Published:
This story appeared online in the Hartford Courant on June 25, 2022.
By Deidre Montague
As Rodney Powell was at the podium to accept an award, he told a story about an interaction between a Black student named Lakeisha and a white teacher.
Powell, who was receiving the Paul Cuffee-John J. Johnson Award for his work when he was president and COO of Yankee Gas Services and when he was president of corporate citizenship for Eversource Energy, told a crowd of teachers, school social workers and parents the interaction took place after a field trip to Mystic Aquarium by a third-grade class,
The teacher asked the students what they learned on the trip and Lakeisha raised her hand and said that she learned a lot about aquarium life, but she was still afraid of whales, Powell said.
The teacher asked why she was scared of whales, and Lakeisha answered it was because of the Bible lesson of Jonah being swallowed by the whale that her Black Sunday School teacher taught her, Powell said. As a scientist and teacher, the teacher challenged Lakeisha and told her whales do not have the biological construct to be able to swallow a person whole, Powell said.
Remembering what her Sunday School teacher taught her, Lakeisha told the teacher that when she gets to heaven, she will ask Jonah himself. However, the teacher challenged her again and asked her what if Jonah did not go to heaven, but went to hell instead?
After looking pointedly at her teacher and remembering what her Sunday School teacher said, Lakeisha told her teacher that when she dies, she can ask Jonah instead, Powell said.
Powell told the story at the recent “Teaching African American/Black Studies Resources to Inform and Inspire” Symposium at Central Connecticut State University in New Britain.
“I say that to say that we are a product of not just what we are taught, but who teaches us. I’d like to lift up that my experience is one of a completely Black experience,” he said. “I went to a Black kindergarten, elementary school, Black high school, Black college, and now university.”
Powell and other experts spoke to give teachers, especially teachers of color, additional resources and answer questions that students had after the first year with the state’s new African American/Black and Puerto Rican/Latino Course of Studies.
Benjamin Foster, a faculty member of the Central African American Studies Program and convener of the Institute for Cross-Cultural Awareness and Transformative Education, facilitated the symposium.
Guest speakers spoke on business and religion, as these were the two topics that teachers reported students had the most questions about.
Elizabeth Normen, founding editor of CT Explorers magazine, for example, presented her children’s publication about Venture Smith, who shares his story about how he overcame slavery and became a successful farmer, fisherman and trader in the American Revolutionary era. Normen had it adapted for school-aged children to be taught in the classroom.
She highlighted how Smith worked for wages and borrowed capital to invest in his business ventures — any investors’ cash to earn interest and how that was a sophisticated operation, especially during that time period.
“Remember, this is a period when there are no banks, and there’s really no common currency. More often, things were purchased through barter book credit or bills of exchange,” she said. “So while scholars are unsure to what extent Smith was literate, he clearly was smart about money matters. That’s not to say he wasn’t cheated by unethical people. He talks about that, but he operated in an economy that was much less formal than we know today.”
Central political science professor Walton Brown said that, in order to talk about African Americans and their role in the American economy, the focus should not be just on enslaved labor.
“Since the beginning of African Americans tenure in the country, they have been entrepreneurs and business persons,” Brown said. “African American women and men have been and are owners and mentors, producers, bankers, manufacturers working in investing in all sectors of the American economy.
“Students should be able to evaluate the role of African American entrepreneurs in the United States economy and to analyze the composition of African American businesses to determine the innovations, creativity, and contributions African American businesses have made.”
Yet, Brown also acknowledged that in comparison to other business entrepreneurs from other ethnicities and immigrant groups, African Americans’ business success and fortunes were and are impacted by the ebbs and flows of the historical pattern of racial exclusion and racial hierarchy.
For the religion seminars, highlights included teaching how the Black religious experience is central to the story of the initial success of African American business.
The Rev. Felton O. Best, also a Central professor, spoke about the significance of the Black church, using the example of their contributions to the helping professions, such as social work.
“As the social work profession became more sophisticated, the Black church was initially deemed as an element that was not welcomed in the helping professions,” Best said. “This trend changed as a result of former President George Bush Jr.'s post faith-based initial policy, which led social service experts to solicit local Black churches and African American communities to become involved in program development and community based intervention.”
Best said federal and state governments have recognized failure in attempting to effectively address the social problem of African American communities, in spite of billions of dollars spent on prevention and intervention programs.
“Social service agencies are turning to the Black church, not only because they believe they have the answers. Instead, they perceive that no other option is available,” he said. “In recent years, the Black church has been viewed as a viable institution that will put both viable candidates and others to receive grants and administer federal programs for helping African American communities.”
Eastern Connecticut State University History professor Stacey Close noted the strong impact that African heritage has had on the Black church.
“African heritage has and continues to have a huge impact on the Black church. When you talk about historically what has gone on in terms of the Christian church, while a number of Africans who were transported via the horrible and dehumanizing trade across the Atlantic, did convert, they also Africanized Christianity and forever changed it,” he said.