort, such as Cory Booker, Artur Davis, and Barack Obama, have often publicly clashed with their elders, either in campaigns or over points of policy. And because this generation did not experience codified racism, critics question whether these leaders will even serve the interests of African Americans once in office.

With these pressing concerns in mind, this volume uses multiple case studies to probe the implications of the emergence of these new leaders for the future of African American politics. Editor Andra Gillespie establishes a new theoretical framework based on the interaction of three factors: black leaders’ crossover appeal, their political ambition, and connections to the black establishment. She sheds new light on the changing dynamics not only of Black politics but of the current American political scene.

The book is also available in Kindle format from Amazon.com at this address.