An evening with educator Jane Elliott

An evening with educator Jane Elliott

Jane Elliott, an internationally known teacher, lecturer, diversity trainer, and recipient of the National Mental Health Association Award for Excellence in Education, will conduct a workshop with McCaskey High School students and offer a lecture open to the public during a visit to Lancaster on November 11.

As a schoolteacher, Elliott became known for her “Blue eyes/Brown eyes” exercise, which uses eye color rather than skin color to demonstrate racial segregation to school-age children. She says she was motivated to teach about racism’s effects watching news coverage of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. The “Blue eyes/Brown eyes” classroom exercise was filmed in 1970 and became the documentary, “The Eye of the Storm.”

There will be a public screening of the documentary film prior to Elliott’s public lecture. The lecture will take place in the McCaskey East auditorium. Doors will open at 6 p.m., with the film screening beginning at 6:20. Elliott will begin her lecture at 7 p.m.

“We fully expect the evening’s discussion with Jane Elliott to be thought-provoking, but also personally engaging for our students – several McCaskey students will take the lead in organizing the event, hosting Mrs. Elliott, and moderating the discussion,” said McCaskey history teacher Dr. Todd Mealy. “Jane is an individual that challenges her audiences, regardless of background or ideology. I think our students will be up for the challenge and we hope the community will join us.”

Mealy oversees the Leon “Buddy” Glover Public Service Project, an interdisciplinary program open to any interested student, primarily juniors and seniors. Students are given an array of problems to solve and a series of speakers talking about problems in different fields, such as law.

Each student is completing an individual project aimed at improving life at McCaskey and can earn a community service credit.Past speakers as part of the project include law professor LeRoy Pernell, the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit challenging controversial new education laws in the state of Florida, filmmaker Keith Beauchamp, producer of the movie “Till,” about the life and death of Emmett Till, and author Kate Clifford Larson, whose Harriet Tubman biography “Bound for the Promised Land” became the basis for the film “Harriet.”

Host or Publisher School District of Lancaster