Education
Debra's Education
(A scene from Debra's high school experience)
Debra: I was asked not to return home many nights, to my own home. And I was not invited into many of my friends’ homes in high school because of my political engagement, whether it be protesting the war or my organizing to create a daycare center in the town where I lived. That was not favorably received. I marched in civil rights marches, feminist marches, environmental marches. I marched with the Black Panthers. And none of that was supported but that’s what was going on at that time, in New York. And it was a time where I think I learned how to stand up and stand in the face of controversy. In my high school, after Kent and Jackson State, May 1st, May Day, SDS closed all the campuses in almost the whole entire state of New York, certainly metropolitan New York. They were about the business of closing all the high schools to have a complete shutting down of the educational system to protest the war. So my high school was stormed by SDS and there were many students who hadn’t decided what they felt. Even when it happened they didn’t know how they felt, they just knew that it was the beginning of trying to figure out how they felt. But I was very clear how I felt. Unfortunately I didn’t fit in either with the athletes who were trying to protect the American flag. (SDS was about the business of taking down flags at that point and burning them as one of their activities.) I was not about the business of being silent and not taking a stand. The majority of my high school was in that position. And you know, I can remember standing in the middle of the courtyard and not being able to fit with anybody. I didn’t necessarily disagree with what SDS was doing, I just--- Some of the methodologies didn’t sit well with me. So I didn’t agree with the violence that some of the chapters were engaged in. That was a moment for me as standing up to my principal who told me to get back inside and I refused to do that and was threatened with losing some leadership award I was supposed to get. And you know, I basically told him he had to do what he had to do and make whatever decisions he had to make, that I had to do what I had to do and make the decisions I had to make. That was an interesting moment that stands out in my mind where I think I was---I was tested, I feel like that was a test for me. About what was really important. That was one of many instances where I had to take a stand and accept the consequences of whatever choices I made. And that, in many instances, was not part of popular opinion, it was not part of the status quo, was not part of where my friends were.
Why Debra Chose Hollins
Danielle: What made you decide to go to Hollins?
Debra: Well, I wanted to get out of New York, and I did not want to go to college with anyone who I had gone to high school with. I had pretty much wanted to go someplace very different. I loved the state of Virginia. So when I thought about school, I pretty much knew I wanted 4-1-4 semester. I knew I had great appreciation and respect for the (Hollins) short term. I knew I wanted to do a college major... I just knew that. I was pretty much just tired of a traditional education. There were other schools like Colorado College and Antioch that had different ways of learning but I liked the size of Hollins, I liked the location... And it seemed like a different enough place from New York to come to that I could do what I wanted to do in a different place. See, that worked out well for me, and no one from my high school went there (laughs). They may have since or before, but not the four years I was there.