RICHMOND, Va. --Alumni of Historic Southside High School Education Center are coming together for a Black History Month roundtable.
This Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. the group will hold a discussion featuring getting ready for a roundtable discussion at the school building, which was the secondary school African American students attended during segregation from 1954 to 1969.
Sharon Yates, chairperson of the Historic Southside High School Alumni Association, explained the discussion will feature former students who attended the school each year it was in operation, and Dr. Latorial Faison from VSU will lead the roundtable.
Yates actually attended Historic Southside High School for two years before becoming one of the county's first 100 Black students to integrate Dinwiddie High School.
They called themselves the "Dinwiddie Little Rock Group," and she shared what it was like for her during that time and the progress she's seen in the county over the years.
"It was a learning experience," she noted. "Some things I will never forget. I do understand that it was part of the times. And so some of the students who were a little unfriendly to us, as they've gotten grown, I've seen a difference in them."
Saturday's event is free and open to the public, and Yates says it's important for students young and old to attend.
"We want our students to know where we've come from the things, that we have endured and struggled for, to make sure that they have a better life, a better education, to make sure that we have our standards is just as good as any anybody else," Yates noted.
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