Texas’ Jeanes Supervisors and Home Demonstration Agents: Black Women Education Leaders, Rural Black Education, and Jane Crow

• In Event: Black Educators' Enduring Fight for Educational Equity

Abstract

Drawing on material from more than one dozen archives, this paper analyzes Black women educators who specialized in rural areas to understand Black middle class women’s educational leadership development and their vision of racial justice. I look at Jeanes Supervisors and Home Demonstration Agents though a lens attentive to the convergence of the race, gender, and class, as Black middle-class women represented most of these supervisors and agents. I ask: What was their preparation for educational leadership? and What was the nature of their work as educational leaders? Ultimately, I argue that these Black middle class women educational leaders viewed Black educational justice as dependent on the extent to which the specific needs of rural Black communities were addressed.

Authors

• ArCasia D. James-Gallaway, Texas A&M University

• Briana Nelson, Texas A&M University