Jonathan Kozol Click on image to download print-quality version

GRANTHAM, Pa. (March 7, 2007) — Jonathan Kozol's lecture at Messiah College, "Still Separate, Still Unequal: The Ethical Challenge for the U.S. Public Schools," is borne from his own experience as a public school educator and his observations of worsening segregation in public schools, particularly in the nation's largest cities.  Kozol, an author and activist, documents such segregation in his new book, "Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America," which will be the foundation of his lecture on March 28 at 7 p.m. in Brubaker Auditorium in the Eisenhower Campus Center on the college's Grantham campus.  This installment of the Annual Boyer Center Distinguished Lecture Series is free and will be followed by a book signing.  Tickets are required and can be obtained by calling the ticket office at (717) 691-6036.

About Jonathan Kozol

After graduating from Harvard University and spending a short time at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar before traveling to Paris to write his first, and only, work of fiction, Kozol was a teacher in the Boston Public Schools in the 1960s.  He was fired for teaching a Langston Hughes poem, an experience he describes in his book "Death at an Early Age," which received the 1968 National Book Award in Science, Philosophy, and Religion.  He then taught for several years in the Newton Public Schools, the district he attended as a child, before becoming more deeply involved in social justice work and writing.

Many of Kozol's books have received honors: "Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America" earned the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award in 1989 and Conscience in Media Award of the American Society of Journalists and Authors; "Savage Inequalities" won the New England Book Award; "Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation" received the prestigious Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in 1996, an award previously given to Langston Hughes and Martin Luther King, Jr.  In 2000, Kozol published "Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope," and "Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America" was released in 2005.

About the Boyer Center

The Boyer Center was founded by Messiah College to further the vision of Ernest L. Boyer, Sr., an alumnus and one of America's leading educators, and to extend and apply Messiah College's educational commitment to nurture intellect, character and faith within and beyond the college. The Boyer Center cultivates responsive educational practice and scholarship from early childhood through higher education. Serving educators, administrators, and organizations, The Boyer Center promotes excellent and accessible education that enriches lives and revitalizes society while seeking to link Boyer’s vision for education and society with some of the most pressing issues, needs, and crises that face the nation and the world today.

About Messiah College

Messiah College, a private Christian college of the liberal and applied arts and sciences, enrolls more than 2,800 undergraduate students in 60 majors. Established in 1909, the primary campus is located in Grantham, Pa., near the state capital of Harrisburg. A satellite campus affiliated with Temple University is located in Philadelphia.