printable versionDesegregation pioneer challenges graduates
"You can tell the world that this should be the norm for all students, that this is the model that works. Show the world that these concepts work miracles in students," Minnijean Brown Trickey told East Palo Alto High School's Class of 2006 during a spirited commencement ceremony in Memorial Auditorium on June 12. Trickey, a member of the "Little Rock 9"—a group of African American teenage students who, in 1957, had to contend with belligerent white opposition to their attendance at Central High School in Little Rock, Ark., during desegregation efforts there—challenged the 54 graduating seniors to make the most of their education at the charter school, which is operated by Stanford Schools Corporation. Thirty-two percent of the graduating class plan to attend four-year colleges and 60 percent plan to attend two-year colleges.