Marshall University Marshall Digital Scholar Theses, Dissertations and Capstones 2018 The Curriculum of Cultural Reconciliation at West Virginia State University and the General Education Curriculum Michael Carpenter Harris II Follow this and additional works at: https://mds.edu/etd Part of the Curriculum and Instruction Commons, Curriculum and Social Inquiry Commons, and the Higher Education Commons THE CURRICULUM OF CULTURAL RECONCILIATION AT WEST VIRGINIA STATE UNIVERSITY AND THE GENERAL EDUCATION CURRICULUM A dissertation submitted to The Graduate College of Marshall University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education In Curriculum and Instruction by Michael Carpenter Harris II Approved by Dr. Eric Lassiter, Committee Chairperson Dr. Elizabeth Campbell Dr. Michael Workman Marshall University August 2018 ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………………………v CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION.
1 The Historic Institution. 6 Significance of the Study. 7 Organization of the Study. 10 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW.
11 The Curriculum of Reconciliation and the Legacy of Research at WVSU. 21 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODS. 24 Settings & Methods: Archival, Interview, and Participant-Observation Research. 31 THE HISTORY OF THE CURRICULUM OF RECONCILIATION AT WVSU.
31 The West Virginia Colored Institute. 32 The Origins of the General Education Program. 52 THE FUTURE OF ORIGINS, RACE, GENDER, AND HUMAN IDENTITY. 52 iii AND THE GENERAL EDUCATION PROGRAM.
52 Student Reflections of the Origins and Race, Gender, and Human Identity Classes. 68 Recommendations for Future Study. 70 Epilogue: Personal Reflection. 76 APPENDIX A: LETTER FROM INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH BOARD.
77 APPENDIX B: INTERVIEW CONSENT FORM. 78 APPENDIX C: GENERAL EDUCATION INTERVIEW QUESTIONS. 82 iv ABSTRACT This qualitative study examined the perceptions and experiences of the faculty and students involved in the creation and administration of the General Education program at WVSU. This study focused on the themes of the creation of the original General Education curriculum that included the Origins and Race, Gender, and Human Identity classes, the redesign of the curriculum due to the state mandate, and how the new version of the General Education curriculum compares to the original.
The findings provide insight into strengths and weaknesses of the program, faculty and student perceptions, government policy affecting education, and possible pathways forward to strengthen a diverse curriculum like the General Education program at WVSU. In particular, this study couches this curriculum within larger movements concerned with a “curriculum of reconciliation,” a new educational concept that has been developing internationally in places such as Rwanda and Australia. Curricula of reconciliation offer more comprehensive perspectives of history and culture that do not privilege the colonial perspective and provides an avenue for social and cultural reconciliation through education and dialogue in the classroom. West Virginia State University as an original 1891 Land-Grant Institution is a pioneer of reconciliation through education because it was established for the sole purpose of social and cultural reconciliation of African Americans after slavery.
In the early 80s, a General Education curriculum was created at WVSU that included Origins and Race, Gender, and Human Identity that embodied the essence of the curriculum of reconciliation. The curriculum had to be totally reimagined due to a state mandate to lower credit hours for graduation in West Virginia. This study chronicles that process and seeks to address the role of change in this curriculum. v CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION The Historic Institution West Virginia State University is a historic institution in the town of Institute, West Virginia.
The unassuming bucolic setting of West Virginia, known to some locals as America’s best kept secret, guards among its treasures the proud history of an institution that is historic in American history, and in the history of the civil rights movement as an institution of education that is, and has been through time, a bridge of understanding and reconciliation between people and cultures. West Virginia State University began as a love story of cultural reconciliation that begins with the forbidden love of a wealthy land owner named Samuel Cabell and his wife Mary Barnes. Cabell was a wealthy plantation owner and descendent of the influential Cabell family of Virginia who lived on the land called Piney Grove where the campus of West Virginia State University now resides (Haught, 1971). When Samuel Cabell moved into the Kanawha Valley, he married one of his slaves named Mary Barnes and went on to father thirteen children with her.
Samuel Cabell wrote a number of legal documents to ensure that his family would be freed from slavery and free to enjoy their vast inheritance in the event of his passing. The language of the legal documents implied that Samuel Cabell was in fear of his life and was involved in conflicts with other residents of the town who were not as tolerant of Samuel Cabell’s social philosophy (Haught, 1971). Samuel Cabell was eventually murdered by seven men who were all acquitted in mysterious court proceedings that caused controversy in the community. The social circles of the community of Institute attributed Cabell’s murder to racism and suspected foul play.
Eventually, the legal documents Samuel Cabell left for his family were deemed valid by commissioners of 1 Kanawha County and Mary Barnes began the process of fighting for, and eventually claiming, her inheritance and the plantation where the family lived and raised their children (Harlan, 1968). After the Morrill Act was put into place offering federal funds for states educating people of color in 1891, West Virginia lawmakers began looking for locations to create a school called the West Virginia Colored Institute for the education of people of color in the state of West Virginia after the abolition of slavery. After the proposal was angrily rejected by different communities around the state, particularly the St. Albans community, the descendants of Samuel Cabell and Mary Barnes sold tracts of the land that became the campus of the West Virginia Colored Institute (Haught, 1971).
The spirit of the idea of a curriculum of reconciliation was in practice at the West Virginia Colored Institute with its educational offerings specially designed to minister to the unique educational needs of a minority population rising out of slavery, but the scope of the mission has grown to include all people and cultures in search of education and opportunity as the curriculum of reconciliation has grown at WVSU through the decades. The Curriculum of Reconciliation is the philosophic use of educational curriculum to create a critical pedagogy that creates a learning environment in which a comprehensive exchange of experiences and ideas occurs where social and cultural reconciliation is possible. Marian Hodgkin (2006) in her work Reconciliation in Rwanda argues the following regarding a curriculum of reconciliation specifically for history in Rwanda: Reconciliation is a process that involves the rebuilding of relations—both individually and collectively. It is not an activity that simply entails “being nicer to each other” but a long-term project that is based on the needs and interests of both groups.
Long-lasting, deep and meaningful reconciliation will not occur in Rwanda without reconciliation with history. An open, democratic and participatory debate about a national history curriculum is not only necessary for reconciliation but, if conducted well, could further social reconstruction and cohesion (Hodgkin, 2006). Hodgkin (2006) goes on to argue that 2 the habit of passive absorption that permeates traditional curriculum leads to some of the same blind spots and gaps in mutual understanding that cause conflict in society, and the creation of a “critical pedagogy” that encourages questioning and challenging of injustice will create the atmosphere where a true sense of community and cultural reconciliation is possible (Hodgkin, p. There is no direct tie to the curriculum of reconciliation in Rwanda but West Virginia State University as an Historically Black College or University has a particular legacy in that the institution of HBCUs began during a difficult time in history when inequality and segregation still existed as law in American society.
The concept of the Historically Black College and University, or HBCU, exists because of America’s recognition of the power of education to uplift people of color in society after their emancipation. These institutions were chartered under a very narrow curriculum that focused solely on agriculture and trade, but the history and culture of what began as a small school for the colored at the Cabell family’s Piney Grove and grew to become the university known as the living laboratory of human relations suggests that the institution always had a destiny that transcended its original charter. The idea of a curriculum of reconciliation has only been conceptualized as recently as 2012 and is now being studied and codified internationally, but the language of reconciliation through curriculum is similar and resonates in both cases. This study will connect the history and concept of the curriculum of West Virginia State University from its earliest beginnings with what is now being defined as the “reconciliation agenda” that has been recently occurring on the international scene and parallels the events that took place in America that led to the creation of WVSU and the institution of the HBCU.
The reconciliation agenda in practice is known as the curriculum of reconciliation by educational professionals. The reconciliation agenda that spawned the curriculum of reconciliation being implemented in Rwanda, Canada, and Australia 3 is identical to the educational movement that occurred in the United States that led to the creation of the West Virginia State University as will be examined by this study. I grew up in the Dunbar-Institute area and I felt the influence of West Virginia State University in the community. As a child, I attended math tutoring sessions in Wallace Hall.
I attended summer sports camps at Fleming Hall and worked on the grounds crew as part of a youth employment program. I worked as a camp counselor on the campus for a Science and Math camp, and finally attended West Virginia State University as an undergraduate student where I worked in the Admissions office, Academic Affairs office, and the Drain-Jordan Library as a part of the work - study program. I sensed the historical significance of the university beneath the surface, walking the campus and hearing languages and dialects from all over the world. I noticed the old buildings lining the roads that looked to me like they would belong in a museum if they were not still teeming with students and activity.
I recognized the privilege of my place in an institution that existed as a refuge for minorities in darker times in American history that eventually transformed itself into a bridge between all people and cultures. I attended WVSU as a student under the administration of President Dr. For 25 years, Dr. Carter led one of the longest, and arguably one of the most prosperous presidential administrations in WVSU’s history.
Carter assumed the presidency of WVSU in 1987 and implemented an ambitious plan to regain federal land-grant status that had been lost after the university was integrated in 1954. Carter led a 12-year campaign that restored land- grant status back to then West Virginia State College by an act of Congress in 2001 (Harold, 2010). Carter also led the effort to bring West Virginia State College to university status, which his administration achieved in 2004 (Harold, 2010). It was as a student, employee, and 4 faculty member throughout these stages, including the achievement of university status that inspired me to delve deeper into the history of such a distinguished institution.
Problem Statement This study is about the unique history of the curriculum of West Virginia State University through time and how that unique history continues through the General Education curriculum. West Virginia State University as an HBCU was created as an answer to a legacy of discrimination to educate people of color after slavery to help lift them up in society through education.